Woosung Alpha’s Sour Grapes

Chapter 21

As Tae-geon uttered the game slogan, Hyeon-woo’s online community nickname suddenly flashed through his mind. Perhaps feeling guilty, Tae-geon’s smile seemed somewhat mischievous. Flustered, Hyeon-woo even stammered.

“Ah, um. I’ll just… go check if they have a snack I’m craving.”

Hyeon-woo hurriedly left his seat and quickly disappeared behind the shelf. Watching Hyeon-woo’s retreating figure, Tae-geon let out a low chuckle. He found it amusing and ridiculous how noticeably flustered Hyeon-woo became, like someone with something to hide.

Tae-geon reached out to pick up an onion for cooking. He carefully examined the condition of vegetables like mushrooms and bell peppers, placing them one by one into the cart.

When shopping together at the mart, it was Tae-geon’s job to select fresh produce like vegetables and seafood, while Hyeon-woo mainly chose packaged processed foods. The same went for snacks. Knowing Hyeon-woo’s preference for crispy and salty bagged snacks over boxed ones, Tae-geon moved the cart from the vegetable section towards the snack aisle where Hyeon-woo would be.

Sure enough, he quickly spotted Hyeon-woo’s back, standing still among the shelves packed with bagged snacks. Hyeon-woo, unaware of Tae-geon’s approach, was staring intently at one end of the aisle. Tae-geon followed Hyeon-woo’s gaze.

He saw what had caught Hyeon-woo’s attention: an alpha-omega couple standing in front of the baby formula display. The alpha was tenderly caressing the omega’s swollen belly.

Tae-geon frowned at Hyeon-woo, who was staring at them in a daze.

“What are you doing?”

“…That omega seems to be pregnant.”

“Is this the first time you’ve seen a pregnant omega?”

“No, not really, but…”

Hyeon-woo hesitated before continuing.

“It’s fascinating, isn’t it?”

“…What is?”

“Just everything. Having a baby inside and looking so happy like that.”

The way Hyeon-woo looked at the omega while saying this…

No.

Tae-geon’s heart sank.

His face turned pale, as if he had discovered something he shouldn’t have seen. He blurted out urgently:

“You can’t get pregnant anyway.”

“…What?”

“…Because you’re an alpha.”

“…Oh…”

As Hyeon-woo exhaled with a blank face, almost like a sigh, Tae-geon added:

“You haven’t forgotten our promise to live together forever without you marrying an omega, right?”

“…”

“You can’t forget. You mustn’t, Hyeon-woo.”

Tae-geon’s voice sounded somewhat desperate as he said this.

“…Why would I forget that? I’m not senile at this young age.”

“…”

“More importantly, ta-da! Look at this. This snack is super popular these days. I was disappointed it was sold out everywhere, but I found the last one here!”

As Hyeon-woo smiled, showing the snack in his hand, Tae-geon felt breathless. For that brief moment, Hyeon-woo’s existence felt distant, like a dying ember. Tae-geon’s grip on the cart tightened involuntarily.

Even imagining Hyeon-woo withering away beside him, yearning for a form of happiness Tae-geon could never provide, was heart-wrenchingly painful.

Please don’t desire what I can’t give you.

He knew he would never let go of Hyeon-woo until death. That’s why Tae-geon hoped and prayed that no stray emotions would take root in Hyeon-woo’s heart before they could even sprout.

If only you’d never be discovered. If you decided to hide being an omega from me, then hide it until the end.

Please don’t let me find out.

He couldn’t help being selfish. If only Hyeon-woo could live his whole life concealing his true nature, anxiously tiptoeing around Tae-geon, never daring to harbor such fortunate aspirations in his heart – if that were possible, Tae-geon would gladly fall for this deception over and over again.

Being together, closest to each other, just as they had been until now.

Tae-geon wanted nothing more than that in his relationship with Hyeon-woo.

*

After eating a delicious curry and even having some sweet melons for dessert, Hyeon-woo went up to his room and sat at his desk, copying down the cooking process he had observed over Tae-geon’s shoulder earlier.

Butter and milk were Tae-geon’s secret ingredients for curry. He used butter instead of cooking oil to sauté the vegetables and milk instead of water to simmer the curry. This resulted in a creamy, rich curry with a deep flavor that filled your mouth.

It was a recipe Tae-geon had developed specifically for Hyeon-woo, who liked spicy and stimulating foods despite not being able to eat them well.

After closing his notebook, Hyeon-woo flopped onto the bed like he was diving and rubbed his full stomach. A pleasant feeling of satiety enveloped his whole body. Surrendering to that sensation, he blinked at the round fluorescent light in the center of the ceiling.

‘You can’t get pregnant anyway.’

His heart had nearly stopped from shock. Even now, just thinking about that moment made his heart race. Fortunately, Tae-geon had said it thinking Hyeon-woo was an alpha, but Hyeon-woo had thought he’d been discovered. Both his true nature and the fact that he was a defective half unable to bear children.

His reproductive ability was irrelevant to him anyway. Perhaps it was even for the best. Because he couldn’t get pregnant, he could carelessly roll around with alphas during his heat, and thanks to his abnormally low pheromone levels, it was easier to deceive Tae-geon.

