HBK Ch 2

Cough. For a moment, the young man opened his eyes, but soon, wracked with violent coughing, the man holding him lifted his drenched body. Striding quickly, he turned the house’s heating to maximum and headed for the nearest first-floor bedroom. Gathering every available blanket to wrap the young man tightly and laying him down, the man checked the young man’s forehead with a palm that had regained some warmth. It was burning. Yet the young man’s face, pale as wax, remained rigid. His lifeless eyes followed the man’s movements.

“Can you hear me?”

The young man slowly blinked twice.

“I lost consciousness for a moment.”

The young man, looking up at the man with eyes pooling like an isolated island, suddenly shuddered.

The man, sliding his hand under the blanket, gazed down at the young man silently. It wasn’t outright rejection, but the young man was instinctively reacting with vague resistance to the man’s touch. Staring up at him yet unable to recognize him, his mind, still not fully returned, was causing a kind of delirium. To the young man, the man was currently a stranger, a threatening presence stirring anxiety. Time was needed to quell those symptoms.

The man deliberately met the young man’s watery eyes, spending a long moment gazing into them. After a while, the young man closed his eyes. His eyelashes, closing, were faintly wet. As soon as this unspoken permission was granted, the man’s hand, thrust inside, firmly grasped the young man’s heart, his jaw touching the young man’s temple.

For someone just pulled from the water, the man’s hand was remarkably warm. Thus, the young man thought the blood near his heart, held by that hand, seemed to flow warmly too. But it was an illusion. The surface of his feverish body was as cold as ice. The man’s hand moved slowly. It was too forceful to be a caress, too gentle to be violence. The young man, whose body had only ever been handled with those two intentions, found the man’s touch unfamiliar.

As the young man’s rigid body gradually relaxed and his body temperature returned somewhat, the man’s hand withdrew. Shivering and unable to open his eyes, the young man was in a semi-conscious state. As his temperature rose, he began to feel intense cold, his full lips trembling faintly. The man lifted the innermost blanket and wrapped the young man tightly again. Fetching a fever reducer, he forced it deep into the young man’s throat, making him swallow dryly.

Despite his pain, the young man, tamed his entire life to obey, complied docilely with the man’s instructions. As the medicine took effect, he slipped into a light sleep, and a long needle was inserted into his vein. Finding the vein was difficult, but the man succeeded after two attempts. Fluids and emergency medicines were always stocked for the young man, who often inserted his own IV needle after city visits or the master’s visits. For the man, seasoned by years on battlefields and accustomed to treating wounds large and small, finding a vein was not a daunting task.

Following the flow of fluid through the rubber tube with controlled speed, the man’s gaze eventually settled on the pale face. Thus, both of the young man’s suicide attempts had been thwarted. The pleasure the young man enjoyed: the price he received for letting his master use his body as desired was solely personal comfort. The one-dimensional comfort of having no lack in clothing, sleep, or food was the pleasure allowed to him.

He didn’t receive grand payments. Unlike other mistresses, he didn’t barter his body for gold or jewels. All he received from his master was a daily life with basic needs met. Even that was temporary comfort, subject to the master’s whims, destined to be shattered anytime, anywhere. Thus, no one called it comfort.

If only sex with the master, those strange games, were truly enjoyable.

How novel.

Suddenly, the man, gazing at the young man’s face, hardened his expression.

The young man was merely a target to protect.

This kind of concern was novel.

🍯

The video shoot lasted twelve hours.

If there was one thing I learned from my mother during my life, it was this:

If you want to stay even slightly intact, never touch drugs.

But that day, I demanded drugs first. I had no confidence I could endure to the end in my right mind. With my body and mind in tatters, I deeply inhaled the methamphetamine seeping through my nose. The methamphetamine, enhanced for aphrodisiac effects, was quickly absorbed into my system. Thanks to it, I felt much better. It didn’t make the deliberate tortures inflicted on my body feel negligible, but it was true they became bearable.

Fortunately, no one stopped me, so I could scream freely. If I hadn’t been able to, no matter how much I relied on the drug’s effects, I would have gone mad long ago. They whipped me until dozens of switches broke, forced me to suck unknown members until my mouth bled, and made me take those members in my anus until it stretched. When they had extracted the needed footage, they finally hung me in the air.

I demanded more drugs. They made me inhale more methamphetamine than I’d asked for. With no part of my body untouched by the switches, it resembled minced meat. Hanging in the air made it look even worse. Water was poured over me. I screamed. Salt was sprinkled, then more water. I writhed, shrieking. Through my screaming, crying vision, I saw a cart rolling in with a clattering sound, piled with instruments I couldn’t even imagine the purpose of.

It was only halfway through the twelve hours. A new film started rolling.

I fainted and woke screaming multiple times.

When I opened my eyes in a back-alley hospital, draped with IV needles, I was amazed to be alive. A fake nurse, coming to change the fluid, told me ten days had passed since the shoot.

The pimp calculated the treatment and surgery costs for those ten days, plus the business losses for the time I was bedridden and would remain so, adding it to my debt. I wanted to get up and stop the debt from growing, but I didn’t even have the strength to blink.

The bigger issue was the aftermath.

I woke from nightmares every night, earning glares from other patients, and suffered from methamphetamine withdrawal, requiring multiple fluid changes. The fake doctor urged me to stop being stubborn and take a hit of methamphetamine to make things easier for everyone, but I vehemently refused. I wanted to retain the will to die on my own terms. I didn’t want to rot away, servicing clients with a decaying body, fueled by drugs. I wanted to avoid such a wretched death. The fake doctor clicked his tongue, calling it pointless stubbornness.

Four weeks later, I was discharged and began taking clients again.

Thanks to the expensive regenerative medicine I diligently applied, my battered skin had healed relatively cleanly. After a fifty-year-old man, licking every inch of my body during intercourse and saying I smelled like sweet honey, left, a new client entered. I was momentarily speechless upon seeing him. His attire was out of place in this shabby brothel. Removing his hat and giving a slight bow, the client, exuding an incongruous fragrance, spoke.

“I’ve come to escort you.”

That was all he said.

While I was with clients, the pimp had taken a hefty payment from this stranger and readily sent me off with him. Indescribable anxiety gripped me, but I was bound to the streets. The tag identifying me bore a stamp marking me as a prostitute, and the brand deep inside my ankle declared me the pimp’s property. The prostitutes of Yeast Street, including me, were not slaves but were treated as the lowest of the low, no different from slaves.

Leaving Yeast Street, I couldn’t collect myself.

Riding in a luxury car I’d never seen in my life, I looked down at the worn-out courtesan’s robe I’d worn 365 days a year. Leaning against high-end leather seats I’d never touched, I became acutely aware of my body odor, still tinged with the fifty-year-old’s semen. Without time to groom, the man who put me in the luxury sedan introduced himself as a butler.

Mister Wood.

