Salt Society Chapter 34

At first, he simply thought he had spilled body wash. He figured he must have spilled the amenities provided in the bathroom onto his pants and had fallen asleep without noticing, leading to this disaster upon waking up.

“Nngh…!”

But that wasn’t it. Something trickled down, right between his glutes. Startled, Kihyun had to crawl on his knees to escape his own traces. He couldn’t even make it a few steps before he slumped his upper body against the floor, feeling the texture of the bedroom carpet against his cheek.

And it was then. With a beep of the electronic chime, someone burst the guest room door open. There was only one person who would enter in such a sudden manner. If it had been Manager Yoo, he would have pressed the doorbell.

“Cho, Cho Yeonoh, …is that you?”

Kihyun called out to Yeonoh, even as he recognized the trembling in his own voice. However, the person who entered through the room door said nothing. He seemed to just stand there silently, staring intently at Kihyun. Because of the heavy shadows cast over his face, his expression was unreadable, but it was clear that his gaze was fixed on him.

There was a considerable distance between the door and the bedroom where Kihyun lay, but Kihyun stopped breathing at the crushing sense of pressure.

It was a sensation Kihyun was experiencing for the first time. None of his senses—sight, hearing, touch, taste, or smell—were like this. To put it precisely, it was a scent felt through the skin. It was a smell that resembled physical pressure weighing down on the body.

It felt like standing under the branches of exotic flowers in full bloom, only to be smothered by tens of thousands of blossoms. Panting for breath, Kihyun barely managed to lift his head from his collapsed upper body to look forward.

Where had he smelled this scent before? He searched his memories through his hazy mind. Even though nothing specific came to mind, someone’s name tumbled out without hesitation.

“Cho Yeonoh…”

“…”

Standing there was So Kihyun’s Cho Yeonoh. Kihyun received a feeling from Cho Yeonoh that could be described as a first in his life. It was a very strange feeling, not as a childhood friend he grew up with, a crush, or a lover—none of those labels fit.

“Ugh…!”

A short wave of nausea surged. At the same time, the space between his legs trembled uncontrollably. It wasn’t a muscle convulsion from overexerting himself while surfing earlier that day. Somewhere felt heavy yet itchy at the same time.

Kihyun wanted to submerge himself in ice water exactly as he was. He felt he had to. The boundary between reason and instinct was merely a blur. His body had now begun to give off the scent of a syrup made by reducing rum and vanilla. That soft, sweet fragrance, from which all traces of alcohol had evaporated, turned the bedroom air sticky.

However, the opponent’s scent was just as formidable. From Cho Yeonoh’s pheromones, he sensed exotic flowers so full they could not possibly bloom any further. It was as if a scent that could only be smelled under branches laden with a thousand, or ten thousand, such flowers was vibrating through the air.

Even though it was just the scent of flowers, it crushed So Kihyun. Kihyun could only let out stifled gasps. Because that was the overwhelming pressure Cho Yeonoh presented for the first time as an Alpha. The pheromones clung to his skin. Kihyun suffered helplessly, without even knowing what it was.

Very deep from within, heat began to sizzle. The first thing So Kihyun thought of amidst that heat was the instinct to flee.

From what? It wasn’t from Cho Yeonoh. It was from himself. So Kihyun thought he had to run away from himself. He could only think that if he stayed like this, there was no telling what he might do if he grabbed onto Cho Yeonoh.

As he fumbled with his hands to grip the bed and barely stood up, liquid trickled down between his legs. He felt the slick dampness between his glutes. It was as if an unknown liquid had poured out, just like what had happened at the restaurant he went to with Cheoljin. At that sensation, his gaze instinctively dropped toward his lower body.

But there was no time to stand there staring between his legs. So Kihyun tried to get out of there quickly. Because he felt he shouldn’t be caught by Cho Yeonoh. If he showed himself like this to him, something inside him might break.

He was feeling that way without even knowing what his own condition was. Staggering, Kihyun stood up and tried to head toward the bedroom door, taking a wide path around Cho Yeonoh.

“I, today my body is a bit… I caught a cold, so… I’ll sleep alone…”

He tried to walk past him without even finishing the last words. That is, if Cho Yeonoh hadn’t snatched Kihyun’s wrist.

“Let go.”

“…”

Cho Yeonoh did not answer. He hadn’t noticed because his own state was so strange, but come to think of it, Yeonoh’s situation was equally poor. Kihyun found that strange and looked back at Yeonoh.

