PAX 16

I’m not interested, but I’ll give him a perfunctory question.

“Why?”

“Because we’re total strangers.”

Is there some philosophical meaning behind that? Something like, even if they’re the ones who passed on their genes, we’re fundamentally all strangers?

While I was thinking, Ahn Yutan, who had been watching my face, suddenly started giggling and cackling with laughter.

“It’s not ‘son’ or anything, you stupid bastard. The two of them are just total strangers.”

I observed Ahn Yutan clutching his stomach and laughing to himself, trying to organize my thoughts.

“Kim Junik isn’t Ahn Juik’s illegitimate son?”

“Yeah.”

“And he’s not the person Ahn Juik was going to pass the director position to?”

“I’m his only child. That bastard Ahn Juik became sterile, so he can’t even sow seeds properly. Even if he wanted to make an illegitimate child, he couldn’t.”

This is information I don’t want to know.

“Why did you lie?”

“Ah, that was just to make it look like something involving Ahn Juik. The Pachulso family is always so wary of the Guardians, right? So it’s easy to pressure you to keep the Pachulso out of it entirely and handle it on your own.”

It’s more accurate to say we try not to cross Ahn Juik’s mood than to say we’re wary of the Guardians, but either way, it was generally convincing, so I nodded.

“I also knew how trashy contractors like you handle business. No matter what kind of request comes in, you don’t verify the facts; you just take the money and kill. So if you want to blame someone for being deceived, blame your habit of not checking the facts from the start.”

He acts like he knows everything, but he’s wrong about this. When the Pachulso receives a contract killing request, we thoroughly investigate whether the background or the circumstances of the target stated by the client are true before proceeding. That investigation is usually Mom and Dad’s job.

Should I have investigated Kim Junik? It seems my guard was lowered precisely because the target was openly associated with Ahn Juik.

I watched Ahn Yutan for a moment as he wiped away the tears that had leaked out from laughing.

“Why did you tell me to kill him?”

I could roughly guess the reason, but I asked to be sure.

Ahn Yutan looked at me while rubbing his wet eyes.

“To get on the same boat.”

This is it.

He must have been testing the waters to lure me into something more important.

I met the eyes of the grinning Ahn Yutan.

But if I had known the truth, would I not have killed Kim Junik?

I don’t know. I don’t think so. If I hadn’t done it, someone would have kept being ‘delivered’ to the front of the Pachulso.

Now that I know the truth, should I feel sorry for Kim Junik and his family?

I don’t know. I’m not sure. If it’s between Kim Junik and my family, my choice is obviously my family.

“Now, the truly important stuff.”

Ahn Yutan suddenly said, his face turning serious.

“The next target is Ahn Juik.”

“Target?”

“The next person to kill.”

What is he talking about?

“Dammit, what’s with that expression.”

I touched my face reflexively. Even though touching it wouldn’t tell me what expression I was making.

“Nothing to be scared of. I’m not telling you to kill him; I’m going to kill him myself.”

My facial muscles tightened of their own accord.

“Director… Ahn Juik?”

“Yeah.”

“Your father?”

“Why, is a son killing his father such a shocking thing?”

Isn’t this something that shouldn’t be said so nonchalantly?

“Let’s establish this firmly before we start: there won’t be a day when you and I say a formal farewell. We are now truly, completely on the same boat, and we’re going to be drifting along together in this boat for the rest of our lives.”

A second-generation infected.

Suddenly, Ahn Yutan’s identity became vividly apparent, and I felt a strange chill. Something I had never once thought about came to mind: the feelings of people back in ‘that period’ who were running away from infected individuals whose entire bodies had turned purple.

It was said that infected individuals would chase people with persistent, gruesome tenacity, maintaining a very steady, slightly fast pace. Without making a single sound of breath, with their gaze locked firmly onto their target.

With only the goal of eating that thing.

