‘What kind of person was El?’ He asked, not even knowing that it was him. Rayan thought for a moment about how to answer, but the answer came quickly. Thinking about it, it was something he didn’t even need to ponder about.
A lover whom he could never give up no matter what the world threw at him. The sun who he would love forever. But the sentences floating around in Rayan’s head were words he couldn’t say to Erich right now.
“… A kind person. My savior.”
Therefore, Rayan stole only a fraction of his feelings to describe him. Even though he sometimes played mischievous pranks, he was kind. Even though he teased him, he pretended not to know and gave in to him. And he was the savior who brought out Rayan, who had locked himself inside a wall of being unable to grow, thinking that he should remain in that position.
He still vividly remembered the words, “You’re just a little late,” and how the wind blew that day, the way Erich looked at him, and even how his heart skipped a beat at that time.
With that memory alone, Rayan would never be able to abandon Erich.
“It looks like he packaged up some bullshit so well to lure out the innocent.”
Even though it was a memory from several years ago, the other person’s bitter and harsh remark brought Rayan out of his reminiscing.
“Are you sure he wasn’t some wicked man?”
Rayan pursed his lips. That’s you… Words that he couldn’t bear to say rose to the top of his throat. Meanwhile, Erich leaned over and tapped his thigh.
“Excuse me, Your Majesty.”
After watching the gesture for a while, Rayan finally called him out in suffocating silence. Erich only raised an eyebrow in response. He opened his lips, pursed them again, and finally sighed and waved his hand as if asking him to speak.
“Speak.”
“…When am I going?”
He left something in the bedroom he stayed in when he first came here, like the box containing a bracelet. He also remembered the worried look in Philip’s eyes… These were all just excuses. Rayan wanted to make a move before Erich pushed him away again. If he disappeared somewhere out of his sight, then it might hurt a little less.
“Where are you talking about? Arhen?”
Arhen… Although he missed the sea immensely, and although he would love it forever, he preferred to be by Erich’s side. Since he didn’t have much time left anyway, he wanted to be by his side even more. When Rayan shook his head, his wrinkled eyebrows straightened slightly.
“If you’re talking about your bedroom, it’s here.”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
“Qts?”
Pa kjr j qegf defralbc. Sglmt vlvc’a gfwfwyfg tlw, jcv tf vlvc’a ibnf tlw flatfg. Lf aglfv ab qert tlw jkjs, yea atlr alwf tf kjr agslcu ab xffq tlw ys tlr rlvf.
“Lbk mbwf?”
“P kjca ab vb atja, vb P cffv j gfjrbc?”
Pa kjr jc fzagfwfis mbcmlrf jcrkfg. Sglmt iloafv tlr aliafv ybvs eq. Cr tf ragjlutafcfv eq tlr rbwfktja ijz qbraegf, atfgf kjr j rfcrf bo jeatbglas. Cii atf wbgf rb yfmjerf tf xcfk atf ybvs ecvfg atja cfja gbyf. Sglmt rabbv eq jcv jqqgbjmtfv Ejsjc, uglqqlcu atf jgwgfra jcv ibbxlcu vbkc ja Ejsjc.
With a familiar tilt of his head, he leaned down and kissed Rayan lightly before pulling away.
“I admit it. I’m interested in you.”
“…”
“Enough to tolerate a certain amount of arrogance.”
“…”
“And I intend to keep you around, at least until my interest dies down. Didn’t I tell you yesterday? Learn how to do it, even with someone you don’t love.”
Erhart’s words were a long-winded way of saying, as if to himself, that in the end, this was not love, but interest. Only an interest that would inevitably disappear someday in finite time.
“What, is there any reason to go there?”
Orb was a place where unaffiliated court servants stayed, so there were many poor and irrational aspects. It’s like living in a cave, or maybe he liked that kind of bad environment. In any case, Erhart didn’t want to let him go. He might also be called to account for being a musician.
Besides, this was not really an issue that required Rayan’s agreement. He was the emperor, and Rayan belonged to him. As long as he stayed in the palace, his affairs were his to decide.
Rayan, who was quietly lowering his eyes as if deep in thought, nodded his head.
A strange sense of satisfaction spread, and Erhart reattached the gap between their lips. Rayan’s body trembled slightly as he scratched the delicate flesh inside. Yesterday, their lips were locked together dozens of times and their breaths incessantly intertwined, and he quickly figured out where his weak spot was.
