Calamity Flame is a Troublemaker (2)
Calamity Flame is a Troublemaker (2)
"Hoooh..."
After an intense workout, Hong Yeon-hwa was drenched in sweat. Her skin glistened, and her light clothes clung to her like she'd been dunked in water. Puddles dotted the floor around her. She looked like someone had just dumped a bucket of water over her head.
"Whew."
Letting out a hot breath, Hong Yeon-hwa plopped down onto a dry patch of the floor. When she wiped herself down with the cold damp towel around her neck, a shiver ran through her body. The brief burst of exertion had heated her up, but it had, thankfully, tamped down her urges a little. She'd followed the old wisdom: when your head gets messy, work your body.
...
Shit, it's flaring back up.
It hadn't even been three minutes since she'd sat down. She grimaced as the desire started smoldering its way back up from deep inside. Contrary to her unruffled exterior, Hong Yeon-hwa's insides had been nothing but complicated and tangled lately.
Well, wouldn't anyone be?
Slumped on the floor, Hong Yeon-hwa asked herself.
Who could possibly be fine right now? As the day gets closer and closer, of course my head's a mess with this and that thought.
And she answered herself.
The fifth day of the Birth Festival, the final day. The semi-forced date she'd wrangled out of Lee Ha-yul. The day of the big event...
Tomorrow.
She'd been waiting with an excited heart every day. But now that it was really here, her mind was a mess for no reason.
Did I really prepare properly?
She'd reserved a room. Not in the great mansion—she could have used her room or Lee Ha-yul's—but she'd booked a high-class inn outside just in case. She'd rented it in advance, gotten everything ready inside, prepared her outfit and underwear for the day...
And other preparations? She'd done as much as she could with Choi Ji-yeon's help. With zero experience in this field, she'd had no choice but to seek advice from someone who knew what they were doing. Even after all that preparation, she was still anxious.
At the same time, she was excited. Her mind had been full of those thoughts all day, and she'd been letting her imagination run wild about a day that hadn't even arrived yet...
Ugh.
A messy jumble of fantasies tangled inside her head. And with the Calamity Flame added to the mix, setting it all ablaze, her desires and emotions amplified beyond easy endurance... Lately, she'd been completely drained trying to soothe and calm that Calamity Flame.
That was probably why she'd teased Lee Ha-yul so meanly just a moment ago. Watching him calmly, she'd suddenly wanted to just snatch him up and do this and that. So she'd teased him for no reason and played it cool.
...Isn't this all Ha-yul's fault, anyway?
Hong Yeon-hwa suddenly had a completely shameless thought. It was a patented specialty of a Calamity Flame Manifestor: passing the buck. Today was the same. Never mind that she'd been the one who asked him. Dressed like that, blushing and avoiding eye contact, yet still stealing glances her way while creeping closer bit by bit...
"This is seriously driving me crazy."
Coming belatedly to her senses, Hong Yeon-hwa shook her head roughly. The daydreams blazing away inside her were nothing short of depraved and sordid... She even felt a flicker of something close to disillusionment with herself. She worried she was harboring nothing but lust for the kid.
She even started to worry that Ha-yul might notice this side of her and be disgusted.
...Even so, he wouldn't go that far.
With a weird expression, Hong Yeon-hwa immediately shot the thought down. That kid, the one who resembled a puppy? Furrow his brow in a scowl? Look at me with disgust? No. It might sound narcissistic, but she just couldn't imagine Lee Ha-yul hating her. No matter what Hong Yeon-hwa did, Lee Ha-yul would only ever meekly come into her arms...
"...Thirsty."
She'd been sitting there for a long while. The water she'd brought with her had long since run out. The once-cold towel had gone lukewarm, and the sweat she'd wiped away was starting to trickle down again. Amidst all that, she felt a thirst so intense it dried the root of her tongue. The thirst deepened because she hadn't properly quelled the sticky Calamity Flame.
Unable to stand it any longer, Hong Yeon-hwa finally got up. A quick shower, then she'd better meditate quietly in her room for a while and calm the Calamity Flame down.
— Wooong
The firmly shut door opened. The comparatively cool air of the hallway buffeted her body.
"Huh?"
She stepped into the hallway without much thought and blinked, sensing something was off. The door across from her was open. Wasn't that closed just a moment ago? She tilted her head, but piqued curiosity made her eyes flit over. She didn't really know the exact purpose of the room across the hall. She'd heard it was some kind of lab? All she knew was that Lee Ha-yul had been going in and out of it lately.
"Hmm."
What on earth does he do in there? Hong Yeon-hwa poked her head inside.
Just a lab.
The interior was nothing special. A research lab crammed with complicated instruments and devices. A wonderland for the average person, but Hong Yeon-hwa had seen plenty of these setups in the Calamity Flame family. The multi-talented Lee Ha-yul must've been messing around with something in here. Hong Yeon-hwa was utterly hopeless at this sort of thing. Realizing this was way out of her league to help with, she pulled her head back.
"Oh."
She tried to pull it back. She would have, if something hadn't caught the very edge of her vision.
A row of glass test tubes sat on a rectangular table. The one in the middle held a liquid. The moment she saw the captivating pink liquid shimmering through the transparent glass, Hong Yeon-hwa's eyes went wide.
I want to drink it.
