INV 93

There is no need to continue a play that isn’t working. It is a waste of energy.

So, Kwon Yihyeon spoke nonchalantly.

“Eat a decent meal before you go. I’ll pay.”

As for Park Seongjun, who was facing him, he honestly felt like he was looking at a psychopath. The guy he had known since they were little brats had just put on a masterful performance all by himself, and now he was standing up with his bag, looking bored.

‘Is he really planning to leave? After all that?’

Park Seongjun stood up to follow him, stumbling slightly from the lack of a sense of reality. “Eat it all, what a waste,” Kwon Yihyeon muttered those sorts of everyday words as he went to the counter and held out his card. The expression that had looked to be at the peak of despair just moments ago was now replaced with a calm social mask. A smile that was moderately dry and moderately simple. The look often worn by white-collar office workers.

If there is a person wearing an ordinary smile alone in the midst of the extraordinary, that person is a madman. Beware.

In that instant, Park Seongjun recalled those words in his head.

That was how much of a madman Kwon Yihyeon seemed like.

“That will be 99,500 won.”

Kwon Yihyeon, having finished his nod of greeting to the counter clerk, opened the door and stepped out with a still-indifferent face.

A biting wind pierced through his coat, bringing a chill. Powdery snow was fluttering through the surroundings.

“It’s more expensive than I thought. Hey, let’s go Dutch. Transfer the money.”

“…What the hell are you really thinking?”

“I said let’s pay together, so why are you making a face? You don’t even want to pay half the meal? Did you see me as some kind of pushover?”

“I’m going crazy, seriously.”

Park Seongjun could not understand Kwon Yihyeon. And Kwon Yihyeon seemed to want it that way on purpose.

Would Park Seongjun have left Kwon Yihyeon alone for three years? Park Seongjun exerted himself in his own way. It was just that Kwon Yihyeon pushed him away, ran away, and evaded him.

But today was somehow different. He had attempted a slightly more intense performance, and when it didn’t work, he let it go.

However, Park Seongjun could not tell what it was that Kwon Yihyeon had resigned himself to.

“What is it that you want?”

“49,750 won.”

Kwon Yihyeon had been a difficult person to deal with for a long time. Park Seongjun knew very well how many different rumors had circulated about Kwon Yihyeon when they ended up in the same class in middle school.

It seemed he had taken all the insults throughout his entire sixth year of elementary school that even a male shaman wouldn’t have to take, simply because he was from a shamanic family. But his temperament was also strange; he would leave it be if people said something to him, but if they said something about his family, he acted like he would tear them to death.

What kind of insane kid is that.

Park Seongjun knew Kwon Yihyeon was strangely out of it, and although it was far from the universality and normalcy that he loved so much… he didn’t need a reason. Without needing to demand a justification, Kwon Yihyeon was Park Seongjun’s friend. Perhaps his only one…

Park Seongjun, who had originally lived with a sense of distance from others from an observer’s perspective, did not interact with many people even after going to university. He got along well with everyone, but he had no intention of forming deep relationships. They were all relationships that would fall apart anyway once it became known he was a shaman. It might be a prejudice, but that was what Park Seongjun thought.

It was because he had no expectations of people leading a normal life. Park Seongjun inwardly thought Kwon Yihyeon would be similar to himself. While that bastard was good at social life and a genius at image management, he was a bit of a gloomy guy if you looked into his essence.

That was why Park Seongjun went to see Kwon Yihyeon living his university life and, after being shocked, cut off contact for three days…

He wondered if it was really the guy he used to know. Why was the guy who used to be like a forsaken wildcat suddenly acting like an insider and all that crap… But he could understand. It seemed Kwon Yihyeon wanted to start fresh in a place where no one knew him. Going up to Seoul, in a place where no one, knew, him, again…

“Can you be happy at the end of that?”

Park Seongjun asked suddenly. And Kwon Yihyeon just laughed with the night sky of falling sleet behind him.

“Do you hate paying that much? You beggar.”

⋆˙⟡

“Isn’t that bastard crazy?”

Kwon Yihyeon shuddered as he thought of Park Seongjun, who had stomped off in a huff.

Park Seongjun had been throwing a fit by himself until just a moment ago as if some button had been pressed, and then he grabbed Kwon Yihyeon by the scruff of the neck and poured snow down into his clothes. It was a legendary nutcase move that made even Kwon Yihyeon—who had intended to humbly and generously understand most of his nonsense—go into a fit.

