WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 126: Whoever the Opponent, You Must Always Do Your Best in a Fight

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"What, what did you say?"

The man sentenced to one hour and seventeen minutes of confinement panted angrily as he asked again.

"Y-you're only taking those two with you? You're leaving us here?"

The woman sentenced to only twenty-one minutes merely kept her mouth shut, as though embarrassed.

I'd seen an expression like that several times.

In the Corridor of Unforgettable Memories. In that hospital room where Kim Hee-sook had tried to kill her own son.

Twenty-one minutes...

Even accounting for the fact that it had been attempted theft rather than completed theft, that seemed like a light sentence. There must have been circumstances that significantly reduced Kim Hee-sook's sentence.

"Yeah. You understood perfectly, so why do you keep making me repeat myself?"

For a moment, Yun Geon-min seemed too dumbfounded to speak.

"Ha. Wh-what kind of selfish person are you? You're taking those two because you're close to them, and you don't care what happens to me and this lady because you don't know us!"

"Huh? Seon Yu-han says we aren't close."

"No, fuck, that's not the point...!"

"Oh! I think so too. The important thing is that they didn't get confinement sentences."

"No, I'm saying! You're just going to leave together, right? You're saying we have to survive on our own!"

"Yeah. That's what I said."

Yu Mi-rae tilted her head at Yun Geon-min as though she genuinely couldn't understand him.

"But listen. Are you saying I have to wait until you get released? Why? What am I supposed to do here for one hour and seventeen minutes?"

There wasn't a trace of malice in that bewildered attitude, which somehow made it all the more malicious.

"Just sit here and chat with you guys? Boringly? I might be able to clear two more floors in one hour and seventeen minutes."

Yu Mi-rae genuinely didn't want to wait.

Purely because it wasn't fun.

"You..."

At last, Yun Geon-min's blood pressure must have shot through the roof. His face flushed red and purple as he panted harshly.

"You, you... crazy bitcheeeaagh!"

Thud, crack!

Yun Geon-min suddenly flew into a rage and charged at Yu Mi-rae, but he collapsed before he could even finish his insult.

Yu Mi-rae reached Yun Geon-min's head before his hand could reach her.

More precisely, she gripped a pen and drove it through Yun Geon-min's eyeglass lens.

"Aagh, ugh...!"

Yun Geon-min lay on the floor, covering his face.

Fragments of the lens fell in tiny clatters. Between his fingers, I could see the pen lodged in his eye, blood running beneath his hand.

Thud!

"Ghk, ugh! Aagh!"

Yu Mi-rae kept kicking him.

"R-Representative Mi-rae... Stop, please... stop..."

Hyeon Je-won squeezed their eyes shut, crouched down, and muttered as though praying.

Thud, crack, thump!

Yu Mi-rae didn't answer their prayers.

"Representative Yu Mi-rae, stop, ngh... Please stop."

It was like Yu Mi-rae couldn't hear us.

I stared at her, clutching my numbed chest where I'd been shoved back.

"Who do you think made me like this?!"

Yu Mi-rae was crying.

"You have no right... I'm sick of it. Sick of it. Sick of it. Shut up!"

Whose voice was Yu Mi-rae hearing?

Her father, who had imprisoned her, starved her, and abused her?

"You don't have the right to call me a crazy bitch! You. You did this... It's all because of you!"

Tears streamed down Yu Mi-rae's face as she kicked Yun Geon-min without mercy.

Her skirt fluttered irregularly with the rhythm of those rough movements, never getting in the way.

It was a deeply unnatural, unreal sight.

Watching it made my stomach turn.

"Representative Yu Mi-rae! Stop!"

I didn't hesitate any longer. I grabbed Yu Mi-rae from behind again.

This time, I locked down her entire upper body so she couldn't drive an elbow into my solar plexus, then pushed against the backs of her knees to throw her off balance.

Naturally, Yu Mi-rae didn't let herself be restrained and calm down.

"Let go! Let go of me, you stupid bastard!"

I was her new target.

Still bound in my grip, Yu Mi-rae put her weight into it and stumbled violently backward...

Thud!

I was shoved backward with her, my lower back slamming into the corner of a desk.

"Why are you stopping me? Why? How can you do this to me?!"

Pain shot through my spine and across my entire body. The moment my strength gave out, Yu Mi-rae broke free and grabbed me by the collar.

It was fine.

She was unarmed. I could take a few more hits if I had to.

But the moment I looked into Yu Mi-rae's reddened eyes...

"Why? Why are you doing this to me? Why? Why are you the only one? The only one who acts like nothing happened. Like you've forgotten everything... Why am I the only one..."

Every muscle in my body tensed.

My heart pounded rapidly.

"You pathetic bastard who couldn't even take the chance when it came. You slave."

That was unmistakable killing intent.

It filled those black pupils.

"You're just like that person."

I would die.

If I kept letting her attack me, I would die.

My body moved on reflex.

Crack, crunch.

I grabbed Yu Mi-rae's left hand, still clutching my collar, and immediately bent back her thumb.

Even then, Yu Mi-rae didn't stop.

Thud!

Her face twisted in pain, but Yu Mi-rae punched my jaw with her uninjured right hand and drove a knee into my midsection.

"Ugh..."

I couldn't curl up here.