He never had any desire to form a cozy family with someone. Yet, strangely, his heart fluttered. The lovely couple he saw at the mart kept appearing before his eyes. He envied that omega who glowed so brilliantly with the love received from their alpha.

What does it feel like to be loved by the one you love? What would it be like to carry the fruit of that love in your womb, watching a new life grow together?

Hyeon-woo, who had been imagining himself as the pregnant omega and Tae-geon as the alpha, shook his head.

You’ve really gone crazy.

To Tae-geon, omegas were entities as incompatible as life and death, day and night, black and white.

The night when he first witnessed Tae-geon’s hatred towards omegas at age seven was still vivid. He had rushed into Tae-geon’s room upon hearing his agonized screams, and for the first time, he faced the pitch-black silhouette sitting with its back to the hazy moonlight.

As the figure twisted its body violently while screaming, it frantically scratched its arms and legs until flesh tore and blood sprayed everywhere.

The hired help who arrived belatedly restrained and bound Tae-geon, then injected a sedative into his skinny arm. Hyeon-woo’s heart pounded wildly as he hid in a corner, watching the entire scene unfold unfiltered.

Only after the seizure gradually subsided and the small body lay limp on the bed like a corpse did people withdraw. Even though his legs felt too weak to walk, Hyeon-woo managed to crawl on his knees to approach Tae-geon.

Tae-geon’s thin arms were covered in terrible wounds and countless injection marks. With unfocused eyes staring blankly into space, Tae-geon was muttering something like a chant in a small voice. Hyeon-woo brought his ear close to Tae-geon’s lips to hear it.

‘…Filthy… Filthy omega… Filthy.’

Filthy omega.

Shuddering at the flood of memories from the past, Hyeon-woo pulled the blanket over his head. The memory of that night when he witnessed the reality of Tae-geon’s trauma with his own eyes remained unforgettable. The scars from that time, branded on Tae-geon’s arms like stigmata, often tormented Hyeon-woo.

He felt suffocated. He felt disgusted and ashamed of himself for even momentarily imagining being a beloved omega pregnant with Tae-geon’s child.

With his mind in turmoil, Hyeon-woo tossed and turned for a long time, unable to fall asleep that night.

*

Thud.

Hyeon-woo’s eyes were heavy with fatigue as he closed his laptop. Just as he was about to go to bed after finishing the report he had been working on for days while losing sleep, Hyeon-woo was seized by an ominous premonition.

After going shopping with Tae-geon, his libido, which had been quiet for a while due to the overwhelming sense of self-loathing, was starting to resurface. It was truly nauseating. A deep point in his lower abdomen kept throbbing.

He thought the pain was strangely familiar, and upon reflection, he realized it was the same area that had convulsed every time the dominant alpha had released thick pheromones during his last heat.

It had been about three weeks since that heat cycle. Just one more week to endure until the scheduled date. Let’s hold out until then, he gritted his teeth and endured. Human dignity and omega impulses were fiercely battling within him.

As if it were a talisman to ward off evil spirits, Hyeon-woo quickly recalled Tae-geon’s scars in his mind. The image of Tae-geon’s wounds, grotesquely torn open and bleeding red with hatred for omegas, flashed before his eyes. He had faced those traces again recently while helping Tae-geon bathe. The scars coiled like snakes on his firm arms, and the muscles undulating beneath his sensual skin…

…Wait a minute. This is going in a strange direction…

“Gasp…!”

Hyeon-woo’s face flushed with dismay as he bolted upright and stared at his own groin.

Damn it. If only he could have held out for just one more week.

Just one week until the day he would have a legitimate reason to seek pleasure. It was pathetic that he couldn’t even endure that and ended up like this.

It was just the other day that he had envied the alpha-omega couple he encountered at the mart, became depressed, and couldn’t even sleep. And now he was in this state. What on earth was this? He couldn’t believe how weak a person could be to their desires. He wasn’t an animal, after all.

Let’s endure. Please.

If you’re human, you should be able to endure. You can do it, Han Hyeon-woo!

“Nngh!”

Twisting his body on the bed, trying with all his might, Hyeon-woo finally couldn’t resist and pulled down his pants. His erect penis sprang out, throbbing and dripping pre-cum onto his navel.

I’ll just take care of this and go to sleep. Repeating this promise to himself, he wrapped his hand around the shaft. The initially careful up and down movements gradually became more intense.

“Ungh!”

As his sexual arousal heightened, the tingling sensation inside his belly intensified. Before he knew it, his hole began to pucker and contract, starting to secrete clear fluid.

“Haa.”

No. No. He tried to block out the sensation by shaking his head from side to side, but Hyeon-woo’s lower body betrayed his will and was rubbing his hole against the bed sheet.

The stimulation to his hole felt a thousand times better than fondling his penis. Before he realized it, his fingers that had been tracing his wet entrance were sucked inside as if drawn by magnetism.

“Ahh… feels good.”

Startled by the voice that unconsciously escaped, Hyeon-woo bit his lip. He curled the finger he had inserted to the base, scratching his inner walls.

Squelch, squelch.

Wet sounds emerged. His thighs trembled with pleasure.

“Mmph.”

Barely managing to swallow the moan that threatened to burst out, Hyeon-woo intensified the movements of his fingers thrusting into his hole. But no matter how deeply he pushed in, he couldn’t reach the source of the itch.

“Ungh…”

Deeper inside…

…Just a little more…