"I'd like to see the ill." Yong Sun chimes, placing the empty cup of tea back on the table.

He stands up, straightening out his slacks.

Soojin's mother walks him to Joon Ki's room, where the washed-out man was looking out of the window, hands curled by his sides as the nurse sat in the corner of the room, minding her own business.

Yong Sun walks closer to Joon Ki's bed, running the pads of his fingers along his calf, feeling the heavy loose skin and flesh dropping from his prominent bones.

He presses his finger over Joon Ki's shin for a few seconds, removing it to watch a depression being formed, post the pressure.

He'd learnt quite a few things in the 7 years he'd hid away from Yun Ki.

One of them being, nursing his own injuries.

"He has fluid in his legs. I'll need to work on him, immediately. It could be something to do with his cardiac muscle dysfunction..How old is he?" Yong Sun asks, eyeing the nurse, who pays him no heed.

She's young, he thinks.

Soojin's mother is rubbing her wrist, worried.

"H-He should be around 30.." She says.

Yun Ki tuts, causing the nurse to look his way.

"Most patients who suffer from an illness as grave as this particular one don't even make it past 30. Tsk tsk, he's overstaying, perhaps. Should we send him to sleep, Eomeonim?" Yong Sun asks, running a hand over Joon Ki's forehead, as he shifts uncomfortably.

Soojin's mother panics and she wrings her hands, forcefully.

"O-Oh no, please! Save him! The other doctor said he could be redeemed…Please, don't give up on him!" She sinks to the floor before him.

Yong Sun prods forwards, grasping her shoulders and raising her back up.

"Dear Eomeonim, he's like a ticking bomb. Can combust anytime…See, I won't give you false hopes like that foreign doctor, I believe in spitting facts. However, there was a time I'd even revived a corpse. I believe I can try and use some methods on poor Joon Ki-ssi.." Yong Sun states, tooting his own horn.

The Mother grabs onto his hands, holding them to her feverish forehead.

"Please! We'll be forever indebted." She exclaims.

Yong Sun looks at Joon Ki, who's watching his mother beg and plead before a man to save his life, a tear rolling off the corner of his eye.

How adorable, he laughs to himself.

He watches the nurse dab his tears.

Bitch, he thinks.

Was it in her quota to clean his tears, couldn't she have let him enjoy a sadistic pang of pleasure?

No problem! He'd tame her well. She'd learn it all, in good time.

His jaws tighten in deep thought as he puts on an act.

"Eomeonim, I was wondering if I could stay here, till Joon Ki-ssi's treatment goes on..Besides, it'll be snowing soon and conveying from my hometown to yours will be a tiring process.." He huffs, looking innocent, silently praying that the old hag allows him to seek shelter.

The Mother nods fervently, agreeing to every demand of his, just to see her son alive and thriving.

He throws the nurse a look before following the Mother out.

"Y-You can stay in Soojin's old room." She guides him, down the hall.

Yong Sun's face stretches in a snigger.

She opens the doors of the room, the smell of Jasmine hitting his nostrils.

He sets his brown suitcase at the end of the room, running his fingertips past the walls, that had been freshly painted.

He looks over at the twin sized bed, the white pillow seated atop a thick mattress.

"P-Please excuse her clothes, in here..We need to have them sent back to The Palace as she'd left so abruptly." She speaks clicking over the thick-wooded chest that lay by the bedside.

"Of course! I don't mind, at all." He seethes, watching the elder woman bow before leaving.

Yong Sun falls over the mattress, flat on his stomach.

Low pants leave his mouth as he feels over the satin bedsheets covering Soojin's bed.

Agh, she slept on this..he thinks to himself.

His hand falls over her pillow as he looks up, engulfing his face into it, with a damped thud.

He sniffs into it, holding it to his chest as though he's suffocating himself via it.

He breathes in the scent of her hair, although the pillow cover might have been washed.

He can still inhale wisps of the water she bathes herself in.

He raises his head from his tight grip over the pillow, feeling his lower member inflate.

The speed with which blood rushes to his member, is insane.

It doubles in size at her odour.

It lies against the mattress, heavy, hard and pulsating.

All for Soojin.

All for those lips.

His twisted mind feels as though it's her beneath him.

He ducks his head into the bedsheets, sniffing like a dog, running his nose over the expanse of her satin bedsheets.

The vessel over his forehead twitches as he ruts his hips into the mattress filled with cotton as his mushroom head frictions against it, a groan leaving his throat.

He struggles to prop himself up, eyes landing on the chest of Soojin's clothes.

He falls to his knees, crawling towards the wooden chest that sits heavy against the marble flooring of her room.

He opens it, in an instant, being hit by her aroma, all at once and it blinds him.

It blinds him in rage and arousal and lust.

He bends his neck, digging his head into the pile of clothes neatly folded, as he runs a tongue over her fabric.

He's starved and dirty, like an animal.

He can't stop.

He can't stop tonguing the fabric as though it's the milky skin of her thigh.

It's a task to compose himself, a string of saliva connecting the wooden chest and his lips, until he runs a tongue over his lips, breaking it.

He skims through her fabric, hands landing on her white silk robe.

The one she'd worn for him when they'd met behind the Cherry Blossom Tree and he'd held her against the hard scratchy bark, littering the milky expanse of her face and swan-like neck, with forceful kisses, one landing her a love bite.

He remembers her convulsing face, the way it'd twist in pleasure.

The way her deer-like eyes would widen when his hands rubbed and grabbed the back of her slim waist or when he sucked her lower lip, tugging it with his teeth, leaving hers swollen and purple.

Agh, the reactions he'd draw out of the goody-two-shoes.

He grabs the white silk, rubbing the material all over his face.

He unties the lace of his vest, bare and sweaty skin of his chest exposed as he runs the material over his pecs.

