Chapter 279

Baekgyeong, unable to bear the growing anxiety, paced the cramped living room like a dog trapped in compulsive motion. Barely thirty minutes had passed since the transfusion started, yet he let himself hope—too quickly—that Isaac might already have recovered, and went to check the room.

But as if mocking that hope, nothing had changed. Isaac was pale—no, bluish, like a corpse—while the brown-haired man transfusing into him still retained a healthy tone in his skin. At the slightest disturbance he looked like he might snap awake and lunge at Baekgyeong with feral force.

Likely today, Baekgyeong would commit murder. It would be his second time, after shoving Ian off the cliff—the man who had helped him escape the island.

He looked down at the face of the man sleeping peacefully, unaware he would soon die, and his eyes held a cold inevitability.

Earlier, after wandering for hours, Baekgyeong had found a suitable target. On the western side of Kamti Island, a young man had been running along a deserted stretch of beach that connected the resort to sea caves near Somora Prison, about a kilometer away. He looked slightly younger than Baekgyeong: tall, long-limbed, posture straight, a young white man. He gave off the impression of a rowing-team athlete from a prestigious European university.

Just from appearance, it was impossible to tell whether he was an alpha or simply a well-bred beta, so Baekgyeong deliberately released strong pheromones and ran ahead of him. The man slowed as he sensed the pheromones carried on the wind.

He stared at Baekgyeong as if he had encountered a serial killer. The emotion in his eyes was unmistakably fear. He looked deeply confused, as though he didn’t understand why alpha pheromones would evoke fear at all. He hesitated, wavering between continuing his running route or changing direction—then abruptly turned back toward the resort and ran.

He clearly wasn’t one of Hybris’ agents pursuing Baekgyeong and Isaac and Siron. If he had been shadowing them, he would not have fled in fear.

When they had been abducted to Lemon Island, other alphas had shown an unusual aversion to Baekgyeong’s pheromones. The reason was unclear, but his pheromones seemed to trigger a fear response in some alphas. That reaction made Baekgyeong feel combative.

He sprinted and blocked the man’s path.

“Stop for a moment.”

Startled by the sudden obstruction, the man stepped back several paces. Trying not to show fear, he intentionally raised his voice.

“What do you want?”

“What’s your blood type?”

The unexpected question made some of his tension loosen; he gave a strained smile.

“Why do you want to know that?”

“I need a transfusion.”

“...What?”

His complexion slowly blanched. He had wanted to laugh off the absurd statement, but something unseen constricted his insides, leaving him panting instead. Cold sweat ran down his face.

“Stop—stop the pheromones. Please.”

“Why? What’s wrong with my pheromones.”

“I—it’s just... hard to endure.”

Pale and hollow-eyed, he let out a weak laugh and shrugged, muttering under his breath:

“You look fine, so why would you need a transfusion...”

“I’m more frail than I look.”

Baekgyeong withdrew his pheromones and stepped closer. The man looked around for someone who might help, then reluctantly asked:

“What’s your blood type?”

“B.”

The man visibly relaxed.

“Unfortunately, I’m AB. If you need a transfusion, you should go to the Community. You can even schedule through the app.”

He spoke as though there were commonly accepted protocols for handling situations like this. But to Baekgyeong, it was the first time hearing any of it.

“Community? App? What the hell are you talking about.”

“You don’t know? How can an alpha not know the Community? ...Anyway, I’ll be going then.”

He gave a curt nod as if to close the conversation and turned to run. Baekgyeong drew a Glock and pointed it at his head. The gun had malfunctioned after exposure to seawater while exiting the tunnel, but it didn’t matter. In a country where firearms were legal, no one would test whether a gun was in working condition.

“Cooperate. I need your blood.”

“N-no. I told you... I’m AB—”

“When did I say I needed B-type blood? The blood I need is AB.”

“I— I’m not AB, I mean—that’s not the point! I said no!”

Agitation sharpened into anger across the man’s face. Baekgyeong, without hesitation, took out a syringe filled with violet solution and tossed it at the man’s feet. It was a strong anesthetic from Isaac’s bag—SomerNol mixed with saline.

