Boy Monster Chapter 8

Captain Jae Eunho’s revealed preference was an answer beyond everyone’s expectations, resulting in a huge reaction. Hyeon Jaewoong, jumping up from his seat, rolled up his sleeves to his shoulders.

“No wonder I felt like hitting the gym so badly…! I think this is destiny!”

His muscles were impeccably and magnificently built. Eunho pointed at Hyeon Jaewoong’s abdomen with the end of his cigarette.

“Your body is too perfect. Too factory-made, so to speak. Add a little more fun to it.”

“Ah, yes. Fun. Fun, sir? Fun…?”

Ji Hwelju and Ji Yeonri, who had returned at some point, joined the conversation. Ji Yeonri’s expression was bright, as if he had been promised some skinship tonight. First-class Ji Hwelju patted his chest and said,

“We’ll make sure Captain Jae Eunho escapes being single this year. Just trust me!”

“That’s right. Getting the captain a girlfriend and, you know, that, is my earnest wish this year. I’ll find him a partner before I become a Buddha myself.”

“I’ll bring 10 blind dates, but before that! Let’s change those glasses.”

“These glasses are meaningful. I’m not changing them.”

Jae Eunho still wore the square, horn-rimmed glasses that a detective friend had given him back in the mid-90s. He wouldn’t budge even when his team members urged him to change them. Eunho was always like that. He still listened to old music and used items filled with memories of people he was close to decades ago. Choi Jungkyung, who had given up on Eunho’s stubbornness long ago, said,

“Hey, don’t you know horn-rimmed glasses are hip these days? They’re back in style.”

“They were always in style in my heart.”

While the agents groaned at Eunho’s dry joke, Hyeon Jaewoong muttered once more,

“I’m really curious who Captain Eunho loved.”

Pretending not to hear, Eunho stubbed out his cigarette. Then his phone vibrated. He thought it was a text from Lim Geonhwi, but it was a chat app notification.

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Jae Eunho quickly deleted the notifications, as if afraid someone would see them, and shoved his phone into his jacket pocket. He thought he should probably delete all the chat apps.

His face flushed as if he’d been caught doing something embarrassing. He felt a fleeting sense of shame for having such an app installed on his phone.

Just then, Monk Chogwang got up from his seat, and Eunho accompanied him out. As they walked down the NIS hallway together, Eunho tried to calm his embarrassment. Right then, as if on cue, a text message arrived from Lim Geonhwi. It was a confirmation about his external schedule with Eunho that evening.

Monk Chogwang asked after him with a worried voice.

“How is life as a partner with the Army Chief of Staff? You’re not enduring it against your will, are you?”

“It’s so-so. Anyway, all married life falls apart after a while.”

Monk Chogwang looked at Eunho with a pitying gaze. Eunho was always calm and playful, which made him even more concerned.

“I’m doing what I can, too. I won’t pressure you guys any further.”

To control their superpowers, the state had injected nano bombs into the blood vessels of all Hwelju and Yeonri and installed electrical signal suppression devices in their brains.

Captain Jae Eunho did not view their fate as bleak. He encouraged the Hwelju and Yeonri, confronted the government, and secured their maximum freedom. Following Jae Eunho’s lead, the team members also kept their distance from despair. The S.E.T.U. special forces were always full of energy and operated with a sense of mission to protect the people. To the S.E.T.U. agents, Jae Eunho was a calm leader with an inner strength that matched his mission capabilities.

He appeared as if he were responsible for the well-being of the Hwelju and Yeonri, and as if he carried out that responsibility with ease. But that was all. Jae Eunho never showed what kind of person he was beneath the surface.

Terrible loss and pain, days spent like a madman, refusal to eat or drink, suicide attempt, emergency room transport, attempted infiltration of the Japanese army, refusal to eat or drink again….

These were the records of Jae Eunho between 1941 and 1950. However, it was impossible to imagine such a past in the now indifferent Jae Eunho. Chogwang vaguely understood. A person who has been overwhelmed by the power of a heavy tragedy and fate that they cannot control eventually becomes excessively detached from it.

“The Hoguksa Temple is also preparing for the Palgwanhoe, a ritual to stop the lunar eclipse on September 8th.1 You’re close to Monk Jiguk, aren’t you? Didn’t he tell you?”

“I heard. It won’t do any good.”

“Still, we can’t just stand by and watch your eighth death. Think of it as an expression of our affection.”

Eunho saw Monk Chogwang off into his car after he received his formal send-off and returned to headquarters.

The entrance to the headquarters was an ancient Four Heavenly Kings artifact not open to the public. As he opened the heavy door, he heard cheerful laughter and chatter from the conference room.

“Let’s all talk about how we started our ‘some’ relationships. Who wants to go first, the one who’s confident about being in love?”