He was intoxicated and not having her feeble hands digging into his chest or feeling up the ripples of his abdomen, was frustrating.

It made him want to rip out strands of his black hair.

His rock hard member twitches, angrily, reminding him that it needs some love and heavy petting.

It needed to feel Soojin's silk.

The soft slippery material over the sensitive skin of his mushroom head.

"Oh Soojin.." He sighs, dreamily, fat beads of sweat trickling down his body as he complies to his body's calling.

His body calling for the virgin.

——————

"Our plan has been foiled!" Yun Ki cusses, dropping his fist over his table, sending bottles of ink, rolling down and spilling over the marble flooring of his Inner Court as 5 of his trusted ministers and a worried Chief Hong, are huddled around him.

"Jeonha.." Chief Hong starts but is interrupted by Yun Ki's hand, asking him to stay out of this.

"Jeonha, we found the man outside an abandoned cottage in The Capitol.." One of them speaks.

"Yes, Your Majesty! His intestines were being fed on by crows when a group of passerbys spotted him and identified him as the man on the Royal Notice.." The other, adds.

"Precisely! There's nothing more we could've done." A third Minister adds, causing Yun Ki to rub the creases over his strained forehead.

Yun Ki looks up.

"There's no doubt in whatever has happened. It's as clear as day. Yong Sun killed him and now, I'm sure he's fled. I'm most certain that the coward has fled outside Baekmin, just as he always does after doing something drastic.." Yun Ki spits, teeth clenched.

There's a moment of silence until one of the minister's suggests an idea.

"H-How about we have his face painted and publicised throughout the Reign?"

Yun Ki's blood boils.

"That's the last resort!" He roars!

"Doing that would just lead to us loosing track of him for the next 7 more years..I-I can't have him inflicting anymore harm and I most certainly cannot live in fear, never knowing when he could strike." Yun Ki huffs, looking at his Minister's focused faces.

"Besides, I-I'm not alone anymore..I have Soojin's protection to worry about, as well.." He mutters, in a soft voice.

"Jeonha, what happened to Minister Choi?" One asked.

Yun Ki huffs.

"What do you mean?" He inquires.

"Well, he said he was going into the Capitol yesterday and he hasn't gotten back, yet.." He responds.

Yun Ki snarls.

"I bet he's lying drunk in a ditch..Don't bother about him. He'll return once he sobers up."

—————————

Yun Ki walks back towards his corridor, back into his Chamber as he remembers Soojin's emesis upon seeing the deceased body of the Chief Guard.

He wonders if she's okay.

He stands before her Chamber, knuckles ready to prod over the wooden door when he's interrupted.

"Jeonha.." A voice calls.

Yun Ki looks back to watch Areum, prodding towards him.

She stands before him, grasping his wrists.

"Are you alright?"

Yun Ki stares at her in confusion.

"I-I heard The Palace women saying they'd seen a half-eaten corpse of The Chief Guard today…Many were sick.." She mouths out, caressing his arms.

Yun Ki nods at her.

"Yes.." He drifts off.

"Don't worry about me, Areum-ah." He completes, hands heavy in her grasp.

She gives him a confused look.

"W-Why not? Am I not allowed to be concerned for you? Aren't we friends?" She questions, eyes sparkling in disappointment as her features drop.

See, this is what hurts Yun Ki.

Making Areum sad.

Why?

Because even in his lowest lows, she'd made him feel lighter, happier.

"N-Nothing like that." He replies, curtly.

A smile pushes over his face and Areum knows it's not a genuine one.

She knows it because she's known him a long time.

She's seen him when he was questioning himself, his worth as a King, his existence and she's seen him laughing his heart out as he read her Poems she understood little about.

She knows him like the back of her hand.

"What's wrong? You seem somewhat different…Somewhat aloof.." She comments, fingers crawling past his wrist to interlock them with his bigger and pudgy ones.

He stares down at their intertwined hands.

He likes her hands but Soojin's look better in his, he thinks to himself.

"Hm?" She questions, breaking him out of his daze.

He looks at Areum.

He can't lie to her. He never has and why should he?

But right now, he can't tell her that he wishes those were Soojin's hands instead of hers.

She'd feel hurt.

He couldn't tell her that things were going bad, that he felt as though the reigns to Baekmin were slipping out of his hands.

"Areum-ah, I'm exhausted." He comments, huffing loudly.

She drops the hands she's intertwined with his and pouts, running a hand over the side of his uncovered face, watching his tired eyes, circling the heavy bags under them.

She squeezes her arms around his waist, pulling him into a hug.

"My poor Yun Ki.." She sighs into his neck as he is rigid in her grasp.

He's embraced her before.

Hell, he's done everything with her and yet, this feeling of her squeezing against his chest, feels heavy.

His arms lie stiff along his sides.

Why was he comparing her to Soojin? He asks himself.

Until he's reaching out to push her away by the shoulders.

Where were these touchy hands coming from? Especially in a corridor lined by guards.

"A-Areum.." He stutters as her hand scratches the nape of his neck, making a calming sound.

Her warm breath hits his neck as goosebumps form all over his skin.

Just as he's placing his hands on her shoulders to have her leave him, the doors to Soojin's Chamber open and she's met with the sight of the two of them, embracing each other.

Areum's chest is plastered to Yun Ki's and Soojin feels a pang of betrayal and hurt.

But who was she to feel bad about another woman touching him? When she her own self had walked or pranced into another man's beating chest.

She didn't like sharing though, she'd learnt that today as she watched Yun Ki look at her with eyes widened and head nodding a no.

"S-Soojin..it's not what it looks li-like.." He stutters as Areum releases him, turning back to watch Soojin, clad in her purple nightgown, pupils shaking.

Bad timing, Soojin-ah!