Vicious Darling

[69]

A quiet ripple spread across Yuri’s face as he gazed at Chris.

Everyone knows that Chris is blind when it comes to Yuri.

In other words, Yuri also knew that Chris sees nothing but him.

Like a dog serving its master. His loyalty existed without a shred of doubt or wavering.

Perfect faith.

So this confession should have been nothing special. It was merely reinforcing an already known fact.

But somehow, the temperature was completely different from what Yuri had always known.

“I don’t know what pure love is. No, I didn’t know.”

Chris spoke quickly to prevent Yuri from having time to think and misunderstand on his own.

“Originally, I didn’t need to separate my reverence and love for Yuri.”

Just as one cannot divide a heart into two, Chris’s feelings were the same.

He was a more old-fashioned man than he appeared.

His naturally insensitive nature to the subtle flow of emotions also played a part.

“This is the emotion that Chris Northern Light taught me.”

“…”

At the mention of this displeasing name, Yuri’s brow furrowed slightly. But he quietly gave Chris his attention, as if willing to hear him out.

“When I lost my memory. When I saw you by chance in the bookstore I walked into. You weren’t a Guide to me then.”

Yuri remembered that day too.

At that time, Yuri was disguised as a bookstore owner. He needed to investigate the books being distributed in the Winter Continent.

Back then, Rosenhauser was smuggling drug materials into the Winter Continent using books.

When Yuri first discovered this, he was astounded. Rosenhauser dried plants that could be used as drug materials, extracted the fibers, and made books with them. This was the method chosen to evade Yuri’s surveillance after his Baekyah took control of the Winter Continent.

With these imported materials, they made drugs, distributed them in the slums, and addicted people.

It wasn’t simply to shake the Winter Continent, which was Yuri’s foundation. Rosenhauser was exploiting the Winter Continent to support the brilliant growth of the Summer Continent. Dumping reconstruction waste from each continent was just a bonus.

It was sickening.

After Chris went missing, Yuri’s nightmares intensified.

Waking up drenched in cold sweat, Yuri would often stare at the empty space. Even though he tried to forget without lingering attachments, Chris imprinted his existence on Yuri through his absence.

He felt like a fool.

Like a human trying to find warmth from the soot where a flame once bloomed.

Thoughts of the missing Chris enveloped Yuri. Sometimes to the point of completely forgetting his disgust toward Rosenhauser.

Without being told, Logan, who had been tracking Chris’s whereabouts, once reported that a new agent at Northern Light closely resembled Chris.

Since the report mentioned an Esper with the ability to transform into a wolf, Yuri flipped over the report and reprimanded Logan for the first time.

“You’ve done something useless.”

No matter how stupid a son of a bitch he was, Chris was Yuri’s dog. Unless his head had been ripped off and kicked like a ball, there was no way he would have walked into the Esper Alliance.

Rosenhauser was one of the three founders of Northern Light and still had a profound influence even after retiring from the front lines.

However… if that Esper’s ability wasn’t therianthrope but telekinesis.

He might have inadvertently hoped.

Ceasing further thought, Yuri volunteered to personally classify the International Standard Book Numbers. He established an antiquarian bookstore and buried himself in work.

At first, he thought it was quite effective.

But one day, a line written on a page of a book he was mechanically flipping through disturbed him.

“A dog disappears silently so as not to show its master its dying form.”

‘Nonsense.’

But did Chris really leave his side without any reason?

Someone as tactless as him?

Questions and doubts followed one after another.

If Chris had decided to leave him, Yuri had no right to hold him back.

He had nothing to give Chris except guiding.

He thought they had some kind of bond, but if it had been meaningful, would Chris have left?

Yuri generally avoided consciously reflecting on the past.

This was because he lived a life full of regrets. And he didn’t have the luxury to be buried in them.

But after Chris left, he would think about old times whenever he let his guard down, even a little.

This happened more often when he was in this leisurely bookstore rather than at Baekyah.

If individuals or businesses unrelated to books suddenly started buying old books, Rosenhauser might have judged that he’d been discovered and stopped the supply.

To postpone this as much as possible, the antiquarian bookstore purchased as a cover became a good hideout.

Like any other day, Yuri was lost in thought when he lifted his head at the sound of the bell on the door.

If it was a customer, he planned to respond appropriately and then send them away.

And at that moment, he thought he was seeing things.

Chris, who had disappeared without a word or leaving any trace, walked into the bookstore with his head held high.

“Welcome.”

While greeting, Yuri thoroughly examined the man before him.

“Hello. Are you the owner of this place?”

Chris’s eyes looking at him were no different from yesterday or today.

