A Life Too Precious

A conference room of old-world elegance, sunk beneath the earth.

A heavy, thick wooden door—old enough to have stood for decades—swung shut, and one device after another came alive to kill sound and shut out surveillance.

There were no listening devices. No. They had to believe there weren't.

The people seated around the long table wore, every one of them, a face with no expression on it. A vice minister. A senior secretary from the Blue House. Executives of the intelligence services. High officials of the prosecution. A senior director of the National Intelligence Service. And even an advisor from a secret organ of the Ministry of National Defense. What all of them shared was a single thing.

Fear.

"…You've checked the report again?"

The question came off the end of the table in a thick voice. A middle-aged man, a sharp gaze behind his glasses. He was the true power of a special committee under the Ministry of the Interior and Safety—in practice, a man seated at the very center of the nation's authority over public security.

An intelligence director gave a quiet nod.

"Confirmed. Every CCTV feed is gone, and the private security network was entirely dead. Not a single device in the area functioned. Physical traces remain. There is no record."

"You're telling me a ghost broke in?"

"There are signs of entry. It was… one person. One person, and the entire household…"

Silence passed through the room.

"…And this connects to the matter of Chairman Kim Seongjin?"

"It does. Kang Minseok, Jeong Suhyeok, Jo Jaejin… every one of those deaths ties back to Seongjin Group, and to Han ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Seungwoo, currently wanted. On the surface it looks like coincidence. The links are far too clear."

Another of them bowed his head.

"Perhaps… this isn't simple murder. It isn't revenge. Han Seungwoo—or some unknown being we can't even be sure is him—is taking aim at power itself."

At those words the conference room went still, as if it had been chilled through. No one wanted that sentence in his mouth. The shudder was already spreading.

"An anti-government faction?"

"A coup?"

"Anything from inside the military?"

The man who had come from the Ministry of National Defense shook his head.

"It isn't the military. Let me correct that. At least… it isn't any military we know."

Someone set a cup down hard.

"Then what is it? You're saying there's a ghost out there?! Something like this happens, and you can't produce a single countermeasure?!"

What stood in his eyes was not anger. It was terror. He could feel the edge of a blade drawing toward his own throat.

"Go on. Say it. Who's next? Is it my turn? Or is it yours?"

He looked around the table and began to meet their eyes, one by one. Suspicion, fear, distrust rose like water.

"Leave this as it is, and every one of us is finished."

At that, the intelligence advisor who had kept his mouth heavily shut finally opened it.

"Foreign powers have already started to move."

"…Foreign?"

"The CIA in America. China's Ministry of State Security. Russia's SVR. The intelligence services of each country have grasped the situation and are preparing to intervene. They've been in contact, offering to dispatch personnel to resolve it."

In an instant, the air inside the conference room went cold.

"What… are you saying? You mean to let foreign armed organizations in among us?"

"It's already too late. This affair is a global issue. A chain of slaughters of the powerful, carried out in the Republic of Korea. We can no longer bury it from the inside."

"…Does that even make sense? Have we no pride left? We have to bring in outside agents on top of everything else?"

"Then solve it. If you can find that monster—find Han Seungwoo—and kill him, I'll be glad to talk you out of it."

Stillness took hold of the room. The suspect was clear. The intelligence was clear. Han Seungwoo. And yet not one of them had been able to follow his trail.

Even in this city of surveillance, a camera planted on every block, no one had found him. That meant there was a means of slipping the net.

And.

"Perhaps…"

Low, but firm, someone opened his mouth.

"Perhaps we ought to hand him over. Hand over Han Seungwoo. If he's a being we cannot control, then guiding him somewhere that can be controlled doesn't strike me as a bad idea."

"…What are you saying?"

"That power. So long as it remains in the Republic of Korea, it can take our heads at any moment. But great powers like the United States, China, and Russia are different. They can control it."

"Throw away a power like that monster's…?"

The reason they were hunting Han Seungwoo. Keeping the blade from their own necks was part of it, of course. That inexplicable power was part of it too.

The CCTV inside Seongjin Group had shown it with perfect clarity. The power displayed by Han Seungwoo—or by someone wearing his face—did not belong to the human realm.

If they could catch him and lay bare the source of that power? If, by some chance, they could control that power at will, then the Republic of Korea—no, their own power—would surely endure forever. So they feared it, and they revered it. They wanted that power.

But now someone was saying they should sell off the very source that might have made the Republic rich and strong.

And the answer was this.

"If we mean to keep our power, that is the answer."

Keeping their power. That, and nothing else.

"…"

Silence returned, but its grain was different this time. Not one of them could refute it.

Greed. Fear. And the filthiest of agreements, struck to protect themselves.

They were already moving not for the nation, but for themselves alone. The purpose of this meeting was not to uncover the truth. All that remained of a purpose was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to survive, somehow, and to hold on to power.

