Chapter 5 - Novel

‘Wait. Wait a minute.’

Harper?

The name is ‘Harper’?

That novel passage I remembered then.

Let me go back over that briefly.

[Gabriel Bailey. Where did you hide my omega?]

Not this one.

[I let him out of the cage.]

[Who gave you permission.]

Not this one either.

[You took my family, my position, and even that wasn’t enough… you dare to take ‘Harper’ too?]

…This is it!

Harper.

The name is similar to Samuel Bailey, William Bailey.

And Gabriel Bailey, who was said to be William’s older brother.

‘Can names overlapping like this really be a coincidence…?’

And also, that hospital pamphlet text is strangely suspicious too.

[Washington Municipal Sophia General Hospital – Children’s Hospital Information]

[*Alpha and Omega parents must take temporary pheromone suppressants before visiting.]

The common sense of this world that’s been drilled into my head from over a year of sex education from my adoptive parents.

Alpha, omega, beta.

I felt like I’d heard these words somewhere before too…

[Where did you hide my omega?]

Sure enough, they appear in that novel passage.

“Ah, shit. My head…”

A headache washes over me sharply again.

At the same time, the text in my head starts fitting together like puzzle pieces.

Alpha, omega, beta.

Blonde baby, Harper Lewis.

BK Group, conglomerate family.

Not Samuel Bailey, but William Bailey.

And, William Bailey’s older brother and…

William Bailey’s enemy.

Trash villain.

“…Me, Gabriel Bailey.”

I remembered.

Everything, I ended up remembering it all!

“How the fuck did I forget this…?”

* * *

The whole affair started with a certain web novel.

“Wh-what is this?”

They were heavily promoting it as a limited-time 98 percent sale, so I quickly bought and read it. Webtoons and web novels were a luxury for me, but I needed to enjoy at least some minimal leisure in my harsh life.

I figured it was just an R-rated erotic novel. Without much thought, I paid and pressed the d******d button…

“Why, why are two men, behind…”

Two men were doing it.

‘A-aha! The real female protagonist will appear later and there’ll be a story of t-true love, right?’

I kept reading while denying reality like that.

“What? Omega?”

Some incomprehensible third gender appeared.

“What? Heat, estrus period?”

Humans had become lower than beasts.

“What?! Pregnancy?”

Now I almost lost consciousness at the part where the protagonist got pregnant. This bastard is a man!

While being shocked and disgusted at every turn, I ended up reading to the last page anyway.

First of all, it was a waste of the few hundred dollars I’d spent, and above all…

“Wow! Isn’t he fucking crazy? That bastard William Bailey? How could he betray Harper’s heart?”

…It was interesting.

“Now he’s imprisoning him, putting shackles on him, and even raping him? This kind of thing happens openly in the 21st century? Wow, let’s see how far this goes, you psychopathic sex offender bastard!”

I don’t want to admit it, but the funky and spicy quality is like buldak…

“What! And the fact that William Bailey’s sworn enemy older brother Gabriel Bailey wasn't actually blood-related?! An adopted kid trying to take over BK Group by doing such cruel and atrocious things?! Wow, this crazy dysfunctional family…”

It was addictive.

“In the end, that guy Harper has a miscarriage and dies… He suffered to death and left so emptily. Meanwhile, why are you shedding tears and making a fuss, you bastard William Bailey? Well, you should have treated him well while you had him.”

Of course, I skipped through the explicit scenes with blurry eyes. No matter what, I just couldn’t watch men doing it together.

“Ha. It was really a trashy novel… It just devastated my heart.”

And I completely denied the fact that I felt entertained reading a BL novel.

“Let me never read BL again. Half of it was explicit content, it just rotted my eyes.”

After just taking the dopamine, I desperately erased the contents of the BL novel from my head.

* * *

I desperately tried to forget. But that ended up being poison instead.

Because it took a whole year and a half to realize this place was inside a novel!

“Damn it, this is the world inside that R-rated obsessive confinement angst high-tension gay story?!”

“B-brother, what’s wrong?”

Only then did I feel the small body tightly held in my arms trembling slightly.

‘I-I forgot! So this kid is…’

That tragically confined ‘male’ protagonist Harper Lewis (age 4) is lost and being held by me.

“Brother’s face is scary. Cool brother turned into a demon hag…”

“S-sorry.”

I apologized first, worried I’d make the child cry again.

And once again gritted my teeth at the urge to beat up my past self.

‘Why did I do that? How did I not notice this? For a whole year and a half!’

Erasing the memory… was probably to maintain my meager pride as a heterosexual man.

