Jeong Tae-ui hesitated, staring quietly at Ilay. Actually, if he thought about it, he had plenty to say. Most of it was hard to say openly, but there were always things to say. Especially after spending several days under what felt like semi-house arrest.

Like how long was this supposed to go on, or at least if he was going to be watched, why not put a proper person on it so he wouldn’t even sense their presence.

“Ah, yeah. You know it anyway. I’m not planning to actually shake off surveillance and run somewhere.”

More precisely, he couldn’t run off, Tae-ui added, frowning. Thinking of that, the pain in his ankle naturally came to mind. Ilay raised an eyebrow but said nothing, instead nodding as if urging him to continue.

“If someone’s bored and casually slips away for a peaceful walk alone, huh? Who beats up a patient with a bad ankle, uses anesthetic spray, and drags him off? That ankle was just getting better—do you know how much it hurt?”

Jeong Tae-ui grumbled but kept his eyes fixed quietly on Ilay. Ilay thought for a moment. His cold eyes briefly wandered through empty space, then he calmly spoke.

“For a patient with a bad ankle, you sure jumped off a skybridge a few meters high. When I heard that, I thought you’d recovered.”

“Well… I jumped because I thought it was okay from that height. I never thought anyone would really try to kill me.”

“Yeah, that’s what I mean…”

Ilay muttered to himself. Tae-ui shut his mouth. Ilay’s gaze, fixed on Tae-ui, wasn’t really looking at him. He was lost in thought. Then suddenly, he snickered.

“I thought you quietly came back to the hotel, but I was right.”

He laughed quietly and cheerfully for a moment. Just then, the waiter approached, placed tea on the table, and stepped back. Warm steam rose above the teacup.

Tae-ui wrinkled his lips and eyed him suspiciously. He wondered why Ilay was laughing all of a sudden. But the hints were too few. He even wiped his face once, half-expecting something to be stuck there. Ilay soon stopped laughing, but the smile lingered in his eyes.

“This time, I have to admit you were pretty good at running away.”

“Huh?”

“From the moment you jumped off the skybridge, what happened afterward is no longer my concern.”

Jeong Tae-ui stared at Ilay intently. Ilay breathed out happily and picked up the gloves he had taken off, beginning to put them back on. Watching that ominous gesture, Tae-ui slightly tilted his head.

“Why are you putting them back on?”

“There was something bothering me for a while, and I just figured out what it was. Wait here a moment. I’ll be back before the tea cools.”

“Wh-what…”

Before Tae-ui could say anything, Ilay got up and strode quickly toward some place. Tae-ui stood there dumbfounded, watching Ilay’s quickly disappearing figure.

Then, across the lobby, a man sitting on a sofa by the desk with a newspaper stood and started running toward the opposite side of the hotel. The distance was considerable. Ilay smiled slightly and quickened his pace. His figure soon vanished from sight.

Alone and clueless, Jeong Tae-ui blankly blinked in that direction.

“Uh...?”

Scratching his head aimlessly, Tae-ui tilted it. Suddenly, a slow, bad premonition rose inside him. A horrible scene seemed about to unfold before his eyes—a premonition with some basis.

He stared at the steaming teacup before him. Maybe it would be better to head back to his room quickly. Even if he witnessed a terrible sight, experiencing it in a crowded public space was very different from facing it in a private one. Of course, in some cases—like if he might be the victim of that terrible disaster—being in a crowd might be safer, but now was different.

Tae-ui eyed the hot tea and glanced briefly toward the direction Ilay had disappeared. There was no sign he would come back. The distance was significant. It would be hard to catch him, and even with a full sprint, catching up wouldn’t be easy. Unless he shot his leg and dragged him back...

Shaking his head, Tae-ui thought it best to get to his room quickly. That Ilay put on those gloves before leaving didn’t bode well. Tae-ui had no intention of announcing to the world that he knew a killer—or someone close to one.

As the thought came, he quickly grabbed his wallet and jacket. Ilay knew his room anyway, so if he came back and Tae-ui wasn’t there, he’d come looking.

“Check, please…”

Calling a passing waiter, the man smiled kindly and gestured toward the register. As Tae-ui tried to hurry away, limping awkwardly, his attempt failed.

Before he could get a few steps from the table, short screams and murmurs, and the shock of a cold splash of silence came from the hotel’s other side. The waiter standing nearby stared in disbelief.

Tae-ui’s face twisted inside as he saw the waiter’s wide eyes looking past his shoulder. He knew instinctively he was too late.

He didn’t want to look back. He wanted to finish payment as if nothing had happened and go back to his room. But faced with the stunned or horrified expressions of the people, Tae-ui sighed and slumped his shoulders.

When the silence stopped just a few steps behind him, Tae-ui heard his name called. Though he didn’t want to look, he had to hear it.

“Is the tea already cold? It shouldn’t be.”

The calm voice muttered suspiciously. The faint sound of a teacup being lifted and a sip echoed in the silence.

“See? Not cold yet. I told you to wait, Tae-i.”

“...”

Tae-ui muttered bitterly, thinking, What do you think you are, Guan Yu? and slowly turned around with a displeased expression.

The scene was as expected. Not at all what he wanted, but exactly what he had foreseen unfolded before his eyes. Ilay had lightly tossed what he was holding in one hand onto the empty chair beside him. The thing that slumped in the chair like a water-soaked cotton ball was—probably—a person. To be precise, a figure soaked in blood.

The crushed face had lost all human form. That was definitely a person. Well, after two punches like that to the face, it wouldn’t have ended with just a smashed face. The arm was slightly broken, the leg slightly broken.