The man, introducing himself as “Mister Wood,” naturally asked my name, but I couldn’t answer readily. Neither my mother nor the pimp called me by a name, using terms like “this bastard,” “that bastard,” “filthy guy,” or “rag-like bitch.” No, Swallow. From the tanker, they called me Swallow. Swallow, who eagerly took and swallowed anything given.

For some reason, my throat tightened, and as I stammered, Mister Wood, patiently waiting, softened his eyes. It was a refined, kind smile, but I could easily tell it was a professional one. Still, it was sufficiently formal and warm.

“It’s better not to use that name.”

Mister Wood’s light denial of my humble name didn’t feel rude. It even seemed justified.

“Your master will give you a name.”

I had a vague certainty that even if my name had been something proper, not Swallow, Mister Wood would have said the same. But I didn’t have time to dwell on it. Sensing the faint curiosity budding amidst the deep anxiety about the new client he called “master,” Mister Wood smiled faintly.

I was captivated by that smile laced with kindness. It took less than a second to have my heart stolen. He said he fully empathized with and understood my feelings, offering me honey tea mixed with brandy. I was so tense that I didn’t refuse his kindness. Above all, I didn’t want to disappoint him by rejecting the first person to claim to understand me. At that moment, I felt I could drink even animal urine if he offered it.

“Your master is eagerly awaiting your meeting.”

The combination of words was clear but incomprehensible.

Mister Wood’s master.

Surely, he would be far more refined and kind than the man before me.

A vague expectation flowed down my throat with the honey melted by brandy.

“He was very saddened seeing you in the video.”

The idea that I’d earned the pity of such an exalted figure was as sweet as honey.

I thought this moment might be a dream. As if reading my thoughts, Mister Wood smiled softly, offering another cup of warm honey tea.

“Don’t worry. This isn’t a dream.”

That’s what he seemed to say.

I gripped the cup with both hands. The unbelievable warmth melted my cold palms, dissolving the last shred of my tension. A refined, kind man, served by the man before me, was seeking me. He was awaiting our meeting. The video. He pitied me, a filthy prostitute exposed to the world in that video. It was unbelievable. It felt like I’d become the protagonist of a fairy tale Kini once whispered to me with a dreamy expression.

“She wore golden shoes, rode a golden carriage, and raced to a golden castle.”

A noble, secretly helping her for years, was waiting at the castle’s entrance. A noble, commanding a fine butler and dozens of servants, had come out to greet her alone. She felt like she was dreaming. The joy of never returning to that shabby attic, of escaping her cruel stepsiblings and stepmother, overwhelmed her.

Yet, thinking of the neighborhood grandmother who gave her a piece of bread when she was kicked out and crying in the alley, her heart grew heavy. But she soon shook off the gloom. She believed the kind, splendid noble wouldn’t ignore the grandmother who helped her.

The golden castle neared. It felt so dreamlike that she pinched her skin, tears welling from the pain. The golden carriage stopped, and the golden gates opened. A noble, more splendid than she’d imagined, welcomed her with a gentle smile.

That’s where Kini’s story ended, as she was dragged into the neighbor’s house by a drunken gambler. Hearing her high moans and the gambler’s rough breathing through the open window, I tried to imagine her story. But I couldn’t. Golden shoes, a golden carriage, a golden castle, a splendid noble helping a filthy prostitute like me without reward—I couldn’t even dare to imagine.

I was thrilled.

I didn’t know or understand the name of that emotion then, but imagining the noble who pitied me, I was as filled with excitement as the girl in the story.

The year I survived the tanker, abandoned without safeguards, must have been because that master helped me. The pimp, who never once offered Kini reconstructive surgery, gave me multiple surgeries because of the master’s aid. Surviving the horrific black hole of the camera lens, battered but alive, must have been because the master secretly helped me. Mister Wood’s master must have known me long before. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have pitied the wretched me in the video and anticipated our meeting.

Perhaps, in his youth, he fell for my mother, a stunningly beautiful prostitute famed in Yeast Street. Or maybe, stumbling into a Yeast Street alley by chance, he pitied me, squatting at the entrance, munching biscuits while waiting for my mother’s tryst to end. Maybe, maybe, maybe. The master must be like that.

The certainty that Mister Wood’s master was, like the noble in the story, like Mister Wood before me, refined and kind, exhilarated me. As the golden castle approached, the golden carriage slowed. I had become the girl in the story.

Like the golden carriage stopping before the golden castle, the luxury sedan halted before a grand mansion’s gate. My swelling heart felt like it would burst, and I drained the remaining honey tea in one gulp. Seeing this, Mister Wood frowned slightly, smiling gently.

🍯

Forgive me. Forgive me.

I begged the mansion’s unknown guests until the skin of my palms tore off.

But their hands held no forgiveness. All night, with a leash around my neck, I crawled on bloodied knees, sucking the members of the mansion’s guests. An unfamiliar violin melody coiled around me like a snake. The honey tea Mister Wood offered in the luxury sedan contained not only brandy but a powerful aphrodisiac. A piercing was driven raw into my grotesquely erect member. As I screamed and writhed, a whip struck.

Soon, a leash was attached to the piercing in my member. The mansion’s servants, dressed in fine suits like Mister Wood, easily controlled me by pulling the leash. When I had sucked all the guests’ members, the violin stopped, and a chaotic silence settled. The golden lighting flooding the banquet hall dimmed, and a bright spotlight focused on the center. Five men and women, leashed like me, were dragged to the center. Feeling the hard texture of a fine wine bottle in my anus, I watched the five become tattered rags.

“He was very saddened seeing you in the video.”

Mister Wood’s master pitied the chastity of a member that didn’t erect watching me in the video. A shoddily filmed, sordid video. Watching the live snuff show before me, I realized how gently I’d been handled before the camera. Nausea rose, but I had to suppress it. Lying flat on the floor, raising my buttocks high, I begged for the slender but long wine bottle to be inserted deeper, swallowing the revulsion of deep fear. Praying I wouldn’t be next after the five, I did my utmost to please the fine wine bottle.

A drugged man screamed. The woman’s endurance was deeper.

I wanted to cover my ears and close my eyes but didn’t want to stand out in any way. I desperately shook my hips, emitting humming moans. But my efforts were unnecessary from the start. The snuff show ended with all five bloodied and carried off. Until the party ended, I diligently played the obedient sex dog, taking everything into my anus and mouth as ordered. Not being placed in the center was enough to make me grateful and devotedly serve the mansion’s guests.

Thus passed my first night in the mansion.

“We don’t actually sever limbs or threaten lives.”

“But it’s sufficiently painful.”

Mister Wood, gazing down at me as I trembled unwittingly, knelt on one knee before me.

“You’re shaking too much.”

His voice was soft and kind. So terrified, I felt tears about to burst, but a mental warning helped me barely hold them back.

