(Study Room)
The study was dim, only the soft glow of the desk lamp cutting through the heavy tension filling the air.
Taekyun sat behind the desk, elbows on his knees, hands clasped tightly.
He wasn't even breathing properly.
His eyes were fixed on the carpet, burning with an emotion even he couldn't name.
Lihan entered quietly, holding a file, but froze the moment he saw Taekyun's expression.
It wasn't anger.
It wasn't coldness.
It was something worse
Something raw and shaken.
He stepped forward slowly and placed the file on the desk.
"Sir… is everything okay?"
Lihan asked carefully.
Taekyun didn't lift his head.
He just nodded once, jaw tight.
"I got him out."
His voice was low, almost flat.
Lihan blinked.
He didn't respond immediately.
He knew what those words meant.
And what they could cost.
"What about Haru then?"
Lihan asked, eyes fixed on him.
Taekyun finally lifted his gaze, eyes sharp but hollow.
"Before his appearance, she survived,"
He said quietly.
"She'll do it again."
Lihan let out a quiet breath, disbelief flickering across his face.
"But sir… what if Pharma took him?"
The room froze.
For the first time since morning,
Taekyun's eyes widened just a fraction.
A thought he hadn't considered.
A danger he should've considered.
Lihan continued, voice firmer now:
"If they did… you know what will happen. Sir, don't let history repeat itself."
The words hit something inside Taekyun.
"I'm going crazy,"
He whispered.
"My closeness to him… what if it gives me the same consequences as his brother?"
Lihan stayed silent.
Taekyun's breath shook.
"I protected his brother,"
He said, voice breaking at the edges.
"Not just because he was Harin's friend… but because of his pheromones.
And in the end… I still lost Harin."
The memory slammed into him again old, buried, unwanted.
Now the same pattern stood in front of him.
"Now again… I'm protecting him because of his pheromones.
Also because he's the reason my Haru… started speaking new words, started living again.
but also the reason she's walking away from me."
His voice cracked despite him trying to stay composed.
Lihan stepped closer, choosing his words carefully:
"Sir, I understand. But pushing either of them away won't fix this.
And if Pharma took Haneul out of the residence… he's unprotected.
They won't just harm him they'll end his life.
Then they'll extract every last drop of his pheromones."
Taekyun's eyes darkened further.
Lihan continued:
"You know how powerful pheromones from Eunoia World(Haneul's world)are.
How the drug made from them in 2019 made every Alpha and Omega lose control.
Even Dominants couldn't survive.
You know what happened…
Hyunjun sir was also"
"Stop."
Taekyun's voice dropped, dangerously low.
Lihan froze immediately.
Kim Hyunjun.
Taekyun's older brother.
The son the Kim family lost in the most brutal way imaginable.
One dose of the illegal Eunoia pheromone-drug…
and his body tore itself apart.
Organs ruptured.
Bones separated.
It was a death the Kim family still refused to describe.
The kind that burned itself into Taekyun's nightmares until he couldn't sleep.
That year had broken the Kims.
It had made their laws harsher.
Colder.
Unforgiving.
And to protect Taekyun from the same fate,
they married him to Harin.
the woman whose four brothers had died the same way.
She had married him for protection.
But she had also ended up isolated.
Alone.
And eventually… gone.
The weight of all this crashed onto Taekyun's shoulders again, harder than before.
And now, the same danger hovered around Haneul.
The same reckless pheromones.
The same vulnerability.
And the same risk of repeating Kim Hyunjun's death.
Taekyun's jaw locked.
"I won't let Pharma touch him,"
He whispered finally.
But the truth lingered.
He wasn't sure how he would protect someone he had just told to get out.
(2019 incident)
In 2019, the country witnessed a biological catastrophe so severe that even the government refused to record it in the national archives.
It began with an illegal extraction.
a refined pheromone compound taken from an Omega of Eunoia World as experiment.
The substance was sold to the highest bidder,
and that bidder was the secret research division of Pharma,
A conglomerate already infamous for tampering with human biology.
They sought to weaponize pheromones.
To create a stimulant capable of controlling Alphas,
overriding Omegas,
and destabilizing Dominants.
But they underestimated the potency of Eunoia pheromones.
The moment the drug leaked onto the streets,
the nation unraveled.
Alphas collapsed first.
their bodies overheating as pheromone levels spiked beyond what the human body could endure.
Omegas suffered next,
their instincts spiraling, lungs failing,
hearts racing until they simply stopped.
Even Dominants normally the last to fall
couldn't endure the overdose.
Within a span of seventy-two hours,
Seoul's hospitals overflowed.
Sirens wailed endlessly.
Emergency wards transformed into morgues.
Bodies didn't just die
they tore apart.
Organs ruptured.
Muscles detached.
Bones cracked under biological pressure.
The deaths were so grotesque
the government classified them as a "chemical explosion"
to avoid public hysteria.
Among the victims were four brothers of the Park family.
And then.
Kim Hyunjun,
first-born son of the Kim line.
His death was the one that shattered the chaebol families.
His body was found in such unimaginable condition
that every report was sealed within an hour.
An investigation pointed to Pharma.
A full arrest was made.
Executives were charged.
The public demanded life sentences.
But Pharma had power.
Connections.
Money that moved behind locked doors.
In the end
They walked free on a one-year bail.
Barely punished.
Quietly released.
Back to their laboratories.
Back to their experiments.
Back to the same monstrous ambitions.
They didn't stop.
They never stopped.
And the world knew nothing.
But the chaebol families remembered.
The Kim family remembered.
Taekyun remembered the way his brother died.
And now
The same kind of pheromones,
the same risk,
the same danger tied to Eunoia World.
had entered the world again.
And with it, the truth that had long been buried returned.
Humanity was not alone. Not on Earth. Not in the way they had believed. There were three worlds each with its own rules, its own biology, and its own deadly consequences for crossing into the others.
Eunoia World,
The origin of Haneul, where pheromones carried power beyond comprehension. Those born there could destabilize every Alpha and Omega they came near, even without trying.
Asterra World,
A realm of natural Alphas whose strength and instincts, if uncontrolled on Earth, could devastate cities.
Travelers from Asterra appeared ordinary, but their presence alone could tip the balance of power.
Umbraxis World,
The shadowed realm without natural pheromones. Its people mimicked Earth-born pheromones perfectly, making them invisible to detection but exposure to Eunoia pheromones could destroy them within hours,
The problem was terrifyingly simple: no one could tell which traveler came from which world. They were human yet deadly, depending on origin.
Because of this uncertainty, countless lives were sacrificed.
Not in wars.
Not in accidents.
But in fear. Anyone suspected of carrying Eunoia pheromones was hunted.
Captured. Tested. Even innocent travelers from Asterra or Umbraxis were not spared.
The world refused to wait for proof.
Survival demanded elimination.
Pharma had profited from the chaos, exploiting fear while the governments of Earth turned a blind eye.
Files disappeared, deaths were unrecorded, and whispers of the
"world-crossing epidemic" were quietly erased from history.
And now, with Haneul and some others walking among them, a new ripple had begun.
One that could awaken old dangers, old violence, and old tragedies.
The scent of Eunoia was back. And the hunters would come again.