KEG 79

“How much can you lend me? How do you make money here?”

“I’d recommend around 500,000 won. Don’t worry, if you need it, I can pull a few thousand at a time. The site’s still up and running.”

I glanced at the monitor and asked again.

“How did a high school student build something like that?”

“If you pay college students and freelancers to do the work, you can set up a gambling site like that in no time.”

“Where did the capital come from?”

“I took out a loan from a fourth-tier financial institution under my parents’ name…”

Lee Sangwoo, who had been staring at the screen, raised one eyebrow and looked at me.

“What are you trying to do?”

He started suspecting me.

Had my questions been too Read on persistent? I’d interrogated him so relentlessly that he’d just spilled everything.

How do I get out of this situation?

“Can’t I be a little suspicious?”

I decided to shift the blame onto Lee Sangwoo, who already looked suspicious at first glance.

At my words, Lee Sangwoo stared into space for a moment with dilated pupils before turning his gaze back to the TV.

“Suspicious… suspicious… ”

And he repeated the word over and over.

Something was wrong.

Had he taken drugs or something?

“Lee Sangwoo, is it true that you encouraged students at school to gamble and lent them money?”

“…Yeah. I made money through ‘proxy deposits.’”

“And you used the names and cell phones of the guys who couldn’t stolen contentpay back the money to set up fake bank accounts and SIM cards?”

“I did…. I did all of that…. I was so broke….”

Saliva dripped from the corner of Lee Sangwoo’s mouth.

His eyes seemed to be fixed on the game screen, but the character on the TV had been walking toward the wall nonstop since a while ago. The sight of the 3D character’s polygons passing through the wall and flailing about was grotesque.

“Are you Lee Sangwoo?”

He didn’t answer my question.

It had been like that from the start.

He wouldn’t answer when asked if he was Lee Sangwoo, but he kept confessing to the crimes. I grabbed the collar of the man who looked like he’d lost his mind.

Slap!

“Look at me.”

His gaze remained fixed on the TV.

Slap!

“I said look at me.”

His head twisted in the direction of the slap, and he drooled onto the floor.

I considered hitting him again, but then I glanced around the room. Despite the commotion, the office workers were sprawled out on the floor or in their chairs.

“You did it because you didn’t have any money?”

He answered my specific questions well. He remained as silent as a grave when asked anything else, but there were certain things he would answer.

“Yeah, my family was so poor… I knew it was wrong, but I needed the money…”

I’d heard that Lee Sangwoo’s family was well-off. I’d also heard he was a top student and a student council officer.

In other words, the guy I had by the collar wasn’t Lee Sangwoo.

“What do your parents do?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t been able to reach them for a long time…”

We hadn’t even exchanged a few words yet, and already there was a contradiction in his story.

“You said you took out a loan from a fourth-tier lender in your parents’ name, but you don’t know what they do?”

The character in the game was still flailing against the wall. It looked like he was wandering in a dream, or perhaps desperately trying to survive.

“If you’re poor, they won’t give you a loan. You know that, right?”

“A loan… I took out a loan… My parents’ debt was so I could open a gambling site…”

“If I check the payment history, it’ll all come up. If you’re going to lie, at least make it believable.”

“I did it… I… I… Ugh…!”

The person, who had been answering blankly while drooling, suddenly fell face-down and vomited. Since he hadn’t eaten much, only clear, yellow stomach acid poured out of his mouth.

Now that I looked, his clothes were also quite worn out.

“My head hurts so much…”

A poor student who couldn’t get in touch with his parents. There was one student who matched the description Kim Yiyun had given.

I picked up my phone, took a photo of the guy’s face, and sent it to Kim Yiyun. Not long after, Kim Yiyun called me.

-What’s with the photo? Where are you?

“I’m at Lee Sangwoo’s operation office right now.”

-The office?

“Yes, it looks like the office for the gambling site run by Lee Sangwoo’s gang.”

I briefly described the location and reported the situation. The call ended with Kim Yiyun saying they’d be there soon.

“All the guys outside were under hypnosis.”

It was a double trap.

A method of screening out people who came to borrow money, and if someone came to arrest him, passing them off to a decoy.

It occurred to me that Lee Sangwoo might be even more cunning than I’d thought.

“Should I call the police? Or an ambulance…?”

As I looked at the people sprawled out like corpses, a few of them sat up.

“Police?”

“Did you say police?”

“The police… the police are coming?”

They were like a bunch of reflexes responding to a command.

A collection of passivity with not a shred of initiative to be found.

The ones who had stood up were bigger than the others.

“Are you the enforcers of this office?”

There were three of them.

They were all tall, and one particularly burly guy had cauliflower ears.

