20XX Love Chapter 17.1 - 16. PHOENIX

“I, I have to kill him. That thing, I have to kill it.”

Kim Yikyung shot up to his feet and, with both arms, grabbed the Separator’s neck and squeezed.

“Kgggh, ghk.”

“I have to kill you. Kill….”

‘If I eat that person… if I devour him… then I can go back… I can return again… go back to how things used to be….’

The Separator, choking as his breath was cut off, began to dream. That dream began to flow through the two hands of Kim Yikyung that were strangling his neck. A time that had not yet unfolded, a single happy dream among the countless dreams that were only nightmares, flowed in for a fleeting moment.

In that dream, Seo Jungin was there. Everyone from Team K814 was there.

“……?”

The strength in Kim Yikyung’s hands slackened. That dream just now. What was that dream?

Kim Yikyung gripped the gurgling, gasping Separator by the shoulders and shook him. As the fading, jet-black pupils looked at Kim Yikyung, he stared back with identical eyes and asked.

“Kang Sunghwan. What was that just now?”

Everyone. Everyone from Team K814 was alive. Not a single one missing, everyone was alive.

“I asked you what that was just now!”

“Yikyung Hyung!”

The moment Kim Yikyung turned to look behind him, Jo Heechan rushed into the morgue with Seo Jungin. Hot smoke billowed from behind their backs.

“You still haven’t killed him?! That son of a bitch, I’ll kill him!”

Jo Heechan pulled out a dagger and rushed forward, aiming for the neck of the Separator that Kim Yikyung was holding down.

“Wait a minute, Heechan-ah!”

Kim Yikyung narrowly dodged the plunging knife, twisted Jo Heechan’s arm to seize the dagger, and threw it away.

“What, what are you doing, Hyung!”

“Wait, Heechan-ah, Kang Sunghwan, the Separator….”

“We have to kill him quickly. Suhyuk-ie Hyung is trapped in the morgue with ice right now, but he said he’ll get out soon. What the hell are you doing not killing him!”

Kim Yikyung looked down at the Separator. What he had seen was likely not a simple dream. It was surely a future he could see because the Separator’s wavelength was flowing within his body.

In that moment, two Seo Jungins came to mind. The two Seo Jungins who had embraced each other across the rift in spacetime.

“I have to replicate it.”

“What?”

“I have to replicate it and open a rift in spacetime.”

Kim Yikyung gripped the Separator’s thin, hard fingers tightly and began to replicate the power within its body.

Because it was the Aberrant of the Special Trait esper Kang Sunghwan, not just a simple Separator, replicating its power was extremely difficult. This was because the ability bond of Special Traits is too strong. That was why, when Kim Yikyung had tried to replicate the power of the Aches before, the Aches, with their relatively weak bodies, couldn’t withstand it and had burst.

Kim Yikyung, also being a Special Trait esper, could tell. No matter how much he replicated this power, he could only manage an imitation and would not be able to wield it properly. He might be able to open a rift in spacetime, but he would not be able to find the right time and the necessary moment. He would become lost in the infinite expanse of spacetime.

But what if he were guided? Just like how he had reached Seo Jungin in spacetime last time, if he were guided again, wouldn’t he be able to find the way?

“Yikyung Hyung, now is not the time for….”

“Heechan-ah! Suhyuk-ie is out in the hallway!”

“This is driving me crazy.”

Jo Heechan, forming a freezing ability at his fingertips, ran back out into the hallway. Seo Jungin followed right behind him.

Kim Yikyung, sweating profusely, absorbed the Separator’s power. The power of the host body was more potent and toxic, making the act of absorbing it painful in itself. Enduring a pain akin to tens of thousands of needles stabbing every nerve in his body, Kim Yikyung suddenly collapsed at a certain point and was sucked into unconsciousness. The same happened to the Separator, whose power was being drained.

Fwoosh.

A blast of heat swept all the way into the tenth morgue chamber. Choi Suhyuk had unleashed a flame large enough to fill the entire hallway.

“Heechan-ah! Are you okay?”

“Ugh, hot, fuck, Suhyuk-ie Hyung! Stop it, I said stop it!”

Even though he had wrapped his body in a defensive barrier of ice, Jo Heechan’s uniform began to melt away. Jo Heechan fired a vortex of cold air with all his might toward Choi Suhyuk, who was emitting a terrifying flame.

Beep beep beep beeeeeeeep.

The final alarm began to blare from Jo Heechan’s watch. The watch widget was flashing a jet-black light.

“Your Toxin Level…!”

The parts of Jo Heechan’s body that Seo Jungin was holding began to harden and crack. The texture of the skin on his neck and his pale face was freezing over into a bluish hue. The Aberration was imminent.

“Uwaaaaaah!”

As Jo Heechan let out a powerful storm of cold air enhanced with his amplification power, Choi Suhyuk staggered back a few steps, but it seemed he wouldn’t last much longer like this.

Boom! Bang!

Flames raging from Choi Suhyuk poured into each morgue chamber, and places all around began to be engulfed in fire. The fire prevention system activated, alarms rang, sprinklers burst, and smoke extractors started running.

The brightness of the regular lights pointing toward the emergency exit increased, and an announcement began to play from the bulletin system. Pushed back to the end of the hallway, Jo Heechan glanced into the tenth morgue chamber, where Kim Yikyung lay unconscious with the Separator.

“Yikyung Hyuuung! What are you doing! Did you faint? Are you dead? Are you dead?”

“Ah! Heechan-ah!”

A giant fireball erupted and surged toward them. In that instant, Seo Jungin embraced Jo Heechan and threw his body to the floor.

Kwaang!

With a massive explosion, the flames filled the inside of the morgue chamber all the way to the ceiling. The streams of water from the sprinklers poured down from all directions with a deafening noise.

“Kgh, kggghk, cough,”

“Aah, haah, Heechan, aah….”

An excruciating pain was felt from his back, which had been swept by the flames, but Seo Jungin had no time to worry about that. Red blood was gushing out from the mouth of Jo Heechan, who was pinned beneath his body.

“Cough cough, heuu… heuuu… uuuuh….”

Jo Heechan’s lips turned blue as his body began to tremble violently.

“Hee, Heechan-ah, Heechan-ah.”

“Kgggh… ugh… co, cold… ugh….”

Choi Suhyuk was approaching, step by step. As he walked through the streams of the sprinklers, with flames billowing around him, black smoke rose with each of his footsteps. The closer Choi Suhyuk came, the more Seo Jungin’s back began to burn. His shirt burned away, and the skin on his back sizzled.

But Seo Jungin no longer cared about such things. Hoarfrost was forming all over Jo Heechan’s ice-cold body, and his pale, lifeless skin was beginning to crackle and split. When the lips that had been endlessly soft to kiss turned a deathly black, Seo Jungin could no longer feel anything else.

“Heechan-ah. Are you cold? I’ll hold you. Are you very cold?”

“Uuuh… co, cold, cold, uuuuh… If I, I fu, fuck you, Hyung, it would be, so, ho, hot, uuuuh….”

“Ugh, Heechan-ah, ugh-heuk, Heechan-ah….”

Seo Jungin felt the cool, chilling energy flowing from Jo Heechan’s hands as he tremblingly hugged his own back. He was using his freezing ability, worried that Choi Suhyuk’s heat would burn Seo Jungin’s back.

“Don’t. Don’t use your ability. Don’t do it!”

“Hah, hah, Hyung, lea, leave, leave me, quickly, with the gun, shoot the Separator dead, an, and, run.”

“Hk, heuk, I have to go with you. How can I leave you and go.”