Because every one of them knew. The dead had all been men who lived by their own methods. And the next turn would fall to one of those who had lived by theirs.

And they look at one another, and they whisper.

A contest of glances among those who held power was beginning.

The street was as crowded as any other day. The sky was clear, and between the cars packed tight along the road a bored traffic signal blinked.

I was walking through the middle of it. The crumpled hood, the worn-out shoes—the burned remnants of armor had been thrown away somewhere long ago. Now I was one person again, soaked back into the anonymous crowd.

And then, above the square, the electronic billboard flared.

The anchor's voice on the screen was calm.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

In an instant, a murmur broke open.

"Is he out of his mind? Even the family… that isn't a human being."

"I heard there was even a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠middle-school kid. God. That's too far."

"Lee Joong-ik—that was the famous young politician, wasn't it?"

"They killed the man who was going to lead this country's future."

"This is political retaliation. It's terrorism, plain and simple."

"The state has to step in and catch him. No question. If we can't even catch one bastard like this, we aren't a country."

Excited voices, gesturing hands, curses. The people were angry. Not because they mourned the dead. They remembered the kind of man he had been, and they were furious at having that much stature stolen from them.

Hypocrisy is always stronger than sincerity.

I turned the words over inside. They didn't know what Lee Joong-ik had done. How many people he had torn apart and killed behind that smiling face. Whom he had threatened, and how he had trampled them, just to sit in that seat.

They only believed whoever the screen showed them, admired him for a few lines he had left behind, and now cursed me as if taking revenge on his behalf.

Someone passing by said it.

"It really brings the tears. To kill a man like that… Hope is gone. This country is truly finished."

Hope. A disbelieving breath of laughter leaked out of me. Who, exactly, had that hope ever been for? The people he had collared and killed were never granted so much as a single thread of light.

I moved my feet again. The criminal on that screen was me, and the one they mourned was a monster.

And next, the billboard changed.

Across the screen came chaotic smoke and flame, and out of the middle of it my own silhouette, caught mid-stride. A subway car on fire. Inside it, I had seized a pregnant woman's arm and thrown my body toward the rear car.

A short laugh slipped out of me.

The man they had called a terrorist a moment ago was a national hero now.

Someone passing beside me looked up at the billboard as he spoke.

"Hey, did you see that guy? The one who saved people on the subway. Wow… he's really something."

"But that's weird. Doesn't his face look a lot like that terrorist from earlier?"

"Come on. No way. That bastard's a complete devil. He wiped out a National Assemblyman's whole family."

The disjointed talk brushed past me.

Curses and praise. Blame and cheers. It was like standing in front of a mirror.

I hadn't changed, and still the way the world looked at me kept splitting apart without end.

One step, then another, and I thought. Depending on a single word of theirs, a single frame, the thing called me becomes a savior, or it becomes a monster. But the truth is one thing only.

I killed those who deserved to die, and I myself have set one foot inside the hell they belonged to.

A street where no screams could be heard. I shoved my hands back into my pockets and walked toward the next target. No words, and no eyes, could shake me anymore. Judgment was still underway.

I was passing down the street like that, firming my resolve all over again, when—

…?

One person entered my sight.

He was no one special. A black puffer jacket and jeans. His hair was a mess, and the phone never left his hand. An impression so ordinary it would not have been too much to call him a piece of the city itself.

On any other day, it was a face I would have passed. There was no dissonance, no scent, no presence. But… I could see it.

His Karma. Not high enough, of course, to be worth real notice. Petty crime, at best. Nothing more than that.

Too ambiguous to hang the word perpetrator on—something like an unpleasant spectator. He had only lived by jabbing a coward's finger at the world.

And yet.

That Karma, that sin, was climbing at a vicious speed. In an instant, my eyes narrowed.

The smartphone in his hand. A posture like something clenched inside the pocket. The minute flinch of his gaze. He was planning something.

It was not unfamiliar. It resembled that heavy hypocrisy I had met on the subway the last time.

And now, even in this moment of confirming it, the sin kept stacking. Karma was advancing, slowly but unmistakably, toward the number of a killing.

…Fuck!

They took all of it. The money, the time, the life. They just fucking… took it. So why. Why doesn't anybody help me.

I woke up again today, my hair a greasy mess, and sat down in front of the computer. The monitor was already blazing as if it might burn itself out, and on the screen, the three-minute candles.

Scalping. I hammered at it like hell and still only lost a few hundred. But I thought I could make it back. Today had felt like it was going to work.

And then?

Shit. Not a single thing ever works out.

And then.

Knock, knock.

Mom rapped on the door.

"Hyundo, go outside and get a little sun, and at least eat something…"

Shut up. Just… leave me the hell alone.

So what if I'm thirty-eight. Bastards who started later than I did are doing just fine. Only me. Why does it have to be only me.

