DS 18

“I told the younger ones to tail Lee Eun-joo.”

The broad-shouldered Bear reported, clam and unfazed.

“It seems she’s heading home, sir.”

Confusion riddled through Eun-myeong’s mind like dark clouds. There was nothing at home, so why…?

They had searched the house thoroughly several times, wondering if any trace of Noona remained. But there was truly nothing left in the house, making those years meaningless. Just tattered clothes, worn-out shoes, and blankets with burst stuffing. Why go to such a house?

‘She bought two tickets to Cheongdo for tomorrow.’

Then, the mention of two tickets echoed in their head. 

Could she be coming to get me…? 

Since no one would have answered when she called the house.

“Should I go catch her alive?” The bear-like man asked. 

At that chilling question, Eun-myeong tensed his neck. His pulse was visibly throbbing with tension.

“No.”

The man stood up in front of Eun-myeong. As his shadow grew larger, Eun-myeong looked up at him with parted lips. Harsh breaths burst forth.

“I’ll go myself.”

The man reached out and took his jacket from above Eun-myeong. The soft fabric brushed against Eun-myeong’s bleached-white face.

“Sir…”

Eun-myeong grabbed the man’s waist as he pushed his arm into the jacket. He raised his eyebrows with a “Hmm?” The fierce gaze that rose was unbearably uncomfortable and frightening.

“Could I… pay it back…?”

The faint voice was thoroughly soaked in anxiety and despair.

“I’m good at slicing sashimi, and, and serving, and I’m good at weaving fishing nets too. On good days I can weave two. I’ll pay back all the business losses.”

They frantically added sentences. Eun-myeong desperately ransacked his mind, trying to make his worthless self seem valuable. With no education and no muscles, everything he could squeeze out seemed like mere garbage. Still, Eun-myeong couldn’t stop speaking out of desperation. Despair rippled in his eyes, visible through his messily grown hair.

“I’ll barely eat, I won’t sleep and just pay back the debt. So please, just leave Noona… please?”

There wasn’t the slightest movement in the man’s expression. His face looked like he was nonchalantly watching an uninteresting movie.

“Why should I?”

His tone was bone-chillingly cold. The man turned and left as if indicating he wouldn’t allow any more pleading. Eun-myeong’s thin arms fell down with a thud.

“S-sir…”

His back grew more distant. Eun-myeong, who had been looking up at him from the closet, quickly raised his hips. Though his unhealed feet hurt, he endured the stinging sensation. Splash, splash, stepping on the marble floor felt like dozens of toothpicks stabbing their tender flesh.

“Boss…”

He used the title that the bear like man and the restaurant aunties used to call him. No matter how much he moved their feet, it was frustrating how he kept getting further away.

Just as their fingertips were about to catch the jacket, he tripped on the rug. The world spun upside down and his body crashed into the rug.

Silence instantly fell over the hotel. He could feel the man’s gaze piercing the back of his neck. An utterly miserable scene. Eun-myeong stammered on.

“It must have been because of me.”

His pronunciation was unclear with his mouth pressed against the rug.

“The orphanage director, I… he raised me thinking I was an Omega…”

Eun-myeong struggled to raise his body. His arms trembled as he pushed against the floor to get up. The brown rug fibers were damp. Their crying face had left an imprint as if stamped into the rug.

“And then he tried to sell me to some old chairman…”

That’s when the man approached with heavy steps. Trampling the rug mercilessly as he came, he grabbed Eun-myeong’s chin.

“Tell me more.”

He whispered. Despite showing no interest until now, surprisingly, a gleam flickered in his eyes. Eun-myeong saw a ray of hope.

“He was in his 70s. Said he needed an Omega who could bear children.”

“And then?”

Eun-myeong gulped and slowly parted his lips.

It was the year he became an adult. He was organizing his things, since he had to leave the orphanage soon, when the director called them to his office. When he went in, there was some old man.

‘This is the person will be your husband.’

The greasy, gleaming gaze fixed on him was so frightening. He wanted to run away, but knowing that everywhere in Gyeryongpo was ultimately under the director’s control. Ultimately, Eun-myeong was dragged to the old man’s mansion.

“But then…”

That’s when the problem arose.

