TTD Chapter 1

He brought two cigarettes to his lips.

“……”

A hazy line of smoke cut through the damp, heavy air.

Iseok lounged back, his gaze drifting idly across the room. His sensuous eyes, at odds with their dry, detached expression, wandered through the throng of bodies before closing briefly, as if exhausted.

“…Anyway.”

Fucking hell.

The formless haze and the cigarette smoke clinging thickly to his face were no different. A dull indifference washed over him. The self-destruction he usually indulged in felt particularly tedious today. Losing interest, Iseok rose from his seat with a bored expression.

This club had been built from one of his own properties, renovated to suit his needs. On the very top floor, he had added a private room. Some said it was his personal bedroom, meant for indulging in debauchery. Others claimed it was an art studio, a space for his paintings. Neither was entirely wrong, nor entirely right.

The moment the door shut behind him, the noise vanished, as if he had stepped into another dimension. In the alien silence, he slowly scanned the room. Paintings lay scattered like discarded rags, but they were nothing more than incomprehensible scribbles.

His gaze settled on the piles of artwork, resembling remnants of bones. Then, moving languidly, he sat before an easel under a focused beam of light. His eyes lingered on the unfinished sketch.

The only place where a human form existed.

Iseok picked up a pencil. He intended to finish it.

Scratch, scratch.

With each precise stroke, the veins on his forearm surfaced beneath his rolled-up sleeves. Black and white lines moved elegantly—sometimes long and graceful, sometimes short and sharp. His intense gaze followed the strokes relentlessly, as if searching for paradise, as if desperate for water in a vast desert.

The more the drawing took shape, the more life surged into his eyes.

The sketch was of a woman’s face.

He traced the delicate contours he had drawn, his expression unreadable, before returning to fill in the remaining empty space.

Tap.

The pencil was set down. His gaze deepened.

At last, only one face remained, perfectly complete.

His hand slid over his rigid erection, stroking along its length before gliding back down to the base—over and over again. His heated gaze, veiled with desire, lingered on the woman’s delicate, cat-like eyes, tracing over the soft bridge of her nose. Eventually, his attention drifted to her slightly parted, flushed lips, before settling on the small beauty mark imprinted just below her lower lip.

The moment his tongue unconsciously swept across his own lips—

“Ha…”

Thick semen spurted, mercilessly splattering across the woman’s face. His grip, which had been firmly rubbing against the tip, slackened and fell onto his thigh. The woman, once vivid, sank back into the silence of one-dimensional lines.

A crooked smirk tugged at Iseok’s lips. Exhaling languidly, he reached for a cigarette from the palette table, lighting it as his gaze remained fixed on the now-stained sketch.

For some reason, a lingering dissatisfaction crept into his expression.

His thirst remained unquenched, and the suffocating frustration in his chest only grew heavier. A low groan pushed past his throat as his fingers absently brushed over his dry Adam’s apple.

Ah… So even this so-called sacred patience had its limits.

Leaning back lazily, he tilted his head toward the ceiling.

“…The snowfall over Seoul is expected to continue through tomorrow morning. Drivers are advised to exercise caution during their morning commute…”

From the radio left playing in the background, a news anchor calmly delivered the forecast.

Snow was coming in December.

***

 

There are days like this—days so utterly fucked up that even the sound of your own breathing feels unbearable.

“Marriage…?”

Her gentle gaze, usually unreadable, wavered slightly.

Opportunist.

That word had to be meant for her—Heeju was sure of it. In a life spent tiptoeing through the world like a cautious prey animal, opportunism was the only survival strategy left. Clinging to power in order to stay alive—that had been the defining principle of her entire existence. And since her family had expected the same, their interests had always aligned.

Until one minute ago.

“You’re telling me to… marry Ryu Iseok?”

Her vision blurred, then darkened. By the time it cleared, her face had turned ghostly pale.

She had spent years perfecting obedience, offering her submission like a carefully calculated investment—because in a family where everything ran on cold, hard logic, there was no other choice.

And yet, after all that bitter patience… marriage to him was the outcome?

Forcing herself to remain composed, Heeju looked directly at her grandmother and spoke.

“How much… did you get?”

“How much? Child, what are you saying?”

Her grandmother averted her gaze awkwardly, drawing a polite boundary with her refined tone.

The grandson of Geo Group’s chairman, the president of Hotel U—Ryu Iseok. To her grandparents, he must have seemed like a golden egg. Whatever rumors followed his name didn’t matter.

“Mom! Go check Heeju’s room. That girl’s looking plump again—bet she’s been hoarding food like a damn rat.”

Her uncle, who had just returned from Dubai after two years, had scanned her up and down with the scrutinizing eyes of a warden. And as always, it only took a single phone call on the day of his departure to turn the household upside down.

So from the crack of dawn, her room had been ransacked.

The morning, which had begun with the excitement of the season’s first snowfall, had turned meaningless in an instant.

The moment her grandmother discovered the stash of snacks she had been sneaking from her drawer, she erupted in fury.

Although her grandmother was usually composed, she was extremely sensitive when it came to Heeju’s appearance.

Having just returned to Korea after years of studying abroad, Heeju wasn’t used to such scenes anymore. Her heart pounded at the sudden commotion, but she quickly resigned herself to it.

