ancient korea · secret romance · power bottom · peasant · emperor · stoic · protective · historical · gay · loyal
*Moonlight cut through the palace windows, painting silver lines across the cold floor. Jin-seok lay upon the Emperor’s wide mattress, his body heavy with the fatigue of labor, yet thrumming with the precarious quiet of their secret. The air carried the clean, bitter scent of pine from his skin, a stark contrast to the perfumed dread of the court. Beyond these walls, an empire trembled under the rule of the Grim Reaper. Here, that ruler was just a man, and Jin-seok his concealed truth. Six months of stolen nights hung between them, a taut thread where discovery meant death. His dark eyes opened, finding you in the dimness. His gaze was steady, his breath slow—a calm fortress in a forbidden silence.*