Chapter 85: Funeral
Thanks to the prompt report, they were able to prevent the worst-case scenario of the fire spreading into a major forest fire. However, they couldn’t avoid the police investigation regarding the chase.
If there was any silver lining, it was that the police were already searching for Kang Chahyuk. After explaining that Kang Chahyuk had kidnapped Dohyuk’s acquaintance and threatened his life while demanding to be smuggled out of the country, and that if they had let him escape, they couldn’t guarantee the acquaintance’s life and Chahyuk might have fled overseas, the police said they would only impose a fine for violating traffic laws.
Kang Chahyuk’s car was completely destroyed by the explosion, and a charred body was found in the driver’s seat. It was Kang Chahyuk’s remains. No other bodies were found, but given the size of the explosion and how thoroughly the car had burned, they said there was no possibility of survival even if someone had been thrown from the blast. Though they thoroughly searched the area around the explosion, Yeon’s body was never found.
The next day, news reports announced that Chairman Kang Mansik, who was thought to have left for China, had gone missing. The media reported that Dragon Holdings, which was promoting the Yeouido project, had recently experienced a series of unfortunate incidents. The death of Kim Yumin, who was Kang Sunhyuk’s mother though not Chairman Kang Mansik’s legal wife, the attacks on Kang Sunhyuk and Kang Dohyuk, and the subsequent death of the youngest, Kang Chahyuk, in a car accident while fleeing as a suspect—it was perfect sensational material for the media to make a fuss about. Some even reported it as a modern-day “Princes’ War,” highlighting how the Kang brothers all had different mothers.
Dohyuk didn’t try to stop the media. He deliberately arranged for Kang Mansik’s body to be discovered three days later. Based on the direction of the gunshot and bullet residue found on Kang Mansik’s hand, it was concluded as suicide.
People excitedly gossiped again. Most believed that Kang Mansik had committed suicide after feeling despair over the series of incidents.
The media also reported that Dohyuk’s acquaintance had been kidnapped by Kang Chahyuk and caught in the car accident. As a result, sympathy poured out for Dohyuk and Kang Sunhyuk, who had lost their mother. The government, which had initially been uncomfortable with the media attention, seemed to view it as an opportunity to cut off Dragon Holdings’ dark past once they saw how public opinion was moving.
There was no particular reaction from Kangsan Construction. This was natural since Kang Dohyuk was already handling all the practical matters, and the fact that they needed Dragon Holdings’ financial strength remained unchanged.
Dragon Holdings couldn’t leave the chairman position vacant for long, so they decided to elect a new chairman after a month. Kang Sunhyuk, who had learned that Kang Mansik was behind all the incidents, was in agony. After his mother’s death, his sense of loss and disillusionment with life had deepened, and he told Dohyuk to do whatever he wanted since he didn’t care about the company anymore. Since there was no one else to take the chairman position besides Kang Dohyuk, employees accepted as fact that Dohyuk would become the chairman.
Dohyuk took on the role of chief mourner at Kang Mansik’s funeral. After learning the truth, Kang Sunhyuk didn’t even show his face at the funeral. When told to play the role of chief mourner even just for show to the media, he refused with disgust, saying it was absurd for him to be the chief mourner at the funeral of the man who killed his mother. He left in anger and cut off all contact, turning off his phone.
Whatever the behind-the-scenes circumstances might have been, Kang Mansik’s funeral was packed with attendees, from government officials to chairmen of major corporations whose names everyone would recognize. Throughout the funeral, Dohyuk looked at Kang Mansik’s portrait with emotionless eyes.
He felt no guilt or remorse. From the beginning, it had been seeds that Kang Mansik had sown. He was having a funeral far better than he deserved given what he had done.
Kang Chahyuk’s funeral, which had been delayed due to various police investigations, was held by his mother Lee Miseon, but without a single guest. Chahyuk’s maternal relatives didn’t want to show their faces at the funeral of a grandson who had become a criminal. They seemed to have decided there was no need to maintain ties with Dragon Holdings now that Chairman Kang Mansik was dead.
During Kang Mansik’s funeral, Dohyuk took some time to visit Kang Chahyuk’s funeral hall. Lee Miseon, who had been sitting alone, staring blankly at the portrait, turned her head at the sound of Dohyuk entering but said nothing even after seeing his face.
After lighting incense in front of Kang Chahyuk’s portrait, Dohyuk sat across from Lee Miseon.
“Don’t you resent me?”
Kang Chahyuk’s death was largely due to the chase with Dohyuk. He had come prepared for Lee Miseon to curse him as soon as she saw his face, but her reaction was unexpected. After quietly looking at Dohyuk, she smiled weakly and turned her head. Her gaze returned to her son’s portrait.
“Do you think I live without any thoughts?”
Dohyuk didn’t answer Lee Miseon’s question. In fact, he had thought she was the most libertine and free-spirited among Kang Mansik’s women.
“But I had to live that way. I was afraid of your mother.”
Lee Miseon brought up a topic Dohyuk hadn’t expected.
