Chapter 94
“You faithless bastard. You get what you believe in. What you believe! You faithless bastard. That’s why you just clean up family trash. Doing what those crazy people tell you to do! Since you got a subsidiary under your control, you think you’re something? Acting all high and mighty like you’re somebody.”
Yoo Oseon criticized Siwoon when he reacted by saying how could anyone believe in such a nonsensical prophecy, and that he was sick and tired of people irrationally harping on about prophecies. While secretly despising the unrealistic dreamers who searched for the target, he coldly condemned Siwoon for not leaving the family and living off its dirty money.
“Well, money is all the same. Is there separate cult money and regular money?”
“Then why are you keeping him? Preciously, at that. Hidden away in a mountain fortress, keeping him under surveillance?”
Oseon was referring to his residence. Realizing that Oseon had approached close by, Siwoon’s eye twitched slightly. An inexplicable fear was consuming him—the possibility that he could have lost Eunseong to Oseon if he had been careless.
“It just feels unsettling to leave him alone. Would Chairman Yoo let him be if he found out? He’d want to cut open the poor kid’s stomach. Jeong-gi hyung ended up like that, should the kid meet the same fate? I’m really sick of all this now. Can’t everyone just live normally?”
“…”
When Siwoon spoke, Oseon’s eyes slowly distorted. The Siwoon he had known until now was excessively taciturn; he would barely utter a word or two even when prodded in the side, and that was the extent of his presence. Oseon couldn’t even remember hearing Siwoon speak at such length before.
A cold silence fell. Oseon didn’t miss Siwoon’s Adam’s apple trembling as he slowly swallowed.
“…Why is this bastard so talkative today?”
“…”
“I’ve never heard you speak more than two sentences in my life. Seeing you talk so well, you weren’t a retard after all?”
“…”
“Shit, so you weren’t a retard.”
Oseon, sensing something, muttered dejectedly as he watched Siwoon flinch for a moment.
His lips, staring intently at Siwoon, formed a grotesque arc. When Siwoon momentarily failed to control his expression and his eyes contorted, Oseon’s face changed to one of joy. It was the joy of finally finding what he was looking for.
“…Is it true?”
“…”
“That, that child, is that child really the ‘Great Gap’? Is it true?”
“…”
“Is it? Is it real?! Is it true?!”
“…”
“That child! That child! It’s true! That child! That child! Ahhh! My wife! My wife!”
Oseon rejoiced frantically as if struck by lightning. It was the pure joy of seeing life-giving water gushing and overflowing into a hole that had been persistently dug in one place for decades during a severe drought. The joy of escaping his cursed fate of dying without ever meeting his companion in his lifetime, only being used as a stud to produce offspring.
“That child! That was the one! It was that child! The knight on the pale, decaying horse comes with thunder! Our god is alive! My wife was alive! My wife! That child is my wife! I had a companion too!”
Oseon shouted with joy bordering on madness, certain that Eunseong was his, completely disregarding Siwoon. Siwoon shuddered with disgust.
“That child was the one! That child, huuuh, my wife is alive! Where is that child! Where is that child! I must meet right now! I must meet my wife! Woman of the goddess! It shall be according to my faith!”
Oseon shouted, bursting into tears of joy. An unknown fear rose inside Siwoon as he looked at him. It was a precarious sense of crisis that he must kill the breeder who had recognized the “Great Gap.” Eunseong was not Oseon’s. Seo Eunseong was Siwoon’s wife, the companion he had searched for all his life.
Siwoon jumped over the window that reached his waist. He kicked Oseon in the back, who was crying with joy while thinking of Eunseong with crazed eyes, knocking him to the floor.
“Ugh!”
He lifted the fallen man and moved him back onto the storage unit. He punched Oseon’s face as he attacked with his limbs in a frenzy. Oseon barely dodged his fist. The missed punch embedded into the metal storage unit with a thud. Oseon looked up in terror, gasping at the dented surface. This time the fist hit his cheekbone accurately. It didn’t stop with just one blow to incapacitate him.
Thud, thud, thud, thud!
Siwoon, breathing heavily like a madman, pummeled Oseon’s face until it was smashed. He hit him so hard that the calluses came off his knuckles. The pale yellow horse was appearing from the rain clouds with a thunderous sound.