Jo Heechan looked up at Seo Jungin with a face white with frost. He raised a stiffened hand and touched Seo Jungin’s cheek. The tips of his cold fingers were turning a stiff, dark black.

“Ah, I wish, this was a fantasy. Hah, hah, if I came back again, and saved, Hyung, I think, I’d succeed.”

“Heuk.”

Seo Jungin took Jo Heechan’s cold hand and pressed it against his cheek, rubbing it. Wanting to warm it even a little, he put the fingers in his mouth and sucked on them softly.

“Ah… thrilling… I’m getting excited….”

“Ugh-heuk.”

“I have to, die, for you to go, my medi—….”

“Don’t.”

Jo Heechan, trembling, was gradually losing focus in his eyes.

“I have to die, for Hyung, to go, I have to die, the med, the medicine, please,”

“No. Heu-heuk, no.”

“Ah, it hurts, so, cold, co—….”

“Ugh-heuk, heuk, Heechan-ah, Heechan-ah….”

Seo Jungin felt like he was going insane. In the end. In the end, I couldn’t save this boy either. Even Heechan. Even Heechan.

I have to save this boy at least. Please, just this boy.

“Ugh-heuk, heuk, heuuu, aah….”

Seo Jungin sobbed, clutching Jo Heechan. In the end, he loses everyone. He fails to save a single person and loses them all. Just like in the nightmares he had repeated countless times, in the end, once again.

Yes. If that’s the case, then I might as well, inside here. I should fall asleep here with all these boys I love. I’ll explode with the power of amplification and, with all of you, make this place our Nest and sleep here forever.

Seo Jungin gently placed a kiss on Jo Heechan’s cold lips. Jo Heechan had already lost all self-awareness and was undergoing the transformation into an Aberrant. His pupils were freezing over white, and his skin was oozing fluids and sticking together in a blackened mess.

“Heechan-ah. I love you.”

Seo Jungin whispered affectionately, then raised his body and turned around. Inside the blackened, melted head of the Choi Suhyuk Aberrant, blazing crimson eyes were staring at Seo Jungin.

“Yes. Suhyuk-ah. Come here. Take my hand.”

Seo Jungin extended his hand toward Choi Suhyuk, gathering all the ability remaining in his body. A powerful force of amplification flickered in his hand. The flame that Choi Suhyuk had fed him. With that power swirling inside his body, he would take Choi Suhyuk’s hand and self-destruct, creating an explosion powerful enough to bring down this entire ward.

Choi Suhyuk slowly stretched his hand forward. He was extending his blackened, burnt hand to grasp Seo Jungin’s, which shone with a bundle of bright, flaming nerves. Seo Jungin smiled sorrowfully and whimpered.

‘In the end, this is how I get to hold your hand.’

Covered in black blood and ashes, Seo Jungin took another step closer to death.

“Hk, you know. Suhyuk-ah. I, I… really… you….”

It was the very moment their hands drew closer and were finally about to touch. The space, the rift between their facing hands, began to tear open in a long, vertical line.

“……?”

A golden light was leaking from the rift in space. Seo Jungin, startled, stepped back and stared at the rift in spacetime from which the light was leaking. The split rift was tearing open longer and longer, pouring out a blinding light.

“This is….”

The rift in spacetime he had once seen in a dream. And the very vision he had seen for a fleeting moment when he had clashed hands with Kim Yikyung earlier. Seo Jungin’s gaze was captivated by the light leaking from the rift before he whipped his head around to look at Kim Yikyung. Kim Yikyung was still lost in unconsciousness, holding the Separator’s hand.

[I have to replicate it and open a rift in spacetime.]

“Yikyung Hyung…….”

It was clear. Kim Yikyung was opening the rift in spacetime with the power he had absorbed from the Separator. Right now, Kim Yikyung was opening a rift to a certain time he needed from within the infinite spacetime.

If that’s the case, then surely beyond this rift. Beyond this space. Beyond this spacetime there must be…!

The golden light that had been shining a long trail on Seo Jungin’s face spread out brilliantly, and the rift in spacetime opened wide.

“Ah……!”

Beyond the hole—there was his past self, who had just awakened to his ability and was resplendently surrounded by a golden aura. His self, who had entered a state of selflessness, enveloped in a wondrous and perfect power. His self, who was surrounded by an ecstatic wavelength and looked like a transcendent being.

The self beyond the hole had everything and possessed all power. Draped in a billowing guiding energy, he was looking at his self inside the hole with disbelieving eyes.

The self inside the hole had lost everything and was as good as dead even while alive. Covered in the ashes of his loved ones, he stood in despair in the morgue that would soon become their grave.

It was as if time had stopped. No, it also felt as if infinite time was flowing, and also as if it was merely a fleeting moment. The hole in spacetime had opened, making the two Seo Jungins face each other.

Now was the time. Seo Jungin could now remember that dream-like, vision-like moment. The me of that time had wanted to hug the me of now. He had wanted to share the power that the me of that time possessed. He had wanted to fill the ashen, empty me of now, who had lost all power, with perfect power.

“Jungin-ah.”

The Seo Jungin from beyond the hole called to him.

“……Jungin-ah.”

He couldn’t help but call back to the Seo Jungin beyond the hole.

The Seo Jungin enveloped in golden light was approaching with his arms outstretched. The Seo Jungin covered in white ash also approached with his arms outstretched.

And soon, the two Seo Jungins gently embraced each other and rubbed their cheeks together.

“Seo Jungin…….”

The two voices overlapped as a golden light wrapped around both their bodies. Seo Jungin felt the wavelength filling his body flow into the past Seo Jungin. He could also feel the warm guiding wavelength pouring in from the past Seo Jungin.

Could there be a more perfect guiding than this? The guiding I receive from myself, a Guide. The most compatible wavelength in this world. A perfect wavelength. A wavelength that fits perfectly without a single crack.

The esper ability, guiding ability, and flame ability within Seo Jungin’s body were all merging to become a single power. A guiding that completely fused the power of the abilities with the body so that no residual ability would be left even after using them. It was ‘Complete Guiding,’ which had only existed in theory.

A brilliant golden light wrapped around the two Seo Jungins, shining even more dazzlingly. At that moment, Kim Yikyung, who was holding the Separator’s hand, awoke from his unconsciousness. The first thing the awakened Kim Yikyung saw was Seo Jungin embracing Seo Jungin.

“Jungin-ah…….”

It was to open this very moment that he had leaped into the infinite spacetime. Because he had received Seo Jungin’s guiding. Because he was certain that the traces of it remained and he would not lose the path leading to Seo Jungin.

Thus, he opened the rift in time of the Seo Jungin who had first awakened his ability to the Seo Jungin of the present. All of it was by Seo Jungin’s guidance (guide).

The two Seo Jungins were embracing each other, transcending time, just as he had seen in the vision. He was truly curious about what would happen next. What would happen next. And now he knew. Kim Yikyung, who had peeked into the Separator’s dream, now knew everything that was about to happen.

We will all be guided by Seo Jungin.

Fwaaaah!

The moment the shining hole closed in an instant, there stood Seo Jungin, enveloped in golden light from head to toe. A perfect golden aura. Golden eyes. An opalescent halo, like a color stretching out into the universe.

A radiant guiding wavelength was pouring out of Seo Jungin. The power was strong enough to cover this entire first basement floor, breathtakingly thrilling, dizzying, and also ecstatic. At the same time, it was gentle, serene, and sweet. That beautiful power was filling every particle of the air.

