Chapter 45
“Hey, Kang Minchan! Long time no see, huh?”
The man, who looked and sounded like a typical thug, wrapped his arm around Kang Minchan’s small shoulders, and with a loud “Ack, ptui!” he spat the gum he was chewing onto the ground.
He had the impression of a gangster straight out of an old gangster movie.
At the thug’s tedious provocation, Shin Hae-jun quietly observed them.
“Hey, look at this kid’s pretty face. Looks like he’s been eating well these days.”
“Where’s that pretty nuna you used to hang around with?”
The man’s companions started picking on Kang Minchan as soon as they spotted him. Seeming used to this, Minchan obediently kept his head down and endured their insults.
“Hey, what are you doing? Not gonna fight back?”
The leader-like guy from the group waved his finger at Minchan, as if ordering him to come. If a dog barks, you go and bark back. Shin Hae-jun heard this common saying as it slipped out of the leader-like guy.
At that, Minchan, just as Shin Hae-jun had done in the past, rushed toward the guy in a fluster. Shin Hae-jun momentarily saw his own young self in Minchan’s retreating figure.
That desperate struggle to survive. The pale face nervously bracing for more violence—he couldn’t tell if it was his own younger self or Minchan’s.
Minchan’s face, now surrounded by the group, looked completely different from the one who had been smiling at Shin Hae-jun just moments ago.
Such guys were everywhere.
Low-life delinquents.
Despite being in a shelter where others watched over them, they were not satisfied and strangely found satisfaction in bullying those weaker than themselves.
“Tsk.”
Shin Hae-jun clicked his tongue in disgust at the thugs’ slimy antics. Inside the shelters, humans were just prey, no matter how much they ran or flailed about. Once out there, they were just prey to be devoured by the infected.
What gave these pathetically weak people the nerve to act like that?
Ah, perhaps his ability to understand things was diminishing bit by bit as he stuck with Min Ahyeon.
Shin Hae-jun didn’t just fail to understand his own sudden surges of emotion when he looked at Min Ahyeon. He also couldn’t comprehend the feelings of those foolish thugs.
Dismissing it as a lack of his own understanding, Shin Hae-jun was about to let it go, when the men suddenly started slapping Minchan’s cheek. Their hands struck his face with a sharp, relentless force.
Slap.
“Hey, didn’t I tell you before? If I see your face here again, I’ll really kill you.”
Slap.
Though the force wasn’t particularly forceful, the man’s hands pushed Minchan’s face in different directions, tainting it with embarrassment.
“S-Sorry.”
Despite not knowing what exact wrongdoing he had committed, or why simply showing his face on the street was such a grave sin, Minchan apologized while being hit.
“This brat came empty-handed too. What the hell does he think he’s doing.”
What does he think he’s doing?
At that remark, Minchan glanced subtly at Shin Hae-jun. Following Minchan’s gaze, the men turned to Shin Hae-jun, who was standing calmly amidst the chaos, one hand casually tucked into his pocket, watching Minchan and the thugs intently.
“What’s that now?”
Discovering Shin Hae-jun, the men frowned in bewilderment. At nearly 190cm, Shin Hae-jun’s physique was exceptional, and with his face fully covered, he stood out even more.
“Is he some kind of attention-seeker?”
Contrary to Shin Hae-jun’s goal of concealing his identity, he had inevitably drawn everyone’s attention. One of the smaller thugs in the group stepped forward and raised his voice shrilly.
“Is he some kind of celebrity or what? Why’s he walking around doing this crap?”
“Forget it. Even in this world, attention-seekers do as they please, it seems.”
They openly snickered and mocked Shin Hae-jun.
“Probably tall but with a face that’s damn ugly. Given how he’s hiding it like that.”
Ignoring the clamor of the crowd, Shin Hae-jun turned his gaze towards Minchan.
“Kang Minchan, was it?”
With a quiet nod, Minchan acknowledged. Shin Hae-jun briefly pondered whether he should intervene.
Should I help you?
Truthfully, Shin Hae-jun didn’t really like Minchan. The way he had eagerly clung to Ahhyeon, calling her “Nuna” despite not being that much younger, acting all innocent when he was old enough to know better—it was disgusting.
“Wow, so all the time we’ve spent together is just meaningless? We’re not in any kind of relationship? It doesn’t mean anything at all?”
Recalling Minchan’s exaggerated display of pretending to be pure in front of Ah-hyeon made Shin Hae-jun’s skin crawl. While not everyone may be as much of a trash as him, human desires were ultimately all the same, he thought.
However.
“Are they the ones who have been in Gangneung for a long time?”
Separate from Minchan, Shin Hae-jun disliked those thugs even more. Yes, he simply didn’t like Minchan, but those guys were downright grating. Enough to make him want to sweep them away. At Shin Hae-jun’s query, Minchan hesitantly moved his lips.
“Ah…”
Seeming to have grasped the situation, Minchan nodded.
“Yes, They’re a local of Gangneung.”
That’s why they probably dislike me, Minchan awkwardly explained. While hometown rivalries existed everywhere, Shin Hae-jun couldn’t understand how a few adult men could harass a mere child like this.
It wasn’t because they were lowly or cowardly, but because they were useless.
Kang Minchan didn’t have any resources or money. He was just a malnourished young boy, so what could those thugs possibly gain from harassing him?
Shin Hae-jun could guess it was about their pathetic need for a sense of superiority, but he still couldn’t understand it.
Where did this so-called “sense of superiority” even come from?
“They’ve been bullying us for a long time.”
Min-chan added cautiously, as if asking to be disciplined. Unlike Ahyeon, Shin Hae-jun didn’t feel compelled to protect the child. He saw it as a waste of resources to get embroiled in such useless affairs.
Shin Hae-jun disliked the thugs and wanted to sweep them away, but he had no intention of doing anything for Minchan’s sake.
“I see.”
Just as when he encountered the dying people in the city, Shin Hae-jun indifferently nodded. How harshly those thugs had bullied Minchan in the past was none of his concern.
Yet, Shin Hae-jun strode straight towards the group, who were snickering and glancing at him. His long legs quickly closed the distance between them.
“Then you must have much more useful information than this noisy one.”
More useful than Kang Minchan.
Shin Hae-jun muttered under his breath, causing the leader to step forward, his expression darkening.
“What the hell are you saying? Who the hell are you?!”
The man angrily pointed his finger. However, he seemed intimidated upon realizing that Shin Hae-jun’s stature was much larger up close than it appeared from a distance.
Despite his imposing height and broad shoulders, the group of men trembled in the face of the inexplicable pressure from him.
“What the hell are you?!”
Yet, the leader couldn’t back down before the watching eyes. He ostentatiously swung his fists at Shin Hae-jun’s shoulders as if to show he wasn’t afraid.
But Shin Hae-jun didn’t budge an inch, even with the force he put into his punches. Instead, he gave a sinister smile and raised his leather-gloved hand.
“No, I’m just glad.”
Shin Hae-jun thought it would be a good way to relieve his stress. Since he had to be able to do things he didn’t want to do in front of Ahyeon, if he could clear his complicated mind with this kind of incident, it would be a good thing.
🕂
Thank you for reading! ♡
