By Zephyria “Hong-seo, you probably know well that I’m someone who can send these memories to the Vice President or release them on YouTube anytime. Right?”
Lee Seo-kyung, speaking from above, grabbed Choi Hong-seo’s hair and pulled his upper body up. Lee Seo-kyung, with a smile reminiscent of a reptile’s chilling coldness, looked down at Choi Hong-seo and smirked.
“What will people think of Hong-seo when they see this? Will they still think of him as the diligent and cheerful leader of ‘Layered’ who works hard at everything, even after seeing this?”
“Heeuugh… You… It was you who did this! I’m the victim… Why should I be blamed?!”
Tears of pure emotion were flowing, but Choi Hong-seo didn’t even notice.
“Did I teach you that the world is that easygoing?”
Tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk. Lee Seo-kyung looked down at Choi Hong-seo with genuine pity.
“Just by looking at this, I can’t tell if you’re a victim or not… but even if you are a victim, people don’t care, Hong-seo. What remains in people’s minds is just this photo. This photo becomes Choi Hong-seo.”
Lee Seo-kyung held his phone next to Choi Hong-seo’s face. He alternated his gaze between Choi Hong-seo’s face and the photo on the screen, as if comparing them.
“To my eyes, it’s just beautiful, hmm… I suppose people won’t see it that way?”
“……”
“I’ll introduce what kind of person our Hong-seo is with these photos and videos… and then, whose house this is… well, if I just leak that much information, a novel can be whipped up on YouTube with a sprinkle of salt and pepper. If they say someone like this was involved… it’ll put a slight dent in the image of the chaebol third-generation model student, Vice President Lee Hae-sung.”
Lee Seo-kyung, frowning as if in pity, was headbutted in the chest by Choi Hong-seo. It felt like a few strands of hair were pulled out, but he didn’t care.
Lee Seo-kyung, pushed back a few steps, grinned with an expression of interest rather than displeasure, and looked at Choi Hong-seo.
Choi Hong-seo glared at Lee Seo-kyung with eyes burning with a ferocity he had never shown before.
“Don’t touch the Vice President.”
“……”
“If even a single drop of your dirty sewage splashes onto the Vice President, then I won’t just stand by.”
Pfft, pfft. Pwahaha… Lee Seo-kyung, who had been trying to hold back his laughter, soon bent over at the waist and burst into laughter.
“Ah… our Hong-seo is spouting nonsense. You haven’t seen me in a long time, have you? What? What will you do if you don’t just stand by?”
“I’ll self-destruct.”
“Self-destruct?”
“Until now, I’ve just dragged myself along like a dead mouse, barely surviving your schemes…”
“But?”
“If your sewage splashes onto the Vice President, it’s simply, I die, you die.”
If Lee Seo-kyung had done some research on the relationship between Lee Hae-sung and himself, denial would be useless. It was also true that this house belonged to Lee Hae-sung. The terrible lies he could concoct from that fact were frightening. He was afraid of Lee Seo-kyung’s sewage potentially splashing onto Lee Hae-sung.
He had never defied Lee Seo-kyung before. In his early twenties, his knees had trembled so much and he lacked the strength to stand properly in front of Lee Seo-kyung; he was that scared.
But even a powerless mouse, when it realizes there’s a cliff behind its back, can bare its teeth at a cat.
Even a powerless mouse, when trying to protect something truly precious, forgets its own limitations and attacks not a cat, but a lion. Whether Lee Seo-kyung knew this or not.
“Photos? Videos? Fine, release them all if you want. If that happens, I… I’ll have nothing left to lose anyway, right? I’ll expose everything you’ve done to me for the past seven years, one by one.”
But of course, Lee Seo-kyung didn’t seem affected at all. Lee Seo-kyung, who had been watching silently, came closer and poked Choi Hong-seo’s temple with his index finger.
“What is this… have you been reading too many novels, or watching too many dramas?”
Choi Hong-seo shook his head, pushed Lee Seo-kyung’s hand away, and lifted his chin to stare directly into that disgusting face.
“I don’t know, fuck. Yes, I’m uneducated and ignorant. That’s why I was afraid of you, and thought there was no other way, so I did as I was told like I was dead. I thought people like you… lived somewhere the law couldn’t touch!”
“Yes, I live in a place like that. My Hong-seo is smart enough even without being educated. But why are you suddenly acting so foolishly?”
“You can’t touch me with the law, but if ‘idol Choi Hong-seo’ reveals that he was raped by Hanseo Group’s Lee Seo-kyung and forced into prostitution for seven years under blackmail, at least… people will be interested because it’s sensational, won’t they? What an exciting story for people to devour, right?”
A story people would find exciting… Hot tears welled up in Choi Hong-seo’s eyes again as he railed.
“Yes, in the end, whether I’m a victim or not, they won’t care, and I’ll be buried with you! But at least! Can’t I splash a little bothersome sewage on your pant legs? That’s why I want us to die together.”
“Is this guy really crazy?”
Only then did Choi Hong-seo see that he had truly angered Lee Seo-kyung for the first time. The tears, precariously brimming, flowed down his temples.
