Joker 1 (Side story) Ch 7

Only after Mailler had disappeared did Joo Hawon wipe his forehead.

“You knew?”

“Knew what?”

Taeha grabbed Joo Hawon’s hand, twining it playfully.

“That he lost all that money, right?”

Joo Hawon turned to face Taeha. His index finger lightly traced patterns on Joo Hawon’s palm, almost like writing. The mischievous finger was trapped in his hand.

Regardless of the circumstances, sponsorship was agreed upon; the rest was irrelevant. Or was it pity?

“Pity?”

“When he said he was in debt, you immediately offered sponsorship. Isn’t that pity?”

Joo Hawon muttered, lightly pinching Taeha’s nose and letting go.

“I told you—I’m petty and mean-spirited.”

“Proud of it?”

“Of course. I help the petty and mean-spirited because I feel sorry for them.”

Taeha’s hand approached his face, but Joo Hawon merely watched. Something seemed to have fallen from under his eye—an eyelash, perhaps? Sure enough, it was. Taeha let out a brief deflated laugh.

“Why are you laughing?” Joo Hawon furrowed his brow.

“Used to think my hand was a weapon,” Taeha muttered.

“What are you saying?”

Joo Hawon pretended not to understand, though he knew exactly what Taeha meant. There had been a time when any movement of that hand warranted suspicion.

He stretched his legs on the sofa, leaning against Taeha’s forearm. The terrace window reflected not the outside, but the two of them.

“Honestly, I’m not sure if sponsorship is the right thing. I wonder if it’s natural for Mailler to feel wronged, or how desperate he must have been to take such measures…”

“But you knew the debt before agreeing to sponsor him?”

“I never said I’d pay it off.”

While conversing with the reflection in the terrace window, Joo Hawon suddenly turned to face them in reality. The distance between his forehead and Taeha’s lips was minimal.

“Sponsorship is tuition provided by STA. Even Lee Eunjun only offered support based on talent.”

“I thought you’d be ransacked out of pity,” Taeha said.

“….”

Joo Hawon parted his lips slightly. How a German-born boy knew such phrases so naturally… Perhaps because his grandfather had valued Korean so highly in life. Even now, when he spoke in old-fashioned ways, his grandfather’s influence was evident.

“Where is Jaehee?”

“Korea.”

Surprised, Joo Hawon straightened up.

“Jaehee hyung said the company that scammed Mailler seems connected to Aeil.”

“…Aeil Kwon? Not Radium, but Zero?”

“You doubted me earlier, and now you’re surprised because I said Aeil? Disappointing. Do I look more like a villain than him?” Joo Hawon pressed his lips firmly against Kwon Taeha’s to make him stop teasing.

“I still won’t forgive you.”

“And what if you don’t? You’re worse than any villain anyway, aren’t you?” Their lips remained in contact as they moved together.

“Worse than a villain?”

“Erlkönig.”

The whisper, tinged with laughter, drifted away more melodiously than any art song.

“So, does that mean I die at the hands of a hero?”

Suddenly, Joo Hawon climbed onto Taeha’s thigh and pressed a quick kiss to his forehead.

“Do you think heroes just appear anywhere? Even Goethe’s poem doesn’t have one, you know.” Taeha’s voice sounded brusque, as if uneasy about the mention of dying, despite his actions.

He slid his hand inside Hawon’s clothing and stroked his back, drawing him closer and pressing his ear to where his heartbeat was strongest. Hawon wrapped his hands around Taeha’s head, softly rubbing his cheek against him.

“If you’re going to be the hero, let it be Hawon.”

“I’ll side with the Demon King, so I guess I’ll be corrupted.” Hawon’s laughter made Taeha feel as if his body were a buoy tossed on a wave.

“But what did you two talk about earlier?” Hawon, still resting his cheek against Taeha’s hair, fell into thought.

Before entering the room, the security team, along with Wagner, had secured it, checking for bugs and any potential terror threats. Unless Hawon spoke aloud, Taeha would have no way of knowing what conversation he’d had with Mailler.

