When I stood frozen like a stone, Sin Haeryang shifted slightly. Maybe because he was between Joseph and me, and because of his size, even though he’d only moved the tiniest bit, I couldn’t see Joseph at all. Joseph probably couldn’t see me either.
“Save yourself with your own hands. Don’t cling to other people.”
“Did you even listen to me?! You’re asking me to do something impossible with my own power!”
“So the method you found was clinging to religion?”
Sin Haeryang neatly summed up Joseph’s longing.
“Give up. There are things in this world that can’t be done.”
So you could say it like that. I couldn’t say anything at all. Where on earth did he learn that kind of firmness? Was he born with it in his genes? Joseph stared at Sin Haeryang as if he’d been slapped across the face. Then he writhed furiously. The curses came as a bonus. His arms and legs were tied, so he was rolling on the floor, but if he’d been sitting up, his will to somehow throw himself at Sin Haeryang was unwavering. I drove the nail in for Joseph.
“With the phenomenon I’m experiencing, I don’t think it’ll be possible to achieve what you want, Mr. Joseph.”
At my words, Joseph stared blankly at me with an expression like he’d been slapped on the other cheek. Toward Sin Haeryang, he had bared his aggression without restraint, but my answer seemed to deflate him.
Sin Haeryang looked down at me and him, then began checking the belongings he had taken from people. I quietly watched as Sin Haeryang put magazines into his pockets or placed an oddly shaped knife into a desk drawer. The conversation vanished as if cut away with a blade. Once the surroundings grew quiet, I could instead replay everything we had said in my head.
“I think I know how the Church of Infinity raises money.”
Sin Haeryang glanced at me while shifting the magazines from one pocket to another.
“The Church of Infinity’s main source of income is probably patients with terminal illnesses. It would be easiest to wring money out of people who want to go back to before their disease was confirmed. If they’ve reached the terminal stage, people want to clutch at even a straw. When you’re suffering from vomiting, diarrhea, and pain, then dominated by depression and anxiety, it’s hard to think properly. If I were proselytizing for the Church of Infinity, I’d go to hospitals first. Make them buy their birthstones and pray endlessly. To let them go back to the past. If not that, I think they’d go to survivors of major accidents like me. In newspaper articles, it’s written simply as so many dead and injured, but the people who survive can’t easily escape that accident. If the Church of Infinity owns a few gem mines, their income would be even better. ······It doesn’t even have to be the patient themselves who believes. The family members connected to the patient might believe in the Church of Infinity.”
When I was able to walk again, my father didn’t think it was thanks to medical technology and rehabilitation. He thought it was because of prayer and donations. The timing really had been bad. The day his son, who still hadn’t been able to walk even after diligently doing rehab following surgery, finally managed to stand was the same day he’d gone and paid fifty thousand won to a religion, half in doubt and half in belief.
“After that, they could target people whose family members or lovers had died. If they come back to life, great, and if not, so what? They say a religion provides a welfare system even the country doesn’t offer. It wouldn’t be bad to join. They say they help you build money, honor, and new human relationships. While spending time on that, you might be able to think a little less about the past or have hope. I don’t know what kind of bastard founded this religion, but he seems exceptional at luring in desperate people who want to go back to the past, playing with them through nonsense, and sucking away their time and money.”
No matter how I thought about it, going back six hundred years the way Kanu wanted, or doing what Joseph wanted, seemed impossible. Is it just that I haven’t died enough, so I don’t know? Even so, I don’t want to die any more than this just to handle this phenomenon. All I want is to go home. ······I want to go home.
“It is not the kind of place you think it is, Savior.”
Joseph seemed to think my loathing for the Church of Infinity was because I was in the grip of a hostage-taker. He tried to soothe me, saying that once I got out of here, I should listen to the stories of people who had already gone through something like this. I don’t know. Salvation or whatever aside, just imagining how Joseph’s attitude would change if he learned that I wanted to get out of this phenomenon as quickly as possible was frightening. Joseph looked at Sin Haeryang’s profile and said,
“Do you think you’ll be able to die comfortably? Do you know how persistent our believers are? If you give up now and leave, I’ll at least speak well of you to the higher-ups so you can die without pain.”
