The Unbelievers

Chapter 53

Yoo Siwoon poured the coffee. The clear brown liquid fell into the glass cup.

As the temperature dropped with the onset of early winter, the heater automatically activated, emitting a faint mechanical sound.

Three months had passed since he last saw Eunseong after that day.

Eunseong immediately recognized the fishy smell of the herb. He asked if Siwoon had mistaken the grass smell for alcohol and was drunk.

Siwoon deliberately made contact with Eunseong. He made him smell it. While praying that he wouldn’t react to this smell, that he wouldn’t respond to him, Siwoon approached Eunseong closely for the first time.

If Eunseong was the ‘Great Rift’, he would lose his mind as if he had swallowed an aphrodisiac and crave the one with opened spiritual eyes. Eunseong, after smelling it, embraced Siwoon’s neck, rubbed his lips against him, and then went limp in his arms, losing consciousness that day.

Siwoon had hoped until the very end that Eunseong wasn’t that being. He had eaten the Jeokdan and gone to find Eunseong with the desperate hope that he wasn’t.

Praying that he wouldn’t resonate, begging inwardly that he wouldn’t show any reaction. If he wasn’t that being, Siwoon could honestly acknowledge his own feelings of attraction towards Eunseong. So he prayed desperately that he wasn’t, offering a prayer to a transcendent being for the first time.

As he approached the confused boy, making him smell his scent as a member of the Seongha bloodline, and caught Eunseong in his arms as he collapsed as if he had swallowed an aphrodisiac, Siwoon felt a bitter shudder.

A fear similar to despair and extreme ecstasy, these two emotions hit his entire body like goosebumps.

He realized then that this was the tremor referred to in the prophecy book, where it speaks of a pale yellow horse appearing from the storm clouds with the sound of thunder. It wasn’t a lie. That nonsensical prophecy book was true.

The ‘Great Rift’ existed in this world, and that boy was Seo Eunseong.

Siwoon, who had confirmed the prophesied being solely by his response to him, without even undressing him to check for the mark, froze while holding Eunseong in his arms.

That night, Siwoon laid Eunseong carefully on the bed and stared at him for a long time, making a resolution.

He vowed never to see him again, never to meet him again.

Never again would he covet those honey-sweet lips and eyes as pure as lilies.

That was the end, the last time.

After that, he cut off contact. As he had decided, he didn’t visit. He ignored Eunseong’s calls. For the first month, Eunseong sent messages or called Siwoon. He even ignored a request to send a photo of a newly hatched baby bird.

Eventually, tired of getting no response, Eunseong stopped texting or calling, and for the past two months, they had been living completely disconnected. Like complete strangers.

Director Nam reported all news about Eunseong daily. Siwoon didn’t ask first. While pretending to be uninterested, in reality, he was focusing all his attention on Eunseong. Very occasionally, he used a cloned phone to check what Eunseong was doing and what he was thinking.

“He doesn’t seem to be in a good mood regarding you, CEO, so I haven’t been able to bring up the study abroad topic yet. Anyway, he’s studying quite hard. His grades have improved a lot too.”

“I see.”

“Do you know that the college entrance exam is next week?”

“Has it already been that long?”

He responded indifferently.

However, Siwoon had been counting down to the college entrance exam since last month.

Checking the cloned phone, he saw that Eunseong, who had declared he wouldn’t go to college, was still searching things like “Seoul universities accepting 3rd grade or lower GPA”, “departments with low admission scores”, and “unpopular but promising majors”.

Then, by chance, he searched for things like “same surname and origin marriage”, “second cousin uncle relationship”, “how to confess to someone older”, “how to date someone 14 years older”, “Cornell University Facebook”, “Cornell University Yoo Siwoon”, “Seongha Momentum CEO Yoo Siwoon”, “Seongha Momentum CEO Yoo Siwoon ex-girlfriend”, “Cornell University Si-woon Yoo”, and even tried to trace Siwoon’s undisclosed private life by searching all sorts of things.

The seasons changed from summer to autumn, and now it was winter. The green leaves turned to autumn colors, then to fallen leaves, and the weather suddenly turned cold.

While telling himself not to pay attention, Siwoon watched Eunseong every day through the CCTV installed in the penthouse. If Eunseong’s clothes seemed too thin, he sent coats or down jackets through Director Nam. Siwoon, who had told Eunseong not to like him, was now more desperately pursuing Eunseong than Eunseong who had said he liked him.

