“Ahjussi.”
“What is it.”
“Do I, smell by any chance?”
Smell. A chemical reaction caused by specific molecules carried by the air stimulating the olfactory receptors of the nasal cavity.
Thus, this sense of smell she was giving off was indeed a ‘smell’.
“No.”
“Then why are you pushing your nose towards me?”
“Because it smells good.”
“So I do smell.”
“But it’s a good smell.”
Bom pulled her body back, so Yu Jitae had to push his body forward by that much.
“Hmm… this thing. It’s nothing much actually,” Bom said with a nervous look on her face.
“You mean the scent?”
“Yes. It’s just a natural scent that spreads with the pulse of a green dragon’s heart. It’s very common actually…”
“I know.”
“Then why…?”
“To be honest, there is something else I am curious about.”
“Is it smell? Is there a different smell?”
“No.”
“Then what is it?”
Since her back was already on the backrest of the chair, there was no further retreat for her. Yu Jitae’s body was a lot larger than hers and thus his body was about to cover her body.
“I need to be a little closer to know what it is.”
“What is that. What do you even mean…”
When they were that close, he found it hard to look into her eyes because it was perplexing. His gaze therefore travelled down to her nose. He had been unconcerned about it before but her nose was pretty so he lowered his gaze even further.
Looking at her red lips brought a surge of perplexity yet again so his gaze travelled even further down. Under her neck, revealed behind her u-neck shirt was her white skin and her collarbone. That place was also unsuitable for his gaze but with that said, lowering his gaze from here on was even more unsuitable. It would be a disrespectful attitude so Bom would probably not like it.
Then should he look at her feet or her stomach? Thinking about it like that, there was nowhere on the body of this hatchling where he could rest his eyes.
Once again raising his gaze, he looked into her grass-coloured eyes. Bom was nervous and her eyes were drooping low as if she was slightly scared. Since it was always hard to tell her inner thoughts, the Regressor couldn’t figure out whether this was a made-up expression or if it was a result of her honest emotions.
In times like this, he tended to brush it aside thinking to himself that there must be a reason.
Daily life was difficult and he was a broken human. By nature there were things he couldn’t understand but he was not planning on disregarding the matter today just because he couldn’t understand it.
This was an extremely important matter.
He asked.
“Bom. Are you scared of me?”
Bom quietly pondered before giving a small nod.
“Why.”
“Because someone bigger is like, coming towards me.”
“You are a dragon. And no matter how big I am, I’m just a human.”
“But still.”
“Still?”
“I’m smaller right now…”
With a slightly frightened look, or perhaps a glaring look, she appeared nervous.
“You are a bit weird,” he said.
“Sorry?”
“Wasn’t it you that were doing whatever you pleased. You were the one controlling the gap and teased me knowing I was feeling troubled.”
“Yes…”
“And yet you are scared of me approaching you? Does that not sound weird to you?”
He thought to himself.
There was something that did not make sense in Bom’s behaviour.
It was somewhat understandable for her to laugh at his perplexity because he too felt amused teasing Gyeoul and Yeorum.
And the birth of a different emotion in that process was also understandable. He knew how Bom had faint romantic feelings for himself and ridiculously enough, he too was feeling some strange emotions.
Then what was the reason for Bom to fear himself?
“It’s fine for me to go near you,” she said.
“Why.”
“Because ahjussi will be normal.”
“What do you mean by normal?”
“The same as yesterday and the day before.”
Once again, it was her unique way of speech and it was clear that she was trying to enshroud the topic at hand in obscurity. However, he decided to be more stubborn this time.
“Yes. Let’s say you’re right. So you mean I can’t go near you?”
“Yes…”
“Isn’t that weird? Didn’t you want to monopolise me.”
“When did I say that?”
“You said it. About how you wanted to have the cake by yourself.”
“Well that’s, umm… because, cakes are tasty…”
Seemingly realising how nonsensical her words sounded as she said them, her lips quivered and closed. Her eyes avoided his eyes as her gaze turned even more anxious.
