I Picked Up the Greatest Villain in the Story

23.

Jian closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Even though they used the same lotion, the child had a slightly sweeter scent.

His body and mind, which had been exhausted all day, relaxed comfortably.

After Jian’s steady breathing flowed out, Sehun, who had silently opened his eyes, buried his face in Jian’s nape and inhaled deeply, his chest swelling.

The child’s hand moved stealthily, touching the shoulder blade. He fingered the area where the mole was and then closed his eyes.

It felt good to know a secret about Jian that others didn’t.

* * *

“Sehun, I’m sorry about yesterday. Did your head hurt a lot?”

Hyunsu sat down awkwardly and apologized to Sehun, handing him a box wrapped with a red ribbon.

“These are chocolate cookies from the bakery I like. They’re really delicious. I bought them with my allowance.”

Sehun stared blankly at the box in front of him without answering. As Hyunsu said, delicious-looking cookies were neatly stacked inside the transparent box.

Seeing the tasty treat immediately made him think of Jian. Sehun took the box and put it down under the table with a thud. He was planning to eat it together with Jian later.

“Are you accepting my apology?”

Ah, how annoying.

Sehun’s eyes gradually distorted as he looked at Hyunsu, who kept chattering.

The fight had started because he had snatched Hyunsu’s colored paper. He just found Hyunsu irritating. Every time Jian looked at Hyunsu with fondness, malice towards Hyunsu accumulated in his heart.

He couldn’t stand it when Hyunsu said he would give whatever he folded with colored paper to Jian.

He tried to fold something pretty too, but unlike Hyunsu’s nicely completed colored paper, his was crumpled and misshapen with crushed corners.

So he ruined Hyunsu’s as well. He couldn’t bear to see Hyunsu presenting the finished paper flower to Jian and receiving praise.

“Huh? Accept my apology.”

As Sehun continued to remain silent, Hyunsu grabbed Sehun’s arm and shook it. Just as Sehun’s irritation peaked and he was about to shake off the arm, Jian came out of the room.

“You two are going to get along well today, right?”

Jian knelt in front of the children and stroked Sehun and Hyunsu’s heads in turn.

Hyunsu nodded vigorously in response to Jian’s face, which was shining brightly today as well.

“Yes! I apologized to Sehun. I gave him a gift too.”

“Really? Hyunsu, you’re acting like a big brother.”

“Hehe.”

Sehun bit his lip as Jian’s attention shifted to Hyunsu.

“…I’m sorry too.”

Sehun apologized to Hyunsu in a small voice. Hyunsu’s eyes widened at finally hearing Sehun’s voice.

Even as he saw Hyunsu’s chubby cheeks turn red, Sehun felt nothing and only watched Jian’s reaction.

“That’s right. That’s how friends are. You fight and make up. You’re both doing so well.”

As if rewarding Sehun’s feelings, Jian stroked Sehun’s cheek and smiled brightly. Just seeing Jian’s smile made Sehun feel his irritation subside considerably.

Ding dong―

“That must be the teacher. Well then, have a good lesson today and play nicely. I’ll come up for lunch later.”

“Okay.”

“Yes!”

Jian got up and opened the front door. A young man wearing glasses greeted Jian cheerfully.

“Hello.”

“Welcome, teacher.”

Today’s lesson was English. The teacher, carrying a bag full of textbooks, entered the living room and waved his right hand at the children.

“Kids, teacher’s here. We’re going to play role-play during today’s lesson.”

“Wow, how exciting!”

Jian left the house as Hyunsu raised both hands and cheered.

Although Sehun was sitting quietly with a shy face, he had just heard from the teachers that Sehun’s academic achievement was improving day by day.

He felt proud for no reason. Sehun gazed at Jian’s back endlessly.

‘…I just want to be with hyung.’

The front door closed. Sehun, unable to let go of his lingering feelings, just let out a small sigh with an expressionless face.

His cold gaze, unlike a child’s, swept over the excited Hyunsu and the teacher who seemed even more delighted than a child.

