After Chairman Cheon Han-jo left the hospital room escorted by Dr. Joo and Kim Dae-hong, Cheon Tae-seong silently counted the seconds. Once he figured his grandfather had walked far enough away from the ward, he stood up and got out of bed.
He moved the IV bag from the pole to a portable stand and slipped on his slippers. As he stepped out of the room, he spotted Song Jae-hyun approaching at just the right moment. With his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his white coat, the man was leisurely strolling over, looking annoyingly carefree. Tae-seong raised a brow at the sight.
“What are you doing? Where are you going?”
When Tae-seong tried to walk past without answering, Song Jae-hyun reached out and grabbed his arm.
“Hey, don’t tell me you’re going to find Ha-jin?”
The way Tae-seong merely rolled his eyes toward the hand on his arm sent a chill down Song Jae-hyun’s spine—but he wasn’t someone who’d back off that easily.
“You’re a patient. Sit your ass down in bed and wait. He’ll come back eventually.”
“Professor Song, you got nothing better to do? Why does it feel like you’re using my hospital room as your personal lounge?”
When Tae-seong shook off his arm and shoved him back, Song Jae-hyun stumbled a step.
What the hell—how does a patient have this much strength?!
The security guards outside the room all turned at the commotion. Embarrassed, Song Jae-hyun straightened his posture and smoothed out his clothes.
“Tae-seong, you’re in rut right now. Stop wandering around out of your damn mind and get back in bed.”
“Right. And this oh-so-careful hospital let an Omega waltz right in as a visitor.”
“Hey, I couldn’t stop that… you know that.”
“Let go. I’m on suppressants—what’s the problem?”
When Song Jae-hyun grabbed his arm again, Tae-seong’s jaw tightened. He was used to being treated like an animal just because he was an Alpha in rut. But he was still in enough control to handle his IV setup—so what was with the patronizing?
“You know damn well that drug doesn’t work… Fine, then come with me.”
Sounding like some flirty lover, Song Jae-hyun looped his arm through Tae-seong’s and began walking in the same direction. He even took the portable IV stand and began dragging it along. Tae-seong let him.
He figured it was either a doctor’s professional courtesy or maybe just some twisted sense of care—not letting him run into an Omega while alone in the hospital. More likely, it was self-preservation; the guy was probably terrified his patient would cause a scandal and drag his name into the headlines.
“Did you ever look into that drug I asked about?”
At the sudden question, Song Jae-hyun glanced around and lowered his voice.
“You’re seriously bringing that up here? I asked around at that company you mentioned, but no one’s heard of it. They said nothing even remotely like it exists. If it did, they were begging me to let them know.”
“Not even one in development?”
“I said no. A drug that completely controls rut? If that were real, the whole industry would be in an uproar. But it’s radio silence.”
The pheromone disruptor Ha-jin had been asked to slip him in their past life had basically been poison.
It was a drug originally developed to control rut—but during clinical trials, it revealed an unexpected effect. It could kill an Alpha, clean and silent.
It only affected Alphas, interfering with endocrine circulation and triggering chemical secretions that caused psychosis and violent impulses. Continued use would inevitably lead to death.
Tae-seong had tracked it as far as he could: the project had been shut down midway, and both the existing supply and formula were supposedly destroyed.
In his past life, he hadn’t managed to fully uncover how that drug had ended up in his hands. He couldn’t narrow down which of the people trying to eliminate him had connections to pharmaceutical companies. This time around, he was determined to dig up every last piece of evidence from the very start.
Who had reached out to Ha-jin back then? There were plenty of suspects, but looking for proof of something that hadn’t even begun yet was giving him a headache.
“Where’d you even hear about a drug like that?”
Song Jae-hyun studied Tae-seong’s expression as he remained silent.
He’d really changed this year. Suddenly obsessed with imprinting and dragging some guy to his side, and now chasing after a drug that didn’t even exist—one that supposedly suppressed rut completely.
If the info had been solid, he’d have dumped all his money into stocks already. But Tae-seong kept insisting his source wasn’t trustworthy, so what could he do?
“If you find it, you hit the jackpot.”
“If what you’re saying is true, Tae-seong, yeah. I’d go all in on stocks. But that’s the issue—it’s not solid. Think about it. If someone were developing a drug like that, they’d be hyping it up and pulling in investors already.”
“Exactly.”
That had baffled him in the previous life, too. A drug like that should’ve been all over the news, but he only learned of its existence after it ended up in his hands. He’d only found out thanks to Ha-jin showing the drug to Dr. Joo.
