Baek Aeyeong strode about leisurely with the satisfied gait of a lion that had conquered the jungle, and began to meddle with those around her. The items stuffed in her pockets were so abundant that one might mistake them not for gold or money, but simply for a display of leisure.
The first one caught by Baek Aeyeong was Seo Jihyeok, who happened to be the closest. He was pulling out bandages and ointment of unknown origin from another drawer he had rummaged through, and Baek Aeyeong watched his actions and asked.
“Didn’t you grab anything for Jihyeon-unni as a gift?”
“From here? I don’t give things I picked up to anyone as gifts.”
Seo Jihyeok looked around the wrecked accessory shop and swept his eyes over the necklaces, earrings, and bracelets strewn about. Then he awkwardly scratched the back of his head with his fingertips and asked in a low voice.
“...What do women like?”
“Solid gold, cash, bank deposits, installment savings, wire transfers, earnings, prize money...”
“...I wasn’t asking what you like. No. I asked wrong. It’s my fault.”
Seo Jihyeok crammed the bandages and ointment into his pocket and replied weakly.
“I’m right about everything.”
Baek Aeyeong said in a voice full of conviction. Seo Jihyeok answered her in a slightly uncertain tone.
“It’s not that you’re wrong. You’re only listing things that would be too burdensome to suddenly receive from a coworker of the opposite sex.”
“Really? Well, I think giving what I suggested would be better than giving weird teddy bears or flowers or whatever.”
“I don’t think so. ...Then what do women hate?”
“Electroplated gold, withdrawals, unpaid fees, late charges, all sorts of bills, stingy bastards who are salty like salt...”
Seo Jihyeok seemed to regret asking Baek Aeyeong such a question. He let out a low groan, lightly shook his head, and replied soullessly.
“I’ll handle it myself.”
Baek Aeyeong quickly lost the interest she had shown Seo Jihyeok and sauntered toward her second prey, Tumanako. Perhaps because she moved so silently, Tumanako failed to notice Baek Aeyeong had approached right next to her. So when Baek Aeyeong spoke to Tumanako, she literally jumped in surprise, springing up on the spot.
“What are you looking at? Do you like that necklace?”
“Huh?! Oh. ...Oh. It’s pretty, right? It was so expensive that I only looked at it last time I came here.”
“Then take it this opportunity.”
Tumanako’s eyes shook wildly with hesitation at Baek Aeyeong’s simple words. Then she spoke in a gloomy voice.
“It belongs to someone.”
“It does.”
Baek Aeyeong took the necklace Tumanako had been looking at down from the wall. She lightly undid the clasp and hung it around Tumanako’s neck. Baek Aeyeong said to Tumanako, who wore the desired necklace around her neck with a complicated expression.
“I stole it and gave it to you. Wow. It suits you well. The necklace has found a new owner.”
Then she started walking again, sauntering. Baek Aeyeong’s third target was me. She approached me, who had been watching from afar, like a king strolling boldly through his palace. Seeing John Doe sitting in a chair and me standing next to him, Baek Aeyeong asked.
“Isn’t it hard carrying this person around?”
“Of course it is.”
“You said you’d ask whether he’ll come with us or not when he wakes up, right?”
“Yes.”
I had guessed Baek Aeyeong would ask about John Doe’s physical condition since he was unconscious. But Baek Aeyeong lightly shook her head and then whipped her palm out like a lash at John Doe’s cheek. There was no time to stop her. John Doe’s face snapped hard to the right once, then to the left once.
It happened in less than a second, and I froze without even properly processing what had occurred. John Doe, having been slapped in the face a second time, jolted awake in surprise.
Mmph? Mmph?!
“He’s awake.”
Baek Aeyeong nodded at me again and raised her thumb. Leaving behind the astonished me and the dazed John Doe who had woken up from being slapped, Baek Aeyeong turned around and gradually moved away.
Baek Aeyeong started walking toward her final target, Sin Haeryang, with cheerful steps. I sighed and spoke to John Doe in a small voice.
“I’ll untie what’s in your mouth, so don’t scream.”
With his reddened, swelling cheeks, John Doe looked at me and nodded. Despite being slapped twice in a row, there were no open cuts on John Doe’s lips or cheeks. Only his cheeks were swelling up quickly; I would have to look to see what state the inside of his mouth was in. Besides, to get an answer, he needed to be able to speak.
I looked at the gag tied in his mouth, trying to undo it, but I couldn’t begin to guess how it was tied. It seemed Seo Jihyeok had undone it in one go? Had I pulled it like this? No? Like that? While I was struggling hard looking at the back of John Doe’s neck, then his mouth, tugging the rope this way and that, Sin Haeryang, who had been talking with Baek Aeyeong, approached. Seeing that John Doe had come to his senses, he spoke.
