“You’re happy?”
“You were angry because you thought the System might’ve used me, just like it used your brother. I know I’ll never be as important to you as Siwoon-hyung… but it feels like maybe I’ve reached a similar place in your heart.”
“What does it matter who’s more important… The System—”
Kim Sibaek faltered, his thoughts crashing to a halt in a wave of stark clarity.
If the System was going to use you… it would’ve been better if you’d forgotten me too.
The idea of Tae Woon forgetting him struck like a blow to the chest.
The boy who used to look up at him from that tiny basement window—those dark, earnest eyes—would never look at him that way again. Like so many others before, Tae Woon’s gaze would drift away, dull and indifferent. A stranger’s eyes. Cold. Unfamiliar. Directed at him.
His boy.
“…….”
A wave of nausea hit, and Kim Sibaek clamped a hand over his mouth.
“Hyung…?”
The worry in that voice chased after him. If even those dark eyes—always filled with quiet desperation—became someone else’s, the thought alone twisted his stomach and scattered his mind.
“I hope the boy slowly forgets me. That eventually, I’ll fade into nothing more than a shadow of a memory.”
Only now did Kim Sibaek realize how arrogant that wish had been. He’d turned Tae Woon away to protect the one selfish thing he still had—his family. Then, cloaked in the false nobility of doing what was best, he dared to wish the boy would forget.
He bit down hard on his lip, the pain grounding him as he choked out a bitter, broken confession.
“…There was a time I wanted you to forget me.”
A soft laugh brushed through the dark. Tae Woon didn’t sound surprised. Like he’d known all along.
“Why?”
“…Because it would’ve been easier for you.”
He didn’t want Tae Woon to be crushed by loneliness in a world where everyone else had forgotten him. Even if he could never let go, at least Tae Woon could escape the chains that had bound him for over twenty years.
That’s what he’d believed. Back then, he’d truly thought it was the right thing.
Kim Sibaek pressed the same hand over his face, trying to smother the chaos within. He hadn’t expected this. This overwhelming shift in his own heart. Tae Woon’s warmth still clung to his lips, heat surging through his mouth, his chest, his core—twisting him up from the inside.
The boy who once said he wanted to carve himself into Kim Sibaek— Had, somewhere along the way, already done just that.
Could these feelings really be the kind one has for a cherished younger brother?
“Even if something changed in that short time, do you really think it would change who we are?”
Tae Woon had said that with such certainty. But he’d been wrong.
From the moment Kim Sibaek accepted the boy’s long-suppressed yearning, everything had shifted. This relationship had changed. He had changed.
Tae Woon’s desire had slowly crept in. Maybe it started that night, when they’d shared heat and breath. Maybe it had begun years ago, in all the times he’d longed for the boy. Or maybe it was the first time he saw that gaze in a young boy’s eyes.
“Hyung.”
The darkness shifted slightly. A large hand settled gently over his trembling one. That cool, pale touch—so familiar, so distinct. Even if he returned as Mak Slechth, Kim Sibaek knew he would never forget how this felt.
“There are people who suffer more from forgetting than from remembering.”
Tae Woon gently pulled his hand away from his face and pressed a kiss to it. Slowly, almost reverently, like he was branding Kim Sibaek with each touch. The kiss trailed from hand to wrist, back to lips.
In the pitch-black room, their lips brushed—soundless. Not even breath. Yet Kim Sibaek understood him. A voiceless, wordless confession.
“When you’re on the verge of death, I want to be the last person you think of. I want your mind so full of me it feels like it’ll burst. I want you to die with only me in your heart.”
Those lips had once said that. Now, they sealed his fate.
“I’ll die drowning in your memory, Hyung. Like sinking into a deep, lightless sea, filled to the brim with your presence—my lungs, my stomach, my prayers, overflowing with you—until even my last breath bubbles up with nothing but your name.”
As if dreaming of a beautiful death, Tae Woon smiled. And from that smile, a radiant voice spilled out—bright and beautiful against the dark.
“So, Hyung…”
A sudden force clamped around Kim Sibaek’s hand, squeezing hard enough to threaten the bone.
“Give me all of you. Carve every part of yourself into me.”
Tae Woon’s desire had finally consumed him.
