Chapter 98

One day earlier, Day 8 morning.

Yo Han Sung woke at dawn on the living room sofa inside Ivory Mansion.

The faint edge of sunrise slowly spread across the sky, brightening the horizon, though the world was still dim with early morning darkness.

After tidying up early, he left the mansion’s main building and went for a light jog.

From the front gate, past the gardens, toward the annex.

When he spotted the room attached to the infinity pool beside the annex, he paused briefly.

But no wavering silhouette appeared.

No one opened the floor-to-ceiling windows and stepped outside.

Sweeping back sweat-damp hair, Yo Han Sung resumed running and circled the mansion four more times.

His personal philosophy was that after pushing his body hard the previous day, proper exercise was necessary to loosen the muscles thoroughly.

By the time he finished running, morning had fully arrived.

A camera staff member who had apparently heard the news late came rushing over and joined Yo Han Sung midway through his second lap.

But perhaps carrying the heavy camera while trying to keep up with Yo Han Sung’s pace from early dawn proved too difficult.

By the third lap, the cameraman voluntarily dropped out.

Apparently he figured he’d already captured enough footage.

Even after Yo Han Sung returned to the room and showered, Jaekyung Park still hadn’t woken up.

After ordering coffee, Yo Han Sung used the quiet moment to review the script for a project scheduled to begin filming soon.

A different script surfaced in his mind.

Gyeol Go’s script.

The one densely packed with notes and handwritten annotations.

Yo Han Sung rubbed the back of his neck and tilted his head back.

The sharp line of his profile stood out against the tension in his muscles.

A faint flex rose along his jaw.

His gaze sank heavily, fixed on the script as coldness swept across his expression.

He wasn’t reading.

His eyes moved across the lines without meaning.

Because all he could think about was Gyeol using the pool with another Alpha.

Because he had seen another Alpha spreading Gyeol’s legs and pushing between them.

Yo Han Sung carefully schooled his expression while taking a sip of coffee.

The hand lowering the cup tightened hard enough for veins to rise along his forearm, though the sleeves concealed it from view.

Just as he flipped the unread script facedown, the morning broadcast rang out.

It was simply the standard announcement marking the beginning of the day.

There seemed to be no special event for either Yo Han Sung or Jaekyung Park.

Which meant—

Yo Han Sung was almost certain someone had gone to pick up Gyeol.

***

At most, he’d assumed it would be a simple pickup date.

Yet even long after Sun Choi returned from the Ivory Mansion date with Gyeol, Gyeol himself never appeared.

Not much later, production announced the news of Gyeol and Jun Shin’s Golden Date.

Keeping his usual expression perfectly intact, Yo Han Sung nevertheless felt as though he’d been struck in the back of the head.

“Yo Han, listen.”

In the middle of that, Hanseul Ga—still incapable of reading the room—clung to him again today and rambled on endlessly.

Politely humoring him was one thing for a day or two.

But Yo Han Sung’s patience was rapidly reaching its limit after Hanseul had practically crawled all the way here just to pester him for days straight.

Hanseul Ga lacked the acting ability necessary for the roles he was given.

His looks were decent enough, but he lacked the kind of magnetism that truly seized people’s attention.

His scripts were always pristine, devoid of any evidence of study, and his frequent stumbling over lines made it painfully obvious how little effort he put in.

Around the time Yo Han Sung had finished roughly assessing the type of person Hanseul Ga was, stories about Hanseul’s background had begun reaching his ears as well.

Not because he asked.

People who liked to flaunt supposed connections to Yo Han Sung volunteered the information on their own.

In short, Hanseul Ga was exactly the type of person Yo Han Sung despised most.

Worse still, he couldn’t even manage his public image properly and constantly turned people around him into enemies.

Yo Han Sung had lost count of how many complaints people had dumped on him over Hanseul.

No convictions.

No common sense.

In every way, he was utterly unfit for this industry and undeserving of it.

And after spending the night at Ivory Mansion with Gyeol, waking up to Hanseul Ga that morning had made Yo Han Sung feel deeply irritated.

At the same time, another thought quietly surfaced inside him.

He wished the person sitting across from him wasn’t Hanseul Ga—

—but Gyeol Go.

Not exactly the sort of thought a man should be having after cornering Gyeol the previous night, threatening him, and ultimately getting knocked down a peg in return.

Yo Han Sung recognized that fact himself.

Then why?

Why was he thinking about Gyeol?

Because he had joined R-Connect 10 after hearing Gyeol would appear on the show?

“Tommy and Hee Jun are back.”

“King Potato! Did you eat French toast? Was it good?”

The lounge erupted noisily as Tommy and Hee Jun Kang returned from their brunch date.

Using the distraction to his advantage, Yo Han Sung rose from his seat.

Hanseul Ga, who had been talking to him, looked flustered.

“Where are you going? We were talking—”

“Be right back.”

“Then at least answer me first. Just answer this before you go.”

The smile resting faintly on Yo Han Sung’s face deepened automatically.

It was practically instinct.

A habit formed for the sake of concealing things.