Kim Yikyung felt that just from the radiant guiding emanating from Seo Jungin, his black eyes that had been tainted by the Separator were returning to normal, the black blood was being purified, and all the Toxin Level that had been rising in his body was being cleansed away in one fell swoop.

“Haha. Seo Jungin. You really are…….”

How much more surprised could he get? By Seo Jungin’s abilities.

As the radiant guiding wavelength poured down, the frozen body of Jo Heechan, which had collapsed on the floor as if crumpled and was shattering into pieces, began to mend, and life returned to his blackened, melted skin. The widget on his watch rapidly changed color, flashing a blue light.

Jo Heechan’s black eyes flew open as he pushed himself up. Jo Heechan, who was bewilderedly touching various parts of his own body, looked up at Seo Jungin standing tall before him.

“Jungin Hyung……?”

A golden energy shimmered as Seo Jungin’s hair fluttered, and with every movement, gold dust scattered like an afterimage. When Seo Jungin moved his fingers, a sweet fragrance spread through the air. Looking up at the unbelievably wondrous back of Seo Jungin, Jo Heechan was at a loss for words.

“Jungin Hyung… is that you…?”

Seo Jungin was looking at the Aberrant of Choi Suhyuk standing in the middle of the hallway. Choi Suhyuk, his body encased in a hot haze, his head blackened and burned, and his crimson eyes shining, stood with his large frame wrapped in a flame-retardant uniform that had all melted and stuck to him, sizzling like grotesque skin.

Behind Choi Suhyuk, fires had started in each morgue chamber, and crimson flames were licking and swallowing the hallway ceiling. In the middle of the hallway where the water from the sprinklers was evaporating and exploding, Choi Suhyuk, standing tall like a demon of flames, stood perfectly still, watching the golden, shining Seo Jungin.

Seo Jungin began to walk toward that Choi Suhyuk, one step at a time.

“Jungin Hyung, it’s danger—….”

Seo Jungin turned his head slightly and smiled at Jo Heechan. After seeing that face, what more could be said? At the sight of Seo Jungin, who seemed to have transcended humanity, Jo Heechan firmly shut his mouth and could only watch.

Seo Jungin is about to perform a miracle. He will perform a miracle. He will show a miracle more amazing than any dream, any fantasy.

Turning his body again, Seo Jungin approached Choi Suhyuk and gently held out his hand. It was a hand shimmering with a golden aura.

“Suhyuk-ah.”

It was a gentle voice, as always. It was the voice that had always called out like that, kindly and gently, to each and every member of Team K814.

Choi Suhyuk stared intently at Seo Jungin’s hand, then slowly extended his own. It was a hand blackened by fire, emitting black smoke and heat.

Unable to come any closer, Choi Suhyuk stopped, and Seo Jungin took another step forward and firmly grasped his hand. The powerful electromagnetic wavelength was no obstacle to Seo Jungin.

“……!”

Choi Suhyuk’s body lurched, jolting violently, and began to tremble.

“It hurt a lot, didn’t it…….”

“Ah… aah… ah….”

Choi Suhyuk convulsed severely, letting out a groan. As the golden wavelength flowing from Seo Jungin’s hand gently climbed up Choi Suhyuk’s arm, the heat began to subside wherever the light touched.

“I’ll guide you. Suhyuk-ah.”

Seo Jungin, whispering affectionately, drew closer and caressed Choi Suhyuk’s cheek. The wavelength began to shine brighter and brighter. Wherever the golden light gently passed, blood began to circulate and flesh began to form on the body that had been burnt black.

“It was so agonizing, wasn’t it. Suhyuk-ah. Heuk, it was hard.”

Seo Jungin, choking up, tenderly stroked Choi Suhyuk’s cheeks with both hands. His pale white skin returned, followed by his lustrous hair, which cascaded down smoothly.

“I’m sorry. You became like this trying to save me, trying to protect me. I’m sorry. Heuk.”

In Seo Jungin’s hands, Choi Suhyuk’s face was returning, piece by piece. On his well-defined head, a slender nose returned, and beneath his well-groomed, dark eyebrows, distinct double eyelids settled. A clear lip line and white teeth. On his flawless, smooth skin, his masculine cheekbones, masseter, and jaw muscles were restored. Finally, the eyelids, fringed with long, thick lashes, carefully opened, and within them were dark brown eyes, looking at Seo Jungin.

“Suhyuk-ah…….”

Seo Jungin looked at Choi Suhyuk for a while, combing his fingers through his thick hair.

“Jungin…… Jungin-ah.”

Choi Suhyuk’s lips parted, and a trembling voice flowed out.

“I was Aberrated, I was Aberrated… I was definitely Aberrated….”

He remembered the moment he was turning into an Aberrant, screaming in searing pain. The last memory of being unable to end his own life amidst the agony of being burned alive resurfaced.

“How, how did this… how did you start guiding again….”

The Seo Jungin before him was shining beautifully with a wondrous golden light, still gently scattering a golden guiding wavelength.

“Suhyuk-ah. It’s okay now. Everything is okay now. So don’t cry.”

Choi Suhyuk was crying without having realized it. He was engulfed in confusion about the incomprehensible situation, but in the depths of his subconscious, he was feeling ecstasy and a thrill. The golden guiding wavelength flowing smoothly inside and outside his body was telling him. Seo Jungin had grabbed his hand, which had fallen into hell, and pulled him up.

“Suhyuk-ie Hyung. Hyung, right now… did you come back……?”

Jo Heechan muttered in a dazed tone and staggered to his feet.

“Huh? You just… came back from being an Aberrant?”

Seo Jungin wiped away the tears flowing down Choi Suhyuk’s cheeks, then looked back at Jo Heechan and gave a nod.

“Ha, haah, crazy… no way…….”

Kim Yikyung knew because he had seen the future. Seo Jungin was now in a state where all of his abilities were completely fused. Because he had received Complete Guiding from the past Seo Jungin, he was an Amplification esper who did not accumulate Toxin Level and the world’s only Guide capable of Complete Guiding. Complete Guiding that could even revert an Aberrant was possible.

“Heechan-ah.”

“Uh… uh…? Uh?”

Seo Jungin said, wiping his cheeks and the corners of his eyes with his hand.

“Get the fire under control. The sprinklers can’t handle it.”

Because it was a basement floor, the smoke extraction systems were installed more densely, but no matter how much the smoke dampers all opened and madly sucked out and expelled the smoke, there was no way to deal with the flames. The sprinklers spraying from the ceiling had their limits. With flames billowing in every morgue chamber and all around, if left alone, the entire first basement floor would collapse.

“Ha, uh. O, okay.”

Jo Heechan, with a dazed expression, gathered his ability in his hand. A clean and endless power boiled up from his solar plexus as if gushing forth. Jo Heechan, surprised by the overflowing power he had never used before, his jaw dropped open.

“What is this now… crazy?”

Jo Heechan shot out the cold air bursting from his fingertips with an exclamation of astonishment, getting the flames in the hallway and the morgue chambers under control.

Choi Suhyuk lifted his head and looked around at Jo Heechan, who was casting his ability, and Kim Yikyung, who was leaning against the morgue wall. The memories, obscured by the hazy, blurry smoke, seemed like they would surface but did not. Seo Jungin took his hand and pulled him along.

“Suhyuk-ah, I have to guide Yikyung Hyung too.”

Kim Yikyung, leaning against the wall, watched the two people approaching him. He thought about what might have happened if he had requested the elimination of the Choi Suhyuk Aberrant from headquarters on the rooftop, and felt that his hesitation, unbecoming of a team leader, was a relief. So, sometimes, it was necessary to be sentimental. After all, there is a realm of intuition that transcends reason.