Erhart kissed him and lightly cupped the nape of Rayan’s neck. Thump thump, he felt his pulse in his palm. It was faint and fast.
“… Your Majesty. Are you here?”
A sound was heard interrupting Erhart, who relentlessly kissed him while taking his sweet saliva.
“Your Majesty. If you suddenly disappear like that…”
The aide’s anxious voice came through the bedroom door.
As soon as Erhart heard that Rayan, who had been sleeping as if dead, had woken up and eaten, he quickly left the documents that were needed for approval and came to the bedroom. For some reason, it seemed like a waste of time to go back and forth from the main palace where he performed his duties to here. The aides must have been in a frenzy as they searched for the emperor who suddenly disappeared.
“I have to go now.”
He didn’t even say he was inside the room, but Erhart also knew that he had to go quickly. Soon there was also a meeting of the House of Nobles. He had no time to be idle like this.
Erhart took a step back, unlike when he had been clinging to her so persistently. Rayan’s breath was heavy as he tried to catch his lost breath during the kiss. His light green eyes looked straight at him. He felt stiff underneath..
“How about sleeping a little more?”
He wouldn’t be able to sleep well at night. Rayan, understanding the meaning of the softly whispered words, lowered his head. Below the crown of the head, the nape of the neck, where his mark remained, stirred slightly. Erhart left Rayan behind and turned his steps towards the direction where a voice earnestly called him again.
He could feel eyes following him from behind.
Even the moment he opened and then closed the door.
* * *
In a sea of dark green, almost black.
Asha’s body, which glided back to its territory, had a strong smell of blood that could not be erased. Sharks and even kraken, those who settled in his black sea and were not afraid of seeing blood or even death looked at Asha with their eyes, a little afraid and tired.
It was known that Asha sometimes washed away the weariness that could not be overcome with the blood of other beings, but it was his frequent visits to the Black Sea these days. And every time he came back, covered in the smell of blood that never went away, without even causing a wound the size of a fingernail on his body.
“It’s boring.”
Asha mumbled while leaning on the throne that only he was allowed to occupy. Over the years, he had become increasingly bored. Taking his life away, and the pain and despair he could glimpse in that split second, were no longer very enjoyable.
“Would it be a little better if I broke the inviolability and tore down Atisa’s barrier?”
‘My king.’
The kelpie, who had been watching him with anxious eyes, called out to him as if to dissuade him. Asha rested his chin and smiled coyly. That’s probably the only thing that existed in the Black Sea that stopped him. Everything that lurked in the Black Sea was belligerent, and with just one instruction from him, they would try to bite things that belonged to Atisa. If that happened, the smell of blood would never go away in this deep sea.
When he brought up Atisa, a series of things came to mind. A small, young being that seemed to be afraid of him but approached him without hesitation. ‘We’re friends,’ he was so fearless the way he called him a friend.
He could clearly see him offering his life to a human as if it were nothing. Even though he lost his guardian stone and was barely surviving, he insisted on going back to the surface.
As Asha kept thinking about it, he suddenly became curious.
Just as Rayan, who had recovered, did not look for him after leaving the Black Sea, Asha also did not look for Rayan. He thought he had naturally pushed it out of his memory, but looking back, it was a stubborn refusal. The way he longed for a human, even with his bloodless face, sometimes bothered him.
“I wonder how the poor little mermaid is doing.”
Did he find love? Or maybe he couldn’t find it.
A bright smile appeared on Asha’s face. The child’s life would not be for much longer now. The life he gave was as short as it was long. A little more time was added on top of the years that had accumulated between them.
Living moment to moment, he wondered if he had any regrets about life.
Asha got curious. The boredom that had driven him to destructive impulses was washed away as if it had never happened before.
‘I will go find out, King.’
“No.”
If his last moments were begging for his own life, that wouldn’t be so bad either.
“Shouldn’t I go to him myself?”
Asha, who was swaying his dark tail as if it contained darkness, lifted his body. When the kelpie blinked its eyes, all it could see was the ominous, flowing trail of black hair.
Deyumn Asha will go to the surface!!!
Oho, he’s going to visit the human world >3
Thx for the ch ٩(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )و