episode_0034

… … … … …

“… … … … .”

Just before the sharp tip of the fork pierced the innocent boy’s skin.

The boy’s pure smile entered Park Seo-ah’s young eyes. It was a smile that she might have had as a child, but never had.

When she came to, instead of stabbing the boy in the cheek with a fork, Park Seo-ah was picking up a piece of pancake and holding it up.

“Okay, take a bite… … take another bite.”

A voice came out of her mouth, inorganic and emotion-suppressed as much as possible.

The boy looked at Park Seo-ah for a moment as if he was surprised, then smiled awkwardly as if he was embarrassed and took a bite of the pancake on his fork.

“Ehehehe… … It’s delicious, Seo-ah. You’re really good at cooking.”

Park Seo Ah’s heart swirled at the boy’s innocent reaction. What she had been trying to do just a moment ago, and what she was doing now. She couldn’t figure out her own mind.

Park Seo Ah just kept handing over pancakes, something she had longed for during her abused days, to the boy in front of her.

In this contradictory behavior, Park Seo-ah felt a change happening inside her. She couldn’t tell exactly what it was, but it was clear that something was changing.

Park Seo-ah feeds the boy a pancake, and the boy eats it with his face turning red in embarrassment.

“Uh, Uh… … Seo-ah, please eat too.”

The one who broke the same pattern that had been repeated over and over again was the boy. The boy looked straight at her, shyly, and spoke. Soon, the boy pushed his plate towards Park Seo-ah.

“Let’s eat together. It’s too much to eat alone.”

“… … … .”

Park Seo Ah was speechless. She had been overlapping the boy’s past with her own, but at this moment, a difference had emerged between the Park Seo Ah of the past and the boy of the present.

She gratefully accepted her mother’s pancakes, but she never offered them in return. Since they were food made for her by her loving mother, she never even thought about sharing them with others.

But this boy was different. He was willing to share his food.

Of course, he’s just a boy, but he’s not really a child. He’s an adult. I know that from his ID. But that fact didn’t seem all that important to Park Seo-ah.

“I… … am okay. Ga-eul can eat it all.”

Park Seo-ah barely managed to answer. But the boy shook his head. This boy, who seemed weak, was surprisingly stubborn.

“Ms. Seo-ah made it. Let’s eat it together. Okay?”

Normally, Park Seo-ah would never have responded to someone else’s request, but she was in a very vulnerable psychological state right now. In the end, she carefully picked up her fork and put a piece of the pancake she had made into her mouth.

It was hard to tell if it was similar to her mother’s, but the sweet and soft taste spread through her mouth. Park Seo-ah’s eyes turned slightly red at the taste of pancakes, which she was eating for the first time in 20 years.

“Isn’t it delicious?”

To the boy’s bright question, Park Seo-ah nodded silently.

… … … … …

Leaving the boy in his room, Park Seo-ah returned to her room and sat on the bed. Her eyes were looking into space, but her heart was looking into the depths of her own abyss.

‘Why do I feel that way every time I see the Autumn Army?’

Park Seo-ah’s hand unconsciously clenched and unclenched a fist.

The violent impulse and sadism that surges whenever I see the boy.

It was a tiresome companion in her life, one she had suppressed for a long time, but which never went away, and which she had been releasing on the scapegoats she called criminals.

She let out a deep sigh. The nightmare from her past, which she had tried hard not to recall, came vividly before her eyes.

Her childhood self, locked in a dark and cramped box, a little girl shaking from her parents’ harsh words and violence.

The girl’s silhouette soon transformed into the figure of the boy she had brought to the secret base.

“… … … That’s ridiculous. That kid is completely different from me.”

As she said to herself, Park Seo-ah and Ga-eul had completely different backgrounds from the beginning.

According to the information I found out after some careful investigation, the boy became an orphan during the dimensional gate invasion. She had nothing in common with him since childhood, having been raised as the daughter of a billionaire with a broken personality and abused.

However, Park Seo-ah was already reflecting on her past self in Ga-eul-gun.

A young girl who was abused, a weak and helpless girl. Park Seo-ah hated her past self. That hatred flowed through her body like poison.

“… … Was it because of self-loathing that you wanted to torment that kid so much?

