Chapter 62.2

Chapter 62.2

“If you do what I say, I’ll let you live. You want to die like an insect?” That day, beside her collapsed father, stood Lee Yi-taek.

She could still feel the cold touch of leather gloves tightening around her neck. Goyo had gasped for air.

“I-I’ll do what you say. Please, j-just… let me live.”

That day, Goyo had to kill Lee Cheol-woo’s daughter—her past self, Lee Goyo. That was the only way to survive. She hadn’t even realized she was trading her life in for something less than human.

“Mur-murderer! He’s going to… kill me… aagh!”

“Lee Goyo! Snap out of it! It’s a movie, just a movie! It’s not real! Damn it!” Jae-heon leapt up and pulled her toward him. Goyo clung to his collar, staggering, gasping for air.

“M-monstr… I’ll kill it…”

“Manager Kim, have the car ready—now!”

Jae-heon turned and shouted to the back. Manager Kim, sensing something was wrong, was already making a call somewhere.

“Jae-heon… he… he’s going to…”

“Hey, please, pull yourself together. Lee Goyo!”

“Haah… I… want to live…”

The movie stopped playing, and the lights came back on in the theater.

Carrying Goyo, limp and unconscious in his arms, Jae-heon left the cinema.

Jae-heon furrowed his brows sharply. There was nothing—absolutely nothing—he liked about the situation. It may have been a holiday, but still, the fact that they couldn’t even get a hospital room ready and had Goyo lying on a bed in the emergency ward was infuriating. The crowded patients and chaotic atmosphere only made his irritation worse.

“Even I, who’m not a doctor, could’ve come up with ‘accumulated fatigue.’”

“Please calm down, Director.”

“Do I look calm to you? She suddenly had a seizure.”

Jae-heon didn’t believe that accumulated fatigue alone could’ve caused the episode Goyo had at the theater. Something must’ve triggered her trauma.

He carefully replayed the movie in his mind. There had certainly been plenty of violent scenes. But fainting? Just from that?

“Manager Kim, which scene was it?”

The one where Goyo started reacting.

“The basement room, wasn’t it?”

“She started acting strangely from that point.”

“…There’s something there.”

Jae-heon’s gaze paused briefly on the IV bag, then followed the clear tube down. His eyes stopped at the peach-colored medical tape stuck on the back of Goyo’s hand.

She bruises easily.

That thick needle was going to leave another bruise.

***

“Prosecutor, what brings you to our home this early in the morning…?”

“May I come in?”

“It’s a bit shabby in here… but y-yes, of course, come in. I only have instant coffee to offer, but would you like some?”

“I didn’t come here for coffee. Is this your daughter?”

“Yes. Goyo, greet the prosecutor. He’s… he’s a very, very important man.”

From behind thin silver-framed glasses, the middle-aged man’s sharp eyes stared intently at the young Goyo. At her father’s prompting, Goyo placed her hands together over her belly button and bowed deeply.

“Must be a recessive trait.”

“Pardon? Prosecutor, what did you just say…?”

“Nothing. Aside from the photo you showed me yesterday, do you have any others?”

“Photos?”

“I think they might help us locate the child’s mother.”

“You really don’t have to go that far… I don’t know how to thank you for taking such care of someone like me.”

“As a fellow parent raising a child the same age, I couldn’t help but be concerned after hearing your unfortunate story.” The man have said.

His words, though seemingly sympathetic, carried an oddly forceful tone. And since he was a congressman, showing any sign of hiding something felt like it might lead to unnecessary suspicion.

Goyo’s father, visibly anxious, pulled a notebook from the bookshelf, a daily log he used to jot down the places he worked or money he hadn’t yet received. He called it a diary, but it was more like a ledger. Though he got a new planner each year, there was one thing that never changed: the photo of Goyo’s mother.

He took the photo out from behind the plastic cover at the very front of the planner and handed it to the man. The man looked at it, then turned his gaze back to the father with a strange expression.

Their conversation wasn’t long. But the man did scan the room, his eyes lingering a little too long on the bookshelf where the diaries were stacked.

After the man left, Goyo’s father held her close and murmured through tears, “The prosecutor said he’ll find your mother.”

He repeated those words over and over, like a mantra, almost as if to convince himself.

A few days later.

“Goyo, th-the prosecutor finally found y-your mother… I’ll just step out for a bit, o-okay? Stay here and w-wait, alright?”

Her father often came home in the morning after working all night. That day was no different—he’d rushed in early in the morning, still in his work clothes, only to leave again just as quickly with barely a word.

But even after lunchtime came and went, he didn’t return.

Hi everyone! You can support us on Patreon and get immediate access to advanced chapters of our novels and read ahead of schedule! Thank you so much.💜

Browse Table of Contents or Continue Reading Now!