Ryu Soh-an’s reaction to seeing Nabin was anything but ordinary. His cheeks were flushed like a boy struck with fever, and wariness bloomed in Hayan’s chest. He had been the one to ask for Nabin’s treatment, but the warmth Ryu Soh-an showed now felt far too much.
As an S-rank Healing Esper, Ryu Soh-an’s schedule was so packed that even two bodies wouldn’t have been enough to keep up. S-ranks were rare and precious in general, but among them, Healing Espers were rarer still.
He was so highly sought after that even foreign clients placed personal requests for him—he was, without doubt, the busiest Esper working under the K Ability User Center.
For someone like him to visit Hayan’s mansion every day just to treat Nabin meant he was devoting all of his personal time to him.
Hayan hesitated. He didn’t like how close Ryu Soh-an was getting to Nabin, but the truth was undeniable—Nabin needed his help if he was ever going to recover.
So, for Nabin’s sake, Hayan swallowed down the restless unease inside him and kept it hidden.
“Then I’d be grateful. Today won’t work, but I’d like you to start from tomorrow. Will that be alright?”
“Of course!”
For Nabin to receive treatment, Ryu Soh-an first had to earn his trust. Nabin carried deep psychological wounds, and something about a stranger’s touch had clearly triggered him.
Building familiarity through daily visits and simple conversation would be a great help—it was part of the healing process itself.
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Holding Nabin gently, Hayan offered a polite farewell and left the treatment room.
“Yes. Please take care. …And you too, Guide Kim Nabin.”
Ryu Soh-an’s shy voice lingered softly in the quiet air.
Click.
The moment the door closed, he collapsed onto the bed, as if all strength had left him. His heartbeat, which he thought had calmed, was pounding so hard it felt like it might burst through his chest.
“…What am I supposed to do?”
Left alone, the fleeting emotions he’d only brushed against now swelled until they threatened to consume him whole. He had never felt like this before.
He remembered lines he had once read describing the feelings of people in love. At the time, he had dismissed them as exaggerated fluff. The idea of the world glowing with brilliant light—he’d thought such things would never happen to him.
But now, he had no choice but to admit how wrong he’d been. Even the most saccharine words, the kind that once made him cringe, suddenly felt true. He could understand them—feel them—better than anyone else.
This was the first love that would change the course of his life.
***
Hayan’s mansion wasn’t far from the K Ability User Center. The neighborhood lay near the border of Seoul and Gyeonggi, an affluent district where high-ranking Ability Users like him, along with the wealthy who could afford it, had gathered.
After monsters appeared in the world, property values soared in places where powerful Ability Users could provide protection.
This neighborhood was now the most expensive in all of South Korea. It was common knowledge that since Hayan had moved here, prices had only risen further.
The mansion itself was a wide, two-story estate. It wasn’t that Hayan particularly wanted something large—it was the view that made him choose it.
Sometimes, after returning from missions, he would feel a hollow loneliness pressing in on him as he stepped through the doors. But today was different. Today, he wasn’t alone. Carrying the sleeping Nabin in his arms, he entered the mansion carefully, as if handling something precious.
The garden was vast, like a park relocated, designed to match the mansion’s grandeur. Yet its emptiness was stark—uncared for, it gave off only a barren, desolate air.
When he lived alone, he hadn’t cared. But now that Nabin would be staying here too, he suddenly found himself paying attention to every detail.
Pausing in the middle of the garden, he glanced around before feeling the small weight shift in his arms—Nabin, burrowing closer as though seeking warmth. Hayan hurried inside.
Without hesitation, his steps carried him to his own room. The mansion had many grand rooms, but the finest of them all was his.
And now, he meant to give it to Nabin. The room with the sweeping view through its enormous windows—the very reason he had purchased this house.
“…Sleep well.”
The way Nabin had flinched violently from Ryu Soh-an’s touch still lingered uneasily in Hayan’s chest. From the very first day they met, every moment with him had felt different, unfamiliar.
