Ch.53Chapter 53. Everything Follows Fate.

-Splash.

In the bathtub of the hotel room.

Irie submerged herself in the cold water, sinking her head below the surface as she became lost in thought.

The coldness penetrating deep into every corner of her body.

She had hoped it would cool the heat filling her head, but instead, it only made the warmth feel more vivid.

‘How, how did I end up saying such things in front of Hyoseong…’

Yes, no matter how much she tried to deny reality, time kept flowing.

Though she claimed to have spoken without thinking, if she had run away immediately after blurting those words, she could have pretended it never happened.

Yet she followed him into this hotel, as if suggesting that she herself wanted this too.

‘Do I, really, want such a thing…’

What she had consistently seen through her prophecies was now becoming reality.

Just imagining it sent shivers through her body as she caressed herself underwater.

As if preparing for what was to come, her feminine instincts seemed to be awakening.

‘No, get a hold of yourself, Irie! No matter how flustered you are, you can’t lose yourself!’

Trying to deny such thoughts, Irie left the bathtub to compose herself.

Then, as if rebelling against her hesitation, she actively left the bathroom, changed into light indoor clothes in the dressing room, and entered the living room.

Just then, he returned from his outing.

“Irie, I bought some drinks…”

“Ah, Hyoseong.”

Irie called his name while drying her hair with a towel.

Though she tried her best to hide her earlier confusion by controlling her voice, she noticed his gaze becoming rigid when he saw her.

“What’s wrong?”

“Ah, no… I, I bought some drinks, would you like some?”

“Ah, yes. Alcohol…”

It wasn’t unusual for them to drink together when spending time with each other.

But Irie couldn’t help feeling considerable wariness about the bottle of alcohol he brought.

For good reason—according to the predetermined future without variables, an incident occurred while drinking with him.

“…I think, juice would be better than alcohol.”

Yes, whatever happens, she must not lose her reason to intoxication.

“Ah, yes. Juice, you say?”

“Yes, I’m rather weak with alcohol… If you give me the bottle, I’ll go exchange it for juice.”

“What? In that outfit?”

“Pardon?”

Hyoseong asked in alarm.

At his words, Irie looked down at herself in confusion.

It was just comfortable sleeveless indoor clothing, so what could be wrong with this outfit?

“Ah, no, I’ll go. I’ll go.”

Hyoseong hurriedly left as if even looking at her was uncomfortable.

Left alone, Irie stared blankly at where he had been looking, then gave up thinking about it and sat down on the bed.

She guessed that since the True Ancestor’s power still remained, he too was in a state where normal judgment was difficult.

‘He’s certainly not in his right mind, but he hasn’t completely lost control yet.’

Although she didn’t know the True Ancestor’s intentions, given the weakness of its power, his reason couldn’t be completely lost.

At most, he was like someone somewhat intoxicated by alcohol or drugs. His actions might be extreme and intense, but they likely stemmed from his own memories or instincts.

In other words, though there was provocation, the fact that he demanded “that kind of relationship” from her meant his true feelings were somewhat involved.

‘Hyoseong sees me as…’

As she felt her hand on her chest, clearly sensing through the thin clothes.

‘He really, from the first time he saw me, looked at me in that way…’

As the heat she had submerged in cold water began to intensify again with her quickening heartbeat.

Feeling her heart pounding more clearly, Irie lowered her reddened face and sank into contemplation.

‘I don’t dislike him.’

There was no way she could dislike him.

Rather, because the world was chaotic and full of dangers, the mere fact that he bore no ill will toward her was reason enough to feel goodwill toward him.

His character was so deeply etched in her mind that she couldn’t forget him, and she had constantly felt the extension of such evaluation building up within her whenever she thought of him.

‘But… is this really okay?’

Such reflections had led her to unconsciously affirm and create this situation, but they were still just before crossing the line.

If there was a chance to change things, it was now. The future can be changed, but the past cannot.

Perhaps this one-time opportunity shouldn’t be realized by going with the flow rather than making a proper decision.

“Irie, I brought juice.”

“Ah, yes. Thank you.”

Irie received the bottle he handed her as he returned just as she had made her decision.

Afterward, the two sat side by side on the bed, focusing on drinking their beverages for a while.

She drank juice, and he drank alcohol.

