In that regard, Hong Seong-jun was a bastard who had discarded even the most basic form of decency. Of all things, there was not even a clock in the room.
That meant he had no way of knowing how much time had passed. If there had at least been a window, he could have guessed the passage of time from the rising and setting of the sun.
With no electronic devices around, the gnawing hunger only grew more vivid and unbearable.
This is the hungriest I’ve been since… back then.
After nearly starving to death before being rescued, Lee Haru had developed an intense fixation on food—almost as if he were trying to erase the trauma of that day.
Once he was placed in an orphanage, he was lucky enough to get three meals a day, but it was never quite enough. The orphanage was always operating on a shoestring budget, and mustering the courage to ask for an extra bowl of rice took a tremendous effort.
It always felt like there was an empty pouch tied up inside his stomach. Even when he ate until he was full, the hunger returned before long.
But there was one day a year when he could truly eat his fill—his birthday.
On that day alone, he could eat without worrying about the judgmental stares of adults or the jealous glances from his peers. He could stuff himself to the brim, turning his belly round like a tadpole’s.
As he got older, his appetite began to fade. But now, after so long, feeling that sharp edge of starvation again brought all those old cravings roaring back.
If he let his grip on reason slip even slightly, he felt like he might end up gnawing on the blanket.
“Lee Haru.”
Just as he was on the verge of snapping, Hong Seong-jun appeared, opening the door. Haru, who had been lying limp on the floor with his eyes closed, snapped them open.
His eyes flashed with a wild gleam, and Hong Seong-jun froze. Haru gathered what little strength he had left and crawled toward him.
“Please… give me something to eat.”
“What?”
“I said, please… just a little food…”
Hong Seong-jun’s gaze lingered on Haru’s hand, which was gripping the hem of his sleeve.
When he finally spoke, the words made Haru feel wronged, like he deserved some kind of compensation for the suffering he had endured in hunger.
“I left food in the kitchen. Did you not see it?”
“The door was locked. How was I supposed to get there…?”
Hong Seong-jun raised an eyebrow. Clearly, he had not thought that far. He had not meant to starve Haru, it seemed, but that only made the sorrow dig deeper.
“I was seriously starving…”
Tears welled up in Haru’s eyes, and Hong Seong-jun took an awkward step back, startled.
Though he was still wearing Kang Min’s face, he seemed to forget to maintain the act for a brief moment.
Haru clung even closer, inching forward.
“Please take me to the kitchen. I am too hungry to walk on my own…”
The room was so large that just walking to the kitchen might take a considerable amount of time. Anxiety clawed at him.
What if Hong Seong-jun locked the door again and left him alone? He clung to his sleeve like it was a lifeline.
Hong Seong-jun’s broad chest rose and fell heavily. Without a word, he scooped Haru into his arms.
Haru obediently hooked his arms around Hong Seong-jun’s neck. Right now, he would kiss anyone who brought him to food.
As expected, it took quite a while to reach the kitchen after leaving the room. After a long trek down an extended hallway, they finally arrived. A large refrigerator came into view.
“I stocked it with food. From now on, help yourself whenever you want.”
This time, Hong Seong-jun seemed to get the message and gently set Haru down right in front of the fridge.
Haru answered with a half-hearted nod and immediately reached for the refrigerator door.
Even before he could take stock of what was inside, the cool air brushed against his face.
“Approved.”
His rage toward Hong Seong-jun diminished by a fraction.
Without hesitation, Haru began pulling out everything he could get his hands on, hugging the food to his chest.
Even ingredients that should have been stored at room temperature were inside the fridge. A sudden urge to organize everything bubbled up, but hunger came first.
He could not even spare the time it would take to use the microwave. Haru grabbed a slice of bread without thinking.
“Kehk— cough, cough…”
Shoving dry bread into his mouth without water naturally made him choke. Even while coughing, he kept chewing with fierce determination. Hong Seong-jun narrowed his eyes.
“…Did a famine spirit possess you or something?”
It was clearly an insult.
Haru glared at him as he hastily opened a milk carton. The entire 500ml carton vanished down his throat in seconds.
Hong Seong-jun watched as Haru devoured ten slices of bread in one sitting and felt a flicker of guilt.
Bringing Haru here had been an impulsive act. This place had been prepared with the intention of imprisoning him eventually—but until now, the opportunity had never presented itself.
Whenever he wore this face, Haru would always come to him on his own.
