Chapter 6
Listening to the conversation between Professor Kwak and Horang, Bobae was barely managing to push down the corners of her lips that kept curving upward toward the sky.
It was already wild enough that she had met a man who didn’t conduct electricity when touching her, but now she was the one making his heart beat? Wasn’t this straight out of a bizarre, mysterious TV show like Surprise?
Just a little while ago, this was the man who had looked at her with icy eyes and yelled at her to maintain a “ten-meter distance limit.” On top of that, he had treated her like a perverted stalker and called her a kiss psycho!
Yet here he was—this man’s heart was beating because of her! Who would have thought her electrical power, which she had always deemed useless, would shine so brightly like this?
While she was secretly cheering, Professor Kwak finished his conversation with Horang and walked over to her. “Patient Na Bobae. I apologize for bringing you to this room without consulting you first. The situation was simply too urgent.”
When Professor Kwak bowed his head in apology, Bobae waved her hands dismissively and said, “Oh, no, it’s fine. It was an unavoidable decision for the sake of a life.”
As Bobae spoke with a smile, Horang let out an absurd scoff. “Thank you for understanding. As you heard, we are in desperate need of Patient Na Bobae’s help.” “Yes, I gathered as much. My help is very, very, truly desperate.” “That fellow has a rough personality, but he doesn’t bite.” “Right. Right now he looks just like a tiger that’s lost its teeth, anyway.” “Pardon?” “Ah, nothing! Don’t worry, please go on ahead.” “Then I leave him in your capable hands.”
Entrusting Horang to Bobae with earnest final words, Professor Kwak left the room.
Once left alone together, a heavy silence settled over the room. Bobae stared intently at Horang, while Horang completely ignored her—thoroughly treating her like a transparent, invisible human.
Eventually, Bobae opened her mouth first. After all, magnanimity was always the prerogative of the one who held the upper hand. “Don’t you have anything to say to me?” “No.” “Hey, I’m pretty sure you do?”
Bobae watched the man sitting upright and clinging to his pride, a subtle smile playing on her lips. His remark that she was throwing her body at people because her writing skills weren’t cutting it still made her blood boil just thinking about it, but it was also true that she had committed a rudeness toward a man she was meeting for the first time. So, if he asked for help, she was willing to grant it.
“Something to say, huh…” When Horang nodded as if something had just occurred to him, Bobae looked at him with expectant eyes, waiting for an apology to slip past that arrogant man’s lips. “Ten meters.” “Ten meters?” “Already forgot? What I said about a ten-meter radius access limit.” “Ha! Is that really the only thing you have to say to me? That damn ten meters!” “That’s it. That’s all!”
When Horang snapped back fiercely, Bobae glared at him. This man really didn’t believe the doctor’s words. Well, who could blame him? A woman who charges batteries? Who would believe such a thing? But— “If you don’t believe it, it’s your own loss.”
Whether he believed it or not, Bobae had nothing to lose. “Just like you said, I’ll disappear past that ten-meter mark, so get some good rest. Make sure you check that properly, too.”
Pointing at her smartwatch, Bobae turned to head out. Left alone, Horang glared daggers at the door. “As if I’d be scared just because she walks out.”
Scoffing in disbelief, Horang picked up the newspaper resting on the table. Business section, social section, and the editorials. Horang’s eyes followed the printed text, but not a single word was registering in his mind. The newspaper was filled with the news he needed to know, but his head was entirely consumed with anxiety over his heart and his battery.
Irritated, Horang tossed the newspaper aside and furtively checked his smartwatch. A sneer rose to the corner of his lips. “Figures. As if that kiss psycho could possibly have any effect on my heart.”
11%. The battery level was exactly the same as before, even though quite a bit of time had passed since she left the room.
Peace of mind finally returned to him. Professor Kwak must have been bored out of his mind, coming up with such an exaggerated joke.
Horang got up from the sofa and stood in front of the window. The rain that had poured all night had stopped. The dark clouds had retreated, and a clear, bright blue sky was spread out beyond the window. The sunlight streaming in felt remarkably warm.
It was while he was thoroughly enjoying that warm sunlight when— Beep-beep, pip-pip-peep!
An irritating warning sound rang out from somewhere. Horang looked around, unable to figure out where it was coming from, though it sounded quite close.
The moment Horang instinctively checked his wrist, his expression stiffened completely. “What is this?”
On the smartwatch that had been fine just a moment ago, a red light had flickered on! To make matters worse, the battery level had dropped to 9%! “Is it broken?”
That thought had barely crossed his mind when— Ugh…
Suddenly, his chest throbbed. Accompanied by a sharp, stabbing pain, breathing started to become slightly difficult.
At that moment, Professor Kwak’s words flashed through his mind: “Without that patient… your heart won’t beat!”
Why on earth did those words have to surface right now?!
He didn’t want to believe it. He wanted to brush it off as a joke and ignore it, but he couldn’t. The smartwatch was wailing even louder, and the pain in his heart was beginning to worsen bit by bit.
Horang bolted out of the hospital room. A nurse on duty outside rushed over and asked, “Are you feeling uncomfortable anywhere? Should I call the professor?”
Shaking his head, Horang asked, cold sweat dripping down his forehead, “Where did the woman who just left this room go?”
Because right now, the person he needed more than a doctor was that woman, Na Bobae.
“I never thought the day would come when my electrical power actually came in handy. Oh, my, aren’t you just the cleverest thing? Mwah, mwah, mwah.”