“Hm?”

Taeha, unable to restrain his curiosity, asked again.

“I thought about how I was at eighteen. Guess I’ve become a bit of a stickler.”

“Why?”

“It wasn’t like that back then. It’s just how I feel now.”

“Did Mailler say something foolish?”

“Hmm… more than that, I thought your family was all cunning, but maybe because he’s young, I could see right through him.” Hawon chuckled softly while shifting slightly, yet Taeha, hearing his heartbeat, remained steady.

Suddenly, the phone rang, startling the intimate warmth between them.

The sound came from Hawon’s phone. The caller was not saved in contacts, so only the number appeared. Still leaning against Taeha, he reached out and checked the country code beginning with 82 before pressing the call button.

“Yes, this is Joo Hawon.”

-Long time no see.

The familiar voice made Hawon tilt his head slightly.

 

***

 

THE FOUL – Joker (wild card) 2

Wagner couldn’t believe it.

Kwon Taeha and Joo Hawon had disappeared without saying a word. At first, he wondered if they had been kidnapped, but with so many bodyguards around Hawon, it would have been nearly impossible to abduct him unnoticed.

Up until now, Hawon had always informed Wagner directly whenever his schedule changed, and he had never minded being protected by bodyguards. He often said that wandering alone and getting into an accident or harmed by someone would be an even bigger inconvenience. So Wagner had to stare at the hotel surveillance footage, doubting his own eyes.

The last recorded sighting of Kwon and Hawon was in the hotel’s underground level 2 parking lot.

There was no one else around them as they made their way to the cars, and Taeha was talking to someone on the phone. He soon handed his phone to Hawon and headed toward the driver’s seat. Hawon, moving his lips as if to speak, opened the passenger door. From then on, after leaving the hotel, they had been unreachable.

Wagner only realized this several hours later. Taeha’s phone was off, and to make matters worse, Hawon’s phone was in Mailler’s hands.

Even though Wagner asked for the phone, Mailler refused to budge. His reasoning was simple: as a relative, he was closer than a mere bodyguard like Wagner.

Not entirely wrong, but in terms of time spent together, Wagner had been around longer than the young man. Wagner couldn’t hide his anxiety and paced around several times.

While alerting STA’s security team about the emergency, he also worried that he might be overreacting. If the two had boarded a flight to Germany or Seoul on their own, wouldn’t they have contacted someone by now?

It was obvious it wasn’t a kidnapping, so all Wagner could do was check with air traffic control whether STA’s private jet had taken off. However, no STA jet had been registered with air traffic control that day.

“Herr Wagner, wurden die beiden sich nicht melden, wenn sie freiwillig gegangen waren?”
(Wagner, if they left voluntarily, wouldn’t they have contacted us?)

A three-year veteran bodyguard at STA addressed Wagner, his superior.

“Sie können auch nach Deutschland geflogen sein, also lassen Sie uns 24 Stunden warten. Dann sollten sie über Incheon gehen, also kann es eine ganze Weile dauern.”
(They could have flown to Germany. Let’s wait 24 hours. To go to Germany, they’d stop at Incheon, so it could take some time.)

“Sagen Sie mal, sind die beiden bisher so oft verbindungslos gewesen?”
(By the way… have they ever been unreachable like this before?)

The junior bodyguard had never experienced this either and asked just in case, but Wagner shook his head. That was why he couldn’t relax. This had never happened before. To others, it might have seemed like a few hours of disappearance, an overreaction, but to Wagner, it was serious. Hawon had to live with a lung condition for the rest of his life, and the Macau incident had become a trauma for Wagner as well.

Guarding VIPs rarely involved personal feelings, but to Wagner, Hawon was like a comrade who had survived the battlefield. Having gone through life-and-death situations together, he couldn’t help being concerned and emotionally invested.

Suddenly, as Wagner paced in circles, his phone buzzed. He quickly took it out to check the sender. Expecting a call, he had initially misread it— it was a text.

