I Became a Slave to the Man I Abandoned Novel (Completed) - Chapter 92

His true feelings spilled out. Nox felt the same, letting out a faint laugh. Khalid reacted keenly to his laughter. He lifted his head to look at Nox’s face.

“…Why the sudden change?”

“Laugh again.”

“Again…”

At the word “again,” Nox forced the corners of his lips upward. But it wasn’t the natural smile from before. Khalid frowned. What would make him laugh?

Khalid pondered and pondered, then recalled a memory from when he was very young. When he used to call him “Young Master,” Nox would always respond with a smile. It was a thought he would never have entertained, words he would never have spoken, if he hadn’t been drinking, if he hadn’t been drunk.

“…Young Master.”

At those words, Nox’s drunken eyes widened slightly. Khalid, in his inebriated state, rubbed his head against Nox’s shirt collar as if being affectionate.

“…My Young Master.”

Nox’s lips parted. It felt as if the past he’d recalled earlier that day was now right before his eyes. Had he not been drunk, he wouldn’t have indulged in such a futile game, but unfortunately, both of them were thoroughly intoxicated.

“…Yes.”

Khalid, perhaps you miss it too? Nox thought. The time when he followed him, calling him Young Master. A sudden thought occurred to him: perhaps he wished to return to that time when Khalid didn’t hate him, and he didn’t hate himself. Through his blurry vision, Nox could still see Khalid clearly. Khalid, fully grown, calling him Young Master.

“…Khalid.”

“Yes, Young Master.”

Nox’s hand softly stroked Khalid’s hair. Khalid, in turn, rubbed his head into Nox’s palm, blinking slowly. Like a well-behaved beast.

Khalid lifted his head, burying his lips in Nox’s palm, then rubbing his cheek, then returning to his head, acting like a child. Nox let out a soft laugh, stroking Khalid’s cheek with a smile.

“My beautiful Khalid…”

Khalid paused. It was something Nox had said very rarely, long ago, when he was still his young master: “My beautiful Khalid.”

Khalid couldn’t resist and kissed his lips. When their lips parted, the scent of alcohol hung thick as mist. Still, he pressed their lips together and entwined their tongues. Nox also opened his mouth, welcoming him in.

He wrapped his arms around Khalid’s neck and gently bit the invading tongue. He swallowed the invading saliva. When saliva he couldn’t swallow dripped from his lips, Khalid briefly pulled away and licked the trace. When Nox narrowed his brow, tickled, Khalid miraculously reconnected their lips and breathed into him.

“Ha-ah, ha…”

“Ha…”

After the long kiss ended, both gasped for breath, neither one first.

“…Young Master.”

Khalid whispered, like a breath.

“Ever since I was little… I always dreamed of this.”

“Touching you and kissing your lips. And swallowing, biting, sucking, and licking your body until you’re exhausted. Dreaming of never letting you go from my arms until you cry.” He whispered the desires of his youth. All those days you only saw me as a child, I always wanted this.

“Did you know?”

“…I-I didn’t know.”

“Liar.”

Khalid stared up at him. Light shimmered in his eyes like a predator in the dark of night.

“Young Master, you were always like that. Pretending not to know even when you did.”

His voice had lowered slightly, deeply fractured. Khalid’s lips parted.

“You knew I liked you, didn’t you…?”

The young Khalid hadn’t known. But the Khalid who had fallen and risen, aged, now understood. He realized how poorly he’d hidden his affection as a child. The thought that his quick-witted Young Master might have grown tired of him so quickly had haunted him like a nightmare for a long time.

As those past emotions engulfed him, a deep-seated resentment surged within Khalid. You clearly knew I loved you. And yet, even so. Khalid bit his lip until it bled. He tightened the arms wrapped around Nox.

If I was screaming my love with my whole body, why didn’t you acknowledge it? Why didn’t you just cut off my feelings and warn me? Instead of abandoning me like that. Instead of casting me out like that.

And so, he blurted out the question he’d wanted to ask for so long.

“Why did you abandon me?”

Nox’s breath hitched at those words. Then, it burst out roughly, as if he’d been holding it in for a long time. His vision was blurry from the alcohol. The question seemed to echo from deep within his mind. To Nox, the Khalid before him now looked just like the child he once was.

Nox raised a trembling hand and caressed Khalid’s cheek.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…”

“…If.”

Khalid’s voice trembled.

“If that day came again, what would you do? Can you tell me you wouldn’t do it again?”

His voice was raw with intensity. But Nox…

“No…”

Nox covered his eyes with both hands.

“I have to do it again…”

I’ll abandon you again. At those words, which left no room for misunderstanding, this time it was Khalid’s breath that stopped. His eyes widened. What had he been hoping for…? He let out a bitter, hollow laugh. Even with his drunken mind, he could feel that they were playing a ridiculous charade. Khalid, whose past wounds had been ripped open once more, slowly pushed himself up.

