The Unspoken Truth About the Smiling Man
I had seen that reaction from the Director General. It was unmistakable.
She had no idea.
The legendary agent of the Inspection Department—the Smiling Man—was unknown to her.
According to everything I knew, the Smiling Man had been a famous operative when Director General Choi Jihye was still active on the front lines ten years ago…
But why?
Why had my senior, Sunghyun, ordered her to hide her true identity in the first place?
The first possibility was that Sunghyun was actually not an Inspection Department agent but a double agent with a vicious side. This was instantly dismissed.
Who would inject themselves with a lethal toxin just to pull that off? That was a move that clearly outweighed any possible gain. A calculating bat like him would never risk it.
Of course, if loyalty was that absolute, it could happen, but someone like Lee Yohee—who raped and murdered casually while smiling, and didn’t even blink at the corpses—was simply incapable of earning that kind of trust.
And the only emotions Lee Yohee showed toward Sunghyun were pure hostility and disgust. A trained agent playing a double agent would have shown at least some faint signs of tension, but there had been none.
Cha Seyeon had been acting strangely affectionate toward her senior lately, but it wasn’t like that… it carried a strong sexual undertone.
Was the head maid secretly in love with him?
In any case, the first hypothesis was unrealistic.
The second possibility was that Director General Choi herself was hiding something dark, while the legendary Sunghyun had seen through it.
Honestly, I wasn’t sure. But it didn’t feel right either…
I knew exactly how devoted the Director General was to the nation. She had come all the way here to save me herself. And judging by Sunghyun’s reaction, he wasn’t hiding his identity because he was hiding something from me, nor was he looking at her like a traitor in the organization.
*Haah… This is way too complicated.*
Impersonation and infiltration had been my specialty, but this kind of tangled, emotional fighting still gave me a headache.
No matter what, since Director General Choi and Sunghyun had decided to trust each other and cooperate, I would just trust the two people I believed in! Buck up!
“What are you doing?”
When I clenched my fist in the air, Director General Choi looked at me with an expression that said, *Again with the stupid stuff?*
“Huh?! N-no, it’s nothing…”
Anyway, my senior was the benefactor who had saved not only my life but my sister’s as well.
Whatever he wanted from me, I had to give him everything.
* * *
“What? Why is your face all twisted like you’re about to crap yourself?”
While I was steadying the nausea, Lee Yohee shot at me with clear displeasure.
“It’s nothing. I must have gotten hit in the Inspection Department’s interrogation room.”
“Ah~ I see. Tsk tsk, poor thing—”
Bang!
At that moment the door opened and someone walked in.
Perfectly slicked-back hair with a high ponytail.
Sharp snake eyes.
J-Jungu…!?
Why had Lee Jungu suddenly shown up here?
The man who only ever stayed in his private mansion and company would never step foot in a place like this.
Countless thoughts flashed through my mind, but the strongest emotion was violent hatred. I had always thought he maintained a cold demeanor, yet the moment I saw the face of that bastard who had casually killed and mocked someone over a trivial misunderstanding, my stomach began to boil.
Still, it was too soon to explode in anger.
While I was breathing deeply to keep my face neutral, Lee Jungu strode across the room without a single bodyguard in tow.
“Ah… What are you doing here suddenly?”
“It’s Yohee.”
The voice of the father who had been acting domestic was gone, replaced by the icy tone of a chairman. Lee Yohee shot up straight.
“..! Y-yes, Father!”
Crack!
“Kyahk!”
A strong slap landed right on her hip.
“So there really was an Inspection Department flunky sneaking in here.”
“Huh… huh… I-I really don’t know why that girl suddenly pushed her way in, Father! I swear!”
“Shut your mouth!”
Lee Yohee was kneeling, trembling like a leaf in the wind. That was deep-rooted learned helplessness and a fear response. She must have been abused since childhood. The psychopathic streak in her was obvious—genetic factors, plus research showing that people who suffered such “home education” often developed impaired frontal lobe function later.
“I already knew that the bastard who got hit during the Angel Dust case last time wasn’t the real culprit. Was your old man really that stupid?”
“N-no, no! I’m sorry, sorry, sorry, Father!”
“You picked some random person to take the blame just to avoid responsibility, and I still let it slide.”
Slap!
“Kyahk!”
“I know how much chaos those Inspection Department bastards raised when they realized what was going on. Do you know that, you bitch?”
So that was why.
That was why he had called me over and stabbed me with a knife.
Crack!
“Kyahk!”
I deliberately turned my head and pretended not to see. I wasn’t supposed to watch a subordinate getting slapped by a higher-ranking superior.
“Five of my key subsidiaries are gone. The previous Inspection Director—a crazy bastard—got demoted, and five companies vanished with him!”
Slap! Crack!
“Kyaaah! Nngh! F-Father, I mean Chairman, I’m sorry! Ple-Please forgive me!”