Those blue eyes that Yuri had seen until he disappeared.

Those blue eyes, gazing at Yuri as if entranced, contained such blatant admiration that it seemed like he wasn’t even trying to hide it.

“My name is Chris. I just moved here and was looking around the neighborhood. I didn’t know there would be such a wonderful store.”

At the natural self-introduction, Yuri almost unwittingly smiled.

It was outrageous.

If Chris were in his right mind, he wouldn’t approach him like this.

He wanted to grab the collar of this ignorant-faced man and yell at him.

What on earth was he thinking when he left?

Why did he come back and appear before him?

Nevertheless, his body unconsciously relaxed.

Even with a brief observation, he could tell that Chris had no memory.

He was a person who had always been poor at hiding things.

Yuri wasn’t so surprised by the memory abnormality either.

In the past, Chris had completely forgotten his past due to the side effects of going berserk. Something similar could have happened again.

As Chris glanced at him furtively, Yuri thought it wouldn’t be difficult to tame him again.

Again. From the beginning.

There was no guilt or hesitation in Yuri’s thoughts.

At least until he learned that Chris was an agent of Northern Light with therianthrope ability.

“So Yuri Magnolia… wasn’t a Guide to Chris Northern Light.”

“Even after my memory returned, that feeling didn’t disappear. To be precise, it naturally melded in.”

The emotions of Chris Northern Light and Chris Danil with his returned memory blended seamlessly.

At first, he thought the one with the longer memory had overwritten the one with the shorter memory.

But in fact, it was because Chris Danil also loved Yuri that they became one without difficulty.

“So… my feelings for you have always been the same.”

Yuri’s expression showed little change. But his face became a bit paler.

“Do my words have a little more credibility now?”

Chris asked almost pleadingly.

He thought at least Chris Northern Light would have persuasion power with Yuri, but he couldn’t understand Yuri’s thoughts at all.

Everything he had imagined without actually hearing was wrong.

So now he intended to believe and follow only what came directly from him.

‘I should have done this sooner.’

As if responding to the anxious gaze looking up at him, Yuri’s lips moved.

“Proof of that kind. You don’t need to provide it.”

Chris almost unwittingly became disappointed.

His somewhat hasty heart considered it a rejection.

“Because it’s unnecessary.”

A hand that felt warmer than usual grabbed Chris’s arm.

“I understood what you were trying to say.”

If Chris felt no need to distinguish between his Esper self and himself, it was the same for Yuri.

“I. Won’t keep any other Esper by my side but you.”

Yuri’s purple eyes were staring at him intently.

“Even before you disappeared. It’s been that way all along.”

Chris’s expression crumbled for a moment. He hastily lowered his head to hide his face.

His first thought was, ‘Have I ever expressed that wish?’

Yuri felt aversion toward Espers. Later, to the extent that he mastered unprecedented non-contact guiding.

In a way, Chris was a beneficiary of Yuri’s aversion to Espers.

Because he didn’t have to share his Guide with others.

But this was the first time Yuri had promised so resolutely.

Yuri’s hand grabbed Chris’s chin and lifted his face.

“You seem pleased.”

As the hand slightly turned his head, Chris avoided his gaze.

“But why hide your face?”

“Yuri… you.”

Starting like a soft sigh, Chris squeezed his eyes shut and continued.

“You’re smiling.”

“Ah.”

Yuri mumbled in a slightly dazed voice.

“I am?”

Like someone who didn’t even know he was smiling.

Chris found his astonishment both pleasing and hard to face directly.

‘Was Yuri capable of smiling like that?’

The corners of his mouth had just slightly turned up; it wasn’t a wide smile. He wasn’t smiling enough to show his teeth either.

But the way he looked at Chris, the light in those purple eyes, sparkled in a way it never had before.

‘It’s unfamiliar.’

And at the same time, it was pleasing.

Because if Yuri were to truly smile brightly, it seemed he would have eyes like that.

Since sneers and jeers were more familiar, Chris hadn’t realized he would come to want to see Yuri’s bright smiling face.

“You’re showing too much how pleased you are.”

Yuri’s expression returned to normal.

“…Because I was pleased.”

Chris stopped after looking for traces of the smile on his now-stiffened face.

Yuri didn’t hide his expression because he was angry or embarrassed. Rather, it was because he felt an awkwardness that even he wasn’t aware of.

Chris could instinctively tell that the day would soon come when he would see it again.

His chest felt ticklish.

Chris raised the hand that had been supporting him on the mattress and took off his shirt.

Slightly lifting his head to bite Yuri’s lower lip, Chris whispered.

“Please don’t give me guiding.”