ANTITOXIN Chapter 35

Fearing that another difficult question might fly in from Cha Jaeyi, Seolwon purposely moved his hands busily. First, he placed the poached egg, which had come served separately, into the earthenware pot, and adjusted the seasoning with red pepper powder and salted shrimp. After that, he quickly mixed the broth and blindly shoved it into his mouth.

“Ah-hot, hot!”

Naturally, as one would expect, the broth was far too hot. Spitting the broth back out, Seolwon suffered as his entire body jolted from the intense heat filling his mouth. Seeing this, Cha Jaeyi let out a loud “Uh-hat!” and burst into laughter. It was a reaction as if he had just watched a slapstick comedy show.

Seolwon, who quickly calmed his mouth by drinking the water still remaining in his cup, suffered for a long while afterward with his hand tightly covering his mouth. In the meantime, Cha Jaeyi, having laughed his fill, put the red pepper powder and salted shrimp into his broth one after another, following Seolwon, and blathered as if talking to himself.

“Ah, it’s so predictable, but it’s fun. As expected, he’s great to mess with. This is why you keep popping into my head.”

A young child who discovered a toy he liked. That was exactly how Cha Jaeyi looked in Seolwon’s eyes right now.

Presently, having even mixed his rice into the soup, he lifted his chopsticks and pointed them at Seolwon.

“Okay. That’s enough background check for now. Eat comfortably, since I won’t mess with you anymore.”

He spoke as if telling him to rest assured.

Poke. The chopsticks that had been pointing at Seolwon skewered a piece of seokbakji cut into an easy-to-eat size. Smirk-laughing as he brought the seokbakji to his mouth, Cha Jaeyi began to munch and chew it down. Bright red kimchi and Cha Jaeyi. It was a terribly mismatched combination.

At any rate, it was a relief that he wouldn’t mess with him further. Because if the background check continued, it would bound to become difficult. Feeling relieved, Seolwon scooped up the soup once again. And unlike before, he blew on it to cool it down before carefully putting it in his mouth.

A quiet meal ensued for a while. Surprisingly, Cha Jaeyi ate the gukbap well. Just as he had said his palate wasn’t picky, it was exactly so. Looking only at the way he ate heartily, it almost seemed as if he, not Seolwon, preferred gukbap more.

It was when they had emptied half of the tightly packed bowls of rice.

[Next news. As military tensions between Jamiras and Barastan reach a peak, both countries have practically entered the stage of all-out war. The decades-long conflict surrounding the Nurabad border region has recently escalated uncontrollably with Barastan’s declaration of nuclear development. The Jamiras Ministry of Defense, early this morning, launched a large-scale airstrike in response to the Barastan military’s border violation…]

The news flowing from the TV hanging on the opposite wall caught Seolwon’s attention. Seolwon stopped eating and inadvertently stared at the screen. Just as the anchor’s commentary finished, footage showing the local situation in Jamiras, where a current of war was flowing, was broadcast. However, all of a sudden, flames could be seen rising over the screen. It was a flame that didn’t appear on the actual screen, visible solely to Seolwon’s eyes.

The meaning of the flames Seolwon saw was clear. It was an omen that the war, which was still nothing more than an announcement, would actually happen. Fortunately, though, the feeling of the flames was not all that explosive. It seemed that while a war would break out, the scale wouldn’t be massive.

Either way, truly…

“It’s damn pathetic.”

“…!”

Seolwon was startled by Cha Jaeyi’s voice, which flew in out of nowhere. When he turned his head to look, he was blathering in a rowdy tone with one corner of his mouth pulled up.

“Right?”

“…”

He was right. That was what he had thought. That it was damn pathetic.

How did he know?

“It’s written right on your face.”

…Could that human also have divine energy?

Seolwon sincerely suspected him at Cha Jaeyi’s remark, which pointed out his inner thoughts with uncanny accuracy.

At Seolwon’s reaction, which ended up acknowledging it by failing to deny it, Cha Jaeyi let out a smirk. The smile, stripped of playfulness, was incredibly cynical.

“I agree too. There might be various justifications, but in the end, my theory is that war is nothing more than a battle of pride. To put it bluntly, it’s an emotional fight carried out at a high price. It’s also a black comedy show with chaos as its theme. In the sense that it very sensationally demonstrates how easily a system can collapse under the pretext of honor and profit.”