The beating was so ruthless it was impossible to call it “disciplinary punishment for a daughter.”
“And you couldn’t even manage your petty cash properly, so now the Inspection Department is after you again?”
Thud!
A kick slammed into Lee Yohee’s limp belly.
“Kyah…!”
Blood trickled from her lips.
“Yohee. This is your last time. Do you understand?”
“Y-yes! I-I understand!”
“If I hear even one weird rumor again, there won’t be any Samjung Pharmaceutical or anything else. No, you won’t even be my daughter anymore.”
“Father!”
The hand that had been raising slowly for a continuation grew quiet with a single more insult, a slap coming next.
“Hyiiik!!”
Lee Yohee jerked and slammed her head to the floor, shaking violently.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry…!”
Lee Jungu looked at his own daughter with disdain, spat on the floor, and turned to leave.
For a split second he met my eyes and gave the expression of *who is this guy*, then seemed to remember something.
“Ah~ So you’re Kim Sunghyun? Hahaha, you took my daughter’s place and got dragged to the Inspection Department? I’ve heard all about you! What a handsome face, though—it’s all ruined.”
Of course information was leaking inside the Inspection Department.
“No, Chairman!”
“Bullshit. I know how vicious they are in the Inspection Department. Anyway, you did well this time.”
“Yes! Thank you!”
“Hah~ You have such a refreshing personality. Hmm, you’re going to be a big man one day. Hahaha! I’ll be off now. Keep up the good work.”
“Please enter, Chairman.”
I would have loved to carve that madman’s belly open with my bare hands the same way he had done to mine, but with superhuman patience I kept my face smiling.
*Clang.*
The sound of the door shutting echoed loudly in the room, and the sound of Lee Jungu’s footsteps faded away outside.
“Ugh… hic… snivel… I’m sorry… I’m sorry… I’m sorry…”
Whether childhood PTSD had flared up, Lee Yohee was curled on the floor sobbing bitterly and apologizing nonstop.
Anyone who didn’t know what kind of woman she was would feel pity for her, but that didn’t justify a rapist who kidnapped and murdered innocent people because they had had a rough childhood.
It wasn’t that kind of thing that mattered.
What filled my head right now was not guilt but a somewhat dark, twisted joy. The perfect way to control and play with Yohee had just occurred to me.
From the warehouse, Lee Jungu and Lee Yohee had looked like a loving father-daughter pair. But the reality was different. Born under a sociopathic father and raised through lifelong emotional and physical abuse, Yohee had become a complete psychopath.
To her, her father would always be an unbridgeable divine being.
What would happen if Jungu ever learned that she was raping and killing people, and that she had been roughly managing the basement?
And if I blackmailed her with that secret?
That idiot who would ignore it after a few slaps and continue to let blood-mixed spit drip from her mouth—could she?
“Snivel… hic… hic…! Hic!”
Lee Yohee was shaking her head side to side as heavy breathing seized her and clutched her chest.
“Miss, please calm your breathing.”
I gently placed my hand over her mouth to help her breathe without hyperventilating.
“Haa… haa…”
A few minutes later, her trembling eyes looked up at me. Her eyes were red and swollen, tears still streaming down her face.
“Sunghyun… aww… p-please get me some potions from the drawer…”
When she needed help, her tone changed completely.
*Creak—*
When I opened the drawer, several blue-liquid ampoules rolled out. And behind them, a pistol.
An M38 revolver. The compact 9mm service pistol I had seen before. Five rounds. Compact enough for women to use, and since it was a revolver there was no worry about malfunctions.
I first unloaded the revolver and stuffed the ammo in my pocket, then grabbed a healing potion and walked over to her.
“Ugh… kyuk… It hurts… My whole body hurts, Sunghyun… ugh…”
The childish, regressive tone she had suddenly adopted.
This was the infantile regression that people who experienced PTSD from childhood abuse often showed.
“Yes, yes. Miss, let me undress you.”
Normally she would never have shown her body to the man she hated so much, but right now Yohee wasn’t in her right mind. She didn’t resist. Instead, in pain, she kept whimpering and lifting her clothes even higher until her bra rode up and enormous breasts spilled out.
*She really is overwhelming.*
One breast was far larger than any porn actress’s. The bra barely clung to the nipple, but the small mole right next to the areola was clearly visible.
I would thoroughly train her so she could become a nude slave who served only this tit.
“I see the wound isn’t broken—lucky. Please excuse me.”
*Whack! Whack!*
“Aww… aaaa… it hurts… eek…”
The childish, pouting tone of a child who was complaining.
When I roughly applied the medicine to her side and started pulling her clothes down, I realized her eyes were still hazy as she looked up at me.
Something was off with her.
“Sunghyun, come sit here!”
She sounded exactly like a kindergarten girl begging her favorite boy to sit beside her.
Why was this girl suddenly acting so sweetly?