KEG 52

***

“Huh! We’re busy people too, so we’ll let this slide!”

The owner of the snack bar lectured the thief, saying that he was just a young man.

The thief knelt down. He shed tears as small as chicken droppings, and repeatedly bowed his head. His coat, torn from being beaten by me, and his messy, bird’s-nest hair shook every time he sniffled.

“I… I don’t have Korean money on me…”

The thief fumbled around and pulled out some Chinese yuan. As he did, he insisted on his innocence.

What am I supposed to do? Does having foreign currency suddenly make his theft any different?

“So… so…”

“Can I go now?”

Go Seokhee and Kim Hwanhee had already left. My business here was done too. When I said I was leaving, the owner smiled and saw me off, promising a free treat if I came back.

I stepped outside the shop and was on my way home.

“Why are you following me?”

For some reason, the thief was following me.

“My place is this way too…”

I lived in a cheap building near a contaminated area.

It was a neighborhood mostly inhabited by people who were financially strapped or those who planned to live there for a short time before leaving.

“Are you using informal speech with me?”

“Don’t get mad, please…”

When we bumped into each other, his body felt unusually solid.

There was no way his class was low enough for him to be this pathetic.

Yet he was abnormally intimidated.

“Have you committed a crime or something?”

Either he was just that kind of person, or he was a crook. My hunch must have been right, because his pupils started darting around.

“Uh, uh? No, no??”

He’s a terrible liar.

There was a hefty reward for reporting crimes committed by Awakeners.

Where did this guy come from?

Thanks a lot.

“Where do you live?”

“Why…?”

“You look like you haven’t eaten in days.”

When I said it with a tone that implied I’d take care of him, the guy naively blurted out his address.

Doesn’t he even remember getting beaten to a pulp? Even the way hr giggles looks a bit dim-witted.

“Hehe, um, what’s your name?”

“Ha Seongho.”

“Seongho… Hmm, Ho-hyung! Can I call you Ho-hyung?”

I replied with a casual nod, and based on the address he’d given, I filled out a report for the Awakeners Management Bureau without hesitation. Tips, reports, and reward payments could all be handled easily via cell phone.

“What’s your name?”

“Me? I don’t have a name.”

I wrote “Unknown” in the name field. My mind was filled with nothing but the amount of the reward I would receive.

Please let him be a vicious criminal.

“Ho-hyung, you look like someone from a South Joseon¹ art film.”

I paused for a moment, my fingers halting as they had been stuttering across the keyboard.

His choice of words was awkward. Hid pronunciation was also slurred from the start.

Just like the ethnic Korean Chinese caregivers in the hospice ward.

“You look like those guys in action movies who wear suits and look cool but die quickly…”

“What is your nationality?”

I cut off his excited chatter and asked. The guy froze at my words and pursed his lips.

Yuan, South Joseon, a young appearance but a well-trained physique.

“Did you come from the North?”

Could he be a spy? The reward for catching a spy was even bigger.

My heart raced with expectation. It was like a Christmas present box.

“I’ve completed all the registration procedures… I’m a South Joseon citizen now!”

The excitement deflated.

“Yes, don’t steal and live a good life.”

Defectors undergo thorough background checks and competency evaluations. The fact that he was an Esper would have been discovered by the state long ago.

Now that he had completed the administrative procedures designated by the state, he was neither a criminal nor a spy. He was just a dim-witted thief who ate without paying.

“Where do you live? We’re neighbors, right?”

When I told him to figure it out for himself, he grinned and said that was fine.

He even bragged that his South Korean wasn’t unnatural, and said that once he found a job, he’d pay for his own meals.

He’s so noisy. I wish he’d just shut up.

“Can I come over? Should we have a pillow fight?”

I thought he was just a dimwit, but his head was a complete mess. He looked like he was going to follow me all the way home if I let him, so I just stared at his face without saying a word.

I was just looking at him, I didn’t do a thing, but he flinched and put up his guard.

He was really getting on my nerves.

“Whyyyyyy…. That’s how they always do it in TV dramas….”

“‘Doesn’t the government contact you?”

In response to my question’s he just blinked like a calf.

As I just sighed, the dimwit opened his mouth.

“What kind of contact?”

“They wouldn’t just let a North Korean Esper and defector like you roam the streets like this.”

Whether he understood me or not, he lifted his turtleneck to ​unauthorized copy​reveal a thick collar embedded with a red magic stone.

The collar bore a serial number and a surname.

DEF-666-S LEE.

“If I do anything, people will probably come?”

It was the serial number of a special forces unit I’d seen a few times in classified military documents. Well, as is often the case with military classifieds, security was lax, and I’d seen it while organizing files.

