A Deal in the Special Room
Special meeting room in the prison.
And in the center of that room, a woman wearing a prison uniform sat blankly on the table.
Park So-jeong, former vice president of the Hunter Association.
“...”
And opposite her, I sat quietly, staring.
Not long ago, the woman who had been grasping the Association like a toy, flaunting her arrogance to the skies.
But now her appearance was quite disheveled.
Her neatly styled hair was messy and tangled.
The face that had always been glamorous with makeup was pale.
Cracked lips.
And the shadows beneath her sunken eyes clearly revealed how she had been living.
Just a pathetic, miserable prisoner.
I placed the phone on the table and started recording, but she didn’t react at all.
Just glaring at me with broken eyes.
Without uttering a single word, she sent poison straight toward me.
With the will to curse me.
“How have you been?”
I offered a casual greeting.
And before the words even left my mouth, Park So-jeong’s lips twitched.
“...Pfft.”
She burst out laughing as if she found it ridiculous.
Well, I knew.
How it must have sounded for her—the one who had thrown her here—to casually ask how she was doing.
But I lifted the corner of my mouth and let out a soft laugh as well.
“You look surprisingly well, at least.”
“What?”
Her eyes turned bloodshot. She slammed both hands on the table and shouted in a voice choked with malice.
“How am I? Even seeing my current state, those words come out of your mouth?!”
Clang! Clang!
“You made me like this and you’re comfortable? You bastard!!”
Park So-jeong unleashed her fury without restraint.
Watching her, a strange sense of relief bloomed in a corner of my heart.
This is Park So-jeong.
If she were to repent for her sins and reform here, I had been a little worried.
But I was relieved that she was still only blaming others.
Unchanged, ugly, like a monster.
“Do you remember how I kicked out all the directors who followed you?”
“...”
Park So-jeong didn’t answer.
She simply breathed heavily and glared at me.
As if she wanted to kill me.
“Have you ever thought you were treated unjustly?”
“...What?”
“Why only me? Everyone else committed corruption, so why me?”
“...”
“Honestly, there are still rotten people overflowing in the Association. Why only you had to come down?”
“...”
“Don’t worry. This time, I’m going to clean up all the remaining directors in the Association as well.”
“...”
“They’re just useless people who only want to sit in their seats while enjoying my body.”
“...”
Park So-jeong spat a nose and turned her head.
As if nothing I said was interesting.
“Have you heard the news outside? This time, the Belves Alliance also...”
“Hah.”
Park So-jeong cut off my words and turned her head again.
With a face full of irritation, she said to me.
“So. You came all the way here to boast about your great achievements?”
“...”
“If you’re going to scratch your temper like that? What do you plan to do with me until the end! Why!!! Why are you doing this to me!! Why ah!!”
She couldn’t control her anger and half-raised her butt, shouting.
Why to me.
“Why are you making a fuss at me!! What did I do wrong to you?!”
She expressed her anger repeatedly, then just stared quietly.
Soon, she gritted her teeth, couldn’t suppress her rage, and her shoulders shook.
After a while, she leaned her upper body forward a bit and spoke in a low voice.
“So.”
“What?”
“It’s unjust.”
“...”
The word “unjust” from my mouth made Park So-jeong’s eyebrows twitch visibly.
“You alone sitting there is unjust, isn’t it?”
At that, Park So-jeong’s anger finally stopped.
“What are you talking about...?”
There was clearly a slight tremor in her voice.
A very subtle tremor that was hard to notice.
It meant she was wavering.
“I don’t particularly plan to just bring you down.”
“...You.”
“I’m going to kick out all the corruption in the Association. So...”
Trailing off, I looked at her.
“So what.”
“If it’s you, you’ll know. The remaining arrogant directors in the Association. The information I’ve prepared to blackmail them someday.”
“...”
For a moment, Park So-jeong stared at me with a blank face.
As if she couldn’t understand the situation where the one who had put her here was asking for information.
But she was also a person who had experienced everything.
Soon, she quickly grasped the situation and lifted the corner of her mouth with a grin.
“Why me.”
“...”
“Why am I crazy? You think I’ll spill all the information for your sake? I’d rather bite my tongue and die.”
The expected reaction.
Naturally.
“Yes, well... I didn’t think you’d hand it over with your bare hands.”
Casually dismissing it, Park So-jeong stared at me fixedly.
Her eyes as if trying to read my intention.
She stared intently as if trying to discern my thoughts.
“Then, how about this. Let’s make a deal, shall we?”
“...You don’t know what a deal is?”
She snorted and shook her head left and right.
“A deal is giving and receiving what each wants. For it to work, what I want must be with you! What will you give me? Clemency? I don’t need it.”
“So. That’s why I’m proposing a deal. Because what you want is with me.”
“...?”
“You.”
Seeing my confident demeanor, her forehead narrowed a bit.
Looking at her, I deliberately paused and slowly opened my mouth.
“You’ve hidden it well.”
“...”
“Do you know? Mastiz Corporation gave the 6th Research Institute to me.”
“...?!”
At that moment.
Finally, Park So-jeong’s two eyes violently shook.
No composure left, her face lost its color.