What had they even been talking about again?

He’d answered absentmindedly the entire time, too buried in thoughts of Gyeol to remember a single detail.

Everyone in the lounge was shouting over one another while teasing Tommy, raising the overall noise level considerably.

Perfect timing.

Using the brief chaos as cover, Yo Han Sung gestured lightly toward Hanseul.

“We’ll talk later.”

Of course, Yo Han Sung had absolutely no intention of ever starting another conversation with Hanseul Ga himself.

***

...What do you think, actor Yo Han?

Whenever he thought about that moment, helpless laughter escaped him.

Once the smile settled onto his lips, it refused to disappear for a long while.

Did Gyeol know?

Did he realize that was precisely the sort of thing that provoked Yo Han Sung so completely?

At first, Yo Han had thought Gyeol was simply naïve.

A gentle face.

Soft smiles.

Crying while watching Yo Han Sung’s acting.

Quietly enduring unreasonable demands from directors without once voicing complaint.

Yo Han Sung had assumed he was as innocent as his clean appearance suggested.

Do you like it now?

But then it turned out he had sharp edges after all.

He acted soft and harmless, yet every time Yo Han Sung pushed, Gyeol pushed back.

Which only made him more curious.

Made him keep testing him little by little.

What kind of reaction would come next?

What sort of expression would he make?

What would he say?

How would he struggle?

“Hah...”

Standing on the beach while exhaling cigarette smoke into the wind, Yo Han Sung continued thinking about Gyeol.

It had become inertia now.

A habit he could no longer stop.

Again and again and again, he kept thinking about Gyeol.

Gyeol reminded him of unripe fruit.

Fruit that could one day redden beautifully, yet still hadn’t fully ripened beneath the sun.

From the outside it looked green and immature—

—but if bitten into, it would likely burst with juice sweet enough to numb the tongue. ℴℴ𝘮

An utterly insane thought.

Because the other man was an Omega with a child.

Yo Han Sung’s eyes narrowed slightly.

He let his expression twist however it pleased.

Production had already decided not to film contestants smoking anyway, so nobody would capture this scene.

And even if they did, he could easily claim the sunlight had simply gotten in his eyes.

Ironically enough, Yo Han Sung had originally quit smoking.

Going even further back, he had once despised smoking itself.

He’d been almost obsessive about it.

Because of his mother, who had spent her life drowning in alcohol, cigarettes, and drugs.

Even after living in America for years, he had never once yielded to temptation—not cigarettes, not drugs.

The first time Yo Han Sung ever started smoking was for a role.

His debut [N O V E L I G H T] character had been a heavy smoker.

A man who constantly carried cigarettes in his mouth, someone whose trademark practically was smoking itself.

Among Korean actors, there was an unspoken consensus:

If you didn’t actually smoke, you couldn’t convincingly portray someone who “smoked well.”

Yo Han Sung had desperately wanted the role.

He wanted to perform it perfectly.

He wanted to become that person completely.

So he abandoned convictions he had upheld for years and stepped into smoking.

Because cigarettes had always disgusted him, they initially felt unbearably awkward.

Still, he forced himself through a full pack a day.

He had no regrets.

The results exceeded expectations.

The GIF labeled “YoHanSung_thug_smoking.gif” became a massive meme and swept across the internet that year, firmly imprinting him into the public consciousness from his very first project.

But once the production ended—and once the success of his next work helped strip away the image of “Yo Han Sung smoking”—he quit immediately.

Withdrawal symptoms and cravings never shook him in the slightest.

Six years passed like that.

And now, after entering this island, Yo Han Sung had started smoking again.

Because he was confused.

Because the emotional swings that felt unlike himself irritated him.

Because he couldn’t stop thinking about Gyeol.

Thinking about him.

Watching him.

Thinking about him.

Studying him.

Worrying about him.

Thinking about him.

Being concerned for him...

He wanted to stop the entire cycle, yet couldn’t.

“...This is insane.”

Unless he’d genuinely lost his mind.

Yo Han Sung let out a bitter laugh.

Ridiculous.

Absolutely ridiculous.

The fact that he had once been practically desperate to tear Gyeol apart—

—and now had even returned to the cigarettes he once loathed because of him.

“So he’s really not coming back all day...”

Just spending one night with Sun Choi had already driven Yo Han Sung half insane and left him unable to sleep.

And now Gyeol would be outside with Jun Shin for the entire day.

Jun Shin.

Yo Han Sung had sensed the strange tension between those two long ago.

It irritated him intensely.

Enough that he genuinely had no idea how he was supposed to endure the hours until Gyeol returned.

“Tch.”

After inhaling sharply, Yo Han Sung let out another hollow laugh and muttered,

“What the hell am I even doing...?”

A strong sea wind scattered his hair wildly.

He didn’t know what exactly he felt toward Gyeol.

Contempt.

Obsession.

Or perhaps...

“Yo Han.”

Someone called him from behind just as his thoughts spiraled further.

I’m really exhausted.

Smoothing over his expression, Yo Han Sung turned around.