Chapter 113
“Don’t you ask what happened to Executive Director Kwon Junho?”
Lee Joon-seung walked purposefully toward Yoo Siwoon and asked.
Director Nam, who had put down the box he was holding, automatically took out his lighter and lit Yoo Siwoon’s cigarette as he was trying to light it after placing it between his lips.
Yoo Siwoon inhaled the cigarette deeply until his cheeks hollowed. The tip of the cigarette glowed red. When he exhaled, white smoke spread pungently through the air. Lee Joon-seung questioned him again as Yoo Siwoon calmly continued smoking, ignoring his words.
“Do you really not know what happened? His phone was last turned on at Chairman Yoo’s residence. Do you still not know? How can you not know about this?”
“…Do I look stupid to you?”
“What?”
Lee Joon-seung flinched and stepped back. Yoo Siwoon turned toward him. He took another drag from his cigarette, exhaled, and continued.
“I’m asking if I look stupid to you.”
“…Who said you look stupid?”
His confrontational tone had diminished by half. It was the first time Yoo Siwoon had spoken to him in this manner and addressed him so fiercely, and Lee Joon-seung was facing this side of him for the first time. Yoo Siwoon had never spoken informally to Lee Joon-seung before. He had always treated him with respect.
An overwhelming sense of intimidation pressed down on Lee Joon-seung. After all, Yoo Siwoon was one of the successor candidates of the Seongha family, with blood from ancestors who had been cruel from generations past.
“Then why are you going around blabbering things you shouldn’t say?”
“What… what are you talking about?”
Lee Joon-seung couldn’t recall carelessly saying anything inappropriate. He looked at Director Nam, wondering what Yoo Siwoon was referring to.
“You want to know what happened to Executive Director Kwon Junho?”
“What are you saying? What do you mean ‘what happened’? What did happen?”
“There are dogs that eat human flesh at Chairman Yoo’s house. Though calling them dogs might not be quite right.”
“W-what did you say?”
“Do you want to see those dog bastards?”
“…”
Lee Joon-seung swallowed hard enough for his throat to visibly move and turned to look at Director Nam. Director Nam, who had been looking at the floor with his head bowed, felt his gaze and looked up. Lee Joon-seung was silently asking with his eyes why Yoo Siwoon was acting this way.
“Why are you looking at Director Nam?”
Yoo Siwoon’s hand roughly grabbed Lee Joon-seung’s cheek and forcefully turned his face toward him, telling him to look at him instead. Although Lee Joon-seung was an experienced police officer from the violent crimes unit and similar in build to Yoo Siwoon, something like an animal instinct was sending him warnings. Yoo Siwoon wasn’t just a representative of a Seongha Group subsidiary but a fixer who had handled all the family’s dirty work. He might have committed even more murders than Chairman Yoo himself.
“CEO, why are you doing this? What exactly have I done for you to act this way?”
Lee Joon-seung asked in a frightened voice, telling him to calm down and explain why he was behaving this way. His mouth twitched uncomfortably in Yoo Siwoon’s grip.
“I’ll show you what happens when you don’t watch your mouth.”
Yoo Siwoon suddenly dropped his burning cigarette into Lee Joon-seung’s mouth and forced his jaw shut.
“Mmph!”
Lee Joon-seung’s scream was caught in his throat. Yoo Siwoon trapped Lee Joon-seung’s jaw and head with his arm, suppressing him with intense strength as he flailed and thrashed. He covered his nose and mouth, preventing him from breathing. The violent movements as he struggled to escape Yoo Siwoon’s grip subsided, and Lee Joon-seung twitched intermittently as if his breath was about to be cut off.
Yoo Siwoon released his head. Lee Joon-seung spat out what was in his mouth with a retching sound and desperately scooped up snow from the ground and swallowed it. He gasped roughly and rubbed his blackened, burnt tongue against the cold snow.
“Ugh, uh… gah, hack, huff, urgh.”
“You’re out of this now.”
Yoo Siwoon dusted off his hands and clothes as if something dirty had gotten on them. He turned to Director Nam, took the box he offered, and threw it beside Lee Joon-seung, who had slumped to the ground.
As the wrapping opened, a glimpse of what was inside could be seen. The box was filled with bundles of money.
“Hack, huh, what, why are you, why are you doing this!”
Lee Joon-seung shuddered, recoiling from the sensation of the foreign object remaining in his mouth, spat forcefully, and looked up at Yoo Siwoon resentfully as he shouted.
“What? You would have killed yourself if you knew?”
“…What.”
“You said you would have killed yourself if you were that existence, didn’t you?”
