PHUW 118

When he first faced that unusually large build paired with a handsome yet harsh and taciturn face, the head of security had assumed the new superior would be extremely difficult and severe. But unlike other third or fourth-generation chaebols who had been spoiled since birth, he never lorded it over anyone. He ignored small mistakes, sometimes even covered for them. His politeness toward everyone, regardless of age or rank, made one wonder how someone so soft beneath the surface could possibly handle the nightmarish, overbearing pests of the second branch.

It also shed light on why the chairwoman constantly ordered him observed and reported, even though he lived so quietly with just a dog at his side. Why hate someone who seemed to live as if dead? That thought had barely settled when Jeong Mok began beating people.

But each time, there had been reason. If someone’s acquaintance had been molested or robbed, the security chief would have swung his fists to the point of collapse too.

‘But burying a man is another matter.’

The dull thuds ceased. The storage door opened, and Jeong Mok walked out. As he peeled off the raincoat blotched with red stains, Chief Ahn stepped up.

“Was there any difficulty?”

He asked and took the raincoat, deftly folding it so the blood would not drip on the ground.

On his way to handle the cleanup, the security chief glanced at him, thinking what kind of absurd question was that.

“So-so. Easier than I expected.”

“You truly take after your grandfather.”

“Not Jeong Yeongil?” Jeong Mok replied, peeling off the blood-soaked leather gloves.

“Let’s say both,” Chief Ahn smiled faintly.

After brutalizing a man, they spoke as if they had just finished a first round on the golf course. The security chief was floored. He knew the chairwoman’s nephew had grown unbalanced from a tragic childhood, but he had not expected this form. Perhaps being a wild, uncontrollable brute would have seemed more human.

He turned on his phone light and aimed it into the storage. His face instantly twisted. The man had been delivered intact, but now not a joint, from fingers to the major ones, pointed the right way. His calves and thighs bore neat punctures, marks from the manure shovel. The worst was the head. The face was completely caved in, no features left. It had not been pierced, only smashed with a blunt instrument. Thinking of the repeated blows at the end and the blood-soaked gloves, it was clear this damage had been wrought solely by fists.

Fortunately, plastic sheets had been spread beforehand. A pit had been dug inside the storage. The corpse was shoved in, the displaced dirt poured back, the surface tamped down. It was finished quickly, not the first time this had been done.

The one just buried had been Cha Iltaek’s right-hand man. Caught on his way in after contact with the kidnappers, he had come without Cha Iltaek himself, whether from suspicion or natural caution. Only the right-hand man and two subordinates had been present. They brought in three, but the subordinates had been dealt with by the security chief before Jeong Mok arrived, since they knew nothing.

The bloodied plastic, raincoat, leather gloves, and manure shovel were burned with broken pallets. The security chief came out and climbed into the thugs’ car. He planned to leave it parked in front of Cha Iltaek’s residence in Bucheon.

After the security chief departed, Chief Ahn slid into the driver’s seat of the battered foreign car, with Jeong Mok in the back. They drove far off course, to a random cafe parking lot, and switched cars again. A high-end sedan of the class Jeong Mok used for commuting headed straight for Seoul.

Seated in the back, Jeong Mok checked the pet cam on his phone. At the end of the feed, still running since earlier, the thick tip of a tail was visible. It lay still, but from time to time tapped the floor, showing sulky displeasure.

“Gom-i is sulking badly. I’ll have to work from home tomorrow morning.”

“Understood. I’ll inform the secretary’s office.”

After Chief Ahn answered, silence fell again.

Jeong Mok opened another app, the spy app. Since he had left, Ahn Haeri had not slept, searching “Jeong Mok” and “Hyeonsan.” He read every news article closely. It reminded Jeong Mok of the time he had furiously downvoted hateful comments about him.

‘It’s the same behavior, with or without memory.’

A gentle smile softened his stiff mouth. He almost sent a message asking why he was still awake, but stopped, wary Haeri might notice the surveillance. When he glanced at the clock, it was already 2 a.m.

Meanwhile, Haeri, still searching nonstop, opened a foreign browser app instead of the default one. After a moment’s hesitation, he typed in: “how to do it with a man.”

“Pfft.”

Jeong Mok laughed, the driver, Chief Ahn, checked the rearview mirror. Jeong Mok gestured lightly that all was fine and kept his eyes on his phone.

