L*st and Death

“Ughh! Nnngh! Mmmph!”

It was the kind of noise an injured animal might make when caught in a trap. The man was desperately trying to speak, but his mouth was blocked—only muffled howling came out. Clearly, he was in the same situation as Siron.

Every time he moved, there was the grating sound of metal and the cold clinking of chains.

A vague image surfaced in Siron’s mind—two sturdy posts installed in the center, replacing the backseat. Chains coiled around them like serpents, ropes stained brown. The thought hit him—those stains had been blood.

“Mmph! Nngh! Ughhh!”

The man screamed, his voice loud enough to bounce around the sealed car, like he was deliberately provoking Johnson. But he didn’t last long. His resistance faded, and the sound of his cries morphed into wheezing sobs, like someone on the verge of suffocation.

It was the cry of someone who knew the end of a kidnapping was death. A cry of someone without the strength to fight or the chance to escape—utter despair.

“Noisy, isn’t he?”

Johnson’s question pierced Siron like a wasp’s sting. Siron flinched violently and shook his head, screaming as loud as he could.

“Mmnnnnghh!”

“Well, it’s a long drive. Best to make it comfortable.”

Johnson had clearly already made up his mind. He turned the vehicle sharply. It rocked violently from side to side, like a boat in the eye of a storm. They drove over rough terrain for several dozen seconds. Then the car came to a stop, and Johnson got out swiftly and opened the side door, climbing into the back.

Siron could feel the vibration of the shifting weight. Chains dragging. The man screaming and thrashing. Just from the sounds alone, Siron could envision what was happening—Johnson pulling the struggling man out and stuffing him into the cargo hold, slamming the heavy metal canopy shut, and locking it tightly so there’d be no escape.

Returning to the driver’s seat, Johnson didn’t hesitate to drive off again. The vehicle bounced from off-road terrain onto a paved road, picking up speed.

A deathly silence settled in the car. The sound of the road, the wind outside—it was like it had all been sucked away. It felt like being trapped in a vacuum.

Siron still couldn’t believe he’d ended up in such an extreme situation. It was so far from normal that it felt like he was filming an action-thriller. But this was real. He was in the car of a psychopathic abductor, being taken for a ride in the middle of the night. And when that ride ended, he would likely be dumped in some remote place—probably in the Secreta Swamp—where no one would ever find his body.

Obvious as it was, your safety was always your own responsibility. Siron had missed too many chances. He’d sensed something was off with Johnson—something manipulative about how he toyed with people’s psychology—but ignored his gut. Because he was attracted to him. Because Johnson was charming. Because he’d felt excited.

There’s no way my life ends here... This is really happening?

Siron couldn’t accept it. But when he looked back, all his downfalls had always come suddenly. One day, his mom dropped him off at his grandma’s house and vanished to remarry in another city. His grandma, who had basically raised him, died just ten days after being diagnosed. His thriving career in entertainment collapsed overnight after one scandal. And now—he was about to be murdered.

But who in the world ever thought they’d meet such an end? Who ever imagined themselves as a tragic corpse?

Holding his breath so as not to upset Johnson, Siron cried silently. In the stillness, only the faint sound of him sniffing echoed in the car.

Johnson fiddled with the stereo and turned on some music. Siron immediately recognized the piece. It was Albinoni’s Adagio, the concerto for strings and organ.

It had been the theme for Kim Taesik, the serial killer protagonist in a movie Siron starred in. As Taesik crossed the point of no return into death, the director had used Adagio to intercut scenes from his past and present for nearly ten minutes. It was a solemn requiem, a farewell drenched in regret and ruin.

I want to scream.

Even as tears poured from his eyes, Siron clawed at the tiniest fragments of hope.

I want to beg him to spare me. I’d get on my knees, cry, grovel, do whatever it takes. Maybe if I look pitiful enough, he’ll let me go.

Tearful acting was his specialty. And this was real—raw emotion, the kind that could gut the viewer’s heart. Even someone who shut out the screams of others and only listened to their own voice—Siron believed he could move them.

But Johnson was merciless. He didn’t give him even a chance to open his mouth. As the car sealed off from the world played that solemn music on loop, time dragged on, cruel and unrelenting.