Calamity Flame flared inside her body. A thirst arose. She wanted to drink that. Her throat was burning. The thirst spreading from the root of her tongue scraped roughly against her mouth and throat. It felt like that thirst would be quenched in an instant if she just took that beautiful pink liquid into her mouth. She absolutely must not carelessly guzzle a potion sitting in a lab. Her rationality, citing this obvious fact, had unfortunately retreated to avoid the massively swollen Calamity Flame.
Before she knew it, the test tube was in Hong Yeon-hwa's hand. The spell that had been protecting the test tube had long since been burned away by the unconsciously spreading Calamity Flame.
It doesn't look poisonous, though?
A shred of reason did assess the situation. Judging by the information visible to the naked eye, this was a potion, not a poison. She wasn't absolutely certain. So she carefully uncorked it and took a tiny sniff at the tip of her nose.
Wow.
It looked delicious at a glance, but even the smell was wonderful. Like the fragrance of dozens of kinds of fresh fruit, harmoniously concentrated. Of course, it wasn't as good as Lee Ha-yul's natural scent, but it was more than enough to dissolve the patience of a Hong Yeon-hwa being influenced by Calamity Flame.
She gave it a final test with the very tip of her tongue. Delicious, just as expected. Distinctive enough that even Hong Yeon-hwa's tongue, accustomed to fine beverages and liquors, found it special.
— Gulp... gulp...
After completing her simple tests in the span of a few moments, Hong Yeon-hwa immediately downed the potion. The potion filled her mouth, ran over her tongue, and slid down her throat, quenching her thirst. At the same time, it spilled into her stomach, and even the Calamity Flame subsided in an instant.
"Huh?"
As the Calamity Flame subsided, her sanity returned with it. The fire in her eyes gone, Hong Yeon-hwa stared blankly, mouth agape.
What did I just guzzle down?
A test tube sitting in a lab. A potion contained within. It had tasted good, but she had no idea what it actually did. As she felt the sweetness remaining in her mouth, the flush from the heat drained from her face, leaving it stark white.
"Oh, you crazy...."
Hong Yeon-hwa spat out a curse. Fwoosh! The instant she finished that assessment, Calamity Flame erupted from her body. The sudden blaze burned every trace of the foreign substance clean from her system. This was why her instincts hadn't felt a major threat even when she was drinking the potion. She possessed above-average poison resistance, and she could use Calamity Flame to completely erase the effects of most poisons before they could even manifest.
After unleashing her Calamity Flame, Hong Yeon-hwa hastily wiggled her arms. Her fingertips weren't stiff. Her muscles hadn't seized up, nor were they numb. Had her skin blackened and died? No, it hadn't.
...Not a poison, then.
After briefly examining her body, Hong Yeon-hwa let out a sigh of relief. Fortunately, it didn't seem toxic. If the effect was immediate, she would've felt some kind of reaction. A type with an incubation period? She'd already burned it with Calamity Flame, so that was no problem either.
This crazy Calamity Flame bastard.
Hong Yeon-hwa ground her teeth and glared at the flames left on her fingertips. She'd been suffering so much for days because of this bastard, and now it made her eat shit again. Yes, it was her own fault for lacking mental discipline, but having already shifted the blame squarely to the Calamity Flame, Hong Yeon-hwa shook her head.
"God, fuck me..."
Her heart had nearly dropped out of her chest. She placed a hand over it and could still feel the fast thump-thump-thump. She put the empty test tube back in its place and, wearing an awkward expression, exited the lab.
What am I supposed to say when Ha-yul gets back... "I just up and swiped the potion you were making and downed it...?" She was like some stray dog picking stuff up off the street. How should she even phrase "I just tested and drank your work without permission..."
She trudged up to the first floor. Ellia had commandeered one of the sofas arranged in the living room, a blanket covering her lap as she quietly read a book. It was quite a thick tome. Hong Yeon-hwa scanned the title on it.
'Habits for Becoming a Good Parent...?'
A truly bizarre title. It certainly fit her cozy and gentle vibe, but Hong Yeon-hwa's expression soured for no reason. Here she was, about to carry out the big event tomorrow, so why was someone else reading that...
"Ah, Yeon-hwa. Training's over...?"
Ellia, absorbed in her book until now, looked up as Hong Yeon-hwa approached and made her presence known. Then her face stiffened. At that unexpected reaction, Hong Yeon-hwa's footsteps came to a sudden halt.
"What? What's with that face?"
"Uhm...?"
Hong Yeon-hwa asked, bewildered. Ellia's brow gently furrowed. Uncharacteristic of her, which left Hong Yeon-hwa more bewildered. Ellia, brows knit, covered her mouth with her hand as she asked, "...Yeon-hwa, what were you doing just now?"
"What was I doing? I was working out...?"
"Is that really all?"
Aversion clouded those bright yellow eyes. In Ellia's vision, Hong Yeon-hwa was radiating an extremely ominous and unsettling energy. Just seeing her form stirred an instinctive repulsion and reluctance. Hong Yeon-hwa, catching a glimpse of the negative emotions in those eyes, narrowed her own brows.
"No... what else could I possibly do here..."
...there?
Hong Yeon-hwa, mid-sentence, suddenly shut her mouth. Something special. She'd just, a moment ago, poured a mysterious unknown potion down her own throat.
......
A chill of foreboding ran through her head. A bead of cold sweat slid down Hong Yeon-hwa's forehead.
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