I quickly assessed the situation. It was spacious. No CCTV cameras.

Perfect for a fight.

“Get that bastard!”

One of them bellowed. At that, all three charged at me at once.

I grabbed the mechanical aluminum keyboard off the desk. I liked how heavy it felt.

Smack!

I smashed it into the head of the guy in the lead. The keys from the cheap Chinese keyboard scattered through the air.

He must have been hit hard, I could see the whites of his eyes.

“Die!”

I felt pressure pushing against my side.

Someone grabbed my legs.

“Let go.”

I slammed the corner of the keyboard into the back of his Read on head and down his spine. The remaining keys fell off in a rapid succession like a harvest. The guy I hit let out a cry that sounded like the motor of a farm tractor.

Whoosh–

A menacing sound of air being sliced through rang in my ears.

Crash!

A swivel chair slammed into the wall. It was the chair the guy with the cauliflower ears had thrown.

He threw something that heavy at that speed… This was an opponent who could easily overpower me if I wasn’t careful.

“Aaargh…!”

I kicked the groin of the guy who was holding onto my legs. I thought I heard something burst, but I didn’t care.

The guy holding my legs collapsed. With two of them out of the way, only one remained.

“Let’s not waste any time.”

As soon as I finished speaking, my opponent charged at me. The towering figure lunged at me in a low stance.

Thud!

Overpowered by his strength, I was slammed straight into the wall.

It was enough force to pick up a wheeled chair and smash it to pieces. If I’d been unlucky, I could have been thrown like the chair and shattered.

“You son of a…”

Classic grappling – he pinned me down to drain my stamina. Muscles as elastic and firm as if I were touching the hind legs of an ox.

The guy with the cauliflower ears wasn’t just some thug who knew a few fight moves.

He’s a wrestler.

Thud!

“Gah…!”

My roundhouse kick landed on his jaw.

The opponent who had pinned me against the wall was sent flying. He must have bitten his tongue, because a stream of saliva mixed with blood was dripping from his mouth, which he covered with his hand.

I got lucky. He let his guard down.

“Come here!”

Once again, he charged at me like a mad bull.

Bam! Crash!

A chase ensued inside the office.

Chairs flying through the air.

Bottles, ashtrays, and trash getting in my way.

“Come here, you bastard!”

My opponent grabbed whatever was within reach and hurled it at me as he charged. Yet he showed no signs of tiring.

He had the upper hand in both stamina and strength. If he caught me again, at least one of my bones would break.

Clang!

“Gah!”

I grabbed a bonsai pot and hurled it. The pot flew and struck my opponent’s shoulder.

I was aiming for the head, but it only hit the shoulder. Soil spilled from the pot, scattering across the floor.

A bull-like opponent on a dirt floor. I really feel like a matador.

Click!

“Die!”

The bull charged, this time, he even had a folding knife in his hand. He looked just like a third-rate villain.

Thud!

“Ugh!”

But I’m just as much of a third-rate villain as he is.

With no time to dodge, I barely managed to block the blade aimed at my abdomen by grabbing a file from the desk, but it pierced through.

It’s been a while since I felt a knife pierce my flesh.

The sensation of being instantly scorched, like a dead tree struck by lightning, hit my brain before my consciousness could register it.

Thud!

I couldn’t withstand the momentum of my opponent’s charge and fell to the floor. Seizing the opportunity, he climbed on top of me and tried to mount me.

“Aaah! My eye!”

I flung dirt from the ground into my opponent’s face.

When I saw that it had hit its mark, I disrupted his balance and locked in an armbar. Along with the sound of the knife he was holding dropping, I saw his thumb bend the wrong way.

Crunch– snap–

It felt like I was breaking a wooden plank wrapped in cloth. I heard the sound of a joint snapping and felt the vibrations of my opponent trembling in agony. He struggled like a madman, scratching my calves and thighs with his fingernails.

This is how it always ends up.

No matter how much I analyze wrestling techniques or whatever, it all comes down to getting dirt in my eyes and scratching.

“Let gooo! Let go…!”

There’s no tapping out in a street brawl.

No surrender, no sportsmanship.

It goes on until one of them runs away or thinks they’ve won.

“I lost! I said I lost…!”

Of course, there’s no surrender either.

Crunch!

With the sound of a major joint snapping, my opponent went limp. I looked closer and saw he was foaming at the mouth and convulsing.

He must have passed out.

I won.

“Haa, haa…”

But my ragged breathing wouldn’t slow down.

Blood trickled from my abdomen; it seemed the intense movement had torn the wound open further. My fingertips trembled and my teeth clenched.

I took off my school jacket and pressed it against the wound.

Kim Yiyun should be arriving soon.