“…”
Lee Joon-seung belatedly realized why Yoo Siwoon was behaving this way. It was just something he had said. Words he had uttered without much thought.
“Is that something to say to a child? Moreover, to spout such things to an unrelated child? An adult? And a police officer at that?”
“…”
Lee Joon-seung felt chills. The fact that he had suffered this just for that one remark, and yet Yoo Siwoon’s eyes still showed unabated anger, barely containing himself from doing more harm. He wanted to crush him but was restraining himself. Realizing that Yoo Siwoon’s question about showing him the “dog bastards” had been serious, Lee Joon-seung’s lips trembled.
Lee Joon-seung knew about the existence of those dogs better than anyone. All that the forensic team had determined was that one leg of his police academy colleague, found on a hillside, had been eaten by a beast—wild dogs.
“If you even pretend to hesitate, next time I’ll cut off your filthy balls and stuff them in your mouth instead, just so you know.”
“…”
“Team Leader Lee Joon-seung.”
“…”
“Watch your mouth if you don’t want your entire family slaughtered.”
Leaving Lee Joon-seung sprawled on the ground, Yoo Siwoon got into the car. Director Nam, who closed his eyes tightly and exhaled a breath of deep regret, said to Lee Joon-seung:
“The CEO found out. That’s why I warned you.”
“…Ugh, damn it. Ugh…”
Lee Joon-seung groaned painfully as he touched the burnt parts of his tongue and palate with his hand, assessing the extent of his injury.
“Step away from our work. You won’t see us again. Discard all contacts and materials you’ve gathered so far. I’m saying this for your own good. Don’t do anything. Don’t… take my words lightly.”
“…Ugh.”
Director Nam turned away after looking at him with an expression that suggested he had more to say.
As soon as he got into the driver’s seat, Director Nam hurriedly pulled out the car. Leaving Lee Joon-seung alone at the burnt temple, the car carrying them quickly retreated along the path they had come.
Looking at Yoo Siwoon through the rearview mirror as he sat in the back seat with his head resting and eyes closed, Director Nam carefully spoke:
“You went too far.”
“…”
“He won’t stay quiet. He’s a police officer. He’s in a position where he can do almost anything.”
“Ah, maybe I should have just killed him. Turn the car around. Let me kill him.”
Yoo Siwoon opened his eyes and said. He grabbed the door lock as if he was about to get out of the car immediately. Director Nam didn’t turn the steering wheel. It meant stop nagging because he didn’t want to hear it. Yoo Siwoon stared intently at the back of Director Nam’s head, then closed his eyes again and leaned back, as if tired.
Director Nam also drove in silence. His concerns weren’t excessive. Yoo Siwoon lost his reason when it came to matters related to Eunseong. Although Lee Joon-seung’s words were harsh, it certainly didn’t warrant such a response. The problem was that Yoo Siwoon couldn’t empathize with the point Director Nam wanted to make.
“Now that he’s also found out about Executive Director Kwon Junho… you should consider the possibility that others will find out too. They’ll think you betrayed them.”
“…”
“CEO.”
“I told you I’m not interested anymore.”
“Are you really going to do this?”
“Don’t cross the line.”
Yoo Siwoon’s eyebrows wrinkled repeatedly as he kept his eyes gently closed.
“Are you saying you’re going to forsake all of us, in the end?”
“Why so dramatic? Am I the head of the family or something?”
He frowned with his eyes still closed.
“You surely don’t think this is an issue that can be hidden until the end, do you?”
“Why can’t I hide it?”
“They’ll be suspicious if you disappear. Team Leader Lee Joon-seung already knows about the child that Seo Jeong-gi took and ran away with.”
“That’s why I told him it’s not true. This is about an innocent child’s life—he won’t go around wagging his tongue recklessly.”
“CEO!”
“I’m going somewhere even you don’t know about, so how will anyone find me?”
His intention was to conceal Eunseong’s existence and hide him forever. He wished to create his own comfortable paradise in a place no one could find, to spend his life with the only being he wanted in the only place where Yoo Siwoon could feel at ease.
“You know they’ll try to extract information from me through torture if necessary, just like they did with Seo Jeong-gi, don’t you?”
“Don’t assume the extreme. Yoo Oseon is dead. Seo Jeong-gi is dead too.”
“Don’t I know that? Why didn’t you just keep me in the dark as well?”
“…”
“How do you plan to silence me?”
“Do I have to worry about that too?”
“Yes, you do. Worry about me too.”
Director Nam asked if he was going to ignore all this and just do as he pleased despite everything he was saying.
Yoo Siwoon had his eyes open by now. He had his arms crossed and was looking out at the road through the window. It was mid-winter weather with snow swirling in the air.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
