A Calculation of Heat

“M-my pheromones?”

“Yes.”

Dae-eon’s mouth twitched. Why did he have to be so damn firm about it? Looking into Seon Ji-ha’s trademark clear, lunatic eyes, he realized that a vague brush-off wouldn’t work this time. His brain, already throbbing from Engineering Mathematics, began to spin at full speed.

The longer Dae-eon delayed his answer, the more desperate Seon Ji-ha’s gaze became. It was visible—the sheer scale of the man’s expectations was growing by the second.

Gulp.

Swallowing hard, Dae-eon finally parted his lips.

“I… I can’t release them for you.”

“……Why?”

“They’re total garbage. Honestly, I use pheromone perfume. You thought they smelled good before, right? That was all the perfume. My real scent is terrible.”

‘Better to admit to the perfume first.’ As the saying goes, a lie shines brightest when mixed with a 1% grain of truth. Dae-eon didn’t hide the fact that he used synthetic scents.

“I wear it almost every day. You probably noticed a slight sense of artificiality sometimes, right? That’s why.”

“……Then the actual pheromones……”

“I never release them. To be honest, I have a bit of a complex about it.”

“A complex?”

Dae-eon slumped his shoulders, mimicking Seon Ji-ha’s earlier dejection. He shifted gears instantly, adopting the expression of someone recalling a deeply painful memory. He squinted one eye as if looking back at a distant, traumatic past.

“Back when I had a cycle once, I accidentally let some out, and this kid told me……”

“……”

“He said I smelled like rotting fish.”

‘Rotting fish pheromones.’ Did such a thing even exist in this world? He’d heard of citrus, mint, woody, or even musk—but rotting fish? Highly unlikely. Yet, Dae-eon pushed forward, his face glowing with shameless sincerity.

“So I can’t show you. It’s a trauma for me.”

“……A trauma……”

“Totally. A deeply painful memory. I’m sorry. Even if it’s you, Senior, I just can’t……”

Dae-eon’s gaze held a deliberate distance, as if suggesting they weren’t quite close enough for such a “vile” revelation. Surely, at this point, even Seon Ji-ha would drop the subject. Or so he thought.

“……Then shouldn’t we try to treat that trauma?”

“Wh-ack? Cough, hack!”

Dae-eon’s voice cracked into a high-pitched squeak. Caught off guard by the sudden counter-attack, he swallowed his own saliva wrong and fell into a coughing fit. Meanwhile, Seon Ji-ha stared at him with that terrifyingly earnest, clear-eyed focus.

“You can’t live your whole life keeping your pheromones locked away……”

“Wh-why not? Plenty of people do! Don’t be so biased!”

“……Dae-eon, don’t you have Heat Cycles?”

‘I don’t.’

As a Beta, there was no way he’d have a cycle. But since he couldn’t say that, Dae-eon kept his mouth shut for a moment before testing the waters.

“I’m an Ultra-Recessive, so I barely have them… right?”

“But you must have them occasionally.”

“Eh, even if I do, it’s just like a mild cold……”

“How often? The average for an Omega is once a month. Dominant Omegas often go every three weeks, while Recessives average once every two months.”

‘How the hell do you even know that?!’

The moment the topic of Dae-eon’s cycle came up, Seon Ji-ha pounced, rattling off statistics about average Omega cycles like a walking encyclopedia. It was information that even Dae-eon, a “Recessive Omega” on paper, didn’t know.

But Seon Ji-ha asked with clinical precision, as if he had been waiting for this exact moment.

“If they are rare, is it once every two months for you……?”

“No! Way rarer than that!”

“Three months?”

“Ah, no?”

Now he was in a position where he had to invent a cycle frequency for a biological process he didn’t even possess. After a moment of frantic thought, Dae-eon held up a thumb.

“Six months!”

“……Pardon……?”

“I only have them once every six months!”

‘With this, surely he’ll think I really am an Ultra-Recessive Omega, right?’ Internally, he prayed Seon Ji-ha wouldn’t dig deeper. As if his prayer were answered, Seon Ji-ha went quiet at the mention of “six months.”

In fact, his face looked a bit pale.

“How often do you have them, Senior? Alphas don’t have Ruts as often as Omegas, right?”