“We’ll get your answer in this state. If you want to part with us, we’ll leave you here. ...If you want to come with us, you have to go gagged and with your wrists bound. Nod if you prefer the former, and shake your head if it’s the latter.”
I thought John Doe would nod his head violently back and forth like a rock band singer. But unexpectedly, John Doe shook his head from side to side.
...Why?
I stared blankly at the direction of John Doe’s head without understanding. I wondered if I had misunderstood or if the translation was wrong, but John Doe shook his head from side to side again. Sin Haeryang looked at John Doe, then soon spoke with Seo Jihyeok. Once Sin Haeryang moved away, I asked John Doe.
“Why did you make that choice? Even if you come with us, don’t you think the people here won’t be of help to you? You get hit. You faint. You’re tied up and treated like livestock, aren’t you? I would like to escape together as best as possible, but if it isn’t safer for you to come with us, I think it would be fine to part ways here.”
“Mmph! Mmph mmph!”
I had been curious about the difference between the armed and unarmed believers of the Muhan Church at the 2nd Undersea Base, but did this person really have to be sacrificed like this in the process? John Doe tried to say something to me, but words wouldn’t come out because of what was in his mouth. I wanted to untie him, but the way Sin Haeryang had tied the knot, it seemed impossible to undo without a knife. I recalled the answer I had given to Henry and asked the tied-up man with an uneasy heart.
“By any chance... do you really like this kind of thing?”
“Mm-mmph! Mm-mm-mmph! Mmph mmph!”
John Doe, making an expression as if his stomach were bursting, turned his head this way and that, then picked up a bottle of nail polish from the display case with his bound hands. He tried to open the nail polish bottle with his tightly bound hands, but dropped it on the floor three times in vain, and seemed to realize he couldn’t open it with his own hands.
John Doe handed me a bottle of nail polish containing blue glitter. Wondering why he was doing this, I obediently took the bottle and opened it. I dipped the brush attached to the lid generously into the nail polish and tried to paint John Doe’s right thumb nail, which he was holding out toward me.
John Doe smacked my hand away in annoyance. He grabbed the brush from the fallen lid and started drawing. It was only when John Doe dipped the brush into the nail polish bottle more than three times because the brush had quickly dried that I realized it was writing.
Ah. ...So that’s why he wanted this. I thought he was suddenly handing me the nail polish to ask me to paint it for him.
[They might say they’ll let me go and then kill me. They won’t let me leave peacefully. I’m not a pervert!]
The last sentence was painted faintly in a desperate blue that seemed about to break off. So John Doe had chosen to come along while still tied up because he thought he would be killed under the lie of being set free.
“I’m sorry. Communication isn’t easy.”
John Doe looked at me with resentful eyes, then slumped as if letting the strength out of his shoulders. When the nail polish bottle spilled, John Doe applied some to his finger and wrote on the floor, avoiding the glass shards.
[Help me escape when the time is right.]
It was just my thought, but that seemed like the worst choice you could make.
Zi Xuan’s escape came to mind automatically. No matter how much I thought about it, the people of the engineer family team seemed to enormously dislike impulsive actions. Wouldn’t it be better to be honest and part ways here?
“I think it would be better to tell Haeryang to leave you here. They’ll want to leave you behind.”
[How can I trust these people? If things go wrong, they might kill you too.]
John Doe hurriedly smeared the words he had written on the floor at the sound of someone stepping on glass.
Seo Jihyeok spoke in a fast voice.
“Now, now. I have no intention of wasting more than three minutes in these ruins. There are too many tourist spots left to see. We need to quickly take a glance and run.”
And he tried to get everyone moving again. Everyone who had scattered gathered in the center of the accessory shop. Sin Haeryang, who was at the very back, quickly swept his eyes over me, Tumanako, and John Doe, then snatched a small nail clipper from inside John Doe’s palm that no one knew when he had hidden, and took it away without a word.
John Doe’s face turned pale.
Sin Haeryang once again scanned John Doe from head to toe with his eyes, then urged John Doe to sit down on the floor. Baek Aeyeong had already come to stand beside me and Tumanako.
John Doe hesitated, then pushed the glass aside with the sole of his shoe and obediently sat on the floor. Sin Haeryang pulled out something long and slender that looked similar to a dental explorer from the ankle area of the long jeans John Doe was wearing. The back of Sin Haeryang’s hand brushed past John Doe’s neck as he bent down to pull out the metal object. John Doe instantly stiffened his body rigidly.
“What is that?”
When I asked Tumanako, who was right next to me, what Sin Haeryang had pulled out, Tumanako narrowed her eyes and said.
“It’s a tool used for trimming nails. Haven’t you used one?”
You trim nails with something like that? Isn’t that a torture device?
Without a word, Sin Haeryang threw the nail clipper and the metal tool said to be used for nail trimming into a corner far away. A metallic clatter rang out as they hit the floor.