Chapter 19 - Chapter 17: Episode 16 - Deception
Part of it was to relay location info to the agents from Hwaryong Guild, but I was also worried about Seon-ah.
I was on my way in the taxi I'd called earlier, not knowing what they might do to some fragile young guy who'd just become an adult.
It had been five minutes since Seon-ah's location stopped moving on the couple tracking app.
Wasn't hard to guess that the thugs who kidnapped him had reached their final destination.
I checked the map—it was a spot full of container warehouses near the coast.
A place Scavengers used all the time, a starting point for all kinds of crimes the media likes to report—drugs, human trafficking, you name it.
Judging by how easily they'd carried Seon-ah and Minji earlier, they were Awakened.
And since they were doing illegal work like kidnapping, they were definitely Scavengers.
I had the taxi stop a bit farther away, then carefully moved toward the container warehouse where Seon-ah might be. I sent the location to the Hwaryong Guild Branch Manager who was supposed to be dispatched.
I could have just waited for backup, but worrying about Seon-ah's safety, I decided to hide behind a container and watch.
It was pitch dark, and there wasn't a single sound, not even a whisper from inside the container. Then a voice rang out.
In a situation where anything could happen, I pricked up my ears and started listening to the conversation coming from inside.
.
.
.
My head's spinning and my body's cold.
I'm trying to get my bearings, but there's a fog in my head.
I'm recalling what happened just moments ago.
I was buying coffee with Seon-ah at a cafe, and then we went to a secluded place.
Seon-ah said he had something to tell me, so he took me there, and then
he spoke when we arrived.
He took a deep breath, looked at my face, and said,
"I'm sorry, Minji. For bringing you to such a dark place. But there's something important I want to tell only you."
So what I'd been mistaken about was, to some extent, true.
In a trembling voice, he continued.
"I think I like you."
I don't know if Yu-rin's cheating, but
Seon-ah liking me.
That seemed clear.
"..."
But I couldn't answer.
I didn't have the confidence to steal a close friend's lover.
The woman named Choi Minji, who'd lived for twenty years, didn't have the guts to take another person's man and love him.
The relationship with two friends.
A crossroads: cut one connection to deepen the other.
I couldn't answer.
If I rejected his confession, Yu-rin would stay my friend. But could Seon-ah still be my friend?
I stayed silent, leaving that hard choice unresolved.
Then, suddenly, I heard running footsteps from somewhere, and
we were both kidnapped.
I can still see Seon-ah's tearful, shocked expression.
After I came to inside this container, some time passed and my eyes have gotten used to the dark.
I hear groaning next to me.
Must be Seon-ah, kidnapped with me.
Worried about him, I called out softly.
"Seon-ah, you okay?"
"I'm okay."
Nothing seemed to have happened after we were taken.
But it was too early to relax—
I heard footsteps outside.
Two people.
Must be the thugs who grabbed us.
.
.
.
Lee Seon-ah felt a little relief after confirming Minji was safe.
I don't know what those thugs who brought us here want, but nothing's happened yet.
A faint hope, but maybe we can still get out of this safe.
Not long after I let myself think that, I heard someone opening the container door from outside.
Three figures came in, shining flashlights into the dark container.
A woman in a black suit with sunglasses—the one who'd grabbed Minji earlier. Another woman in similar attire. And one dressed in expensive luxury goods who
didn't seem to fit the crime scene at all.
"Looks like you brought them properly. Now, once you do the job, the request is over."
The woman in luxury goods said.
As soon as she finished, she came in front of me, grabbed my chin with one hand, and lifted my face while I lay there.
"Do you remember me, pretty boy?"
"Who are you?"
I really didn't remember this woman.
'I don't know her. What's going on?'
.
.
.
The woman who made the current request was Kim Soo-ah, granddaughter of the Daesan Group chairman and a third-generation chaebol heiress.
Daesan Group was a major conglomerate ranked third in South Korea's business world. With so many subsidiaries, the breadth and depth of its industrial reach was enormous—it accounted for 11% of our country's GDP.
Kim Soo-ah, who grew up as the granddaughter of that chairman, had a nasty hobby.
After multiple plastic surgeries—though you could tell if you looked closely—she had a pretty face, luxury goods from head to toe, foreign cars, etc.
She'd take men who were already taken, make them hers, play with them, and then throw them away.
In plain terms, she was a woman whose hobby was adultery and stealing men.
Using her silver tongue and her wealth as bait, she'd hook them, use them, and discard them.
Whenever she showed other women the sight of their men licking and sucking another woman's pussy right in front of them, or made videos and sent them to the other party, Kim Soo-ah's heart would race and her whole body would get aroused.
From Netorare—swallowing the man's cock with her own pussy—to gang rape where she'd call in several women to endlessly torment the man's dick until it was worn out and raw. In severe cases, she'd drug them and have them passed around to the invited women for dozens of hours while taking photos and videos.
The reason Kim Soo-ah targeted Seon-ah was simple.
Originally, she didn't use coercive methods like this.
She'd approach men who had other women on the sly, exchange numbers, and repeatedly seduce them by flashing her wealth.
With her plastic surgery-enhanced looks, not a single man had ever resisted her before.
Except for one person: Lee Seon-ah.
A man who didn't fall for this body draped in luxury goods and precious metals, and a face that plastic surgery had made prettier than most women's.
Lee Seon-ah.
Their first meeting was when Seon-ah was in high school.
