Traces of the Truth
"So this is what happened."
Using the Angel Guild's intelligence network, Lee Ha-yeon had been quietly gathering information through people she could trust. What she was collecting concerned the existence of Baekho Guild's missing eldest son — Baek Seo-jun.
"Baek Seo-jun."
Even though he had clearly lived at Baekho Guild until the age of ten, information about young Baek Seo-jun was astonishingly scarce compared to what existed for Baek Seo-jin. No official records remained. It was as if Baekho Guild had set out to erase him entirely, scrubbing every trace of his past from existence.
Can they really go this far to wipe their own son's records?
From the moment she began this investigation, Lee Ha-yeon had sensed something deeply wrong in Baekho Guild's behavior. She was beginning to understand why Baek Seo-jun used the alias Kim Ho-jun and refused to return to them — and why he had given her his real name while asking her to keep it a secret.
He was trying to stop me from getting close to Baekho Guild.
More precisely, he had given her a choice: stand against him, or keep her distance from Baekho Guild. If not for Baek Seo-jun's existence, she might have felt reasonably well-disposed toward them. They hadn't been much help, but they had at least sent supporting forces. The two guilds might even have become friendly allies. She might have seen Baek Seo-jin as a worthy rival — a good competitor.
But growing close to Baekho Guild would mean turning against the man who had saved her life. And the more she learned of their past, the more instinctive revulsion rose in her throat. Even the fragments of truth she had uncovered were enough to make one thing painfully clear: she could never befriend these people. Baek Hyeong-won, Kim Yu-jeong, and their son Baek Seo-jin — she wanted nothing to do with any of them.
"Young miss, this is the information we obtained from Baekho Guild's long-serving members."
"Thank you for your hard work."
Lee Ha-yeon had selected people within the Angel Guild who knew how to keep their mouths shut and would never leak a word to outsiders. She hadn't done this solely to keep the investigation hidden from Baekho Guild. She needed to extract testimony from those veteran members who still remembered what Baek Seo-jun had been like in the past.
Given Baekho Guild's surveillance and threats, most people would never open their mouths no matter how much money they were offered. No fortune was worth more than one's own life. But when the Angel Guild promised absolute secrecy and put a staggering sum on the table, the story changed. As long as they believed their testimony would stay confidential — that they wouldn't have to fear Baekho Guild's retaliation — they spilled every secret they had.
This is too much.
Reading through the original audio files and the neatly compiled reports, that was all Lee Ha-yeon could feel. It was simply too much. According to the guild members who had watched Baek Seo-jun's life until he was ten, he had been subjected to severe discrimination even in the most basic necessities of food and lodging.
The fact that Baekho Guild's eldest son had to go to the members' mess hall to beg for leftover scraps — and that even that was eventually forbidden because people started talking, forcing him to subsist on meals that cost less than ten dollars — was appalling. Meanwhile, the younger son, Baek Seo-jin, had been served meals worth hundreds of dollars at every sitting. There had been considerable talk about it within the guild at the time, but Baek Hyeong-won personally threatened that anyone who brought it up or spread rumors would see their entire family suffer for it. Everyone had no choice but to keep silent.
That kidnapping by villains nine years ago is suspicious too.
The Baekho Guild members hadn't been at the scene, so they didn't know the exact truth of that incident either. Not a single one of them, however, believed that Baek Hyeong-won and Kim Yu-jeong had actually grieved over Baek Seo-jun's disappearance.
They might have sold him to the villains.
Lee Ha-yeon filed the speculation away as a possibility for now. She had no hard evidence yet.
"His goal is revenge, after all..."
Having obtained this information about Baek Seo-jun, she could guess what he was after. But she had no intention of digging it up or exposing it. She would simply keep it to herself. She was merely learning about the teacher who would be instructing her from now on.
Finding the traces that truth had left behind, and knowing that Baekho Guild were people she must never get close to — that alone was harvest enough. One thing was now certain.
The Angel Guild would never grow close to Baekho Guild.
A day had passed since Gye Un-jik had inflicted those grave wounds. By the next morning, Baek Seo-jin's condition had recovered to a startling degree.
