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Chapter 11
Yoo Hae-in slipped in like a stray cat, quietly sneaking through the entrance before hiding her body somewhere among the people at the back.
Tae-jo stretched his neck a little longer to catch sight of her.
Black turtleneck, black suit pants—her hair, unlike yesterday, was neatly arranged. Again today, she wore little makeup, and as before, had no bodyguards accompanying her.
Her shoulders were drawn in tight with tension, her every move careful, as if she thought this wasn’t a place she belonged.
Yet at the same time, her eyes kept scanning the area, as if she were desperately searching for someone.
“Why?”
Watching her silently, Director Yeom spoke up again.
“Is there someone here you know?”
“Yoo Hae-in.”
“…Yoo Hae-in?”
Director Yeom furrowed his brow, then craned his neck in the same direction Tae-jo was looking.
“Your fiancée?”
At those words, Tae-jo’s eyes shifted to Yeom. The way his eyebrow tilted upward was sharp, almost hostile.
“Not anymore.”
His voice was equally cold.
“We broke off the engagement.”
For six long years, Tae-jo had grown sick of that wretched phrase, your fiancée, always clinging to the name Yoo Hae-in.
Out of duty, out of obligation to protect someone, he had unwillingly allowed her into his territory. But because the fact itself chafed at him, he had been driven further abroad, roaming endlessly, if only to distance and reject her more completely.
“So don’t call her that again.”
“You broke it off? Wasn’t this supposed to be the meeting where you’d introduce her to me?”
“Introduce her? Don’t be ridiculous.”
Tae-jo gave a cold snort.
It was one thing that Yoo Hae-in had shown up here. But he wasn’t nearly at ease enough to act as if nothing had changed.
They’d suffered the same accident, but Ju-hong was dead, while Yoo Hae-in lived.
It wasn’t that he wanted Hae-in dead—but wasn’t she, in some way, partly responsible for Ju-hong’s death? There was no reason, no will, to introduce her to anyone.
And from the way Hae-in was trying to stay hidden, it seemed she too wished no one would notice her.
But then…
“Didn’t the two of you plan this? Your fiancée—she’s walking this way.”
As Yeom said, Hae-in was indeed approaching.
Her bare face, pale and unadorned, was marked with redness around the eyes—had she been crying?
Her gaze was fixed straight ahead as she walked with an upright bearing that didn’t quite seem to belong to her.
Again, Tae-jo felt that odd suspicion. Was that really Yoo Hae-in?
Could someone change so completely before and after an accident?
Watching her, Director Yeom muttered under his breath.
“Hey, wasn’t your fiancée supposed to be blind?”
“She was. But she can see now.”
“She had surgery?”
“She hit her head in this accident, and now… she sees.”
Director Yeom narrowed his eyes at him, his large pupils silently saying, What nonsense are you spouting?
Tae-jo understood. It made no sense.
“But it’s true.”
It was, however, the truth.
“And she’s not my fiancée anymo—”
Tae-jo had to shut his mouth, because Hae-in had come right up close.
“…re.”
Something was strange.
Did Hae-in know Director Yeom? Had she met him before?
Her deep brown eyes were locked solely on Yeom. That alone seemed to rattle the director, who usually carried himself with easy arrogance.
“Uh, uh, uh?”
The normally smooth-talking Yeom now stuttered, as if caught in a buffer.
“Uh, h-hello.”
In that moment, Tae-jo was nothing but a background extra.
It was as if Hae-in hadn’t even noticed his presence. Standing before Yeom, she didn’t so much as blink, allowing Tae-jo to remain a mere observer.
“…Teacher?”
Her voice trembled at the end, carrying a faint dampness, as if with tears.
Why?
Was she apologetic, guilty, for being the only one who survived?
Or was there another reason?
More than that—how did she even know Director Yeom?
Hadn’t she just called him teacher?
Frowning, Tae-jo glanced at Yeom. Caught, the director spoke hurriedly, wearing a strained look.
“I’ve heard a lot about you. You’re Yoo Hae-in, right?”
But though she had come forward so confidently, Hae-in suddenly faltered. With a startled face, she stumbled back.
“Th-that’s… I think I mistook you for someone else.”
Mistook…?
Then why did it look so much like she really knew Yeom?
Her words sounded more like she had recognized someone she shouldn’t have, and was scrambling to cover for it.
“I—I’m sorry.”
She lowered her small head in apology. Again and again she bowed—something the old Hae-in had never done so easily.
Backing away while bowing, she nearly bumped into a passerby.
“Hae-in.”
At last, Tae-jo had no choice but to step in.
He grabbed her wrist, pulling her closer, and only then did she seem to notice him. Her eyes widened.
“S-Se… Tae-jo?”
She murmured his name softly, almost to herself. That grated on his nerves—so she truly hadn’t realized he was there.
For the cautious, calculating Yoo Hae-in he had known, such carelessness was rare. But with her memory gone, she had become looser in every way.
“What are you doing here, Seo Tae-jo?”
She blinked several times, forcing strength into tear-stained eyes, and pulled her wrist free from his grasp.
“Then what about you—what are you doing here?”
Was she flustered by his question?
He saw the storm swirl in her pupils.
“Well…”
For Hae-in, this place was hardly forbidden. In fact, it was natural—expected—that she come.
There was more than one reason.
“…It’s the memorial service for the victims of the Ino Training Center accident.”
It had happened at the Ino Group Training Center.
Though it was called a training center, it was also practically Hae-in’s personal playground. Her being here was entirely reasonable.
“And because they were in the accident with me.”
Her solemn steps carried the weight of a survivor, one who hadn’t forgotten that her own photo might easily have been placed on the altar.
“I felt I had to come.”
A perfect answer.
It was delivered like a memorized model response, recited mechanically.
And that was precisely what made it strange.
The answers she gave fit the new Hae-in, but they didn’t suit the old her at all.
Tae-jo couldn’t help but laugh.
“Ha… ha.”
His scoff, full of disbelief, made her brown eyes dart about in panic.
“So, you nearly die and now you’re finally trying to act human?”
Perhaps the words stung. The dampness in her eyes immediately dried, turning brittle.
She raised her chin ever so slightly, pulling sunglasses from her handbag to cover her reddened eyes. With her head tilted up, she looked almost haughty.
And then—
“If you come back from death, then you’d better know how to live like a human.”
With that retort, she swept past him. Her steps toward the altar were strangely formal.
Three chrysanthemums.
Carrying the white flowers, Yoo Hae-in climbed the platform. She laid them before precisely three people.
Agent Kim Dan-woo.
Agent Yoon Soo-young.
And the hacker, Ju-hong.
She only gave Kim Dan-woo a brief glance. Before Yoon Soo-young, she bowed her head for a long while.
But in front of Ju-hong—she lingered the longest, dazed, her face vacant.
Tae-jo thought she would finish her brief tribute and leave.
But no. She even boarded the bus heading to the burial ground.
Ju-hong…
The child being carried in that hearse.
