Dressed in a loosely fitting old T-shirt and worn-out cotton pants with stretched-out knees, Seo Suyeon trudged toward the playground.
With her disheveled hair and vacant gaze, she exuded an aura very similar to Oh Yeong-i’s.
Thump.
Seo Suyeon approached the bench where Oh Yeong-i was sitting and sank down lifelessly beside her.
Then, leaning forward, she picked up Oh Yeong-i’s phone, which had fallen on the ground.
‘This is insane!’
Looking at the text on the open screen, Seo Suyeon couldn’t help but be appalled.
[Starting tonight, you will sleep on the streets of Seoul Station with Jisu for one week.]
Before joining this coverage, she had received a rough explanation from Lee Hyeonwook.
He said a report of child abuse had come into the fan cafe and that they needed to rescue a specific victim.
But reports from a fan cafe, were those even reliable?
The way Lee Hyeonwook looked at the person he met as a source was also a bit strange.
Why was he looking at a source he just met with such tenderness? What was with those romantic eyes?
It wasn’t the kind of coverage where a clear judgment could be made. Moreover, he told her she had to disguise herself as a crazy person wandering the neighborhood.
Still, she trusted him. Because the Lee Hyeonwook she knew was a reliable journalist.
And Lee Hyeonwook was right.
At the scene she visited following the source, an unbelievable act of child abuse was unfolding.
‘It would have been a disaster if I’d brought my niece.’
Fortunately, she hadn’t called her niece because Lee Hyeonwook said it was just a preliminary visit to establish a connection and that the child was still safe.
She didn’t want her niece to see a mother and daughter who weren’t sane in a playground like this.
Seo Suyeon vowed to use her soul-consuming acting skills to catch whoever sent such a crazy text.
“…Here.”
After glancing at the text for a brief moment, she handed the phone back to Oh Yeong-i with a lethargic motion.
Oh Yeong-i’s hand was still trembling as she took the phone.
Her hollow eyes looked moist, as if tears were about to spill over at any moment.
“Huu-huuuu.”
Seo Suyeon beat her to it, bursting into tears first.
Oh Yeong-i was bewildered that a woman she had never seen before was sobbing.
She was the one who wanted to cry…
The loan sharks were terrifying, and the fact that she had to sleep on the streets with Jisu starting today was bleak…
“Is that child on the swing your daughter? I’m so… huuu-huuu, envious.”
Oh Yeong-i felt anxious.
Chaeryeong’s mother had told her not to engage in useless conversation with others.
So she didn’t respond, but the woman beside her continued talking to herself.
“My daughter can’t leave the house. She’s only five… huuu. If I could just see her riding a swing in a playground like that, I would give up my entire fortune. Huuu-huuu.”
It was only 1:00 PM.
As Oh Yeong-i wondered how she would endure until 2:00 PM because of this woman, she suddenly whipped her head around to look at Seo Suyeon.
En. Tire. For. tune.
Oh Yeong-i originally had no interest in money.
There was nothing she wanted or wished to buy.
She simply saved the money her husband earned for Jisu’s future.
However, having been tormented by money for the past year by Jin Hwaju, Chaeryeong’s mother, and the loan sharks, her body reacted instinctively to Seo Suyeon’s words, “entire fortune.”
“Why… can’t your daughter?”
Oh Yeong-i’s mouth, which had been firmly shut as if she wouldn’t say a word, finally opened.
Seo Suyeon replied, struggling to maintain her emotional line calmly.
“She says the outside world is scary. She says she can’t go anywhere. She can’t even go to the hospital. I’ve called doctors to the house, but they can’t cure her.”
Instead of sobbing, Seo Suyeon let tears stream down her cheeks.
Those tears made her look like a mother truly worried about her daughter.
In her head, she recalled the words Lee Hyeonwook had said when they were at the cafe with the source.
“You must never try to persuade them or point out their wrongs. Tell them you’re in the same position. That you’re desperate for even a straw of help. You must approach the person who is manipulating the victim at all costs.”