37.212601, 128.821798, No C5

As soon as Wagner saw the message, he secured the location from the coordinates and made a call.

“No C5” was Kwon Taeha’s signal to the strategic planning team to move to that coordinate. Without looking back, Wagner hurriedly left the hotel operations room.

***

In the dark early morning, the fog hanging on the mountains looked whitish, almost like clouds. Perhaps it wasn’t fog at all, but accumulated snow. The mountain ridges varied in size, jagged and uneven.

Joo Hawon, wearing a thick cashmere coat, a scarf, and a cloth mask, stood in front of the lobby, observing the mountains. Thanks to the surrounding hills, the air felt clean even with the mask on.

The roar of a sports car, with its exhaust detached, made him frown. The car, like an angry beast, sped past Hawon and stopped near a stand ashtray at the far end of the lobby.

The young man inside didn’t even turn off the engine. He began puffing on a cigarette. From the passenger seat, a woman’s long legs emerged, and she too lit a cigarette. Her short shorts were barely visible under a thick fur coat.

Without waiting for each other, they spat on the ground anywhere. Hawon wished at least the car would be turned off, but they seemed to enjoy drawing attention, making the scene even louder.

Hawon’s hands were in his pockets as he blinked straight ahead. He felt alert, perhaps because he had taken short naps during flights and transit.

Meanwhile, another car arrived at the hotel entrance. It rounded the curve at high speed and screeched to a stop behind the sports car, dangerously close to the bumper, making Hawon worry about a potential fight.

“Fuck! So noisy, can’t you turn off the engine?” the man who stepped out of the driver’s seat yelled louder than the car itself.

“You don’t know the resonance of a soul, man! Our baby’s crying sounds so beautiful!” The man and the couple seemed familiar, waving and acknowledging each other.

“Ha baby, damn it, turn it off!”

At the newcomer’s scolding, the young man in the first car reached for the ignition and turned it off. Hawon finally exhaled in relief, his ears no longer ringing, and turned back to the mountains.

“Bro, wasn’t casino access banned?”

“Yeah. It’s lifted from today. Wasn’t it past midnight earlier?”

From the passenger seat of the second car, a woman got out as well. The four of them smoked together, and the smoke reached Hawon, irritating him. It reminded him of when they made the raccoon den on the cruise—now even secondhand smoke felt suffocating. Hawon had stepped outside for air but shook his head, realizing inside might be better.

While the two couples talked as loudly as their cars, Hawon stifled a chuckle under his mask. Luckily, his breath disappeared without a trace.

The world was the same everywhere. Hawon had seen such people countless times in Macau—those who flaunted expensive cars in hotel lobbies, and those with bloodshot eyes entering casinos like zombies.

For the first time in a long while, Hawon felt a strange sensation. Places like this had once been his life, and now they felt familiar but awkward.

“Damn it, I tried to ignore it nicely, but since earlier they’ve been frowning, acting all petty. Hey! What are you splitting? What are you splitting?” the first young man shouted toward Hawon. Perhaps he was drunk. Hawon didn’t want to waste energy arguing, so he quickly walked into the lobby.

To make matters worse, the man following him was someone he recognized.

Well, a sparrow never passes a mill by.

Since this was the only casino in Korea open to locals, it was hard to call it a mere coincidence that he ran into that guy. At least the sparrow was trying to hold back the reckless young man.

“Ah, come on, let go, hyung. That guy’s been glaring at me since I came in,” said the sparrow.

“Hey, you little shit, you trying to cause trouble from the very first day the casino opened?” A commotion broke out between the young man and those trying to restrain him.

Do I look that easy to mess with? He probably doesn’t give off a weak impression… Hawon thought that much and stopped. With his mask on, there was no way the young man could see his face properly.

Hawon checked the time on his wristwatch.

“Let go! I’m not going to fight!”

The young man who had followed them into the lobby looked like a raging bull. Snorting angrily, he even shoved his horns at those trying to hold him back. Hawon tried to move further inside, but the young man stepped forward and blocked his path.

