The Unbelievers Chapter 37

Since they were family, there was no possibility of betrayal that the family would have to bear, and that family member had already disposed of quite a few people under the orders of the eldest uncle and the Council of Elders, in addition to being the representative of an affiliate company. This meant that if he were not careful, he had too much to lose.

Yoo Siun opened the viewing window of the incinerator. He checked the situation inside. The person who had been slumped over with his head between his knees, fallen to the side, was nowhere to be found, and vain fragments of bone were clustered within the fiercely blazing flames.

Having peered inside, Yoo Siun pulled his hand out of his pocket and reduced the heat. The intense thermal energy flushed his face deep red. After spending a bit more time, he cut off the flames completely.

He stood back for a while and opened the lid, waiting for the internal heat to subside. When he pulled the handle of the incinerator, a steel plate slid out like a large oven tray being drawn. Atop it, the mound of bones radiated a scorching heat, and embers drifted up like dust.

He swept the bones with a broom. The number of bones in a human is 206. Fine ribs, neck bones, or fingers could no longer be traced; only the large pieces, such as the two femurs, the skull, and the pelvic bone, indicated that these bones had once been a person.

He immediately transferred what was in the dustpan to the grinder and pressed the lower lever with his foot to activate the machine. Instantly, a loud motor sound broke the pitch-black and silent atmosphere. Dust and small fragments flew up. The remains splintered, making a crushing sound.

He did not wait until they became powder as they would at a crematorium; once they were roughly ground into an unrecognizable state, he turned off the rotating machine. As the noisy mechanical sound vanished, the barking dogs also grew quiet. Soon, the surrounding silence stood out with hair-raising clarity.

He picked up the grinder bin and headed toward the pit. A hole had been dug in advance, deep enough to submerge one of Yoo Siun’s knees. He dumped the remains there. A cloud of gray dust rose up, and Yoo Siun waved his hand through the air.

As he finished the work and plugged the empty bin back into the grinder, the sound of a car approaching from the distance was heard just in time.

He brushed his hands clean and shook off any dust that might have settled on his clothes. He walked to the faucet in the yard, leaned over, and turned on the tap. He rubbed his hands together under the trickling water.

The car stopped, a door opened, and the rustling sound of someone gathering things followed. By the time he finished washing his hands, Manager Nam was approaching with coffee.

“I’ve brought something for you to drink. Is it all finished? I am sorry, every time. This is work I should be doing.”

“This isn’t work to be assigned to others; it is something family should originally do. Besides, don’t you find this frightening, Manager?”

“Frightening? I’ll have you know I served in the White Skeleton Division. It’s just that I was obsessed with the occult when I was young. It feels a bit uncomfortable. It is true that I’d prefer not to do it if possible.”

“Are you afraid it will appear in your dreams?”

Yoo Siun gestured with his chin toward somewhere in the darkness, as if pointing to the buried pit.

“CEO, I served in the White Skeleton Division, you know?”

Manager Nam poured bottled water into a cup with ice and handed it over. Yoo Siun drank the water refreshingly, like a reward after grueling labor.

It was night and the entire surrounding area was a wooded hill, so the temperature was much cooler than in the city, but summer was still summer. Moreover, to Yoo Siun, who had been standing next to a scrap metal bin radiating intense heat, the cold drink was a refreshing water of life.

“I figured you would, so I bought one more bottle.”

“This is why I like you, Manager.”

Yoo Siun praised Manager Nam, who was pouring fresh water into a cup that had nothing left but ice even though Yoo Siun had barely taken a few sips.

They moved toward the car. Now that the work was concluded, it would be over once they left this place. While Yoo Siun surveyed the surroundings out of habit, Manager Nam glanced at him and spoke.

“It didn’t seem that way lately.”

“What do you mean…”

Yoo Siun looked at Manager Nam, asking what he meant, and then, remembering the words he had just spoken, let out a dry laugh.

“Ah, right. I was a bit jealous because Eunseong was making such a fuss about wanting to live with you, Manager.”

“Anyone who heard that would laugh. To think you would be jealous of me, CEO.”

“I was envious, though.”

“It seems student Eunseong still hasn’t backed down from that claim. Are you really thinking of moving him out?”

“Thinking… yes, I am thinking about it. What can I do when he says he hates it so much? He is a precious person, so I should do as he wishes.”

Yoo Siun spoke as if joking. The sound of grass insects that had been heard intermittently cut off abruptly as he stepped closer to the thicket.

“He’ll have to move elsewhere anyway once the identity laundering is finished. Wouldn’t it be better to send him then?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

Yoo Siun knew that whether Eunseong eventually moved out or went elsewhere, he would have to leave him regardless.

Manager Nam opened the back seat door. Before getting into the car, Yoo Siun brushed off his clothes once more and dusted off his pants. As he climbed into the back seat, Manager Nam closed the door. With a “thud,” the sound of the car door closing scratched through the eerie silence, and the grass insects began to cry again.