Though he seemed to have been drinking before meeting her, his gaze showed no signs of being disturbed.

Was he as strong a drinker as his innate mental strength?

“Um, Irie.”

Yes, with such strong mental fortitude, he would soon regain his senses if the instigator wasn’t by his side.

As if confirming her prediction, his voice, which had been confident at first, began to stiffen.

“We’ve somehow ended up in this situation, and… I’m just asking in case, but about what I said earlier on the street, you’re not forcing yourself to go along with it…”

“Shh.”

Guilt from a belated realization.

Closing the distance, she stopped his mouth with her finger as he tried to express it, looking up at him from below eye level and whispering softly.

“Please be quiet for a moment? I’ll explain everything.”

“Explain, what?”

“Yes, I’ll explain why I accepted your proposal.”

Irie, who had repeated herself, then removed her hand from in front of him and quietly faced him.

She wore only thin indoor clothes.

In a situation where removing just one more layer would not make it strange to enter such a state, she hardened her resolve and directed her clearly open eyes toward him.

“…Hyoseong.”

Calling his name, which she had never forgotten.

To continue the resolution she had made while he was briefly away.

“I know a lot about you. You probably guessed that, right?”

“Ah, yes. Since you knew my name and what I was doing from our first meeting…”

“As you say, I have the ability to read the past of the person I face. Although I can’t learn information about the previous world, at least from the moment I met you, I roughly understand what you’ve been through since coming to this world.”

His name, Hyoseong Woo, and the fact that he fell into the status of a Foreign Laborer after entering this world.

Furthermore, she knew that he had countless brushes with death while serving the heroes, and that his survival wasn’t just due to luck.

And she felt that such evaluation was increasingly rising.

Because she had been thinking of him every moment and couldn’t forget him, she had been more seriously immersed in his past.

“I… think you’re an amazing person.”

There was no falsehood or pretense in that assessment.

Such feelings had grown stronger in this moment when her heart trembled just by facing him.

“Ah, no. Amazing is…”

“No, Hyoseong is an amazing person. Unlike me, who is powerless without prophecies.”

Look even now.

The judgment of the destruction god was clouded by a variable created by a single Transcendent, and she couldn’t properly respond to what happened during that gap, creating this situation.

Even now, she was barely maintaining her composure, so she still couldn’t use the power of the Haven family.

She realized how powerless she was without her prophetic abilities through this situation they unintentionally created together.

“So, when I saw a future where I would be with you…”

So let’s acknowledge those feelings.

“Be, be with me?”

“Whatever form it takes, I sometimes… thought that the result might be accompanied by my true feelings.”

She spoke these honest feelings with a resolute voice, tightly gripping the bedspread.

“That it might be emotions held as a person of the opposite sex, not just as one person to another…”

-Thump, thump.

The sound of her heartbeat gradually growing louder.

It wasn’t just from anxiety.

If looking at her pure, honest heart, she was even feeling ‘anticipation’ at this moment.

“Then, Irie too……”

“But I’m sorry, Hyoseong.”

And because of that, Irie felt guilty toward him.

Even if she felt emotionally drawn to him, still.

She couldn’t shake the feeling that it was too early to realize those feelings.

“I should have responded more calmly, but to say this after coming to this situation.”

“…Is it a rejection?”

“It’s not that I dislike you. It’s just that I have a mission.”

Yes, the reason she came to this empire in the first place was to prevent the destruction prophesied by her first ancestor.

For that purpose, she had been seeking fortune-telling from passersby while avoiding the eyes of guards, in search of someone destined to save the world.

Even if the person before her was specially regarded among them, she, who also bore the mission of reviving her clan, couldn’t impulsively allow her body.

“So just a little…”

If she were to compromise her position and do this, the future they would face would surely be one they would both regret.

If after being with him, she were to be with another man to follow her mission.

It would be no different than betraying him who had given his heart to her.

“Could you give me a little time?”

So for now, they should wait and see.

Believing that if she thought this moment’s relationship was premature, the right answer was to take a step back, she watched as he, who had been silently listening to her words, finally smiled bitterly and lowered his head.

“I understand Irie’s feelings.”

“…Hyoseong.”

“Certainly, if you have circumstances, you’d want to focus on them. Even coming into this room with me at my unreasonable request must be the result of your consideration, because your feelings for me are not light.”