The image was clear without seeing it. They’d caught the guy running madly, broken his legs first, then made him unable—or unwilling—to move before dragging him back.

That man hadn’t run off jogging slowly; to catch and drag him this fast from that distance, he was definitely no human. Couldn’t be human.

Jeong Tae-ui decided that when he met Kyle next, he’d seriously ask if that company’s lab really studied weapons.

Ilay took off the gloves soaked black in spots, threw them onto the man, and sat down. Then he picked up the still steaming teacup and sipped.

“...”

Tae-ui stood blankly, barely suppressing the urge to leave immediately, quietly staring at him. Ilay glanced at Tae-ui briefly.

“You said your leg hurts, so why are you standing?”

“...I don’t feel like sitting with someone whose life hangs by a thread, struggling for every second.”

Tae-ui muttered bitterly. Blood was soaking through the chair the man lay on. Ilay chuckled shortly.

“No, it just looks like a bad head injury causing a lot of bleeding. It’s not really that serious. I’ll send him to the hospital so he won’t die. But first, I want to ask him something.”

Tae-ui stared at the blood pooling on the chair. It didn’t just look like a lot of blood...

But, unfortunately, Tae-ui knew the wisest thing to do in this situation. Clicking his tongue, he approached the table and plopped down on the chair, mumbling unhappily.

“If you have questions, ask them quickly. I want to get back to my room.”

Feeling the burning gazes around him, Tae-ui wondered if the man could even answer. The police would likely storm in soon.

But Ilay remained as calm as ever. He turned slightly and gestured lightly to a man standing by a pillar some distance away. The man nodded and made a phone call somewhere.

Tae-ui recognized that man as one of the surveillance people who had followed him. Suddenly, something occurred to him and he glanced at the bloody man lying nearby. It took a moment to recognize him because his face was so horribly distorted, but it was the same man who had chased Tae-ui two days ago. The one who had pulled out a spray.

“Uh...”

Tae-ui murmured, and Ilay calmly said while sipping tea,

“I wondered who was staring at you so intently. Where’d you get such a tail?”

“Wasn’t that you?”

When Tae-ui asked, Ilay pointed at the man standing # Nоvеlight # by the pillar. Tae-ui looked at the bloody man suspiciously.

“Then who is this guy?”

“Well, that’s what I’m going to ask. It won’t take long. We’ll ask him, then head back to the room.”

Ilay put down his cup and asked the limp man simply,

“Who told you to follow this guy?”

No answer came back. Maybe he was truly unconscious. Tae-ui murmured anxiously.

“Is he out cold? Don’t tell me he’s dea—”

“He’s neither dead nor unconscious. As soon as we broke his leg, we pumped him full of stimulants. The formula’s a bit flawed, so it’s not commercially sold, but it works well. He probably won’t sleep for a while... Surgery will be tough. I didn’t think of that.”

Ilay muttered without batting an eye. Tae-ui stared with a pale face in shock.

There was no way Ilay hadn’t thought about it. The man trembled and jerked his head slightly as if awake, and Ilay smiled without emotion.

Tae-ui bit his blue lips and shut his mouth. This wasn’t someone else’s problem.

Why did I get a grudge from someone like this? Knowing he could flay a person alive, why did I do that? Tae-ui murmured inside, rubbing his goosebump-covered arms.

Meanwhile, Ilay clicked his tongue and lightly patted the man’s shoulder.

“I asked who told you to follow him. More accurately, they probably told you to catch and bring him back by any means necessary.”

“...”

“Damn. There sure are a lot of stupid people in this world.”

Ilay clicked his tongue again, watching the silent man. As he finished speaking, unsettling, unnatural murmurs and terrible screams broke out here and there. People flinched and shrank back. Fragile screams echoed two or three more times. Several men, seemingly hotel staff, approached from a distance.

Ignoring them, Ilay twisted the broken, tattered man’s arm in the opposite direction and slapped his cheek a couple of times.

“One more time. Just once more. If you don’t answer this time, your next stop won’t be the hospital. It’ll be the room. We’ll go quietly into the room and have a slow chat. You’ll learn firsthand how many bones a person has and what their organs look like. Got it?”

His calm smile and even whisper reached Tae-ui’s ears.

Tae-ui bit and bit his lips, looking at the man with a complicated expression. Maybe it was a mistake to ask why the surveillance was assigned. If he’d stayed silent, this might not have happened. But how could he know if it was Ilay or someone else who put him on the tail?

Still, on the other hand, if it wasn’t this guy, what other busybody in the world would idly stalk him like this?

“Hey, Ilay, is this maybe catching the wrong guy—”

Afraid it might be a misunderstanding that caused the wrong person to be caught—and that’d be a crime deserving divine punishment—Tae-ui spoke up, but only got a cold look laced with a mocking sneer.

Ilay ignored Tae-ui’s words and lightly twisted the man’s jaw. Lightly—yet knowing the strength of those white, beautiful hands, Tae-ui looked away from the contorted face quietly.

“Then I’ll ask again. Who ordered you?”

Ilay asked quietly. His calm tone and expression could have belonged to a gentle young man anywhere if he weren’t holding a bloodied man right in front of him. Surely many would be fooled by that face, but not this man. The man stared at the still calm Ilay, trembling with pale lips. Those lips might have been silent not because he didn’t want to speak, but because his tongue was scared.

Ilay didn’t give him much time. Maybe a blink or two.

Without hesitation, Ilay stood. Just then, a man in a neat uniform, presumably the hotel manager, ran up beside him. Behind him, four burly men followed.

“Sir, I’m sorry, but you must—”