“I see.”
Sin Haeryang answered without any rise or fall in his voice, then handed Joseph the radio and said,
“Call for support.”
“What?”
“I know you people have Deep Blue surrounded. Request more support, saying there’s a lunatic here holding an innocent dentist hostage and sending everyone who comes in to the hospital.”
They had surrounded us? No wonder Sin Haeryang had been refusing to leave. Then again, there had been all that gunfire, and a medic had come and gone too. The Church of Infinity’s believers must already be stationed around the area. Joseph, who had been spitting vicious words, made a puzzled expression at Sin Haeryang’s act of readily handing him the radio and said,
“That’s all true, but why does it feel so filthy? Is there some kind of trap?”
“I’d like to see just how persistent they are.”
Joseph, who seemed completely fed up with Sin Haeryang, looked at me once, then asked in a powerless voice,
“Hey. Don’t you just ······have any intention of letting us go?”
“Are we staying here?”
I couldn’t help asking, worried about how we could escape the Church of Infinity. Leaving me aside, even though people hostile to him were waiting armed, Sin Haeryang spoke with a face utterly devoid of tension.
“There is only one reason they aren’t forcing their way in with strength.”
“Why is that?”
“Because hostages are more often injured or killed when outside forces forcibly break in to subdue the hostage-taker than when the hostage-taker is holding them.”
How does he know things like that? ······No. I don’t even want to know.
“They’re not coming in because they’re afraid Mr. Joseph or I might die?”
“Judging from this man’s behavior, I think they’ll only care about your life, sir.”
Sin Haeryang stared quietly at Joseph, who was holding the radio, and Joseph sighed as he gripped it.
“This is Bravo Team, Joseph Graham. Hostage situation at Deep Blue. The Messiah has been taken hostage. Over.”
As if they had been waiting, an answer came from the radio. It was a heavy voice.
[Copy. This is Knight. Can you confirm the Messiah’s survival inside Deep Blue?]
“Affirmative. I lost all my team members to the hostage-taker. Requesting support that can fuck this guy up. Pour every bit of firepower you have into killing this bastard. Over.”
Hearing that nearly made my jaw drop, but Sin Haeryang, beside me, laughed lightly at the exchange.
[Can you confirm the hostage-taker’s identity and the number of perpetrators?]
Joseph looked at Sin Haeryang, then answered quickly.
“One guy, and he’s a son of a bitch! A son of a bitch!”
At Joseph’s serious voice as he answered while spraying spit onto the radio, I bit down hard on my lip to keep from laughing. Beyond the radio, a flustered voice asked again.
[······Say again?]
“It’s Ssin Haeryang! Ssin! Hae! Nyang!”
From beyond the radio came a jumble of curses and the sound of someone beside the person holding the radio explaining something, then it cut off for a moment.
[Roger. ······It seems you are referring to Sin Haeryang, the leader of the engineering Team A at the Fourth Undersea Base. I wish to speak directly with the hostage-taker. Hand over the radio. Over.]
At that, Sin Haeryang, who had heard the transmission, shook his head and said to Joseph, who was barely holding the radio with his wrists bound in front of him,
“Tell him I don’t want to talk to him. If he doesn’t want to see Park Muhyeon die right now, tell him to put someone else on.”
I decided to let Sin Haeryang’s threats to kill me go in one ear and out the other. After hearing them several times, the shock and intensity were much less than the first time. I feel like I’m developing safety insensitivity. Rather than wondering how Sin Haeryang might kill me, I was more curious why he didn’t want to talk to the person named Knight. Hearing the threat that he would kill me, Joseph spoke to the other party with a somewhat careful tone.
“He says he doesn’t want to talk to you and to put another person in charge on. This bastard is completely insane. Before working here, he was definitely a gang member on the streets or in the ghetto in Korea, or sold drugs or something. Over.”
