#073
Gyo-ha also felt like crying. It was because the place Hwi-kyung had lied about working overtime and followed Sung-ha to was a hotel.
Is it possible for someone to cheat before even dating? Gyo-ha’s hands trembled when he saw Hwi-kyung, whom he thought was a conservative Confucian youth, making bolder moves than himself. We’ve only gone as far as cuddling! It was a reaction Hwi-kyung would have found vulgar if he knew.
But Lee Gyo-ha felt truly wronged. No matter how he looked at it, the only thing he lacked compared to Lee Sung-ha was a degree. He was better-looking, and even after a hundred reconsiderations, his personality was also better.
Yet Jung Hwi-kyung had abandoned Gyo-ha (though not of his own will) and come to a hotel with Lee Sung-ha. Unless they planned to enjoy an afternoon tea set at the hotel’s top-floor lounge, the reason for two healthy adult men visiting a hotel was obvious.
How could this be! The emotional Gyo-ha wiped his dry eyes as if crying. He thought they were at least in a quasi-relationship, if not actual lovers. He felt utterly betrayed. How could someone who pushed him away for being too heavy when just lying on top suddenly become so open!
But nothing would be solved by being sad. Rather than sitting pitifully like an abandoned man wiping away tears, it would be more efficient to ambush the car Sung-ha and Hwi-kyung were in.
Gyo-ha, after tidying himself up, got out of his car. His steps towards Sung-ha’s car were heavy. It was suspicious that they were both still in the car after parking in the hotel parking lot.
Come to think of it, hadn’t Gyo-ha also done this and that with Hwi-kyung in the car? Gyo-ha’s heart raced for no reason. He felt like he would truly shed tears of blood if he saw Sung-ha and Hwi-kyung kissing through the car window.
They might not be dating, but they were living together. In France, cohabiting couples are sometimes considered in a de facto marriage. Gyo-ha suppressed his urge to whine and cry, bent down, and peered into the car window.
And then his eyes met Hwi-kyung’s, who was on top of Lee Sung-ha, throwing punches.
“Ah?”
He expected to witness his quasi-lover cheating, but instead, he witnessed a scene of violence.
* * *
Jung Hwi-kyung was a pacifist.
The reason it’s in past tense is that fourteen regressions had turned him into a non-pacifist. Hwi-kyung wanted to live kindly too. But after dealing with shitty bosses in one regression, awful colleagues in another, and then difficult clients in the next, anyone would abandon peace.
Of course, Hwi-kyung, being a law-abiding citizen, rarely swung his fists at people. It wasn’t because of a strong sense of ethics about following the law, but because going back and forth to court took up too much time. Living kindly meant getting involved in fewer troublesome matters.
Filing a lawsuit was troublesome, but being sued was equally unhelpful in life. It was best to live without having to go to court, quietly enduring and reciting patience a hundred times. Messing around carelessly could ruin one’s life in an instant if it resulted in a criminal record.
However, despite all these rational judgments, Hwi-kyung ended up hitting Sung-ha. It was because Sung-ha tried to drag Hwi-kyung to a hotel. Even after Hwi-kyung expressed his refusal, Sung-ha spouted nonsense about stopping playing hard to get and tried to subdue Hwi-kyung by force.
So Jung Hwi-kyung struck Lee Sung-ha. This was self-defense. Hwi-kyung thought so after hitting him. Since he hit once, he’d take two hits in return and settle. Since the other party had first used his position to sexually harass, he could somehow get a favorable judgment.
In reality, it was obvious that Hwi-kyung would be at a disadvantage. First of all, Jung Hwi-kyung was a man, not a woman, and Korea often overlooked same-sex sexual violence. Moreover, his opponent was none other than Lee Sung-ha, the eldest son of the BK Group.
The difference in the level of legal representation would be obvious from the start, so breaking his nose twice would be a losing battle.
“You crazy bastard!”
Besides, Lee Sung-ha wasn’t that weak either. Even if Hwi-kyung hadn’t decided to take some hits, he would have inevitably received one or two. The car’s interior was too narrow to dodge, and Sung-ha was bigger than Hwi-kyung.
Even though he was on top, he could be flipped over at any time due to the weight difference. If he didn’t maintain the upper hand, he didn’t know what would happen to him if he got pinned down. Hwi-kyung hit Sung-ha’s solar plexus once more, imagining himself pleading not guilty in court.
And then his eyes met Lee Gyo-ha’s through the car window.
At that moment, Hwi-kyung was truly flustered. He couldn’t understand why Gyo-ha was there. Why was the guy who should have been eating dinner alone at home in the underground parking lot of the hotel where Lee Sung-ha had forcibly brought him?