“Well done.”

He praised me for it.

I couldn’t tell if it was praiseworthy, but I was still relieved by Mister Wood’s kindness. I felt he might help if I begged.

“Your master is eagerly awaiting your meeting.”

Repeating the same words, Mister Wood held a cup to my lips.

It was familiar honey tea. Hesitating unlike in the sedan, I saw him smile faintly.

“There’s no aphrodisiac.”

Believing his assurance to drink safely, I trusted him.

My mouth was raw, my throat clogged, but I managed to empty the small cup over several sips. This time, there was neither brandy nor aphrodisiac. I thought I’d done well to trust Mister Wood, relieved I could trust him.

“Five days from now, your master will come for you.”

I didn’t ask the foolish question of why five days.

“Your master hopes that during these five days here, you’ll take in and hold as much of the noble’s essence as possible.”

My body was too base. The semen I’d taken in my body until now was base.

Mister Wood, saying my body reeked no matter how thoroughly washed, unfastened the leash on my member and pulled me to the bed.

“It’s likely impossible to completely wash away the crude, vulgar stench layered on your body.”

Thus, Mister Wood’s master had brought me to this mansion.

To cover that stench with the semen of nobles, nobler than oil workers, street gamblers, drunks, or thugs, born noble.

“From tonight, you can’t receive their essence without a price.”

At that moment, the piercing screams of the five men and women flashed through my mind.

They, too, were gathered to have their semen washed. The blood dripping from their limp toes vividly covered my eyes. The show they performed last night was the price for the noble semen Mister Wood spoke of. If they succeeded in this semen washing, the price they’d receive, the price I’d receive, was:

“You can keep living.”

As a noble’s pet bird.

The pimp hadn’t received payment from Mister Wood; he’d settled my body’s price.

I was sold, handed over to a communal laundry to become a prostitute fit for a noble.

If I couldn’t be thoroughly cleaned in the remaining time, I would die.

It didn’t feel real. Mister Wood’s face showed understanding.

“You should sleep.”

Pulling up the blanket, he whispered kindly.

I clamped my lips, which moved unwittingly. I was wrong. No matter how I begged, he would never help me. The cold glint in his eyes behind his gentle smile said so. Don’t forget. This isn’t a dream. My foolish expectations and inflated hopes shattered, strewn on the floor. The golden shoes, carriage, and castle vanished without a trace. Only a prostitute, filthier than a rag, more repulsive than a sewer, lower than vermin, groaned, swallowing shards of broken glass into his gut. I, who took my mother’s death as payment, couldn’t grasp the death looming before me.

Forgive me. Forgive me.

Forgive me for being foolishly thrilled.

A scream finally burst out.

While a hundred switches broke, five skilled punishers took turns, turning my back, buttocks, and calves into minced meat. My sanity lasted until twenty switches. After that, I screamed until my voice gave out.

Even breathing was painful. No, living itself was pain. Yet, as soon as the ropes binding my limbs were undone, I crawled across the floor, hiding between the mansion guests’ crotches. Bleeding from battered wounds, trembling, I tirelessly worked to receive noble semen, crawling diligently through the vast banquet hall that night.

As a hundred switches broke and piled at my feet, the death I hadn’t grasped stepped closer.

Mister Wood offered honey tea mixed with sedatives and brandy to me, unable to sleep from the pain of dozens of needles piercing my flesh. Only after three cups could I be freed from the pain.

“Take and receive as much as possible.”

Mister Wood’s advice was consistent. That consistency became my goal and guide.

He seemed to want me to survive. True or not, I had to believe it to endure.

My stomach swelled like a balloon. My urethra was widened to fit a finger easily. To reach that point, I took in five liters of water anally and had to insert anything long, regardless of thickness, into my urethra. With my anus plugged by a restraint and my urethra blocked by two fine fountain pens, I crawled again. The mansion guests pointed and laughed at my pregnant-like belly. I had to drink more semen orally than the previous night.

“You should sleep more.”

Lifting heavy eyelids, Mister Wood’s refined face slowly came into view.

I felt like crying. I thought I could die like this. Yet he still seemed to want me to live. Though his lips never spoke of it. I was too despairing, too pained.

“Give me drugs.”

Mister Wood gazed at me with dark eyes, then shook his head.

“Your master wants a clean body.”

If I could endure three more days, I would meet Mister Wood’s master.

A noble aristocrat. A splendid gentleman. The one who was eagerly awaiting our meeting.

“I know it’s not comforting.”

Mister Wood, whispering softly with an expression that seemed to understand everything, brushed back my hair and looked into my eyes.

“On the day the five days end, I have something to tell you.”

His fingers, finishing the sentence, touched my hair again. As if under a spell, I soon fell into a deep sleep.

🍯

Save me. Save me.

I ran frantically through the bushes.

The sound of pursuit thundered, pounding my heart. Losing my sense of direction, I glanced around. The rain blurred my vision. I was crying. Trembling all over, I pushed through the bushes and burst out. The menacing footsteps of the men chasing me clung fiercely to my back. Holding my breath, I dashed onto the road. Desperately grabbing the nearest door handle, I pulled with all my heart. I leaped through the door as it flung open. The door slammed shut behind me, cutting off the rain that had been pelting my body. But soon, the men’s vicious shouts overwhelmed me. Shivering, I crawled underneath.

Save me. Save me.

My body was beyond control.

I had splendidly, successfully endured the five days Mister Wood spoke of.

One hundred switches, enemas beyond permissible limits, urethral play surpassing torture, fisting, gang rape with all fifty-six mansion guests—I paid for the noble semen with my cheap body in full. But, but.

I wanted to soothe my exhausted body. It felt like if Mister Wood brushed my hair with his cold fingertips, all my fatigue and pain would vanish. But Mister Wood didn’t come to me the morning after the five days. Because of the semen I had swallowed and taken in as much as possible, as he instructed, my mouth reeked of it. I wanted to vomit it all out but held back. If I could drink the honey tea Mister Wood offered, I’d feel better, but he didn’t appear even as the morning passed. So I went to find him.

Groping through the unfamiliar mansion beyond the banquet hall and my assigned bedroom, I searched for Mister Wood.

And I stood before that room.

The seven men and women who had spent the five nights with me were bound naked in that room.

No, one of them lay on a table, staring blankly at the ceiling.

I thought I had seen something wrong. But it was neither temporary delirium nor hallucination. A sharply raised blue axe blade struck the wrist of the man lying on the table. Splatter—blood sprayed, the severed wrist flew, and the man’s scream cracked. The sobs of the remaining six, bound, leaked through the open door.

I looked down with pale eyes at the cold hand covering my mouth. Mister Wood was behind me, stifling my scream. The fresh scent emanating from him was, in that moment, chillingly terrifying. Nausea rose. My body, finally realizing what I had seen, began to show symptoms.

