Chapter 90: The One Who Came Back for Him

Thud. Thump, thump.

Go Ha-jin’s heartbeat pounded violently. It filled his ears so completely that it felt loud enough for the man standing behind him to hear it too.

The shock that began in his chest left his mind completely blank, and he could only stand there with his mouth hanging open, unable to say a word.

“There’s no need to be that scared. I heard dying doesn’t hurt as much as people think.”

He added, “Though I guess that depends on how you’re killed.”

Ha-jin thought the man sounded unusually cheerful. His voice was distorted, making it impossible to read his emotions, but somehow it felt as if he were smiling.

A man who could casually laugh while talking about death… if he wasn’t the omega serial killer, that would be impossible.

“It’ll probably hurt more to give birth to the baby in your belly than to die.”

The man’s hand slid down from Ha-jin’s chin and rested on his abdomen.

“Take… your hands off me, you f*cking psycho!”

Every movement of that hand felt like thousands of snakes crawling across his skin. There wasn’t even a child in his belly, but the disgust was overwhelming enough to finally make him speak.

As the man leaned closer, Ha-jin tried to slam his head into him, but even that failed. The man dodged his head with eerie ease.

“You’ve got quite the mouth.”

“Ha…”

Maybe it was because he had shouted, or because cursing had relieved some of the pressure, but his mind finally began to work properly.

What was the point of sitting here frozen with fear?

Even if he begged for his life, would this man really let him go?

Of course not.

If he would, all those previous victims wouldn’t have died.

“…You know me, don’t you?”

He had to buy time.

He didn’t know how much time had passed, but by now Chae Woo-seok had probably noticed he was missing. Even if their marriage was only contractual, Woo-seok was the kind of person who would come looking if someone suddenly disappeared.

At least, that was the Woo-seok Ha-jin knew.

He just had to hold out until then.

“What makes you think that?”

Thankfully, the man didn’t seem to be planning to kill him immediately. He was willing to keep talking. The trap-like questions and casual teasing were proof of that.

“Not many people know I’m pregnant.”

“Hm… pregnancy isn’t exactly some huge secret. The famous dominant omega got pregnant. Didn’t you think that rumor would spread quickly?”

The man sounded disappointed.

That was bad.

Ha-jin’s goal was to keep him interested and keep the conversation going.

Turning his back on Ha-jin, the man walked to a box under the desk and began taking things out.

None of them were ordinary objects.

A knife as long as a forearm.

A broad blade the width of a thigh.

A hammer.

A saw.

One deadly weapon after another.

“…The bracelet.”

“What?”

“The bracelet. It wouldn’t have been easy to take it unless you were close to my family.”

“Oh!”

The man finally stopped what he was doing and turned toward Ha-jin.

“So it was you! I’d been wondering which bastard had hidden it. I worked pretty hard to get that bracelet, and then it disappeared without a trace. You have no idea how annoyed I was.”

That single answer resolved a surprising number of questions.

The SHS gallery had not been chosen by chance.

The bracelet had been left intentionally.

This man was targeting the Chae family.

And he was close enough to them to have access to things outsiders couldn’t obtain.

Maybe he had even met Ha-jin before.

“Why Chae Woo-seok?”

“Hm? Did the shock scramble your brain? You’re the one who got kidnapped. Why are you suddenly asking about Chae Woo-seok?”

Tilting his masked head, the man sounded genuinely puzzled.

But Ha-jin had his reasons.

The bracelet.

The murdered omegas who had all been connected to Woo-seok.

And now Ha-jin himself had become a target while he had been with Woo-seok.

There were too many coincidences.

“Don’t tell me I was really your target. How am I supposed to believe that out of all the omegas in the world, I just happened to get unlucky? Isn’t it much more believable that you’re trying to drag Chae Woo-seok into this?”

Even bound hand and foot, Ha-jin managed to sound calmer now.

His voice no longer trembled uncontrollably.

Strangely enough, making up his mind had made him feel a little steadier.

He had absolutely no intention of dying here.

He might not have had much to boast about, and his life might have been nothing but one struggle after another, but that didn’t mean he had no regrets.

He wanted a better life.

A real life.

He just needed one moment.

One chance for this man to let his guard down.

“Not bad. I thought you were just a pretty ornament.”

The man even applauded, exaggerating the gesture as he clapped right in front of Ha-jin’s face.

“So? Why do you think that is?”

“I…”

Faced with the man’s expectant question, Ha-jin couldn’t answer easily.