“You…”

And then he swallowed the words that failed to come out. The front of the PK shirt Cho Yeonoh was wearing was completely disheveled. The buttons were mangled as if they had been torn off. His thick pectoral muscles, appearing swollen, were noticeably rising and falling every time he breathed. On his thick neck, veins were clinging and bulging out.

So Kihyun felt as if he were facing something wild from a very close distance. He felt a similar sensation from the masseter muscles protruding due to his tightly clenched jaw. His face, which usually looked elegant despite his large build, now revealed an unhidable wildness. Kihyun realized instinctively that what was permeating those seemingly delicately crafted features was lust.

He had never received this kind of feeling from Cho Yeonoh before. Kihyun even held his breath involuntarily. It was a minor rebellion to try and stop his scent from settling deep into his lungs, but it didn’t last long. Because the inside of the wrist he was holding began to itch intensely.

“I, I said let go.”

He tried to shake him off convulsively, but it didn’t work. When they played thigh wrestling or arm wrestling, he used to take the victory about once every three times, but the current Cho Yeonoh remained motionless while holding Kihyun.

A warning light turned on once again in So Kihyun’s mind. He didn’t even know what this warning light was for this time. He just felt that he couldn’t go on like this.

At first, he had no thought other than that he must not let Cho Yeonoh discover his condition. He didn’t want him to find out about his back being wet and something slick trickling down between his legs. Even while not knowing what it was.

…If he knew, he would… So Kihyun, who had thought that far, believed he just had to leave the bedroom. But now, he felt a sense of danger in a different sense. He felt he shouldn’t be here any longer. The unknown smell of flowers grew so thick that his nasal passages felt constricted and painful.

Kihyun didn’t realize that his pupils were losing focus on their own. Cho Yeonoh was still silent, and Kihyun felt like he would do anything if he could just escape from this place right now. But his lover and longtime friend, who knew him all too well…

“So Kihyun.”

“…”

By calling his name just once like that, he bought up all of Kihyun’s rebellion at a cheap price. Having surrendered all his refusal to the other, Kihyun regretted the price paid so cheaply, yet he had no choice but to follow as he was pulled.

Ridiculously, their destination was not the bed.

“What are you doing now…?”

Kihyun asked back, finding it strange that Cho Yeonoh was suddenly taking him in front of a console that looked like a vanity table located in a corner of the bedroom. Cho Yeonoh held Kihyun by the waist, positioning him between the console and himself. As the console was pushed, the large mirror attached to the wall rattled along with it.

“What are you… Hey…!”

He had no choice but to cry out in surprise. Because Cho Yeonoh had suddenly thrust his hand inside his pants.

For Kihyun, it was the first time another’s hand had intruded into such a place. In his younger days, they only had a playful sort of romance, and after growing up, he never looked at anyone but Cho Yeonoh. Touching a place so intimate—a touch he hadn’t even received during physical therapy training—made him forget even what kind of physical state he had been in until just a moment ago.

The intruding hand dug straight between Kihyun’s wet glutes. He had no choice but to gasp for breath. It was difficult to understand what was happening to him right now.

Squelch, there was the sound of something viscous that had been pooled in the narrow crevice trickling down. The most horrifying thing was that the sound came from his own body. Unable to believe it, Kihyun’s eyes simply quivered. The fingertips of Kihyun, who was gripping the console, turned white.

“Get out, right now, you son of a bitch—.”

“…”

However, the opponent still said nothing. Even when he tried to squirm his body, he only held Kihyun’s pelvis tighter. Something heavy, like a club, touched the upper part of his buttocks. Not knowing what it was, Kihyun kept moving, but instead, it ended up looking like he was rubbing his buttocks against it. Cho Yeonoh clicked his tongue. Then, with his eyes narrowed, he spoke.

“You aren’t So Kihyun.”

“…What?”

Upon hearing those absurd words, Kihyun’s movements stopped completely. Squish, Yeonoh’s hand pulled out from his waistband. Since it was completely soaked, there was a squelchy sensation of liquid clinging to the hem of Kihyun’s t-shirt and sticking to his waist.

Kihyun looked back, unable to believe his eyes even as he saw it in the mirror. It was because Cho Yeonoh had put his tongue between his index and middle fingers, which were wet with something, and was staring down at Kihyun while licking them.

“What, what are you doing, you crazy bastard—!”