Destruction — Chapter 39

“Hm?”

Following Woobeom, Saejin stopped in front of an unfamiliar car and blinked. The car they came in was parked on the opposite side. So why had they stopped in front of a different one?

“This isn’t… our car, is it?”

Saejin shone his flashlight toward the abandoned van. Maybe Woobeom had mistaken the vehicle and he wanted to point it out.

“That’s mine, brat!”

Tae Kyungshik smacked the back of Saejin’s head in passing and climbed into the driver’s seat, seething. Getting hit just for asking a question left Saejin stunned. He glared at the driver’s seat with offended eyes, only for Woobeom to gently pat his back like calming down a child. It was exhausting. They weren’t even trying to merge sensitive stray animals. Someone had simply joined the group, and yet it already felt too tiring.

“Just get in.”

Grumbling, Saejin steadied himself and climbed into the back seat. Woobeom took the passenger seat to guide Kyungshik, who didn’t know the way up the mountain.

Once he put on his seatbelt, Saejin narrowed his eyes, trying to identify the object poking his thigh. Plastic containers were stacked beside him. The faint smell of gasoline leaked from the opaque lids. It was gasoline.

‘…So this is why there was no fuel at the gas station.’

Judging by the amount, Kyungshik had probably siphoned gas from multiple stations across the region. Now it made sense why Woobeom decided to bring him. Owning this much gasoline was valuable, if they used it sparingly, it could last several months.

The asphalt, left unmaintained, was cracked and broken everywhere, making the road rougher than unpaved ground. Leaning fully against the seatback to keep from bouncing, Saejin stared at the two men up front. From the very beginning, they acted like he wasn’t even there, holding a serious conversation between themselves. The more he watched, the more frustrated and irritable he felt.

It felt like someone had taken Woobeom away. He knew he was acting childish, but the restless emotion twisted inside him and wouldn’t let go.

‘…Oh, they were just talking about directions.’

Listening closely to their conversation, Saejin let out a deflated sigh.

He lowered his mask to breathe better, shoved his hands into his pockets, and squirmed slightly. Watching the view outside, the scenery flew by. Before long, a familiar stretch of road appeared.

“…Oh, they were just talking about directions.”

After eavesdropping carefully, Saejin breathed out again, exhausted.

He lowered his stuffy mask, shoved his hands into his pockets, and fidgeted while watching the scenery blur past. Soon enough, they were on a road he recognized.

“We’re getting off here.”

When Woobeom signaled him to pull over, Tae Kyungshik obeyed. At the same time, Kyungshik glanced at Saejin through the rearview mirror. Who was this kid to be riding around so comfortably? It felt like some nobody had been placed in the chairman’s seat, and spite rose in his chest. Still, he didn’t voice a complaint. His cheek still throbbed from where Woobeom had slapped him. There was no reason to earn another one.

As soon as the car stopped, Woobeom got out, opened the back door, and reached a hand toward Saejin. Since the ground was dark, he was telling him to take his hand while stepping down. Seeing that, Tae Kyungshik gaped in disbelief. Woobeom offering someone kindness? Had a ghost possessed him? It didn’t make sense.

‘Good lord, what did I just witness?’

Cold sweat even broke out on his forehead. Wiping it away, Kyungshik stared at the strangely gentle look on Woobeom’s face, so different from how he had been in the organization. If he told the others about this, they’d probably beat him for lying.

It must be a one-time thing. Woobeom being kind? Maybe Saejin would trip and hurt himself otherwise. That had to be it. Swallowing dryly, Kyungshik followed Woobeom up the mountain.

“Yoon Saejin. I told you to be careful. It’s dark.”

“Oh, thanks.”

Even with a flashlight, he couldn’t fully see the ground. He almost tripped on rocks several times, and Woobeom caught him each time.

Watching this pale-faced was Tae Kyungshik.

Woobeom had changed. That was the only way to describe how he treated Yoon Saejin. Back in his active days, Woobeom would flinch and snap if someone even brushed against him. His temper was so vicious that rumors once spread saying he had a cleanliness obsession. Those rumors faded quickly.

‘A guy with a cleanliness obsession… couldn’t possibly walk around drenched in blood like that.’