As Seo Jungin came closer, Kim Yikyung got to his feet.

“Hyung. I’ll guide you.”

“Jungin-ah. The radiant guiding was enough. You don’t have to.”

His body was clean enough to know without even needing to check his watch. However, Seo Jungin silently pulled on Kim Yikyung’s hand. Kim Yikyung obediently offered his hand but continued speaking with a slight smile.

“I said you don’t have to. I’ve been guided enough.”

“No. Hyung. You idiot. At this rate, Hyung, you can’t go to the sea with me…….”

Definitely… since the 24-hour count is in progress. He would disappear before they arrived at the sea.

“So I’ll guide you. I will take you to the sea.”

Kim Yikyung sharply inhaled at the power flowing from Seo Jungin’s hand and tilted his head back. A power of distant climax was filling his body.

“Ha, haah…….”

“I can fill up everything that Hyung is lacking. That little time Hyung has left. I will fill it all for you.”

“Haah, no way. Aah, ha, Jungin-ah, haah,”

Kim Yikyung could feel it too. The 24 hours of life force that had been flowing away like sand in an hourglass. That count was disappearing. As a gentle wavelength enveloped his entire body and swept over him, he could feel a life force filling him with density. It was not a replication but a living, real life force.

“All done. Yikyung Hyung. It’s done now.”

Seo Jungin abruptly pulled Kim Yikyung into a hug. A helpless laugh burst from Kim Yikyung. An unbelievable miracle had occurred.

“How could this, you… how is something like this possible?”

“You won’t disappear now. Hyung. Even after 24 hours, you will be by my side, Hyung.”

“Ha, Jungin-ah.”

Kim Yikyung hugged the Seo Jungin in his arms tightly. He kissed his cheek and rubbed his back, holding him close.

Jo Heechan, who had run over at some point, hugged both Kim Yikyung and Seo Jungin at once and showered their cheeks with kisses.

“Hyung is a truly crazy Guide. Wow, for real, you’re crazy. Completely insane!”

“Heechan-ah, heuk, eu-heuk.”

Seo Jungin sobbed and wailed as if his tear ducts had burst. Those tears were tears of joy. They were genuine tears of joy for having brought back Choi Suhyuk, for having brought back Jo Heechan, for having brought back Kim Yikyung.

However, Choi Suhyuk, standing beside them, could not share in that joy. A nasty feeling was slowly creeping up on him. He had clearly committed a terrible act, but he couldn’t remember what it was.

He remembered Nam Taeyong swallowing the D-Toxin and Kim Yikyung dying, and his own Aberration after that. But while the replicated Kim Yikyung, Jo Heechan, and Seo Jungin were here, Hwang Woohyun was not. And in his hazy memories, an afterimage of himself attacking his teammates flashed by.

Choi Suhyuk, who had been lost in thought with his head tilted to the side, suddenly blurted out.

“What about Woohyun-ie?”

Jo Heechan and Seo Jungin flinched in surprise and turned to look at Choi Suhyuk.

“Hwang Woohyun is…….”

After saying that, Choi Suhyuk, who had fallen silent again, looked down at his own body. His uniform was completely melted and stuck to him, like the blackened, cracking skin of a Flaming-eo. Then he raised his two hands and looked down at them.

“…….”

Choi Suhyuk’s hands gradually began to tremble.

“Suhyuk-ah.”

“Is he dead?”

Seo Jungin shot up and approached him, but Choi Suhyuk avoided Seo Jungin, stepping back, and asked again.

“Did I kill him?”

A silence once again fell upon Choi Suhyuk’s expressionless face. In that moment, a powerful image flashed through his mind. The image of Hwang Woohyun being scattered into pieces in the air by the ultra-high temperature flames that shot from his own fingertips, turning into ash and scattering away.

“Ugh…….”

“Suhyuk-ah!”

“Uuughk…….”

Choi Suhyuk fell to the floor and began to vomit. Throwing up bitter fluid, Choi Suhyuk couldn’t breathe.

“Hah, hah, Woohyun-ie, I, keok, uuughk,”

“No, Suhyuk-ah!”

Seo Jungin rushed in and wrapped his arms around his back, but Choi Suhyuk pushed his hand away.

“Hah, hah, I became an Aberrant, and while attacking you guys, did I kill him? Woohyun-ie?”

“Suhyuk-ah. That’s not your fault…….”

“Did I kill Woohyun-ie?!”

Choi Suhyuk remembered the dazzling bolt of lightning that had stood against his torrent of flames. He remembered the sight of them clashing in mid-air, a flash of light erupting, and sparks scattering in all directions. He remembered the last moment, the face of his beautiful and strong friend, standing against the flames he poured out.

Choi Suhyuk, kneeling on the floor, began to scream. It was a ghastly and piercing scream. Soon, a haze began to rise from his clenched fists. Flames were gathering.

“Don’t!”

Seo Jungin’s face turned deathly pale as he rushed to Choi Suhyuk and wrapped his arms around his neck.

“Don’t! Suhyuk-ah! Don’t do it!”

“Aaaaaaaah!”

Choi Suhyuk, with lost eyes, scattered his flame ability and cried out into the air. If Seo Jungin hadn’t been holding him, he would have torn open his own chest, pulled out his heart, and burned it. The fact that he had scattered his friend into a pile of ash in an instant with his own hands caused a maddening urge for self-destruction to surge up.

Jo Heechan’s rage-filled gaze, who had been watching, turned toward the Separator cowering in the corner of the morgue.

“Because of that son of a bitch……!”

As Jo Heechan instantly rushed toward the Separator, Kim Yikyung hurriedly grabbed him.

“Let go! I have to kill that bastard. He died because of that monster bastard! Taeyong-ie Hyung too, and Woohyun-ie Hyung! And Hyung died too! That son of a bitch……!”

“Heechan-ah, wait! Wait a minute!”

“Why! What are we waiting for! We have to kill that bastard to get out of here anyway. I’m really going to kill that monster bastard!”

Kim Yikyung desperately blocked the thrashing Jo Heechan, panting for breath. Of course, he felt the same way. He was filled with the thought of killing that monster. Filled with anger. Filled with anger for losing his precious friends. But.

“Heechan-ah, he’s the same as Suhyuk. Kang Sunghwan is the same as Suhyuk!”

“What?!”

“It’s Kang Sunghwan. That Separator. He was an esper. He was a team leader. He became an Aberrant… lost his sanity and killed his own teammates……!”

“Ha…….”

“The X-Creepions are all just our Aberrants in the end. We’re just killing each other over and over again…….”

Kim Yikyung muttered the last part softly. His mind was in turmoil. It wasn’t over yet.

“But… Jungin-ie can turn him back. To a human. If we turn Kang Sunghwan back like we did with Suhyuk….”

The future that still remained. The future he had glimpsed in a fleeting moment. Everyone from Team K814 was smiling. That wasn’t all. It wasn’t just us. Team K364 too. The platinum-blonde esper, the cute brown-haired one, the former baseball prospect full of self-importance, the prideful, prickly guy, they were all smiling.

Kim Yikyung rushed over to Seo Jungin, who was holding Choi Suhyuk, and grabbed his shoulders. Looking into Seo Jungin’s golden eyes, he continued in a trembling voice.

“Jungin-ah. You can turn them all back, you can bring back all the kids who died.”

Seo Jungin looked up at Kim Yikyung with tear-filled eyes.

“Is that… really true? All of them… I can bring them all back to life?”

