Clutching his face, Kim Jae-hui toppled onto the sand, but Riko didn’t seem satisfied with just one hit. Seo Ji-hyeok, who had been dragging Jeong Sang-hyeon by both arms out of the surf while dodging the waves, witnessed the assault, flung Jeong Sang-hyeon onto the sand, and came running over. Then he grabbed Riko’s arms from behind and lifted her up.
Riko tried to kick the fallen Kim Jae-hui, but since her feet were dangling in the air, the tips of her toes barely missed him. Seo Ji-hyeok pleaded with Riko in a coaxing voice.
“Riko. What’s wrong? I’m sure Jae-hui did something wrong, but can’t you hit him later instead of now?”
“No!”
With a bewildered look at Riko’s behavior, Seo Ji-hyeok asked Kim Jae-hui,
“Jae-hui. What did you do just now to make Riko act like this? She’s not like this.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
At Kim Jae-hui’s words as he rubbed his face, Riko seemed to get even angrier. Did she think he was playing innocent? Just thinking about sorting out the survivors’ jumbled memories was giving me a headache. Since she had taken off her diving suit and thrown it onto the beach, the pinky-length wound on Riko’s leg was immediately visible.
“……Mr. Jae-hui attacked Ms. Riko’s leg first. And then he tried to feed Ms. Riko and Mr. Hae-ryang to the sharks.”
“Me? I’ve been climbing stairs all day today.”
Kim Jae-hui asked back with a puzzled expression. Seo Ji-hyeok set Riko, who had been dangling in midair, back down on land. Then he straightened both his arms and palms and pointed at Kim Jae-hui. It looked like he was telling her to beat the hell out of him. Weren’t you here to stop her?
Without the slightest hesitation, Seo Ji-hyeok went back to the sand, grabbed Jeong Sang-hyeon by both arms, and dragged him over toward the beach beds. Riko didn’t have the strength to hit Kim Jae-hui anymore. Since she couldn’t even stand properly, I supported her and brought her to the beach bed farthest from Kim Jae-hui. Riko stared blankly at my left hand with a deathly pale face and asked,
“What happened to your hand?”
“I hurt my fingers a little.”
“Did that bastard do that too?”
Afraid Riko would go off to hit Kim Jae-hui again, I answered quickly.
“Someone else did this.”
“Then I’ll teach that bastard a lesson too. I’m going to hit all the bad guys.”
As soon as Riko lay down on the beach bed, her eyes fluttered shut, and she fell asleep as if she had fainted. What had happened today must have been exhausting. It seemed the scuba diving had drained all of Riko’s remaining strength, and after escaping to Daehan-do and feeling relieved, the tension had finally left her. I prayed inwardly that Meiji would surface as soon as possible. I took down a towel as big as a person from where it hung on the parasol and draped it over Riko like a blanket. Seo Ji-hyeok, who had been checking on Jeong Sang-hyeon, urgently called out to me.
“We need a dentist over here!”
Right. I’m coming. I walked through the sand and found Jeong Sang-hyeon vomiting seawater and blood. Emma saw the sight, startled, got up, and moved over toward Riko. Since Seo Ji-hyeok had been dragging Jeong Sang-hyeon around, I thought he was unconscious, but that wasn’t the case either. Jeong Sang-hyeon was sitting on a beach bed and groaning, so I checked inside his mouth and found that four of his front teeth were missing. Fortunately, there didn’t seem to be any displacement, but his tongue was bleeding.
He had probably smashed his front teeth into the boat, fallen into the sea, then panicked and bitten his tongue while poking at the teeth with it. When I checked inside his mouth, I could also see cavities here and there.
Jeong Sang-hyeon touched the empty space where his front teeth had been with his finger, then looked ready to cry and started trying to touch and wiggle all his remaining teeth, so I stopped him, telling him not to. I shook out a towel that seemed to have been left on the beach bed and tried to stop the bleeding from his tongue first. Since he was swallowing half the blood coming from his tongue, I instructed Jeong Sang-hyeon to lean his head forward. Seo Ji-hyeok watched from beside me as I performed first aid with only my right hand, then asked an ominous question.
“His tongue keeps bleeding. Is it possibly fatal enough to kill him?”
Maybe my ears were playing tricks on me, but Seo Ji-hyeok’s voice sounded as though he hoped it was. I could feel Jeong Sang-hyeon freaking out at Seo Ji-hyeok’s question against all the fingers of my right hand. To calm the patient, I answered as if it was no big deal.
“It’s extremely rare for someone to die because of the lingual artery. In his current condition, I don’t think Mr. Sang-hyeon will die.”
People almost never die from biting or severing their tongue. Jeong Sang-hyeon seemed relieved, but Seo Ji-hyeok asked back as if dissatisfied.
“Oh. Really?”
“Euuup?”
Jeong Sang-hyeon looked like he had a lot he wanted to say to Seo Ji-hyeok. However, since my fingers were inside his mouth, he couldn’t say anything. Doing this on a beach without gloves felt really awkward. I sighed as I looked at Jeong Sang-hyeon’s missing front teeth, then asked Seo Ji-hyeok,
“I heard you collected Mr. Sang-hyeon’s teeth, Mr. Ji-hyeok.”
“Mmmph?”
“Ah. Yes. They were stuck in the boat, and if Sang-hyeon had died, I was going to keep them and at least deliver these to his family. ……But he’s alive.”