“Ever since you ruthlessly killed Kim Junik, who was living his own life in his own way, you’ve become a perfect teammate with me. So don’t whine, don’t try any useless tricks, don’t think about escaping, and just follow along quietly. You already know well that it would be better to do that if you want to keep seeing the Pachulso kids walking around your home in one piece.”

Ahn Yutan, the second-generation infected, kept yapping away.

Up until now, I had never once feared the infected of the Nagon district, whether they were first or second generation. I knew full well why outsiders feared them and tried to stay away, but I had never sympathized with it.

But looking at Ahn Yutan’s bruised face, I kept being drawn back to that period I had never even experienced.

“Are you ready for the second secret summit now?”

Ahn Yutan asked with a suddenly bright expression.

“Or is this the third? Ah, last time was just a date, right. So this is the second.”

“Why are you killing your father?”

“Let’s walk, come on.”

Ahn Yutan signaled and started walking. I walked alongside him.

“Do you know how old Ahn Juik is now?”

“Not sure.”

“58. In his prime.”

“I see.”

“Ahn Juik is going to keep sitting in that seat for at least another 10 years, easily. Maybe it’s because that bastard is sterile, but he’s poured all his desire into his lust for power. And his appetite.”

More information I don’t want to know.

“But I don’t want to just wait blindly for over 10 years; I want to become the boss of the Guardians right now. I’m also confident that I’ll do much better than Ahn Juik.”

We walked, trampling the damp, overgrown grass under the cool shade of the trees.

“But it just so happens that the fitness test is being held at the end of September.”

The fitness test is an event to select new Guardians. In the Nagon district, second-generation men and women in their twenties gather at the playground of what used to be a middle school a long time ago to show off how great their physical strength is, and at the end, they even hold martial arts tournament matches. It can be considered a fairly important and big event in the Nagon district.

Director Ahn Juik sits in the guest of honor seat, watching the fitness test from start to finish, and personally calls out the people selected as new Guardians at the end. The event concludes after Ahn Juik personally presents the iron batons that the Guardians always carry to each of the newly selected Guardians.

Because people who join the Guardians rarely quit unless there’s an extraordinary circumstance, the fitness test isn’t held every year for the purpose of supplementing personnel. This fitness test, which will be held in three months, is the first in three years.

“Since almost all the residents gather to watch during the fitness test, I’m going to cut Ahn Juik’s throat right there. In front of everyone’s eyes.”

“…Why?”

I held back adding the word ‘specifically.’

“There’s no need to gather them with difficulty, right? Since they’re gathered there anyway, I’m just showing it all transparently in front of the people. That I’m not some idiot who just sucks his thumb waiting until I inherit the position, but a revolutionary who carves out his own path. That I’m not even scared to kill an old fart in front of everyone, and that I’m fairly achieving it with my own power.”

It seems his way of defining situations or actions isn’t exactly typical.

“But won’t the people there, especially the infected, be even more sensitive to patricidal crimes? I don’t think showing such a scene will have a good influence on your image.”

I’ve heard that many of the infected at the time ate their own parents or children. Though, of course, they probably didn’t know it was them at the time.

“Do you think I care about that?”

Ah. I briefly mistook Ahn Yutan for someone with whom common sense might work.

“What are they going to do if they think poorly of my image? Start a riot? Vote me out? Tell them to fuck off. The rule is that the boss of the Guardians is inherited from the father, and I am inheriting it fairly. I’m just moving the time up a little.”

“I see.”

I was a bit tired, so I just responded briefly.

“Now, here’s what your role is in this.”

Ahn Yutan stopped dead in his tracks. I stopped behind him.

“Aren’t you expecting it? What’s with that expression?”

I touched my face again.

“It’s just a neutral expression.”

“Why are you making a neutral expression? Don’t you know the ‘mu’ (無) in ‘neutral expression’ stands for ‘nothing’? Why are you erasing your expression in such an important situation?”

“I didn’t erase it….”