“I saw it. I definitely saw it while I was replicating. We were all smiling. I saw us all smiling together in front of the Christmas tree. Jungin-ah.”

“You saw it? You really saw it?”

“Yes. I saw it. We can save them all. For sure. If we turn the Separator back into Kang Sunghwan.”

Tears streamed down from Seo Jungin’s wide-open eyes.

‘I can meet them again? I can meet those kids I love again?’

Seo Jungin slowly turned his head and looked at the Separator.

‘This monster, who trapped me in a nightmare and made me constantly think of death, who made the kids I love die over and over again, can bring them back?’

Seo Jungin went over and whispered into the ear of Choi Suhyuk, who was kneeling on the floor and trembling. That whisper was a comfort for Choi Suhyuk, and also a vow to himself. A moment later, Seo Jungin straightened up and, step by step, approached the monster he had hated so much, the one he had wanted to kill so much.

The Separator, cowering in fear, looked up with its black, shiny eyes as Seo Jungin approached, as if mesmerized. It was being drawn to the golden guiding light flowing from Seo Jungin.

“I will guide you. I… will turn you back into a human again.”

In that moment, Kim Yikyung clearly heard the desperate wish of Kang Sunghwan, who had, over the long time he was an Aberrant, even forgotten why he wanted to eat humans.

[I want to go back again.]

Seo Jungin pulled the Separator’s thin, slender fingers and held them warmly.

“Come back… heuk, and bring back the kids who died. Please bring them back to me again.”

Seo Jungin’s hand began to shine. He was infusing the guiding wavelength into the Separator’s body. The desperate wish of team leader Kang Sunghwan, who became an Aberrant in a tragic time and devoured all of his most beloved teammates. Just as he wished to return to being human again.

A golden wavelength shimmered from Seo Jungin’s hand and flowed through the Separator’s hand. In every area the wavelength caressed, skin covered over and flesh began to form.

As the golden light gently rose, the bizarrely twisted limbs slowly returned to a human form. On the epidermis that had been glistening with bodily fluids, pale flesh grew, and the rotten black blood regained its red hue and flowed. From the grotesquely melted scalp, beautiful golden-blonde hair sprouted. The teeth that had grown sharp to devour humans returned to an orderly state, and the eyes that had been a glossy black were now filling with a brilliant emerald light.

Kang Sunghwan, having completely returned to a human, was an incredibly beautiful young man. The Separator, which had endlessly devoured humans with its strange and gruesome insect-like appearance, was, in fact, an esper no different from Team K814, who had loved and cherished his teammates and fought until the very end.

“Ha, haha…….”

Jo Heechan let out a hollow laugh and sank to the floor.

Kang Sunghwan remained crouched on the floor, holding Seo Jungin’s hand. His naked body, which had been motionless, began to convulse and tremble at some point. Kang Sunghwan, who had been trembling and silent, at another point began to retch and sob.

Does he remember? His teammates that he devoured after becoming an Aberrant? The countless people he had eaten for so, so long?

He did. Kang Sunghwan, a powerful Special Trait esper, had memories of his time as an Aberrant that were just as vivid. Kang Sunghwan clearly remembered the numerous times of cannibalism that he would rather not remember.

“Keo-heok!”

“Kang Sunghwan!”

Kim Yikyung rushed to Kang Sunghwan, who was trying to shove his hand into his own mouth, and grabbed his wrist to pull it away. Kang Sunghwan struggled, repeatedly trying to bring his hand to his mouth.

“Calm down! I said calm down!”

“Keok……! Gak!”

If he could, Kang Sunghwan wanted to shove his hand down his throat, dig into his stomach, and pull out his own entrails that had endlessly swallowed blood and flesh. It felt like he couldn’t breathe unless he pulled them out with both hands and squeezed them dry.

Kang Sunghwan dug his nails into his own stomach. Jo Heechan had to rush over as well to restrain Kang Sunghwan’s struggles. If they hadn’t, he seemed poised to tear open his own stomach while alive and spill out his innards.

Choi Suhyuk, seized by sorrow, watched Kang Sunghwan with clenched teeth. In this place, the only person who could understand the ghastly despair he was feeling was Choi Suhyuk. Only Choi Suhyuk, who had killed his friend with his own hands after becoming an Aberrant, could understand him.

Could he truly accept himself, a team leader who had killed his teammates and devoured countless people, after regaining his sense of self? Wouldn’t Kang Sunghwan just go insane like this?

Kang Sunghwan, who had indeed been thrashing about like he had gone mad, fainted while being held down by Kim Yikyung and Jo Heechan.

💘

“Mr. Kang Sunghwan. Mr. Kang Sunghwan.”

His eyelids slowly opened, and the green eyes within looked blurrily at Kim Yikyung.

Kang Sunghwan was lying on the floor, covered by Kim Yikyung’s uniform jacket. Kim Yikyung was looking down intently at his blinking green eyes.

The time Kang Sunghwan had been unconscious was not very long. But Kim Yikyung could not wait any longer. The more time they delayed, the last chance would scatter and disappear into spacetime. He knew because he understood the principles of the power Kang Sunghwan possessed. To see the only happy ending among countless nightmares, he had to wake Kang Sunghwan now.

“I’m sorry. I know how hard it is. I know how much pain you’re in and how you feel like you’re going crazy. But I can’t wait while comforting you. We don’t have time.”

They were his own precious teammates that Kang Sunghwan had taken, and that only Kang Sunghwan could return. It was something Kang Sunghwan had to do before the isolation of the ward was broken.

Kim Yikyung stared at Kang Sunghwan with pleading eyes and held his hands tightly with both of his.

“You feel sorry toward us, don’t you. You want to do something, anything, don’t you. So, just like in that dream you showed me, bring back my teammates. Summon all my dead teammates here.”

Kang Sunghwan stared blankly at Kim Yikyung’s face, then opened his mouth and gasped for breath. He gasped, squeezing out his voice.

“……Ca, ca, can’t do it…….”

Kang Sunghwan, perhaps because he had forgotten how to speak for so long, could not even speak properly and stuttered in a small voice.

“What do you mean, you can’t……?”

“……I, I, wh, what I su, summon, is o, only, twenty-four hours,”

“……What?”

Kang Sunghwan twisted his hand free from Kim Yikyung’s grasp, then curled up on his side and clutched his head with both hands. Hiding his face and trembling, he muttered haltingly.

“I, I’m, no, not summoning the real thing, b, but the af, afterimage, left in time, su, summoning an afterimage,”

Kim Yikyung couldn’t believe it. He was confused. He had clearly seen his teammates in the time he had looked into with Kang Sunghwan. They were all laughing together, without a single one missing. He had seen them laughing in front of the large Christmas tree at the entrance of the ward. Not only Team K814, but he had definitely seen the members of Team K364 as well.

Kim Yikyung bent down and looked into Kang Sunghwan’s face.

“Think carefully. You saw it too. You saw that future with me. Not only my teammates, but your teammates too… they were all smiling.”

Kang Sunghwan couldn’t properly meet Kim Yikyung’s eyes and darted his gaze here and there.

“Af, afterimage, that’s an afterimage, o, of countless, futures that haven’t come yet, an afterimage, an illusion, an illusion,”

“……That can’t be…….”

“Even if I su, summon them, after 24 hours, everything resets, everything resets, I c, can’t,”

Everyone was at a loss for words. In the first-floor basement morgue, only the sound of water dripping from the sprinklers and the mechanical noise of the smoke extraction system echoed eerily.

“So, sorry, I’m sorry, sorry, sorry,”

“…….”

