By Zephyria 
He was tied up and beaten until his bones broke, and his eardrum burst, permanently losing his hearing in his left ear. But Tae-hwon was satisfied just seeing people crawling out of the smoky Gambling Den and running away like cockroaches.
Seeing him smiling even as he vomited blood as if he was about to die, a middle-aged man in a well-tailored gray suit intervened.
“Alright, that’s enough. You’ll kill the kid.”
In third-rate movies, the person who steps in at times like this is usually a big shot in the underworld, and that was really the case. The head of the Gyeongjeong Faction, the Dark Demon Kwon Jung-il.
“What’s your name?”
“……Ugh, your father.”
“Is that so? Haha. I’m meeting your deceased father on the street like this.”
Chairman Kwon personally stuffed a crumpled business card into Tae-hwon’s mouth, which was full of blood, and burst into a refreshing laugh. His dignified appearance and the ingrained sense of intimidation made it clear that he was no ordinary person. Despite his small stature, he had an atmosphere that overwhelmed people.
“When you get to my age, your standards for judging people narrow down to one.”
Chairman Kwon grabbed Tae-hwon’s chin, choked him, and forced the business card into his mouth, muttering with satisfaction.
As far as he remembered, that voice still had an enthusiastic side, like a young man in his prime.
“Eyes. Everything else is just nonsense.”
“Cough, huff……!”
“Come find me when you want to get out of the gutter someday.”
With that, Chairman Kwon led his followers away from the scene. From behind the sleek foreign car, the Gambling Den owner, whether he was President Kim or whatever, hurriedly ran out and bent over in half, bowing and shouting.
“G, go in safely, Chairman!”
At the time, Tae-hwon, who couldn’t afford to go to the hospital, worked at the gas station and suffered for three weeks with his bare body. Fortunately, his broken bones healed straight, although he lost his hearing in his left ear, and as time passed, he was able to move as before without difficulty.
And that night.
Tae-hwon again grabbed the gasoline can and lighter and went to the Gambling Den in his memory.
He set it on fire again.
Of course, he was caught again.
This time, he was beaten just enough not to die. Since Chairman Kwon Jung-il wasn’t among the customers today, there was no one to step in and stop them. Tae-hwon was sixteen years old, in the winter of his third year of middle school when this happened.
After that. His father, who couldn’t quit gambling, continued to frequent gambling dens and disappeared somewhere without a trace, becoming a missing person, and Tae-hwon, who didn’t go to high school, got a job at a factory with a middle school diploma. He worked like a dog in a workplace that provided room and board, and when a creditor came to collect his father’s gambling debts, he moved to another place, and when they came again, he moved again, and he endured like that for three years.
At the time, Tae-hwon was twenty years old.
The debt, which had ballooned, quickly exceeded 200 million won. It was an amount that he couldn’t afford to pay off even if he worked his whole life. After several months of wandering and worrying, he visited his deceased mother’s hometown, reminisced about his faded childhood memories, and made the last decision he would ever make in his life.
He decided to knock on the doors of Gyeongjeong.
It wasn’t that he had great expectations. There was no way they would let a young punk suddenly appear and say he had come to see the Chairman. But Tae-hwon had nowhere else to retreat. The bottom couldn’t get any lower than this sewer. He was just going to blindly crash into it, with a do-or-die choice.
Or maybe, he thought, he should just set fire to the Gyeongjeong Faction headquarters this time. Then, no matter who the Chairman was, he would be surprised and jump out.
Tae-hwon, who didn’t even have the money to go to Seoul, walked for days, hitched rides on other people’s trucks, and barely made it back, kneeling in front of the gates of Gyeongjeong in a filthy state.
In the end, at the young age of twenty, when the blood in his head had dried up, Tae-hwon joined the underworld organization. He didn’t know where the rumors had started or how they had spread, but the harassment from those who saw him as a thorn in their side because he had been personally taken in by Chairman Kwon was no joke. Visible bullying, invisible ostracism, being ignored, being scolded, being hit with ashtrays and having his skin burned with cigarette butts.
The place where he was pushed out after being disliked was the remote Separate House.
A child disowned by his family. An illegitimate child brought in from outside. Unlike the three sons from the legal wife, who were the official successors, it was the place where the thorn in their side, the youngest Kwon Rae-i, was.
Since Kwon Rae-i was sickly as a child and often bedridden, Tae-hwon had been kicked out to take care of the frail and practically non-existent kid.
