🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter 5
Hongshi, blinking slowly, suddenly pouted her lips.
“Jonghooo… my stomach hurts, hng.”
Taesan lowered his head and looked down at Hongshi acting cute.
A dry laugh slipped from his mouth.
“Ha, you’re really something else.”
Too drunk to even understand the situation, Hongshi kept babbling.
“Jonghooo… you know, a shaman once told me this before. Said an evil spirit clung to me because I was too greedy for someone who had so little. I thought that was all a lie, but maybe it isn’t. I’m too greedy for someone like me…”
Unable to even recognize the person sitting in front of her properly, Hongshi started sniffling.
And with that mouth of hers, she wasn’t calling Taesan but that damned bastard Jongho instead, naturally whining and acting affectionate toward him.
There had been plenty of fearless idiots aiming for Hongshi over the years, and naturally, Taesan dealt with them.
He hadn’t raised her so carefully just to hand her over to pathetic bastards.
Jongho had been the exception.
Why?
Because Jongho was such an unimpressive nobody that he was reassuringly harmless, and because he’d known his place and groveled to Taesan on his own.
But seeing her whining and acting cute while calling for Jongho made him realize he might’ve judged wrong.
And what was this nonsense she was spouting now?
“I should just be grateful even this life feels like a dream…”
“Who taught you to live like that?”
Putting aside thoughts of what to do with Jongho for the moment, Taesan lightly flicked Hongshi on the forehead with his index finger.
“If you were like me, then whenever there’s something you want, you fight fiercely and take it no matter what. That’s what I taught you. You did nothing wrong, so live proudly.”
“Really? Then can I have everything? What I really want…”
Staring blankly at Taesan with eyes black as wild grapes, Hongshi’s eyes widened.
“O…ppa?”
“Yeah, your oppa.”
Taesan lightly thumped her forehead with his knuckle.
“Finally sobered up?”
Still looking dazed, Hongshi suddenly jolted upright in horror.
Only to smash her head right into the roof of the car.
“Ahk!”
She screamed.
She really was something else.
Taesan let out a long sigh and got out of the car first.
“Get out.”
“O-oppa…”
Taesan’s expression grew even more menacing.
“Don’t want to get out? Then should I send you properly to the afterlife?”
Hongshi seriously wanted to die.
Of all things, she had to show him something so embarrassing.
Did Jongho contact him?
If by any chance he had, she decided she’d kill Jongho.
Well, not literally. She’d secretly burn the game console he bought without Aunt Jayeong knowing.
Though at this rate, she felt like she’d die first.
Standing in front of Taesan with her hands politely clasped together like a student dragged into the principal’s office, Hongshi carefully watched his mood.
Taesan’s expression wasn’t just cold—it was freezing.
“Who told you to guzzle alcohol? Are you dying to get yourself killed?”
She looked sullen for a moment, but then suddenly felt wronged.
No matter what, she was twenty-four years old. Was it fair to scold her like a child on the street?
Maybe it was because she’d been drinking.
Normally, she would’ve apologized profusely, but today she somehow found the courage to protest.
“I-I’m an adult too…!”
Though even that courage was tiny.
Taesan laughed incredulously.
“Adult, my ass. Then you’ll end up in the ER again and piss someone off.”
“T-that wasn’t because I drank, I got drunk and walked into a utility pole—”
“Who said you could talk back?”
“Why not? Am I not allowed to talk back?”
Hongshi glared up at him resentfully.
Taesan’s eyebrows shot sky-high.
“Hah? Look at you.”
She should’ve backed down by now, but she didn’t want to.
Everything felt unfair and miserable.
Why did he keep treating her like a child?
She was all grown up now.
He’d even wiped off the lipstick she’d put on just to look pretty for him.
“I can do everything too! I can wear makeup, and I can drink alcohol!”
“Ah, really?”
“Yes!”
“And what else can you do?”
At that moment, Taesan suddenly lowered his head and leaned in close.
The sudden closeness froze Hongshi in place.
Taesan lowered his gaze and stared straight at her before tilting his head slightly.
A kiss…?
“Can you do this too?”
As his lips came close enough to touch hers at any second, Hongshi squeezed her eyes shut.
But nothing touched her.
“Look at you getting startled.”
When she cautiously opened her eyes, he was smirking at her mockingly.
Hongshi’s face flushed bright red.
Taesan pressed a hand firmly onto the top of her head.
“There are plenty of guys who target innocent girls like you. If you want to drink, ask me to buy it for you—”
Still glaring at him, Hongshi suddenly grabbed his tie and yanked.
Their lips crashed together instantly.
The moment her soft lips touched his, Taesan’s eyes shook.
Smacking her lips lightly, Hongshi pulled away.
Then she looked at him with clear, unwavering eyes and said,
“I can do it.”
“You…”
“Don’t go on blind dates.”
She had definitely lost her mind.
But once the feelings she’d held back burst out like a flood, she couldn’t stop them anymore.
Since things had already come to this, she might as well go all in.
“If you’re going to marry someone, marry me.”
Hongshi had just caused a massive disaster.
“Marriage.”
To Hongshi, Taesan was practically her savior.
Up until her first year of middle school, he’d been nothing more and nothing less than that.
At least until she saw him passionately kissing some woman by the wall near their house.
The shock lasted only briefly. Because in that moment, she realized Taesan was more than just a savior to her.
The moment she fell in love for the first time, what she felt wasn’t excitement—but despair.
Because he was someone far too distant for her to ever reach.
She tried to give up, but as time passed, her feelings for him only deepened.
Little by little, she became greedy.
She wanted him… to see her not as a little kid, but as a woman.
Not as the pitiful child who’d almost died from her parents’ abuse, but as someone confident enough to confess to him proudly.
So she desperately worked hard and moved forward little by little.
Once she settled into her own life and became independent, she planned to say it proudly to Taesan.
“I really like you, oppa.”
But everything fell apart.
The words she’d swallowed down for so many years spilled out uncontrollably.
“No, I love you.”
Taesan flinched slightly.
Like someone faced with a difficult problem, he rubbed his twitching brow with his thumb while staring at her.
Trouble. Fatigue. A hint of bewilderment.
She had imagined every possible reaction to her confession, so she’d expected this too.
But actually facing it hurt unbearably.
The feelings she’d swallowed over and over for years were nothing more than a burden to him.
Tears surged into Hongshi’s eyes as she clenched her fists.
Seeing her reddening eyes, Taesan clicked his tongue.
“Now that you’ve sobered up, get up and let’s go inside.”
Now he was treating her like some drunk person too?
Hongshi bit her lip hard, trembling.
“I’m not drunk. I’m perfectly clear-headed.”
Feeling rebellious, Hongshi grabbed Taesan as he turned away.
“I’ve liked you for a long time. I know I shouldn’t have, but my feelings just became this way. So why were you so nice to me?”
This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.
She was supposed to confess in a cooler, more graceful way.
Instead, she was drunkenly rambling with alcohol on her breath and even blaming him.
She deserved to get rejected, but she couldn’t stop the words anymore.
“So now this is my fault?”
“I’m saying you’re at least partly responsible.”
“…”
“I really, really like you. So can’t you just give me one chance? I’d treat you really well. I know I could.”
“What exactly are you good at?”
“Everything.”
“Everything, huh…”
Suddenly, he strode toward her and bent down to meet her eyes.
“Then are you good at this too?”
“Good at… what?”
Caught off guard, Hongshi’s eyes wavered.
“Dirty things.”
Hongshi sucked in a breath at Taesan’s unexpected words.
“D-dirty things?”
