Chapter 54
Chapter 54
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 54
Chapter Title: The Unraveling Truth
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Haon entered the fourth-floor lab and displayed the contents of the phone on her computer.
She had taken advantage of the chaos to copy Gowon's phone from the inmate property storage.
“Why did you have to go that far? If you were caught, they might think you killed him.”
Juyeol clicked his tongue, pulling up a chair to sit beside Haon.
For this to happen right when Eun Haon had requested a visit with Gowon. The timing was just too perfect.
“I was in the counseling room at the time. I also broke the CCTV camera when I entered the visitation area, so it should be fine.”
Haon was anxious too, but she tried to calm herself by reminding herself that she had an alibi.
She was oblivious to the fact that Juyeol was staring at her with a look of disbelief, especially at the part about ‘breaking the CCTV camera’.
The encrypted messages were still saved on Gowon's phone.
Fortunately, they weren't set to self-destruct after a certain amount of time.
For Haon, this was like a crossword puzzle.
“What was so important on that bastard's phone that you had to copy it?”
“‘Eun Haon’… no, I… apparently called Gowon to Korea to get an Awakening Sphere from you. The deal was that he'd turn himself in, in exchange for me paying off his debt.”
“Hah.”
Juyeol let out a disbelieving laugh.
Back when he'd made the deal with Eun Haon, she had been disturbingly obsessed with the Awakening Sphere.
It was hard to believe she was the same person as the Eun Haon before him now.
“But I never paid Gowon the final amount.”
Haon continued, her fingers clacking on the keyboard.
“Gowon definitely received the final payment and turned himself in right after. That's been bothering me.”
“You only asked for one Awakening Sphere… Does that mean someone else wanted Gowon brought to Korea?”
“Seems like it, right? Ah, got it.”
Haon quickly decrypted the messages and displayed them in chronological order.
Juyeol also scanned the messages that appeared on the large screen.
“With both of us looking, we should be able to find anything suspicious quickly.”
They needed to find out who sent the final payment on the day Gowon was arrested.
Haon's intuition screamed that this person was definitely connected to Gowon's death.
*...Huh?*
Just then, Haon paused as she read a certain message.
Her face grew paler as she moved to the next message, and the one after that.
*W-what is this?*
She stared intently at the monitor, but nothing changed. She hadn't misread it.
“The one who sent Gowon the final payment that day was…”
“Halo?”
The two of them stared wide-eyed, stunned by the unexpected name.
In that moment, Haon spotted something hidden between the messages.
“Wait. Blue!”
She immediately snatched it and decrypted it, revealing a voice recording.
Haon exchanged a suspicious glance with Juyeol and played the audio file.
In case it was set to delete after one play, she also instructed Blue to make a backup recording.
And the words that flowed from the recording, spoken by Gowon, were shocking.
[So, you're saying that if I take the fall for one case of arson that you, Halo, committed, you'll pay off all my debts. Is that it?]
“…?”
A beat later, a horrified Haon clamped a hand over her mouth.
Take the fall? For an arson committed by Halo?
*The person who set fire to Juyeol's house ten years ago... wasn't Gowon?*
Haon suddenly felt a chill run through her heart.
Halo was the real culprit and had paid the final amount, yet Gowon had only waited for ‘Eun Haon's’ call.
That meant…
“...!”
A strong premonition washed over her—she had to stop this recording immediately.
“B-Bl—mmph—”
The moment she tried to give Blue a new command, a large hand covered her mouth.
Haon's heart sank. Juyeol had clearly sensed something was wrong, too.
His face was cold and hard as he listened intently to the recording.
[That's right. When you enter the country, Dr. Eun Haon will contact you. It's her plan, so she'll protect you until you're arrested.]
Haon's face turned deathly pale at Halo's reply.
[How did you even know I was being hounded by debt collectors...? I can trust you, right?]
[I'll send the down payment today, so turn yourself in after you receive the final payment.]
[Well, alright. Let's work out the contract then.]
As Gowon and Halo's conversation played, Haon clutched at the hand covering her mouth, not knowing what to do.
She didn't know why Halo had set fire to a house in the old district.
Juyeol was more important than that.
The look on his face as he'd tried to kill Gowon, only to end up cuffing him, kept replaying in her mind.
Had she just shoved him, a man who was finally starting to find some peace, back into the dark abyss of vengeance and rage?
Did she have the right to do that? What would happen to their relationship now?
Would he shoot her? Or grab her by the collar?
