There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)-Chapter 698: Side Story 3. Stellar Blossom - 33

It was so hard for his mind to wrap around the fact that his baby brother was already a father, but above all that...the name. It couldn’t be a coincidence, so...

"You knew?" Han Joon widened his eyes.

He knew he wasn’t allowed to talk about his sister. His father had already warned him to never mention her, that there was never a daughter inside that house. So there was no way he would tell Shin about it.

"Of course," Shin nodded while taking a seat beside him. "You told me after that man died."

That man...oh, he meant their father. Han Joon was yet to get used to the hateful tone that Shin used to address their father. Joon himself had no thought aside from fear in regard to his father. Perhaps...longing, if he was allowed such silliness.

But then again, he knew there was nothing nice about his father either, so he understood the contempt in Shin’s tone.

Anyway, there was no chance for him to think abiut his deceased father when the snow fairy demanded his attention. "Chuun, agg!"

The small baby hands smacked his cheek again, although it felt more like a tap, barely tickling. The snow fairy climbed and stood on Joon’s thighs, stretching up her arms to barely circle Joon’s neck and threw herself at her uncle.

Blinking, Joon held the baby in reflex, circling the small figure. "Oh, you want me to hug you?"

"Agg! Chuun!" Nari giggled and laid her head on Joon’s shoulder, standing on her toes.

It took Joon two seconds of being stunned, before he laughed and hugged the little snow fairy back, careful to not damage the artificial wings attached to her back. The bouncy black curl tickled his cheek the way his sister’s hair would when she hugged him in the past.

Just for the duration of the hug, Han Joon allowed himself to think that his sister was actually reincarnated as this adorable snow fairy.

But that wasn’t the end of the surprise, because a pair of handsome little snow elves appeared not long after.

"Nayi!" a little boy whose hair looked as of it was made out of snow ran inside with full force, and pulled a swift break at the sight of Joon. The amber eyes widened and the little boy shrieked joyfully. "Uncle Jun!"

Once again, Joon could only blink in surprise as the handsome little boy ran in his direction. Nari the snow fairy turned her head and shrieked in response, filling the room with high-pitch sounds.

"Oh, the twins are here!" Han Shin clapped his hands before raising them for the younger twin to high-five. "You’ve grown so big!"

"Aca tall?"

"Yes, very tall!"

Shin raised his thumbs and stretched out the snow elf’s arms, saying it would make him taller. Han Joon wondered if it was true. The little boy seemed to be about three or four--maybe three, although he did look tall. But he wasn’t alone. Another handsome snow elf with the same face but black hair and different-colored eyes entered calmly, and, upon seeing Joon, immediately walked faster.

"Uncle Jun..."

Different from the first one, this handsome little boy was calm and quiet, even calling him in a gentle tone. The different colored eyes observed Joon’s clueless face keenly, and suddenly nodded.

Yes, it was just as Dada said. Uncle Joon was sick and could not remember anything, including them or Dada or even Baba. Dada said he should introduce himself to Uncle Joon once they met again, so the older twin did just that.

"Uncle, this is Kal," the older twin tapped his chest. Seeing that, the younger one immediately followed suit by raising his arm high.

"This is Aca!"

Han Shin laughed and patted the twins’ shoulders. "Kar and Asa," he told Joon.

Asa cheekily added with hands on his waist. "We plotec Nayi and Uncle!"

"Ung."

Han Joon was shocked enough that his baby brother had a baby, but...there were another two? Also, his flabbergasted mind belatedly digested the fact that he was...

"Uncle..." the black eyes blinked repeatedly. "I’m an Uncle?"

"Hehe..." Han Shin giggled, and Han Joon narrowed his eyes.

"These two are not--"

"No, no--of course not!" Han Shin and Reina laughed at Joon’s neverending shocked expression. They thoroughly enjoyed seeing this face, which they had never seen before. "They are Nari’s playmate brothers. Look--that very pretty man and the scary one beside him are their parents."

Han Joon followed his brother’s finger, which was directed to the sitting area arranged on the other side of the room, separated from this play zone with a glass screen. He could see Laurel and Ludya, as well as Dee, and two people he didn’t know--although he did remember seeing them at the hospital.

"Oh," Han Joon nodded. A pair of very handsome people, no wonder their children looked like pretty elves in a fairy tale.

The black-haired elf tugged on Joon’s sweater after the introduction was done. "Kal want play with Uncle Jun."

"Oh, oh--Aca too!"

"Chuun! Aay!"

The snow fairy princess also gave her agreement while patting Joon’s cheek. Being surrounded by these babies, he suddenly realized that he wouldn’t be able to know how Shin grew up since that baby brother had already become an adult--and a father. Oh, how disappointing, but...

Well, this looked like a nice compensation.

"Mm," Han Joon smiled and nodded, finally understanding why there were a lot of plushies in a house with no babies. "Let’s play."

* * *

"Aww~look at how adorable they are!" Laurel clasped her hands and squealed at the way the children swarmed at Han Joon. "They love their uncle as usual. Are you not going to join them, Zein?"

"I don’t want to make the situation awkward," the guide chuckled. "He doesn’t know about us yet, so I’ll leave it to the kids to accompany him."

