Now That My Affection for Aunt Min-jung Has Been Exposed, I'll Become a Madman Who Won't Hesitate to Kill [Re-educating the Rapist][3]
“So our Man-bok is more terrified of someone else than he is of me right now,”
“Which means that bastard’s no ordinary piece of work.”
“And that same bastard is currently threatening the community I’m part of.”
Having devised his own method for prying Kim Man-bok’s mouth open, Geum Tae-yang muttered the words under his breath, building the tension like a carefully staged monologue.
In truth, every word was meant for Kim Man-bok’s ears.
“In that case, Man-bok, this is something you need to think about carefully. At this point, wouldn’t figuring out who’s behind you be a hell of a lot more important to me than just killing you? That’s the rational move, right? What do you think?”
He looked down at Kim Man-bok, who still clutched his head with both hands, and asked the question.
Geum Tae-yang was offering him a deal.
“W-what the hell does that mean…?”
Kim Man-bok had been drowning in despair, certain every possible escape had vanished. But Tae-yang’s words sounded close enough to a negotiation that he stole a sidelong glance, clearly tempted.
“What it means is that instead of killing you, I get more out of digging up whoever put you up to stalking Aunt Min-jung.”
“No—wait. Against someone like that, I should be thinking even bigger, shouldn’t I? Just finding out who he is probably isn’t enough. Let me rethink this.”
“From the look of things, you two have a pretty solid connection. In that case, it might be smarter to keep using you as a go-between, steadily pulling information on the guy and watching how things develop.”
Looking down at Kim Man-bok, Geum Tae-yang saw the hopeful glint in his eyes.
So he kept feeding him lines that would make Man-bok cling even harder to that hope.
“I mean… if you suddenly pivot like that, I don’t know if I can just…”
The bait was almost too good.
But Kim Man-bok couldn’t bring himself to bite right away.
Extreme anxiety had him completely in its grip.
He was already a suspicious bastard by nature; cornered like this, he had shriveled up even tighter.
“Yeah, I’ll be honest—I was pissed as hell when I first heard about your murders. But I’ve survived six days in this shitshow. I’ve always gone for the most rational path.”
“So I’m trying to look at this situation the same way—rationally, my own way.”
“Rape-murder is some seriously disgusting shit, sure. But I’m not about to play justice warrior in the middle of an apocalypse. My priority is protecting A-young and Aunt Min-jung. That’s what makes sense.”
The man in front of him had raped and killed multiple women.
And he had used every underhanded trick imaginable to wriggle free of the situation they were in now.
Fully aware of all that, Geum Tae-yang worked his tongue with practiced skill, trying to dismantle Kim Man-bok’s wariness piece by piece.
“Mmm…”
To Kim Man-bok, Tae-yang’s logic actually sounded reasonable.
But this was an apocalypse. One wrong move, one wrong word, and he could end up completely fucked.
He kept his reaction cautious.
A slow grin spread across Tae-yang’s face.
The timid response was more than enough.
Feeling that Man-bok had accepted his justification, Geum Tae-yang lifted the corner of his mouth in quiet triumph.
“So here’s what we do, Man-bok. You spill everything about your backer, and I’ll take you to the police station.”
Having locked in the terms of the deal, Tae-yang laid out the method.
“No matter how chaotic the cops are right now, you think they’re going to ignore ironclad evidence like this?”
“Of course they’ll arrest you. And that’s a win for you—because right now, the safest place you could possibly be is a holding cell.”
“I’ve done some digging. The Harim-dong police station is still actively managing their area. I’ll personally haul your ass over there. It’s not that far from Pyeonghwa-dong, so it’s no big deal for me either.”
The bait Tae-yang had dangled was a free ticket into police custody.
In the end, Kim Man-bok was terrified of the retaliation he would face from his backers the moment he talked.
Judging by the state he was in, he had zero ability to survive on his own while dodging them.
Geum Tae-yang himself had no interest in protecting the bastard either.
Which made a holding cell the perfect place for Kim Man-bok to disappear into.
“I’ve heard people saying the holding cells are the coziest spots around these days. Apparently even the ones who’ve already been in are fighting to get back inside.”
“See this, Kim Man-bok? There are review posts and everything.”
