Chapter 148
In the past, these would have been things Director Nam should have known about, tasks he should have handled. Yoo Siwoon would certainly have informed him. Moreover, as the person exclusively responsible for taking care of Eunseong, these were things Director Nam needed to know. The fact that Yoo Siwoon hadn’t informed him about this in advance made suspicion rise like smoke in Director Nam’s mind, wondering if he was intentionally hiding something from him.
If, as Lee Joon-seung said, this was also part of his plan…
If Yoo Siwoon really intended to kill all male children under ten years old who had Seongha Group bloodlines…
But Seo Jeong-gi’s death was something even Yoo Siwoon hadn’t anticipated. Director Nam could guarantee this. It was because Director Nam had personally tracked down Seo Jeong-gi, who had lost contact, under Yoo Siwoon’s orders.
Eunseong’s eyes were fixed intently on his father’s white urn. His eyelids trembled as if tears might fall at any moment.
“…”
Did he suddenly want to see his father?
Eunseong had said Director Nam would die too. Suspecting that Eunseong might have discovered something, he carefully suppressed his rising anxiety and tried not to pressure him as he asked:
“What you said earlier… about me being killed too. What did you mean by that?”
“…”
“Who’s going to kill me?”
“…”
“Are you talking about the CEO?”
Eunseong wasn’t listening to Director Nam’s words. After staring intently at his father’s urn and its contents, he suddenly approached the glass storage cabinet of the memorial hall and opened its door.
“Eunseong, what are you doing?”
Then he tried to take out the urn from inside. Being high up and quite heavy, Eunseong staggered from the unexpected weight as he removed the urn. Director Nam tried to help catch it, but he was a moment too late. In that split second, the urn fell to the floor. The ceramic shattered with a tremendous cracking sound in the quiet place.
“…”
“Th-this… what on earth.”
Director Nam’s face contorted in dismay, expecting bone ash to be mixed with the ceramic fragments and scattered on the floor like dust.
But there was no white bone ash. All that was scattered on the floor were pieces of broken ceramic.
There was nothing inside. It was an empty urn. Eunseong’s hand froze in mid-air as if he had grabbed something but let it go, his eyes staring blankly at the shattered ceramic fragments around his feet.
“…What is this?”
Director Nam asked Eunseong what on earth was going on. Eunseong’s eyes looked at the sharp ceramic pieces at his feet before turning to Director Nam.
As soon as their eyes met, Eunseong’s body collapsed like the power had been cut off. Director Nam barely managed to catch Eunseong as he fainted and fell toward the broken ceramic.
“Eunseong! Eunseong, wake up!”
∞ ∞ ∞
“I heard you took Eunseong somewhere. The executor mentioned it. What happened?”
Yoo Siwoon, who had returned home late, asked Director Nam who had come out to greet him instead of Eunseong.
Fortunately, Eunseong had regained consciousness in the car on the way home. Director Nam was driving, agonizing over whether to go to the hospital or report to Yoo Siwoon, when his eyes met with Eunseong who had just woken up. Neither of them said anything. They both knew what thoughts, what suspicions the other harbored. Director Nam didn’t ask anything, and Eunseong didn’t seek confirmation from Director Nam.
Director Nam brought Eunseong back to Yoo Siwoon’s residence without asking anything. Eunseong likewise didn’t say he wouldn’t go back or ask to be taken elsewhere.
Director Nam didn’t even ask why he had rushed to the memorial hall after seeing whatever he saw on that phone.
Eunseong got out of the car with a coldly hardened face. Receiving greetings from the executors, he went into the house and straight to his room. He neatly hung up his outer clothes and, after staring silently at Director Nam who had followed him in, went into the bathroom and locked the door. After showering, he changed into pajamas and got into bed.
As if it were the most natural and ordinary thing, like going to bed at bedtime.
“He suddenly said he wanted to eat tteokbokki, so we went out for a bit.”
“What’s this about him not looking well? Is Eunseong sick?”
“I think he’s feeling a bit ill.”
“…He’s been saying he’s had cold symptoms since before. Did he enjoy the tteokbokki? You said he’s feeling ill?”
“He seems to have gotten worse after eating the tteokbokki. I gave him some digestive medicine.”
