After dropping Namsu off, Yieum headed to the prosecutor’s office. While waiting for Jung Daehan, he called his doctor, Yoo Seola. The medicine had eased his symptoms, but if Namsu had been an alpha, he might have noticed the subtle change.
“What’s with the call at this hour?”
“Are you busy?”
“Having lunch. Why?”
“Can I come see you on Thursday for a bit?”
“Why? Is something wrong?”
“My body’s been feeling strange lately. I’ll explain when I get there.”
“Hm… what should I do? I’m leaving for vacation the day after tomorrow.”
“So suddenly?”
“You know my unnie, right? She works for Sehwa Group. She got sent on a business trip to New York, and they gave her two tickets. Business class, too. Plus a five-star hotel. There’s no way I’m passing that up.”
Listening to Seola’s excited voice, Yieum gently bit down on his lower lip.
“When are you coming back?”
“In a week. Is it urgent? Do you want to come now?”
Yieum stared uneasily at the medicine bottle in his hand.
Ten days… I can manage that long, right?
The symptoms had only lasted a moment, and the suppressants had worked quickly. There was no reason to panic over something that might amount to nothing. Deciding not to feed his anxiety with unnecessary thoughts, he told Seola he would see her after she returned.
“Just in case, should I ask a senior colleague of mine to see you? He’s very discreet.”
“No, it’s okay. I still have enough medicine. Nothing’s happened yet anyway.”
After wishing her a good trip, Yieum ended the call and tucked the medicine deep inside the car. Looking up, he saw Jung Daehan approaching from the distance. The moment he spotted Yieum’s car, he quickened his pace.
“Sorry. Did you wait long? I was about to leave when my department head called me in.”
“No, it’s fine. I just got here too.”
Jung Daehan slipped into the passenger seat and fastened his seatbelt. Internally, Yieum worried that, as an alpha, Daehan might notice something unusual about him.
But like every other alpha, Jung Daehan noticed nothing at all.
“I tried contacting Yang Mokhyung for a witness interview, but he’s not answering his phone. Sorry for dragging you into this.”
“It’s fine. I had business in the area anyway.”
Yieum started the engine and pulled out onto the road.
During the drive, Jung Daehan talked about his interview with the perpetrator, Kim Sangbeom, carefully explaining which parts of the testimony felt inconsistent. He had even brought documents with him.
Watching Daehan earnestly lay everything out in detail, Yieum found himself smiling before he realized it.
Noticing the smile, Daehan blinked at him with wide, innocent eyes.
“Why…? Is something funny?”
“No. I just remembered something from the past.”
“Huh?”
“You once spent nearly an hour explaining to me how bees affect the ecosystem. Back then, I honestly thought you’d grow up to become an entomologist. During breaks, you were always crouched by the flowerbeds hunting for bugs.”
“Did I really do that…? Well, I did a lot of embarrassing things when I was young…”
“Not at all. I thought it was cool. Back then, I didn’t really have any dreams myself. Or anything I particularly liked.”
At the bitterness hidden in Yieum’s tone, Daehan looked genuinely surprised.
His expression practically said: Didn’t you always want to become a police officer?
But the truth was, Yieum had never dreamed of becoming one.
His father had always been too busy with work to be home, leaving the burden of raising the children entirely to their mother. Years later, she admitted how unbearably lonely and difficult those days had been.
Yieum never wanted his own spouse to live like that.
At the very least, he wanted to spend weekends happily with his family.
But in the end, all three siblings had followed in their father’s footsteps anyway.
And perhaps because he’d learned he was not a beta but a half-omega, he no longer allowed himself to cling to fantasies of a peaceful family life.
“By the way, do you remember Noh Seongyu? He was in our class.”
“Your athlete friend? The one who looked kind of scary?”
Yieum burst out laughing.
Come to think of it, Choi Wonjoon had said the exact same thing back when he’d lost his memories.
Though honestly, Wonjoon himself was hardly any less intimidating.
Yieum suddenly wondered what kind of expression Seongyu would make if he ever learned that the Choi Wonjoon he used to drag around like a younger kid had become the CEO of Sehwa Construction.
As they reminisced about childhood memories, they eventually reached Yang Mokhyung’s house.
The loud barking of dogs announced the property long before they arrived.
“That place?”
“Yeah.”
When they pulled up outside and looked into the yard, Yieum immediately noticed the blue truck from before was gone.
He parked nearby, and the two of them headed inside while the dogs barked viciously at them.
The stench of animal waste mixed with something raw and fishy assaulted their noses. Yieum scanned the yard once before knocking on the front door, but unsurprisingly, nobody answered.
“The truck’s gone. He must be out somewhere.”
Even after checking around the house, there was no sign of Yang Mokhyung, and he still wasn’t answering his phone.
Then Yieum noticed an old warehouse sitting farther back from the property.
The structure stood well away from the main house, sealed shut with a thick iron door and a heavy padlock.