Even her two hands started to tremble.
“You... you...!!!”
“Honestly, I was quite surprised too. I didn’t know you had a son hidden from the vice president.”
“Don’t touch him!!”
Park So-jeong shouted in a torn voice, then raised her upper body as if to rush at me.
“If you touch...! If you touch even a single hair of my son, I’ll definitely kill you...! I’ll kill you!!”
The desperate momentum, the appearance, more than any I had seen from Park So-jeong so far.
The sight was rather amusing, and I watched with a sigh of relief.
“So that’s it? That’s why Mastiz Corporation...”
“Listen to what I’m saying!!”
“...”
“That kid didn’t do anything. Please... why... why touch that poor kid...”
“Poor.”
I cut off her cry and shot back in a cold, calm voice.
“Your son is quite smart. Seeing him working with special treatment in the Mastiz 6th Research Institute at just 17 years old.”
“This... this...!!”
“Other kids, parents lost... those really poor kids are being used as forced awakening test subjects.”
“...You!”
“You hid your own child and raised him spoiled, didn’t you?”
“...”
Park So-jeong finally closed her mouth.
There was no answer.
As if a mother in name was involved in experimenting on children.
Her own son was so dearly cherished.
Of course, what she aimed for was Jo A-young.
But that didn’t mean she hadn’t been involved.
An undeniable truth.
“Honestly, it’s quite disgusting.”
At that, Park So-jeong covered her face with trembling hands.
Then tears flowed from her cheeks.
Is this real sadness?
Or crocodile tears?
What irony.
The one who enjoyed power on the blood and tears of others was crumbling in front of her own flesh and blood.
“...How.”
She asked me in a trembling voice.
“How did you know.”
How did you find out.
She must have thought the 6th Research Institute would be absolutely safe.
“I just said it. Vice President Park Seong-jun of Mastiz Group gave it to me. So, while looking through the list...”
“Click.”
The sound of Park So-jeong grinding her teeth was clear.
And she suppressed her anger and clenched her fist.
Then.
“I see.”
“...”
“I understand. I’ll tell you what you want...!”
She looked at me with pleading eyes, head raised again.
“Please don’t touch my son.”
“...Say it all.”
Park So-jeong started speaking as if giving up.
“Director Kim Hyungchul... that man is...”
The information that came out one after another from her mouth were nothing but nauseating words.
The more I heard, the more it told how much the Association had been eaten by them for so long.
How ugly they were.
And why we had to kick them out.
After the long exposure ended, Park So-jeong breathed heavily and leaned her back against the chair.
“This is... everything. The weaknesses of the people I know.”
“Thank you for your hard work.”
I pressed the end recording button, put the phone back in my pocket, and stood up.
Just as I was about to leave the visitation room.
“Let’s make one more deal with me.”
Park So-jeong’s voice came from behind my back.
An out-of-the-blue proposal.
I stopped walking and turned my head to look.
She appeared with eyes full of poison.
“Deal? As you said, what I don’t have must be with you...”
“Why did you leave Mastiz alone.”
“...”
I looked at her with somewhat widened eyes.
...Look at this.
“You plan to carry Mastiz to the end? Absolutely not. You’re a vicious and meticulous bastard.”
“...”
“Since there’s no way to bring them down now, you’re leaving them alone. Am I wrong?”
“...”
I had no words to reply to her.
Honestly, there were no wrong words.
At this moment, there was no way to bring down Mastiz.
With Park So-jeong?
Would Mastiz fall with her?
Instead, it would have given them a reason to flee to America.
They were already preparing.
“Then, let’s make a deal with me.”
“...Well, I need to hear what this deal is...”
“Bring down Mastiz.”
“...”
“If you just bring them down, I’ll help you.”
Smart.
I couldn’t help but let out a soft laugh.
Because I knew why she was making this proposal.
“You don’t need to say the reason, I know.”
“Park Seong-jun... that bastard.”
Just as I thought.
She was resenting Park Seong-jun now.
Probably the cause was that he gave the 6th Research Institute to me.
“You gave the 6th Research Institute...? Then, you were going to abandon me from the beginning and bury me. That’s why... that’s why you kicked me out of the board. Am I wrong?”
“...”
“You planned to abandon me from the start! Using me as a shield to cut off my tail...! Even handing over the research institute where my son is...!!!”
Watching her burn with anger, I thought.
She was currently misunderstanding that Park Seong-jun had voluntarily given the 6th Research Institute to me.
But.
What does it matter.
She would help me with the misunderstanding on her own.
No need to correct the misunderstanding.
The enemy of the enemy was the most useful weapon.
“Yes, let’s do that.”
After hearing the answer, Park So-jeong finally sat down with a thud.
Her appearance of breathing heavily as if the tension was released.
To her, I spat out a greeting.
“...We’ll talk about that story later.”
With that, I turned without hesitation.
Clang.
After walking for a while, I came out of the prison.
The gloomy sky greeted me.
Thinking about whether it would rain, I took the phone out of my pocket and pressed the shortcut number for a long time.
[Yes, President.]
It was Director Oh Hyungwoon.
“Now, let’s start cleaning up.”