For words coming from a bastard who would be making huge profits by selling weapons through that battle of pride, it was quite critical. Maybe that was why. Seolwon thought it was contradictory.

“I know. It’s funny for a prick who makes a living selling weapons to run his mouth like this. But business is business, and ideology is ideology. Not all humans live their lives according to common sense and ideology. Isn’t that right?”

As if reading Seolwon’s thoughts this time too, Cha Jaeyi added both an acknowledgment and a defense.

He didn’t particularly have any desire to engage in a war of words, but Seolwon, who found the still-un-excised contradiction thoroughly bothersome, could not ignore it and countered.

“That’s a fine excuse.”

It was true. No matter how much he greased his tongue, it was merely an excuse. Did a man who raked in profits by selling weapons have the right to throw out critical messages regarding war? In Seolwon’s judgment, the answer was no.

Despite the spear-like criticism, Cha Jaeyi did not look displeased. On the contrary, he only found it interesting, his eyes gleaming.

“Precise. Right, it’s an excuse. It’s also the truth.”

“…”

Seolwon could not deny it. In reality, people who live their whole lives according to common sense and ideology are rare. That was the reality. Because choices and actions are bound to be influenced by far more things than that. The act of consuming food made by killing life to satisfy one’s hunger without any sense of guilt, while simultaneously believing that all life holds equal value, was also the same. In other words, his words were a fine-sounding excuse and, at the same time, an uncomfortable truth.

Separately, Seolwon felt like he finally knew why the news, which he usually would have let pass without much interest, had touched his nerves so much today. It must be because of that man, who had a very close relationship with war.

“Since I’m making excuses, shall I run my mouth a bit more? When I was young, I read a book called The Prince. But a certain line from it stuck with me very impressively. Not just in my mind, but in my heart as well. In a way, you could call it the quote that had the biggest influence on my life now, but do you know what it is?”

Far from knowing, Seolwon, who didn’t even know the existence of a book called The Prince, silently waited for the following words. It wasn’t an actual question anyway, but a kind of modifier to add effect to the words that would ensue. Therefore, he thought there was no need to answer.

“Do you know?”

But what do you know. Cha Jaeyi asked again. Thinking that perhaps he was wanting a response, Seolwon only then shook his head, saying he didn’t know. At this, Cha Jaeyi knit his brow.

“You don’t know?”

It was a reaction as if wondering how he could possibly not know.

Could it be that the quote from that book, The Prince, belonged to an extremely common-sense domain? Though he had never told anyone, Seolwon, who actually held a complex about his academic background, became extremely timid.

“Yes…”

Seolwon disclosed honestly. Because there was no way he could answer that he knew something he didn’t know. Then, Cha Jaeyi muttered in an unsatisfied tone.

“Tsk… that’s troublesome.”

Did that mean it was a quote so important that not knowing it was troublesome? It was just when Seolwon’s shoulders shrank, having gone past being timid to feeling embarrassed. Cha Jaeyi spoke with a serious face.

“Because I asked because I forgot it too.”

“…”

…Is he a crazy prick?

Dumbfounded by the unexpected words, Seolwon let his mouth hang wide open in absurdity.

“You’re a shaman. But why don’t you know?”

Despite having said that he didn’t know either, Cha Jaeyi conversely argued back. He was so shameless that Seolwon momentarily became confused, wondering, ‘Did I do something wrong?’ Of course, it was only for a split second. Just before getting completely swept up, Seolwon, who barely managed to catch his senses, protested with an exasperated face.

“No, even if I’m a shaman, I can’t know every single thing like that.”

Fortune-telling is not mind-reading. It is reading spiritual clues through divine energy, and interpreting those clues as correctly as possible. If the deity he served happened to have read The Prince, they might have given him a tip, but for Seolwon, who was a half-shaman, it was something he couldn’t even attempt.

“Eh, what kind of ability is all vague like that?”

A vague ability. It was an evaluation that corresponded to the facts, no more and no less. Nevertheless, Seolwon, whose pride was somehow wounded, flared up again.

Seeing Seolwon’s gaze, which had turned sharper than just a moment ago, Cha Jaeyi laughed as if it was pathetic.

“Look at him throwing a temper. That expression is nice, baby. It makes me want to strip you bare and eat you up again.”

He had let it slide earlier, but looking at it now, that expression ‘want to strip you bare and eat you up’ contained a sexual intention very overtly. No, far from just containing it, it was overflowing.