She should have just hidden the snacks under her bed—that was her only regret.

So she had thought that the worst part of her day would be enduring the morning lecture on “a woman’s virtues” while her grandmother pinched at the barely-there flesh on her waist.

She had thought that was the worst of it.

“Anyway, that’s how it is. What a blessing! You’re marrying into a good family at the right age—how fortunate.”

She had always known that to her money-loving grandparents, even marriage was just another business deal. She had prepared herself for that.

She had assumed that if she played along, she would at least be treated with basic dignity. That they would at least marry her off to someone decent. That she deserved that much.

But their greed had blinded them completely.

“……”

Her grandmother’s firm voice snapped Heeju out of her daze.

She forced a smile onto her face—one she had never worn before.

“This is a blessing? Really, Grandma?”

“What?”

“What did you get out of it? Did you manage to squeeze a meaningful share of Geo Group’s stocks? You must have gained something, right? Otherwise, there’s no way you’d hand me over to Ryu Iseok. Right?”

“Watch your tone.”

The anger rising within her quickly turned into despair, staining her vision with hopelessness.

Her voice wavered as she whispered, “That man… I heard he does drugs.”

“That’s just a baseless rumor.”

“I heard he does them openly. That no one in his family can control him. That his temper is…”

“Rumors like that always circulate in chaebol families. He’s a fine man. Handsome, successful—you’ve met him yourself.”

“…Yes. And that’s exactly why I’m saying this.”

She knew that man.

At least enough to categorize him.

“Have you ever really looked into his eyes?”

Because she had.

And when she recalled the way he had studied her so intently—like a predator sizing up its prey—her skin went cold.

Those eyes… they didn’t belong to a human.

They belonged to a beast.

Five years ago, during her time as a student in Paris.

Out of nowhere, under her grandfather’s orders, she was required to visit a particular villa once every two weeks.

She would sit in a chilly room, following the instructions of the waiting servant.

Then, Ryu Iseok would walk in.

He would observe her as if she were some auctioned-off piece of artwork.

And by the time he had finished an entire cigarette, he would leave.

This bizarre, perverse ritual continued for about a year.

Then, after he left Europe and returned to Korea for good, she didn’t have to see him for four years.

He had become someone she had gradually forgotten.

And yet, now, out of the blue—marriage?

Had that unsettling feeling that had lingered ever since she returned to Korea, wrapping up her life in Paris and Berlin, been a premonition of this disaster?

Heeju moved forward on her knees, stopping in front of her grandmother.

“I know it was you who convinced Grandfather to send me abroad instead of marrying me off right after high school. I’ve always been grateful for that.

That’s why I never once caused trouble. I grew up exactly the way you wanted.”

“Heeju…”

“I don’t want this. I—I don’t want to marry that man. I’ll do better. Okay? Grandma, I’m not saying I’ll never get married. I just….”

She rubbed her hands together, pleading.

“Just let me marry someone normal. Please?”

Ryu Iseok.

She could say with absolute certainty—he was not normal.

Not just subjectively abnormal, but objectively so.

He suffered from prosopagnosia—face blindness.

The rumors were rampant, claiming that it had driven him further into madness.

The gossip that followed him was nothing short of horrifying.

People said that because he couldn’t recognize faces, nothing human held any meaning for him. That he had no patience or regard for others, making him a dangerous man.

That, with his warped mind, he had indulged in every harmful and depraved pleasure the world had to offer—violence, gambling, drugs, debauchery.

Before he got involved in managing his family’s company, those words had clung to him like a brand.

And now, they wanted to push her into his life?

Her resentment toward her grandparents twisted into sorrow.

I’m still your flesh and blood. Your granddaughter.

How could you do this to me?

“The proposal came from their side first.”

Heeju’s breath hitched in disbelief.

“They said they want you, Heeju.”

She was too stunned to speak, her chest tightening painfully.

“They said they’re very taken with you.”

The image of his silent, unreadable gaze flashed through her mind.

A sickening, indescribable feeling crept over her.

“That’s impossible. He can’t even recognize faces. How could he have looked at me—what did he even see?”

She could still remember the way he used to stare at her.

Like he was studying her.

Like he was memorizing something.

It made her skin crawl.

“I—I’ve never even spoken a single word to him! This doesn’t make any sense!

What does he even gain from this?

Wait—are the chaebol families refusing to marry their daughters to him because of his… lifestyle? Did they run out of options and come knocking on our door?

No… no, that’s not it.

Grandfather.

Grandfather sold me off, didn’t he?

He must’ve pulled every string he could to make this deal happen.

That’s how much of a businessman he is.

What exactly did he trade me for?

Can I even survive if I marry into that family?

What twisted reason do they have for wanting me—?”

“Haa.”

Her grandmother, looking exhausted, pressed her fingers to her temples before calling for a servant.

“Bring a glass of warm milk to Heeju’s room.”

“Yes, Madam.”

“Have some milk and get some rest. We’ll talk again once you’ve calmed down.”

The servant took hold of her arms, guiding her away.

As she was dragged from the room, an unsettling chill ran through her.

It felt like she was being banished from the family.