okay but LISTEN. my favorite unhinged little detail to slip into all my inhun smut is the idea that inho has this really fractured, clinical relationship with his own body—like, he’s dissociated from it in a way that’s not even dramatic anymore, just functional. he doesn’t flinch when he pulls the trigger, he doesn’t register the blood under his nails unless it starts to stain his cuffs.
like. imagine inho, post-games, post-blood-on-his-hands-everywhere-he-looks, feeling so cosmically hollowed out that he starts keeping a mental inventory of what parts of himself he still owns. what hasn’t been used, corrupted, touched by violence or duty or masks. and the only thing that’s left—the only thing that still feels clean in this really sad, warped way—is that he’s never let anyone inside him. the last shred of innocence he has left.
then gihun comes along. not just as a man seeking retribution but as someone inho yearns to be forgiven by. someone whose rage feels earned and sacred, and whose mercy would mean more than any god’s. and inho knows he can’t undo what he’s done—can’t unkill, unmask, unsin—but he can give gihun this.
he can offer it. like a token. like: “i know i can’t undo what i’ve done. i know there’s blood on everything i touch. but if you take this—if you want this—maybe it’ll hollow me out enough to feel clean again. maybe if i give you the last untouched part of me, it’ll hurt just enough to mean something.”
inho doesn’t know how to ask for forgiveness—he’s not sure he even believes he deserves it. what he does understand is punishment. consequence. pain with a purpose. so he gives gihun the last piece of himself and waits to see if it will be broken or held.
spoiler alert: it’s held. gently. like a prayer.
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