“Us, us! When I first met him, it had been so long that I didn’t realize he was a Yeonri. I liked him anyway. I had a crush on him, and then…”

Eunho peeked inside without entering. Thanks to this, no one saw his expression darken. Eunho’s silent gaze, fixed on Choi Jungkyung smiling comfortably while video calling his wife, and Ji Hwelju and Ji Yeonri bickering closely together, fell to the floor.

He couldn’t join their happy gathering. Utterly lacking the confidence to do so, Eunho backed away.

Leaving headquarters, he looked back at the door. Above the Four Heavenly Kings sculpted entrance, the head of a horned monster was affixed high up. It was the symbol of the Four Hwelju who governed the Hwelju.

Gazing at the withered monster’s face, Jae Eunho turned around with his head bowed.

Evening had darkened. The place Jae Eunho headed in a taxi wasn’t the location Lim Geonhwi had designated. There was an old bar he frequented whenever he wanted to drink alone.

In a narrow, crooked alley in Jongno, he found the sign that read ‘7080 Live Music Cafe.’ From the moment he stepped onto the stairs leading down to the basement, the smell of stale fried snacks and damp air wafted up. Eunho limped down the stairs, his hand on the worn-out wall.

The bar owner, wearing a beret, recognized Eunho and turned on the music without a word. Kim Hyunsik’s rough and honest vocals filled the speakers.

Eunho sat alone in a corner and gulped down his drinks. He could only get drunk when he was alone, and only when he was alone could he say what he wanted to say.

Eunho lowered his eyes, drowsy from the alcohol. Nodding his head with his black hair falling around him, he turned on a recording app and recorded an automatic reply.

“Hello. Today’s selection is Kim Hyunsik’s ‘Like Rain, Like Music.’ It’s a masterpiece…. I was holed up in this very cafe when this song first came out… It’s been decades. I especially like the lyrics, ‘The painful rain is falling.’”

Pausing his words and listening to the song in a daze, Eunho opened his briefcase. Inside the briefcase, which could only be opened with Eunho’s fingerprint, were secrets related to his missions. Eunho pulled out a small scrapbook from among the documents. It was an album sized to hold two 3×5 film photos vertically.

As he flipped through the album page by page, old photos of Eunho taken with a film camera unfolded one after another. A picture of him eating jjajangmyeon with his team members in front of a fan, wearing a white shirt; checking his attire before an assassination mission at a hotel; sitting on the headquarters sofa with his chin resting on his hand, wearing a comfortable shirt; flashing a V sign in a hospital bed after barely surviving a tunnel terror attack….

Eunho slipped his finger behind one of the photos and pulled out a hidden piece of paper. It was a newspaper clipping, cut and folded.

[June 2006. Monster sighting in Gumi, Gyeongsangbuk-do… A laughable incident]

[March 2006. Director Bong Joonho, ‘I wrote the scenario based on my memory of seeing a monstrous creature crawling up the Jamsil Bridge when I was in high school.’]

[May 1992. Four hikers witness the monster Jangsan Tiger in Haeundae, Busan]

[September 1977. Mr./Ms. 000 and family witness an Imugi in Taean, North Jeolla Province]

He had cut out and kept every article about monster sightings in Korea. He had investigated them all, but they were all unsubstantiated eyewitness accounts.

The dates in the film photos went back through the 90s, 80s, 70s, and finally to 1941. The last photo was of the scene where the monster had exploded and died. A low voice reached Eunho’s ears as he caressed the old black-and-white photo.

—Sir, social swing dancing is all the rage these days. Have you ever tried it?

Eunho murmured the same answer he had given 100 years ago.

“No. The sight of me doing that kind of dance would be nothing short of hell.”

—Then, shall we enter hell together?

At the voice that came to his side, Eunho chuckled and replied,

“Yeah, let’s go.”

—Shall we enter hell together?

“Please, just take me away, Hwonwoo.”

After uttering the boy’s name, he hugged his knees. Crouching down and burying his face between his knees, Eunho didn’t raise his head for a long time. Smoke curled up from the unlit cigarette resting on the ashtray.

Half-drunk and drifting in and out of sleep, he suddenly heard a rumble.

Eunho abruptly lifted his head. He wondered if it was an earthquake, but the bar owner, seemingly oblivious, was staring at a stock investment page. He heard the sound of several footsteps descending the stairs.

Eunho quickly hid the album deep in his bag. Men in suits approached him.

“The Army Chief of Staff has arrived early and is waiting. Please get in the car.”

“…Fuck, tell him I forgot. Or that I’m drunk.”

“Yes, sir. You have to go anyway.”

“Sigh…”

Staggering to his feet, Eunho suddenly pretended to put on an earpiece. Then he mumbled,

“This is Captain Jae Eunho of S.E.T.U. Requesting Control Release Level 1. The Army Chief of Staff is being a nuisance.”

After babbling nonsense, Eunho tapped the shoulders of the men in front of him.

“Put it on Lieutenant General Lim Geonhwi’s card. You know which one, right?”

“…….”

• A ritual to prevent a lunar eclipse.