The truth was, he had no convincing explanation.

What could anyone possibly gain by targeting someone like Chae Woo-seok?

“Ah, that’s disappointing. I was expecting a better deduction. Well, I guess it was a difficult question.”

The man pulled a long knife from the back of his waistband and pressed the tip against Ha-jin’s lower abdomen.

“But unfortunately, that answer is wrong. My real target was you.”

Ha-jin’s body went rigid again.

Partly because of the blade against his stomach.

Partly because of the words coming out of the man’s mouth.

Even through the distorted voice, the content was chilling enough to make his hair stand on end.

“I’ve always believed one thing.”

The man moved the knife slowly over Ha-jin’s clothes as if drawing a picture.

“All omegas deserve to die. They’re trash. Filthy creatures. They should all be wiped out.”

The hatred in his voice was unmistakably real.

“Alphas lose their minds over them. They’re no different from animals, so they should be treated like animals. And do you know which ones I hate the most?”

The mask covered even his eyes.

Yet when he looked up at Ha-jin, it felt as though their gazes met directly.

As though burning eyes were staring straight into him.

“Dominant omegas. Every dominant omega like you should be torn apart. And the thing growing inside your belly should be destroyed before it’s born.”

It was true.

People had always said the omega serial killer murdered out of hatred for omegas.

This was beyond hatred.

This was madness.

His rage crashed over Ha-jin like a tidal wave.

His throat was so dry he could barely breathe.

The knife looked ready to split open his stomach at the slightest movement.

“Why…”

“What?”

“Why…? You’re… an alpha…”

The man’s hand stopped completely.

“How did you know that?”

It wasn’t some brilliant deduction.

He couldn’t smell the man’s pheromones, but there had been clues.

The large, well-built frame.

The unnaturally quick movements.

Ha-jin had spent his life reading people.

Instinctively, he knew.

This man was far beyond the ordinary range of a beta.

The brief struggle had already told him the man possessed overwhelming physical strength.

Completely subduing an omega was not easy.

Unless you were an alpha.

“Anyone can tell… And that hatred. Betas usually don’t care much about secondary genders. But you… You hate omegas. Especially dominant omegas.”

Whether that hatred came from jealousy or some event in the past, Ha-jin couldn’t know.

But it looked exactly like the gaze of a broken alpha looking at an omega.

“Ha.”

The man suddenly stood up and let out a hollow laugh.

“Well. I definitely can’t let you live now.”

“W-Wait…!”

Without warning, he grabbed Ha-jin’s chair and dragged it across the room.

The chair legs screeched horribly against the floor, but he never stopped.

He pulled Ha-jin around the desk and placed him directly in front of it.

“Please- I’ll help you! I don’t know what you want, but I’ll help you!”

Ha-jin was speaking without thinking.

Anything.

He had to say anything.

Because he had finally understood where he was.

Plastic sheets covered the floor beneath the chair.

In a situation like this, what were plastic sheets for?

To clean up blood afterward.

And there was a large camera set up in front of him.

“Really? You’ll help me?”

The man sounded delighted.

Genuinely pleased.

For one foolish second, hope flickered inside Ha-jin.

Then the man smiled.

“Then shut up and die. You and your baby. That’s how you can help me.”

Bang!

The man kicked the chair violently.

Ha-jin crashed to the floor with it.

“Ugh… f*ck…”

Pain shot through his entire body.

“That expression suits you.”

The man selected a long, slender knife.

It was so narrow that it looked almost like an oversized awl.

“I’ll get rid of the baby first.”

“P-Please…”

Had death ever felt this close before?

Tears burst from Ha-jin’s eyes.

He struggled with everything he had, even though he knew it was meaningless.

He begged, even though he knew begging wouldn’t save him.

Pathetic as it was, one desperate desire consumed him.

He wanted to live.

He wanted the life someone had given him.

He wanted to go back.

He wanted someone, anyone, to save him.

And more than anything, he wanted to see that one person again.

Ignoring his tearful pleas completely, the man raised the knife high.

The target was unmistakable.

Unable to bear watching the blade descend toward him, Ha-jin squeezed his eyes shut.

His entire body tensed.

He even stopped breathing.

Then…

Crash!

A deafening explosion tore through the room.

Startled, Ha-jin opened his eyes.

A man was rushing toward him.

“Take your hands off him, you piece of shit.”

The person he had been desperately wishing for, had come.

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