WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 81: Darkness Sometimes Feels Comforting (8)
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What were plans, schemes, and stratagems?
There could be many interpretations, but Director Baek saw them as methods of achieving a goal.
Reading other people's movements. Reading the currents of society. Reading the environment and its variables, then steering events in the direction he wanted.
The “perfect plan” Director Baek sought, therefore, was one that succeeded no matter what happened. One the other side could not stop even if they knew about it.
Until now, Director Baek had believed he had done his utmost to make such plans. But looking back, his plans had always carried one prerequisite.
The other side does not know my plan.
Because they did not know, they could not prepare. Because they could not prepare, they could not stop it. Perhaps Director Baek's plans had not failed because no one could read him, rather than because the plans themselves were so perfectly designed.
But now, Kang Jin-ho could read Director Baek. Whatever he prepared, whatever he discarded, even if he rolled the dice. Kang Jin-ho knew in advance.
“...Then.”
What sort of plan could not be stopped even if the other side knew about it?
Director Baek thought for a long time. Then he reached a surprisingly simple conclusion.
A plan the other side did not want to stop. A plan whose outcome they wanted as well.
“An invitation.”
“...Pardon? An invitation?”
Rather than answering Dolsoe, Director Baek opened a drawer. He took out a small envelope and a card, then wrote a short message with a small brush.
-Thursday, 3:00 p.m. XX Cafe, Eastern Boulevard.
-This won't be needed anymore.
Then he picked up a die rolling around on his desk and placed it inside the envelope.
“Director. Are you... sending that to Kang Jin-ho?”
“Yes.”
“But... if you send something like that, this place's location might be exposed. And there's no guarantee Kang Jin-ho will come to that meeting place, and even if he does, if he brings heroes along...”
“It doesn't matter.”
Director Baek tied the envelope shut with string.
“Even if I hide, he'll find me. He already has a grip around my neck. In that case, it's better to take a gamble.”
“...”
“Think about it, Dolsoe. Kang Jin-ho has only a few choices after receiving this invitation.”
Director Baek continued expressionlessly.
“First, he ignores it entirely and arrests me. Second, he accepts the invitation and arrests me. Third, he comes to meet me alone.”
“...If it isn't the third option, wouldn't that mean you get arrested either way?”
“Dolsoe, they can arrest me whenever they want. I'm already in a losing position. And... if he chooses the first or second option, that's information too.”
“...”
“Either way, I lose nothing. And perhaps... Kang Jin-ho wants to meet me as well. If he truly has psychic abilities, there's no reason for him not to meet me.”
Perhaps it was the simplest plan of all. A plan too embarrassing to even call a plan.
“I'll give this to a low-rank villain. I'll have them hand over the letter while pretending to turn themselves in to Kang Jin-ho.”
Yet it was a plan bound to succeed. Director Baek handed the envelope to Dolsoe and pressed his lips tightly together.
“Let's see what you do, Kang Jin-ho.”
* * *
“Jin-ho, a villain who came to turn themself in had a letter like this.”
“Ah, yes. Just leave it there.”
Kang Jin-ho had been reviewing documents when he checked the envelope and let out an involuntary laugh.
An envelope with a date written on it. A single die inside.
“‘This won't be needed anymore,’ huh.”
Kang Jin-ho rolled the die from the envelope in his hand as he thought.
It was Director Baek. Anyone could see Director Baek had sent this letter. Returning the die meant that Director Baek acknowledged he had been read. At the same time, it meant he would not hide.
'If you're going to arrest me, go ahead. But if you come alone, be prepared to be read. Will there be countermeasures in place?'
Director Baek was probably thinking this. Kang Jin-ho would have few options after receiving the letter, and the choice itself could provide information.
Above all, Director Baek knew something else. Kang Jin-ho wanted to meet him too.
“I'll have to go and find out.”
Kang Jin-ho slipped the die into his pocket.
He had no intention of bringing heroes along. He had no intention of arresting Director Baek either. Even if he threw him in prison, there was no way the sentence would be high. There would be no evidence. Memories? Light City had more than enough ways to erase those.
So Kang Jin-ho intended to go alone, just as Director Baek wanted.
After all, it was an invitation.
* * *
A small cafe along Eastern Boulevard.
A man was already seated by the window. He wore the ordinary clothes of an office worker and had an ordinary face one could see anywhere. The sort of person whose face would not even be remembered if they passed by on the street.
Jingle.
Kang Jin-ho entered the cafe and sat in the chair across from him without hesitation.
“You came.”
“I received an invitation.”
“And you came alone.”
“Wasn't that what you meant?”
Rather than answer, Director Baek raised a hand and ordered two coffees from the employee.
“Is an Americano all right?”
“Anything is fine.”