If I did, Yu Mi-rae would take control of the fight, and it would lead straight to my death.

What should I do?

Countless thoughts flashed through my mind in an instant.

If I half-heartedly tried to end this by merely knocking out someone who had completely lost control, I would be the one who died.

But I didn't want to actually kill her.

Besides, this wasn't a situation where the Labyrinth had forced one side to kill the other or die.

Only one person had completely lost her senses...

Ah.

Then I just had to make her come to her senses.

Grab!

I barely caught Yu Mi-rae's left hand. I gripped her broken thumb tightly and twisted it, then seized her right hand too when she flinched.

"R-Representative Mi-rae!"

Of course, my face was getting clawed up in the process, and Yu Mi-rae was still biting my wrist hard enough to tear off flesh.

So I threw my head back...

Thud!

And smashed my forehead into Yu Mi-rae's with all my strength.

My vision went white.

From the point where our foreheads collided to the back of my skull, my head throbbed as though it were splitting apart. Pain screamed inside my skull as though my brain itself had pain receptors.

Right. It had to be this much.

Yu Mi-rae would hurt as much as I did.

I felt the tension ease slightly in the jaw that had been biting my arm like a vicious dog.

"Look carefully!"

I didn't miss that moment. I gripped Yu Mi-rae's face and directed her gaze.

"I'm Seon Yu-han!"

Not Yu Hyun-jae.

"That's Yun Geon-min!"

Not her father.

"You're at the office right now!"

Not home.

"..."

Me. Yun Geon-min. Then the whole office.

As I turned her face, Yu Mi-rae looked around in turn. Focus slowly returned to her eyes.

The killing intent toward me faded.

Only then did I cautiously let go of Yu Mi-rae.

"...Ah. Right."

Representative Yu Mi-rae gave a faint smile.

"I got confused. My mistake."

Two mistakes like that, and we'd be holding funerals one after another.

"It's inconvenient without Manager Kim..."

Yu Mi-rae muttered indifferently.

Crack, pop.

She reset her broken left thumb.

"..."

An unpleasant crawling itch ran beneath my clothes, as though bugs were moving over my skin. I looked away from Yu Mi-rae.

Hyeon Je-won was still curled up with their hands over their ears, while Kim Hee-sook stood frozen, blankly staring in this direction.

Yun Geon-min seemed to have passed out completely.

His life wasn't in danger, but he probably wouldn't be getting up easily for a while.

Rustle, clack.

I brought over the first-aid kit whose location I'd checked before and sat in front of Yun Geon-min.

Thankfully, his ribs didn't seem broken. They could be cracked, though.

His organs hadn't ruptured, had they?

...Not that there was anything I could do if they had.

I decided to treat only the wounds crushed beneath Yu Mi-rae's soles.

I couldn't carelessly pull out the pen lodged in his eye. The same went for the broken lens fragments.

If I meddled with them carelessly, he might go into shock.

I'd injured my eyes plenty of times, but honestly, I had no idea how to handle someone else's.

"What? Aren't you leaving?"

"Just let me finish this."

It seemed better to secure the pen so it wouldn't move or come out.

"Really? Do what you want. What about you, Je-won?"

Hyeon Je-won's body jerked as they sat with their head buried in their knees.

"Aren't you coming with me?"

Hyeon Je-won didn't answer.

"You don't want to? Fine."

Yu Mi-rae turned around.

"See you later!"

She said goodbye brightly, as though nothing had happened, and left.

"..."

For a while, silence lingered in the Legal Affairs Office.

Like the aftermath of a natural disaster.

Of the three of us, excluding the unconscious Yun Geon-min, Kim Hee-sook spoke first.

"Um, Seon Yu-han... Are you okay? I think you should get treated too..."

Kim Hee-sook looked back and forth between my face and arm as she asked.

"Ah."

Only then did I feel the sting in my cheek where I'd been scratched by nails and the throbbing in my bitten wrist.

My face didn't matter.

But my wrist...

"Oh no, what do we do..."

I needed to disinfect it.

The teeth marks were still there.

My jacket sleeve had ridden up during the fight, leaving only my thin dress shirt as a barrier against her teeth. The fabric had even been pierced around the canines.

That was why my bare skin had been injured too.

Wipe, wipe.

...How had Yu Hyun-jae fought Yu Mi-rae like that?

And how had Yu Mi-rae fought Yu Hyun-jae like that?

Their height difference wasn't that great, but there was still a basic difference in build...

As I disinfected the wound, all sorts of questions surfaced. Then I stopped thinking about them.

"Hyeon Je-won."

Their body flinched again when I called their name to check on them.

"Are you feeling a little better now?"

The researcher, who had trembled the entire time Yu Mi-rae was being violent, didn't answer.

Just as they hadn't answered Yu Mi-rae earlier.

...They were scared of me.

The way they were scared of Yu Mi-rae.

Seeing how well Hyeon Je-won had followed Representative Yu Mi-rae until now, nothing like this must have happened before.

Then again, until today, Manager Kim had been alive and well, keeping watch over the representative. And they hadn't been trapped in the Labyrinth like this in the first place.

"..."

I looked at Kim Hee-sook for a moment, then checked the time and stood.

"I'm leaving now."

Honestly, I had no intention of waiting either.

Just like Yu Mi-rae.

Footnotes:

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