The old Woobeom was, simply put, a man who had lost his mind somewhere. Anyone dragged into the torture room by his hand came out half-dead at best. Even when he was soaked head to toe in someone else’s blood, he wouldn’t so much as blink.

What truly terrified the subordinates was the poisonous glint in his eyes. Those empty pupils, impossible to read, held a chilling madness. Perhaps the accumulated malice had finally broken something in Woobeom’s brain.

Then one day, the malice that had stacked inside him vanished overnight, as if it had never existed. After that, Woobeom announced his retirement.

One day, all the venom stacked inside Woobeom simply evaporated, as if it had never been there. And he retired immediately afterward.

‘Whoever that guy was… it was terrifying. Really terrifying.’

It was probably the first time an ordinary civilian had ever been dragged into their torture room. One day, Woobeom brought a man to the basement and didn’t come out for days. He sent every subordinate away and handled the torture alone, so no one knew what had actually been said inside.

When the tightly shut torture room door finally opened, even the professional cleaners called in to tidy up the basement recoiled. Some even ran out, saying they couldn’t bear to look.

If even people accustomed to dealing with corpses were horrified, that said everything. The man who had been dragged in had no intact limbs, and not a single piece of skin remained where it belonged. Even for people familiar with violence, it was a level of brutality that couldn’t be explained unless there had been an unimaginable grudge behind it.

Woobeom’s sudden retirement had been so unexpected that the memory of it still lingered vividly among his old subordinates. Although no one said it aloud, they all believed it was related to that torture room incident.

And yet this same Jung Woobeom was now holding some kid’s hand… acting in ways no one could believe. Watching him like this, Kyungshik’s gaze shook nonstop. What kind of person was this Yoon Saejin, that he could make Woobeom act like this? All sorts of thoughts swirled in Kyungshik’s head and vanished again.

They walked for quite a while, stepping across the damp, earthy ground. At one point, they even encountered a creature crawling across the forest floor, and Saejin felt his heart nearly leap out of his mouth. Facing a ghost might have been less frightening. The sudden spike in his heartbeat briefly blew away his exhaustion, but only for a moment. His eyelids kept drooping and he had to press them hard to fight off sleep.

“To think this was here…”

Discovering the villa, Tae Kyungshik reacted as though he had found a new continent. He had heard, back when he was in Sanwon Group, that Woobeom owned private land. But he had never heard that there was a cozy villa sitting on it. Kyungshik had been Woobeom’s subordinate, but not part of his inner circle, so the rumors he heard were limited.

“Don’t fall asleep.”

Seeing Saejin walking with his eyes closed as if his tension had finally faded, Woobeom flicked his forehead lightly and offered his arm for him to lean on instead. Clinging to that arm, Saejin sniffled as he realized how sore his legs were. He’d have to take medicine before bed to prevent body aches. If he forgot, tomorrow would be another hell of muscle pain.

When the villa door opened, a warm wave of air swept over them, completely different from the cold outside. Even though the boiler had been turned off before they left, some residual warmth still lingered. Once the lights came on, Kyungshik stared wide-eyed at the sight and swallowed silently.

“We’re tired, so let’s rest for today.”

Helping the half-asleep Saejin out of his raincoat, Woobeom spoke quietly to Kyungshik. When he peeled away the blue tape wrapped around Saejin’s wrist, the skin beneath was red and irritated. He had tried to wrap it carefully, but maybe the blood circulation hadn’t been good.

“Ah, yes…”

Kyungshik responded awkwardly to Woobeom, who was taking an unusually relaxed approach. Anyone could see that the one truly exhausted was Yoon Saejin, not the two of them. Yet Woobeom was putting off an important conversation just because Saejin was tired. It was one surprise after another.

What exactly was Yoon Saejin to Jung Woobeom? At this point, Kyungshik couldn’t hold back his curiosity. They had no resemblance, and their surnames were different, so they clearly weren’t siblings. And even if they were relatives, who treated their younger cousin that gently?

‘I’ll just ask the brat later.’

The country had fallen apart, and the organization had scattered. Even if Woobeom had retired, Kyungshik couldn’t quite bring himself to act casually around him because he knew exactly how dangerous the man used to be. So the easiest target for his curiosity ended up being Yoon Saejin.

