CH 2.6

“...Can he really not see me? Isn’t he just blind?”

Kang Inheon wasn’t looking at anything. There was nothing in his jet-black eyes.

No matter who saw it, the house was a mess. The house, which had been like an overly tidy hotel someone had just checked into, had been ransacked by Lee Juwon for a while.

The door, as well as the drawers and dresser, were all opened at random, and the contents inside were thrown around. It was a situation where you’d question if it was a thief, stalker, or ghost.

Hunters were especially sensitive when it came to security. Most of them even remembered the angle at which a book was placed on the table. However, Kang Inheon didn’t seem to see Lee Juwon or the messed-up interior of the house.

It was the same for the dressing room Kang Inheon entered. Contrary to the tidy, gallery-like state it was first in, the wardrobe and drawers were completely flung open, but Kang Inheon didn’t care.

Riiiiing, riiiiing-.

Kang Inheon’s phone vibrated. But he didn't even bother to check the caller and just took off the slacks and sweatshirt he was wearing. Lee Juwon closely examined his calves, thighs, abs, forearms, shoulders, and even neck.

“His shoulder…”

A red wound remained on Kang Inheon's shoulder as if he had been injured not long ago. Lee Juwon's face contorted.

"When did he get hurt again?"

Kang Inheon reached for a white dress shirt hanging in his closet with shaking fingertips. It took him a while to put the shirt on, fumbling with it like a child trying on a buttoned shirt for the first time.

With the collar of his shirt turned up and a black tie on, he tightened the tie around his neck so tight that his knuckles turned white, then flopped down with a thud while letting out a rough breath.

After sitting there for a while with both hands covering his face, Kang Inheon stood up again.

Grabbing his black coat, Kang Inheon left the dressing room and headed back down to the first floor. His steps were much steadier, unlike earlier when he was staggering while mumbling strange things.

However, Lee Juwon's face became increasingly distorted as he looked at him. When he wasn't wearing his combat uniform, Kang Inheon liked to wear clothes with fresh colours. No one wore a black suit and black tie for no reason.

Riiiiing, riiiiing-.

The only sound in the quiet house was the vibration of Kang Inheon's mobile phone.

He walked through the living room, which was littered with fragments of the broken remote control, and entered the bedroom. The bedroom was also turned upside down, but he didn't glance at it.

On one wall of the bedroom hung a frame with the hunter code written on it. Kang Inheon tore it off with one hand and threw it somewhere.

Thud!

The corner of the frame hit the floor first. The glass covering the frame cracked. As if the hunter code was being broken.

Where the frame had been, there was a keypad for a vault that connected to the inside of the wall.

Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. Kang Inheon dialled the seven-digit number and the safe clicked open. He dumped the contents into an empty box.

“What’s that…?”

It didn’t look like money or jewels… Was it dungeon mining rights? While Lee Juwon was wondering, the vibration sounded again.

Riiiiing, riiiiing-.

Kang Inheon slowly moved his gaze to his mobile phone as if he had just felt the vibration. It was a slow reaction, as if the slow-motion button had been pressed, which was completely different from his usual reflexes.

After holding the phone to his ear and listening for a while, Kang Inheon spat out in a low voice, “...Yes, I checked its identity.”

“......”

“I’m going now. Control the entrance and exit.”

After ending the call, Kang Inheon looked up and raised an eyebrow. Only then did he glance at the mess inside the house with a suspicious expression on his face.

Lee Juwon, whose guilty conscience was pricked, shrunk back for no reason but Kang Inheon soon returned to his cold, expressionless face. He didn't call security, look for signs of an intruder, or check for missing items.

He simply put on black shoes instead of the sneakers he had worn earlier. He left the house, carrying only the box he had taken from the safe.

Bang!

The front door closed again. Once more, Lee Juwon was left alone in Kang Inheon’s house without him being present.

“Sigh…”

Even Kang Inheon couldn't see or hear Lee Juwon.

His faint hope disappeared. He didn’t know how things became like this. He stared blankly at the empty front door, where the sensor had been switched off because the presence of a person disappeared.

He couldn’t get a proper grasp on a single thing in this confusing situation, but he could guess where Kang Inheon was going now.

But what stung Lee Juwon more than that guess was Kang Inheon. 

The long eyelashes that shook, eyes bloodshot due to blood vessels bursting erratically, dry lips that muttered unintelligible words, and the huge body that didn't have any support and staggered...

Lee Juwon squeezed his eyes shut, unable to bear the afterimage of Kang Inheon in front of him. However, as if engraved on his eyelids, Kang Inheon did not disappear.

* * *

It is said that people who are condemned to die go through an endless cycle, like the Möbius strip, of first denying that anything could have gone wrong, then anger, asking, "Why me of all people?", then compromise, saying that if they are spared, they will do right in the future, and then depression, saying that their life was beggarly. But the process of accepting death was the privilege of the living.

Lee Juwon had to wait until he was dead for that process.