Bobae praised her own electrical power—which she had cursed and neglected all this time—by planting kisses on her own arm. Until she turned thirty, she hadn’t even been able to hold a man’s hand. She had cursed this useless ability for ruining not only her dating life but also her future path as a writer. Who would have thought it would come to the rescue in such a dramatic fashion?
Anyway, that man desperately needed her power, and she needed that man to help her write. In short, her electrical power was actually useful for writing. What a good little superpower. “She should be coming out about now, right?”
Bobae muttered, glancing sideways toward the rooftop door.
She didn’t know how much juice was left in the man’s artificial heart battery, but if it was sitting at 11%, dropping below 10% wouldn’t take long. And human psychology being what it was, once a battery dipped below 10%, anxiety was bound to follow. After all, in this modern age, people could live without food, but they couldn’t live without a battery. “Speak of the tiger, and it appears.”
Bobae smiled brightly as she spotted Horang finally showing himself.
Glancing around frantically, he spotted Bobae and marched straight toward her. With his anxious gaze, the beads of sweat on his forehead, and the smartwatch blaring its chaotic warning alarms, Bobae was certain of one thing the moment she saw him: this man had finally figured out the situation. “Oh my, who could this be? Isn’t this the very person who told me a ten-meter distance limit?”
Horang’s ears burned at Bobae’s twisted, mocking tone, but his attention was entirely captured by the smartwatch—the moment he closed the distance to her, the warning alarm stopped.
With a faint glimmer of desperate hope, Horang checked the smartwatch. To his shock, the battery level, which had been at 9% just moments ago, was now reading 10%! And it had only been a few seconds since he met up with this woman.
He was in complete turmoil. He had seen it with his own eyes, yet he couldn’t believe it. If the professor’s words were true… if it was true that this woman was making his heart beat… What was he supposed to do now?!
“If I stay this close, I’m going to get cursed out. Honestly, I’ve been cursed at so much these past two days, I was starting to worry I’d live too long.”
As Bobae smirked and tried to brush past him, Horang stepped directly into her path to block her way.
It was the exact reaction she had expected. However, she had no intention of meekly caving to his wishes—it was simply her nature to return whatever she received in kind. “We really shouldn’t be standing this close. I’ll get in big trouble, you know. From you.” “Even if you go back to the hospital room, I’m going to be there anyway.” “That’s why I’m planning to switch rooms. To one about ten meters away from you.”
As Bobae smiled and tried to move her feet again, Horang blocked her path once more. “Oh my. Was ten meters supposed to be this close? Isn’t this like, ten centimeters instead of ten meters?”
The man had stepped so close she could practically feel his breath. It was clear proof of just how desperately he needed her. And desperately he did.
Looking down at the irritatingly smug woman glaring back at him, Horang forced his surging anger down. He despised this situation with every fiber of his being, but to survive, he needed this woman. She was his only lifeline right now.
Clenching both fists so tightly that the veins stood out clearly on his skin, Horang forced the words that refused to leave his throat—dragging them out laborously, painfully, and with agonizing difficulty. “Hel… p… me.” “Pardon? What was that? I couldn’t quite hear you.”
He had summoned every ounce of energy left in his body to force out words he vowed he would never say again in his life, and she was playing dumb! To make matters frustrating, she blinked her big, innocent eyes as if she didn’t have a single clue in the world.
Clenching his back teeth, Horang opened his mouth again. “Hel… p… me, please.” “Help you? Oh, my goodness! President Baek Horang of Taesung Group is asking me—the kiss psycho with a rotten mental state—for help? I don’t know what to do with myself.”
Despite claiming she didn’t know what to do with herself, Bobae crossed her arms resolutely, completely contradicting her words, and looked up at him with bright, sharp eyes.
Infuriated to the point of disbelief by this sight, this situation, and this reality, Horang forced himself to endure. For survival! “Will you… help me?”
When he dragged the words back out from his choked throat to ask again, the woman wiped away the sickeningly sweet smile she had been wearing, blinked, and threw the question right back at him. “For free?”
Horang’s eyes widened at the unexpected question. “What?” “Don’t you know about give-and-take?” “…?” “Isn’t expecting to receive something while giving nothing back the mindset of a thief?” “…!”
The exact words he had thrown at her yesterday came right back to bite him. He had figured this woman wasn’t ordinary, but she was a certified psycho—a psycho with an exceptional memory, at that. “Well, of course, morally speaking, from a humanitarian standpoint, I could help out of the goodness of my human-loving heart. But! Mr. Baek Horang, you hate that kind of stuff, don’t you? You like clean-cut calculations and absolutely despise getting things for free, isn’t that right?”
To make matters worse, not only was she returning his own words from yesterday back to him, but she was also serving him a massive slice of humble pie. A truly colossal one.
However, there were two things this bold woman didn’t know: unlike Bobae, he had a lot to ‘give,’ and he remembered every single word of the conversation they had shared yesterday.
Bathed in the sunlight breaking through the dark clouds, Bobae’s face was glowing with a brilliant, porcelain white. Her face had been just this white yesterday, too.
“Just give me one kiss!”
Even when she had said those words, wrapped in his arms. “So, as long as something is given in return, it’s fine?” “Pardon?”
Horang cupped Bobae’s face with both of his large hands. And with rough lips, he swallowed up her soft ones.
It was his first kiss.
