TFN C20

Chapter 20

Cheongmun, seeing Wonhyo suddenly ask him to take his hand, identified which teammate was knocking outside the door.

Each time the door rattled, Wonhyo’s shoulders jerked; taking in the way he startled, Cheongmun raised his voice.

“Step away from the door.”

“Oh? Are you in—pardon?”

“For a moment, please vacate your current position.”

“Yes, just a moment.”

Deputy Manager Choi A-cheong retreated.

Though Wonhyo brightened and glanced at the door, it didn’t seem far enough to satisfy him.

While Wonhyo’s attention was out in the hall, Cheongmun set him down and, taking the glove’s fingertip between his teeth, tugged it off.

He recalled removing his glove and marking the cub form Wonhyo had taken by making contact.

If, while being carried, he asked to “hold hands,” he likely wanted a re-creation of that moment.

“Does contact halt the change?”

Bare skin met bare skin.

Hooking finger to finger, Cheongmun looked down at the crown of Wonhyo’s head, his neck drawn in.

Though human body temperature should be much the same, Wonhyo flinched as if burned and reflexively tried to yank his hand away, but Cheongmun held on hard.

“Exposed to powerful ‘ghostly energy.’ (…in progress…87.4%)”

The jump was smaller than before, but the number climbed again.

“Why is it rising? It definitely stopped last time.”

Wonhyo murmured, thrown.

“Found the team leader?”

“So he’s here?”

“Seems he’s in the bathroom; told us to step away from the door for a bit.”

Voices outside layered on.

“What?”

As the voices drew closer again, Wonhyo met Cheongmun’s gaze.

Wouldn’t it be faster to open the door and drive them off?

But to say that, he’d have to explain that someone out there was the problem.

Claim a teammate was possessed or contaminated by contact with a ghost—would anyone believe it?

Usually, when he said such things, people behaved like they’d just heard a joke.

Until he showed it directly, they didn’t believe; he could show it now too, but he looked liable to tip into penalty state the moment they crossed paths.

“What about increasing the area of contact?”

“Pardon?”

When Wonhyo lifted his head, not understanding, fingers flashed, unwinding the scarf; then they slipped in to touch the nape.

“Ugh!”

He hunched his neck.

Watching his reaction, Cheongmun gripped the other glove in his teeth, stripped it, and cupped the nape with both hands.

“Not yet, it seems.”

Seeing him still frozen and unable to answer, Cheongmun lowered his head.

“Please consider this an emergency measure.”

As the hands left his nape, Wonhyo gave up on breathing altogether at the soft, firm touch on his throat and the fingers sliding beneath his T-shirt.

Right below the ear rim, an unfamiliar breath sounded.

“Still the same?”

The low voice right above the pulse came far too close.

Perhaps when one’s bewilderment exceeds a threshold, it circles a full 360 and returns to a calm, nothing state.

As the fog cleared to an almost pleasant blankness, he took stock.

Aside from contact made in animal form, touch seemed useless.

Then at least if he transformed, contact would work—except he’d read that if one became a lizard or a carp, human body heat could burn.

So the best method now was to be caged immediately after transforming—in that semi-transparent cube he’d used before—and be transported home.

He lifted his hand and rubbed the corner of his eye.

“Exposed to powerful ‘ghostly energy.’ (…in progress…95.2%)”

As if to announce the imminence—and, unlike with other beasts, to warn that life itself was at stake—scales sprouted across the back of his hand.

It definitely wasn’t a lizard.

Even under the bathroom’s dim light, fish scales glowed with an iridescent sheen; calmly, he spoke.

“If I turn into a carp, the water temperature needs to be between 15 and 20 degrees, and don’t handle me with bare hands.”

If only he’d stocked a basin and water at the right temperature in his inventory.

But if this was the stage before dragon, then carp meant a full-grown form, likely.

Some fish forms could be newly hatched; that case needed warmer water.

“Do you know the temperature of the tap?”

