Even Zombies Have Fandoms

Chapter 95

Struggling to remove his soaked clothes that clung to his skin, Muyoung failed to notice the shadow cast beyond the curtain. Not even when the large figure parted the curtain and settled on one side.

Thus, as soon as he escaped his upper garment, he experienced the sensation of his hair standing on end. He had casually turned his head and discovered a large, dark presence standing before him.

“Pwuha- Huuk!”

*Flutter!*

Muyoung’s feet momentarily lifted into the air before landing. Startled and gasping, he staggered backward and asked:

“W-who is it?”

Even though it was natural that only his companions would be in the classroom. The sudden appearance of an unexpected figure during his undressing made his heart sink. The dimness and enclosed space created by the single curtain also limited his vision.

“…What? It’s you, Hyung? You scared me.”

After creating some distance, Muyoung could see the familiar face amid the broad chest that had filled his view. Recognizing the intruder, he unconsciously smoothed his chest, and the sleek sensation under his palm made him suddenly aware that he was standing half-naked before Seokjae.

“Uwah!”

Letting out something like a scream, Muyoung hastily clutched his top to cover himself. Though the damp fabric clinging to his body again felt unpleasant and almost made him shiver, protecting his bare body was more urgent.

“…”

Seokjae raised one eyebrow crookedly at the reaction, as if Muyoung had been embarrassed about showing something he shouldn’t.

Noticing this change, Muyoung belatedly felt sheepish. He realized his reaction had been excessive for merely exposing his upper body.

“Ah, no. It’s just…”

A familiar embarrassment crept up, similar to when he’d once mistaken a wall stain for “that bug” with large antennae, frantically called for his mother, and then learned the truth.

“Did someone just say something?”

“Wasn’t that Muyoung-hyung’s voice?”

The small commotion inside the narrow curtained area must have reached the others, as Kyungho and Junwoo’s voices came from a short distance away. Muyoung jumped, startled, and quickly stretched his neck toward their direction to answer.

“Uh, yeah! It’s me, I just dropped my clothes and got surprised!”

Somehow unable to say that Seokjae had suddenly invaded his makeshift changing room, Muyoung awkwardly lied.

Fortunately, the two didn’t seem particularly interested, responding with casual sounds like “aha” as if accepting his answer. Then they seemed to focus on changing their own clothes again. The sound of damp clothes being hung up continued from beyond the curtain.

“Hah…”

Muyoung sighed with relief at their somewhat dismissive response. It wasn’t as if he was doing anything wrong, so why had he lied? As he tilted his head, wondering…

*Tap.*

As if demanding his attention, a much larger foot stepped forward in front of him.

“Huk.”

Muyoung stepped back, instantly erasing what little distance had formed. Simultaneously, the indecent sight of Seokjae’s thick chest filling his view appeared again.

Flinching, Muyoung quickly lowered his head and retreated weakly like a rabbit facing a tiger.

“Hyung. Why are you here…?”

*Thud…*

*Step.*

“Hyung, please just stay there for a moment.”

*Patter!*

*Step step.*

But Seokjae wouldn’t simply stand by. Despite Muyoung’s protests, he advanced as much as Muyoung retreated—no, slightly closer.

After that, neither of them stopped, creating a childish game of widening and narrowing the distance.

*Thud.*

“Ah.”

The meaningless struggle, which seemed like it would continue, ended sooner than expected when Muyoung’s back hit the wall. Though he was using the leftmost section, from the outside it would look strange—a curtain stretched long with a round head prominently visible, like a ghost covered with fabric.

‘When did we get this close?!’

There was nowhere left to escape. Muyoung rolled his eyes in panic, moistened his lips that felt parched from tension with his tongue, and then bit them gently. While fleeing, he hadn’t noticed, but now that he’d stopped, the distance was even closer than before.

‘Isn’t this a situation that could be misunderstood?’

Simultaneously, he vaguely understood why he couldn’t honestly explain to Kyungho and Junwoo earlier. It seemed his instinct had known what his mind hadn’t realized.

