As Shin Haeryang gazed silently at Tumanako, her overflowing confidence and shamelessness seemed to gradually crumble. He spoke slowly to Tumanako.
“If you apply for a visa under E-7, it takes about a week for the Ministry of Justice to respond.”
He truly intended to apply. There was not an ounce of empty talk in him. However, Tumanako seemed reassured by those words instead.
“I can’t be dead when it gets approved, so you’ll obviously protect me, right?”
“……I’ve never applied for one on behalf of a hairdresser before, so it’s uncertain whether the Ministry of Justice will grant approval.”
Can’t you just let me become a Korean without compensation? Would anything serious happen from protecting one more woman? ……No? Is this me thinking from my own perspective? These people said the contract itself only protects Koreans. If something happens while taking a New Zealander along, could it become a matter of international dispute later?
“If you don’t take someone of my caliber, Korea will be at a loss!”
Seo Jihyeok smiled silently at those words. Then he rested his chin on one hand and watched the two.
Baek Ayeong didn’t seem interested in what Shin Haeryang and Tumanako were talking about. She quickly inspected her gun, took out all the weapons she had, checked their condition and placement, and put them all back. Then she pulled out every bundle of cash she’d hidden in her pants pockets.
Using the rubber bands strewn nearby, she gathered only the high denominations and rolled them up tight. Once the bulk was reduced by more than half, she put them in her pants pocket and checked that they were properly secured. As for the remaining small bills, she either had no intention of taking them or simply swept them up roughly and piled them inside the salon sink. Watching Baek Ayeong busy herself like a squirrel storing grain, I heard the conversation resume beside me.
“There is a condition.”
“What is it.”
Tumanako asked, clenching her fist tight. She had probably done so unconsciously, but Shin Haeryang didn’t seem the least bit concerned about the possibility of her cute little fist flying at him.
“If there is a next escape craft or opportunity to escape, please cooperate so that Bak Muhyeon can escape with the highest priority.”
When I heard my name, I snapped to attention and said,
“I’m fine.”
Both of them ignored my answer in unison.
“……Fine. The next person out after him is me. Promise me.”
“I promise.”
Tumanako held out her palm. Shin Haeryang looked at it, then grasped her hand. After holding it for a few seconds, Tumanako seemed to pull Shin Haeryang slightly toward her, but Shin Haeryang’s body, seated on the floor, didn’t budge an inch like a lump of iron. Tumanako sighed and lowered her head. Then she lightly pressed her nose against Shin Haeryang’s nose before pulling away.
“Whew. You’re handsome, so I’ll let it slide.”
As Tumanako pulled back, Seo Jihyeok made more of a fuss than Shin Haeryang, whose nose had just been rubbed.
“What. What. What did you just do? I didn’t see wrong, did I? Didn’t you two do the wrong thing—shouldn’t you have touched lips?”
Seo Jihyeok asked the two with his jaw hanging, and Baek Ayeong spoke as she separated the stolen valuables into those containing gold and those not with her fingertips.
“You idiot. It’s called a [hongi].”
“What is that. What is it. Why do they touch so close like that?”
“Imagine doing that with Liam from Engineer Batim.”
The smile vanished completely from Seo Jihyeok’s face. Then he spoke as if horrified.
“Was it an attempt to kill? Did our team leader just nearly die? But seeing how both of you are glaring at me perfectly fine, it seems whatever attempt failed.”
“You don’t have any close New Zealander friends, do you?”
At Tumanako’s question, Seo Jihyeok shrugged his shoulders and said,
“I don’t have a single person I like among those Engineer Batim bastards—not even as much as a cockroach’s hind leg.”
Tumanako watched Seo Jihyeok shudder and asked curiously,
“Why do the engineers not get along so badly? Every engineer who comes to the salon can’t wait to badmouth people from other country teams. They especially talk a lot about the Korean team.”
Seo Jihyeok reached out to help Baek Ayeong sort the valuables, got smacked hard on the back of his hand, then spoke with a sigh.
“When I first got here, the engineers got along famously. The Korean team was pushed around in the pecking order and took beatings from the other seven engineer teams in turn, so it was very peaceful. Even those who should have been at odds somehow knew the Korean engineers’ payday so well that they’d line up in order, affectionately extorting money, and they’d have fun slapping each other around like old pals.”
Tumanako froze with her mouth open.
“At that time, the Korean team leader was Team Leader Yang, affiliated with the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries. She was a woman who went missing. And Jo, who was the deputy leader, had temporarily taken over as leader, but then two employees who ran away during work hours got caught stowing away on another country’s vessel. One female employee locked down a research lab at the Jujak-dong Research Center and was eating and sleeping there. Another female employee was sharing a room with some American team thug and didn’t even come back to her own room, and the remaining retards were crawling around trying to please the other teams’ retards.”
Seo Jihyeok spoke in a depressed voice, hugging his gun.
“That bastard Deputy Leader Jo would get kneed a few times and reflexively use his team leader authority to open the employees’ doors. And Jihyeon and I had just newly joined here, right? The atmosphere was a mess, so Jihyeon and I had switched rooms, and some bastard who didn’t know opened my door while I was trying to sleep, putting on airs.”