He’d never plunged into tap water as a carp, but it had to be better than air… right?

This could be a literal last statement—he wanted to rattle off every caution he knew, but time was short.

Please, just don’t let me die.

At that moment, the man holding him lifted his head. With this, the chance of being burned the instant he transformed seemed gone.

If you’d just lift your hands from my waist as well, thanks—

“Before you leave a final statement, let’s try one more thing.”

“What—?”

The mask covering his nose and mouth slid down under Cheongmun’s hand.

Beyond a full 360, the gauge of bewilderment began to spin again.

A tongue that wasn’t his slid past his lips.

Hot, slick, and firm, flesh grazed the palate and entered, laving the tongue startled by the intrusion.

Wonhyo tried to break away in shock, but Cheongmun held him fast.

The other’s breath drifted soft over skin; the slow movement of the tongue swept through his mouth.

Every hair on his body stood on end.

He squeezed his eyes shut.

He couldn’t bear it otherwise.

Good lord.

That was the only phrase that came to mind.

Like a wave crashing in all at once, it carried him, the languid tickle of breath teasing him as it receded.

Body heat.

Could something like this be tied to a single word—heat? As it faded, his knees buckled.

The hand at his waist steadied him upright.

Panting as if reclaiming stolen breath, he raised his head.

Cheongmun studied him with a face impossibly composed.

Even as his own heart thundered.

“How is it?”

Wonhyo dragged his gaze to the status window in front of him.

“An unknown force has partially purified ghostly energy. (In progress… 66%)”

The figure that had raced toward 99% dropped sharply in an instant.

Without knowing why, a low sound rumbled in his throat.

“Emergency measure, achieved.”

“Good.”

Apparently not intending to pry, the unreadable face lowered its gaze and looked at him steadily.

There was nothing more said.

Instead, the hands at his waist released and stepped back, one pace, very slowly.

Wrestling his spinning thoughts into place, Wonhyo reached a conclusion: he didn’t know the principle, but standing here, after… that—mouth-to-mouth—purification had occurred.

When he’d come to the Agency, he’d thought a simple handclasp “just in case” might do; it turned out stronger contact was needed. That was that.

All right. No problem.

Now that he’d been saved, should he say thank you?

But “sorry for making you do mouth-to-mouth with a fish”—that sounded wrong.

And no one had ever touched him this directly; who knew what misfortune might fall on Cheongmun after this? Apologizing would only look more suspicious; better to drop that.

Words like first kiss and first mouth-touch thrashed at the bottom, but he shoved them back beyond the unconscious.

There had clearly been no thread of fate allowing him to touch another like this—what trick was this?

And even if such a tie formed—here, in a bathroom, like this? If only it had been in cherry blossom season—yeah, right.

He scrubbed his face with a palm.

He’d lost himself for too long.

As soon as he finished the dry wash, Cheongmun caught his eye and silently lifted a corner of his mouth.

“Has the problem vanished entirely, or is the symptom only temporarily relieved?”

If he revealed it was a penalty from a failed class quest, that face looked ready to fix it.

He checked the status window again.

The “unknown force” had, because of mouth-to-mouth with Cheongmun, applied to the penalty; then the energy had purified, the accumulated ghost-load dropping into safe range.

Since the cause hadn’t been removed, it would climb again—but for now, the window was quiet.

“It seems to be a temporary halt… but if I touch the cause again, I don’t know what will happen.”

He let the sentence trail off.

“The cause?”

He thought of the voice he’d heard outside the bathroom door earlier.

He had to confirm what it was.

“The person who knocked just now.”

“Yes.”

“I sensed ghostly energy on them. Ghostly energy is—well, energy that comes off ghosts. Sometimes it rubs off on people, too. Like when a smell clings… something like that?”

He tried to explain his private lore clearly.

As before, it was a relief Cheongmun wasn’t the type to bluntly scoff, “There are no such things as ghosts.”

If he had to start by convincing him ghosts exist, an entire night in a bathroom wouldn’t suffice.