Manager Nam glanced back at the livestock shed, which appeared only as a huddled shadow, and shuddered. Once again, he felt grateful to a boss who showed consideration for his circumstances as a mere employee. He had excluded him by saying it was a family matter, but in Yoo Siun’s position, he could have made him do anything through power or money.

Getting into the driver’s seat, Manager Nam started the ignition. The headlights brightly illuminated a spot where weeds grew as tall as an adult male. Winged insects flew scatteredly into the light.

“We are departing.”

“…”

Yoo Siun did not respond and leaned his back into the rear seat.

Just as he told Manager Nam, he was preparing for the separation from Eunseong, but he was unable to execute it.

Right now, Eunseong would be rummaging through Yoo Siun’s study, spreading a blanket under the astronomical telescope, disrupting the angles he had adjusted while looking at whatever was being reflected, tilting his head and wondering if it was Jupiter or Mars.

Despite having asked to be sent out, Eunseong was actually increasingly invading Yoo Siun’s space, leaving his scent, rumpling his bedding, and even shelving the books in the study upside down.

He had never shown his private space to anyone, but that was even more reason why he shouldn’t with Eunseong. If Yoo Siun had to keep one specific person away at all costs, that one and only person was Seo Eunseong.

He also noticed that Eunseong felt disappointed—no, more than disappointed, he felt sorrowful about that. Yoo Siun could not accurately define what his own heart was feeling.

Whether it was fear, or dread, or if he was hoping that the ‘what if’ might actually be true while saying ‘no way.’

Even where, how, and why these complex emotions were coming from.

“CEO… forgive me for saying this, but from what I’ve overheard, they say there is some kind of mark on the ‘Great Rift.’”

“…”

“Have you by any chance seen it?”

Yoo Siun did not deny that the reason he placed Manager Nam in charge of Eunseong was with the sinister intention of finding that mark.

“If you haven’t seen it, Manager, then I suppose it doesn’t exist.”

“Yes…”

Manager Nam trailed off doubtfully. To someone who had been obsessed with the occult during his youth, it was a subject likely to provoke curiosity and wonder.

“May I say something even more presumptuous?”

“I don’t want to hear it, but you’ll probably say it anyway, so go ahead.”

“If it turns out that student Eunseong really is the ‘Great Rift.’ If it really is true… couldn’t the order of succession for the Seongha Group change? According to the laws of the family, it is only right that it changes.”

Yoo Siun kept his eyes closed, took a sip of cold water, and set it down. After drinking ice water—which he had been consuming in the heat outside—inside the vehicle where the air conditioning was blasting, the chill traveling down his esophagus was enough to make his body feel cold.

“Are you saying you want me to take over the entire Seongha Group?”

“No, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Manager Nam quickly lowered his eyes from the rearview mirror as if he were sorry.

“You have a lot of greed.”

“I’m just saying that it’s only natural.”

Manager Nam added that he didn’t mean it that way.

“That is natural. Because that is the law by which our family determines the successor.”

Yoo Siun also nodded, agreeing simply with his words. His voice was dry, showing no impatience, anxiety, or even much expectation in the face of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to perhaps take over the Seongha Group.

Yoo Siun was practically exiled within the Seongha Group. His position was at the very bottom of the hierarchy, furthest from the throne.

“Indeed. That was what I wanted to say.”

Manager Nam turned the steering wheel and asked if that wasn’t how the procedure was supposed to go. If that were the case, the humiliation of being wary of the main family and having to silently clean up trash in the periphery would never happen again.

“I don’t think it’s a matter to be taken lightly.”

“I don’t think of it that way. I can’t take it lightly after bringing the person here. It’s already not light.”

Manager Nam spoke about the things that would be gained by possessing that existence.

Both Seo Eunseong’s father and Yoo Siun knew that Eunseong met the conditions of the ‘Great Rift.’ Regardless of whether they believed in the existence of the prophecy or not, it would be a lie to say they hadn’t calculated what would be gained by possessing that existence.

The Seongha Group would likely become Yoo Siun’s property, and he would never again have to clean up his eldest uncle’s filth. From then on, the eldest uncle would be the one cleaning up Yoo Siun’s filth. Such was the procedure, and such was the law of the family. The hierarchy depended solely on who obtained the ‘Great Rift.’ If Eunseong was that existence, Yoo Siun could overturn the hierarchy within the family in one fell swoop. He would become the Crown Prince, not a messenger from the periphery.

“Since we’re on our way up anyway, let’s go see the monk after a long time.”

At Yoo Siun’s words, Manager Nam glanced briefly toward the back.

“I’ll try calling first. It’s getting very late.”

Listening to the beep of the button as Manager Nam operated the navigation to change the destination, Yoo Siun closed his eyes as if seeking sleep.