“When they tested me, it turned out I was a Beta…”

He too had lived his whole life thinking he was an Omega. But he wasn’t, and whenever doctors tested afterwards, the trait was always the same. Eun-myeong was a Beta, no matter what anyone said.

‘How dare this thing roll into my house just because of a pretty face?’

The old chairman slapped Eun-myeong’s cheeks several times. In the end, he was  thrown out of the mansion with his clothes all torn. He was returned for a refund. Naturally, the director had to cough up Eun-myeong’s price again. That was a whole 200 million won.

‘After I fed and housed you, you stabbed me in the back like this? You useless vermin! I should strip you naked and feed you to the fish, then you’ll come to your senses, huh?’

The director’s cruelty reached its peak. Eun-myeong was stripped naked and locked in the director’s office for days. He was trapped in a tiny boiler room attached to the office, trembling without water, occasionally dragged out only to be beaten. It was a punishment inflicted on a disobedient child.

…A week after escaping the director’s office, the director made Eun-myeong take out a loan from the restaurant owner.

“He made me borrow 200 million won in private loans from the restaurant owner…”

Most children at the orphanage left carrying loan debts. The director said it was repayment for raising them. Eun-joo noona was saddled with 20 million won, and other children were around the same level. But Eun-myeong was different. The 200 million won that went into the director’s stomach was loaded onto Eun-myeong as debt. The debt snowballed until it grew to an unmanageable amount, choking Eun-myeong.

“That’s why Noona must have done it.”

He grabbed Eun-myeong’s cheek and pulled them closer.

“You’re really a Beta?”

Eun-myeong hesitated to answer. Maybe it would be better to say he was an Omega here to get a higher price for themselves.

“Yes.”

But Eun-myeong nodded. Tears streamed down until his cheeks were completely damp and cold.

“If I were an Omega, the restaurant owner would have… would have sold me long ago.”

But now they knew how terrible the consequences were of being discovered not to be an Omega. When they were locked in the director’s office, if Eun-joo Noona hadn’t burst in threatening to report to the police, Eun-myeong might have been beaten to death then.

“Could I… could I go too? Please take me with you…”

Noona hated the director more than death. The reason she hated doing bad things was very simple. Since the director was a bad person who would do anything illegal for money, she naturally came to despise such behaviour.

And that Noona had sent crabs to the director. And Omega heat inducers at that… Though he wasn’tsure, it must have been because of their pathetic, lacking self. Eun-myeong couldn’t just stand by and watch what happened to such a Noona.

“Please, boss.”

He begged the man desperately. He wanted to read his thoughts, but as usual, his face didn’t show any trace of emotion. Only those eyes, those pupils gleamed with interest as if coated in oil.

“Please let me go too.”

They couldn’t let the man leave as such. If he could follow along, he stood a chance in convincing him. And…

He desperately wanted to confirm with their own eyes that Noona was alive. They had lived too long in a hell of repeated worry and concern that something might have happened to her. After that, whatever happened to them didn’t matter.

Soon the man gave a short nod. He had succeeded in catching his interest. Only then did Eun-myeong let out a long sigh.

It was one fortune among ten thousand misfortunes.

* * *

The car sped like an arrow. Eun-myeong stared outside, his eyes blank. His fingers kept picking at his hangnails. When he scraped off where the scab had formed, blood burst forth again.

“…”

As they got closer to home, he didn’t know what to do, paralyzed in anxiety.

Soon the car crept into the familiar alley. But the house gate was open in the darkness. Eun-myeong quickly got out of the back seat. The thug who had been following Noona was standing in front of the house.

“You’ve arrived, boss.”

He bent his waist 90 degrees while guiding the man toward the house.

“Lee Eun-joo is hiding inside.”

Eun-myeong quickly moved his feet. Limping across the threshold, the lights inside were off. It was so quiet not even insect sounds could be heard. So quiet that others might think the house was empty.

“Noona…”

Was she keeping quiet for fear of being discovered by someone else? As Eun-myeong approached the house calling softly, there was a crashing sound and a door opened.

“…Eun-myeong.”

And the woman who appeared had dishevelled hair and damp eyes. Her clothes were shabby as if she had thrown on whatever she could find, and her socks didn’t match. “Noo-na,” Eun-myeong whispered.