—Stop it—!
—Wow. Second Lieutenant So is finally opening his mouth. Do you know how much effort it took just to hear you speak?
The man speaking grabbed Gi-hyeon by the ankle.
The touch made his skin crawl. He wanted to kick him away, but the grip was too strong.
In the dirt, Gi-hyeon twisted desperately, trying to pull himself free. Every attempt ended the same way — someone dragged him back by the leg. Gravel scraped harshly across his cheek, leaving shallow cuts behind.
The men surrounding him laughed openly.
To them, this was entertainment.
Gi-hyeon kept his face expressionless, staring blankly at the ground while waiting for it to end. No one was coming to help him. He had understood that from the beginning.
The man suddenly spat onto Gi-hyeon’s uniform.
The others followed immediately, laughing as they copied him.
Saliva dripped through his closely cropped hair — a haircut he’d gotten only because Jo Yeon-oh had casually mentioned a few days earlier that he wanted to see him with a buzz cut.
A broken sound escaped Gi-hyeon’s throat.
Not from humiliation.
From pain.
Every breath sent sharp agony through his ribs. Something was definitely wrong. Clutching his side, he forced himself to breathe slowly and prayed nothing had punctured a lung.
Despite hours of boots slamming into him, he still hadn’t screamed once.
But the pain was getting worse.
Still, this would pass eventually.
He only had to survive it.
Gi-hyeon had endured worse humiliations before. Those memories hadn’t broken his bones, but they had damaged something much deeper. Compared to that, this beating almost felt simple.
The spit could be washed off.
Bruises healed.
That was the only thought he allowed himself to hold onto.
Unfortunately, that silence only irritated them further.
They wanted to see him beg. Wanted to crush him until he broke apart completely. The more stubbornly he endured it, the more vicious they became.
—What’s so impressive about being a commissioned officer while spreading your legs for some Alpha bastard? Have any of you ever seen a career soldier offering up his own ass before? Can we even call this thing a soldier?
Laughter exploded around him.
Gi-hyeon closed his eyes.
There was something he refused to surrender.
If he apologized here — if he begged — then everything he had protected until now would become meaningless. He refused to drag the feelings he treasured most through this filth.
Maybe it was stubborn pride.
Maybe it was his pathetic way of clinging to dignity.
Either way, he refused to let them touch that part of him.
—Look at him shutting his mouth again. Tell me, Second Lieutenant. What exactly are you relying on to act this arrogant? Why not share some of that privilege with your juniors?
The Captain crouched beside him.
He pressed a finger hard into Gi-hyeon’s cheek, then pulled a ballpoint pen from his breast pocket and wrote across the fabric of his uniform.
Male Whore.
Gi-hyeon knew he would remember that moment for the rest of his life.
—Just take the discharge already, you son of a bitch. Stop ruining the military’s discipline. Do you think the Lieutenant Colonel would’ve asked for my help if this hadn’t become a problem?
Gi-hyeon said nothing.
Anything he said would only become another excuse for them to keep going.
Besides, he already understood the real reason.
The accusations about him dating an Alpha were just a convenient pretext.
As his promotion to First Lieutenant approached, Gi-hyeon had repeatedly been ordered to participate in dirty work he wanted no part in.
He refused.
This was the result.
The Lieutenant Colonel had no intention of keeping around a subordinate who disobeyed him. This wasn’t retaliation so much as a calculated removal. They wanted him gone — and they wanted him to resign voluntarily.
Gi-hyeon had refused that too.
That was why he was here now, lying in the dirt beneath their boots.
The Captain laughed sharply and tossed the pen aside.
—A few torn ligaments should be enough, right? Enjoy your discharge, Senior.
The Lieutenant Colonel had probably promised him a promotion.
Once Gi-hyeon disappeared, the Captain would move up next.
A tired breath escaped him.
He had endured this for months already. But the exhaustion — physical and mental — had finally reached its limit.
I can’t do this anymore.
Military pride. Officer’s dignity.
Those weren’t the things Gi-hyeon had sacrificed in the end.
Maybe losing here was simply unavoidable.
The moment Gi-hyeon suddenly stopped resisting, the Captain’s face twisted violently.
Grabbing him by the jaw, he snarled—
—Senior. You always—
“Gasp—!”
“So Gi-hyeon.”
Someone was shaking his shoulder.
His eyes burned painfully as light flooded his vision. The hotel room lighting felt unbearably bright.
Still half trapped in the nightmare, Gi-hyeon instinctively tried to shove the hand away before a familiar voice reached him.
“You were having a nightmare again. Just open your eyes for a second and calm down.”
At those words, the tension drained abruptly from his body.
Only then did he realize he’d been trembling.
As his vision adjusted, he saw Jo Yeon-oh looking down at him.
Gi-hyeon let out a rough sigh.
“…When…”
“When did I get here?”
Yeon-oh finished the question for him.
Gi-hyeon gave a weak nod, and Yeon-oh sighed.
“Four hours ago, I saw you in the lobby and hoped I was hallucinating. Two and a half hours ago, Manager Yoo confirmed it was actually you, and I had to sit through dinner pretending not to lose my mind. About an hour ago, I finally tracked down your room number after calling half the hotel staff. And twenty minutes ago, I came up here ready to kill you, only to find you asleep.”
“…I’m tired. Stop whining.”
Ignoring the entire explanation, Gi-hyeon rolled over and dragged the blanket over his head.
All he had wanted was one quiet weekend alone, yet Yeon-oh had tracked him down anyway. Completely in character.
Yeon-oh climbed into bed beside him without hesitation.
Judging by the silk pajamas, he had probably bullied Manager Yoo into bringing him a change of clothes. There was no way he’d willingly wear a hotel robe someone else had used.
“I checked. You ate dinner. You also drank all the beer in the minibar. So what was the reason for running away? Did you just want room service that badly?”
“Hey. I paid for this room myself. You’re trespassing. Once the weekend’s over, I’m suing you.”
His voice came out rough and sleep-heavy.
Watching him grumble from beneath the blanket, Yeon-oh wrapped an arm around him anyway.
“Go ahead. I’m already paying lawyers to exist for no reason.”
Talking to him was exhausting.
Gi-hyeon gave up responding altogether.
Yeon-oh laughed quietly.
“You had a nightmare. Let’s sleep for tonight. I won’t get angry.”
“…”
I’m the one who should be angry.
The person whose vacation had been ruined should logically be him, not the lunatic who broke into a hotel room because a few phone calls went unanswered.
Yet somehow Yeon-oh sounded magnanimous about forgiving him.
Completely ignoring the stream of curses probably running through Gi-hyeon’s head, the Alpha pulled him closer.
After a long sigh, Gi-hyeon closed his eyes.
“Turn the lights off. And I’m naked under this blanket, so if you crawl in here, I’ll assume you’re suddenly interested in that ‘Betas dating’ thing you hate so much.”
Gi-hyeon still had no idea what “Betas dating” was actually supposed to mean, but at this point he was willing to weaponize the phrase anyway.
Behind him, Yeon-oh muttered softly,
“So that comment really was why you ran away.”
Go to hell.
Too exhausted to answer properly, Gi-hyeon let consciousness slip away again.
Within moments, he was asleep.