I turned a game on. Figured if I hunted for a while, I might feel better.

But they laughed at me there too. Worthless little shits, running their mouths at me.

Boomer? Me? I have to sit here and take shit like that?

My hands shook. My heart pounded. My eyes went dark, and inside my head the words came through for real: kill every last one of them.

And now I'm here. I don't know where. I just came out.

All I could think was that I wanted to wreck somebody—just one guy, really just one. Because then I figured I'd feel a little better.

But I was scared. See a big guy, and my legs lock up on their own.

Ah. That one won't do. I'll get hit.

A woman? No. With this body of mine I couldn't handle a sturdy woman.

But a kid. A kid was fine. Weak, and small, and absolutely unable to stop me.

That was when I saw one up ahead.

Third grade, maybe. A vest on, a cartoon-character backpack in hand, a child walking alone.

"…"

I walked toward that kid. No. I ran.

The kitchen knife in my pocket. Bought at the supermarket. Ring it up with a cutting board and nobody says a word. The moment I clenched it inside the pocket, I heard it in my head again.

Good, Hyundo. You're someone who can do something now. Your life is finally going to have a presence.

I drew the knife. In that instant, the child in front of my eyes turned into a game monster. No—not a monster. He became that piece-of-shit bastard who had been cursing me.

"You… fucker…!"

I howled as if to grind him underfoot and charged the child with the knife raised high. The child turns around.

Clear eyes. Eyes that knew nothing—and that only made me angrier.

You too. Someday you'll be one of the ones who looks down on me.

And so.

"Die!"

I stabbed. To kill the monster. To kill the anonymous user who had picked a fight with me. But—

"…?"

Something snatched my wrist.

And then—

Crack!

Together with the grotesque sound of bone twisting the wrong way—

"AAAAAGH!"

A scream tore out of my mouth whether I wanted it or not.

The instant I snapped the wrist.

"Gh… aaagh! Let go, let go of me…!"

That was not a scream. It was a yelp. All that ruled this pathetic human thrashing in front of me was fear, and nothing more.

It had been five seconds ago. No more than that. But the keyword floating in my sight had changed a little.

This was no longer a petty offense. A murderer, beyond any doubt. Not one child alone. Once he had tasted blood, he would have tried to kill many more.

And so the man was now… a subject of judgment.

"Aaaagh! It hurts, I'm telling you it hurts!"

I looked down without hurry at the man suffering with his arm bent.

"Who are you blaming?"

He opened his eyes as if to ask what I meant. A face smeared together with snot and spit. His own knife lay tumbled across the ground, and still he could not grasp that this was real.

"Everything is society's fault? The world just never recognized you?"

Through the History of Judgment, I could see the man's past. In truth, it was nothing you could call a past.

A blank page. He had done nothing. He had only fled from reality—other people's fault, society's fault, none of it his own.

I tipped his cheek up with a fingertip. Lightly. But like a mockery.

"Then have you, even once, truly tried to change?"

"…Wh-what…"

"Have you ever faced it. The fact that all of that failure might be your own fault."

He looked up at me with trembling eyes and muttered.

"I… I just… wanted to live…! I wanted… to be acknowledged too…. If you'd just left me alone, that would've been enough! Why. Why are you putting your hands on me. This one and that one…"

"Acknowledged?"

I laughed. Only the corner of my mouth rose—a cold sneer with the smell of blood in it.

"You needed a presence? So you wanted to kill one child and make the news? If that's it, you've achieved your goal."

This time it was not the wrist. It was the arm.

Crunch!

I broke it completely.

"GYAAAAAH!"

The scream spread. The arm hung bent in a wrong direction. Before he had the chance to curl in on himself, I drove my knee down into the back of his skull.

Thud!

The face caved in.

"Hurk—!"

Under that enormous impact he vomited where he stood and crumpled to the ground. Over him, I knelt and whispered at his ear.

"For a piece of trash like you, that life was far too precious to be something you were allowed to kill."

Far too precious, for a life that would have had to die on account of garbage like this—a being he had no right even to look at.

"So pay the price for reaching toward what you were never worthy to behold."

Saying so, I glanced behind me. As if sensing the danger, an elderly person was hastily drawing back with the child held in their arms.

What I had feared most was the horrific sight that child would see in the very next moment. That worry was gone now.

Thud!

The fist came down. With that single blow, the contemptible man's life was finished. A death as shabby as his influence on the world—as shabby as the presence he had hungered for.

"A—a person?!"

People packed the surroundings. Criminal though he was, at the scene of the sentence they screamed, some filling the gap with their phones, some with their cries.

It was the moment I meant, as always, to slip away from the scene.

"…"

Behind me, through the chaos, I could see the Karma I had not caught in the confusion, floating above the elementary student's head.

Positive Karma, seldom seen. Good deeds, and a merit that did not belong to that age, shone with a brilliant light.