That frown – it seemed that Bom wasn’t aware of how the reluctant look on her face was stimulating Yu Jitae even more.
“You’re a bit strange.”
Bom opened her mouth and talked back.
“You are also strange today, ahjussi.”
“What about me.”
“You usually never do this to me.”
“What am I even doing.”
“Look. You look as if you are trying to eat me…”
Yu Jitae thought to himself.
From who knows when, the range of his perplexity had widened. Even when it wasn’t an embarrassing situation; even when they weren’t overly close; even when Bom wasn’t looking into his eyes and even when she wasn’t softly whispering into his ears.
He was easily troubled.
By the time he realised it, he was already a step further in. He found Bom pretty and often thought about her. Looking at a pretty hair pin reminded him of her grass-coloured hair and he thought about Bom even when he was looking at other humans.
It was no longer an issue that could be glossed over. He may be inexperienced but was no fool.
He wasn’t clueless –
About the fact that this was similar to ‘romantic feelings’.
The Regressor valued logic above everything else. He couldn’t logically understand the birth of romantic feelings inside him. It was impossible for such things to occur nor should they and besides, there wasn’t even a clear cause was there?
“Why am I like this, you ask?”
“Yes…”
“I don’t really get it either.”
Like the unspecific time frame of an ice melting, he couldn’t specify the exact moment it began so Yu Jitae couldn’t believe the fact that there were such emotions existing inside him.
He needed certainty.
“That’s why I’m going to look into it now.”
“Into what? Ah…”
Finishing his words, Yu Jitae carefully reached his hand out and touched her cheek. When she gave a startled look on her face, a gush of perplexity rose in his heart, almost enough to suffocate him to death.
“Tell me if you don’t like it.”
Since this ‘perplexity’ had caused him to turn away from those situations, he wasn’t able to clearly discern his emotions till now.
“Ahjussi. Wait.”
“…”
“What if someone comes in…”
“No-one will.”
Lowering his body, he went even closer to her body. The scent tickling his nose became even denser.
“You can’t…”
Bom didn’t say she hated it, even though she was so scared that she was almost about to cry.
…The cause of this absurd situation was what happened a few days ago.
***
The next morning after their return from Las Vegas, Yu Jitae headed out with Bom early in the morning and bought food. The breakfast menu of that day was black bean noodles with sweet and sour deep fried pork. It was one of Kaeul’s favourite menus but since Yeorum was especially into spicy food, they ordered some spicy noodles on top.
Unit 301 was filled with tension that morning.
“…”
“…”
It was because Yeorum, who tended to avoid Kaeul these days, was having breakfast with them. Yeorum was silent and so was Kaeul because she knew how Yeorum was being conscious of her.
Gyeoul stole a glance at Bom. In return, Bom caressed her hair so thinking that it wasn’t anything important, Gyeoul immersed herself in her noodles.
Meanwhile, Bom glanced at Yu Jitae. He faintly shook his head to the side telling her to not worry about it.
And soon, Yeorum broke the silence.
“Yu Kaeul.”
“Huh, uh?”
“You became that transcendent cadet or whatever.”
“Ah. Nn…”
In fact, Kaeul had failed the test. She had returned with 17 seconds left on the clock but it was quite late compared to other successful cadets.
However, the details of her test were overwhelmingly unconventional and her name was being mentioned more than thousands of times a day on the internet. Since that was the case, Lair made her an exception and seated her as one of the transcendent cadets.
Kaeul had become one of the five transcendent cadets of Ha Sukmoo, but for some reason, she didn’t look too happy.
“Well done.”
“Uh, t, thank…”
“You did well, but if you try to get on my level just because of that, I’ll smack you alright.”
“Nn…?”
“You might think something like this. You and I are both in the same grade, received the same military education and we’re both dragons. So you might be able to fight against me on the same level. Right?”
Yeorum picked up her chopstick and pointed it at Kaeul. In her hand, it looked like a chisel.