Because you can’t accept your past self and you see that past reflected in that kid?”

Park Seo-ah, who realized her true feelings, smiled bitterly. She remembered the moment when the boy had been so scared that she had cried.

When a suicide attempter who harmed the social atmosphere and encouraged others to commit suicide was executed after severe torture.

When those who witnessed street crime and did not report it were treated as accomplices in aiding and abetting social evils and had their limbs crushed.

When you gouge out the eyes and cut out the tongues of social media celebrities who make money by posting negative videos that pollute the minds of others.

The joy she felt when she performed this act of justice was not even half of the joy she felt when she made the boy cry.

If so, it would be in her nature to continue to harass the boy, but for some unknown reason, Park Seo-ah could not lay a hand on the boy.

When she stroked the boy’s cheek, Park Seo-ah originally wanted to hit him hard. She was willing to knock out one or two of the boy’s teeth.

But the moment she was about to slap him, the strength in her arms gave out, and she ended up just gently caressing his sobbing cheek.

For her, who was considered an object of fear by many, caressing someone’s cheek was almost the highest level of affection.

It was the same when she fed him pancakes. An intense urge that she could only feel when she had not tortured a criminal for almost two weeks swept over Park Seo-ah, but for some reason, she could not release her violence on Ga-eul.

“Hoo… … … .”

Park Seo-ah covered her face with her hands.

That day, when his trash parents tried to kill him, he awakened his powers and tore his parents apart to the point where they were unrecognizable.

From that day on, her life was simple. She succeeded in everything she wanted to do, and she could easily break down obstacles with her superhuman physical abilities.

She didn’t know what to do with her complicated emotions. She couldn’t decide between her desire to torture the boy harshly and the human warmth she felt from him.

“What on earth am I supposed to do… …?”

Her mutterings still remained as unanswered questions.

… … … … …

Maybe I’m lucky.

Even though I brought the crisis upon myself by doing something stupid like confronting the rice-sack guys from the Human Defense Association who were committing armed robberies, I’m lucky that I didn’t lose my life.

It was even more fortunate that I met Ms. Seo-ah, saved my life, and was given safe refuge.

Especially Ms. Seo-ah, she is really… what should I say? She is a really kind and wonderful woman. She cooked for me and even gave me a room to stay in so I could be comfortable.

But there was one problem.

I shouldn’t complain when I’m just lucky enough to survive, but I still feel a little lonely being alone in such a large room.

Whenever this happens, I miss the peaceful year I spent with Seoyeon after leaving the orphanage. Seoyeon treated me like a younger sister when I was a homeless person with nowhere to go, and I felt like she was family to me.

Will I ever be able to return to those warm days? Wouldn’t it have been better to just continue spending time with Seoyeon?

“… … No, no. It had to come out someday. Let’s not get caught up in the past. ”

I shook my head vigorously, feeling like I was going to cry a little. Even though Seoyeon treated me like family, we were still strangers who weren’t related by blood. It’s not a good habit to live off the affection of others.

“Seoyeon noona, how are you doing… … ?”

I found myself muttering to myself. When will my sister return from her mission beyond the dimensional gate? When she returns, what should I tell her about independence?

“Haa… …I should stop thinking about it.”

If I continue like this, I think I’ll get depressed. Since I have nothing to do, I decided to kill some time.

I turned on my phone and opened the Internet. While I was thinking about what to search, Seo-ah suddenly came to mind.

“What kind of person is Seo-ah… …?”

Out of curiosity, I typed ‘Park Seo-ah’ into the search bar. But the results were beyond my imagination. The search results poured out.

“Wow, wow… … amazing… … .”

I couldn’t hide my surprise. There were even several related news articles.

[Chairman Park Seo-ah selected as female entrepreneur of the year]

[Chairman Park Seo-ah receives award for social contribution activities]

And so on, various articles came out one after another. I could tell that Seo Ah was an amazing person just by looking at her, but I didn’t think it would be to this extent.

As I read articles about her, related news kept coming out. As I continued to scroll through my phone, I came across one article that caught my eye.

[Seoul City District A, Extreme Violence Occurs… … Members of the Human Defense Association Extremely Brutally Murdered]

“Huh… …? What the heck?”