“It seems there was some talk about him at vocational school because of it as well.”
Even on the rare occasions when group projects required him to work with others, he had apparently offended female classmates more than once and earned their disapproval.
“Any known reason?”
“No specific incident has been confirmed. We’re still looking into it in more detail just in case.”
Taking in Chief Manager Seo’s words, Gyohyun turned to the next page. One eyebrow rose quietly.
“He dated a man?”
Gyohyun murmured to himself quietly.
“Dated might be a stretch given how brief it was — but aside from that, it seems he doesn’t see anyone and focuses solely on the workshop.”
Song Jeonho.
The other party was currently practicing as an attorney at Yulmyeong Law Firm. True to Chief Manager Seo’s thorough nature, he had already gathered information on him as well.
His public image was solid and respectable. But behind that, he was an entirely different story. Orgies were the baseline — his private life was utterly filthy, involving rape and gang rape.
“His judgment in people is….”
A hollow laugh escaped his lips. Gyohyun’s eyes narrowed as he read through the documents.
“I’ll have to take back what I said about him living exactly as he looks.”
Young and already that wide-eyed and trusting.
Gyohyun’s expression soured slightly. For some reason, it didn’t sit well with him.
“Director.”
Gyohyun, who had been frowning, looked up.
“While you were at the workshop, the Chairman reached out.”
The hand that had been moving toward his creased brow paused.
“What for?”
“It seems to be regarding the Yoon Hoseong matter. He’s asking you to come to Haejeong Won by tomorrow.”
Haejeong Won was the private residence of Chairman Lee of Hyosung Group.
Gyohyun’s grandfather, despite being well into his eighties, was still sharp and vigorous. It was almost certainly about the Yoon Hoseong situation. He had expected as much, so Gyohyun agreed without resistance.
“And….”
Gyohyun’s brow twitched. He could tell that what was about to be said was the real matter.
“The Madam….”
Gyohyun’s expression stiffened. There were only two people referred to as Madam within Hyosung Group, and the one Chief Manager Seo was referring to was the wife of the eldest son — Gyohyun’s mother.
Gyohyun’s eyes pinched as though a headache were already forming. He hadn’t even heard the main point yet, and he was already exhausted.
“Go on. What has my mother done this time.”
“Well… the Madam has apparently commissioned a shaman to perform a ritual.”
At that, Gyohyun said nothing and leaned his head back against the headrest, looking worn out. His eyes were open, but they felt heavy enough to fall shut at any moment. The headache that had inexplicably eased just a little while ago came throbbing back the moment he heard those words.
That the eldest daughter-in-law of Hyosung Group had become entangled in shamanism was already an open secret within business circles. Women who married into the Lee family tended to fall into one of two types.
Those who learned the family’s secret and flatly rejected everything — curses, ghosts, all of it. And those who clung to the powers that came with it.
Gyohyun’s mother was the latter. When her husband failed to find his Noble One and died, she had declared it was all the fault of the spirits, and had gone seeking shamans all across the country ever since.
“When?”
“This weekend.”
“This weekend? That’s the day after tomorrow — why has there been no report on this until now?”
When Gyohyun scolded him for being lax, Chief Manager Seo wore an expression of deep remorse.
“My apologies. The Madam kept this matter entirely secret, which is why word was slow to reach us. I’ll make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
The furrow between Gyohyun’s brows deepened. Chief Manager Seo, catching a glimpse of it in the rearview mirror, added:
“I’ll tip off the Madam’s secretary to be careful nothing leaks out.”
“Leave it.”
“Pardon?”
Chief Manager Seo asked, caught off guard. But Gyohyun seemed lost in thought for a moment before speaking.
“She won’t listen even if someone tells her. Whether she has a shaman perform a ritual or not — just leave it alone.”
“Ah….”
A quiet sound of resignation escaped Chief Manager Seo. Gyohyun was right. It wasn’t something those below her could step in and stop.
“…Understood.”