The sight of him waiting for his girlfriend outside the bathroom at a department store.
A man holding his girlfriend's bag in front of the restroom.
There was a thoughtfulness toward his woman that ordinary men didn't have.
He felt different from other men.
That was the first time I talked to him and tried to seduce him.
A game that ends once you get the phone number.
But Lee Seon-ah said he couldn't because he had a girlfriend, apologized, and didn't even take my number.
He was the first man to reject her favor.
The girlfriend he was waiting for came out of the bathroom and called his name.
"Lee Seon-ah, where are you looking again?"
The boy's name was Lee Seon-ah.
I couldn't forget that name.
Even after going home, and even after a long time had passed, the pounding in my chest didn't fade.
After finding out where Lee Seon-ah lived through a private detective agency, I kept trying to seduce him the same way as the first time.
A method that had a 100% success rate with everyone except Lee Seon-ah.
But it never worked on him.
It didn't even work in front of the movie theater earlier, which was supposed to be my last attempt.
If I can't have him, then I should break him.
I intended to use a stronger method this time, like I'd done before.
He was a man I was going to play with and throw away anyway. The moment he fell for me was thrilling, but what excited me most was the look in his eyes after he'd been messed up and gang-raped by several women.
That look—unfocused, glazed, asking "Why?" without understanding the situation—was the most exciting part.
But the Scavengers brought very good news.
They said they'd brought the woman who was with the man.
Must be Seon-ah's girlfriend I'd seen every time.
My cunt was already leaking just thinking about raping Seon-ah in front of that woman.
Anyway, once the work was done, I was going to sell him to the human trafficking market in China. Thinking about enjoying a big round of fun, I brought all sorts of drugs I'd used while abusing men—narcotics, adrenaline injections to keep him from fainting, aphrodisiacs, even heat-inducing drugs normally used on livestock like cows.
This time, it didn't matter if he died.
Because by tomorrow, he'd be a person who didn't exist in this country.
.
.
.
Seon-ah thought the woman who grabbed his chin and lifted it was crazy.
There had been stalkers before, but his mother, a B-rank Hunter, had personally handled them and taken them to the police station.
But this was the first time someone had kidnapped him like this.
And she acts like she's known me for a long time.
Not just a stalker, but a crazy bitch?
I thought for a moment,
then realized her physical features matched the woman I'd seen in front of the movie theater earlier.
"You doing this because I didn't give you my number earlier?"
"That's right. And not just now—it goes way back."
She confirmed it and acted like there'd been similar attempts before.
Honestly, I can't remember.
"Shall we say hello to your girlfriend next to you before we violate you?"
As soon as she finished, she walked over to Minji and kicked her in the chest.
"Ugh... cough, cough."
She was still conscious—I heard her gasp when the kick landed, followed by a painful cough.
"What do you want? I'm not Seon-ah's girlfriend."
The stalker who kicked Minji looked at me.
"You swapped women from high school or something? I thought this guy was a total slut. Guess I was wrong."
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I couldn't say anything.
I'd just confessed to Minji before we were kidnapped. If I flatly denied it now, I knew exactly how she'd look at me.
Worrying about appearances even in a moment like this—what a piece of trash I am.
"Then what's your relationship with this woman?"
Before I could answer, Minji cut in.
"We're just close friends. Nothing more."
She answered first, seeing me struggle to speak.
Even in a situation where we didn't know what would happen because of that answer, Minji's upright nature never wavered.
I feel even more pathetic.
"Oh, is that so?"
The woman sounded surprised.
"He's so pretty, I figured he'd at least be two-timing. Boring."
"..."
Come to think of it, I never said I'd broken up with Yu-rin before meeting her.
From Minji's silence, it was obvious she knew I'd confessed while having a girlfriend.
Even in front of strangers, even in front of criminals, she kept her mouth shut for my sake.
"Then, since we barely know each other, can you let Minji go?"
I said it, hoping to get her out.
She'd been dragged into this because of me. If she got hurt or worse, my conscience would never let me live it down.
My last word, like the final bastion of my conscience, was
"No can do. Come to think of it, this bitch has something she needs to do."
Denied.
"Originally,"
the stalker continued, suddenly moving to a corner of the container.
When she carefully opened a box, there was a woman inside I'd never seen before.
Eyes closed, face deathly pale.
Anyone could see she was a corpse.
"I had prepared a really trashy, filthy bitch for you to violate.
Looks like they didn't manage her properly—heard she died yesterday."
The look in her eyes when she finished speaking was full of lust.
"So I was going to let the fixers enjoy her instead, but
it seems there's a better woman to leave as photographic evidence?"
The stalker made a creepy expression, like she was licking me all over.
Revealing her twisted desires, she said,
"Was it Minji? Seon-ah was calling her that earlier, right?"
"..."
Minji stayed silent.
She knew exactly what that woman wanted to make us do.
Refuse, and we might die. Agree, and she'd have to rape Seon-ah.
Violating a man who'd just confessed to me.
Everything Minji had lived by wouldn't allow that.
But to break that silence, Seon-ah spoke.
"Minji... if it's you, it's okay. No, I think I'd want it to be you."
Shocked by my words, Minji looked at me, then turned to the stalker.
"Then I'll do it. You'll let us go safe after it's done, right?"
The stalker answered.
"We'll see."
After it was done, she'd send the man to China and kill the woman.
Kim Soo-ah turned her face toward the door so the two couldn't see, and let out a low, filthy laugh.