Mister Wood’s sharply glinting eyes scanned my body. A snake’s tongue grazed my skin. Slowly, spreading its venom into every corner.

His cold hand touched my neck. Like a convulsion, I shook off Mister Wood and ran down the dark, gaping corridor. A scream threatened to burst out, but I suppressed it with all my strength. But my trembling legs couldn’t support me. I tumbled down the stairs, and black shoes swarmed toward my head. Shaking off the hands trying to grab me, I ran toward the exit.

Someone’s hand tore the single shirt I was wearing. I let it go without hesitation and threw myself out the door. The angry shouts of the men scrambling behind me spurred my steps. It was so painful that I thought it wouldn’t matter if I died. But the vivid reality of the blood splattering before my eyes, the wrist falling and rolling on the floor, the man’s scream, the blue axe blade, and Mister Wood’s breath chillingly brushing my earlobe violently shook my desire to live.

I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die.

I ran through the rain, almost sobbing.

Tears threatened to spill, but I couldn’t even breathe freely. Huddled in a corner, I desperately prayed they would pass me by. But that stroke of luck didn’t save me. A hand reached through the flung-open door, grabbed my hair, and dragged me out. I screamed in near despair, but it was soon drowned by the men’s angry shouts and the rain. I struggled wildly, pleading with them.

Save me. Save me. I was wrong. I was wrong.

I sincerely wanted to live, didn’t want to die like that, so I clung to them desperately, begging. But they answered by slapping my face and kicking me. Only at someone’s restraint did the man kicking me stop, panting and grabbing my hair again. Dragging my heels, their skin completely peeled to reveal raw flesh, he turned onto the asphalt road.

The blood trailing my toes slithered like a red snake flicking its tongue.

🍯

I had a dream.

A dream I hadn’t had in a while.

The man, who had fallen asleep with his back buried in a chair, opened his eyes. The young man’s faint breathing came from close by. Looking down at the pale face revealed under the moonlight streaming through the window, the man ran a hand over his own face. Suddenly, he craved a drink.

After memories he had buried deep were summoned by the unconscious realm of dreams, he always drank. He took sleeping pills for insomnia and drank to erase memories. Both were excellent for oblivion. But instead of drinking, the man swallowed dryly and looked down again at the young man’s wax-like face. He touched the young man’s forehead with a palm relatively warmer than others’. Thanks to the fever reducer and fluids, the fever had subsided significantly.

He lowered the heating and ventilated the air to a suitable temperature. The picturesque scenery outside the window framed like a painting. The night at the southern tip of West, with its typical subtropical monsoon climate, was slightly warm for the man. Twenty-three years had passed wandering through tropical rainforests, fierce blizzards at the front lines, and battlefields. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say the man was born and raised on the battlefield. His parents died early, and his uncle, a wandering mercenary who took him in at five, was killed by a stray bullet, vanishing like dew on the battlefield.

The man remembered his first kill.

The memory of blood staining his hands, chest, and vision had long settled inside him, exploding within. The man left the battlefield. The memory of slaughter, not war, transformed the man, once a loyal knight of the king, into a worthless, fleeting speck, less than nothing.

Staring at the palm scarred by bullet marks, the man stood.

Without replacing the empty fluid bag, he removed it, tossed it into the trash, and checked the young man’s complexion again. Despite his striking appearance, the young man’s presence was faint, yet when his eyes were closed, he evoked a strange sentiment in those who saw him.

That was likely the fundamental reason he became an aristocrat’s mistress. The fundamental reason. In the current reality, the aristocrat’s refined hobbies required neither cause nor explanation. The young man was simply chosen as a plaything because he was there, with no particular significance attached.

The young man, having failed at suicide, showed neither disappointment nor apology. His vacant eyes soon recognized reality and resigned. That process occurred in the brief moment the man gazed into his eyes to imprint his presence. Without expressing regret for the impulsive act or disappointment in its failure, the young man fell into a deep sleep.

When his first suicide attempt failed, both of the young man’s legs broke. Left in a dilapidated warehouse, he endured five nights and five days. Rats crawled over his twisted legs, and he wrestled with the fierce gaze of a venomous spider descending on a long web above his sweat-soaked forehead, enduring five days of silence. The warehouse’s days were stiflingly hot, its nights suffocatingly humid. His lower body, wet with uncontrollable urine, dried and wet again, while hunger gnawed at his sanity.

When the unbearable pain from his broken legs began to fade, the creaky warehouse door opened. A dark face peered inside. The driver, following the master’s orders, found the young man with broken legs sprawled in the dark and grinned. Lamenting the prostitute’s luck in surviving a hanging, the driver dragged him out, allowing the young man to escape the warehouse after five days.

The young man was bound to a bed until his legs healed.

The master’s anger was unleashed relentlessly on the immobile young man.

Even after his legs healed, the young man, battered by the master’s wrath, couldn’t move for days, remaining bedridden. When he could finally walk, he submerged himself in water as if starving and met the man, his new bodyguard, under the blazing sun.

That was six months ago, and three years since their encounter in an old jeep on a rainy night.

The man clearly remembered the young man’s face.

🍯

Holding the Lady Gold handed to him by a colleague, the man drained a whiskey bottle while peering at the youthful face in a thin file. Back then, the man was a broken military weapon. Old, rusted, unable to execute assigned commands, a useless component. He wanted to retire, but the military recommended rest. Yet his overstretched spring was on the verge of stopping. Barely winding it with alcohol and sleeping pills, the man was given the Lady Gold and the young man. Parking two blocks from the promised meeting place, draining the bottle, his body was intact, but his mind was already beyond normal.

The gun could hold twelve rounds. He didn’t need to use all the loaded bullets.

A single shot from the offensive semi-automatic pistol would suffice to pierce his skull, shatter his brain, exit the other temple, and break the car window. The man checked the loaded magazine, repeatedly releasing and locking the trigger mechanism, and finished the whiskey.

By then, even sleeping pills couldn’t bring sleep. The image of a young boy bleeding out, his chest blown open, swirled before his eyes, and the bodies of children strewn like rags in the smoke-filled ruins of a collapsed building unfolded like a panorama.

He could no longer sleep.

“That day’s engagement was legitimate defensive combat.”

It was a colleague who grabbed the liaison officer parroting those words by the collar.

The man prepared for the next mission, packing gear and moving to the operation site. The colleague retired six months later, and the man devoted three more years to the state. Meeting the broken man after retirement, the colleague bared his chipped teeth in a chilling smile.

“Do you see those kids every night too?”

Every night, the man, drenched in their blood, clutched a blown-open heart with one hand and a child’s cold body with the other, breathing roughly like a beast.

It was murder. And slaughter.

The man remembered his first kill.

It was etched into his soul.

🍯

The young man stood in the middle of the pool.

