Beyond the road where buses occasionally passed, the village was sparsely lit with hardly any streetlamps. The vast farmlands stretched into silence and pitch-black darkness.
In that place, where there was no noise, no light, no people wandering around, the fugitive—who’d been cornered until just the day before—felt an odd sense of calm.
He hadn’t meant to dwell on it, but at that moment, Cha Eui-sung briefly thought of his mother.
A pointless fantasy had flickered in his mind—that maybe a peaceful town like this would’ve been a better place for a mother and son living alone.
He hadn’t had land to settle on, money, family, or health—not a single one of those things.
If only he’d just left that place back then… at least that idle, fleeting fantasy might’ve stayed intact.
“It’s just… a pretty unremarkable town.”
Cha Eui-sung threw out a short, half-hearted description and turned his gaze away. Maybe it was because he noticed his eyes drifting toward the keyboard, but the conversation subtly veered off to something else.
“Someone I’ve grown close with recently moved out to Gangwon-do, too. Makes me think—more and more people are leaving the city these days.”
“Really? I’ve just stuck around.”
No matter the topic, Jeong Seong-hyu’s voice and tone remained even and tranquil. He was clearly picking up on things in Eui-sung’s words, but there were no visible reactions—no “gotcha” moments or shifts in his body language.
Maybe that’s why.
Though this was supposed to be a counseling session, Eui-sung found himself talking about more than just surface-level questions and answers.
At some point, Jeong Seong-hyu had stopped asking about past experiences. Their conversation would just drift around and eventually circle back to dreams.
“Do you remember how you felt while dreaming?”
“Not really.”
He remembered waking up pissed as hell. Thinking back on what happened in the dream, he was probably either scared or frustrated.
“I don’t know… Maybe I felt wronged?”
“If you felt wronged, then maybe something was taken from you in the dream?”
“That’s not it, but… I dunno.”
Nothing had really been taken from him. Still, he had died twice, after all. And he’d never not tried to live his life properly—yet the rewards he was left with were pitiful beyond belief.
“Are you usually alone in your dreams?”
“Most of the time, yeah. Though there are times when I’m not…”
“And?”
“Now that I think about it, even then… there wasn’t really anyone on my side.”
Well, yeah. He wouldn’t exactly count loan sharks beating the crap out of him as ‘company,’ now would he?
He answered as if offhandedly, but the mood soured in his gut.
Cha Eui-sung rubbed the back of his neck, sensing it was about time to steer the topic elsewhere.
Sure, the dreams were ridiculous, but he hadn’t come all the way here to talk about them.
“Anyway, it’s kinda funny. Even thieves have friends, but I guess I’m worse than a thief in my dreams.”
“Is that how you feel?”
“I guess…? Now that I’ve said it, it does sound weird. But if you think about it, shouldn’t it be the thief who doesn’t have anyone to help them?”
He let the words slip and paused briefly. Jeong Seong-hyu didn’t interrupt—just waited patiently.
Feigning a bit of hesitation, Cha Eui-sung threw out a question.
“Am I the only one who thinks this way? That sometimes, it feels like criminals have better luck with people.”
“Can you give an example?”
“Like, a violent criminal getting top-tier legal defense. Meanwhile, the victim has to endure endless stress through the trial, and yet the criminal ends up getting their sentence reduced.”
“So you feel it’s unfair—when guilty people still receive help.”
“It’s not just that, but… It seems like the bigger and more infamous the crime is, the more people come out to help in some way instead of punishing them. I mean, whenever things look like the law might not go their way, the first thing they do is pull out a mental illness diagnosis.”
For the first time, Cha Eui-sung began speaking in a long, uninterrupted stream.
Jeong Seong-hyu, with his skillful guidance, had gently nudged the conversation that way and now found himself caught in the flow of crime talk.
“Of course, I’m not saying all those diagnoses are fake. I’m sure some people genuinely need treatment. But still, don’t you think at least one or two of them are faking it to get a lighter sentence?”
“That’s a fair thought. But in reality, psychological evaluations for criminals are much more detailed and rigorous than you might think. They’re used in official reports. No one’s going to fabricate a diagnosis just to get a criminal off the hook.”
Even as he explained something that might be uncomfortable to say aloud, Jeong Seong-hyu’s expression didn’t waver.
Though—perhaps he’d unconsciously thought of Jo Tae-jong, because there was the faintest flicker across his face.
Cha Eui-sung caught every minute movement with precision.
Pupil dilation confirmed. Reflex movement… also detected.
If someone this composed still gave off such clear signals, then yeah—there was definitely a connection here.
Which meant Kim Jeong-baek’s shoddy detective work wasn’t entirely off the mark.
Locking eyes with him, Cha Eui-sung continued speaking.
“I wouldn’t know. In a world where tangled interests can fabricate crimes that never existed, hiding something that does exist isn’t that surprising.”
“You feel that the application of criminal law is somewhat… opaque?”
