"A-Tao? A-Tao?" Mark asked loudly as he entered the building where the Chán Grand Leader was staying. "A-Tao, are you deaf?" The man continued grumbling as he opened the door to the younger man's room, but his feet were literally rooted to the ground by the sight that greeted him.
"Mark-ge?" The Chám boy shrieked, his face turning as red as a tomato. "I was just..." The younger one started, then swallowed hard. "I was getting dressed!"'He suddenly pulled his clothes together. "Yes, I was getting dressed." He repeated it, but he didn't get an answer, as his friend just stood in the doorway of the room and didn't take his eyes off the boy.
"You were getting dressed?" Mark asked back with difficulty, then as if he had come to life again, he stepped further into the room and closed the door behind him. "You have to think of something better than this, A-Tao." The former Vietryk tilted his head to the side.
"I don't know what you're thinking, Mark-ge." The chán boy folded his arms in front of him, but this only made the western man start giggling and sit down on the bed next to him.
"I didn't know you were so shy, A-Tao." Mark chuckled, then turned to his friend. "So who's the little lady that got you so excited?" He glanced down at the chán boy's lap, where the younger man's manhood was barely covered by his clothes. However, when he did this, the chán boy immediately clenched his legs and even turned his head away.
"What makes you think it's someone specific?" She Tao asked, clearing his throat.
"It was just an idea." Mark shrugged, as if he didn't see anything wrong with his idea. "You're not a child anymore, you do what you want." He continued.
"Of course I'm not a child. I turned sixty today." The chán boy rolled his eyes.
"And your golden core is still developing, you have a beautiful age ahead of you, A-Tao." The deputy director of the Floating Air Barracks smiled kindly at his friend. "Oh, while we're at it. I brought you this as a gift." The man said and pulled a bracelet out of his pocket, which he placed on the bed right next to the chán boy's thigh, then stood up. "And I was going to invite you to lunch, but I think it's better if I let you finish what you started. I'll see you later, A-Tao." He said farewell, but didn't even look back at his friend, who in turn caught the man's wrist.
"Mark-ge." He started talking.
"Yes?" The question came and Mark looked back at his friend with a strange sparkle in his eyes. The chán boy looked up at him with a dreamy look, then as if he had noticed what he was doing, he blushed and turned his head away.
"Why did you buy me a bracelet?" The younger one finally asked a question.
"It's an armor. I had Mullen make for you." The western man confessed, which made his friend turn back to him with his mouth open.
"You're giving me a Mullen armor for my sixtieth birthday? Because if you did for the hundredth, I would understand, that would be a big milestone." The young man grumbled, which made his friend start giggling and turn towards him.
"Sesanti once told me something about your sixtieth birthday. I thought that was reason enough." Mark shrugged. However, his words had unexpected consequences, as the chán boy blushed again. "A-Tao, you'll end up being a giant red panda if you blush that much." The ex-Mist member chuckled.
"Where did you want to take me to lunch?" She Tao distracted himself from his awkward situation.
"I said I wanted to invite you, not take you to lunch." The western man corrected his friend.
"What's the difference?" The younger one asked curiously.
"I cooked in the latter." The older man muttered.
"Invite me to lunch Mark-ge." She Tao smiled as he slowly let go of his friend's hand and picked up the bracelet from the bed and immediately put it on his wrist. "Give me two minutes to get dressed." The boy blushed again, and his friend just started giggling.
"No need. Give me a minute and I'll bring it in." Mark smiled and before the chán boy could answer, he had already turned on his heel and stormed out of the room.
Mark's heart was beating fast and his hands were shaking a little more than he wanted. All that was on his mind was Weruh's words from that morning, constantly repeating. "You don't have to wait anymore." This sentence kept repeating in the man's mind and he had to pull himself together so that his thoughts wouldn't show on his face as he headed back to the room with his homemade lunch.
And as his friend left the room, She Tao tried to suffocate himself with his pillow. He had never felt so embarrassed. It wasn't enough that his best friend had opened the door on him while he was clearly selfpleasureing, but the man who had appeared was the center of his fantasies. He would be lying if he said that there was an immediate sexual attraction between the two of them, but it had definitely grown stronger since Mark returned to his homeland in the west.
"I hope you'll like it..." Mark spoke, entering the room. "A-Tao, if you want to die of suffocation, there are much better ways to do it than with a pillow." The man shook his head as he placed the tray on the nightstand next to the bed.
"Like?" The chán boy grimaced as he pulled the pillow off his head.
"Kissing." The western man shrugged as he picked up one of the bowls containing the homemade soup.
"Should I take this as an offer, Mark-ge?" She Tao asked with a wicked grin on his face, trying to hide the fact that his heart rate had jumped and his body was starting to show interest in other places as well. However, Mark froze completely at the question and clutched the bowl so tightly that he was afraid he would break it. "Mark-ge?" The chán boy whispered when he noticed his friend's situation.
"You have no idea what you're doing, A-Tao." The Western man put the bowl back on the tray and grabbed the nightstand with both hands. "You have no idea..." He swallowed hard.
"Mark-ge..." The chán boy began in a worried voice. With this, he managed to make the man's muscles relax, then turn to his friend with a sad look.
"Don't tempt me, A-Tao." He held the boy's face in one hand. "In the end, I won't be able to control myself." Mark ran his thumb along the younger man's lips.
"What if that's exactly what I want?" The chán swallowed hard, his whole body shaking with cold when the western man touched his lips.
"You've always been a headstrong half-demon." Mark smiled. "If that's what you really want, then ask for it." The man leaned close to the chán's face.
"You're my shadow, it's time for you to touch me too!" She Tao grabbed the man's coat with both hands.
"As you command." The western man whispered the words. The early afternoon light shone warmly through the room window, and when the two men's lips met, another shadow appeared out of nowhere, next to the previous one on the room floor, and like the shadows, their owners intertwined to spend the rest of the day in each other's arms.