35.
“Ryu Ho-yeon!!”
Only then did the Research Director’s voice, which had been remarkably calm until now, rise. As if to say how could he utter such terrible words about her, she immediately grabbed her son’s shoulders, shook them, and cried out angrily.
“You! There are things you can and cannot say to your mother! How can you say such things, knowing that I live only for you? Huh? How!!”
As his shoulders were seized and shaken frantically, tears finally began to flow. Soon his entire face was hot. Tears he hadn’t shed for years were this burning temperature. He bit his lip tightly without letting out even a faint cry. Though his chin kept trembling, making it difficult, he somehow managed through sheer stubbornness.
After all… when Choi Jae-won first contacted the Research Director saying he wanted to be Ryu Ho-yeon’s Guide, he was only fifteen years old. Even the twenty-year-old Choi Jae-won he met last year was sufficiently young and immature, but a student five years younger than that—good heavens. It was hard to imagine.
Ryu Ho-yeon remembered fifteen-year-old Lee Han-seo at his formal entry press conference at the Center’s main entrance. That young child, thrown alone before a barrage of cameras, with a height just over 160 centimeters, trembled in his school uniform. After the press conference, he cried loudly that he missed his parents. Fifteen, just fifteen. That’s the kind of age fifteen was.
When such an incredibly young child insists on walking into hellfire voluntarily, even if you can’t jump in their place, the minimum decency and morality as a human being, as an adult, is to clearly explain where they’re trying to enter and to prevent them from going in.
However, his beloved mother gladly sold her decency and morality. Having already sold nineteen-year-old Kim Jun-young for her son, what difficulty would there be in selling fifteen-year-old Choi Jae-won as well?
But Ryu Ho-yeon didn’t know if his mother’s choice, her transaction, was truly worthwhile. If all she got from selling her decency and morality so completely was merely extending his life… he really didn’t know if he, if his insignificant life, had such a noble value. He wasn’t confident. He had even less certainty.
“Look at me.”
“Hic…”
“Ryu Ho-yeon. Come to your senses and stop crying. Lift your head and look at me. Quickly.”
The tears streaming down like a downpour showed no signs of stopping. Ryu Ho-yeon couldn’t dare to stop crying but barely managed to lift his head. The Research Director’s hands, which had been holding his shoulders, had now moved up to tenderly cradle her son’s tear-soaked face.
A woman’s hands, marked with traces of aging like tattoos, kept wiping his still soft skin. But no matter how much she wiped, it was useless. As soon as she dried one path of tears, impressive new streams would break out.
Finally giving up on consoling her son, the woman pulled that small head tightly against her chest. She could clearly feel her suit jacket and blouse getting soaked, but she didn’t mind.
Just as she was inscribed in the innermost part of Ryu Ho-yeon’s boundaries, Ryu Ho-yeon was also inscribed in the innermost part of her boundaries. More precisely, there was no one inside her boundaries except Ryu Ho-yeon.
It had been that way for quite some time. Even when she first planned to have this child, she truly didn’t know she would come to love her child so helplessly.
Holding the newborn child in her arms, seeing the wrinkled face of the little one who couldn’t even open his eyes—it just happened that way. She fell helplessly in love.
“If it’s hard, just blame mom. Never think things like ‘why didn’t you let me die’ or anything like that. Understand? You know what others say. Mom is a cold woman. A selfish woman who only cares about herself. So even if I devour several other people’s children, I don’t care as long as I save my one child. If I went back, I would still hand Kim Jun-young over to Dr. An instead of you, and I would still introduce Dr. An to Choi Jae-won.”
From the beginning, having Ryu Ho-yeon was a selfish choice. So since she was being selfish anyway, she decided to be selfish thoroughly, to the end. It didn’t matter what others pointed fingers at or spat or cursed. It was all true. Even if she went to hell after death, she would be satisfied if she could take good care of her one child while alive.