A white shirt, reaching his hips, carelessly covered his pale lower body, and the nearly drained water swirled around his ankles, sucked into the drain. A massive vacuum sound enveloped the deep pool’s interior. Unfazed by the slowly fading vibrations, the young man stared at the blue cement floor until it was fully exposed, then suddenly looked up. Black hair falling from above draped his nape like a curtain. Bathed in sunlight, the young man seemed to melt into the light, wrapped in a precarious presence. The vivid glint in his eyes when he realized he was alive, not dead, raised its hand anew in the man’s mind.

The regular sound of a stiff brush scraping the floor echoed. Sweating profusely, the young man scrubbed the pool’s bottom with a cleaning brush, moving diligently. Breathing heavily, sweat droplets sparkled in the sunlight. Wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, he surveyed the cleaned pool floor and pulled the long hose.

Whoosh—the jet of water washed the stripped pool tiles thoroughly, sucked into the drain. Pouring water over his head, the young man soon resembled a drowned rat. Brushing back wet hair and wiping his soaked face, he roughly shook off the water and tossed the cleaning supplies onto the inner wall.

Climbing the aluminum ladder from the nearly three-meter-deep pool bottom, the young man’s feet were also wet. His movements were light, but his condition likely wasn’t great. As if to prove it, when he reached the final step, his white foot slipped on the wet ladder, and his body lurched downward. On the verge of plummeting three meters, his body was caught in midair. In the young man’s wide-open eyes, the man’s black silhouette appeared.

The man’s forearm, gripping tightly enough to ache, was hot. Firmly holding the young man’s white arm, which had been flailing like aquatic plants, the man balanced on the ladder’s railing, unshaken by the sudden weight. The moment the young man felt the heat of the touch, his body, floating in the air, was pulled sharply upward.

“Are you alright?”

The man’s chest was close. Anchored to the ground by the man’s hand, the young man was slightly dazed, the accident not yet sinking in. Meanwhile, the man’s arm, tightly entwined with the young man’s, slowly released, along with its warm heat. As if it were a signal, the young man’s heart, which had been holding its breath, began to beat slowly.

Staring long at the man’s silent chest, unlike his own panting heart, the young man tilted his head back. The man, with an almost expressionless face, was looking past the young man’s shoulder at the deep pool’s bare bottom. As the young man blinked, watching the man seemingly gauge the depth, the man’s jaw tightened. Their eyes met.

“Why did you do it?”

The man didn’t understand the young man’s sudden question but didn’t ask for clarification. Water droplets rolled down the young man’s cheeks, still glossy from the un-dried moisture. With lips tightly closed and ashen eyes too generous to be called indifferent, the man looked down at the young man, sunlight filtering through his pale blonde hair. It felt as if a hot breeze blew faintly.

“Why did you keep watching me until the end?”

Only then did the man understand. The young man was referring to the day the master, accompanied by several amateur actors willing to do anything for money, put effort into attracting a porn audience. The man had reluctantly taken his place as designated by the master, watching every moment as the young man exposed his depths.

The young man, his porcelain skin flushed red as if heated by fire, had immersed himself in the acts the master desired without a trace of shame or humiliation. He was simply focused on the given tasks. And the man was focused on the young man’s small ears and the white temples that twisted like twigs under strain. The feeling transmitted from the young man, who endured such treatment without showing pain, was a sense of déjà vu.

“Did you like it?”

The young man’s eyes, looking straight up at the man, were clear.

His eyes, with black pupils occupying more space than the whites, were unbelievably clear for a seasoned prostitute who had risen from the filthiest places through cesspools to an aristocrat’s mistress. His voice, asking if the man enjoyed watching, held no contempt, mockery, or cynicism. It was pure curiosity. With soft eyes, the young man asked again.

“Were you satisfied with how I looked?”

You too.

The man paid no attention to the “you too” added at the end. The master was satisfied, as were the five black men and two blonde women who accompanied him. Thus, the young man’s “you too” could easily refer to them. So the man didn’t think deeply. The calmness was no different from the young man’s focus during the act, so he didn’t consider that the words might have another meaning.

“Do you want to see more?”

The young man, smiling as if he’d willingly show if desired, gave a gentle smile. It was reminiscent of a polite neighbor boy. If the man didn’t know the young man, he would have thought so, given the natural expression and gaze. This, too, was a result of the master’s tastes.

The young man’s lazily dangling hand brushed the man’s wrist. It seemed accidental but carried clear intent. As it grazed the man’s forearm and fell away, the young man suddenly deepened his black eyes. Instead of a bright smile, a dry smile lingered at his lips.

“Don’t do it again.”

If it wasn’t sexual curiosity or desire.

If you didn’t enjoy it.

The young man was saying there was no need to do so. With a face understanding the man’s position, drawn to that spot by the young man’s screams, he looked up at the man.

“I assure you, that level of pain can’t harm me.”

The master tortured the young man. Until the man stood as a spectator. The master physically harmed the young man’s genitals, making him scream loudly, shed hot tears, and writhe, twisting his body. Even now, an incomplete tattoo remained vivid on the young man’s genitals. Only a fraction was etched, indistinguishable, but the pain of a blade touching raw flesh without anesthesia was more than enough to harm him. But what the young man spoke of now was mental damage.

That level of pain doesn’t affect me.

So please.

“My screams are better, aren’t they?”

For a spectator who doesn’t enjoy such a spectacle, the show was akin to torture.

Yes, if you don’t enjoy it.

“…”

The young man was being considerate of the man.

“You didn’t have to do it for my sake.”

Your duty isn’t like that.

Smiling and drawing a line, the young man’s eyelashes were crisply dry.

🍯

A kite was soaring in the high sky.

With his legs submerged in the now-filled pool, the young man, head tilted back, followed the kite’s wings with his gaze. The man, returning from picking pineapples in the field, placed the fruit in the kitchen corner overlooking the pool and drew a knife.

The young man’s drenched body had dried as the pool, once empty, filled. His tilted black hair swayed limply in the air, and the white shirt, wet and clinging to his back, absorbed the strong light fully. The young man’s slow, habitual breathing seemed vividly felt even from behind. The still air drifted leisurely around him. Watching the young man’s back, leaning languidly like a young beast resting after long physical labor, the man cut the peeled fruit into bite-sized pieces.

Looking down at the pineapple pieces on the plate, the young man raised his gaze. Placing the plate beside the young man after circling the veranda, the man stood on the wooden tiles encircling the pool’s outer wall, facing the lake. His tall, sturdy frame, proportional to the eye level one had to look up to meet, was accentuated by curved shadows.

The sun was already setting. Staring at the massive red sun falling into the lake, the young man shifted his gaze to the man’s shoulder. He blinked. The man’s tall figure was enveloped in a veil of reddening light.

Fingering a piece of pineapple exuding a sweet aroma, the young man put one in his mouth. It was the sweetest he’d ever tasted. Though it shouldn’t be, he couldn’t understand why. Chewing diligently and swallowing, he took another piece. His gaze never left the man.