Lee Juwon was now at his funeral. He didn't expect to become the protagonist of an unrealistic and boring story, a ghost looking at his deceased portrait in a funeral parlour.

All the world could see was Lee Juwon's corpse. The same went for Kang Inheon, who was his last hope. The one who checked the corpse and confirmed its identity was Kang Inheon.

Lee Juwon saw his own body again. Under the bright white light hanging from the ceiling of the morgue, his naked body was perfectly revealed. Lee Juwon's body on the transport cart was in a state as gruesome as the car, which was in such disrepair that it had to be scrapped.

When Kang Inheon nodded, a white cloth was placed over Lee Juwon's face, and just like that, Lee Juwon's death was officially acknowledged.

When he read the proses of his death, it felt like someone else's story, and he couldn't accept it.

When he looked at the detailed photographs of the wrecked car from different angles, it didn't seem real either. The article had more ‘heartwarming’ comments than any other article that year and the comments section was filled with firecracker emojis, not the usual offering of condolences saying "May the souls of the departed rest in peace." or black ribbon emojis, and it all felt like a bad prank.

But the moment he faced the body, he couldn't avoid it any longer. It was the moment his death became clear.

They didn't even need an autopsy to find out why or how he died. It could even be diagnosed with the naked eye. Lee Juwon had a broken neck, his brain had stopped functioning, his ribs were crushed, and all his organs were damaged. His pale skin, not much different from when he was alive, was unnerving. His body, deprived of warmth, was as hard as a piece of wood and would be burnt before it could rot.

He knew that all living things die someday, but he didn't realize that 'someday' would be now. Why me of all people, why now of all times, why here of all places? He wanted to question, but no one could give an answer to his inaudible voice.

On the contrary, he could hear other people’s voices very well. The voices of people he couldn’t hear properly during that time could be heard after death.

“No, but who died for there to be such a fuss[1]?”

[1] idk how to write it in english but the cleaner here has an accent

The cleaner who was clearing out the funeral home's garbage bins asked, looking out the window and talking to himself, and an employee of the funeral service company, all dressed up, said in a low tone, “Don't you know? Lee Juwon died.”

The elderly cleaner tilted their head as they tossed a new black plastic bag into the round blue garbage can.

“Who’s Lee Juwon?”

"Why, the CEO of the company Inhunter’s at!"

At the mention of Kang Inheon's name, the cleaner suddenly understood and looked interested. “Ah, that place called twelfth month or whatever?”

"Yes, their CEO was instantly killed in a car crash."

“Aigoo, that’s great! Isn’t he the guy who scammed people and sold water?” The cleaner said, clapping their hands. But then, as if sensing that this was not something to say at a funeral, they finished tidying up the garbage can and muttered, “Ahem, still, he was so young so it’s a shame he died...”

“Well... is there an order to go[2]?”

[2]order to die

No one could blame them for the beginning words that they had subconsciously blurted out and their clapping being genuine. There was no exact need to straighten things out or act tactfully either.

The funeral home was packed with reporters at the entrance, but almost no one actually showed up to pay their condolences. There was no chief mourner for Lee Juwon, who had no parents, no siblings, and was never married. At Lee Juwon's funeral, it was Kang Inheon who wore an armband with two lines[3] on his arm.

[3] two lines signifying he’s the chief mourner

Public opinion of Lee Juwon had always been consistently negative, but Lee Juwon didn't care. With as few office staff and corporate tax returns as possible and wearing the mask of a limited company, he didn't have to worry about shareholders, boards of directors, or auditors.

After all, they, like Lee Juwon, were the most important people for the company’s profits. The hunters, with the exception of Kang Inheon, tacitly agreed with December's ideology of lowest risk, highest return.

Blood-like money was spent in order to prevent serious issues from being reported and to do some media manipulation, but above all, December had no substitutes. If you didn't want to die in the dungeon, you had to hire a hunter.

There are other hunter services out there, but when comparing the number and rank of hunters, their tactics in dungeons, and the number of items they have, December is by far the best in the industry. It wasn't a company you could selectively consume, so no one wanted to turn Lee Juwon into an enemy, even if they cursed him behind his back.

That's why the negative publicity was even more intense when he died than when he was alive. Reporters sat at the entrance of the funeral home for a long time and took pictures of the mourners in real-time, and many streamers were broadcasting live.

A ‘Lee Juwon Funeral Attendance List’ circulated on the internet and was updated every hour or so. Each time, the people on the list were flooded with criticism and businesses were boycotted.

Lee Juwon thought that although he had no friends, he had many connections, and those connections would be generous if they sent wreaths to his funeral. Normally, there were more members of the deceased’s family than the deceased’s acquaintances, but Lee Juwon had no family so it was quiet like the funeral of a loner.

Only the sombre air intertwined with the scent of chrysanthemum flowers and incense filled the funeral home. There were only two team leaders of the company who took their shoes off and sat on the floor at a table while pouring soju and munching on suyuk.

