Dirty Sweet Baby Chapter 1

His molars throbbed from grinding them too hard.

Heeheon clenched his teeth and tried to sit calmly on the sofa. But the sudden hand tugging open his collar and digging into the nape of his neck was so chilling he couldn’t even think of dodging.

“Ugh…”

“Quit flinching.”

From him came a laugh, like he was amused. As if he meant to tease, his fingertips trailed along Heeheon’s neckline, watching his reaction. Heeheon glared back with fierce eyes, accusing.

“Cut it out, Cha Mugyeol. You’re my younger brother.”

“Brother? What brother. Do people call stepbrothers with no shared blood siblings?”

The touch climbing up his neck sent a shiver down his spine. Mugyeol’s large hand grazed his earlobe on purpose, flicking against Heeheon’s pale rim of ear.

Truthfully, every time they touched, Heeheon broke out in cold sweat. The core in his chest was reacting wildly to Mugyeol’s presence. Still immature because he was in the early stage of awakening, but resonating with an S-rank Esper’s core was crushingly overwhelming.

“We didn’t grow up brawling together as kids. We met after we were already grown, in a remarried family. And now you expect me to treat you like a brother? Isn’t that ridiculous?”

“…”

“Besides, Baek Heeheon, haven’t you always treated me like I wasn’t even human? Always dismissing me?”

“I never did that. Stop joking around and just finish it.”

“Fine. Let’s say you didn’t.”

Then, the hand leisurely drifting near his ear suddenly seized his jaw.

“But if you hate fooling around so much, then you should have done it properly, hyung. The guiding.”

The grip clamping down was terrifyingly strong. He twisted his head to shake it off, but couldn’t escape. Then Mugyeol’s thumb pressed down on his lower lip and slowly forced its way inside.

“Open your mouth.”

“Ughk…”

“I’ll finish quickly, just like you wanted.”

The hand rubbing at his tongue was merciless. He gave no reprieve, pushing deep to the root of his tongue, stirring until the back of his throat shuddered. Heeheon barely managed to steady his breathing low, focusing on the contact points.

‘It’s fine. This is just guiding. Nothing more than guiding.’

Contact through mucous membranes was far more effective than skin contact, so it was just touching tongues. It didn’t mean anything special. Even if Mugyeol ravaged his mouth until it hurt, there was no need to overreact.

Anyway, until guiding was over, whether he liked it or not, he had to stay stuck to him. Better to grit his teeth and let it happen briefly than waste half a day clinging to his hand.

“Hhh…”

Heeheon’s eyelids trembled faintly. Saliva he couldn’t swallow in time spilled down Mugyeol’s thumb and dripped at the corner of his lips. Maybe it looked filthy, because Mugyeol’s brow furrowed. His face twisted in distaste, scowling—yet strangely, the two of them looked the same like that. Even if their features didn’t resemble each other in the slightest.

“Do it properly. Don’t dribble like a child.”

When Heeheon gave a small nod to show he understood, Mugyeol’s face only grew harsher. What was it this time that grated on him? His thick thumb jabbed even deeper into Heeheon’s mouth. Heeheon gagged, letting out a sharp sound, but Mugyeol didn’t relent.

At last, Heeheon grabbed his forearm, trying to push it away. Mugyeol didn’t budge. He only muttered in a low, eerie tone.

“You know, you never once acted like a brother. Isn’t it cowardly, hiding behind that sibling relationship now?”

“Th-that, ngh, stop it.”

“I can’t recall ever having a brother like you.”

“Ch—ughk, khh—!”

“Don’t you agree?”

Coughing, Heeheon barely tore himself free of his grip. His mouth was a mess, swollen red and smeared with spit. Breathless, his eyes flushed from the strain. Mugyeol looked down at the gasping Heeheon with eyes cold as frosted glass.

“You’re not my brother.”

“…”

“You’re my guide.”

“…”

“So… from now on, you’d better do the guiding properly. Baek Heeheon.”

W-wait.

Heeheon’s hair stood on end. Mugyeol shoved his shoulder down against the living room sofa, and the knees resisting his hands forcing them apart were bent in against his will. Even his mouth, opened to shout in fury, was quickly silenced.