In response to the concerned questioning, Director Nam found himself telling a lie, and was chillingly surprised at the fact that he had lied to him. Director Nam was fully displaying his confused emotions on his face, but Yoo Siwoon, absorbed in his own worries, failed to notice.
“You’ve worked hard until late. Go and rest now.”
“No. I’ll stay here.”
“Having another man besides me in the house at such a late hour.”
“…”
“I believe I’ve told you before that I find it unpleasant.”
Yoo Siwoon slowly unbuttoned his jacket. His eyes glanced briefly at Director Nam, but didn’t look at him directly. His downcast gaze conveyed only a hint of warning. Director Nam stood his ground without moving and spoke as if in protest.
“Is that how you’ve been seeing me?”
“You have balls, don’t you, Director? Don’t you?”
Yoo Siwoon asked the explicit question while hooking his finger into his tie and pulling it down.
“I do, but—”
“You don’t understand how I feel.”
“Yes, I tried to understand, but now I really don’t understand.”
It was a protest against how he could ask such an unreasonable question.
He wanted to ask if this was why Yoo Siwoon was trying to dry up the seeds of the breeders without his knowledge, but Director Nam kept his mouth shut. He wanted to confirm with him if it was true that he intended to kill all the male children of the family under ten years old who weren’t yet qualified as breeders, but he was too afraid to ask in case it was his true intention. It was not only an act that violated the laws set by the Council of Elders, but also more cruel than anything the Yongse Pacheon Church had ever done.
To the indignant but simultaneously disrespectful protest about how he could treat him like that, Yoo Siwoon replied in a cool voice without even a hint of mockery:
“Please go now. Thank you for your hard work.”
“…”
“Did I speak too quietly?”
His face, as he looked back at Director Nam, was deeply marked with fatigue. When he frowned, a deep double eyelid line formed in one eye, accentuating the concave features of his face.
“…I’ll be going then.”
Director Nam, who had been hesitating lukewarmly, reluctantly bowed to him and turned around. After confirming that Director Nam had left the house, Yoo Siwoon unbuttoned his shirt that was tightly constricting his neck and opened Eunseong’s door.
Eunseong’s room, with its drawn curtains, was enveloped in a cozy darkness. Eunseong was asleep. He was curled up small under the bedding, forming a tiny mound. Yoo Siwoon sat by his side for a moment. As he sat down, the mattress sank softly, taking his weight.
“…”
Eunseong’s sleeping expression was tense, as if he were having a bad dream. His face looked like he was pretending to sleep rather than actually sleeping.
Yoo Siwoon extended his hand toward Eunseong’s cheek and disheveled hair, but didn’t touch them, only moving his fingertips above as if tracing them. Hoping that even his dreams wouldn’t be arduous, he quietly asked:
“…Are you asleep?”
Eunseong showed no reaction. He seemed to be in a deep sleep. After gazing at the sleeping face for a long time, Yoo Siwoon pretended to kiss his cheek, temple, and forehead before getting up.
With careful steps so as not to wake him, he left the room and closed the door.
He washed his hands with coarse salt from the kitchen until they stung, then went to his own room and finished undressing.
He had been on his way back from cremating a corpse. He put all the clothes he had worn, including his underwear, into a garbage bag and sealed the opening. After a long shower, he came out wearing only his lower garments, placed a towel on his wet hair, and looked for a cigarette.
He rarely smoked inside the house, but today was an exception.
He was looking for a lighter to go out to the garden to smoke when he turned his head at the sound of someone approaching. Between the gaps in his vision obscured by the towel, he saw Eunseong.
“You’re awake?”
“…”
“Why did you eat something when you’re feeling ill and have indigestion? Are you feeling better now?”
Eunseong stood silently at the doorway, looking at him with light streaming in from behind him. Yoo Siwoon couldn’t clearly see what expression and look in his eyes Eunseong had as he gazed at him. A pale silhouette of light spread along the lines of Eunseong’s body.
As Yoo Siwoon was about to remove the towel from his head and take out the cigarette he had in his mouth with an “oh,” Eunseong slowly approached him. Yoo Siwoon turned toward Eunseong who was coming close to him.
Unable to remove the tobacco that was stickily attached to the surface of his wet lips, he sat down almost falling onto the bed as Eunseong pushed him. His surprised eyes looked up at Eunseong, awkwardly holding the cigarette between his lips.
“…”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