‘Right. That’s how I ended up looking after young Master Rae-i.’
Up to that point, his memory was vivid.
It came back to him as clearly as if it had happened just yesterday.
Young Master Rae-i, with his fair skin and doll-like, delicate features, was initially unfamiliar and difficult to approach, but at some point, Tae-hwon began to feel concerned for him. This was because the young boy’s abandonment by his family shared similarities with Tae-hwon’s own family history.
Was this what they called empathy? Tae-hwon saw his younger self in the young master. The loneliness of that time, the lack of a guardian to lean on and depend on, the sorrow, and even the resignation he had learned after enduring a distorted environment and countless wounds.
‘He was pitiful.’
Yes, that was it. That’s why the two, who were so alike, clicked at some point.
Kwon Rae-i, who wouldn’t listen to anyone in Gyeongjeong and remained locked in his room, opened his heart to Tae-hwon at some point. He only allowed Tae-hwon to care for him, only ate the food Tae-hwon brought, and then clung to and acted spoiled only with Tae-hwon. Gradually, he regained his vitality, and one day he even gave a slight smile, and eventually, he smiled brightly…
Ah.
That face, as radiant as a star, came to mind.
A pure face, without a trace of impurity, unique to children.
The warmth that could only come from the young age of ten. The strong bond between guardian and protected. Unwavering and complete trust. It was something that couldn’t be bought for two hundred million, let alone a thousand gold pieces.
To Kwon Rae-i, Tae-hwon was the only adult he trusted and followed, and to Tae-hwon, Kwon Rae-i was a mirror reflecting his own childhood.
He filled the void of his childhood, which he thought could never be recovered, through Kwon Rae-i, and his pain was healed by Kwon Rae-i. He was able to recover and move forward. Just seeing young Master Rae-i smile at him made his day feel vividly alive, like a plant absorbing water and nutrients.
In a way, their meeting was salvation for each other.
‘But, why? How could…’
What on earth had happened in the ten years that had passed?
Even though ten years could change the landscape.
Why was Woo Tae-hwon a traitor to Gyeongjeong, and why was Kwon Rae-i confessing his love and kissing Woo Tae-hwon?
‘It was enough as it was back then. There was nothing more to wish for.’
It was embarrassing, and he couldn’t tell anyone because it was presumptuous, but Tae-hwon thought of young Master Rae-i as his own child.
Children were so small and weak. It felt like their wrists would break if touched wrong, like they would be deeply hurt by the slightest roughness, and he couldn’t help but cherish them. Cute and adorable, young, weak, and in need of protection… a being that placed an absolute responsibility on Tae-hwon’s shoulders.
Wasn’t that what the world called family?
So, even though Woo Tae-hwon was only twenty years old, young Master Rae-i felt like his son. Even if they weren’t connected by blood, he treated him that way in his heart. And young Master Rae-i, surely, back then ten years ago, had followed Tae-hwon like a father.
That’s how it was back then… It was definitely like that.
Kwon Rae-i and Woo Tae-hwon were like a son and a father, more like family than family…
***
When Tae-hwon woke up again, he was alone in the dark and quiet bedroom.
He seemed to have lost consciousness once more. He didn’t know if it had been hours or days this time. His physical condition was truly the worst.
‘…It’s night.’
A sliver of moonlight leaked through the gap in the closed curtains.
The light cast a long line across his face and upper body, as if dividing Tae-hwon’s body in half. Perhaps it was dividing not only his body but his life itself.
The ten years of life that had been cut off from Tae-hwon as much as he had lost his memory weighed heavily on him. He was on the verge of being crushed to death by a huge weight.
“Hoo…”
Tae-hwon lowered his eyelids deeply and slowly pulled back the blanket covering his body. His whole body felt wrecked, making it difficult to move, but he still had to move. Tae-hwon took a deep breath and got out of bed. Creak. His stiff muscles screamed.
Tae-hwon staggered, his body swaying as if he were about to collapse at any moment, and took small steps. His vision gradually adjusted to the darkness, and he could see his surroundings. It was a stylish bedroom with a high ceiling. The wallpaper was light gray, and the flooring was black marble, exuding a luxurious minimalism.
Next to the king-size bed in the center were a bedside table and drawers, and across from it were a table and sofa, and on the opposite side was a passage leading to the bathroom.
Tae-hwon slowly moved towards the bathroom. He groped for the switch on the wall and turned it on, and the lights illuminated brightly, dazzling his eyes.