Snake Venom Ch 36

 

Chapter 36

His windpipe was being crushed, making even breathing a struggle, but Yeonwoo felt he had to respond somehow. He barely managed to speak.

“I… I don’t understand what you mean, Team Leader.”

Eat him? What a horrifying thing to say.

“Team Leader?”

Cheon Wooshin tilted his head, repeating the title with a lift in his voice. As he loosened his grip, Yeonwoo coughed desperately, and Cheon Wooshin stared down at him in silence. Then, one corner of his mouth curled upward in a crude and vicious sneer.

“Ahh.”

A languid sigh slipped out between softly parted lips.

“Yeonwoo.”

Cheon Wooshin addressed him precisely, then twisted his lips again in a crooked smile. Between his curled lips, fangs were faintly visible—unnaturally long, more like those of a beast than a human. His dark eyes gleamed.

“You were mine.”

At that very moment, damp pheromones poured out. The scent of clean earth soaked by rain slithered like a snake and clung to Yeonwoo’s skin. It was so intense, restraint seemed meaningless. Not even hybrids released pheromones this hastily or rudely. To Yeonwoo, it felt more like an assault.

“Ugh.”

Yeonwoo reflexively tried to cover his nose, but his wrist was caught. The grip was so vicious it ached down to the bone. It wasn’t just the scent. The influence was so heavy it felt like viscous fluid dripping onto him, making his vision spin. If this were to seep into him… the mere thought was terrifying. Yeonwoo had never been so blatantly drenched in someone else’s pheromones before.

“Hngh, ah…”

As Yeonwoo twisted his wrist to break free, a sharp nose abruptly brushed against his earlobe. Cheon Wooshin, driven by instinct, pressed his nose deep into the spot below Yeonwoo’s ear where the pheromones were thickest. The sound of him inhaling sharply, sshhh, rang in Yeonwoo’s eardrums. He whispered.

“If you let me eat…”

His lips brushed Yeonwoo’s skin, and the low rumble of his voice trembled through them.

“I won’t devour you.”

What… what does that even mean? Though Yeonwoo was trembling, consumed by the pheromones, he was also dumbfounded. He had no idea how to respond to such a selfish and absurd statement.

A sharp sensation pricked his nape. It was the unnaturally lengthened fangs. Then a cold, soft piece of flesh brushed against Yeonwoo’s delicate skin. Before he could even comprehend what it was, the damp flesh clung to his bare skin, dragging upward in a sticky stroke as if carving a path. The fine hairs on his skin stood on end.

“……!”

Yeonwoo snapped back to his senses in an instant.

He shoved at Cheon Wooshin’s chest and scrambled away. The moment he got to his feet, he frantically wiped his damp skin. Rubbing at his neck, Yeonwoo stumbled backward.

It was a tongue. A tongue. He had just licked him.

From that spot upward, heat flared. Among hybrids, pheromone-laced fluids were used to stimulate each other, but Yeonwoo had never heard of human bodily fluids affecting a hybrid. Yet, even while telling himself it was impossible, his body was reacting.

What on earth…? His mind was a mess. The only thing he knew for certain was that, if not for the booster suppressant, he didn’t know how he would have been swept away by Cheon Wooshin’s provocation. That thought was so unbearably disturbing that Yeonwoo found himself hit with a second wave of shock.

Cheon Wooshin, who had been sprawled carelessly where he was pushed, rose to his feet.

Fully upright, the sheer pressure of his presence was overwhelming.

“Why refuse me right away? I think we’d be a pretty good match.”

His cocky tone and smile made him look like a mischievous young man—or an insolent brute. He walked straight toward Yeonwoo.

His wide strides were both unhurried and unrelenting, like a predator tightening its trap. Naturally, Yeonwoo was the prey.

Yeonwoo fumbled with stiff hands as he staggered backward. What on earth was going on? That man didn’t seem like Cheon Wooshin at all. Not even in Sodom had he felt fear like this—this was something on a completely different level. His mouth went dry. He stuttered.

“T-Team Leader, snap—”

“Do you see this?”

Cheon Wooshin gave a slight nod downward, guiding Yeonwoo’s gaze between his legs. His groin was bulging, swollen thick and curved to the left.

There could only be one thing there. He grasped it brazenly, showing off its size, and slowly stroked it. The veins and tendons on the back of his hand bulged visibly.

“Feels like it’s about to burst.”