Only his hand was caught, but it felt like his whole body had been snared. Without resistance, Kim Sibaek fell back onto the bed.
A heavy, shadowy form climbed on top of him—once familiar, now impossibly heavy. That weight crushed down on him, made it hard to breathe. He gasped in shallow, broken breaths.
The sash of Tae Woon’s robe, clumsily knotted, came undone, and the fabric cascaded down his body. That’s when Kim Sibaek finally noticed—Tae Woon wasn’t wearing anything underneath.
The heat pressing against his stomach and upper thighs was already heavy, swollen with arousal. His mouth went bone dry.
“Woon…”
He called his name, but even he didn’t know what he meant to say. Whatever it was, it vanished—swallowed whole by Tae Woon’s mouth. The lingering echo of his voice trembled deep in his throat.
Tae Woon’s tongue moved with single-minded intensity, sucking him in with a hunger that sent electric shocks down his spine.
The boy who once begged to be carved into him now seemed determined to devour him completely.
His tongue pushed in deeper than ever before, slick and hot, almost scraping against his uvula. The back of his throat convulsed, gag reflex kicking in, but Tae Woon didn’t pull away.
If anything, he bit down harder.
He chewed on Sibaek’s tongue like he was claiming it, dragging it deeper, all while pressing his full weight down on Sibaek’s chest. His hand cupped Sibaek’s face, firm and unyielding, making it impossible to turn away.
His lips throbbed with pain—crushed, bitten, abused. The metallic tang that filled his mouth made it clear—he was bleeding.
“Kh… Hngh—haa…!”
Tae Woon finally pulled back, and Sibaek gasped, choking on coughs and half-swallowed gags. His vision blurred with involuntary tears.
Even through the hazy dark, he felt it—Tae Woon’s gaze, sharp and unrelenting.
He hadn’t closed his eyes—not for a second. Even in this pitch-black room, he’d been watching, sensing everything through instinct alone, like a predator locked onto its prey.
Tae Woon licked his own lips, catching a bead of blood with the tip of his tongue.
“Has anyone ever kissed you hard enough to split your lip?”
“…Do I look like someone who’s had that happen before?”
A low chuckle rumbled from Tae Woon’s throat, pleased with the answer.
“I’m the first, huh? That makes me happy. I should’ve been your first kiss—and your first time too.”
“You trying to make me a criminal?”
“If you went to jail, I’d follow you there.”
Old instincts stirred in Sibaek, some buried part of his former life as a detective reminding him that adults and minors didn’t go to the same prison. But saying that now would be ridiculous. He kept his mouth shut.
Tae Woon pecked at his jaw, nipping lightly at his lips.
“Are you mad I bit your lip?”
“If I say yes, will you stop?”
“No.”
With that, he bit down again—hard enough to tear at the already bleeding flesh. Pain lanced through Sibaek’s body, and his fingers twitched involuntarily.
Tae Woon’s hands moved lower, yanking up his sweater and fumbling at the shirt beneath. He tried to undo the buttons but grew impatient and tore them open instead.
Buttons snapped, flying in all directions.
Sibaek didn’t even have time to protest. He just stared in disbelief. Then Tae Woon, who just moments ago had been watching him with such intensity, tilted his head like he was confused.
…He raised this kid. He had no one to blame but himself.
With a sigh, he let it go. Tae Woon chuckled and dragged his tongue down his jaw, tracing a line to his collarbone.
The spot he bit was already marked—a fading hickey from a few days ago.
Tae Woon latched on, sucking hard, deliberately reigniting the bruise. His lips made loud, wet sounds as he worked, licking over the same spot again and again.
Then, like a wild animal, he bared his teeth and sank them in deep.
“Haah… ngh…!”
He bit down with no hesitation, hard enough that it felt like he was tearing not just skin, but flesh. Pain flared, hot and searing.
Sibaek’s arms instinctively wrapped tighter around Tae Woon’s shoulders.
But the heat didn’t stop there.
It wasn’t just pain that bloomed.
A dizzying wave of heat spread through him, flooding low in his abdomen.
“Haa… nghh…”
Moans spilled from between clenched teeth, tinged with agony and something far more dangerous.
He’d never once mistaken pain for pleasure.
But now, the nerves beneath his skin lit up under every bite— and with every sharp sting, he burned hotter.