A short while later, the coffees arrived, and the two drank in silence. To an unfamiliar observer, they would have looked like coworkers enjoying coffee in the afternoon.
“Did you receive the die?”
“Yes. I put it in my pocket.”
“That's a relief. I was worried it might have fallen out of the envelope.”
Director Baek set down his cup and continued casually.
“I'll admit it. I lost. Ever since Senior Officer Ahn Seong-sil went on leave, it's been a process of seeing just how thoroughly I had lost.”
“...”
“So today, I called you here simply because I wanted to know who I lost to.”
Director Baek raised his head.
For the first time, he looked Kang Jin-ho directly in the eye. His eyes gleamed, and the ether inside his body surged.
Kang Jin-ho did not look away. He had come all this way to let him see.
“...”
And then... Director Baek saw it.
Annoyance. A little unease. Tension. The desire to go home quickly. Tangled, complicated feelings toward a woman named Eun-yeong.
Those human, ordinary emotions passed in an instant. Something enormous was revealing itself higher up, in a deeper place.
“...This is.”
Karmic retribution. Lives. Karma.
Something like the lives of countless people crushed under a compactor rested above this man's head.
No, it was not resting above him. The man was pinned beneath it.
“...”
Director Baek blankly stared into the air. His mouth hung half open as he looked above Kang Jin-ho's head.
Kang Jin-ho quietly watched his reaction.
What had he seen? Could he see a number? Or had he seen something else? Kang Jin-ho could not know. But one thing was certain. Director Baek had confirmed his karma.
“...Heh.”
Then, at some point, a laugh slipped from Director Baek's lips.
“Heh... hehehehe!!!”
The quiet laughter gradually grew louder. Director Baek covered his face with one hand, his shoulders shaking as he laughed.
“...”
When the laughter stopped, bloody tears were streaming from Director Baek's eyes.
“...I see.”
Director Baek glared at Kang Jin-ho with reddened eyes. They looked weary and exhausted, but still unbroken.
“I don't know what kind of monster you are, what kind of mass murderer, or what the hell you did, you crazy bastard. I don't want to know. But there's one thing I understand.”
Director Baek leaned across the table.
“I have read you.”
Director Baek had read Kang Jin-ho. He had not seen the whole man, but he understood at least the principles behind his actions.
An ordinary person's mind would have screamed and collapsed the moment it saw the weight of lives Kang Jin-ho carried... but Director Baek was different. With sheer mental strength, he overcame what he had seen and even came to understand it.
That man was being crushed under the weight of lives. If he did nothing, he would surely suffocate.
And to lighten that weight, the man did good deeds. Every time he solved a case, every time he caught a villain... by doing anything that helped Light City, he bought himself a reprieve from the lives weighing him down.
'In that case.'
The answer was simple. Make it impossible for him to lessen it.
Kang Jin-ho held off that weight by solving cases? Then make it impossible for him to solve cases. Remove villains from this city. Turn Light City into a peaceful place, and Kang Jin-ho would naturally be crushed beneath that weight and...
“...”
Director Baek's thoughts stopped there.
A peaceful city.
A city without crime, without villains, a city where evil had vanished.
Would there be a place for Director Baek in such a city? Would there be a place to show off a perfect plan?
“...Ha.”
There wouldn't.
Director Baek was someone who fed on chaos. Therefore, in a city without chaos, there was nowhere for him to stand. No reason to make plans, no stage upon which to prove himself.
The way to defeat Kang Jin-ho at his core was to make this city peaceful. And the moment he made the city peaceful... the driving force that had moved Director Baek all this time would vanish as well.
If he wanted to win, Director Baek had to abandon himself.
“...Heh heh.”
Director Baek laughed again. This time, it was a weak sound, like air escaping a balloon.
A plan that could not be stopped even if the other side knew about it.
If Director Baek made a plan to turn the city peaceful, no one would stop it. The police, the heroes, and the citizens would all welcome it with open arms.
So perhaps a peaceful plan was the closest thing to the “perfect plan” Director Baek had been seeking all along.
But if there was a plan that had led him to this “perfect plan,” how could it possibly be called perfect? Only then did Director Baek realize why Kang Jin-ho had come here so confidently.
Director Baek... had never had any way to win from the start.
“Mr. Kang Jin-ho.”
“Yes.”
“You are... a truly cruel man.”
Looking as though his soul had left his body, Director Baek took out money for the coffee and placed it on the table. Then he unsteadily rose from his seat.
“Where are you going?”
“...Who knows. I have no plan.”
With those words, Director Baek left the cafe. With unsteady steps, he vanished into the crowd in an instant.
“...”
Left alone, Kang Jin-ho looked down at his cooling coffee.
“Well... I figured this was how it would go.”
The coffee tasted terrible.
Author's Note
Thank you for reading.
This is the final chapter uploaded.
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