When they first crossed paths in that collapsed dungeon, Hayan had returned to him the keepsake of his late mother. When they unexpectedly reunited at the Center, it had felt like stepping onto an inescapable road of fate.
Each time a part of himself surfaced that he’d never known before, it was strange. Yet because those changes were all because of Nabin, even the strangeness felt sweet.
He had never needed such a large estate. The truth was, he couldn’t stand living pressed up against someone else. For all his outward courtesy, he was uncompromising when it came to his personal space—the very thought of someone else living in it unsettled him.
Then why…
Why did he want Nabin not only in the same house, but in his own bedroom, in the place steeped in his presence?
Even asking himself, he had no answer. But one thing was clear: once Nabin was here, the emptiness in this space was gone.
The hollow wind that had always blown through his heart had vanished, replaced with a deep, overflowing sense of contentment.
“Mmm…”
When Nabin stirred restlessly in his sleep, caught in a nightmare, Hayan laid a soft blanket over his delicate frame. Each time his face smoothed into peace after a brief frown, Hayan’s chest tightened.
To tend to the wound that had been bothering him earlier, Hayan took out a high-grade potion. Carefully, he let a little slide between Nabin’s lips. Even asleep, his mouth moved faintly, and a small, unguarded smile touched his face.
“Welcome to my home, Guide Kim Nabin.”
Hayan stroked his hair, then pressed a fleeting kiss against the fine strands, delicate as silk threads.
***
“Hhhk… ahh…”
Nabin woke slowly, his body soaked in cold sweat. It felt like he had been sinking into heavy water, only to be thrown suddenly onto land.
His head was heavy and foggy, so much so he couldn’t even remember when he had fallen asleep. Catching his breath, he tried to gather the fragments of memory.
He remembered the comfort of Hayan’s presence in the chaos, then the tears he shed when he saw Kim Su-hyun again.
Then… asking Hayan to help with his mother…
But the chain of memory snagged and broke. The moment he recalled a face—familiar, yet not quite—his breathing grew ragged.
The man had hair and eyes so bright they seemed almost to glow. The one Nabin knew had gentler, softer features, but the two looked alike enough to be brothers.
The instant their eyes met, Nabin’s mind was dragged back—to the bathtub filled with water, to the moment he had slashed his own wrists.
At first, it had been the man’s radiant looks that caught his attention. Unlike those who always made him tremble in fear, this one had smiled harmlessly, spoken gently, and Nabin had dared to open his heart a little.
To Nabin, that had been a tremendous act of courage, even if the other man never realized it.
Because of that, he had managed to scrape together a fragile peace among the Espers who terrified him. Each time he broke down, that gentle hand had soothed him. Like clothes getting soaked unnoticed in drizzle, he had unknowingly given away a piece of his heart.
But Ryu Somin had never truly been kind. For reasons Nabin never understood, he lied to other Espers, twisting their view of him. Later, he even staged incidents to make it look as though Nabin had endangered him.
Those memories were blurred, hazy as if through a veil. Dream and reality blended together until he couldn’t tell them apart. But one thing remained crystal clear—the voice that lingered in his ears, and the hands around his throat, squeezing hard enough to snap his neck.
He hadn’t done anything… but the storm of accusations had cornered him so completely he had even begun to wonder if, without realizing it, he had truly tried to kill Ryu Somin.
As those scar-riddled memories rose again, breathing became nearly impossible. He remembered cutting his wrists, pouring the last of his heart into trampling himself. So why… why was he alive again, only to be tormented once more?
Struggling for breath, his hands clawed desperately at the white sheets. His vision flickered black and white in turns. It felt as though a hole had been punched into his chest, all sensation sinking into its depths.
And then, a foolish hope rose—that someone, anyone, might share warmth with his freezing body. Though he had once chosen death, he now found himself clinging pathetically to life. The shame of it brought tears spilling down his cheeks.