Its brick walls were solid, without windows or visible ventilation.
Almost instinctively, Yieum grabbed the lock and shook it.
A faint sound came from inside.
His expression sharpened instantly. Holding his breath, he pressed an ear against the crack in the door, where a strange smell seeped out from within. Jung Daehan, who had been checking the opposite side, walked over.
“Yieum.”
“Shh.”
After signaling him to stay quiet, Yieum focused on the sounds beyond the door.
Did I imagine it?
Knock, knock.
He rapped on the metal, but no response came.
“What is it?”
“I thought I heard something inside.”
“Maybe it was a rat?”
“Maybe.”
Falling into thought, Yieum glanced toward the entrance before reaching into his back pocket for his wallet.
From one of the folds, he pulled out two short metal wires.
Daehan stared at them, eyes widening.
“What are those?”
Without answering, Yieum inserted the wires into the padlock and began fiddling with them. Daehan looked utterly horrified.
“Y-Yieum?”
“Mr. Prosecutor, just pretend you didn’t see this.”
“No, wait—we can’t just break in without a warrant. And it’s not like it’ll open that eas—”
Click.
The lock sprang open before he could finish speaking.
A grin tugged at the corner of Yieum’s mouth, while Daehan looked completely dumbfounded.
“Yieum… first of all, when the owner comes back—”
“We’ll just lock it again before he returns.”
“No matter how I think about this, it feels like a terrible idea.”
Creeeak.
The heavy iron door swung open, and a nauseating stench rushed out.
Daehan immediately turned away with a grimace, while Yieum covered his nose with his sleeve.
The warehouse interior was larger than expected. Piles of junk filled the space, and near the entrance sat a large plastic basin containing a mound of black, unidentifiable lumps.
“What the hell is that?”
Yieum picked up a nearby stick and poked through it.
Animal carcasses.
Small ones.
A whole pile of them.
He had no idea why anyone would keep something like this, but the smell was so overpowering it nearly numbed his senses.
Unable to endure it, Daehan gagged dryly several times.
Pinching their noses shut, the two searched the warehouse until their eyes landed on a large cabinet shoved against the wall.
Staring at it, Daehan muttered jokingly:
“In movies, there’s usually a secret room behind stuff like that.”
Yieum gestured toward it.
“Go ahead. Try moving it.”
Daehan laughed awkwardly. He’d only been joking.
Still, almost as though they’d silently agreed on it, the two cleared away the junk and shoved against the cabinet together.
It didn’t move.
“Of course not…”
They exchanged embarrassed laughs at their own imagination—
Then they heard it.
A faint sound.
Something between a moan and a whimper.
Their eyes met instantly.
Both pressed their ears against the wall beside the cabinet.
“Is someone in there?”
Silence.
Bang. Bang.
Even after pounding on the wall with their fists, there was no response.
They examined the cabinet more closely and eventually found what looked like a latch mechanism near the bottom on the opposite side.
The moment they flipped it—
Rumble.
The cabinet slid sideways with a heavy grinding noise.
Behind it, a hidden entrance appeared.
The two stepped inside—
And froze.
A bloodstained bathtub sat against one wall.
On the floor nearby lay a man wearing nothing but a thin slip, his body covered in blood. His wrists and ankles were tightly bound, and tape sealed his mouth shut. His eyes barely opened.
Yieum and Daehan immediately rushed over to check his condition.
“Hey. Wake up. Hey!”
The man’s eyelids trembled weakly. A muffled groan escaped him, and tears streamed down his face.
Relief?
Terror?
Maybe both.
Once they confirmed he was conscious, Yieum immediately pulled out his phone and called Namsu.
He was in the middle of requesting backup and an ambulance when—
Bang!
A deafening noise sounded behind them.
Both men spun around.
The warehouse door that had been standing open moments earlier was now shut tight.
“Fuck!”
They rushed back out and threw themselves against it, but the door didn’t budge.
They’d been so focused on the victim they hadn’t even noticed someone approaching.
Jung Daehan came up beside him, and Yieum shouted toward the outside.
“Yang Mokhyung! Open this door right now! Do you realize what you’re doing?”
No answer came.
Furious, Yieum kicked the door repeatedly, but it didn’t even shake.
“Damn it!”
His eyes darted around until he spotted a rusted shovel nearby. Daehan grabbed it and slammed it against the iron door over and over, but the metal held firm.
Eventually the shovel head snapped off the handle and clattered uselessly onto the floor.
They immediately realized waiting around could get them killed.
Yieum contacted the nearest police substation and urgently requested officers at the location.
Then, while frantically searching for another escape route, he heard liquid splashing across the roof overhead.
At first he thought someone was pouring water.
Then came the crackling sound.
Smoke slowly drifted through the gaps in the ceiling like shimmering heat haze.
Daehan’s face hardened.
At the same time, Yieum groaned and cursed under his breath.
“Fuck… we’re screwed.”