Target the Scorpion Syndrome #2
The slap of the fly swatter echoed sharply as I struck Seo Gaeul’s pale, exposed thigh. An Awakened’s muscles are at least twice as dense as a normal person’s, but few people train their skin’s durability to match. That made a wide-area strike surprisingly effective.
“Aaaagh! You fucking lunatic!”
Seo Gaeul, who had been getting hit nonstop by me, finally lost her mind and let out another ear-splitting scream. Of course, no one but me was around to hear her hysterical shrieking.
Regional imbalance. Wealth gap. Low birth rates and failed redevelopment projects. All the things that had once symbolized misfortune for me had now become a blessing in disguise. That’s why people say luck and misfortune are separated by a single sheet of paper.
Anyway, I had a duty to protect, safeguard, and simultaneously develop Seo Gaeul.
“You crazy bastard— I’m going to kill you. I’m really going to kill you.”
Huff—huff—.
Seo Gaeul glared at me while breathing hard. Floating in front of her were glowing letters.
Name: Seo Gaeul
Status: 《Intense Hatred》 — Her mind has become hazy from severe dehydration and overwhelming hatred.
This was the first emotional opening Seo Gaeul had ever shown me. Strangely enough, I felt more joy—and a twisted thrill—from this crack in her emotions than from the blatant seduction earlier when she had tried to pull down the blanket and show me her white skin.
She had finally opened her heart to me!
Is this what dating is like? Do people all slowly build things up like this?
Whatever the case, there was only one thing I needed to do.
“Seo Gaeul, I’m going to save you! You have to live!”
I pried open her mouth and forced the water from the PET bottle down her throat.
Glug glug glug—.
“Mmph! Mmmph!”
“You have to drink it! Drink all of it! You must live!”
It was only natural that Seo Gaeul, who hadn’t had a single drop of water since last night, would start showing signs of dehydration. An Awakened’s active metabolism required far more fluids than a normal person’s.
“Mmph! Mmmph! You fucking lunatic! Mmmph!”
Glug glug glug—.
I shoved the entire contents of three 1.5-liter PET bottles into her mouth. After drinking that much, she should be able to last a whole day without water. Of course, because she thrashed around refusing my kindness, her face, body, blanket, and the floor all got soaked—but that was a problem I could easily fix.
“Time to give her food now.”
She had drunk water, so next came a meal. It would be good to bring a few changes of clothes too. With that in mind, I decided to head back home for now.
“I’m going to kill you! Aaaaaagh! Aaaaaaaaaaagh!”
“It really is quiet.”
Seo Gaeul was probably throwing a fit in the basement next door, but our house was completely silent. If you strained your ears, you could faintly hear her screaming “Aaaagh—”, but it was only audible to someone with senses as sharp as mine. Even if someone wandered around the area, the sound wouldn’t reach other people. That was reassuring.
Ding-dong—.
Right then, someone rang our doorbell. My heart instantly went cold. Ramen’s broth timing is everything— who the hell would show up at such a critical moment?
Ding-dong—.
“Coming.”
Clack. Creeeeak—.
When I opened the gate, I saw a man in a suit and several people standing behind him. Their postures were straight and disciplined. They definitely weren’t ordinary civilians. There was also a strong smell of blood iron.
Police? Not exactly, but they were clearly something similar. Why had people like them come to see me? What business could they possibly have? I couldn’t think of anything.
“Who are you?”
I asked the man wearing a fedora and large sunglasses. His face was heavily covered, but for some reason he felt faintly familiar.
“I am Section Chief Kim Jangdong of the Response Team from the Superhuman Management Agency, a newly established subsidiary of the National Intelligence Service under the current government.”
What? Section Chief Kim Jangdong? Why was my regular client, Chief Kim, here of all places?! Should I be happy or bewildered—?
“Have you seen these people before, kid?”
Slide—.
Chief Kim Jangdong stepped into our yard and handed me several sheets of paper. On them were the words Wanted — Kim Taeyang along with a photo.
I recognized the face. He was one of the loan sharks who had come to our house.
“We’re investigating the places these loan sharks visited before they were murdered. You know they’re dead, right? It was all over the news.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Wasn’t it you? The one who killed them. The culprit is strong enough to unilaterally beat and brutally murder three adult men armed with weapons. That means he’s an Awakened.”
“Oh, I see.”
“Ha Namjin. You’re a student at Youngsa High, right? You’d have a grudge against these loan sharks. It fits perfectly. Could you be that ‘Judge’? The psycho killer who only targets criminals?”
Chief Kim Jangdong had completely missed the mark. I was actually the one who felt most inconvenienced by those loan sharks’ deaths. I had planned to ask them about kidnapping techniques. If I had gotten information from them, I never would have considered the ridiculous plan of climbing forty floors of a conglomerate headquarters the hard way.
Chief Kim Jangdong narrowed his eyes, then pulled a business card from his pocket and handed it to me.
“Contact me if anything comes up.”
“Will do.”
“Oh, by the way—does a student named Seo Gaeul attend your school?”
“Pardon?”
“Do you know anything about that student?”
This caught me off guard. The conversation had suddenly drifted straight toward Seo Gaeul. Was he about to ask about her disappearance or kidnapping?
While I was carefully considering how to answer, a woman who appeared to be an employee nudged Chief Kim Jangdong’s side and said, “Section Chief. That matter is still—”
“Ah, never mind. You were boiling ramen, weren’t you? The smell is all over the house. Enjoy your meal.”
Chief Kim Jangdong suddenly changed his attitude, put his shoes back on, and left. Only after everyone had filed out and I could no longer sense their presence did I finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Feels like my lifespan just got shortened by five years.