Things had veered off course ever since Haru’s suicide attempt, but now, finally, the timing was right.
Everyone still believed Haru had been captured by the leader of Black, so it made perfect sense that he would be the one to “find” him.
“But does not staying in that form get uncomfortable after a while?”
“What do you mean?”
That was when Haru mumbled something strange under his breath.
He had said it in passing, almost casually—but for some reason, it stuck.
“Changing your face and body like that. It doesn’t seem like something you can do easily.”
“…What?”
What… exactly had he just heard?
Hong Seong-jun’s eyes shook violently. As his gaze darted aimlessly, struggling to regain composure, Lee Haru quietly traced his fingertip across the surface of the dining table.
“…I know you’re not Esper Kang Min.”
One of the table’s corners had splintered clean off. He had unconsciously applied too much pressure. When he curled his fingers into a fist, the fragments of wood crumbled into powder in his palm.
“You really have lost it, haven’t you? Now you’re hallucinating?”
Hong Seong-jun had never, not once, imagined that Haru would figure it out. Why would he? Haru had believed, without a single flicker of doubt, that he truly was Kang Min.
It was that selective blindness unique to the lovestruck.
No matter how perfectly he imitated Kang Min’s appearance, no matter how flawlessly he copied his tone and behavior—at the end of the day, they were two different people. But Haru had only ever seen what he wanted to see, believed what he needed to believe.
To keep his inner panic from surfacing, Hong Seong-jun fought to steady the storm inside him. But when he saw the unwavering certainty in Haru’s eyes—more resolute than ever before—he nearly let out a bitter, involuntary scoff.
“Enough. Stop pretending to be someone you are not. There is nothing left to gain from it.”
Haru rose to his feet. As he closed the distance between them, one step at a time, Hong Seong-jun found himself unable to move.
He could have stepped away. That alone would have been enough to defuse suspicion. Anything would be better than letting Haru uncover everything he had been hiding.
How much had he concealed just to get this far? What did it cost him to borrow another’s face just to draw near?
Haru came to a halt just half a step away and looked up at him. Hong Seong-jun could not tear his gaze from those obsidian-black eyes.
It had always been like this.
He used to scoff at the idea of love at first sight, convinced it was a fairytale fantasy. But the first time he saw Lee Haru, it was as though every fiber of his being had been captured in an instant. And that was how he knew: no matter how close he hovered, no matter how long he lingered, Haru’s gaze would never turn—because his heart was always fixed on one person alone.
“When did you… figure it out?”
He realized then that there was no point trying to deceive him any longer. Perhaps, deep down, he had grown weary of this endless, one-sided charade too.
At first, all he wanted was to possess him—even if it meant using the face of the one Haru loved. Even if it meant destroying him. He just wanted to make him his.
Kang Min had never cared about Haru. Not once. So he believed that if he kept exposing what a bastard Kang Min truly was, Haru would eventually let go. But Haru had laughed in the face of that expectation—by slitting his own wrists.
What had gone through his mind when he heard the news?
Even now, that day remained shrouded in fog—everything about it blurred and distant.
Everything had fallen apart. And the Haru who came back from the brink of death… was not the same person.
It was as if a completely different soul had taken residence in his body. The unfamiliar expressions he now wore—ones Hong Seong-jun had never seen before—made it impossible to approach him carelessly.
Bit by bit, the contours of Hong Seong-jun’s face began to shift. The sharp, cold lines softened, giving way to a gentler, almost tender expression.
He did not look away from Haru’s steady gaze as he slowly extended a hand.
Haru didn’t run. Instead, he leaned into the hand that brushed against his cheek, resting his face gently in the palm.
It was the first time Haru had stayed so still while looking at him in his real form.
The reason he had ordered Haru to sexually Guide him—while disguised as Kang Min—had been painfully simple. Including Yu Je-hyun in the mix was merely a precaution, to keep Haru from growing suspicious.
If he had not gone that far, Haru would have treated him like air.
Only when he commanded him with Kang Min’s voice would Haru approach, speak first, and reach out to touch him.
But each time, it was obvious he was forcing himself—always averting his eyes, always trembling beneath his fingertips.
Whenever he approached in Kang Min’s guise, Haru would cling to him, even when he acted cruelly, as if begging for more. Yet in his true form, no matter what he did, Haru never welcomed him.
He felt that rejection like a blade to the chest.
The hand that had been gently stroking Haru’s pale cheek turned violent in an instant.
This dude’s insane. And not in a hot way