“…!”

It wasn’t a kiss—it was a harsh, brutal guiding.

Between their ominously locked lips, their tongues entwined deep, leaving a stinging tremor.

*

The truth was, from the very first glance, he had been unsettling.

People like to say “love at first sight,” but Baek Heeheon never believed it. If anything, he thought the opposite must be true. Because from the very first moment he laid eyes on that bastard, he had hated him to the bone.

His mother’s new husband’s only son, heir to a business empire. Arrogant to no end, reckless and shameless. The kind who, as if it were natural, leapt past the ordinary people who struggled and scraped, a lone prodigal beyond compare. A blazing soul that bewitched others, yet sneering down at the moths drawn to him as if they were beneath contempt.

Heeheon hated it. Absolutely.

That bastard, Cha Mugyeol.

He hated him so much it drove him mad.

He hated his jet-black hair that reminded him of a lonely winter night, and his cold eyes like sharpened blades. He feared the deep hollows of his eyes like traps, afraid he might fall in. And whenever he let out a low laugh, it felt as if he had seen straight through Heeheon, mocking him—and it infuriated him.

Why did Cha Mugyeol have to be Cha Mugyeol?

Of all the eyes in the world, why did only his seem so different?

Whenever Mugyeol looked at him, it felt like all the lights in the world went out. Like he was sliding somewhere, falling endlessly.

That was why he hated him. Hated him to death.

From the day eight years ago when his mother remarried. From the moment he became a brother without a drop of blood shared with him, when Mugyeol stepped into his life and drew his first breath there…

Heeheon had always been desperate to escape him.

He didn’t want to be just another disposable part in Mugyeol’s perfect, extraordinary life. He didn’t want to be one of the many who clung to him and ended up destroyed. If he could, he wanted to live without ever getting entangled with him. He knew instinctively—that was the only way to survive.

‘I want to get away.’

‘I want to avoid him.’

‘I mustn’t stay near…’

Maybe heaven answered his desperate wish.

Three years after his mother’s remarriage, five years ago now. On the day he turned twenty, Baek Heeheon underwent the state-mandated second awakening test, and was declared an A-rank guide.

A guide—in other words, an awakened one.

Normally, people were tested at birth and awakened then, but sometimes, like Heeheon, it happened later in adulthood.

Until just a few years ago, belated awakeners had been called “mutants” and executed indiscriminately. But with sweeping military reforms, such barbaric practices had been abolished.

‘I became a guide. And not just any guide—an A-rank guide.’

That meant Heeheon would be relocated not to an ordinary residential district, but to the special residential district where awakened ones lived.

No more blending in with ordinary people, no more normal college life or working life. Now, he would belong to the Center, train to fight the creatures that emerged from the gates, and live as an awakened being.

‘Yeah… This is better.’

So when he received the awakening result, Heeheon felt immense relief.

‘This way, it’s fine.’

Go to the special residential district. Live the life of an awakened one.

Never cross paths with Cha Mugyeol again, never get entangled with him again…

<Heeheon, what are we going to do… My son, what will you do now.>

Though his mother’s eyes brimmed with tears at parting, there was nothing to be done. She had suffered her whole life and finally found new happiness, marrying the owner of Musa Group and starting a new family. Surely she would live well, even without him.

<Don’t be like that, Mother. Isn’t it a blessing? I became an awakened one—it’s like a lightning strike of fortune.>

He had become what others longed to but could never be.

To ordinary people, awakened ones were heroes, saviors chosen by fate.

The media idolized them, showing them gloriously defeating creatures. They lived in luxury in the special residential district, earning salaries of tens, even hundreds of billions, more famous than celebrities. That was what it meant to be an awakened one in this age.

<But awakened ones are so rare. To even enter the special district, you need permits, procedures…>

<Yes. It’ll be hard, but it can’t be helped. I’m ready.>

Heeheon forced a bitter smile, comforting his mother. It was cruel, but at twenty years old, he had only one thought: to leave.

Far away. As far as possible.

To where Cha Mugyeol’s gaze could never reach him.

And so, five years passed.