But it was still too early to relax. I first checked under the table and every corner of the house.
“There they are. Listening devices.”
I remembered how Chief Kim Jangdong used to plant bugs all over our house whenever he commissioned me with requests like “Please whip me.” It seemed that habit hadn’t changed. I collected a total of five bugs—just like before. The last one was in a hard-to-find spot, so it took some time.
“Damn it, the ramen’s all soggy now.”
The sudden visit had wasted a whole hour. What if Seo Gaeul got angry because she was hungry? From what I saw on MeTube, women become extremely cranky and violent when they’re hungry. I hurriedly grabbed the ramen pot and headed for the basement next door.
Clack. Creeeeak—.
When I opened the basement door and stepped inside, Seo Gaeul was sitting far more demurely than I expected. However, a strange atmosphere lingered around her. Her face was flushed red, her breathing was ragged, and the way she twitched her thighs and subtly twisted her body gave off a faintly erotic vibe.
What the—?
IQ 140 brain running at full power! Conclusion!
“Do you need to use the bathroom?”
“I’ll kill you!”
Name: Seo Gaeul
Status: 《Intense Rage》 — She is genuinely pissed off.
Seo Gaeul was truly furious. At that moment, it felt like something exploded like a fountain inside my head.
Of course.
I had just forced her to drink a ton of water. By the law of conservation of mass, that same amount of water would now be stored inside her body, and it would naturally want to come out.
“Gaeul, if you hold it in you’ll get cystitis.”
“Aaaaaaaaaagh! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!”
Seo Gaeul’s face turned red like a maple leaf as she began thrashing around again. She looked so deranged that even I felt a chill run down my spine. She must have been really hungry.
“Alright, alright. Eat this first. It’s your meal. Spam and ssamjang ramen.”
“Who the hell would eat this crap? Do you enjoy tormenting me that much? You son of a bitch! Are you seriously trying to screw with me using food? You perverted bastard!”
I wasn’t tormenting her. I had even specially added Spam to the ramen today. But Seo Gaeul seemed displeased with something and kicked the pot with her foot, spilling all the ramen I had gone to the trouble of cooking.
Splash—.
“Serves you right!”
“……”
A vein bulged on my forehead. One of the things I hated most was people wasting food. But the other party was Seo Gaeul. I figured I should let it slide once. Just as she had given me a second chance, I wanted to give her one too.
“Gaeul, you and I are going to be together for a long time. We have to become soul partners, best friends. We’re going to get close anyway, so let’s stop being so prideful.”
“Fuck off!”
“I already did! Back in sixth grade! My mom tricked me by saying she’d buy me pork cutlet!”
“You lunatic!”
Hmm, what a delightfully sweet curse. I cleaned up the spilled ramen from the floor and stepped out of the basement. I felt like I was gradually seeing more and more of Seo Gaeul’s ‘bottom.’ But they say love grows stronger when you reveal each other’s scars, wounds, and hidden sides, right? Just like that, I found myself liking Seo Gaeul even more.
Even so, I had to admit it honestly.
I was a complete beginner when it came to training or education. I was worried about how to structure the curriculum going forward. If those loan sharks were still alive, I could have learned how to properly handle a kidnapped hostage. Whoever that “Judge” bastard was, he had completely ruined my plans. When I meet him someday, I’m definitely kicking him in the balls.
Wait, hold on. What if the “Judge” is a woman? She wouldn’t have balls to kick. It was a night of serious contemplation in many ways.
Anyway, the important thing was the curriculum. So I went home and watched all ten episodes of the movie Perfect Training that had left a deep impression on me before. In that film, the hostage ends up falling in love with her kidnapper. That was exactly the outcome I ultimately wanted.
“The phenomenon where the victim sympathizes with the kidnapper. I think they call that Scorpion Syndrome. Pretty smart, right? I worked hard researching it just for you.”
“It’s Stockholm Syndrome, you idiot! Aaaaaaaaaagh! Aaaaaaaaaaagh!”
Yeah—.
That was the starting point of the flashback to our story. We had finally reached this point.
“Then, Gaeul, make sure you guard the house well today too.”
I couldn’t be late for school. Since Chief Kim Jangdong was keeping an eye on me, I needed to be careful about my every move. I was about to close the iron door with a creak and head to school when Seo Gaeul shouted.
“Hey!!!!”
“What?”
I opened the iron door again and asked. Did she have an urgent matter? Maybe she needed the bathroom after all?
“Do you need to go to the bathroom that badly?”
“Thanks to you, I awakened a new Concept at dawn yesterday. It’s called ‘Lady.’ Therefore, I no longer need to use something as vulgar as a bathroom. You must have wanted to see my humiliating side, but too bad, huh?”
Awakening a new Concept? In the end, I had trained Seo Gaeul and made her even stronger. My method had been at least somewhat correct! As joy surged through me at that thought, Seo Gaeul, who had regained quite a bit of composure, looked at me with narrowed eyes and said,
“You said you wanted to train me, right? Fine. Fuck it, I’ll let you do it. But there’s a condition. If you fulfill this condition, I’ll listen to you properly. If not, I won’t cooperate either.”
“A condition?”
I was delighted! It felt like Seo Gaeul’s heart and mine were finally facing the same direction! No matter what she said, she must have liked me too. Just like the heroine in Perfect Training!
“What’s the condition?”
“Do you know Yu Yeoleum?”
“Yeoleum? Of course. She’s my best friend.”
“Kidnap that bitch too and bring her next to me.”
…….
The movie I watched didn’t have anything like this in it.