No, self-defense is meaningless. Anyway, I’m fully receiving the consequences of the shit ball I kicked.

“Brother?”

“Ugh.”

Oh no, another headache…!

Information I didn’t even want flashed through my mind again.

[Harper Lewis. Why is that guy William Bailey okay but I’m not?]

[Don’t do this, Gabriel…!]

[You’ve got some pride for a slut.]

Did Harper slap his cheek, angered by Gabriel Bailey’s abuse?

At this, Gabriel Bailey’s eyes changed.

[Ha. This is more fun to do.]

Damn, fuck! What’s fun about it!

Go die, you criminal bastards! Ah, right now I’m that criminal bastard!

‘There was also a scene where Gabriel Bailey attacked Harper… To relieve the inferiority complex he had toward his younger brother…’

Provocative scenes crept through my mind. Even though I read them with blurry eyes, there were so many shocking lines that even with my eyes tightly shut, they flowed in between my eyelids on their own and stuck firmly in my frontal lobe.

Something about restraining with a belt, tearing clothes, what pheromones? And drugs…

“Brother, when will you find dad?”

“Ahhh. Sorry!”

I came to my senses at the tearful baby voice.

This isn’t something to imagine with an innocent 4-year-old baby in front of me. Absolutely not!

“H-Harper, right?”

“Yeah. What about brother?”

“Huh?”

“Brother’s name.”

“Ah, ahaha. There’s a counter over there. Nurse—!”

I’m sorry. I have no name to tell you. Please just remember me as a cool brother passing by. That’ll be good for you. And for me too…

When I hurried to where the nurses were gathered, one of them greeted me with a kind smile.

“Hm? What’s the matter?”

“This child said he lost his parents.”

“Oh my. Is this Harper?”

“Ah, you know him?”

“Of course. His father just…”

That’s when it happened.

“Harper!”

“Oh! It’s pretty dad!”

“I was worried when you suddenly disappeared!”

Is this what a voice like rolling jade beads sounds like?

A male… with beauty no less than my adoptive father came running with cold sweat, hugging Harper Lewis. Contrary to my expectation of a blonde foreigner, he was pure asian. Then is the cool dad the foreigner? No, let’s not be curious. I don’t want to know.

“You weren’t scared?”

“Uh-uh. No! Brother played with me!”

Harper pointed at me with a bright smile, his tension released after meeting his dad.

“This is cool black cat brother!”

“Thank you for finding Harper.”

“Ah, no.”

I reflexively bowed my head at the thanks.

“Harper is usually very shy around strangers, but today is different.”

“He’s shy?”

“Maybe because he looks a bit unusual. He’s a bit tired of people.”

Ah, I understood. With that baby angel-like sacred appearance, not only babies his age but weird adults must have swarmed around him too. Like that smartphone brigade earlier, and that obsessive stalker criminal bastard ‘William Bailey’…

“I’d like to give you some kind of reward.”

“N-no! It’s fine.”

“Have you had dinner? Even just a simple snack…”

“No. I’m full.”

“I see. I feel so sorry.”

“It was nothing. Please don’t worry about it.”

“My. I’ve never seen such a sharp and mature child before. Your parents must be proud.”

“Hahaha…”

Guilt washed over me at the child’s slightly dejected face, but I didn’t want to get any more involved with Harper, so I drew a sharp line.

At this, the handsome man also gave up and turned around.

“Harper, let’s go. Your uncle is waiting.”

“What about brother? Come with us.”

“Don’t trouble brother.”

Harper kept looking back at me with eyes dripping with lingering attachment.

We were only together for about an hour, could he really like me that much?

But that’s only possible because he doesn’t know the novel’s content.

“Brother…”

This is a terribly explicit novel world without morals, and I am that Gabriel Bailey.

The older brother of the one who will drop Harper into the pit of despair, and the older brother is no less of a perpetrator than the younger brother.

Even if a complete stranger possessed that Gabriel Bailey…

‘Not getting involved is best.’

If I repay Harper Lewis, who died in the novel, even a little, wouldn’t that be right?

I have no obligation to repay Harper, but as a reader, I felt something like a debt of the heart.

‘You died so emptily and sadly.’

Even if I forgot all the other content, only the scene of Harper dying alone on the beach, pale and wan, was vivid before my eyes.

“Goodbye, Harper.”

Let’s never see each other again.

Like that, I coldly turned my back on the tearful angel-like child and walked away desolately.

…And shortly after my adoptive father was discharged from the hospital.

“Oh! Cool brother, we meet again!”

Harper ends up moving into the apartment right next door…