Then Seo Ji-hyeok rummaged in his pocket and pulled out two front teeth with bits of flesh attached. When Jeong Sang-hyeon saw the front teeth in a plastic bag, his eyes doubled in size. But he also seemed deeply disappointed by the fact that there weren’t four teeth. At a glance, the teeth looked to be in decent condition. They weren’t broken either. Seo Ji-hyeok handed the two front teeth to Jeong Sang-hyeon as if he were giving him a complimentary gift. Then he pointed at Jeong Sang-hyeon’s mouth with his finger and asked,
“Can you put the missing teeth back into his mouth?”
“The results depend on how quickly he receives treatment. It is possible.”
“You hear that, Sang-hyeon? If you’re lucky, they can put them back in. Then, Doctor, can you also put a proper state of mind back in along with his teeth?”
This time, Seo Ji-hyeok pointed at Jeong Sang-hyeon’s head as he asked. I hesitated for a moment, then answered with a sigh.
“That’s not my field.”
“Ah. I see. Sang-hyeon, what a shame. You’ll have to fix your own head.”
Seo Ji-hyeok grabbed Jeong Sang-hyeon’s shoulder and leaned on him, pressing down on him like a cane, then spouted more nonsense.
“Still, since he rinsed his mouth with seawater, doesn’t that mean the injured parts got disinfected at least a little? Can’t we disinfect his brain somehow too?”
“……That’s not disinfection. That’s contamination.”
“Ah. I see. Exactly. Sang-hyeon, you should’ve stayed still. Why did you have to throw a damn fit about moving to another lifeboat when the waves were rocking and end up like this?”
“Mmmuuuuuuuuuph.”
“Seeing how the lifeboat plucked out your upper teeth so neatly makes me want to pluck out your lower teeth too, but I’m holding back because I don’t want to increase the dentist’s workload.”
Seo Ji-hyeok kept turning Jeong Sang-hyeon’s stomach with words that were impossible to tell were comfort or mockery. Shin Hae-ryang, supported by Gang Su-jeong, came out onto the beach, took off all his equipment and left it on the sand, then pointed at the lifeboats floating in the sea as they talked. They were probably discussing the surviving team members.
Taking advantage of the moment, I cautiously asked Seo Ji-hyeok why he had made us write other people’s names on the survivor list. Since my fingers were inside his mouth, Jeong Sang-hyeon had to stay still, while Seo Ji-hyeok, who had been about to pull out Jeong Sang-hyeon’s hair, gave up as if even touching him would be some kind of biological terrorism, shook his head, and said,
“Can we really trust all seven armed guys? Even if just one of them is a lunatic, it could cause a huge problem. Besides, just like we can’t tell Western faces apart very well, they can’t tell Asian faces apart very well either. Nothing happened, so forget it. It’s not as if we falsified the survivor list, is it? Sang-hyeon did survive.”
Seo Ji-hyeok started to smack Jeong Sang-hyeon on the back of the head, then realized my fingers were in Jeong Sang-hyeon’s mouth and held back. Then he went over toward Team Leader Shin.
While I was focusing on stopping the bleeding, I suddenly felt someone rush over in a panic and hide behind my back. When I looked, Kim Jae-hui was hiding behind me as if a bear were chasing him. What the hell? I turned to look ahead and saw Shin Hae-ryang walking this way, with Seo Ji-hyeok hanging onto his back and being dragged along, while Gang Su-jeong was holding onto Shin Hae-ryang’s right arm and speaking.
“Good grief, Team Leader. Let’s talk. Talk! I don’t know what Jae-hui did, but hold back for just a bit. If you hit Jae-hui once, two places—no, four places might shatter. Not break, shatter.”
Seo Ji-hyeok also spoke as if telling Shin Hae-ryang to hold back.
“Use words! Words! I’m holding back from throwing punches by the second too! It’s already a headache with one injured guy, Sang-hyeon, so imagine having two! Think about efficiency! Efficiency! Ah! You like efficiency, don’t you!”
In the middle of this, Kim Jae-hui poked his head out from behind me and shouted,
“I didn’t do anything. I have absolutely no idea why our team leader is suddenly acting like that.”
“Jae-hui! If you don’t want to get hit by the team leader’s fist and mine too, keep your mouth shut!”
Gang Su-jeong screamed while holding onto Shin Hae-ryang’s right arm. Kim Jae-hui looked at me as if he were looking at a fraud and asked,
“Are you sure the other Kim Jae-hui really lived kindly? Seeing as I have no memories, I think the Kim Jae-hui from another round probably went around causing trouble. There isn’t just one or two people trying to hit me. Are all those people floating out there on the lifeboats saying they’re going to kill me too?”
“The Kim Jae-hui from then did live kindly, but only to me. This is the result. I don’t think there’s any way I can help you.”
“Mr. Mu-hyeon. Your friend is about to die here.”
I’m more dumbfounded that you’re hiding behind me. Do you think I can be an excellent shield against Shin Hae-ryang’s fist? If I get hit once, four places might shatter too. I awkwardly greeted Shin Hae-ryang as he came closer.
“Mr. Hae-ryang. I’m glad you escaped safely. Were you bitten by a shark or anything?”
“……No. I’m fine.”
Even with two team members clinging to him, Shin Hae-ryang answered in a fairly calm voice. Impressive. When a shark came close to me, I was so shocked I couldn’t even think straight. Yet he escaped from that situation while taking care of two injured people. Shin Hae-ryang quickly looked over Jeong Sang-hyeon and me, then fixed his gaze on my left hand and asked,
“How did you injure your hand?”
Then Shin Hae-ryang looked at Kim Jae-hui hiding behind me, probably thinking I had been injured because of him. Judging by Seo Ji-hyeok’s and Gang Su-jeong’s attitudes, it seemed like Shin Hae-ryang was about to smash Kim Jae-hui at any moment.
“Uh. This wasn’t Mr. Jae-hui’s doing.”