“Wh-what happened?”
Tumanako asked, swallowing hard. Seo Jihyeok yawned as though his mouth would tear, covered it with his palm, then spoke.
“The bastard came into my room leading a group of retards, flustered, and said, huh? This isn’t the room. He said it in a tone that meant he never dreamed the room’s owner would be a handsome, dashing man in his twenties.”
Baek Ayeong made a face like she was about to vomit and said,
“Correct the wrong parts quickly.”
“I left out that he’s a dashing, accomplished, cheerful man with a great body and sexy as hell.”
“I feel sick. It’d be legal for me to puke on your head right now. ……You should have killed them all back then. A fucked-up thing happened again because you didn’t.”
Baek Ayeong seemed to be listening to Seo Jihyeok half-heartedly. She looked at the rings that seemed not to contain any gold, apparently finding the cost-benefit ratio worse than expected, and clicked her tongue.
“Cut me some slack. It was my first day at work. I had to patch them up and send them away alive, what else could I do? Team Leader Shin was arriving in a week, and I couldn’t hide five corpses in my cramped room until then. Back then, I didn’t even know how to lock my door. Just approaching the door made it open automatically like an automatic door. Plus, I didn’t know where to throw away trash, so I wiped the blood on the floor with wet wipes and hid those wipes and tissues in my room for two days, I’m telling you.”
“Ugh. A man whining like that.”
Tumanako, who had been listening to Seo Jihyeok blankly, asked,
“Didn’t anyone help or stop them?”
“They saw three guys sprawled on the floor and immediately someone called others from outside, saying people had collapsed. I was waiting with a glad heart for someone to come clean up this mess, but some New Zealander bastard who came into the room swung at my chin.”
Tumanako frowned and asked,
“I’m just asking because I’m curious, but how would you commit a perfect murder on the seabed? Can’t you just secretly dump the body in the ocean? It’s surrounded by water.”
“Trash thrown into the ocean either floats to the surface or sinks to the bottom. If I’d cleaned up a few guys and just dumped them in the sea, later an excavation robot or an engineer team repairing the outer wall might go, huh? What’s this? It’s the arms and legs of our team’s trash. And discover them. If you dump them in the waters off Daehan Island, the waves will sing lost item~ and send them right back to the white sand beach.”
Seo Jihyeok whined as if rubbing his eyes with one hand and spoke toward Baek Ayeong.
“Sniff, sniff, sniff. Ayeong. I’m only saying this now, but you don’t know the hardships I endured during the three months waiting for you to arrive.”
“I don’t want to know at all.”
“Sniff, sniff, sniff. For the crime of asking Jihyeon—Jihyeon, what time are you going to shower? How many times a day do you go to the bathroom? When are you going? What time do you sleep?—I still can’t forget the look in Jihyeon’s eyes as she stared at me like I was a pervert.”
“You really picked the pervert questions to ask.”
Seo Jihyeok quickly gave up on pouring out his past difficulties to the busy Baek Ayeong and gaining sympathy from her.
“If you hadn’t come after three months, I’d have paid back the contract fee and everything, and run away carrying Jihyeon. Team Leader Shin would have felt the same way, right? Right?”
“…….”
Shin Haeryang said nothing, but he seemed equally displeased with that situation. Seo Jihyeok spoke calmly to Tumanako.
“A seabed base is where greedy, power-drunk bastards swarm like bugs to get more mineral resources. They’re in such debt from the support they receive that it’s never enough, yet there’s one country’s team that constantly gets hounded to bring in results without any government help? And in that situation, the teammates are nothing but traitors with their eyes rolled back in their heads, trying to grovel and immigrate to other countries? Exploitation is peaceful, sure. Because you just accept the unfair treatment and let them take what they want. The reason relations are bad is because someone resisted and tried to improve things. Until now, the others sat still reaping extra benefits, but suddenly Korea went berserk and seemed to cause them losses, so the conflict continues.”
“Has it changed now?”
“Our team leader hates compromising or yielding at an appropriate point.”
When his name was suddenly brought up, Shin Haeryang shook his head and said,
“It’s a story unrelated to my work as a special duty officer. Please don’t concern yourself with it.”
Baek Ayeong picked out only the jewelry with large stones embedded in them and dumped them onto the sink piled high with bills. Then she mainly gathered precious metals made of diamond and gold, which were much smaller than the gemstones, and put them in her pockets.
“You’re not taking these?”
I asked, looking at the sink, and Baek Ayeong pointed at the raw stones in the rings and said,
“These might look pretty, but they don’t sell for money. When you’re in a situation to pack cheap opals like this, diamond or gold of the same size is best. Sir, make sure you remember that and use it later.”
“Diamond or gold is best…….”
Gold is also best for human teeth. Various things have come out trying to replace gold, but they still haven’t found a metal that can replace it.
When Shin Haeryang, having checked the time, rose to his feet, Seo Jihyeok, who had been practically lying on the floor, also sprang up. Baek Ayeong approached the door as if she would take flight. Seo Jihyeok peered around outside and slipped out. Baek Ayeong followed right behind him. Tumanako and I moved with Shin Haeryang.