Standing at the edge of the wooden floor, staring somewhere in the reddening sky, the man suddenly turned. Beneath the young man’s knees, under a red canopy, the red lake rippled. Their eyes met. The young man’s throat moved slowly, swallowing the chewed, sweetless fruit. The intensity of their gazes gradually deepened. The inner thighs of the young man’s spread legs, under the shirt curling up to his thighs, glinted discreetly.

Splash. The sound of water splashing rang out.

🍯

It was an unfamiliar voice that woke me. A real doctor in a white coat looked down at me. He said I needed a few more days of rest to fully recover. I found it hard to understand his emotionless voice. No matter how I searched my mind, I had no memory of serious injury. My limbs weren’t severed, my bones weren’t broken. The five nights left immense trauma on my mind and body, but with the aid of drugs, I could manage.

Even the fake doctor’s fees were hard for me to afford. If a real doctor’s fees were added to my debt, what else would I have to sell? Was I abandoned? Was the splendid noble who paid a fortune to the pimp dissatisfied with the five nights? Or was witnessing the slaughter at noon my mistake? Is this not a hospital? Was the man demanding my rest not a real doctor? Where am I? Why am I lying here? What did they do to my body, which feels no pain?

I felt no sensation from fingertips to toes. Staring at the ceiling with unfocused eyes, the image of the man’s wrist being severed, blood splattering, revived before me.

A scream was about to burst out.

“Can you hear my voice?”

It was Mister Wood.

Oh, I wasn’t abandoned.

Blocking the harsh light from above, Mister Wood looked at me clearly.

“On the day the five days end, I have something to tell you.”

The voice of Mister Wood, soothing me as I trembled in fear and pain, whispering softly, vividly came back to life.

The 13th Battalion had been isolated for two weeks.

The arid desert did not permit human intrusion, and humans armed with firearms did not acknowledge the desert’s stubbornness. The man marched forward. If he did not walk, it was as if he were not alive. Carrying his gear on his back, supporting a rifle with an arm on the verge of giving out, he aimed at the ashen desert where nothing was visible. There were no stragglers, but no one opened their mouths.

The ensuing silence eroded the battalion members like the ashen desert. Under a relentless sun, when someone screamed, gunfire rang out, and sobs spread through the unit like a dirge. The man, taking the rifle from a member who failed to die and removing its magazine, surveyed the battalion with a blackened face. The white night drove even well-trained soldiers to madness.

“We can’t get a signal, Brigadier.”

The desperate voice of the communications soldier broke the man’s white night.

“Keep trying.”

The man’s voice was deeply subdued. The members were starving. With isolation, supplies to the 13th Battalion’s twelve members had been cut off, and they had emptied the last canteen yesterday morning. No one spoke of death, but every single one sensed it. The man lifted his gaze from the compass, its needle unmoving. The midday light was scorching the white night’s desert.

“The radio isn’t broken, Brigadier.”

The communications soldier’s desperate voice was laced with suppressed sorrow.

“We can’t get a signal from an unbroken radio, Brigadier.”

Repeating like a parrot, the communications soldier was stating a paradox.

“Have we been abandoned?”

The man did not open his firmly closed mouth.

The 13th Battalion had been isolated for two weeks. And the radio was not broken.

The operation to recover the 13th Battalion’s military firearms was the man’s final mission.

🍯

The limousine was already making its second round on the outer road. One round took about two and a half hours. For precisely four and a half hours, the man sitting in the passenger seat, staring ahead, was inundated with the young man’s coquettish moans flowing ceaselessly from the back.

The driver, a man who always followed the master, did not hide his scornful sneer whenever the young man’s moans came through the open partition. Silently mimicking a whistle or making crude gestures with his fingers, the driver chuckled, and the man, averting his gaze, looked at the side mirror.

The road surface, retreating swiftly, boasted a flawless smoothness thanks to annual repaving. There were no pursuing vehicles, and under a sky heavy with dark clouds, not even a single bird could be seen.

Instead of the young man’s panting, as if he were about to pass out, the sound of sucking something wet, followed by gulping noises, echoed. The man, who had been looking out the window, turned around. The master’s cane was tapping the wide-open partition. The two black men who had sat near the partition with the young man upon boarding were, like the young man, invisible through the gap, their presence only indicated by the incessant sounds.

Following the order to head to the sea, the driver obediently turned the wheel. It would take at least three hours to reach the coast from here, even driving diligently. The dark clouds, once clustered, had lowered further, preparing to rain. The checkpoint, recognizing the master’s emblem on the limousine, did not stop the vehicle.

As they exited the open outer road and merged onto the general road, rain finally began to pour. The man’s gaze, drawn to a piercing sound, caught the young man’s red-stained back in the rearview mirror. Visible through the narrow partition gap, the young man’s shoulder blade bore a large bite mark, as if someone had torn into it. Slap, slap. The sound of flesh colliding fiercely mingled with the rain hitting the car. The driver occasionally shifted his hips, as if scratching an itch, while the man turned his gaze to the unclear view outside the window.

When they reached the lower Rain River along West Route 7, they spotted the coast. Continuing down the coastal road would reveal Norlinger Bay. The dark clouds that had dominated the West sky failed to conquer the lower Rain River. The black limousine, bearing only traces of rain, sped along the quiet coastal road.

The master ordered the car to stop somewhere inconspicuous yet close to the coast. Without stopping, the driver circled the coastal road and parked on a hill overlooking Norlinger Bay. When the engine was turned off, the sound of waves crashing against jagged cliffs roared like thunder.

“Norlinger Temple.”

The master’s low murmur mingled with the young man’s sobs. As if lost in thought, the master paused before speaking in a hoarse voice, as if a memory had just surfaced.

“The lord of that temple was a founding hero.”

Through the fully lowered window, the fierce sound of waves surged freely. The young man was moaning in near panic. The driver, gripping the steering wheel, shivered slightly, while the man listened to sounds beyond the waves. As if reciting a fairy tale to a child, the master spoke in a low voice about the history of Norlinger Temple.

“That Norlinger Temple was a gift personally bestowed by King Baden to that family. All the heirs of the Norlinger family were born there, swore loyalty to the king, and gave their lives for him. Like the first Count Norlinger, his descendants were born with noble traits, achieving great feats for the nation and earning much praise from commoners.

But that family was exterminated. The last heir of the Norlinger family plotted treason. You know this well, don’t you? It was detailed in the book I gave you recently. Yes. What was the name of that last heir? Oh, you’re still a dim-witted child. Tighten your grip on the penis. This child listens better that way. He’s a high-maintenance, stubborn child. But that makes him cry so delightfully. He’s born for it. Yes, that’s my child.”