Though Lee Hyeonwook was her junior, he possessed the presence of a senior. Seo Suyeon followed his direction faithfully.
“If only my daughter’s anxiety could be cured, I would truly do anything. What’s the point of piling up money at home? My daughter is more precious than money.”
Oh Yeong-i thought.
If this pitiful woman became a follower of the Machine Church, her problem could be solved.
If she followed the directives and practiced faith just as she did, that woman’s daughter could get better.
‘And maybe…?’
She also thought that if she introduced a follower and had them pay an admission fee, it might be similar to the offerings she made.
If so, she might even be able to avoid the homelessness she had to endure starting tonight.
After hesitating several times, Oh Yeong-i finally spoke as if she had made a decision.
“Um, then…”
If the will to strip a person of everything in their pockets and even the skin off their back were materialized into a human, would it feel like this?
A face so greasy it was practically glowing, excessively teased hair, hands adorned with multiple rings and bracelets that jingled with every movement, and a luxury bag placed naturally on the table. Everything radiated the aura of a vulgar nouveau riche.
Jin Hwaju didn’t hide her expression or the look in her eyes, which screamed that she was thrilled to have found a sucker.
This was because she was already accustomed to Oh Yeong-i, who obeyed her unconditionally.
Since Oh Yeong-i had brought someone who looked just like her, there was no need to be tense.
“Our Jisu’s mother made a very big decision. She must have looked truly desperate. Welcome. This isn’t a place just anyone can enter.”
Jin Hwaju spoke, mixing informal and formal language.
She seemed friendly, but it was actually a way of speaking designed to press the other person down, conscious of her own superiority.
“Please, please accept me too. If I believe, my daughter’s anxiety can really be cured, right?”
Seo Suyeon spoke desperately, her mouth dry as a bone because she hadn’t moistened it.
She had intentionally avoided drinking water after sweating a lot at the playground to look exhausted.
To anyone watching, she looked like a woman who had given up her entire life to save her young daughter.
“I’ll pray really hard. Offerings? I heard that if I do that, the prayers are answered better. I’ve heard about it. I can give everything I have.”
“You must have heard a rough explanation from Jisu’s mother. I am a Holy Land, right below our Holy Lord, so I’ll speak to the Holy Lord specially for the sake of Jisu’s mother. First, to become our follower, you have to pay an admission fee…”
Gasping for breath, Seo Suyeon made exaggerated gestures toward Jin Hwaju, whose lips kept curling upward.
In the social affairs meeting room of the KCN broadcasting station.
Ju Myeongjin, Jeong Eunwoo, and I were watching the footage of the meeting with Jin Hwaju that Seo Suyeon had captured with a hidden camera.
The reason Seo Suyeon had moved her body so much was to properly capture Jin Hwaju’s face on the hidden camera.
In fact, Jin Hwaju’s face had never appeared in any news from my previous life, but seeing her in person was truly bizarre.
“These people are all crazy. That mother? She told me it’s a problem that can be solved if I believe in a religion. Then she had a phone call, and suddenly that woman appeared.”
“Wait, just a second. What I reported was that woman’s child abuse. Why does the talk of religion keep coming up?”
Jeong Eunwoo asked with a bewildered expression.
“The things the woman you reported is doing to her daughter are linked to a pseudo-religion.”
“What…?”
I explained it to him, but his expression didn’t suggest he understood easily.
It was probably because it was hard to believe.
“But is it okay to share the details of the coverage with the informant like this?”
Ju Myeongjin asked cautiously, glancing at Eunwoo and me.
“There will be more things we need help with in the future. The coverage has just begun, so nothing has been revealed yet, and since the victim and Jeong Eunwoo live in the same neighborhood, he can provide additional reports. It’s okay to ask for his cooperation, right?”
I almost called him “Eunwoo, this brat.”