“Yes, I’m crazy. When you push someone to this point, how can they not go crazy? So… if you don’t want to get bitten by a stray mad dog and ruin those expensive pants…”
“……”
“Don’t touch the Vice President.”
Even though his vision was blurred by overflowing tears and he couldn’t see Lee Seo-kyung’s features, he held his head high and stared intently at where he thought Lee Seo-kyung’s eyes were.
“How dare… a mongrel like you… he’s not someone you can speak of… Ugh!”
Lee Seo-kyung’s heavy fist struck Choi Hong-seo’s abdomen. Having trained in various martial arts for self-defense, the punch was solid despite being delivered at close range. Choi Hong-seo felt a twisting pain in his gut and his breath caught, causing him to collapse forward.
Even at a moment like this, the thought that Lee Seo-kyung wouldn’t even hit his face struck him as so typical, and a bitter smile escaped him even as he knelt on the floor, clutching the shopping bag.
It wasn’t consideration for someone who worked with their face; Lee Seo-kyung was that kind of pig. A pervert on a different level from simple hotheads who wielded violence indiscriminately, without rules.
He would never forget the countless scars covering Lee Seo-kyung’s entire body, hidden beneath his clothes, on his wrists, ankles, and below his neck. It was the most disgusting sight Choi Hong-seo had ever witnessed.
Lee Seo-kyung crouched down in front of Choi Hong-seo, who had collapsed on the floor, and sat facing him. He tilted his head askew, rested his chin on his hand, and let out a long sigh.
“Hong-seo, you have to throw your whole body to splash even a drop of sewage on me, but I can just discard those pants and wear new ones. Don’t you still understand that? The fundamental difference between you and me?”
“Heeugh, hee…”
Groaning in pain, Choi Hong-seo continued to stare directly at Lee Seo-kyung, as if trying to engrave it deeply in his memory so he wouldn’t forget.
“I’ve been very stressed with business lately. There are some kids who don’t listen like you. Today, Hong-seo was entertaining in various ways, and I’m busy with work, so I’ll be going now…”
Having said that much, Lee Seo-kyung tapped his finger on the phone screen and continued.
“If you keep this attitude up, my fingers will get restless?”
Then he stood up, adjusted his suit, and walked towards the elevator.
“Tell CEO Myeong too. That I came and went.”
Lee Seo-kyung tidied his slightly disheveled hair, adjusted the position of his wristwatch, and pressed the elevator button firmly. His cold eyes looked down indifferently at Choi Hong-seo, who was huddled on the cold marble floor, his shoulders heaving.
“But what about our Hong-seo?”
“……”
“If sewage splashes onto Lee Hae-sung, it’ll be the sewage of your past splashing, won’t it?”
“……”
“Ah, if you want to protect the Vice President so badly, then erase your past. That’s what you should do.”
Lee Seo-kyung, shrugging with a smile, disappeared into the elevator.
Choi Hong-seo remained seated in the elevator hall for a long time, his breathing ragged from the lingering pain in his abdomen. Until the sensor lights automatically turned off.
The scariest thing. The thing he most refused to acknowledge, the terrifying thing.
It was the fact that Lee Seo-kyung was the truly madman, the one who had been mad from birth. The fact that because he was truly mad, it was impossible to predict when or how he would do something.
“Heeuugh… Hee… Hooough…”
If he were to touch Lee Hae-sung even a little, he would be prepared to ‘not be able to show his face in Korea,’ prepared to no longer be by Lee Hae-sung’s side, prepared to lose everything, and expose the atrocities of Lee Seo-kyung and Myeong Do-hoon… those words were all sincere.
Even if he hadn’t resolved it beforehand, he felt that he had been gradually strengthening that resolve within his subconscious during his time meeting Lee Hae-sung.
Choi Hong-seo slowly rose from the darkness. Clutching his aching abdomen, he carefully bent and tenderly picked up the crumpled shopping bag. He wiped his tear-soaked face haphazardly.
He would do anything if he could make it as if it never happened, but he couldn’t.
The person who didn’t try to deceive him, use him, or control him with money, but looked at him warmly, approached him slowly, and touched his heart. At the very least, he didn’t want the fallout from those dirty deeds to splash onto that one person. It was the only clean thing he had gained since coming into this world, the only thing worth protecting.
Just a moment ago, the sensor had been working properly. But as Choi Hong-seo walked towards the front door and entered the password, the lights remained off. As if it couldn’t detect the movements of a person named Choi Hong-seo.
In the dark hall, where no light seeped in through the windowless space, Choi Hong-seo entered the door lock password incorrectly several times. During that time, new tears continued to flow, and he wiped them away with a blank expression, completely unconcerned.
Because of Lee Hae-sung, he had been able to bask in golden sunlight even while living in hell. No matter what awaited him in the future, he would never regret the happiness he felt closing his eyes in the warmth of that sunlight, even for a moment.
That was a fact several times more obvious than Lee Seo-kyung being a madman.
Ttiririring.
With a cheerful sound, the lock finally disengaged.
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