The young man sobbed for a long time. The master patiently waited for his response, and when he finally answered, the master moved to the next story, meticulously checking what was in the young man’s mind. The waves grew rougher. The young man’s sobs intensified. The sound of waves pounding the cliffs, as if striking his chaotic mind, drove him to near convulsions, but no one cared.

🍯

Having spent the evening at Norlinger Bay and entering West along the Rain River, the night was deep. By the time they reached the middle of the Rain River, the young man’s sobs no longer mingled with the rain hitting the car, though the persistent sound of sucking flesh occasionally lingered.

The limousine stopped in a parking lot reserved for the city’s elite. The master transferred to a large sedan, and the car, as if waiting, exited the lot. The two black men, stepping out of the limousine’s rear door, donned coats and glanced at the man. Despite panting for hours, their leisurely southern demeanor permeated their sturdy frames.

“He won’t even let you touch him right now.”

The man, wearing a hooded cap and zipping up his jacket, spoke. The desert land of Valashi, where he had laid foundations, was stiflingly hot by day and bone-chillingly cold by night. Taking a joint from his companion, he offered it to the man, gesturing toward the limousine’s interior.

“This might help.”

Though his voice lacked conviction, the two men, as if shaking off unease, handed the joint to the man and hurriedly left the lot. Staring at the joint in his hand until their footsteps faded, the man bent to peer into the back seat.

The naked young man, curled up, was trembling violently. The door was open, and the heater’s warm air still lingered, yet he shook like an aspen. Straightening, the man removed his jacket and looked inside again. As he reached to cover the young man, he flinched and opened his eyes.

His black pupils were heavily dilated. His eyes were red, and his swollen lids made the movement of his delicate eyelashes seem miraculous.

“Do you recognize me?”

The young man couldn’t even move his lips. His ears, swollen from constant sucking, seemed nonfunctional. His blurry, dilated eyes slowly focused. With vision and hearing lost, his peripheral nerves hyper-sensitized, the young man couldn’t lower his guard.

The man thought the young man might not recognize him. Though seemingly defenseless, the young man was highly cautious. Yet every time, exhausted and collapsing on the way home, he let down his guard with the man, always closing his eyes quietly and accepting his touch. But now, he was wary. The man waited patiently until his image faintly reflected in the young man’s turbid eyes. Finally, the young man let out a frail breath. Only then did the man speak cautiously.

“I’m going to cover you with this.”

He held the jacket clearly in view, whispering. The young man, lacking the strength to blink, stared at the approaching hand. Spreading the jacket over the curled body, the man’s fingertips accidentally brushed the young man’s knee. The startled reaction lifted the man’s gaze. He realized the black man’s warning about not touching was literal. Quickly grasping the situation, the man withdrew his hand and sat in the back seat. Closing the door, the warm air absorbed the cold.

The young man, eyes wide, didn’t move. His long, delicate eyelashes, stuck to his lids, were motionless. Finding the joint in his pocket, the man lit it. After a long drag to keep it burning, he held it to the young man’s lips. The young man didn’t open his mouth.

“It’s barely addictive.”

The young man, lips unmoving, stared at the man as if nailed in place.

Silently meeting those blurry eyes, the man held the joint to his lips again.

“To move you, I’ll have to touch you.”

The young man’s trembling transferred to the jacket, visible to the naked eye. Still, he didn’t open his tightly closed mouth. The man finally extinguished the joint and flung open the closed door. As the man’s hand reached out, the young man grimaced in pain. Even the jacket’s touch caused agonizing pain, and he refused what the man offered.

The young man wanted relief. But since those five nights long ago, his body had become a hyper-sensitized entity. Even small doses of drugs made him lose consciousness, and even low-addictive marijuana triggered withdrawal symptoms. Sometimes, the master deliberately made him inhale aphrodisiacs. After performing the master’s every command in a half-mad state, he was left in ruins.

Today, he had taken half an aphrodisiac before starting and the other half midway. For nearly ten hours, he was relentlessly used. Even the sensation of a breeze was torture. If he had opened his mouth for momentary relief, the marijuana would have acted as a stimulant, not a relaxant, devouring his last shred of sanity.

The most horrific part of pain was its beginning. The young man wanted to believe that beginning had passed, that he had reached the peak where consciousness blurred. But the pain he faced again was another beginning.

The man lifted the young man into his arms and stood. A sobbing sound escaped the young man. Tears fell. Tormented by the mere touch, he lacked the strength to push the man away, only moaning. The man, pulling him close, quietly closed the car door.

The lightly held body was ice-cold. The man quickened his wide strides, carrying the young man as steadily as possible. Laying him in the back seat of the usual sedan and climbing into the driver’s seat, the man’s gaze fixed on the rearview mirror. The young man, curled up and collapsed, was out of view.

🍯

The master put a leash on me and locked me in a cage.

I spent fifteen days and nights curled up naked on straw.

Beside me, a dog barked, and in front, a pig grunted in heat. For ten days, I was starved without a sip of water. At first, unable to bear the hunger, I chewed straw. But it didn’t digest, and I vomited it with stomach acid.

After repeating this several times, I gave up on the straw. Only after foolishly expelling what little was in my stomach did I regret my stupidity and cry. Soon, even tears dried up, and I could only blink weakly. I couldn’t tell how many days passed. I was completely starved. Beside me, the dog tore at meat; in front, the pig ate feed. Their eating tortured me.

I turned my barely moving body. Crawling, I pressed my face to the cage bars. In the next cage, a large dog licked glossy meat with a long tongue and tore flesh with sharp teeth. I salivated. Panting like a dog, I pressed my face harder against the bars. Startled by the sound I made, I fell back. I couldn’t believe it. Burying my face in my arm, I sobbed. But no tears came. My body’s moisture was nearly gone, and even urine had stopped.

Lying face-down, I breathed faintly. From afar, the sound of a mating pig came. Beside me, the dog barked loudly. I tried to recall memories. That time, that place. I struggled to remember the soft whispers of Mister Wood as he looked down at me, blocking the light. But I couldn’t remember well. I sobbed again. With a contorted face, I stared at the ants crawling over the straw, lips trembling as I sobbed.

I recalled a childhood day when, unable to endure days of hunger, I climbed onto a dump truck for a sausage. No, that memory wasn’t clear either. I was viciously starved and desperately parched. In utter darkness, I tried again to recall Mister Wood’s words, but it didn’t work. Even his face was now blurry. That wasn’t just sad—it was terrifying. Why was I thrown here? Having lived my life as a sewer, did this mean I was now less than a dog or pig? Was I abandoned? Thrown into a pigsty to be treated as less than that?

The scream of a man being slaughtered alive struck my mind. I couldn’t even convulse. That, too, grew faint. My stomach, once boiling as if filled with acid, calmed, and my foul-smelling mouth quieted. I didn’t try to open my dimming eyes. Breathing faintly, I pressed my face to the straw. My noisy mind was silent, as if submerged in water. Then, something warm flowed over my numb cheek. I lifted my heavy eyelids. Only when my blurred focus cleared did I realize what was wetting my face. A black dog was urinating on the bars toward me. The dog’s urine soaked my cheek.