“I’ll actually f*cking smack you then.”
Kaeul frantically waved her hands in front of her body in response.
“Ehew. No…! Me on the same level? If you wanted to, I’m sure you can break all my limbs!”
“Hmm. Right…”
“Why would we even fight? Umm, if we, uhh, go and save people together, I think that would be awesome…!”
The table turned silent after her words. Although Yeorum was silent, she appeared quite content but that instead proved how much she was conscious of Kaeul.
“And also, just because your output’s a little good, don’t go everywhere shooting spells.”
“Unn?”
“You can’t control it at all can you. Doesn’t your heart feel empty after a spell? And your fingers tremble and feel burnt?”
“Ah, unn…”
“That’s a problem, you know. You’re simply pouring out mana while your body is unable to handle it. If it runs out that fast like a premature ejaculation, you’ll be useless when you’re actually trying to save someone, you get that?”
“Uunn… Thanks for your advice.”
On the outside, Kaeul appeared to be obediently following her advice and there wasn’t any change in their hierarchy.
But there was an incident during the meal. It happened when both Kaeul and Yeorum picked up the same piece of pork. With a servile smile, Kaeul released her chopsticks while Yeorum comfortably brought the pork after confirming the hierarchy.
The problem happened afterwards because Kaeul took the few remaining pieces of pork and piled them on her plate.
“Oi. Why are you taking everything.”
Yeorum tried to take one of them but that was when Kaeul raised her chopsticks and blocked hers.
Hoh? Thinking that, Yeorum added more power to her grip.
A different light appeared in Kaeul’s eyes. For a split second, a sharp light like that of a blade appeared in her eyes that were looking into Yeorum’s eyes before quickly dissipating. When Yeorum glared back into her eyes, Kaeul flinched and laughed while scratching her head.
She then placed the plate underneath her where the large baby chicken was. Chirpy started diligently chewing the pieces of pork that it got from Kaeul.
“Far out. Just say that you were going to give it to the chicken.”
“S, sorry…”
Kaeul laughed hehe… in a subservient manner.
*
After the meal, Bom talked to both Yeorum and Kaeul separately. Her role was to make the two of them feel competitive against each other while not harming their relationship.
In order to do so, she had to talk to each of them separately.
“Is Yu Kaeul a competitor for me? No? I don’t care a single bit about her. Frankly speaking, her role is different and she just started learning magic so it would be shameless of her to try getting on my level,” replied Yeorum when she was alone with Bom.
“Yeorum-unni? Ehew. Would I even be a match for her? Of course unni is the strongest! I won’t even be able to fight against her. She tries very hard right? And, uumm… there’s no reason for us to fight either.” That was what Kaeul said in response.
“Hmm… you know, by the way.”
“Nn.”
“I don’t really get it because I’m more into physical fights than magic… Ah, don’t take me wrong and just listen. I’m just asking since I’m super curious. Is she really that talented?”
“Of course.”
“…But if we fight, I won’t lose right?”
Yeorum asked.
“By the way. Unni unni.”
“Nn.”
“Uumm, I’ve never heard my mum tell me I was good at using magic so I can’t really understand yet… Am I really a genius? Aren’t all the other dragons the same as me?”
“Of course not.”
“Then… not that I will fight her but… would I be able to win if I fought against Yeorum-unni…?”
Kaeul asked.
In response, Bom pondered before smiling and telling the same thing to the two of them.
“Who knows? Until you actually fight her.”
*
It was while slight tension was budding inside Unit 301.
A message came to Bom via her watch. Surprised, she quickly dashed and looked for Yu Jitae. She found Yu Jitae sitting on the sofa playing a game with Gyeoul.
“Ahjussi.”
“Yeah?”
“I won an award…!”
Bom appeared happy, which was quite a rare sight.
An award?
Yu Jitae checked the message that was on the display screen of her watch.
[Horror Novel Contest Awards]
– Hair Colour Broccoli