Two people in one curtained changing area when there was no shortage of curtains? If they had entered together from the start, the others might have thought they were just very close. But to start separately and then secretly enter someone else’s changing area when others weren’t looking?

That was too…

‘It looks like we’re trying to do something, you know, romantic!’

Look at their current posture—he was so close that he would step on Seokjae’s shoes if he moved his feet slightly sideways. That made it even more likely to cause misunderstandings.

Of course, he knew Seokjae wouldn’t sneak in with such thoughts. But it was difficult for his slow mind to follow Seokjae’s thinking.

Unable to come up with anything, Muyoung bowed his head deeply to prevent his breath from possibly reaching Seokjae, and whispered:

“H-hyung, why exactly… What’s going on?”

Even if he wanted to push him away, he couldn’t bring himself to touch the t-shirt that clung to Seokjae’s muscles. It felt like any touch would be full of personal desire.

‘Am I possibly frustrated? Am I having these thoughts when I haven’t even started changing how I think about Hyung?’

Even if he was a fan before being a friend, he wasn’t a pubescent teenager just beginning to be interested in sex. He couldn’t understand why his gaze kept being drawn to another person’s body.

‘What happened to the “my baby” mindset? Someone’s looking at my baby’s body like this…’

Seokjae was too excessively attractive to maintain fan feelings like “my baby.” He was too sensual for an inexperienced fan like himself, untrained in such stimuli, to view purely without change of heart.

‘To only realize such an obvious fact now! I’m… I’m a fool, an idiot!’

While Muyoung was, for the umpteenth time, revoking his own qualification as a fan, *tap, tap*—dark-colored fingers touched his pale hand that was tightly gripping the wet t-shirt.

Startled back to his senses by the tapping, Muyoung abruptly lifted his head, froze at the immediately meeting gaze, and then stammered:

“Ah, um… You do have something to say, right?”

He thought Seokjae’s gesture was confirming what he had been asking all this time. While trying to subtly avert his gaze by rolling his eyes somewhere between his brow and nose, Seokjae moved his lips.

“Don’t cover it.”

That Seokjae had a nice low voice was something he already knew. But hearing it for the first time in this dark space, separated by just a thin piece of fabric, why did it feel so secretive and dangerous? It had more impact than ever before.

A chill ran up his spine, and he felt his fine hair standing on end, which made understanding Seokjae’s words take longer than expected.

“Huh?”

Only after Seokjae prompted him once more did Muyoung finally gather his wits enough to respond.

“Don’t cover it? So…”

What? Surely not my body?

In the current situation, the only thing he could be covering was his upper body, but… it didn’t seem likely that Seokjae would request such a thing. Also, asking “My body?” might seem too presumptuous.

“W-what do you mean?”

How could he bear the shame if he was wrong? So Muyoung ended up passively asking him.

Observing this flustered behavior, Seokjae muttered inwardly.

‘Pretending not to know?’

Judging by the tension not hidden beneath his bewildered expression, he clearly knew the answer. Whether he was pretending not to know because he didn’t want to comply or had some other reason, Seokjae wasn’t sure.

‘Well, whatever the reason, I have no intention of missing this good opportunity to satisfy some frustrations.’

Seokjae pointed firmly with his index finger at the upper garment Muyoung was gripping so tightly that water droplets were squeezed out, forming a puddle at his feet.

“This. I want you to remove it.”

Though the touch was slow and gentle like poking flour dough, the sensation that reached Muyoung was as startling as being pricked by a needle. His shoulders flinched and drew in.

It was a relief that Seokjae wasn’t delusional, but it wasn’t good that he wanted to see Muyoung’s body.

“M-my clothes? My clothes? W-why this?”

The expression was too direct to pretend not to understand. But still wanting to avoid showing his body if at all possible, Muyoung persisted in asking why, looking for an escape route.

Unfortunately for Muyoung, Seokjae was unimaginably shameless, inconsiderate, and unacquainted with embarrassment.

“I came here to see your body. So you shouldn’t cover it.”