No matter how exceptional an Awakener's regenerative ability, attacks infused with mana had the effect of suppressing that recovery. Even so, an Awakener's healing was inherently remarkable, so hospital treatment alone would have restored his body quickly enough. But Baek Hyeong-won and Kim Yu-jeong couldn't bear to see their beloved son lying in a hospital bed any longer than necessary, so they spent a fortune on rare potions as well.
"Hahh..."
Thanks to his parents' love, his body was healing rapidly — but Baek Seo-jin's heart was heavy. He couldn't remember it, but he felt as though he had had a terrible dream. No. He was afraid to even think about it. A wariness had taken root in him — the sense that if he recalled something, the happiness he had now might shatter completely.
"Seo-jin, how is your body feeling now?"
"Much better."
"Good. Still, rest a little longer, just in case."
Baek Hyeong-won and Kim Yu-jeong were relieved by their son's improved condition, and they continued to fuss over him. Basking in that love, Baek Seo-jin tried to push aside whatever was nagging at him. He must never think ill of the parents who loved him — the parents he loved in return.
This stubborn conviction, already calcified by a teenage boy's obstinacy, was trying to stop his thoughts from digging too deeply into the truth. But the traces of that truth had already been stirred within him, and they would continue to torment him for a long time to come.
"Dad, Mom."
In public, Baek Seo-jin called them Father and Mother, but in private like this he still used Dad and Mom, just as he had as a child. Baek Hyeong-won and Kim Yu-jeong disliked the formality, saying it created distance.
"Yes, our son. What is it?"
"Is it possible... to seal my memories of my older brother?"
Baek Seo-jin believed that all of this was because of his memories of his brother. Whatever was making his heart so uncomfortable, whatever he must not recall — he was certain it was because of those memories. He didn't know what they contained, but his heart was telling him. If he didn't seal his memories of Baek Seo-jun — if he allowed himself to remember — something would go wrong. This happy family would fall apart.
Seeing the anxiety written across their son's face, Baek Hyeong-won and Kim Yu-jeong's eyes welled with tears. Kim Yu-jeong in particular pulled him into her arms and burst into sobs.
"Hic... hic, our Seo-jin has been suffering so much! Yes, Seo-jin. Just forget that wretched bastard."
Even this display from his mother sent a jolt of dissonance through him. The way she cursed his brother, bursting into tears and fussing over him, all because he wanted those memories sealed. But Baek Seo-jin deliberately ignored that sense of wrongness. This sickening feeling, too, would vanish once the memories were gone.
The childhood memories that had surfaced when he became an S-class hunter — if he sealed everything related to his brother, he wouldn't have to recall them. He wouldn't even have to struggle not to think about what those memories contained. And so Baek Seo-jin chose the path of turning his eyes away from the truth.
If he had been a few years older, he might have chosen to face it, however painful. But at the age of a teenager, he refused to confront it, and made this choice instead.
"I'll have someone brought in today — this very day — so we can seal every last memory of that bastard."
"Yes. Please. I'm counting on you."
Baek Seo-jin felt his heart grow lighter.
Se-hee and Lee Ha-yeon both said a man named Kim Ho-jun rescued them. Once I feel a bit better, I should go see them.
He wanted to check with his own eyes that they were all right. Because of the incident four years ago — when Kangin Guild arrested Pi Woo-jae, who had been with Baekho Guild — his relationship with Han Se-hee had been forced to begin as a pretense of friendship. However they had obtained the evidence, video footage of Pi Woo-jae murdering Han Se-hee's parents in a dungeon had been submitted, and under a truth serum he had confessed to the crime. There was no denying it. With Han Se-hee, too, they had talked about his brother Baek Seo-jun back then...
No.
Baek Seo-jin forcibly stopped the thought from leading, as it naturally wanted to, toward Baek Seo-jun. He must not think about it. He must not recall the truth about his brother, the memories of that time.
Driven by instinctive fear, desperately turning away from the truth, Baek Seo-jin averted his eyes and chose the path of immediate convenience. Raised on his parents' indulgence, he still didn't know how to face things head-on. Even if he would come to regret it terribly someday, the boy he was now couldn't think that far ahead.