Unlike Omegas who suffered monthly, Alphas averaged once every three months. Some only experienced it once a year. Dae-eon leaned in with curiosity, hoping to flip the script.

Seon Ji-ha answered gloomily.

“Once a month……”

“What? Once a month? For real?! Is that normal for Ultra-Dominants?”

“……No, just me……”

Dae-eon didn’t know it, but Seon Ji-ha had been a regular at national research institutes since he was a child. Born as an Ultra-Dominant Alpha, he was treated as a “Special Case” due to his extreme pheromone concentration, frequent Rut cycles, and the dangerously high libido that accompanied them.

He knew his cycle perfectly. Because his levels were so high, he occasionally suffered from irregular “breakout” Ruts—which was exactly what had happened in the student lounge.

“Whoa. Your future wife is going to love you.”

“……Huh?”

“Oh, was that weird? I mean, high stamina… isn’t that a good thing? I’m actually jealous.”

In his life, Seon Ji-ha had heard that his status was “scary,” “weird,” or “distanced,” but he had never heard anyone say they were jealous of his stamina. He looked at Dae-eon with wonder.

Moments like this made Seon Ji-ha feel like Dae-eon was an alien. His reactions were just so…

“Looking at you closely, Senior, you’re tall, you have big hands, big feet. Honestly, if you styled yourself just a bit, you’d be incredibly popular.”

‘Isn’t he acting exactly like a Beta who doesn’t care about dynamics?’

Dae-eon truly had no prejudice. To him, an Ultra-Dominant was just “rare,” and a Recessive Omega was just “sensitive to scents.” Most Alphas or Omegas reacted with suspicion when they heard Seon Ji-ha was an Ultra-Dominant: ‘You? No way.’ Everyone had a fantasy of what a “Dominant” should look like.

That was why Seon Ji-ha felt a strange sensation every time they spoke. He stared at Dae-eon, who simply blinked back.

“What? Was that too much? We’re both guys, after all.”

“Guys……”

Dae-eon was the only one who didn’t seem to realize that “guy” was an outdated term in a world divided by dynamics.

“Senior?”

“Yes, Dae-eon.”

“Should we get back to studying? We talked too much again, didn’t we?”

Dae-eon grinned and picked up his stylus. But just as he was about to focus on the tablet, Seon Ji-ha tilted his head.

“So, about the pheromones?”

“Huh?”

“The trauma. We have to treat it.”

“……”

‘I thought I changed the subject!’ Dae-eon stared at him, speechless.

“I’ll help you……”

“I’m telling you, I’m really fine!”

“Then I’ll just catch a small whiff. To see if it’s… really that bad……”

Dae-eon let out a long sigh. He never expected to find a person who wanted to smell rotting fish. Usually, that would be a deal-breaker for any scent-sensitive dynamic.

Then, Seon Ji-ha whispered, his voice small:

“There’s no way your scent could be bad, Dae-eon……”

His face turned bright red. For him, it was a massive confession of courage.

But Dae-eon, who possessed zero intuition in this department, just stared at him blankly and retorted:

“It’s really bad, though.”

“……”

“It’s actually horrifying.”

Seon Ji-ha snapped his head up. He met Dae-eon’s eyes and said firmly:

“I’ll be the judge of that.”

‘So show me.’

Dae-eon finally understood the underlying meaning. He realized he couldn’t run anymore. If the rotting fish excuse failed, he had to play his last card.

“I’ll let you smell them during my next Heat Cycle. They don’t come out right now.”

“……They don’t come out?”

“Yeah, because I’m a Recessive.”

Dae-eon didn’t know if that was scientifically true for Recessives, but he had to wing it. If Seon Ji-ha tried to correct him, he’d just say he was a “special case.”

“When is your next cycle?”

“Uh…… a year from now?”

“……”

“Haha! Just kidding! It’s in six months. I actually just finished one.”

“Just finished one?”

“Yeah, like… ten days ago?”

Blink. Blink. Blink.

Seon Ji-ha blinked exactly three times. It was the sign of a brain performing rapid-fire calculations. Once the math was done, he muttered under his breath:

“Then… we’ll be going through our next cycles at the same time.”