He roughly laid Oseon back down as he struggled, spitting blood simultaneously from his nose and mouth with broken teeth, and pushed the storage unit in.
“Huk, huk, heok, huk, shit! No!”
As soon as the storage unit closed with a bang and a sliding sound, there was a frenzied outburst from inside as if a fire had been lit. The entire unit shook, and even Seo Jeong-gi’s body lying neatly beside it vibrated.
Siwoon was pressing the door with all his strength using both hands, even though it couldn’t be opened from the inside.
Oseon, who had been shouting until his voice was hoarse, stopped his frenzy. Soon, desperate pleas flowed out.
“Sa, save me… save me, please. Siwoon. I was wrong. I won’t tell. I won’t tell anyone. You take him. You can have that child! Just please save me. Hik… please. You son of a bitch!”
“Haa, haa… Huup.”
Siwoon deliberately kept his mouth shut and swallowed his panting breath. He made no sound.
“Siwoon…? Did you leave? You didn’t really leave, did you? Siwoon! Yoo Siwoon! You bastard! I said I won’t tell! I said I won’t tell! You take him! You can have that child, can’t you! You can have it all, you fucking bastard! Don’t go. Hik… don’t go, please, please, don’t go. You didn’t even believe in that prophecy. You despised all of us. So why… hik, why are you doing this? Please save me. Please, please, I’ll keep my mouth shut and won’t tell anyone. Just spare my life.”
Thinking Siwoon had left, Oseon shouted as if he had lost his mind, then cried, begged, and cursed Siwoon.
Having lost his senses in fear, Oseon mumbled something. It was a prayer.
“Huuk, behold, the God who came by the side path rides the pale yellow horse and travels that road, their end is in the fire of destruction, and only our righteousness shall be abundant in the world. Ugh.”
《Behold, the God who came by the side path rides the pale yellow horse and travels that road, their end is in the fire of destruction. When the end of the world is near, a knight on a pale yellow horse will appear and cover the land with darkness, ruling humanity with death; his name is Death, and what follows him is called Hell. The whole world will tremble and fear before his power.
After paving the way for chaos and destruction, the God who came by the side path will appear like light from the darkness through the Great Gap; this is the Savior, the one to be worshipped, lips as sweet as honey, eyes as fair as lilies, the serpent multitude in the abyss shall be visible only to those with spiritual sight, and the keys to the whole world shall be placed in his hands.
Mark the sign of the knight on the forehead and hand. All power and glory are but for a moment. Behold, the God who came by the side path rides the pale yellow horse and travels that road, their end is in the fire of destruction, and only our righteousness shall be abundant in the world.》
Siwoon left the medical center. He had the illusion that Oseon’s prayer-reciting voice kept coming from behind him. Director Nam, who had been waiting for him outside, ran over when he saw Siwoon walking unsteadily as if in a daze.
“CEO, are you alright?”
Even Director Nam had never seen Siwoon so pale, like white wax. Having grown up witnessing harsh things from a young age, Siwoon was fearless in that regard and had never experienced the sensation of being terrified in his life. Yet now he was scared as if he had seen a ghost.
“What’s wrong? Did something happen in there?”
“No. Nothing… nothing happened.”
“What about President Yoo Oseon?”
“I took care of him.”
As if about to vomit, Siwoon couldn’t stand straight and leaned on the car for support. Then he really went “urgh” and gagged, drooling. Director Nam anxiously patted Siwoon’s back as he shuddered and tried to suppress the urge to vomit. After barely calming down, Siwoon rejected the helping hand. He repeatedly pushed cold, chilling air into his lungs and exhaled.
“…Are you really okay?”
Siwoon swallowed. No matter how much dry saliva he swallowed, his pounding heart wouldn’t calm down. Struggling to subdue the nauseous feeling, Siwoon asked. His forehead was wet with cold sweat.
“What about Master Manpo?”
“By now, the temple should be completely burned down. I heard the monk is boarding a smuggling ship this evening.”
“We need to… change the plan. I think we can’t let him live. He noticed Eunseong’s existence. Master Manpo knows too.”
“Then how…”
“Kill him.”
“…”