“Maybe. I’ve always been a little suspicious by nature. When I was a kid, a friend’s family went through something awful, and the perp didn’t go to prison—they ended up in a forensic hospital instead.”
Jeong Seong-hyu’s hand twitched, then slowly curled inward. He’d probably moved to raise it without realizing and then stopped himself. Someone in his line of work should be a pro at concealing emotion, but if this much leaked out—he must’ve seen a lot.
Only then did Cha Eui-sung allow a faint smile to curve his lips, steering the conversation back toward himself.
“Anyway, I guess being alone in my dreams is partially my own fault. Still, when the pain you get back feels way out of proportion to your karma… it does piss you off, doesn’t it?”
“Sounds like you have a lot of dreams tied to past mistakes?”
“Mistakes… more like just being a dumbass.”
“Hmm. What’s the difference, in your opinion?”
“If you mess up even though you knew better, that’s a mistake. But if you fall just because you didn’t know any better, that’s being dumb. The latter… well, you can erase that if you try.”
“Erase it?”
“Yeah. Then that version of me’s not me anymore.”
He was a professional, after all. Jeong Seong-hyu quickly pushed aside his brief moment of discomfort and refocused on the session. He offered a few tips about sleep, but since none of them had anything to do with Moon Tae-young or Jo Tae-jong, Cha Eui-sung mostly tuned them out.
Beep beep! The sharp ring of an alert sounded, and just like that, the session, which was winding down anyway, came to an end.
“Feels like I’ve talked more just now than I have in ages.”
“I’m glad to hear that. Most people are pretty tense during their first session.”
“So the next appointment’s a year from now, right? That’s kind of a bummer.”
“Pardon? Haha, no, that’s just for the first booking. That’s why the wait time’s so long. You mentioned you live pretty far—will it be hard for you to come again next month?”
Ah, so that’s how it worked. Cha Eui-sung cursed inwardly. In hindsight, of course there wouldn’t be some dumbass system where you only get therapy once a year.
“Mm. I think I can make it.”
“The front desk will help you with scheduling. Until then, try to reflect on the points we discussed. Writing a dream journal, like I mentioned, might help too. For now, I’ll prescribe something that can help with your sleep.”
Dream journal, yeah right. He didn’t even want to recall what he’d just heard.
Opening his phone’s memo app, Cha Eui-sung moved Jeong Seong-hyu’s file just beneath Moon Tae-young’s. Seeing him in person had sealed the deal.
Whether that reaction was guilt or fear, he couldn’t say for sure—but if someone was still this shaken by an incident over a decade old, then they’d done something bad, and whatever it was, they had a reason to still be remembering it now.
He’s tied up in that Demon King revenge crap, alright.
What kind of cooperation was he providing, exactly?
He didn’t seem like the type to destroy his life over guilt alone. How many damn layers did this thing have?
“Seriously. I just wanna ask him what the hell he’s been up to.”
Muttering out loud as he stepped outside, Cha Eui-sung rubbed the bridge of his nose.
Untangling a mess with no start or end felt less like deduction and more like bludgeoning his neurons into submission.
He’d rather just bite Moon Tae-young’s lip and come right out and ask what the hell he was plotting—but that’d never work.
Come to think of it, maybe he just wanted to bite his lip.
Cha Eui-sung chuckled to himself and shook his head.
It felt bizarre, somehow—how naturally these thoughts came to him, even with a mission on the line.
Back when his skull was echoing from blunt trauma and his vision was going dark, not once had he imagined he’d be entangled with the head of the Hunter Association like this.
Honestly, if it weren’t for that damned restriction not to harm the Demon King, Cha Eui-sung would’ve killed him already.
He could’ve chased him out to the middle of the Pacific and driven a spear into him, making sure every single day of his life became a waking hell.
Hell, even just a month ago, he’d imagined smashing that smug, slippery bastard’s head in more times than he could count.
In his mind, the back of Moon Tae-young’s head always let out this sharp, satisfying crack—BPAK!—like glass breaking cleanly.
But then…
Once he realized that Moon Tae-young actually had feelings for him—
And again, when he thought he might get something out of stringing him along—
The resentment and tension that had once governed him began to morph into something… strange.
Not that it meant he liked him. Obviously not.
But still…
Yeah. He’s not bad. Definitely not bad.
Suddenly, he found himself wondering.
Once the Savior Gauge was filled, and the world was saved from destruction—
What would happen to the Outer God’s proxy then?
Once he broke free of the role assigned to him, how much of the secrets tied to the Demon King and the Hero would he uncover?
Would Moon Tae-young still be the same person as now?
Would any of his emotions or memories change?
“Tsk.”
He’d be heading back to Cheongseri soon.
This time, he planned to rest his head not on a hotel pillow—but on Moon Tae-young’s arm.
Cha Eui-sung brushed off his unease by picturing the warmth on the back of his head.
But as he started the engine and adjusted the rearview mirror, his eyes caught his own reflection.
And what stared back at him… was a pair of eyes, visibly unsettled.