Kim Yikyung silently looked at Kang Sunghwan. Although he couldn’t use the replicated power to its full extent, Kim Yikyung understood all of its principles and limitations.

The reason Kang Sunghwan said he couldn’t summon them was because the past is an immutable domain. A being summoned across spacetime wounds time. Time will try to cover the wound, so it will either erase the being or repel it. That is why everything that is summoned disappears after 24 hours. That is also why the Separator cannot directly summon and devour its target. The existence of the Separator that ate the target would be erased along with it.

But Kim Yikyung could tell. Why he was able to glimpse that impossible future afterimage.

“Ha…….”

A laugh like a sigh escaped Kim Yikyung. That laugh was not one of hopelessness. It was one of astonishment toward Seo Jungin.

Jungin-ah. You are truly our unbelievably perfect Guide. You are our hope and our salvation.

“Mr. Kang Sunghwan…… summoning from a past time will wound the present time, but what happens if the being that is summoned possesses the wavelength of the present time.”

“…….”

“What I’m asking is what happens if a past existence is summoned here while possessing a trace of the present time.”

Kang Sunghwan was still clutching his head, but his trembling had stopped. A mumbling voice flowed out.

“Th, then, ti, time, can be, fo, fooled,”

“We can fool time, right? Because it will be accepted as a being belonging to the present time.”

It was difficult for everyone to fully understand the conversation that Kim Yikyung and Kang Sunghwan were having. Because this was a story about the power to touch spacetime, it was difficult to easily understand unless one was a person who wielded that power.

But Seo Jungin suddenly recalled the voices of the members he had kept hearing as auditory hallucinations. Inside the trapped time, he had kept hearing auditory hallucinations as if the order of time had been jumbled.

Kim Yikyung looked at that Seo Jungin and smiled faintly.

“It’s a paradox. Jungin-ah. While you were receiving guiding from your past self, you also shared your wavelength, didn’t you. The ability that Suhyuk-ie fed you. Suhyuk-ie’s flame ability, which makes a Guide burn up and an esper go crazy when their mucous membranes touch, you gave that to your past self.”

Seo Jungin was only confused even while listening to Kim Yikyung’s words.

“When you first awakened your ability, you received that wavelength from your present self and carried it inside your body. And while you were giving us mucosal guiding, you left that wavelength as a trace.”

The reason I got excited and lost control as an esper when my mucous membranes touched someone. Was it because of the ability I received from my present self, who had eaten Suhyuk-ie’s flame ability?

Until they were isolated in the nursing hospital, he had never once performed mucosal guiding. So he had just thought that his body had changed from performing mucosal guiding.

“The traces you left on us while giving us mucosal guiding are all a paradox. It’s a bootstrap paradox where you can’t tell what came first. All the traces you left are traces of the present timeline. So if you summon a person with that trace left on them, time will accept that person not as a being of the past, but as one belonging to the present. We will be able to fool time.”

Kang Sunghwan blinked his green eyes, which were hidden within his two arms, then muttered in a small voice.

“B, but, th, then, the pa, past ti, time will also be wounded, and from that timeline, it will be erased,”

“That would be so. If a being with a trace of the present time exists in the past timeline, that time will also be wounded. After 24 hours, it would have been erased.”

Kang Sunghwan finally moved his hands away and slowly raised his body. He stared blankly at Kim Yikyung and asked haltingly.

“S, such a being, i, if there was one, wh, why……?”

“Why wasn’t it erased, you ask? Why weren’t we, who received mucosal guiding from Jungin-ie, erased? Mr. Kang Sunghwan… you isolated this ward, didn’t you. You isolated it in a time of 24 hours. We were continuously inside December 6th, so we weren’t erased. And from the point when the present Jungin-ie met Jungin-ie, we have settled in the present timeline.”

Kang Sunghwan’s eyes flew wide open. His pupils were shaking in confusion.

“And Jungin-ie… is the center gear of this entire paradox rotor. He’s the central axis of the paradox clock. Like the eye of a storm, all the paradoxes happened with Jungin-ie at the center. So Jungin-ie’s existence is fixed within any timeline.”

Seo Jungin, shaken by the incredible story, finally had his pupils light up with the embers of hope that were kindling again. Jo Heechan, who had been listening to the story with a look of headache, grabbed his head and opened his mouth.

“I don’t get what you’re saying, but so, in conclusion, we can see the Hyungs again, right?”

“Yes. We can definitely see them again.”

“Taeyong Hyung, Woohyun-ie Hyung, all of them?”

Kim Yikyung nodded his head, full of conviction.

“Yes. All of them.”

While Jo Heechan abruptly hugged Seo Jungin and, on that pretext, showered him with kisses, Kim Yikyung lightly held Kang Sunghwan’s shoulder and looked into his beautiful green eyes.

“So, Mr. Kang Sunghwan. Would you please summon my dead teammates here for me?”

💘

Crackle. Fwaaaah.

The bolt of lightning that shot out from his outstretched hand gathered its last strength and shone in the air. A black Toxin Level settled in his head, and all his nerves, from their very ends, screamed as they were burned away by the powerful force of the electric shock.

Before swallowing the D-Toxin capsule, Hwang Woohyun looked at the Polaroid picture for the last time. In the frame, only two people were captured. It was himself, smiling, and Seo Jungin, with a surprised face.

I wanted to continue the stopped time in the photo with you. I wanted to walk through the coming time with you and try so many things. If I cannot greet that time with you, then I think it would be good to remain forever in the time of this photo.

Jungin-ah. Seo Jungin. I really liked you. I really loved you.

Goodbye. Jungin-ah.

“Woohyun-ah!”

Hwang Woohyun was about to put the capsule in his mouth but stopped his hand at the sound of Seo Jungin’s voice.

Is it an auditory hallucination? This voice. Is it my last wish, to hear your voice just one more time?

I shouldn’t turn around. If I turn around, I don’t think I can possibly let go of my lingering feelings.

“I won’t leave you behind here alone. I won’t let you die like the other kids. I’m going to fight with you!”

Jungin-ah. Ha…… Seo Jungin. How could I not turn around. After hearing your voice, how could I possibly not turn around.

Hwang Woohyun, unable to bear it any longer, turned around. From a distance, Seo Jungin was running toward him with a face full of tears. Seeing that face, it was so maddeningly painful and pitiful that his heart felt like it would shatter into pieces. If only I could be held in those arms one more time.

“Jungin…….”

In that moment, Seo Jungin’s face flashed by and disappeared, and everything was covered in pitch black. In the darkness, only Hwang Woohyun’s existence was shining. His body, which felt no sense of gravity as if swimming through the darkness, was enveloped in a golden aura.

Whenever he looked around or moved his hand, gold dust poured out like it was being scattered in all directions, sparkling. And the sparkling dust that enveloped Hwang Woohyun’s body was creating a path in the darkness with a single stream, as if guiding him somewhere.

‘Maybe… did I die? Is this now me going to the afterlife… something like that?’

Hwang Woohyun was quietly floating along the sparkling light that headed toward only one place in the pitch-black darkness.

How much time had passed. Unable to even recognize if the place he was in was a space, he just floated along the golden path, continuously recalling the tear-stained face of Seo Jungin that he had last seen. And finally, when the dazzling light pouring from the end of the golden path covered his entire vision and then released Hwang Woohyun. Hwang Woohyun could tell what that sparkling gold dust that had guided him was.

Before Hwang Woohyun’s eyes, Seo Jungin, as if clad in gold, was watching him, crying with a face that looked as if his entire heart would collapse.