Good heavens. This Canadian had apparently never been to Korea even once. He probably thought of Korea as being similar to America, where guns grew like weeds, or China, divided up like a pizza.
“Ordinary citizens are prohibited from owning firearms in Korea.”
At my whispered words, an expression flashed across Joseph’s face that said that couldn’t possibly be true. Since I was the Savior, Joseph seemed unable to bring himself to refute me. The voice from the radio answered quickly.
[Negative. I am the one controlling the situation. Tell him he has no choice but to speak with me.]
When Joseph looked at Sin Haeryang at those words, Sin Haeryang thought briefly, then said,
“Elizabeth Weaver. Tell him to put her on.”
“He says he wants to speak with Elizabeth Weaver.”
After a brief silence from the other side, an answer came.
[Negative.]
Hearing the other party’s refusal, Sin Haeryang answered simply.
“Tell him to think carefully for ten minutes.”
Joseph spoke to both the radio and Sin Haeryang in a reluctant tone.
“He says to think carefully for ten minutes?”
Sin Haeryang snatched the radio away, said one sentence, and cut the transmission.
“Out.”
Then he asked Joseph,
“Who is the person on the other end of the radio? The leader of the Church of Infinity?”
“What? No! The Church of Infinity hired a few mercenaries because of today’s incident. They said his name was David Knight. These are also the people who taught us shooting.”
Joseph, who had been frowning, watched Sin Haeryang’s expression and asked,
“Why aren’t you talking to him directly?”
But Sin Haeryang completely ignored Joseph’s words.
“Why did you ask for someone else instead of David Knight?”
Sin Haeryang ignored that question as well. Then Joseph looked regretful that although he wanted to kick Sin Haeryang, he couldn’t because his feet were tied. I was curious about the same things Joseph was curious about. Just in case, I asked Sin Haeryang,
“I’d like to ask again what Mr. Joseph asked.”
I didn’t particularly expect an answer from Sin Haeryang. But without even glancing at Joseph, Sin Haeryang answered me.
“Usually, the person who receives a transmission like this and gives orders is someone capable of negotiating with me, the hostage-taker.”
······So he answers my questions. Beside me, I heard Joseph’s breath catch. Sin Haeryang had treated his questions like trash and ignored them, but because he had respected me, the Savior, Joseph seemed to be hesitating over whether or not he should shower Sin Haeryang with curses.
“Uh. ······I suppose so? That’s why he answered the radio?”
“When you communicate by radio with one person in the middle, your intentions aren’t properly conveyed.”
“Uh. Right? Since Mr. Joseph has to relay the words while stuck in the middle?”
“I did it so he could experience how frustrating radio communication can be.”
Had he experienced using a radio like that before? Hearing Sin Haeryang’s answer, I was left speechless, and Joseph began cursing with the veins standing out in his neck.
“XXXXXXX! You XXXXX! ······You are the most XX-fucking-XXX I’ve ever seen. You! XXXXX! Gah! Cough! Cough! Cough!”
“If my opinion isn’t reflected ten minutes from now, I’ll tell him to think for another ten minutes. Once those ten minutes pass, I’ll say my finger is itching and I want to shoot anyone. All the good targets for shooting are in the hospital because of Park Muhyeon.”
Then Sin Haeryang looked at Joseph. He had only looked at him, but Joseph spoke as if a gun barrel had been aimed at him.
“Y-you bastard! You really aren’t in your right mind!”
“I expected the outer wall repairs to take half a day, but thanks to you people, I have time to spare. I can make as much time as I want, but can you?”
Only now did I realize Sin Haeryang had never intended to leave this place.
“Are we going to keep staying here?”
“Yes. We are going to keep staying here.”
“Then what do you think will happen?”
“In the end, I think the Church of Infinity bastards will come storming in. I don’t know how many I’ll kill, but even if I resist, you’ll fall into the Church of Infinity’s hands, and I’ll be shot dead.”