Yeonwoo was momentarily hypnotized. The thick column, the graceful fingers, the obscene movement of his hand—he couldn’t help but stare. Then, as if burned, he turned his head away and wiped at his flushed cheek.

That wasn’t something the gentlemanly Cheon Wooshin would ever do. It was like a completely different personality. So that’s what it meant to lose one’s mind.

“I feel like I have to unload it somewhere. Anywhere.”

So vulgar, so crude.

“Right now, I’d prefer your hole.”

Every word made Yeonwoo want to scrub out his ears. He’d never imagined Cheon Wooshin could utter something so filthy. Maybe that’s why he felt dizzy. Yeonwoo stared at him, eyes filled with disbelief. Cheon Wooshin smiled, as if relishing that look of horror.

“What are you doing?”

Even his casually tossed words made Yeonwoo’s skin crawl.

“Weren’t you trying to run?”

There was barely five meters between them. The only reason the distance had grown was because Cheon Wooshin had stopped walking, but that only made the gap feel more meaningless.

How could “I’m letting you go” sound so terrifying? Cheon Wooshin stretched his neck slowly, like a predator waking from slumber.

“Or should I start counting?”

He was saying this was Yeonwoo’s last chance. Yeonwoo glanced sideways at the front door. He fought back the overwhelming urge to dash for it and instead forced himself to speak. If this was the last chance Cheon Wooshin was giving, he wanted to use it to confirm one thing.

“Do you remember that we’re on the same team?”

Being on the same team meant not hurting or killing each other. It meant recognizing each other’s abilities, respecting one another beyond hierarchy. Protecting each other in danger, and doing your part when it came to work. It definitely did not mean harassing or coercing each other like this.

Cheon Wooshin rolled his eyes theatrically, scanning the surroundings as if pretending to seriously consider it for Yeonwoo’s sake. Then he stared at him directly. His mocking smile grew more dazzlingly sinister.

“So what?”

He responded lightly, leaning against the wall.

“Pretty sure you’re not.”

With practiced ease, Cheon Wooshin slipped his hands into his pockets and moved his lips. Though he spoke no sound, the shape of his mouth was unmistakable.

“If I catch you, you’re dead.”

Even without him specifying how, Yeonwoo knew exactly what he meant. Pressing his lips tightly together, Yeonwoo glared at him with resentful eyes.

…That man’s not our team leader.

That conclusion brought a chilling clarity. Yeonwoo’s gaze darted sharply. His phone was closer to Cheon Wooshin. Whatever he tried to do, he’d only end up taking the bait. The best option was to escape first. Yeonwoo turned and bolted toward the entrance.

Cheon Wooshin had been poisoned by serpent venom. His reason had entirely evaporated, leaving only a savage temperament in its place. And however it had happened, he had become an entirely different person, shocking Yeonwoo to the core. It was like his very soul had been replaced. The Cheon Wooshin Yeonwoo admired was gone.

As he sprinted down the hallway, the front door quickly came into view.

Cheon Wooshin had once taken out armed groups with no gun and could shoot a target in the head with a single bullet. And now, with a ferocious, lawless attitude layered on top of that skill? He was basically a walking time bomb, an unleashed beast.

Right now, he might be acting like a sated predator, but if he decided to act, devouring Yeonwoo would take no effort at all. Sharing space with such an unpredictable being was a death sentence.

Even so, Yeonwoo hesitated in front of the door. He could just run and call for help, but his feet refused to move.

Cheon Wooshin had already shown him the fate of other addicts who suffered side effects.

A colonel who couldn’t resist his hunger and ate his own family was executed by firing squad. A businessman who raped and murdered three times in a state of amnesia jumped from a skyscraper.

Even if one avoided the worst-case scenario, being labeled a national threat would land you in a lab as a test subject. Neither money nor power nor citizenship could stop it. Once declared abnormal, the next step was inevitable: restraint and relentless experimentation until death. There were no exceptions.

If Yeonwoo ran away and left him behind, Cheon Wooshin would suffer the same fate. Having kept his addiction secret, Cheon Wooshin was both a criminal and a threat. He’d be dragged off—either to prison or to a lab.

“Am I human… or half-human?”

That’s what he had asked. Of Yeonwoo, the one who had distinguished countless humans from hybrids by scent. In a way, he had asked the one person he trusted most for an answer.

“Run.”

The desperate command to push Yeonwoo away—it might not have been a misunderstanding after all.