My body stiffened. Hot steam rose from the straw. Yellow liquid flowed toward me through the straw. I sobbed. I had no strength to cry, but I couldn’t bear not sobbing. I wanted to lick it. But I wasn’t a dog or pig. Yet, I was torn by violent impulses.

I wanted to drink the dog’s urine. I hadn’t had a sip of water in ages and was viciously parched. If I could, there was no reason not to take and drink anything given. My name was Swallow. Swallow, who eagerly took and swallowed anything. There was no reason not to drink the dog’s urine. But I sobbed. I sensed that drinking it would shatter something within me.

The dog’s excrement was slowly evaporating. I stared at the disappearing urine. I wished the moment it seeped into the straw and vanished would stop. At some point, I was writhing. Trembling, I opened my mouth. I stuck out my tongue. Turning over, I buried my face in the straw.

I shook violently. Breaking my last shred of dignity, I stuck out my tongue, but the dog’s urine had already dried. I writhed and cried. Burying my face in the foul-smelling straw, I trembled and wailed. No tears came. No sound came. My stomach twisted as if my insides would tear.

Oh, only then did I fully recall the whisper Mister Wood had left me.

“The most horrific part of pain is its beginning. The pain of your body breaking. The pain of your soul shattering. When that reaches its extreme, you will finally find peace. Don’t blame yourself. It’s futile. Try to live as much as you can. No one can judge your choices. They haven’t lived your life. They have no right to spit on it. But if you still want to die…”

Drip, drip. A clear sound rang through my nearly numb eardrums. Grimacing, I barely opened my eyes. Even holding the faint darkness was hard. Drip, drip. The sound of clear water dropping struck my ears again. Yes, water. I frantically crawled toward the sound. But my shriveled, twisted body could only wriggle like a worm.

Clear water was filling an empty canteen. Feeling intense thirst, I crawled with all my strength. When the water overflowed the canteen, wetting the straw, I could finally touch it with my tongue and lips. Tears seemed to come, but nothing emerged. I crawled for ages. Even with my nose in the straw, I could feel the water, but I wanted to plunge my face into that clear water. Stretching my arm, the distance felt like a thousand miles.

Breathing heavily, dragging my heavy body, I finally reached the canteen. As I lifted my impossibly heavy head to dunk it, the canteen tipped over. Clear water spilled, quickly sucked into the straw. I croaked like a mute and finally cried out. Wailing with deep sorrow, my body trembled. Then, a hand in white latex gloves touched my cheek. Sobbing, I buried my cheek, nose, and lips in that hand. Feeling with my whole being that this hand was my savior, creator, and life-giver, I saw the shards of my shattering soul melt into the water.

I was a blank slate. That choice was my will.

🍯

The young man’s condition was wretched, as if torn apart by a giant beast.

Touching him would make him scream, so the man avoided contact as much as possible. Laying the young man naked on the bed, as even the weight of a blanket caused pain, the man raised the heating to keep his temperature stable and gathered wet towels and fluids. Placing them on the bedside table, he noticed the young man, previously prone, had twisted to lie on his side. His effort to minimize contact and pain was likely ineffective.

Staring at the young man’s back, turned toward the wall, the man hung the fluid bag. The young man’s body, ravaged for nearly ten hours, had no unscathed part. His once-clear skin was mottled or bruised blue, as if stung by thousands of jellyfish, with some areas torn and bleeding from sharp teeth. Places heavily handled by the men bore equally horrific marks. Rolling up his sleeve and connecting the rubber tube to the hung fluid, the man opened the needle.

Holding the young man’s wrist, where bones protruded, he pressed the sharp needle to his twisted arm. Flinching, the young man neither resisted nor responded, enduring until the man finished. The needle pierced the vein, the tube was connected, and the fluid began to flow. This time, the man succeeded in one try. Lowering the young man’s medicated wrist to his chest and adjusting the fluid’s speed, the man rummaged through the supplies again.

“Did they use an aphrodisiac?”

The young man, trembling motionlessly, stared at the wall with unfocused eyes. Using an aphrodisiac but injecting another drug to counteract it would make his peripheral nerves explode like fireworks. The master, anticipating this, mixed a neurological drug with the aphrodisiac. His hyper-sensitized body reacted to external stimuli a hundred times more intensely. The condition began three years ago, and the young man was gradually adapting. The only palliative he could tolerate was the fluid. No explanation was needed; the man accurately deduced his state from a few symptoms.

“Is there nothing else that works?”

“No.”

Swallowing was difficult due to his swollen, raw mouth, but speaking was better than nodding, so the young man answered.

“I’ll call a doctor.”

Self-treatment wouldn’t easily heal him. The hyper-sensitization would subside as the drugs wore off, but the rest needed professional help. The young man was skeptical about calling a doctor but didn’t respond. The man would soon realize.

Snapping awake after briefly losing consciousness, the young man glared at his trembling fingertips. With the fluid circulating through his blood, the sensory pain stabbing him was easing. Turning to the other side, his gaze caught the man’s silhouette. He sat in a chair, bathed in bluish moonlight, motionless. Soon, their eyes met from not far away.

“It feels a bit better now.”

“The doctor was blocked at the checkpoint.”

This land allowed no entry without the master’s permission.

The young man wasn’t surprised. The man, sensing from the young man’s steady gaze that he knew this, soon fell silent. But he let out that quiet voice again. Each time, the young man thought his voice resembled vibrations underwater.

“May I touch you?”

The young man suddenly smirked.

“You know that sounds a bit strange?”

His mouth’s condition slurred his words, but they were understandable.

“I can treat myself.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. Just…”

The young man, about to say something, closed his mouth.

Standing to adjust the fluid’s flow, the man looked down at the young man. His pain-free eyes were, as always, clear. Even in deep suffering, he didn’t moan. Though he let out sounds freely when held by men, his body, unconsciously withholding even a hint of those sounds, sweated coldly like an unceasing spring.

Thinking to change the sheets, the man lowered the fluid to the minimum and turned. Looking back, his gaze dropped. A pale hand clutched his trouser hem, barely holding on.

“Can’t you stay here?”

A faint tension glimmered in the young man’s gaze. If rebuffed, he wouldn’t grab again and would apologize for bothering the man. Overlaying the young man’s smile, saying it wasn’t necessary, with his disheveled eyes asking him to stay, the man sat back down. Only then did the faint strength in the young man’s hand fade. The man looked at the nearly dry sheet, and the young man followed his gaze.

“It’s okay.”

The man didn’t know what was okay. He only stared with dry eyes at the young man, who, as if the man’s presence was enough, fully shed his tension.

The young man trusted the man to an incomprehensible degree.