Using Kim Man-bok’s own phone, Geum Tae-yang pulled up an online community and deliberately showed him posts from people who had gotten themselves locked up and lived to write about it.
With the zombie apocalypse now fully in view, all kinds of stories were circulating online.
And the hottest topic by far was where to go when things went wrong—the safest places.
Every time that conversation came up, police station holding cells got mentioned like clockwork.
It wasn’t just talk. People were deliberately starting brawls just to get thrown inside, and the numbers were climbing fast.
As a rapist-murderer, Kim Man-bok would have no trouble jumping the line in that competition.
“For real…? Geum Tae-yang, you’re not gonna kill me? You’re actually gonna hand me over to the cops…?”
Tae-yang’s effort—digging up community posts and everything—had paid off.
Recognizing that a holding cell was the only place that might guarantee his safety, Kim Man-bok asked the question in a careful voice, though his eyes were full of desperate hope.
“Obviously. Think about it logically. You’re a logical guy. That’s why everyone always looked at you sideways. Even you can feel it, right?”
Tae-yang answered with a completely serious expression.
He needed to sell the trust.
And after all, he had become a kind of broker now, hadn’t he?
He made sure to show just how well he, the broker, knew his client Kim Man-bok.
Back in their school days, people had often sneered that Kim Man-bok was a calculating little shit.
The psycho streak, the creepy vibe, the complete lack of human warmth—all of it had woven together into his life as a total outcast.
“Do Min-chul… Min-chul ordered me to stalk Kim Min-jung…”
In the end, Kim Man-bok spilled the name of his backer.
That backer was Do Min-chul, the top delinquent boss of Hanseong Metropolitan City.
“What the fuck? That piece of shit Do Min-chul? Why the hell would that bastard go after Aunt Min-jung????”
Hearing the answer, Geum Tae-yang tilted his head in pure disbelief.
Since Joo Chang-je ran with Do Min-chul’s crew, Tae-yang had already included him in the range of possibilities.
But the motive side of things had been completely murky, which was exactly why he had gone as far as offering a deal just to get a clear picture.
“You fought Do Min-chul in secret back in first year of high school, right…?”
Now fully in blabber mode, Kim Man-bok immediately launched into the reason.
“How the hell do you know that? It was literally private. No way Do Min-chul would’ve told anyone.”
Geum Tae-yang answered with wide eyes.
Aside from the times he had simply beaten someone down after they picked a one-sided fight, the only time in his entire life he had ever squared up properly for a real match was against Do Min-chul.
Back then, Do Min-chul had already unified the entire academy district of Hanseong Metropolitan City under his rule.
And the one person who had gotten under his skin was Geum Tae-yang.
Tae-yang never went around flexing his strength, but among the so-called hidden experts of the underground, the consensus was that Geum Tae-yang was the only one who could actually go toe-to-toe with Do Min-chul.
In reality, because Park A-young was such a famous figure in the Hanseong academy scene, Tae-yang had clashed with Do Min-chul’s crew a few times.
Through those run-ins, Do Min-chul himself had felt Tae-yang’s not-to-be-underestimated presence.
So he had brought a few of his core boys and come looking for him.
That was how the fight between the two schoolyard fighters went down—and the winner was Geum Tae-yang.
But the victor, Tae-yang, had kept the whole thing private.
He hadn’t wanted word of his win getting out and dragging him into every random mess.
“I got close with Chang-je, so he told me… Chang-je was getting pretty stressed out under Do Min-chul too… Apparently that fight made Do Min-chul grind his teeth over you…”
Losing the fight had already been a massive humiliation.
But the fact that Geum Tae-yang had deliberately kept it secret was, from Do Min-chul’s perspective, the ultimate insult on top of the insult.
Being the king of the delinquent world had been his pride and his greatest achievement.
Yet to Tae-yang it had meant nothing at all—and that had scraped him raw.
“So Do Min-chul’s side was stuck trying to figure out how to take you down… then they heard I was stalking Park A-young, pulled me into the crew, and gave me the order… saying there was something going on between you and Aunt Kim Min-jung…”
Simple revenge alone hadn’t been enough to satisfy Do Min-chul.