“Heu-heu-heuk, Woohyun-ah, heuk,”

“Jungin-ah…….”

Hwang Woohyun stared blankly at Seo Jungin, who was enveloped in an unbelievably ecstatic light.

‘Is this a dream? Am I dreaming? Or a fantasy? Am I experiencing a fantasy?’

He blinked his eyes a few times and looked around. A large bed with white curtains drawn. A hospital ward. A VIP-exclusive bed. There, he was lying down in a dirty uniform that was still giving off smoke from its remaining heat.

What happened. Am I in a fantasy?

But in Hwang Woohyun’s hand, proof remained that everything was stark reality. The D-Toxin capsule and the Polaroid picture were still clutched in his hand.

“Woohyun-ah. I’ll guide you.”

Seo Jungin whispered affectionately, gently took Hwang Woohyun’s hand, and removed the Polaroid print and the D-Toxin capsule.

“Guiding. You said guiding? Jungin-ah. What does that… Oop?”

As Hwang Woohyun muttered blankly, Seo Jungin pressed his body against him and rubbed their lips together. Through the mucous membrane and tongue that touched Seo Jungin’s, an unbelievably ecstatic wavelength flowed in like a flood. In that hot, surging power, the Toxin Level in his body was cleansed in a single breath.

That wasn’t all. Hwang Woohyun was hit with a sense of euphoria and a pleasure so intense it felt like his eyes would roll back, incomparable to any time he had been guided by Seo Jungin before, and he absolutely could not keep his wits about him.

“Oop, heup, ah, haah, chuup, oop.”

“Nng, oop, chuup, chuup.”

Seo Jungin burrowed into Hwang Woohyun’s embrace and frantically put his own tongue into his mouth, rubbing them together. The more he did so, the more Hwang Woohyun’s body lost all strength, and he couldn’t control his eyes from rolling back.

It was an overwhelming guiding. Also, it wasn’t just guiding; something was happening to the power of lightning that was settled in his solar plexus. His head flashed as if lightning was striking inside his body. Just like when he had first awakened his ability, the power of lightning was newly spreading out to the ends of his blood vessels and nerves.

‘Ah, what is this? What on earth is this. It doesn’t feel like guiding, it feels like I’m newly awakening. Ah, I think I’m going to die.’

Finally, the moment the essence of that power flashed as if heading toward a climax, running along his spine and striking his brainstem like a thunderbolt, Hwang Woohyun’s eyes rolled back, and only then did Seo Jungin’s lips part.

“Ah, haah, what is this… it’s too… aah…….”

“Haah, heuk, Woohyun-ah, heuk,”

Where he was right now. How Seo Jungin had come to be able to guide again. What this sensation was, of lightning flashing and exploding inside his body. Hwang Woohyun had so many things he wanted to ask amidst the confusion, but he couldn’t get a single word out. While his mind was a jumbled mess, only the desire to hold Seo Jungin was welling up with a frightening intensity.

“Haah, haah, c, can I? Haah, haah, ca, can I touch you?”

“Heuk, heu-euk, yes, you can touch me. Ugh-heuk, you can do it. Woohyun-ah. You can do anything.”

Seo Jungin whimpered and clung to Hwang Woohyun. Seo Jungin also couldn’t bear the desire to touch Hwang Woohyun for even a moment. His whole body was maddeningly hot. He wanted to be sucked on all over by Hwang Woohyun’s hot lips and to be touched by his rough palms. He wanted to be held by the Hwang Woohyun he had only dreamed of, even in his fantasies, as quickly as possible, and be roughly thrust into by his large member. He wanted to be pounded so roughly he would faint, and then hear endless whispers of love in his distant ears.

The reset, clean VIP hospital room. To the point where he even forgot that not only the members but also Kang Sunghwan, who had been the Separator, were here right now, Seo Jungin was so desperate to just be held by Hwang Woohyun.

Seo Jungin climbed on top of Hwang Woohyun’s body and unbuttoned his own shirt. Hwang Woohyun, unable to hide his impatient and craving lust any longer, reached out and, with a rough touch, flung Seo Jungin’s shirt wide open. The clinging texture of his skin and his soft, pale pink nipples were laid completely bare.

“Ha, Jungin-ah. I want to suck them.”

The words came out as if by a reflex. Seo Jungin, as if he had unbearably missed even that, gazed at Hwang Woohyun’s pleading eyes that sought permission and wrapped his two hands around his golden head, pulling it toward his own body.

“Jjuup, chuup, keuk……!”

“Ah, haaaah!”

As his nipple was sucked into Hwang Woohyun’s hot mouth, Seo Jungin poured out a tingling wavelength and, in the ultimate satisfaction of having touched the Hwang Woohyun he had so desperately wanted, he came in his pants.

“Haaaah……! Haah…… Ah…….”

“Keuk, keu-heuk.”

Hwang Woohyun, his eyes completely glazed over, panted and wrapped his arms around Seo Jungin’s waist, laying him down on the bed. A rough hand undid the buckle on Seo Jungin’s pants, then grabbed his briefs as well and pulled them all down. When he tossed Seo Jungin’s clothes off the bed, his member, which had become a mess from being rubbed with semen, was laid bare right before Hwang Woohyun’s eyes.

“Ha, haah, you came already? Was it that good, me sucking your chest? Haah, haah, should I suck it more?”

“Hut, heu-eut, everything, everything you do is good. Woohyun-ah, heuk,”

“Haah, haah, am I dead? Am I dead now, and seeing a fantasy?”

“Woohyun-ah, heuk,”

Hwang Woohyun wrapped his hand around Seo Jungin’s member and rubbed it gently, and leaned down to flick his pink nipple with his tongue and lick it.

“Hauk! Ha-eut, heuk!”

“I was thinking I wanted to hold you just one last time. Is this… something like a last wish?”

“Heuk, ugh-heuk, heuk,”

Hwang Woohyun, captured by a distant excitement and amorous desire, caressed Seo Jungin’s cheek and whispered.

“Why have you been crying this whole time. Jungin-ah.”

“Heuk, it’s not that. It’s just… you, eu-heu-heuk, I like you so much, heuk,”

Hwang Woohyun licked up the tears that wet Seo Jungin’s cheeks. Even the touch of the tears was chilling and tingly.

“Eut, haah, Jungin-ah. Me too…….”

“Heuk, nng.”

“I like you so much too. I love you. Jungin-ah.”

Jo Heechan, who was listening to the two’s conversation from beyond the curtain, whispered to Kim Yikyung in a choked voice.

“Hearing Woohyun-ie Hyung’s voice. I think I’m going to cry a little.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

Jo Heechan picked up Seo Jungin’s pants and underwear that had been tossed and had flown to his feet, and whispered.

“If I go and ask to join in, do you think they’ll let me? Jungin Hyung wearing only a shirt. He’s so fucking hot.”

Kim Yikyung, in the same posture of watching the curtained bed, just tilted his head and whispered back in the same way.

“Heechan-ah, I’m thinking of going and stopping them.”

“If you stop them now, Hyung, you’re really, wow. That’s not right. I’m going crazy right now too. The Hyungs who are being summoned will all lose their minds when they get guided, right? How the hell are you gonna stop that.”

Kim Yikyung turned his head and looked at Kang Sunghwan, who was leaning against the sofa in a shower gown. Kang Sunghwan, with his shimmering blond hair falling to his shoulders, seemed at a glance to have fallen asleep. But he was probably now searching for the traces of Seo Jungin’s golden guiding within the infinite spacetime.

If they summoned the members who had died after the ward’s isolation and had received guiding from Seo Jungin, they could revive everyone except for Han Seungmin.