“Are you S-class?”

DEF-666-S.

Defector – the 666th subject under surveillance – S-class.

That meant he was a person of interest.

“Yeah, probably?”

The fact that a case like this was roaming the streets meant he had been brainwashed to the point of losing himself, or..

“I got fed up with the training and walked out. They didn’t stop me?”

…They couldn’t catch him.

No form of control was effective against an S-class. Even if he killed me right now, this guy would be protected as a national asset.

“…How did you find a place to live?”

“The Management Office gave it to me.”

Even if they did, why on earth would they give him a house in a neighborhood like this? An S-class time bomb in a rundown neighborhood filled with vulnerable people?

The way they handled it was so sloppy it sounded like a lie. But in a way, that made it seem even more real.

“‘Didn’t they give you money?”

“I lost my bag…”

When I saw him mutter, “My phone and wallet were in there,” I started to understand why the Management Office wasn’t actively trying to control him.

He had no ambition. No malice either.

“What were you planning to do about a job?”

“Hmm… Maybe I’ll join a company?”

He hadn’t even thought about it.

A company? Does he even have a valid degree? Or does he just want to get dragged into some pyramid scheme?

“Won’t things work out somehow?”

I picked up something strange.

I need to throw it away right now. No, let’s just ignore it.

Figure it out on your own.

I turned my back and went on my way.

“Ah! Ho-hyung! Ho-hyung, where are you going?!”

“My own life is hard enough.”

“Huh?”

I don’t have the energy to deal with someone like you. Just looking at you drains me.

It was hard enough just keeping my own body together, it was falling apart and pieces were flying everywhere. I would have to go back to being a janitor soon, so I need to at least preserve my mental health.

“Can’t you at least tell me where you work?!”

At those words, my footsteps halted.

A penniless Esper who was sturdy and had a head full of flowers. He didn’t even have ambition.

In that case.

“Did you say you were looking for a job?”

“Huh? Yeah….”

I turned around and looked at the promising janitor.

“They’re hiring at the place where I work.”

***

Paradise Hospital’s Esper-Specialized Hospice Ward.

There were almost no elderly people here.

Espers who awakened in their later years chose retirement communities over hospital wards. Since everyone took precautions (except in unavoidable cases due to financial necessity) there were very few elderly Espers injured in combat. And only a tiny fraction of those who were injured chose to undergo life-sustaining treatment.

Having lived long lives, they had come to understand the workings of the world.

They harbored no fervent sense of justice or mission, nor did they covet wealth or power.

To them, today was an endless work in progress, and tomorrow was merely a process of reviewing their aging bodies.

They were grateful for their safety, yet life was tedious, and they repeated their days as if they were rehearsing for their departure.

The elderly.

Standing on the boundary between life and death.

They were like the embodiment of a hospice ward in and of themselves.

“Wow, Ho-hyung! That person is the only elderly person in this ward!?”

DEF-666-S LEE said.

His name was too long, so we called him Yuksam. Perhaps he liked it too, because a few days later, he came to the ward carrying an ID card with the name Lee Yuksam.²

Crazy people always have incredible drive.

I worked six days a week; Lee Yuksam worked two.

“Get to work.”

Lee Yuksam’s voice was unnecessarily loud. Did he eat a North Korean propaganda loudspeaker for breakfast?

“Whoa, yes.”

He was easy to deal with because he listened well. He was strong and very sensitive to others’ feelings. He had no social skills, but it was obvious he wanted to fit in.

“By the way, this ward is really great. They even hired someone like you!”

Lee Yuksam had no ill will.

The ill will came from me.

I shouldn’t have brought him here.

It was just giving me a headache.

“That patient and the caregiver are communicating in Morse code right now.”

The elderly man in Room 3. He was an Esper with enhanced hearing.

They said he was a Navy diver who conducted underwater operations until a severe spinal injury left him unable to move. He was a captain who could distinguish between different types of submarines and calculate distances.

“Oh my god! They just said they love each other!”

Lee Yuksam had been a child soldier in the North. I didn’t know what kind of training he received, but he knew Morse code and had an excellent understanding of military operations.

“Eeh~ It’s like a soap opera~ So romantic~!”

The problem was that his head was full of flowers, but his physical abilities were outstanding.

Such innocence in a world like this.

“Huh? They are looking our way.”

“Because you’ve been making such a fuss.”

The elderly man and the caregiver in Room 3 didn’t speak to each other; they communicated by tapping each other’s hands.

Room 3 was always quiet. The sound of the humidifier was louder than the people.

“There’s a lot to see here.”

Lee Yuksam sometimes described situations unfolding before him as if he were watching TV. It was as if he were the only human in a giant zoo called the world.