*Maybe... maybe he'll trust me this time, too. We've gotten pretty close. He's helped me. This might work out better than I think.*
Just as she was trying her best to think positively, the rough hand covering her mouth pulled away.
Haon turned to him, clinging to that sliver of hope.
His dark, trembling eyes met hers.
“A false confession?”
Meeting his gaze, Haon recoiled as if her heart had stopped.
Bewilderment.
Betrayal.
Disappointment.
Despair.
Regret.
Vengeance.
And again, rage.
Countless emotions swirled in his eyes, merging into a single, dark mass.
“This… was all your plan?”
Hearing his trembling voice, Haon couldn't bring herself to shake her head.
There was no way to know whose name ‘Eun Haon’ had intended to give Juyeol.
“Say something.”
As Haon's lips merely trembled, he pressed her, his voice laced with desperation.
His eyes pleaded with her to say it wasn't true, looking increasingly anxious.
The longer she met his gaze, the more her mind went blank, and she began to ramble.
“I-I'm really a different person from the ‘Eun Haon’ you know. It wasn't me… I can prove it. That wasn't me. Really…”
“Why? Can't you remember that either?”
Juyeol clenched his jaw so hard it made a sound, then let out a hollow laugh.
“The times you tried to kill me, all the countless things you've done. None of that shit matters. But this… This is different.”
He muttered emptily and turned away.
“Juyeol!”
Tears streamed down Haon's face as she desperately grabbed onto him.
Juyeol flinched at the sight and whipped his head away, avoiding her gaze.
“Don't come to the safe house for a while. And don't contact me.”
“...!”
Haon felt the ground crumble beneath her feet.
The fear that he would never see her again felt like it was choking her.
She was being left all alone again in this strange dimension. The foreseeable loneliness was already stabbing her in the back.
He walked away without a backward glance.
All Haon could do was watch blankly as Juyeol got on the elevator and left.
Through the closing doors, she heard Juyeol's trembling voice.
“Hah, I must have been crazy.”
* * *
Haon sat blankly in the research institute's cafe, her eyes swollen and puffy.
The police had just left.
The officers, who had arrived right after Juyeol left, seemed to consider Haon a suspect.
Feeling wronged and miserable about the whole situation, Haon burst into tears like a broken faucet.
She cried while answering their questions, cried while explaining the situation at the time of the explosion.
Then she thought of how coldly Juyeol had left and sobbed her heart out again.
At first, the officers were taken aback, but by the end, they left with exasperated expressions, completely fed up.
Since Haon's alibi was solid, there was nothing more they could do.
Having cried so much, Haon was completely drained, staring blankly into space.
[Haon! You have a visitor. It's a Hero!]
At Blue's notification, she shot up and looked toward the entrance.
But it wasn't Juyeol who walked into the cafe.
“Dr. Eun. I heard reports that Gowon is dead…?”
River, who had been looking around the cafe as she approached, froze when she saw Haon, who had very obviously been crying her eyes out.
Crying? Dr. Eun Haon?
Was it even possible for “Eun Haon” and “tears” to exist in the same sentence?
River looked as confused as someone discovering a platypus for the first time.
Meanwhile, Haon stared blankly at the goblin emblem on River's clothes, her eyes welling up with tears again.
River recoiled, unable to believe her eyes.
“Wha-what? What's going on?”
“Waaah…”
Haon finally broke down sobbing. River's jaw dropped, her expression like she was seeing something that shouldn't exist.
Just then, the hurried footsteps of two people entered the cafe.
“Eun Haon! You're in the news. Don't tell me you got your memory back?”
“Unni! The police were leaving here. Was it because of what happened at the rehabilitation center?”
Chacha and Bani came running in, their faces full of anticipation for some juicy news, but their eyes widened in shock.
“Uh, Unni?”
“Eun Haon, are you… crying?”
No matter how much ‘that Eun Haon’ had lost her marbles, for her to be crying so sorrowfully...
If it were anyone else, maybe, but seeing Haon cry was unbelievable. It would be more realistic to see a random Hero crying on the street.
The two, utterly shocked, exchanged glances.
*'What's wrong with her?'*
*'I have no idea.'*
Baffled by the inexplicable situation, they finally noticed River, and their eyes instantly turned sharp.
They didn't know what this Hero had done to Haon, but it must have been something truly heinous. There was no other reason Haon would be crying so pitifully.
Noticing their pointed glares, River instantly looked wronged and waved her hands defensively.
“I-It wasn't me! I didn't do it! How in the world could I possibly make Eun Haon cry!”
Even having to make such an excuse was so absurd that she felt like crying herself.