Well, he said that, but someone was actually really sad about that. Zein stroked his pouting husband, who had been holding back from seeing Joon in order to not confuse the man too much. The kids were fine, but having an adult suddenly approach and state that they were friends might be too much for a seven-year-old. Especially because most adults in his life were the kind who abused and exploited him.

"At least, he looks really happy," Bassena muttered, fixing the camera on his commlink to capture the view of the playzone clearly.

"He does, doesn’t he?" Ludya smiled widely. "He’s been making all kinds of expressions--it’s all so adorable. Don’t you think so, Dia?"

Radia stared at the fresh, innocent smile Han Joon made as Nari and the twins hugged him. Even though he had seen Joon making a lot of smiling and laughing face in front of him, that kind of smile he had in front of the children--whose mental age wasn’t very big from the current him--was something new.

It was pure, the kind that made people think of the first snow and the morning dew. The smile of someone healing from their scar. The smile that the adult Han Joon could never make, because the scars had already run too deep, too invested in his soul to be healed fully.

Because those were the kind of scars that someone would never been able to forget by themselves. Unless...

"Perhaps he wanted this," Radia muttered.

"Dia?"

"Maybe he had wanted to forget, so he could heal," Radia said. "That’s why he ended up regressing. Perhaps his deep conscience willed his brain to erase everything."

Laurel turned toward her son and frowned slightly. "What are you talking about?"

"Don’t you think...it’ll be better for him to not remember?" Radia continued, smiling an empty smile. "Wouldn’t he be happier without remembering all of those painful things?"

Before the pain he remembered could leave another deep, ingrained, unerasable scar.

"Shouldn’t we...prioritize that?"

Laurel bit her lips at her son’s disappearing voice. She knew Radia had been very quiet ever since they returned from the hospital, but...she thought he just needed time to mend his heart and get used to the situation. Ah, she should have talked to him more instead of focusing on Han Joon.

"Dia--"

"Hah!" before Laurel could say anything, a dismissing scoff could be heard from Bassena. "How stupid."

It was a surprising remark that made even Radia couldn’t respond on time. They just stared wide-eyes at Bassena, watching the esper sneered.

The amber eyes looked at Radia coldly. "Did he ever say he was unhappy?"

Radia frowned. "That’s--"

"Last year, when he knew he was ill and a ticking time bomb--did he ever say to you that he was unhappy?" Bassena repeated sternly. "Did he ever tell you that he wanted to return to the past or repeat everything?"

Radia pressed his lips, because he couldn’t answer it. Or rather, they knew what the answer was. Because Han Joon, the steady, stubborn man that they knew, would never say it. No. He would never even think of that.

Zein smiled wryly--he knew what Bassena was getting at, but they probably shouldn’t show this kind of tension in a place where the children might see them. He patted his husband’s arm, and Bassena tool a deep breath to calm himself.

Exhaling shortly, Bassena continued with a calmer voice. "You know how I met Zein, don’t you? I won’t be able to if I wasn’t trapped in a double dungeon," Bassena snickered. "I wouldn’t get trapped inside that dungeon if my relatives weren’t envious of me, and they wouldn’t get envious of me if I wasn’t so powerful. You know what’s funny?" Bassena smirked. "I wouldn’t get thay powerful if they didn’t kill my mother."

Zein tightened his grip on Bassena’s arm, before sliding his hand to the esper’s hand. The amber eyes glanced at him and the bitter smile turned into a soft, joyful one. "It was painful, and I wouldn’t say I don’t regret a few things in the past, but..." he shifted his gaze to his children, who were building a fortress made of plushies for the little princess. "I will never choose to forget even those painful memories. Those scars, for me, were the proof of a battle I had to do to achieve happiness in this life."

Radia clenched his jaw, staring hard at the laughing face coming out as the fortress tumbled down. The black eyes, which sometimes searching for him, were haunting him with longing.

"Of course it’s cruel--of course he deserves better. But if he forgets everything, then you put nothing into the things he has endured," Bassena continued. "What do you think he did all that for? For you, so he could live with you. So he could continue to love you, and receive your love in return. If he forgets all of that, forgets his reasons and his love for you, then what..." the low voice ended in a sigh. "For what did he endure everything?"

Truly? Would it be alright to let Han Joon remembering all of those nasty things again just so the man wouldn’t forget him?

"More than anything," Zein tilted his head, observing the shaking crimson eyes. "Can you really let him go? You won’t be able to be with him for...I guess another eleven years."

"Haa," Bassena scoffed. "You really do resemble each other, down to your tendency to sacrifice yourself for each other. What a silly couple."

Could he? Could he really?

"Pfft--ha...haha..." Radia brushed his fallen fringe, and let his hand stay there.

Could he? What a silly question. Even if the world burn, Han Joon was the only one he could never let go. He had always been a selfish one, so what did he act all chivalrous now?

Radia laughed, even while tears were dripping between his fingers. But it was okay, he could laugh it off for real this time, for being foolish and stupidly melancholic.

At the end of the day, Joon was his. And even if he had to wait for eleven years more, Joon would always be his.