Chapter 36: The HK Exchange

Occasionally, Betas without any manifesting traits were brought in, but their situation was no different. Most clients who bought Betas did so for clandestine surgeries or experiments, sometimes paying prices comparable to those for Alphas or Omegas.

Those who ended up on the 5th basement floor were usually people whose lives had been pushed so far to the edge that no one was left to save or search for them. Even if that weren’t the case, returning to their former lives was impossible.

Injected with drugs as soon as they arrived, they lost all sense of time, sleeping through most of the day. Some tried to dream of escape, but most succumbed to despair before they could even move within their cages.

Eventually, everyone withered away as if by mutual agreement.

Amidst the dizzying mix of foreign languages…

The oppressive heat was bad enough, but the sticky humidity clinging to his entire body finally made the man snap.

“Ah, I want to go back to Korea.”

The man moistened his dry lips with his tongue. He wanted to hop on a plane and return to where he came from immediately. He had given up his vacation to board a flight to Hong Kong two days ago, only to realize painfully that the hot, humid climate didn’t suit him at all. He was shaking his damp, sweat-soaked shirt and exhaling hot breaths.

Then, a firm voice came through his earpiece.

[No. Endure it. You haven’t made contact with the target yet. Move too soon, and things will get bloody.]

The trace of a smirk in the voice suggested that the person on the other end was quite mischievous.

“I haven’t even had a drop of water today.”

[Hmm, then why don’t you try swallowing your own spit…?]

Otherwise, they wouldn’t be able to tease—rather than comfort—a teammate who had practically walked into a building where several people were carried out dead every day.

“If I’d known it would be like this, I should’ve just taken my grandmother on vacation.”

[Forget it. Didn’t you say you were saving up to buy a house? If you chase vacations like everyone else, you’ll never own a home.]

“…Are you a boss or a nemesis…?”

[You think I can’t hear you if you mumble? You, you. Have you already forgotten that I’m the one who insisted on hiring you? Kwon Yunhwan, you can’t treat me like this. You really can’t.]

“…….”

As Yunhwan let out a deep sigh…

“Shut up!”

A man guarding the cages shouted in broken English. He slammed against the bars threateningly, causing Yunhwan to cover his head with his hands again. Once the violence subsided and the footsteps faded, the earpiece crackled one last time.

[What a temper. The heat makes everyone irritable there.] Then, the line went dead.

Always the first to bail, Yunhwan thought, shaking his head slightly.

The cage he was in was draped in blackout cloth on all sides. Every cage was the same. He estimated that at least twenty people, including himself, were trapped on B5, and his target was in the cage right next to his.

But as Team Leader Hong had said, he hadn’t made contact with the target yet.

And for good reason…

“Phew… it’s so loud.”

Even when he spoke Korean to signal his identity, the person next to him showed zero interest. It wasn’t that the target was unconscious from drugs; every evening, Korean could be heard from that side.

Once a day, when the curtains were pulled back for food distribution, Yunhwan tried to sneak a glance, but they never spoke, and their eyes never met.

“…….”

Despite his efforts to ignore it, things were getting strange.

It seems that man has no will to escape.

Yunhwan nodded to himself, reaching a grim conclusion. The client had paid billions of won to save this one man, yet the target sat in his cage as if he were waiting for his execution date. Occasionally, sharp curses could be heard at night, but by morning, a ghostly silence always returned.

—Creeeeeak

The heavy warehouse door rattled open and shut. The guards seemed to have left. Yunhwan spoke again, his voice a bit more forceful than before.

“Excuse me. I don’t usually make a hobby of saving people who want to die.”

He cleared his throat, which was tight from the heat, making his voice clearer.

“But we’ve been paid, you see.”

The heat sticking to the back of his neck felt greasy. Yunhwan, promising himself never to take a job in this country again, lifted his head.

“The down payment was 500 million, and the success fee is 2 billion. The 500 million is likely already in my boss’s pocket, but we haven’t received the remaining 2 billion yet. If you keep acting like this, dear customer, I’ll have no choice but to knock you out and carry you. Ha…”

Mercenaries for this operation were already positioned around the building. While there were gang members and private security hired by the shops inside, they weren’t the problem. The mercenaries hired for this rescue were all veterans. A few hired separately by the boss were stationed on every floor, promised hundreds of millions in bonuses.

Preparations were complete; all that was left was to strike. The mission seemed to be progressing smoothly, but there was one hurdle.

“Do you prefer being carried in someone’s arms or on their back?”

Whether the man wanted to escape or not didn’t really matter. Yunhwan, deployed to the 5th floor, would drag him out regardless.

“I’ve been thinking… is dying actually your wish?”

But shouldn’t he at least gauge the man’s condition first? Yunhwan was starting to get annoyed by the man’s total lack of reaction, as if his mouth were nailed shut.

Yunhwan had infiltrated the building a few days before “D-day” to ensure the man’s safety during the wait. While it was common for PMC mercenaries to be involved in rescue ops, Yunhwan usually steeled his heart whenever targets hugged him or cried in relief after the mission.

But this man, even when told he’d be saved, didn’t seem relieved. He was quiet as a ghost during the day, but at night, he babbled things Yunhwan couldn’t understand. His voice and tone shifted erratically like a madman, which was chilling, but Yunhwan wasn’t one to pry. The priority was always the safe extraction of the target.

“Why would someone who wants to die choose to end it in a place like this?”

“Does it look that way to you?”

“…!”

A heavy voice with clear pronunciation. After two days of being ignored, the man finally responded. Yunhwan blinked in the darkness.

“I’m asking if it looks like I want to die.”

“Uh…”

Yunhwan hesitated, the silence stretching as he searched for an answer.

“If it’s the 2 billion you want, I can give it to you myself. The collection method is a bit complicated, but for someone taking a 2 billion won job, it should be worth the trouble.”

“Hmm…”

“What, are you losing confidence because the explanation is getting long?”

A faint, mocking laugh followed the quick, clear voice. Interpreting Yunhwan’s silence as embarrassment, the man didn’t hide his amusement.

“Customer.”

Yunhwan paused. He felt a sudden urge to rip off the “fake skin” mask clinging to his face, but he didn’t want to be recognized and shot years later at a resort in Guam or Hawaii. Instead, he fanned himself uselessly over the smooth synthetic skin. He closed his eyes against the persistent heat.

“It makes me quite sad when you talk like that. It makes me feel incompetent.”

“You?”

“Who else is there?”

When he’d talked to Team Leader Hong earlier, it was 2:00 PM. The escape was scheduled for four hours from now, under the cover of evening. Yunhwan took a long, deep breath.

“And as for the 2 billion, I’d rather earn it fair and square by saving you and sharing it with my team. I’d prefer the success fee from the contract over your somewhat suspicious personal funds.”

The man asked in a low voice, “You said you came from Korea to save me.”

“Yes.”

The silence didn’t last long this time. The man’s questions followed like stepping stones.

“What happens to you if this mission fails?”

“…Since the request failed, my ‘market value’ will drop. If I’m unlucky, rumors will spread that I’m incompetent, and I might have to spend my time hiking for a while.”

“Just because of one failure?”

Yunhwan let out a groan. He didn’t want to imagine it, but for a target with this kind of price tag, a failure would likely cause long-term damage to his career.

“You’re worth 2.5 billion won. It would be weirder if there was no damage.”