“Of course. My dream is to be a journalist, so I’m preparing for the press exam. I’ll consider this practical experience and do my best to help.”
“Oh, you’re an aspiring journalist?”
Myeongjin’s face lit up at Eunwoo’s answer.
‘Hey, you two were soulmates. You got close by viciously badmouthing me together.’
It felt strange to see a duo I thought I’d never see again. No, it felt too good.
Clap!
“Can everyone focus on what I’m saying?”
Seo Suyeon clapped her hands and continued the story.
“When I got in the car, we went somewhere strange. It wasn’t a cafe, but some kind of office, and I don’t know what they do there.”
The scenery in the hidden camera footage looked like a fairly small-scale office.
When Seo Suyeon sat down and stood up at a meeting table in the corner of the office, a mug printed with the words “Never Promotion” was barely visible.
“That woman’s looks are something else, and her voice is creepy. When I said I could give my entire fortune, oh my god, she told me to pay 100 million won as an admission fee.”
“That’s insane.”
Even I couldn’t bring myself to say anything nice.
“Exactly. Even the child’s mother looked surprised and stared at that strange woman. I guess she didn’t pay as much as 100 million.”
“That’s why addiction is scary. Just as a violent abuser gets addicted to hitting and starts hitting harder, a scammer who extorts money keeps increasing the amount.”
I tried hard to make a rational deduction.
However, the moment I saw Jin Hwaju’s face, I felt something lingering in my mind.
‘What is it? Why do I feel so uneasy?’
Avoiding the gaze of others, I opened my reporting notebook to check the records from that time.
[September 18, 20XX. Oh Yeong-i, who killed her own daughter. Jin Hwaju, who extorted 120 million won after proselytizing the Machine Church to Oh, and ordered her to kill her daughter, received a 4-year suspended sentence.]
Jin Hwaju had only extorted money and ordered the murder from Oh Yeong-i.
I hadn’t written it separately in the notebook, but Jin Hwaju had a grudge against Oh Yeong-i. The reason was absurdly simple: she was annoyed that Oh Yeong-i’s daughter was better at studying than her own.
But the Jin Hwaju that Seo Suyeon was describing now gave off the vibe of a pseudo-religion that sought money from many people.
I unconsciously wrote the name “Jin Hwaju” in the empty space below the record in the reporting notebook.
“Anyway, I barely managed to get out by saying I’d sell a few things, raise the money, and come back.”
“But Noona, your acting is seriously good. You sound like a crazy mother. You could be an actress if you quit being a journalist later.”
“Don’t forget that you only have one life.”
“Because I only have one life, I said it in such a mild way.”
“You little…!”
Smack!
When Ju Myeongjin acted cheeky, Seo Suyeon delivered a smack to his back.
Just then, Seo Suyeon’s phone suddenly rang.
After checking the caller ID, Seo Suyeon put her index finger to her lips and looked around at us.
Realizing who the call was from, we all fell silent for a moment.
“Hello. Yes. Yes. Of course. Yes. I’m getting ready. What? Ah, I understand. Yes, yes. Goodbye.”
After finishing the call, Seo Suyeon’s expression became strange.
“It’s Jin Hwaju. She told me to come to a Machine Church prayer meeting separately, without Oh Yeong-i knowing? Was this actually a real religion?”
A prayer meeting? There’s an actual gathering?
My gaze shifted back to the reporting notebook.
‘Huh! What on earth is this?’
Text that wasn’t in the reporting notebook had appeared.
[Taster Bonus Point activated.]
[Jin Hwaju. Approximately 1.05 billion won.]
It was new information written in neat handwriting beneath the name “Jin Hwaju” I had just written.
‘Taster Bonus Point? Was this what the points that appeared whenever the reporting notebook changed were?’
It felt as if the reporting notebook was a living entity speaking to me, wanting me to solve the case.
If so, I should respond to that answer.
Because the figure “approximately 1.05 billion won” was information that instantly told me what the suspicion I had been feeling uneasy about was.
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