Frustration, and regret evident in his voice.

It meant that he too had been expecting the time afterward, but like her, felt anxious about not naturally accepting this situation.

So he too would surely approach this situation cautiously.

“Then… we’re pretending this never happened?”

“No, that’s impossible.”

“Eh? What do you… Kyaah!”

Her body fell onto the bed from a sudden push.

Afterward, though she tried to resist somehow, the thought that it would be possible against the shadow cast before her was soon erased.

After all, overcoming the strength of a man trained by labor would be impossible for her who had lost her prophetic abilities.

“Hyo-Hyoseong, please calm down! You’re not this kind of person!”

“How could that be possible! After openly seducing me from earlier and then saying to wait a little! Are you making fun of me!?”

“Seduction… I didn’t! I never had such thoughts…!”

“Wearing such thin clothes and being defenseless on the bed, if that’s not seduction, what is!?”

“What? But, but this kind of clothing is normal indoors!”

“It’s sexy! It felt even sexier because you weren’t aware of it at all!!!”

“Eeh, eh!?”

Though direct words flew at her face, she had no such awareness.

She had only lived as a successor of Haven and as an astrologer, without any awareness of how her true self might appear to others.

Having never brought a man from outside into the same room, she had no way of knowing how her comfortable indoor attire might appear to others.

“Please have some awareness. That you, Irie, are an attractive woman, and that I am an untrustworthy man.”

Conversely, before her was clearly a man starved for sexual desire.

No matter how high his mental strength, when a situation is created so blatantly, he can’t help but be tested for patience.

Even that patience is enough to maintain some reason under a vampire’s enchantment, but the fact that the other party doesn’t reject him has led to breaking even the last line he should have held at this moment.

“I, I don’t know about such things.”

So no matter how sincerely she spoke and tried to rely on his character, it was natural that such a situation would arise once they entered this room alone together.

Despite realizing this, Irie ultimately just turned her gaze away from him, as if escaping reality.

“This is the first time I’ve been in a room with a man like this, so I don’t know what to do…”

“It’s true that you don’t dislike me, right?”

At that sudden question following her small resistance, her voice cut off.

Afterward, she held her breath, glanced at him, and quietly began to move her head toward him.

-Haa, haa.

As the quiet breathing from both their mouths intertwined, increasing the heat in the room.

As that heat covered the alcohol’s effect, making the mind intoxicated, he finally put strength into his neck and said.

“…I’ll take responsibility.”

It was a groundless statement.

Just words recklessly uttered by someone who feels self-loathing for his own weakness, immersed in immediate desire.

“Whatever responsibility Irie bears, whatever mission you carry out, I’ll bear it together.”

But even if he can’t handle it, he doesn’t avoid it.

He knew what he was saying, and was prepared to take all the responsibility that came with it himself.

“Hyoseong…”

“So don’t leave.”

Because he had always lost them.

Because he had always sent away those who gave their hearts to him, saying he couldn’t handle it.

“I don’t want to let go of the person by my side anymore.”

The powerlessness he felt each time turned into a dagger, leading to a desperate longing for opportunity.

Whether the time they’ve met is short, or whatever fate lies ahead.

He would think after seizing this opportunity that would never come again once this moment passed.

‘…Ah, great ancestor,’

But how could that be seen as a sin?

It would be wrong to blame him as foolish for waiting for her answer without reaching out despite feeling desire, when she herself felt her heart racing at this moment.

‘Despite bearing a mission, it seems I too am merely a human after all.’

Yes, she did not refuse.

The past that has already gone cannot be changed, and the present unfolds with such past at its roots.

Just stopping because of the reason that distance should be kept due to her mission was too much, as the two knew too well the feelings they had for each other.

“Irie?”

“Don’t, say anything.”

Even in this world, he would always hunger for people.

And she, unable to forget such a man, foresaw a future where she would have to bear a mission too burdensome for herself.

“Having come this far, I’m not shameless enough to say do nothing…”

As she realized this and gradually loosened the hands wrapping her body.

At the end, having defenseless exposed her body, she quietly said.

“So, for now, don’t say anything…”

“Let’s just focus on following our fate.”

Realizing that the future she had been so afraid of until now.

Had become reality by none other than her own will.