Retire 326

326 Declaration of Revenge (2)

Classes at the co-ed school started at 9 a.m.

The current time: 8:13 a.m.

It took just over forty minutes to walk from home to school, and we were about halfway there.

Even if Kang Taewoo had just spent a short vacation in Hawaii with his little sister, and even if he now had a home in Korea, I wasn’t cold-hearted enough to send an eighteen-year-old straight to the dormitory. I told him he could commute from home just for this week. After all, he lived across the hall, and every morning Uirok went over there for breakfast anyway. I could just drop them off on my way to work.

Well, yes… I’d also figured that forty minutes together in the enclosed space of a car would give us a chance to talk about this and that.

I wanted to ask Kang Taewoo if he really remembered his childhood in America, and check on his mental state.

What I’d learned from teaching at the co-ed school was that kids are a lot tougher than you’d think.

Kang Taewoo was no exception. There was a time when I hadn’t liked Kang Taewoo—Number 3 from the lab. To be honest, even now, seeing his face didn’t exactly put me at ease.

It just reminded me of the dark, stifling lab.

But at the same time, Kang Taewoo was proof that the future had changed, just like the pilot school kids who should have died in Myeongdong. I didn’t know what had happened to Number 3 in the original timeline, but I doubted he’d ever laughed freely with kids his own age. He wouldn’t have had a little sister, or grandparents, either.

“……”

I turned on the hazard lights and slowly pulled over to the side of the road.

Let’s be grateful that Hong Seokyeong built the pilot school in such a remote area. I still felt proud that I’d managed to calmly pull over instead of slamming on the brakes.

Still, I wanted to check on Kang Taewoo. After his sister died, he’d been a gloomy, quiet boy, but after the runaway incident with Seungyeon Lee, he’d brightened a little. When Seungyeon was raising a fuss about clubs and guilds and whatnot, he’d even seemed like a normal high schooler. I figured it was because he finally had something to care about besides his sister. That’s why people need hobbies.

After he learned his sister was alive… well, he seemed a little more scatterbrained. But who could blame him? If you could meet a family member you thought was dead, you might act like a fool too. Compared to the gloom at the start, he seemed much more human.

So I never expected Kang Taewoo to say… that kind of word. If it had been someone like Oh Hyunwook saying, “I want to kill my old guild master,” I would have been prepared.

…Wait, did he say something like that before?

Anyway, this is why quiet kids are the scariest. You can never tell what they’re thinking.

“……”

“……”

I gripped the steering wheel and took a deep breath.

Remember: the kid in the passenger seat is a student. A minor. Maybe he just thought “revenge” sounded cool and wanted to try saying it.

While I tried to calm myself, Kang Taewoo seemed completely unbothered. He even pulled out his phone and checked his messages as if nothing was happening.

This brat, honestly.

“So…”

My voice cracked.

I coughed and tried to steady it, doing my best not to grit my teeth, to sound as gentle as possible.

“What do you mean?”

I tried. I won’t say I succeeded.

“Huh?”

“…What you just said.”

“Oh. Revenge?”

Kang Taewoo put his phone down on his knee and looked at me. He looked so vacant and foolish, I could hardly believe this was Number 3.

“Don’t you understand me, Teacher?”

“……”

“You were at the lab too.”

Suddenly, I was lost.

Not because Kang Taewoo had said something absurd. On the contrary, because he was too accurate.

It would be a blatant lie to say I didn’t know what he meant.

But to say I understood would be something I couldn’t allow myself as an adult.

I’d never learned from Father what kind of face, voice, or answer was the right one for this kind of conversation.

But I doubted Father would have known either.

No, Father probably had his own answer.

‘I’ll let you do anything you want.’

But I doubted he would have allowed revenge.

He’d have just taken care of everything himself before I could act. In fact, that’s what he did.

That’s not an answer I can use.

As always, Father wasn’t here. Neither was Hong Seokyeong. If only Isabella and Robert were here, I could have passed the buck to them.

Damn it.

“You’re still chasing the lab, aren’t you, Teacher? I’ve helped you with that, and from what Sohi says, it seems like that’s what you’re doing.”

Kang Taewoo kept talking in that dazed voice.

But his hand, gripping the phone, was tense.

“That’s what you’re doing at school, too. And that mana monster that came after Irok the other day.”

“…You saw that?”

“No. But it was so big, I could feel it.”

I’d forgotten about Kang Taewoo’s sensitivity to mana, too focused on Uirok.

I let out a short sigh.

I shouldn’t have worried about Sunjin’s talk of Hong Seokyeong’s private detective. Kang Taewoo had been thinking the same thing.

It was all my fault.

I should have kept the school just for the kids…

When I got to school today, no matter what Kim Chaemin or Imi-seon said, I’d have to get rid of the monster corpse on the field. I couldn’t keep it covered with a tarp forever.