Taking advantage of Hwi-kyung’s distraction with Gyo-ha, Sung-ha attempted a counterattack. In an instant, their positions were reversed, and Hwi-kyung’s body, crushed under the weight, cried out in pressure. However, Hwi-kyung couldn’t resist properly. Gyo-ha had started banging hard on the car window.
“Did you call him?”
“…What are you talking about?”
“Why, should I strip you in front of him?”
“Stop talking nonsense… Just get off me already.”
“Do you think you can keep working at the company normally after this?”
“I’m going to report you first, you know?”
The unproductive argument ended quickly. Sung-ha, who had also noticed Gyo-ha, lowered the car window as if he had no choice. Gyo-ha looked at Sung-ha, who had a blue bruise on his face, and Hwi-kyung, whose lip was split, with a serious expression.
To anyone looking, it seemed Lee Sung-ha had taken at least two more hits. Hwi-kyung, despite his appearance, had quite a heavy hand, so if Sung-ha was unlucky, he might need to have his newly reconstructed face fixed again.
But Gyo-ha was more concerned about the slight scratch on Hwi-kyung’s mouth than his brother’s bruised face.
“Get out.”
“Hey, Lee Gyo-ha…”
“You, just shut up.”
“What?”
“I said shut up.”
Hwi-kyung hadn’t heard harsh words from Gyo-ha’s mouth in a long time. The last time Gyo-ha had used such language was when he had inexplicably returned to the morning of his first semester of master’s degree.
It was a situation that made him sigh involuntarily. As soon as the car door opened, Gyo-ha pulled Hwi-kyung out. Jung Hwi-kyung had to fall into Lee Gyo-ha’s arms without being able to resist even once.
“I’ll remember this.”
Lee Sung-ha muttered a line like a third-rate villain.
“I’ll make sure you can’t work properly at the company. Just wait and see.”
“I said shut up.”
With those final words, Gyo-ha slammed the car door shut. Sung-ha’s hand, which was about to follow them out, nearly got caught in the door.
The startled Lee Sung-ha cursed something, but Hwi-kyung was too busy being led out of the parking lot by Gyo-ha to notice. He wanted to ask how Gyo-ha had come here, but it wasn’t the right atmosphere to ask questions.
“Why did you lie?”
Moreover, Gyo-ha beat Hwi-kyung to the punch before he could ask.
“You said you were working overtime. Is coming to a hotel overtime work?”
“I didn’t come here because I wanted to.”
“Did Lee Sung-ha force you to come?”
“…Yes.”
Will he look disappointed now? Maybe he’ll get angry at me. Hwi-kyung glanced at Gyo-ha’s expression from the corner of his eye. Although they hadn’t defined their relationship, they were close enough to live together, and they were aware that they liked each other romantically.
In such a situation, even if Hwi-kyung hadn’t intended it, seeing him enter a hotel with someone else, and his brother at that, Gyo-ha couldn’t be indifferent. Hwi-kyung braced himself to be criticized to some extent.
“You’re hurt again…”
But contrary to Hwi-kyung’s expectations, Gyo-ha just muttered in a upset tone. His warm hand, with a higher than average body temperature, gently caressed Hwi-kyung’s split lip.
It was a ticklish touch. The back of his hand, which had been injured from hitting someone just moments ago, no longer stung. His body, which had been extremely tense, suddenly went limp.
As Hwi-kyung staggered, his legs giving way, Gyo-ha stretched out his arm to support him. In an instant, they were entangled, not in the hotel but in the underground parking lot, but both were too preoccupied with each other to care about how they might look to others.
“I really didn’t get forced into a regression…”
Despite climbing on top of the company’s vice president and swinging his fists while thinking ‘Violence is bad! But that bastard started it!’, he didn’t move on to the next round.
The system window was still going crazy, but only the font size of the ‘Y’ in [Do you want to regress?] had grown exponentially, without any notification of moving to the fifteenth round.
Lee Gyo-ha’s guess had been correct. Now, unless Jung Hwi-kyung chose directly, the system window would only send the annoying warning [Inadequate condition: ] without arbitrarily turning back time.
Whatever was in the fifteenth round, whatever was in the ‘bet’ the Buddhist grandmother had mentioned… the fact that there was no immediate transition to the next round quickly reassured Hwi-kyung.
“Lee Gyo-ha.”
“Yes?”
“You won.”
Hwi-kyung could now somewhat understand why Gyo-ha had suddenly kissed him before. There inevitably comes a moment in life when you can’t help yourself.
Hwi-kyung reached out to cup Gyo-ha’s cheek and, rising slightly on his tiptoes, kissed him first. It was an unfamiliar experience for Gyo-ha. Hwi-kyung rarely took the initiative to act aggressively.
However, it was too welcome an opportunity to push away just because it was unfamiliar. Gyo-ha wrapped his arms around Hwi-kyung’s waist and continued the kiss.