“This time too. You had to enter S-class dungeons, but Choi Jae-won couldn’t properly keep up with you. If Choi Jae-won hadn’t requested it first, I would have called him and suggested it discreetly. Asked if he would consider more experiments. Yes, it’s all mom’s fault. Blame mom.”
The Research Director was simply amazed. Even by her own assessment, she was indeed what people would call a wicked, cold-hearted woman. If people could be divided into right and wrong, she would absolutely belong to the latter. But how could a child born from her womb be so transparently pure to the point of being obsessive?
Even now, after just saying “why did you do it, mom,” he can’t say anything more because he feels sorry. If she were in Ryu Ho-yeon’s position, she would have first judged her parents’ actions as an exceedingly rational choice and wouldn’t have considered it wrong, but even if she did protest, she certainly wouldn’t just shed tears and merely ask “why did you do it.”
He was such an obedient child. Never throwing tantrums, quietly living confined in the lab. Sometimes he would start to show signs of frustration, but upon seeing the tired face of the busy Research Director, he would just come and hug her neck tightly before leaving. The comics, movies, and novels he became absorbed in at some point were probably all means of escaping reality. Without such outlets, it would have been impossible for him to survive.
“Why did you do it, mom, really, why… Why because of me, because of me…”
His sobbing voice trembled miserably. The Research Director, finding even that thin trembling wavelength amazingly lovable, spoke with greater strength. To firmly support someone who was wavering, she needed to be more reliable and stronger than anyone.
“It’s just mom’s greed. Whether you want it or not, I’ll do anything to save you. I will never let my precious son get hurt.”
Ryu Ho-yeon couldn’t say anything more and just cried out loudly. She endlessly patted her son’s back until the exhausted Ryu Ho-yeon fell asleep right there in her arms.
When he opened his eyes, he saw a familiar ceiling. Above Ryu Ho-yeon’s head was an expensive light fixture allegedly made by some famous Danish designer whose name he couldn’t properly remember. At least it wasn’t the former residence that Kim Jun-young had recommended.
He kept blinking. After doing so for who knows how long, he heard the door fling open, followed immediately by the question, “Are you awake?” It was Choi Jae-won’s voice. As he hurriedly tried to get up, Choi Jae-won approached quickly and gently pushed his shoulders down. Then, in a rather stern tone, he told him not to get up yet.
“Don’t get up yet. Stay lying down. The doctor said your blood pressure dropped. Do you know you almost fainted from crying so much? I was so shocked when I got the call from the Director.”
From the calm tone continuing the conversation to the soft touch of the towel wiping away his cold sweat—everything was peacefully perfect, as if everything had been arranged just right. Because of this, Ryu Ho-yeon almost forgot what had happened right before he collapsed, or rather, fell asleep.
“But it’s good, right? The vacation that Team Leader Kim gave you still stands. You still have six days left. Want to go on a trip somewhere? You said you’ve never been to Jeju Island. Or how about my grandfather’s villa in Namhae? You can play in the sea until you’re exhausted, take plenty of naps. At night we can grill some meat.”
After wiping the cold sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief, Choi Jae-won naturally moved his hand down to carefully wipe his neck and chest. Then he pressed his lips firmly against the exposed forehead, infusing guiding. Vitality surged through his tired body. Ryu Ho-yeon, who had been unconsciously being drawn into the peaceful vision Choi Jae-won was describing, came to his senses at the very moment the guiding rushed through his body. This guiding that was now effortlessly calming Ryu Ho-yeon… it was obviously a product of the experiments.
“…Jae-won.”
“Yes, hyung.”
He has no intention of daring to criticize when he has no right to do so. After all, isn’t he alive and well thanks to Choi Jae-won’s willingness to endure such pain? But once he knew, even if he hadn’t known before, he needed to clearly address certain matters.
“Let’s dismiss Dr. An.”
“…”
“Dismiss him, please.”
Choi Jae-won looked down at Ryu Ho-yeon with a somewhat irritated expression, then promptly said, “No.”
“What?”
“Didn’t you hear me? I said no, hyung. Why should I do that?”