“Where should I go…?”

Placing both hands politely together, Kyungshik asked Woobeom with an awkward smile. Even if he was only staying at the villa temporarily, he deserved proper accommodation, after all, Woobeom had agreed to the ‘deal.’ As expected, Woobeom pointed out a room using just his fingertip. It was the room next to Saejin’s.

“Thank you.”

Still bowing stupidly, Kyungshik removed his outer coat and headed to the room he had been shown. Woobeom seemed too preoccupied with holding Saejin to spare a moment for conversation. And more than that, the difference between the expression he wore when speaking to Kyungshik and the one he wore when speaking to Saejin was like the difference between a tropical rainforest and the Antarctic. With such obvious favoritism, Kyungshik couldn’t bring himself to make small talk.

Watching Kyungshik disappear into the room, Woobeom finally looked down at the now-sleeping Saejin in his arms. His long eyelashes trembled softly with each breath. The rounded silhouette beneath his closed lids didn’t move at all, it looked like he had fallen into a deep sleep. When Woobeom gently pinched Saejin’s cheek, the soft flesh squished between his fingers.

“Mmh… don’t…”

Whether it was annoyance or simple discomfort, Saejin shook his head without opening his eyes. Then he slowly burrowed deeper into Woobeom’s chest. It was an instinctive search for warmth and comfort. Dumbfounded, Woobeom let out a small laugh and lifted him up properly. Saejin clearly wasn’t going to walk on his own.

But when he reached the door to Saejin’s room, he was met with an obstacle, the door was locked. Even when he turned the knob with force, it wouldn’t budge.

“Yoon Saejin, did you lock the door before leaving?”

He doubted it, but he asked anyway. He had never given Saejin the key to the room. He didn’t even know whether the key existed or not, so the idea of Saejin locking it didn’t add up. There was no response, he was completely asleep, but it didn’t matter. Woobeom was already convinced the door was broken.

With no other choice, he turned around, still holding Saejin. He planned to let him sleep in his own room for the night. Since Saejin tended to cling to someone while sleeping, he couldn’t just put him in someone else’s room. And besides, Woobeom reasoned that waking up next to someone he already trusted would startle him less.

Soon, he laid Saejin down on his bed.

The side near the window naturally became Woobeom’s spot. Saejin had been sniffling earlier, and putting him near the cold side might make him sick. The heating was strong enough that he wasn’t worried about the room temperature, but unlike Woobeom, Saejin had a fragile constitution. Even a little strain could lead to a fever, so he couldn’t take the risk.

To get him to take his medicine, Woobeom gently woke Saejin, only to be met with another round of sleepy whining. Even though Saejin had already complained once for him to stop, the persistent attempts to wake him eventually made him open his mouth in reluctant surrender. Half-asleep as he was, he probably didn’t even know what was being put into his mouth as he swallowed it.

It wasn’t as if a mother bird was feeding a baby bird. Still, as Woobeom slipped the pill into Saejin’s mouth, the thought made the corner of his lips lift. Yoon Saejin sometimes brought new sensations into his life. And he didn’t dislike it. There was no way he could.

With that mischievous face of his, always seeming moments away from causing trouble, Saejin constantly drew Woobeom’s eyes. Dropping into his dull life without warning, Yoon Saejin was someone Woobeom simply couldn’t bring himself to hate.

More than anything, Saejin always looked at him with eyes full of trust. That gaze slowly changed Woobeom. He knew he should stop here, that he shouldn’t let this feeling grow. But the vivid shape of his emotions kept swelling on its own.

Woobeom hated childish and foolish people. Yet he himself was turning into a fool. It was absurd. Somewhere along the way, Saejin had wedged his way into the top of Woobeom’s priorities. He didn’t know if Saejin had changed him, or if wanting Saejin had made him change himself.

As time passed and dawn approached, Saejin briefly opened his eyes and froze when he found Woobeom sleeping beside him. He sucked in a startled breath.

Cough, cough.
He couldn’t believe he’d choked on his own breath. With tears pricking at his eyes, he looked over at Woobeom’s peacefully sleeping features.