By Zephyria 
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[Instructor, how are you feeling? I’m leaving a message because I heard some news. It’s nothing else but…]
The unexpected contact arrived exactly 34 days after that damn cohabiting hungry ghost had vanished.
Since he had already applied for leave from the defense force and stepped away from his post, he hadn’t expected anything. But as the date of his return drew near, a message flew in from Park Young-chan.
I happened to hear some rumors about you. I don’t know how useful it will be, but I have some information that might help. If you have time, could we meet?
The content was concise, exactly like his personality, and it made Mu-hae’s eyes snap open. He stepped out of the bathroom, dripping water, in the middle of washing up.
He set the appointment for that very evening. He firmly refused the offer for the other man to come to him and put on a coat for the first time in a while.
Before leaving for central, Jin Mu-hae glared at his reflection in the mirror. He didn’t want to show his anxiety, but the man in the glass had eyes that looked disgustingly desperate.
The meeting place was a cafe where he had seen him once before. He remembered coldly stopping Joo-oh from ordering every single dessert on the menu there.
If it were him, it wouldn’t have taken long to eat, and he would have cleared the plates silently and cleanly. Mu-hae felt a slight pang of regret, wondering if he should have just let him eat a few.
He was a guy who particularly loved sweets. He would look so happy when eating something delicious that Mu-hae would often pretend to be coerced into taking a bite of things he would normally never touch if Joo-oh offered them.
“Instructor.”
Despite arriving earlier than the appointed time, Park Young-chan was already sitting in a corner of the cafe.
He stood up abruptly and waved a greeting, but his face soon sank.
“It’s been a while.”
“I heard you suffered a major injury. Are you feeling better now?”
“I have no problem moving around now. More importantly, you said you had some good information…”
He knew the other man was glad to see him after so long, but he didn’t have the luxury for lengthy pleasantries.
Perhaps sensing the urgency despite his expression, Park Young-chan soon nodded and got to the point.
“Well, I happened to hear some news. That you’re looking for a colleague.”
“He’s missing. But it’s certain that he isn’t dead.”
“I see… ahem, I suppose so. I looked into it on my end as well, but I couldn’t find any significant leads. However, regarding the attack that day.”
Mu-hae prayed that he didn’t look like a madman to him, but seeing the flustered look on the man’s face, it seemed stories about a crazy mercenary searching for a dead companion were circulating here as well.
Park Young-chan remained silent for a few seconds and then lowered his shoulders slightly. He looked cautious, as if sharing a secret.
“The type of Aberrant hasn’t even been identified yet, but there are some rumors circulating quietly. They say it hasn’t left the vicinity of Goryeo City and is still wandering around.”
“Are there… witnesses?”
“No. However, I heard who leaked that information. Sakdal—you know it, right? It’s outside the official residential area, but the residents are quite organized, so I heard central has an unofficial manager in place.”
The moment he heard the name Sakdal, an unpleasant face flashed before his eyes. Mu-hae clenched his teeth, feeling a sense of dread.
“Since it’s a neighborhood where all sorts of people visit, it seems a lot of information flows to that man. He seems to know about the Aberrant related to the accident. I asked through a family elder, and they said the nuance was quite strange.”
“Damn it.”
“Pardon?”
“Nothing. That’s good news.”
Sakdal’s blue head. Of all people, it had to be that man. Mu-hae let out a low sigh and pressed his temples firmly.
Come to think of it, such an irritating guy had been hovering around Joo-oh.
The thought that the blue-haired bastard might also be looking for Joo-oh made a feeling of disgust and a flicker of hope shake his heart simultaneously.
“You don’t know the person, but you say he seems to know about the Aberrant.”
“Yes. I’m sorry if this isn’t the news you wanted, but…”
Once the Aberrant was mentioned, Park Young-chan’s gaze became slightly anxious.
He seemed worried that Mu-hae might dive back in to seek revenge with a body that hadn’t fully healed.
Indeed, he was currently half-standing. Jin Mu-hae pushed aside the coffee he hadn’t taken a single sip of and pushed his chair back with a loud scrape.
“…I’ll compensate you later. If you don’t mind, I’ll be leaving now.”
‘Fuck, I’m out,’ he barely managed to hold back the words from leaping out of his throat. After stubbornly maintaining the mask of a defense force instructor until the end, he flew out of the cafe the moment Park Young-chan nodded.
As the tall man sprinted, people’s gazes followed. But Mu-hae didn’t even notice the surprised faces of the pedestrians.
The sun was already setting, but night was Sakdal’s time anyway. The manager of that place would be coiled up, waiting for him.
Meetings with Cheong had always been ill-fated. From the first encounter, there had been bloodshed, and he had no memory of any kind words being exchanged.
A large part of that was due to Cheong’s obnoxious face, but it couldn’t be said that Mu-hae’s tendency to get irritated and act out didn’t play a role.
The way that guy looked at Joo-oh was a bit fucked up. And what about his behavior, openly flirting as if Mu-hae wasn’t even there?
But because of that, when he learned the source of the information was Cheong, he instinctively felt it was a story worth hearing.
“He says you may enter.”
“Lead the way.”