“If you cooperate, I’ll let you go. If you behave, I’ll be generous. That benefits both of us, doesn’t it?”

But Baekgyeong’s promise was as empty as a sandcastle on a tide-washed shore.

Arms crossed, he sat on a stool and watched the red line travel through the transfusion tubing.

Every alpha he knew had been someone consumed by lust or rage—broken, abnormal. But this man seemed healthy in body and mind. His pheromones held something like the freshness of sea breeze.

The thought of killing one of the rare alphas who seemed mentally intact—just to save Isaac—made his conscience sting.

The thin alliance between Baekgyeong and Isaac, held together only for intelligence-gathering, had shattered the moment they learned the condition for Imprint was love. Baekgyeong doubted it was even possible. It felt like something out of a fantasy film—childish and absurd.

Love. The very sentiment made his skin crawl. Imagining himself whispering promises of future happiness to Yoon Siron felt repulsive down to his organs.

He buried his face in his palms. A bitter laugh slipped out. It felt like someone was forcing a saccharine melodrama on him, insisting this was what life truly was. But to Baekgyeong, love was fiction—trite and worthless.

He and Siron had had sex during overlapping Ruts, their bodies tied together repeatedly. All physical conditions were present, yet they had not Imprinted. Because he did not love Siron—had never felt fluttering warmth toward him. Or rather, that had to be the reason.

If the truth were instead that he did love Siron, but Siron did not love him back, and that was why they had not Imprinted—Baekgyeong knew he could never accept it.

“Fucking pathetic.”

The very thought made his chest ache and rage roar up his spine. He clenched and unclenched his fists, then abruptly stood. The fire burning his chest spread as if to consume him whole.

His mind kept reaching toward the possibility of Isaac and Siron imprinting. Siron—strange, unpredictable Siron—could be drawn to Isaac for reasons no one could foresee.

And Isaac was no more trustworthy.

“...Excessively beautiful, isn’t he.”

The momentary hesitation in Isaac’s voice when acknowledging Siron’s beauty stuck with him. A truth Isaac could admit only because Siron would never hear it.

Baekgyeong barked a laugh.

“What a joke.”

He rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand, laughing without a trace of mirth in his eyes.

He stared down at Isaac’s corpse-like face. He felt he could kill him now without a shred of guilt—maybe even with relief. But now was not the time.

Hybris wanted Yoon Siron. Isaac and Baekgyeong might be second priority, but their true objective was Siron. Even if Siron was miraculously recovered, the root problem wouldn’t disappear. They would never abandon the only omega in existence.

So the information in Isaac’s mind—the protocol to convert betas into omegas—had to be shared. Only then would Siron’s fate as the world’s sole omega become meaningless. Only then could he be freed from pursuit.

But Isaac would never share it.

Isaac wanted alphas erased from history. He would not share the omega-conversion protocol with them. The conclusion remained bleak.

“Of course the one person who knows is a sociopathic murderer. Fucking perfect.”

Baekgyeong raked his fingers through his hair. For Siron, he could slit Isaac’s throat himself, offer up his mother’s suppressant data, anything. But he still didn’t know who was truly behind all this. Even Gezar’s information was fragmented.

“His name was Isaach... I think.”

“Isaach? What is that?”

“Whatever you do, do not catch his attention. If you ever meet him—pull the trigger on yourself first!”

Baekgyeong hadn’t heard the entire exchange, so he didn’t know exactly what Gezar had told Siron. But from the fragments and Gezar’s expression, if Siron fell into Isaach’s hands, death might seem like mercy.

Gezar’s mad laughter still echoed in his ears. Cold sweat gathered in Baekgyeong’s palms.

To understand what awaited Siron, he had to know who Isaach was. Isaac likely knew—but he hovered between life and death.

Baekgyeong opened Liam’s laptop and began searching. Without knowing the exact spelling, he tried Eshaq, Isaach, Ishak, Isaque, Isaak, Isaac. The database was too vast—impossible to narrow to one person. But one intriguing result emerged:

Eshaq, Isaac, and its many variations were the name of a single figure appearing in both the Bible and the Qur’an. The same person, pronounced differently by culture: Ishaq in Islamic tradition, Isaac in English.