“Hey, what are you doing? Let’s at least hear the reason.”

The stench of alcohol came even through the mask. Without a phone, Hawon couldn’t call 112, and the hotel security wasn’t in sight, probably due to the late hour.

“I think there’s been a misunderstanding. If I did anything that could be misinterpreted, I apologize,” Hawon said politely.

The young man’s aggressive, red-faced energy slackened. Huh, if you’re going to act like that, why even start? What a ridiculous guy. He muttered nonsense to himself.

“…Huh?”

The man who had come to restrain them stared at Hawon for a moment, then let out a deflated sound. He stepped forward, tilted his head, and looked Hawon up and down.

“Hey, wait. Take your mask down.”

The man frowned and jabbed at Hawon’s mask, though his expression suggested disbelief.

Hawon exhaled loudly, but inside the lobby, his breath was invisible. Not wanting the guy to cling like a leech, he pulled the mask down and rested it on his chin, subtly signaling recognition to the wide-eyed man.

“Long time no see, Lee Kihyun.”

“Ha… fuck… what the hell are you doing here?”

“Hyung, do you know him?”

“No, you just stay put. Hey, are you working as a dealer even for tournaments now? Huh?” Hawon expressed his displeasure at Kihyun, who had leaned in close.

“Stop spouting nonsense and watch that gossipy mouth of yours. How do you even hear about my high school-aged relatives?” Hawon scolded.

Kihyun’s face, which had gained some color since last seen, twitched.

“Gossipy brat?”

He seemed to have picked up the habit of dragging out the end of his words.

“Shouldn’t you be in Germany? Why are you here? Did you come looking for a dealer job because you went broke? Huh?”

“Do I look like that?”

The one who seemed tense was actually Kihyun.

“Fuck! Seriously going crazy, why the hell did my dad—fuck!” Kihyun stomped as if the empty air were his opponent and yelled at the top of his lungs.

The young man who had followed in anger was calm by comparison; the one having a meltdown was someone else entirely. When his friends asked what was going on, Kihyun didn’t answer.

“Hey, let’s just go. Feeling like crap today, can’t even enjoy the game. Fuck, Korean casinos are dead. With dealers like that coming and going, I’m never coming back.” Kihyun spat onto the marble floor.

“The dog can stop shitting.”

“Exactly!”

“Let’s go. The boss should be here soon.”

“What the fuck, you’re going to tell him?”

“This should stay within my control. If STA gets dragged into this because you can’t keep your mouth shut, it won’t just slide this time.”

“Ah, fuck, fuck, fuck!” Kihyun cursed nonstop as he spun around and started walking. Then he spun back, growling, “Let’s see how long you can keep this up, fucker.”

Idiot.

Hawon tugged his mask back into place with a flick. Kihyun, despite reading the insult, only screamed one last time like a fit and left the lobby. Nothing had changed. It was the same as before, hopping from casino to casino, robbing his parents’ pockets.

Hawon wanted to throw all his Korean steel shares at him, but he had no intention of letting his emotions get the better of him. Even if Kihyun was trash, his parents’ company wasn’t. Kihyun could bark all he wanted but couldn’t bite because Hawon’s position relied on a friendly stake from Kihyun’s father.

Watching the entrance, Hawon noticed a tall man entering the lobby. His height and presence immediately drew Hawon’s attention, softening his previously tense gaze.

“You bought it?”

Kwon Taeha glanced at the door where Kihyun had left before looking at Hawon. Maybe he had seen Kihyun come in but chose to ignore him.

“Yeah. If you’re going to wait here, come with me.”

“Just imagining the boss wandering around is kind of cute.”

“Just imagine. He didn’t get lost.”

Hawon nodded, noting that Taeha had arrived faster than expected. In his hand was a black plastic bag that seemed oddly out of place. Hawon looked down at it and smiled.

“Let’s go inside.”

Behind Hawon, a massive sign shone brightly:

Jeongseon Land CASINO