“Why don’t you go see him for encouragement? He seemed to be waiting for you.”

“What good would that do?”

“He probably has given up his feelings for you by now. It’s been three months, hasn’t it?”

Although he didn’t specify the subject, Director Nam was still talking about Eunseong. At this careful suggestion, Siwoon turned to look at him. The last time he checked Eunseong’s cloned phone, unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. The search terms he saw then were still related to Siwoon.

“That would be fortunate.”

“How about taking him to school on the day of the college entrance exam? There’s a good reason for it.”

“No. We won’t see each other anymore. It’s better for both of us not to meet.”

Siwoon told Director Nam that he would never see Eunseong again, and he made the same promise to himself. That’s why he hadn’t touched Jeokdan since that day. Although he had been someone who didn’t believe the ‘Great Rift’ actually existed, now he had no choice but to acknowledge it.

Despite clearly knowing that he should distance himself further, his inner self was torn in two. He was in the midst of a terrible struggle, and his base desires were constantly eating away at his reason. He knew well that it wasn’t the ambition to become the successor, but that he was coveting Eunseong himself, longing for the time they had spent together.

Siwoon postponed what he had to do and looked at the CCTV every day. The more he kept watching, the more his desire to see more, to see inside, grew bizarrely large. It wasn’t a size of desire that a human could handle. From the moment he was certain that Eunseong was the ‘Great Rift’, he had also become aware of his true feelings towards Eunseong.

“Shouldn’t you at least say goodbye to each other before Eunseong goes abroad to study?”

“What’s the point of seeing him? There’s no need.”

“Is there really a need to be so cold?”

“If I’m not cold, what can I do? If I give any room and he says he likes me again, then what? Are you saying we should date?”

Siwoon turned to him helplessly. The only thing he could do for Eunseong was to help him escape from this land as soon as possible, before someone realized he was the prophesied being. That was the right thing to do, and also what Siwoon had to do.

“That’s not what I meant… I’m sorry.”

Director Nam hadn’t meant it that way at all. Eunseong didn’t even seem to like Siwoon anymore. He got angry whenever Siwoon was mentioned. Someone who didn’t know the situation might think Siwoon was some kind of enemy to Seo Eunseong’s family.

He wanted Eunseong to appreciate Siwoon’s efforts in caring for him so meticulously, and to clear up any misunderstandings. Dating? Director Nam, who had never even thought in that direction, was rather puzzled by Siwoon’s words.

Siwoon also looked somewhat frustrated and gaunt.

“How’s your condition? You look very tired.”

When Director Nam asked in a worried voice, Siwoon answered in a softened tone.

“I’m always the same.”

His life hadn’t changed. As always, he worked hard, diligently cleaned up after his uncle, and searched for corruption in the Seongha Group. He still brewed and drank his favorite coffee in the morning, and stubbornly wore monochrome clothes because he found choosing tiresome.

The only difference from before was that he had developed a habit of staring blankly at the empty seat in the dining room that looked lonely when brewing coffee, and he thought he looked like a crow every time he put on black clothes and saw himself in the mirror. When he lay down to sleep, he would hear the sound of a small animal moving and unnecessarily get up to look around. He no longer used the recliner where he often fell asleep while listening to music, leaving it always empty. The telescope remained fixed on the North Star where Eunseong had last set it. In his spare time, he exercised like a madman, pushing his body to the limit.

And now, when reading the scriptures, instead of scoffing incredulously, he shuddered at their truth.

《Lips sweet as honey, eyes as pure as lilies, the swarm of snakes lies in the abyss, visible only to those with opened spiritual eyes…》

To those with opened spiritual eyes, those who consumed Jeokdan, lips as sweet as honey and eyes as pure as lilies were an unbearable beauty.

“I apologize for not being able to pay much attention to you lately, CEO, as I’ve been taking care of Eunseong. Once Eunseong goes abroad to study, I’ll serve you more diligently from then on.”

“…”

As Director Nam said, Eunseong would soon have to leave for abroad. That was their plan. To ensure that no one, not even Siwoon himself, could become the successor of Seongha through Eunseong, to protect Eunseong from suffering a terrible fate. For this, it was absolutely necessary to launder his identity and send him far away.

Siwoon questioned himself. He asked his reluctant heart:

What do you want to do?