***

“Shit! Crazy bastard!”

Ahn Haeri swore out loud when he saw that almost every link in the search results had already turned purple. Even the list of past searches stored in history nearly made his eyes pop out. It wasn’t even some half-baked prank. Some terms had been so thoroughly checked that even ten pages in, the links were still purple. He knew his own nature well. For him to have dug this far meant he had been serious.

He threw his phone aside and clutched his hair.

At first, he suspected that the big handsome perverted chaebol bastard had given him his own old phone. But the way it recognized his biometrics without fail proved it was his phone. On top of that, just looking at the messages exchanged with classmates and the DM history on Neostar, it couldn’t have been anyone else’s.

“I’m seriously going insane.”

Because of his injured leg, he couldn’t kick the blanket off, so he just rolled left and right until finally staring up at the blurry ceiling with a long sigh.

“I want to die.”

Another wave of suicidal impulse, one that had come to him more than once before, swept over him. If only his leg were fine, he would have already jumped out the window. If only his leg were fine.

He stared blankly at the ceiling. Back when he worked in a busy district, a drunk old man had suddenly grabbed him in a hug. Disgusted, Haeri fought back until it came to fists. The owner had threatened to sue the old man for sexual assault, but if he hadn’t, Haeri would’ve been the one dragged to court for battery. Of course, the owner fired Haeri right there. Then he had the gall to lecture him, saying people hate most in others what they hate in themselves, and that intolerance over things that could have been overlooked was just self-hatred.

At the time, Haeri had cursed him, saying he didn’t know shit because he hadn’t been through it himself. Now, though, it didn’t seem completely wrong.

“Still… not a noona, but a hyung, really, fuck.”

He groaned with his eyes shut tight.

That afternoon, he had logged into Neostar. The main screen, auto-logged in, showed an account he had never seen before. It was obviously new, with only one public post. The post was a photo of himself hugging a dog as big as a black bear.

He recognized the dog right away. It was the same dog from the photos in his gallery. But he had no memory of it at all.

What had he done during the three months he couldn’t remember? How had he ended up adopting a dog, and how had he gotten tangled up with one of the country’s top chaebol vice chairmen?

From what he gathered through the dedicated nurse and Shin Chaehee, they had met as accident victim and perpetrator, and then quickly grown close.

‘But seriously, what kind of chaebol vice chairman hurls a crowbar at a wild boar in the middle of a construction site at dawn? Is this some gag comic?’

They say reality can be stranger than drama, but if he told people he got involved with a chaebol heir in such an absurd way, they’d dismiss it as a cheap fabrication.

“Anyway, I guess I have to stick to him, right?”

The bastards who killed Lee Sangjin had even sent people to kidnap him. If not for Jeong Mok, he would already be playing cat’s cradle with Sangjin in the afterlife. So, no matter what, even if it killed him, he had to stay glued to that man. The thought made his skin crawl.

“Good-looking, rich, all fine, but why a man? Where the hell did all those amazing noonas go?”

After another fit, he wore himself out.

No matter what anyone said, Haeri did not believe that man truly loved him. And even if he did, what, did love last forever? If it did, then why had that foreign bastard who seduced his grandma dumped her? And why had that punk who swore he would love his mom until death, gotten her pregnant before graduating high school, then vanished?

If even man-woman relationships the world accepted broke so easily, what chance did two men have? He couldn’t even be sure of tomorrow. And the man was a chaebol heir. Without a doubt, someone stern-looking would show up one day and say coldly, “Please break up with our son,” handing over an envelope. If he refused, they’d show up with big black bodyguards ready to break his bones and dump him somewhere.

The only fortunate thing was that Jeong Mok was gentlemanly. He said Haeri could live doing only what he wanted, even just in words. Employers were everywhere who, during job interviews, promised he would only need to do set tasks, but once he started, piled on everything they’d never mentioned. There was every chance that bastard would be the same.

“Bit at least he’ll put on a show of it. And it looks like he’ll pay a lot.”

In a situation where he could be kidnapped and killed any moment, it wasn’t the time to fuss over scraps. He had to stick close, secure a decent share, then get dumped gracefully. He only prayed desperately that before that happened, none of the misfortunes he loathed so much would come to pass.