“Kim Yumin, me, and your mother. Our reasons may have been different, but we were all entangled with Kang Mansik, and as long as we had children, we couldn’t become complete strangers to him. Kim Yumin was a woman with nothing, so she probably wasn’t even worth your mother’s vigilance, but I was different, right? If I had maintained a friendly relationship with Kang Mansik, if it had been evident that Kang Mansik cared for our Chahyuk, would your mother have left us alone? She didn’t guard against me only because I lived so pathetically.”
Her words might be right. Dohyuk’s mother, for all her emphasis on refinement, didn’t even treat Kim Yumin, who came from a bar, or Lee Miseon, who hung around with young entertainers, as people.
“I was more afraid of your mother, backed by the Baekwha Foundation, than of the indifferent Kang Mansik.”
Lee Miseon let out a low sigh.
“I told you that you can’t live long if you harbor unnecessary greed.”
It was a message meant for Kang Chahyuk in the portrait, not for Dohyuk. Her eyes grew moist. It seemed she hadn’t been completely unaware of Chahyuk’s ambitions.
“It’s true that Kang Chahyuk hired someone to kill me.”
Dohyuk continued calmly.
“However, all subsequent incidents have nothing to do with Kang Chahyuk.”
Lee Miseon turned to look at Dohyuk. Her eyes wavered with emotion.
“It seems Kang Mansik was instigating Kang Chahyuk from behind. When things didn’t go as planned, it was Kang Mansik who took direct action at the end.”
Just that much was enough to distort Lee Miseon’s face. With a complicated expression, she repeatedly opened and closed her lips, then after a long while, she exhaled loudly.
“Kang Mansik didn’t really commit suicide, did he?”
Among all the thoughts that must have been going through her mind, that was the only question she asked Dohyuk.
“It’s true that Kang Mansik himself pulled the trigger.”
At this ambiguous answer, Lee Miseon stared blankly at Dohyuk before pulling up the corners of her mouth bitterly.
“I see. Then that must be how it is.”
She nodded and turned her eyes back to Kang Chahyuk’s portrait. Dohyuk, having nothing more to say, stood up.
He couldn’t know, nor did he need to know, how a mother felt receiving her son’s body that was too damaged to properly identify. He didn’t feel sorry for Kang Chahyuk, nor did he feel sympathetic toward Lee Miseon. However, while he had allowed public opinion to direct all its arrows of criticism at Kang Chahyuk, he believed that his mother, at least, should know the truth. Some might ask what difference there is between soliciting murder and committing murder, but there is a difference. Even for someone like Kang Chahyuk, it would be unfair to take the blame for all of Kang Mansik’s crimes.
The usual Dohyuk, even if he thought Kang Chahyuk might have been wronged, wouldn’t have moved directly like this. After all, Chahyuk was a stranger to him, and whether he was criticized or misunderstood, it had nothing to do with Dohyuk, so he would have left it alone. But now he couldn’t do that. Yeon, his existence, prevented Dohyuk from acting as coldly as he used to.
As he left the funeral hall, Director Choi was waiting by the car and opened the door for him. Sitting in the back seat, Dohyuk felt fatigue washing over him and closed his eyes, resting the back of his head against the headrest.
“The search?”
When he asked Director Choi, there was silence before an answer came.
“No progress, I assume.”
“I’m sorry. We’ve deployed as many people as possible to search, but we haven’t even found anything resembling a body.”
Yeon’s body wasn’t found in the exploded car. So Dohyuk thought he might still be alive. Whether he was thrown from the car, escaped on his own before the explosion, was a corpse, or was injured somewhere, he should have been found by now, but there was no trace of him.
As if he had never existed in the first place…
Suddenly, Dohyuk remembered the image of Yeon entering his house dressed in white shaman clothes that first day. Even then, he had felt unreal. It was as if Yeon alone had come from another world, creating a sense of incongruity.
But still, he shouldn’t disappear like this. He said he wouldn’t run away…
“Keep searching until you find him.”
Unless he had vanished into the earth, a person couldn’t disappear so completely. If Yeon had been a real person, he would have left some trace somewhere.
He’s not dead. He must be alive. Somehow, Dohyuk felt certain of this.
Thinking of Yeon made his heart feel heavy, like a stone had been placed on it, but he couldn’t give up the hope that Yeon was still alive.
Dohyuk lowered his gaze to look at his own hand.
“It would have been good if I could see it…”
If only he could see that red thread that was supposed to be wound around his hand, like Yeon could. Just knowing that the thread was still there might have reassured him that Yeon was definitely alive…
No. If he couldn’t find Yeon, it would be the same either way.
He would find him. No matter what… He felt he might go crazy if he couldn’t find him. For the first time, he understood what it meant when it was said that his past self didn’t live long after losing Yeon and soon died. He felt like he couldn’t breathe like this. Yeon had embedded himself deeper into Kang Dohyuk’s heart than he had expected.
***
“Is this really okay?”
A woman approached Muyeong as he looked into the intensive care unit through a glass door. Muyeong nodded with a faint smile.
“But at least you should see his face before you go.”
At the woman’s words, Muyeong shook his head.
“I can already see everything. My connection with that child has already been severed.”
At Muyeong’s answer, the woman sighed and told him to do as he wished. Muyeong handed her a bankbook and a seal.
“This is for that child. Please give it to him when he wakes up.”
On the first page of the bankbook, the name “Lee Ha-yeon” was written.