Sakdal’s goblin neon signs looked down upon the people intoxicated by pleasure. Under the wary glares of the exceptionally vigilant guards, Mu-hae entered Cheong’s private elevator.
Ding!
The hallway on the top floor had a different layout than before. Only after passing through a more winding and unnecessarily confusing path did the door to a middle room open.
A space of about 60 square meters revealed itself. One wall was a floor-to-ceiling window, and the other wall was covered in panels acting as monitors.
Each monitor showed a different hallway or building entrance; it seemed he was monitoring the surroundings via CCTV.
It hadn’t been this blatant when he came before. Or had it?
Seeing the long blackout curtains folded at the corners of the walls, it seemed he had been keeping the installed devices hidden all along.
“It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
A man sitting slouchily with both legs up on the desk curled the corner of his lips as he looked at Mu-hae.
The same annoyingly smooth face, hair blue to the roots.
It was surprising that a guy who received this kind of security had a cast on one arm; he wondered where he’d gotten hurt.
Cheong waved his healthy hand and lounged himself up from his seat.
“They say bones get stronger if they heal naturally.”
The way he blurted out things no one asked for was irritating for no reason.
“Sit?”
The attitude, as if he knew Mu-hae would come, was somewhat infuriating, but Mu-hae didn’t have the luxury to nitpick every detail of his behavior.
He had searched for Joo-oh for over a month, but no one had seen him—not even as an Aberrant, let alone as a human.
As of now, Cheong was the only one who had specifically mentioned ‘the Aberrant from that day.’
He must have leaked that information because he knew something. Mu-hae’s heart, which he had forced to be calm, began to throb violently again.
“Is there a need for a long conversation? You probably already know why I’m here.”
“That’s true… but it’s not very cool to have a secret conversation while standing blankly, is it?”
Cheong strode over and sat on the sofa near Mu-hae.
As usual, a tea table was placed between the facing sofas, but depending on who he came with, not even a glass of cold water, let alone food, was ever served.
“You wouldn’t touch it anyway.”
“I never complained.”
“You were cursing me with your eyes, so don’t act like you didn’t. I don’t really feel like preparing anything unless it’s for a guest who actually eats.”
Even though he wasn’t in the mood for leisurely chat, Cheong arbitrarily presumed his thoughts.
He crossed his legs comfortably, leaned back deep into the sofa, and pulled out his usual glass rod, sucking on it with a slurping sound.
“Haa… it seems you’re looking for the Aberrant. Not your missing friend.”
“…”
“Strange. Why leave the living person alone while stubbornly insisting he isn’t dead?”
As expected, while he seemed quiet, he had been gathering news about this side.
He had even reached his own conclusion based on that. That Jin Mu-hae was looking for the Aberrant that attacked him, not the vanished Joo-oh…
“What does that have to do with you?”
“It does. It’s fun.”
The sight of that obnoxious face talking about ‘fun’ overlapped with Joo-oh’s smile, making it feel inexplicably shitty.
Joo-oh had been like that too. Far from finding it a chore, he would hum and be excited when going out on a job.
“Why. Do you think the friend will appear if you find the Aberrant?”
“…”
“Or do you think the Aberrant will appear if you find the friend?”
“…What?”
Canines were visible between his giggling lips. Mu-hae struggled to keep his wavering expression calm and glared at him as if he were listening to the most nonsensical bullshit in the world.
“It’s a joke. A joke. You shouldn’t glare at someone like you’re going to kill them just because of one sentence.”
“I’m not in the mood for dogshit. You should know why I came all the way to a place like this.”
“I know. The noble hero of the city needs some information from me.”
Cheong muttered nonchalantly and gestured to the empty air.
Soon, someone entered through a side door, quietly handed over a tablet, and disappeared backward.
“My information is expensive. It’s rare.”
“If it’s money, I can pay sufficiently within a reasonable—”
“80,000 Deals.”
“A reasonable limit.”
“It’s plenty reasonable.”
Just as expected. The man who had seemed quiet had called out an insane price for information.
80,000 Deals was close to one-third of the money Mu-hae had saved over seven years.
Not only did he not want to hand over that much money to someone like Cheong, but even if he intended to pay money he didn’t have in the first place, he didn’t even have 10,000 Deals on hand right now.
He could ask Director Gil to deposit the remaining money all at once, but then the Director would surely ask what it was for.
The image of himself blabbing, ‘To find Joo-oh…’ and the pitying look in the other man’s eyes unfolded vividly in his mind.
“Why. Can’t pay in cash?”
“…”
“Then you can pay with your body. I can just put ‘our Mu-hae’ into a job that creates about that much value.”
That creepy way of addressing him was likely intended to remind him of Joo-oh.
When talking to Joo-oh, Cheong had always called Mu-hae ‘your guardian’ or ‘your Mu-hae.’
“What kind of job.”
“I’ll tell you that in due time. So, how about it? Seems like a not-so-bad condition.”
Interest and excitement were overflowing in Cheong’s eyes. His face was so suspicious that it made Mu-hae’s chest ache, wondering exactly how much the man knew.
184 – Became an Anomaly in a Dead Game