It felt uncomfortable, like being forced to wear ill-fitting clothes. The only reason he was enduring it was simple: because Jian wanted it.

Although Jian couldn’t know, Sehun had actually been educated up to university level while at the research institute. His forcibly activated brain was different from a young child’s and absorbed the information fed to him without filtering.

Due to the gag always in his mouth, he had no chance to speak, so only his pronunciation was a bit underdeveloped, but he could converse to some extent not only in English but also in Chinese, Japanese, and Spanish.

So for Sehun, the lessons he took with Hyunsu were as childish as playing house.

“One person will play the role of the demon king, and one person will be the knight. Does anyone have a preference?”

“I want to be the knight!”

“Sehun, is it okay if you’re the demon king?”

“Yes.”

Sehun answered halfheartedly to the teacher’s question. Whether knight or demon king, he just wanted this tedious time to pass quickly so he could see Jian.

* * *

“Boss, are you going to keep the coffee prices like this…?”

A customer, holding a freshly made iced Americano, looked at Jian with desperate eyes. The hand holding out the card was trembling.

“Hmm. I’m thinking of lowering it back to the original price soon.”

“Really? You’re not lying?”

The customer’s gloomy face brightened up. After drinking the coffee Jian had made once, it was torturous to go to other cafes because the taste wasn’t the same.

Although 90,000 won could be earned quickly, it was a burdensome price to pay for a single cup of coffee.

‘Well, the customers are starting to drop off now anyway.’

Jian smiled his business smile as he saw the customer off. The cafe, which had been bustling due to Soochul’s post, started to slow down from the day the prices were raised, and now it had recovered to a situation similar to before.

Even now, most of the people visiting the cafe were customers who had become accustomed to the taste of Jian’s coffee. There were still some hunters who couldn’t let go of their curiosity, but they numbered less than ten throughout the day.

‘It’s surprising that he gave up so easily when he didn’t seem like the type.’

Soochul, who had been pestering him to join their guild, seemed poised to visit the cafe every day and be a nuisance.

But he hadn’t shown his face since that day. Although it felt a bit unsettling, Jian decided not to think much of it since it was a good thing for him.

As he washed the cups piled up in the sink due to the rush of customers, he found himself humming softly.

‘The cafe business is going smoothly, Sehun and Hyunsu are getting along well, and the more I get to know Hyunwoo hyung, the nicer he seems.’

Hyunwoo, who initially gave off a villainous vibe, made Jian realize that first impressions might not be that important.

He was a brother who loved and cared for his younger sibling more than expected and was passionate about his work. Although he was busy running the guild, he never neglected caring for the children, even if he was sometimes late.

Jian, too, had been working hard to get used to using his skills by running nearby F-rank dungeons every other day since returning from the clam dungeon.

It felt like everything was falling into place.

‘I wonder what they’d like to eat today.’

While his hands were busy, Jian was thinking about what to feed the kids for lunch.

As he pondered what dish would be both appealing to the children and nutritionally balanced, time flew by quickly.

When lunchtime came, Jian hurriedly put up the “Break Time” sign on the door and went up to the second floor.

He had also ordered food to eat with the children. As he climbed the stairs, he heard a commotion from inside the house. Worried that the two children might be fighting again, Jian quickly opened the door.

“Kids!”

But the scene that unfolded was a bit different from what Jian had expected. It was chaotic, but in a different way.

“Jian hyung, I was trying to make Sehun’s hair pretty, you know? But… how did it end up like this…”

Hyunsu, making eye contact with Jian, grinned sheepishly and discreetly hid the scissors he was holding behind his back.

The problem was that the floor was already covered with a mess of cut hair. Sehun, who had been sitting with a blank expression, saw Jian and quickly got up and ran over.

“Hahaha…”

The face looking up at him while grabbing his leg was cute, but the state of his hair was beyond words.

The bangs were jagged as if gnawed by a mouse, the sides were of different lengths, and the back was even worse.