“Right. There’s no going back now anyway.”

Those words were meant for himself as much as for Nox. He knew it well: they had come too far to go back, and there was no turning back. Nox had abandoned Khalid, and Khalid had abused Nox. Therefore, it was already too late. Khalid once again kissed deeply into Nox’s palm. My foolish young master, my stupid slave. After all, you are a pitiful wretch who can only play in my hands now.

“You… this is what you get for being so stupid.”

Nox’s fingers curled slightly. It seems you were fine after abandoning me. Saying he’d abandon him again if that day came again ultimately meant he didn’t regret it. Thus, Khalid’s longing quickly turned to resentment, and he bared his teeth, biting the inside of Nox’s palm.

“After abandoning me.”

Until it bled.

“And after abandoning even the Second Prince, your fate was practically sealed.”

Nox felt tears well up at that cold, heartless voice. He wanted to make excuses, but they were just that—excuses. There was nothing he could say. You’re right. You’re right. But still.

I, I mean. I…

“I never abandoned you because I wanted to…”

A single tear finally gleamed in the corner of Nox’s eye.

“You…”

At those words, Khalid paused.

Nox pulled his throbbing palm back and covered his eyes again. He didn’t want to show such a pathetic display of crying.

“And as for the Second Prince, I was just… abandoned.”

His tear-laced voice held a strange meaning. Khalid keenly noticed it. Abandoned by the Second Prince? What on earth does that mean?

“Nox…”

“I was the one who first reached out to him…”

Nox’s head was spinning. His vision blurred. Was it his foolishness, or the Emperor’s cruel nature, that he had extended his hand first, been rejected, and ultimately been used and discarded? And so, Nox finally closed his eyes. Tears that had pooled in his eyes fell, and Nox, as if fainting, drifted into sleep.

Khalid, with his drunken mind, struggled to comprehend his words.

Abandoned by the Second Prince?

Nox’s body went limp. Khalid looked down at him, his mind sluggishly trying to process, then he collapsed beside him, as if falling.

Despite the overwhelming drowsiness he couldn’t resist, he replayed Nox’s words over and over.

What could those words possibly mean? Lying there, he gazed at Nox’s profile. The tear-stained eyes. Wet eyelashes. The dark circles under his eyes and his skin, paler than before.

In the dim room, Khalid’s gaze swept over Nox’s face again and again.

His eyes were slowly closing. All his thoughts, steeped in alcohol, prevented any clear reasoning. His body felt soaked in water. It was a strange sensation, his head floating in the air while his body sank.

And so, Khalid succumbed to the alcohol and closed his eyes. Soon, their breaths mingled.

Thus, the next morning arrived.

***

Khalid opened his eyes, clutching his forehead, which throbbed as if pierced by something sharp. His disheveled hair tangled in his fingers. He turned his head and saw Nox sleeping beside him. Through the splitting headache, Khalid recalled what he had done yesterday.

‘Young Master.’

He smacked his own head. Crazy. I must have been crazy to do such a thing. Khalid took a deep breath to calm his tangled thoughts.

He slowly got up. Nox, who had drunk heavily and fallen asleep yesterday, seemed not to have woken yet. It was awkward to face him after yesterday’s events. Thinking it best to shower and leave first, Khalid rose from the bed.

Then, a fragment of a conversation flashed through his mind.

‘As for the Second Prince, I was just… abandoned.’

‘I was the one who first reached out to him…’

His faint memories were fragmented, making it hard to recall the beginning or end. Only Nox’s words, that the Second Prince had abandoned him first, lingered faintly. He also remembered the claim that he had reached out first. Khalid paused, looking down at Nox.

‘What does it mean that the Second Prince abandoned him first?’

And what did he mean by reaching out first, Nox? Khalid tried to infer the meaning based on what he knew. Then, something the Emperor had once offered him suddenly came to mind.

The ring, that ring.

The Ring of House Rainerio, which the Emperor had offered, claiming it was merely a fleeting connection from childhood.

Khalid deliberately pulled out what he had buried in the depths of his memory.

‘It just occurred to me now, something I received a long time ago.’

‘I won’t answer if you ask. It’s something just between the two of us.’

The Emperor’s lingering words, and the words that followed immediately:

‘What if Nox desired me first?’

‘Such a thing…’

‘How can you be so sure it won’t happen?’

Was there something between the Emperor and Nox? Something he didn’t know about? Khalid’s head began to ache, and he briefly pressed his temples. A relationship close enough to give a ring.

He now felt an uncomfortable stiffness, not in his forehead, but in a corner of his chest. The more he speculated, the more foolish he felt.

Khalid ran his hand through his hair and called a servant to prepare his bath. He then immediately went into the bathroom.

Khalid immersed himself in the hot water of the tub, continuing to ponder. The Second Prince abandoned him first.