Kim Yikyung silently looked at Kang Sunghwan, lost in thought. The scene he saw in Kang Sunghwan’s dream was only a fleeting moment, so it was possible he hadn’t seen it properly. But he felt like he had definitely seen Han Seungmin’s back as well…….

At that moment, a wavelength of bright green power began to surge from Kang Sunghwan’s body. He had found someone in spacetime who had a trace of Seo Jungin left on him. Beside Seo Jungin. On the bed. A dead member is being summoned.

Kim Yikyung listened intently. Would it be Nam Taeyong? Or would it be ‘me’ after all? Should I not say me? Is it ‘him’ who is now in a state of being completely disconnected?

From inside the drawn curtain, Seo Jungin’s whimpering voice could be heard.

“Eu-heu-heuk, Yikyung Hyung.”

I guess so. To Jungin-ie, the original Kim Yikyung, the replicated Kim Yikyung, each and every person has a different meaning. So, Jungin-ie, you must have had to save the Kim Yikyung who was impaled in ice while being eaten alive by the Creepions back then.

The replicated Kim Yikyung lowered his head, then lifted it again. Whether original or replication, there was no difference in their feelings toward Seo Jungin. The heart of himself, a replication, was also entirely his own. Moreover, with Seo Jungin’s Complete Guiding, he would now not disappear even after 24 hours. He too was a complete Kim Yikyung. His feelings for Seo Jungin were his own, now that the link with the original was severed.

Inside the white curtain, Seo Jungin was hugging the just-summoned Kim Yikyung and pouring out tears.

“Jungin-ah…… what is going on…….”

“Ugh-heuk, Hyung, you know. I’ll explain later. First, receive my guiding. I can guide again.”

Kim Yikyung was confused, unable to understand what was going on. He had definitely been snatched up by the countless hands of the Creepions and dragged into the room, and seeing the sharp teeth lunging at him, he had squeezed his eyes shut with the thought that this was the end.

After that, when he opened his eyes, his body was enveloped in a golden aura and was floating in the darkness. He had been floating along a golden path, and then his whole body was enveloped in a dazzling light, and suddenly he was in Seo Jungin’s arms. Seo Jungin, completely wrapped in golden light, even had his eyes filled with gold, radiating a mysterious rainbow-colored light.

The bed with the white curtain drawn was familiar, but he couldn’t figure out what was happening. Furthermore, Seo Jungin was in a half-naked state, wearing only a wide-open shirt, and Hwang Woohyun, who was ceaselessly kissing that pale body, had his eyes glazed over and had already lost control.

Kim Yikyung’s mind, full of complicated thoughts and questions, soon became no different from Hwang Woohyun’s. Because as soon as Seo Jungin started to kiss him, he could no longer think about anything.

“Haah, Yikyung Hyung.”

“Jungin-ah, chuup,”

The moment he touched Seo Jungin’s lips, Kim Yikyung felt as if all his reason was being blown away entirely by the ecstatic pleasure that rushed in along with a guiding wavelength hotter than before.

“Ha, Jungin-ah, wait, just a moment, ah…….”

Kim Yikyung was instantly consumed by the tingling pleasure pouring in from Seo Jungin, and other than the thought of wanting to enter that body right away, nothing else came to mind. It was a wavelength stronger, faster, and more maddening than before. It was impossible to maintain his sanity.

Kim Yikyung pushed away Seo Jungin’s shoulder as he clung to him and panted.

“Haah, wait a minute, it’s too, ah…… When you kiss me, I feel like I’m going crazy.”

“Heuk, let me do it. I want to. I missed you so much. I wanted to see you so, so much.”

Kim Yikyung no longer had the patience to stop him from clinging and kissing him again. Completely intoxicated by the tingling sensation that Seo Jungin’s lips passed on, Kim Yikyung eventually threw away all his reason.

Kim Yikyung, who had been showering kisses down on Seo Jungin, who was lying between Hwang Woohyun and his own body, took his half-erect, filthily wet member into his mouth in a single motion. He could feel all of Seo Jungin’s semen on the tip of his tongue, but even that was sweet and chilling.

“Ah, hauk, Yikyung Hyung, ha-eung.”

Kim Yikyung, starting from the soft and moist glans, meticulously and strongly took it into his mouth with his lips and began to suck deeply all the way to the root.

Kim Yikyung sucked up and swallowed all the bodily fluids smeared on Seo Jungin’s member and even sucked up all the precum that was leaking out in trickles from the urethral opening. Each time, an unbearably tingling sensation ran up his spine, and Kim Yikyung couldn’t even breathe properly.

“Eut, Jungin-ah, what happened. How again, like this.”

“Nng, eut, eut, Hyung…… eu-eup!”

Seo Jungin was startled by Kim Yikyung’s finger that had suddenly invaded his mouth, but soon licked that finger affectionately with his tongue and began to suck it earnestly.

“Keuk, ah…… Jungin-ah.”

Kim Yikyung’s whole mind grew dizzy from the feeling of Seo Jungin’s mouth, which was tingling all over as if electricity was flowing, and the touch of his soft, hot tongue on his fingers. He gently swirled the fingers he had put in his mouth to wet them with saliva, and licked up the smooth mound wetly with his pliant tongue.

He licked his soft belly and slender waist, then pulled on his shirt and covered his chest with his lips and sucked. Licking higher and higher, he sucked on the luscious line of his neck, and nibbled on his earlobe with his teeth, pouring out his breath, and a low sigh escaped from Seo Jungin.

Just like that, he pulled the two fingers, soaked in saliva, out of Seo Jungin’s mouth and brought them down, gently pushing them into his small, tight back hole.

“Ha, haaak……!”

Since Hwang Woohyun’s fingers were already moving in and out of the hole in the flesh split beneath Seo Jungin’s scrotum, the place for Kim Yikyung’s fingers to delve into was naturally the hole located below it. The inside of the hole was hot, tight, and wet, and tingly.

Kim Yikyung licked Seo Jungin’s earlobe with his tongue or pulled on it and sucked, while simultaneously thrusting his fingers into the hole below.

“Ah! Aah, ha-eung, nng!”

With two men’s fingers entering and exiting two holes, all sorts of obscene and slick sounds flowed out ceaselessly from below Seo Jungin along with slippery fluid.

“Ah! Haah! Yikyung Hyung, haut, U, Woohyun-ah, aah…….”

Hwang Woohyun, whether it was Seo Jungin’s neck, shoulders, arms, or armpits, scratched every place his lips touched with his teeth and sucked with his lips, leaving marks. When he licked the tightly erect nipple, he couldn’t bear it and groaned at the tingling sensation. At the same time, his thick, calloused fingers were delving into Seo Jungin’s hole and stirring gently.

“A-heuk, Woohyun-ah, ha-euk.”

“Ha, haah, inside your body, it’s so hot and completely wet, ha…… It’s really driving me crazy.”

Hwang Woohyun’s kind and gentle face was disheveled and deeply colored with lust. The thick nape of his neck was tense and hard, and the mouth that always smiled gently was baring its teeth and letting out ragged breaths. His glistening, sweaty skin and his darkened eyes were burning blue as he looked into Seo Jungin’s face.

“I want to put it in. Please. Let me put it in. I want to put it in here right now.”

Hwang Woohyun whispered frantically and thrust his rough fingers into the wet and soft flesh. The inner mucous membrane, soaked in the slick fluid Seo Jungin had leaked, swallowed and devoured the thick fingers without resistance.

“Nng! Nnng! Hut! Woohyun-ah……!”