It wasn’t that the snow was piled up deep on the road. Since it was sleet falling rather than heavy snow, it meant a whole clump of snow hadn’t entered his clothes. Even if gathered together, it was a handful; at most, that was all.

However, once you personally experience the sensation of snow rushing inside your knit sweater, making your spine chill before melting into wetness, wouldn’t it be natural to be pissed off regardless of the amount of snow?

‘I almost gave up my concept play.’

To think he made Kwon Yihyeon feel the impulse to drop the act he had maintained for three years. Park Seongjun was indeed a magnificent son of a bitch. He had even given the double bird and run toward the bus stop before Kwon Yihyeon could make any kind of decision. In the end, only Kwon Yihyeon was unilaterally screwed over!

“Just wait until I meet you again. I’m really going to destroy you.”

Kwon Yihyeon, who had been heating up, recalled after a moment how long it had been since he had felt a proper emotion. At that, his mouth naturally stiffened.

He must not let himself loosen up like this. Kwon Yihyeon must think carefully. He has work to do. He has a purpose. It is not efficient to let his emotions loose.

Kwon Yihyeon steadied his heart which had been trying to falter. Then he wrapped it all up and threw it away somewhere.

⋆˙⟡

“Did you have fun with your friend?”

“Yes.”

A businesslike and dry answer came back. Kwon Yihyeon hadn’t changed even though his friend had dragged him away by force.

‘Well, if that stubborn guy actually listened to others and changed, that would be the day I die.’

Gwak Deukcheon was thinking that, but then it felt like a cursed thought even to himself, so he pressed the cancel button repeatedly in his mind and rinsed his mouth.

He was pouring down a 500ml bottle of mineral water almost in one shot when the office door opened with a Bang!

“Another incident has broken out!”

Gwak Deukcheon jumped up from his seat and scanned the team members. Would Kwon Yihyeon be wearing a faint smile that imitated a moderate social mask with emotionless eyes as usual? But this time was different. Kwon Yihyeon looked a little tired. As if the dry mask had cracked and something inside was pouring out.

‘Is what’s inside… perhaps guilt?’

Come to think of it, Kwon Yihyeon acted as if he were trying to take responsibility for all the violence in the world. Since the tragedy began because Jae Angshin caused that mess, he could understand it emotionally, but he couldn’t empathize. If Gwak Deukcheon were in his position, wouldn’t he have told the world to fuck off? He might have been killed while throwing a tantrum, asking why everyone was giving him shit when he was a victim too.

But Gwak Deukcheon thought he was right. Rather than acting like he was carrying all the worries of the world like that.

Thinking that at least he himself should take his own side.

‘Unlike you, kid.’

“Fortunately, the victim is still breathing! It’s touch and go… but since it wasn’t instant death, we should be able to save him! Just in case, I came to ask for some protection!”

At the following shout, Gwak Deukcheon hiked up his eyebrows.

Gwak Deukcheon’s team is secretly investigating the Reaper murder cases. Many Reapers in Samra do not know that there is a killer targeting only Reapers. They merely think sadly that many colleagues have been dying lately at the hands of things like monsters.

The reason Samra does not reveal the truth is simple.

It is because there is a high possibility that the culprit’s identity is an insider.

Therefore, rather than cursing the damn Samra for entrusting the protection of the victim to a secret investigator, Gwak Deukcheon made a different choice. He began to loosen up his shoulders with the determination to squeeze a ton of information about the culprit out of the victim once he woke up.

“Okay, where do we need to go?”

“Uh, that, well, we didn’t catch the culprit, we saved the victim…”

“Ah, I’m asking where we need to go.”

Though various misunderstandings were involved, Gwak Deukcheon chose to push forward with his own will rather than explaining every single thing, as he always did.

However, the victim they actually faced merely said this with a face so pale it was deathly white.

“I didn’t see anything. I don’t remember. Could you please let me go now?”

“Where are you going?”

“To do overtime.”

Gwak Deukcheon almost spat out a swear word. Are kids these days all like this? Are you on the company’s side? Is that it?

‘What kind of state is this company in that a person who just barely survived death is worrying about overtime?’

Is this some kind of trend among the MZ generation?

‘This crap?’