Gyohyun pressed his fingers to his brow.
2.
Siyun had just left the leather supply shop and was on his way toward the center of the market.
An elderly woman in worn, shabby clothes was sitting vacantly in front of a shuttered store. White hair blown loose by the wind covered half her face, and her dry, unfocused eyes drifted aimlessly through the empty air. It was the grandmother who had run the vegetable stall — she had passed away three months ago.
Siyun’s breath caught in his chest. He tried not to look and quickened his steps. But as he passed by her side, the grandmother’s head slowly turned, following the back of Siyun’s retreating figure. A chill shot through his spine. The saving grace was that she didn’t follow him or try to speak.
The first time Siyun became consciously aware of the existence of ghosts was when he was in the first grade of elementary school.
During cleaning time, in the bathroom, he had seen a woman who cast no reflection in the mirror. Her eyes, nose, and mouth weren’t clearly defined, but the dark form unmistakably seemed to be looking in his direction. Siyun had screamed and run to his teacher — but no one believed him.
His parents were the same. At first they took him to a hospital, thinking he was seeing things — but every test came back normal.
Yet as the days passed, Siyun’s condition only worsened. At first he only had to avoid bathrooms and shadowy places, but he began having episodes in the classroom as well, completely out of nowhere. After this repeated itself several times, Siyun had become a liar in the eyes of the other children. And to make things worse, his parents were fighting far more than before. Day after day, they hurled accusations at each other — it’s your fault, it’s because of you.
If their conflicts had once centered on issues between the two of them as a couple, now most of their fights revolved around Siyun — and so he came to feel as though it was all his fault. That was what led him to start lying, to say he couldn’t see anything. Whether that effort paid off or not, his parents’ relationship seemed to improve a little, bit by bit.
But in the spring of his tenth year, something decisive happened. On his way home from school, he was caught in a serious traffic accident. He survived, fortunately — but from that accident onward, what Siyun saw only became more vivid. Things that had once appeared as blurry outlines now came to him as clearly as the living.
That incident pushed the two of them over the edge, screaming blame at each other, and they finally separated for good when Siyun was fifteen.
The shaman had looked at Siyun once, and at his grandmother once, and then said:
“Even between parents and children, there’s such a thing as compatibility. And your grandchild has a fate that severs the bond between husband and wife. There’s nothing to be done about it.”
She had said in particular that Siyun and his mother were in direct opposition — that it would be better for them to live apart. At the time he had thought it was nonsense, but in the end the shaman had been right.
The divorce between the two had gone through far too smoothly. Normally, when children are involved, things get complicated — custody, division of assets, child support — but Siyun’s parents had settled everything with such speed it was as though they had both been desperate to be free of each other.
His father threw himself into work, and his mother remarried the man she had been seeing and left the country. Just as the shaman had said, once they were separated from Siyun, it was as if whatever had been blocking their luck had been lifted — everything they touched began falling into place.
“Haa.”
Stepping out of the market, Siyun let out a sigh first thing. The past few days had been so hectic he hadn’t had a moment to breathe. Work had piled up all at once and he’d been staying late, yet there was still more left to do.
The item commissioned this time was a backpack. He’d taken an order for four each of the men’s and women’s versions, and the deadline was a little tight. He didn’t usually accept rush orders, but it was a regular client who had been coming to him since he first opened, so he’d deliberated a bit and agreed.
Backpacks took more time than regular bags. It was unavoidable — multiple storage compartments had to be made, which meant more components, and there were far more seams involved.
The bag holding the apples rustled. He had originally planned to just buy the fabric and head out, but he’d passed by the stand and they had looked so perfectly ripe and delicious that he’d bought them on impulse. He generally had a small appetite and didn’t eat much, but sweet-and-sour fruits were something he could usually manage. He was especially fond of peaches, and apples were something he enjoyed eating as well.
I’ll peel one to eat instead of lunch, he thought — and was just approaching the area near the workshop when Siyun stopped in his tracks without realizing it.