Going back to before it all began was a chance—but it also meant he’d lost every lead. The drug was practically a ghost now, and even the two years he remembered from his past life were starting to feel like some delusion. All he had was a gut feeling about whoever had paid Ha-jin—and it was driving him crazy.
“You’ve been super obsessive about pheromones lately. Don’t tell me that drug has something to do with Ha-jin too.”
Song Jae-hyun was annoyingly quick on the uptake.
“Come on, just be honest and get the imprinting test with him already. Actually, since you’re at the hospital, why not just do it now? He seems like the type who’d accept it if you were upfront. He’s got a good head on his shoulders. Speaking of which, what the hell happened to yours? I know your reflexes—you wouldn’t trip even on a bar of soap.”
The guy just never shut up. Tae-seong let out a dry laugh.
“Took you long enough to ask. Ha-jin did it.”
“He… did what? Hit you? On the head?”
Song Jae-hyun’s eyes went wide with shock, then morphed into disbelief, and finally into incredulous laughter.
“You’re telling me Ha-jin did this? Why?”
When Tae-seong didn’t answer, Song Jae-hyun narrowed his eyes. He didn’t want to believe it—but the hallway was running out. At the very end, in front of the elevator, Tae-seong pressed the down button. The digital display flickered as the elevator began to move.
Still staring straight ahead, Tae-seong suddenly muttered like a confession.
“He seduced me.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Then smacked me over the head with the IV stand.”
“Bullshit. Like he’d fall for your seduction in the first place. You shouldn’t be in a hospital, you should be in a holding cell, you psycho. And you think you’re not out of your mind right now? Get back to your room, now.”
Tae-seong watched as Song Jae-hyun freaked out, flailing like a fish. And just as the guy muttered, “Ha-jin’s got more spine than I thought,” Tae-seong burst into laughter.
Naturally, Song Jae-hyun’s face twisted even more at the sight. Clearly, he thought Tae-seong had lost his mind entirely, thanks to his intensifying rut.
The elevator reached the lobby. Tae-seong yanked the IV stand toward him and strode off, slippers scraping along the floor with brisk purpose. Song Jae-hyun scrambled to catch up.
“Wait—do you even know where Ha-jin is?”
“Didn’t you know?”
“How the hell would I know, you idiot!”
Tae-seong stopped dead in his tracks, irritation flashing across his face. Not knowing where Ha-jin was—that was infuriating. He should’ve locked him up somewhere until he had the whole situation figured out.
Unaware of Tae-seong’s increasingly twisted thoughts, Song Jae-hyun kept chattering on, pleading for him to return to his hospital room.
***
Ha-jin stepped into the Omega specialty ward—one his younger brother visited more often than their actual home—looking cleaned up and composed.
In one hand, he carried a shopping bag filled with his shredded clothes. In the other, a box of drinks.
“Oh, Ha-jin? It is you, right? What brings you here?”
“Hello. I had some work at the hospital today.”
The one greeting him so warmly was Ahn Se-hyung, a specialist who had looked after Yushin for years. Counting both before and after his regression, Ha-jin’s relationship with her was as long and deep as the one he had with Kwak Mari.
Ha-jin quietly harbored gratitude for people like her who had always treated him with such warmth through the years.
“Here, I brought these for when your blood sugar dips.”
“You know we’re not allowed to accept gifts like this.”
“Yushin’s not currently admitted, so it should be fine, right?”
Despite repeatedly declining, Ahn Se-hyung eventually accepted the drink box with a sheepish smile. She then immediately invited Ha-jin to sit for a tea break. She’d spent enough years reading patients’ faces to know when someone needed to talk.
“Did you come to the hospital because of a client?”
“Yeah, well… something like that.”
They walked side by side through the connecting corridor between wards. The open-air garden between the buildings had been beautifully arranged for both patients and medical staff.
Ahn Se-hyung took the lead, settling on an empty bench. Ha-jin hesitated for a moment, then followed.
“So? Why didn’t you go straight home and came here instead? Something troubling you?”
At the blunt question, Ha-jin stared down at the juice bottle in his hand.
“It’s just that…”
The more gently she smiled, the more frequently Ha-jin bit his lip.
She was right—he was in trouble. Normally, he’d schedule an appointment and follow protocol, but right now he was grasping at straws.
He had come in a rush. The words were already lined up in his mind, and the other person had generously given him time. Yet, he couldn’t bring himself to speak.
He felt more nervous than when he’d walked into the boutique covered in blood. His mouth was dry as dust.
“Go change first. Get your thoughts in order and come back. Don’t let the Chairman see you. It’ll be a mess.”
“Get my thoughts in order…?”
“You reacted to my pheromones.”
Tae-seong’s cold voice echoed endlessly in his ears.