“Anyway, I want to… catch the person in charge of the lab.”

“You…”

I chose my words carefully.

Let’s look at it differently.

In the end, experience is the greatest motivator. It’s not unusual for someone to want revenge. I was just startled by the extremity of the word.

You see it in everyday life. Someone sees litter and decides to become an environmental activist. Someone sees an abused dog and wants to protect animals. Someone sees a hit-and-run victim and dreams of becoming a police officer.

Kang Taewoo was the same.

“…Even though I’m already doing it, like you said?”

“But you haven’t caught them yet.”

“……”

“Teacher.”

Adventures in youth always start with not listening to your teachers.

If I told him no, would Kang Taewoo listen? Would he run off on his own?

With Sophia around, I doubted he’d do anything stupid, but on the other hand, maybe he’d think it was all right now that she had a guardian.

“Did you know?”

“…Know what?”

“The people who decided to ‘graduate’ me from the lab.”

“……”

“My mom was there, too.”

Kang Taewoo was smiling.

“I mean, it feels weird to call her Mom. Even so… No, I don’t think I’ll ever understand why she did what she did.”

“……”

“Teacher. Have you seen my mom since then? Did you catch her? You’d know her face, right?”

“You want to… catch your mother? You want her to be punished?”

Please say yes. Please say yes.

Tell me your revenge is just seeing those people receive proper legal punishment.

Kang Taewoo didn’t answer.

Instead, he said something else.

“At first, I wanted to catch and kill the guy who killed Sohi—Sophia.”

“……”

“I remember his face. He was obsessed with the fact that I could sense mana. So I thought, maybe if I became a Hunter and talked about it in an interview, he’d come looking for me.”

For a moment, I forgot the earlier conversation and stared at Kang Taewoo in shock.

Are all kids these days like this? It’s hard to keep up.

“But apparently he helped, so I gave up on that plan. I even asked Sophia, and she said she met him again in Boston. Said he was a nice oppa.”

Ah.

“You didn’t seem to care, so I just let it go… But it’s him, right? The one who’s been making noise lately. I remember his face. Alex Hope.”

This was a real blunder.

“He’s the one in the infirmary, right?”

My face must have given everything away. Kang Taewoo shrugged.

“It’s not like I’m going to sneak into the infirmary and stab him or anything. I probably would have, if I hadn’t known he saved Sophia.”

“…Thank you for telling me.”

If I could, I’d have gotten out of the car. I’d never resented being stuck in the driver’s seat so much.

I suddenly remembered that there had been another kid present when Alex Hope attacked Kang Taewoo.

“…Was Seungyeon there too?”

“Seungyeon hyung? Of course he remembers.”

“……”

“That’s not a face you forget easily.”

“Yeah…”

“He didn’t know about Sophia, so… It was tough stopping him from going to yell at Hunter Imi-seon.”

“I see…”

I’d have to tell Imi-seon, too.

I checked the time. We couldn’t sit here on the roadside forever. I started the car and drove slowly.

“…Taewoo.”

“Yes.”

“You’re right, I’m still chasing the lab. Most of the kidnapped kids have gone home, and we’ve caught quite a few of the researchers.”

It’s not as if I’d spent all this time just teaching kids.

“If you want to take revenge on them through legal means, I’ll help you.”

“…Legal means?”

“Not hunting them down yourself, but making sure they’re tried by the proper authorities.”

Kang Taewoo fell silent.

I spoke to him slowly.

“It’s hard right now, but… someday, I want to create a special investigation agency for Awakened, to go after these kinds of crimes.”

“…Don’t we already have that?”

“Not a dedicated agency. Nowhere near enough.”

I thought back to the Awakened Investigation Unit where I’d been briefly detained after first falling into the past. It was barely a ‘team’—so few people, they had to borrow staff from outside.

Things were very different now from when Father created the Agency. Hong Seokyeong wouldn’t feel the need for it as desperately as Father had. There was still a need for reform in dungeon raids, but it didn’t have to be as violent or radical as before. Since I’d experienced it, I could make up for what was lacking then and be better prepared now. There was Seungyeon and Oh Hyunwook, too. I didn’t think those kids would throw everything away on a whim.

What the world needed now wasn’t the Agency, but a police-like investigation unit for Awakened. A place to track crimes in dungeons, to deal with Awakened criminals.

A place where people who wanted a better world could work to make it happen.

…The very thing Father had tried and failed to create.

“No, I’ll make it.”

“…You, Teacher?”

“It doesn’t have to be me. But someone has to do it.”

Kang Taewoo frowned. I couldn’t read his expression.

Did he understand? Or…?

“Would that be enough? For your revenge?”