It was Team Leader Baek and Team Leader Yuk, the ones who had been the most eager to flatter Lee Juwon when he was alive. He didn’t think he could exactly put his trust in them, but they came all the way here in this situation. Lee Juwon saw them a bit differently.

Team Leader Baek turned his shoulders stiffly as if his suit was uncomfortable. He picked up a bowl of yukgaejang on the table and gulped it down, then grimaced. "This is the first time I’ve tasted a funeral hall’s yukgaejang that’s this bad."

Team Leader Yuk said, picking up a peanut from a white disposable container and eating it, “Even the peanuts taste bad. It’s not easy for these to have no flavour.”

“Don’t they say that if the food at a funeral hall is good, the dead have gone to a good place? As expected, it seems like Lee Juwon went to a shitty place?”

Team Leader Baek dug through the vegetables and meat of the yukgaejang and put down his chopsticks as if he couldn’t eat it. Red oil splashed across the white tabletop.

“But why is Inheon tactlessly guarding this place, can’t he read the mood? We have to stay here because of him."

“That’s what I’m saying… Still, in this situation, it's Kang Inhunter who we're counting on."

Team Leader Yuk refilled his soju glass. Cheers, the two men raised their glasses and clinked them together. Team Leader Baek picked up the small soju glass with his thick hands and downed it in one gulp before looking at his surroundings and saying, “He’s been guarding the place all day long, but where’d he go now?”

“Ah, he must’ve gone to a witness interview. You know, since he was the last one to see CEO Lee.”

“That bastard’s giving shit to Inheon till the end, huh.”

“Sigh, what the hell’s so good about CEO Lee that makes Kang Inhunter suck up to him until death…”

“My words exactly. Do parentless guys get along well together?”

"Maybe... they get along in another way? Doesn’t CEO Lee have a pretty face?”

At the end of Team Leader Yuk’s words, he repeatedly motioned his finger with an obscene meaning behind it. Vulgar laughter spread through the funeral home for a moment before fading away. Team Leader Baek refilled his empty glass with soju and said, “I didn’t know Lee Juwon was pretty, though? What’s there to look at in a pale guy who looks like a pimp[4]…”

[4] demeaning term for a guy that’s more beautiful than handsome

Team Leader Yuk quickly reached for the bottle of soju in Team Leader Baek's hand and agreed, “Well, everyone these days seems to like those—what was it—tofu? They like guys that look soft like tofu. Even at first glance, CEO Lee looks like a needle won’t go through even if you stab him.”

“Does that only apply to his looks? Fucking hell, that young bastard acts so poor and like such a dick…”

When Team Leader Baek downed the entire glass of soju in one go, Team Leader Yuk said, "Woah, take your time," and refilled the glass.

"The alcohol’s going down so well today. It must be because we’re in a good mood."

"Are we the only ones? Just looking at the internet, everyone’s excited. Have you seen the stuff on YouTube?"

“Well, one or two, what is it?”

"It's not much, but they say that all the clothes CEO Lee was wearing when he died are all worth less than a hundred thousand won combined. Is that possible? Even though it’s winter right now?”

“It’s possible if it’s that bastard. A real-life fucking Scrooge… Ah, should I say dead now?”

Team Leader Baek mimed slitting his throat with the side of his hand and made an "Argh" sound while Team Leader Yuk went as far as pounding on the table and laughing exaggeratedly. Team Leader Baek made a philosophical expression and continued, “His life was in vain… If he was going to just die like that, he should’ve shared his face or money…”

“Ah, hyung-nim, you just said CEO Lee looks like a pimp.”

“Huhu, did I?”

When their laughter died down, the funeral home fell silent again. The only sound was the munching of peanuts coming from Team Leader Yuk. When he had finished the peanuts in his hand, he lightly dusted his hand off and said, “Even a nice face can rot, but money doesn’t... Do you think he was able to close his eyes properly even though it’s a waste he couldn’t use that money?”

“He can’t close them. That incorrigible cheapskate... He's probably still circling around here. With a white face like a ghost...”

Team Leader Baek wiggled his fingers in front of him, imitating a ghost. When he mimicked Lee Juwon's voice and said, "Give me my money, you bastards," Team Leader Yuk dropped his drink as if he'd seen a real ghost. Drip, drip, the clear soju dripped over the edge of the table and soaked his trousers.

“Why is that person...”

At Team Leader Yuk's frightened reaction, Team Leader Baek jerked his head back to follow Team Leader Yuk’s[5] gaze.

[5] it actually said team leader yoon here, but I think this was a typo on the author’s part

And he locked eyes with Kang Inheon, whom he was unsure of when he returned to the funeral hall.

Kang Inheon was leaning askew against the doorpost of the funeral parlour. The black-haired Kang Inheon was wearing a black suit so he looked like a huge, black shape from head to toe.

The corridor was brighter than the funeral parlour, so they couldn't see his face as he stood with his back to the light. A shadow was cast on his face, making his expression unknown, but inside that backlight, his eyes momentarily shone like the eyes of a predator.