Baek Kyung stepped into Anna’s house and quickly surveyed the lobby. The entrance was decorated with ornate molding and a grand crystal chandelier woven into an intricate pattern. Past the foyer, the hall was floored in glossy white marble, covered here and there with expensive rugs. Elegant wooden furniture. Classic landscape paintings framed in gold. The place clearly didn’t match the siblings’ personalities.

No way she bought a multimillion-dollar mansion on a traffic cop’s salary. She had to be living in her parents’ house.

“I’m going to shower.”

Covered head to toe in fire extinguisher dust, Lewis didn’t look back as he climbed the stairs to the second floor. Anna looked absently at Baek Kyung, who was trudging ahead like he owned the place, just as disheveled as Lewis.

“What the hell? Did you come in with your shoes on?”

She scowled and jabbed a finger at him.

“Take them off.”

Baek Kyung’s face crumpled at her stern tone. Not Could you?, not even Please. Just a straight-up order. She sounded just like his annoying older brother.

The old Baek Kyung would’ve ignored her and stomped around just to piss her off, but this time, he somehow mustered the patience to return to the foyer and take off his shoes. Unlike the brutish man he used to be, there was a trace of civility in the present him. He found the feeling oddly unfamiliar.

I think I’ve gotten kind of nice.

Sliding his feet into slippers, Baek Kyung stroked his stubbled jaw and sank into thought.

Ever since becoming an alpha, his personality had mellowed. Compared to his reckless, rage-prone past, he’d adjusted to company life decently and didn’t explode over every little setback.

He’d dropped out of school early and couldn’t do anything beyond basic arithmetic—despite being a third-generation chaebol—but now he could solve calculus problems and recite the line of Joseon kings in order. His parents said it was because he’d been conditioned in the extreme environment of the psych ward, but that wasn’t it. Becoming an alpha had brought him closer to what most people called “normal.”

What exactly is an alpha?

How far can the changes from alpha transformation go?

Standing in front of the panic room, Baek Kyung stared at the warped triple-lock mechanism.

“Your rapist brother did this?”

Anna shut her eyes tightly. She hated that new nickname for Lewis with every fiber of her being. But she couldn’t defend him, either.

“Yeah. That bastard did it.”

“Cheap lock, huh?”

“Cheap? I spent twenty grand on that thing! And repairs will cost another twenty!”

Baek Kyung stroked his chin, looking around the opened panic room door. Then back to the ruined locks and bent frame. It was brute force that defied belief—unless a machine had done it.

“He’s more advanced than your standard alpha?”

“Basically. He doesn’t just respond to omegas—he reacts and tracks alphas too.”

Baek Kyung recalled his conversation with Isaac Bazelli about the rapist. The guy didn’t seem smart. Which meant his superiority likely came from enhanced physical traits.

“You know your brother’s rut cycle?”

Anna frowned, reluctant, but opened her phone’s calendar app. After skimming through, she answered uncertainly.

“I don’t know the exact date of his first rut, but it probably came about 33 days in. It lasted an insanely long time too. He was basically out of his mind for ten days.”

Baek Kyung grimaced.

“So it’s been just over two months since he became an alpha?”

“Yeah.”

Alpha rut cycles varied wildly. Some came every 40 days. Others, once every three months. A newly turned alpha could have an unstable rhythm—but ten days? That was way out of line.

The man was clearly more dangerous than a typical alpha. Like a werewolf that transformed into a monster under a full moon. Baek Kyung had seen it with his own eyes—the crazed beast that lunged at Yoon Siron like he’d lost all reason.

Can I really team up with that bastard to find Siron?

Baek Kyung dragged a thumb across his lower lip and sucked in a slow breath.

The more he thought about it, the worse the idea seemed.

“What about your cycle?”

“Why the hell do you want to know that?”

Even as he scowled, Baek Kyung answered anyway.

“Thirty-eight days.”

“And how long does your rut last?”

“Jesus Christ...”

He bristled, but Anna wasn’t fazed.

“Come on. I’m seriously curious.”

“...A week.”

“Yikes. Yours is long too.”

After a few seconds of silence, Anna raised a question.

“Can alphas function in daily life like this? I mean, can you even hold down a job?”

“There are ways to manage it.”

“There are?”

“If you have sex, it shortens the rut by a day or two.”

“...Who the hell would sleep with a rutting alpha?”

“No one sane, obviously.”

Ugh. Anna’s lips curled in disgust so hard she nearly grew a double chin.

“You too? Did you sleep with someone during rut?”

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