Like a true king of thugs, he had sniffed out the subtle tension between Kim Min-jung and Geum Tae-yang.
Deciding that Kim Min-jung was Tae-yang’s Achilles’ heel, he had put Kim Man-bok on the job of watching her.
“…”
After hearing the full story, Geum Tae-yang fell silent and stared straight ahead.
This was a man who usually dumped out a full bowl of thick curses every time he confirmed something shocking.
But now his face had gone completely blank as he stayed quiet.
He was feeling a murderous intent that went all the way down to the bone.
The kind of killing urge that no amount of swearing or rage could ever burn off.
“Do Min-chul’s a vicious bastard who fights well enough to unify the academy district, sure. But even so, the fact that you’re still more scared of him than of me—someone who could kill you right this second—still doesn’t sit right with me.”
A man who has truly swallowed his rage becomes calm.
Because grinding that target into dust becomes his absolute number-one priority.
In a low voice, Geum Tae-yang looked at Kim Man-bok again, probing once more.
“Th-that’s… I don’t know if you’ll believe me, but… Min-chul awakened after killing a zombie…”
To that question, Kim Man-bok delivered an extremely satisfying answer.
“Oh? Awakened?”
Landing an unexpected big fish, a faint expression finally returned to Geum Tae-yang’s previously blank face.
“Hmm. Yeah, I’ve heard plenty of talk online about people awakening after taking down zombies. Half skeptical, half ‘maybe it’s possible.’ But somehow I don’t think you’d bother lying about something like that, Kim Man-bok.”
A small smile curved his lips.
It was the kind of smile that said, I’m trusting your words enough—so keep talking.
“With that awakening ability, he even started swallowing up the organized crime groups he already had connections with a few days ago… When I heard that, I realized it was a size I couldn’t handle…”
Kim Man-bok spilled even more detailed dirt.
Once the delinquent king Do Min-chul gained an awakening ability, he had started rolling out a whole new business in this world that had turned into pure chaos.
It was his desperate struggle to transform from delinquent king into villain king.
“Do Min-chul’s awakening ability is that strong? Strong enough to build a whole faction?”
For a moment Geum Tae-yang’s eyes went wide.
This reaction wasn’t for show—it was genuine curiosity.
Tae-yang himself had already gained an awakening ability.
And from his perspective, no matter what power you held, there was a world of difference between defending and going on the attack.
On top of that, among attack styles, simply smashing things apart and absorbing entire forces into your own were completely different dimensions.
“From what I heard, Do Min-chul’s awakening ability is something on the mind-control side… That’s why Chang-je even bragged to me once that he got a temporary buff from it.”
Mind control.
The reason Do Min-chul’s rampage had been extreme enough to make even Tae-yang tilt his head was the special nature of the awakening ability he possessed.
Huh. Mind control?
The awakening ability of the delinquent king Do Min-chul—mind control—was genuinely shocking.
Even Geum Tae-yang, who was currently hunting zombies with a projection steel pipe charged with mana energy, found his mouth hanging open at the power of it.
“Do you know anything more concrete about that mind-control ability?”
That was why Tae-yang fired off more questions packed with real curiosity.
It was the type of awakening ability where advance information mattered more than almost any other.
“I only heard it from Chang-je, so that’s all I’ve got… Chang-je said he doesn’t know the details either…”
But that was the full extent of the information Kim Man-bok possessed.
“I really told you everything I know, okay??? You’re gonna keep your promise, right??? You’re gonna take me to the cops, right???”
And because he was so thoroughly terrified, he openly revealed that he had completely run out of cards to play.
“I already told you—that option works out better for me too.”
With a smooth motion, Geum Tae-yang released the pressure of his right knee that had been pinning Kim Man-bok down and slowly stood up.
“Hahaha…!!! Th-thank you…!!! Thank you, Tae-yang…!!!”
Kim Man-bok burst out in excited, overwhelmed gratitude.
“From an information standpoint, yeah, that would be the right call…”
A low, rising hum filled the air as Geum Tae-yang poured projection energy into his steel pipe.
“But at a time like this, a hundred and fifty points is just too damn big to pass up!!!”
A brilliant flash erupted as he raised the projection steel pipe high, aiming straight for Kim Man-bok’s head.