Flowers Are Bait Novel - Chapter 151

Splash, a huge spray of water shot into the air.

No information could be obtained from the man, who was only spouting nonsense, intoxicated by the drug. Kwon Giseok did not lose his characteristic twisted smile even as he fell into the tank. He seemed to think he had finally shaken off the sense of defeat that had been festering for a long time, and he laughed like an unblemished young man in his twenties.

“Teacher, look at this. Teacher.”

But the essence of Kwon Giseok, who had held immense power and controlled everything, was that of a slave.

The boy who first met Yoon Jooha had been miserably dragged around by her ghost his entire life, and his life was nothing more than a struggle to fill the void left by one woman.

Kwon Chaewoo found such a man ridiculous, but he clenched his jaw until his molars ground together, his face confirming his victory.

Ultimately, Kwon Giseok’s actions, driven by a desire to protect and control someone, were strikingly similar to Kwon Chaewoo’s.

Disgustingly, the brothers were no different.

Kwon Chaewoo gazed indifferently at the tank, which quickly turned red with blood, then turned his back. Kwon Giseok would now experience all ten hells, and this was only the beginning.

When he came out, the sky had already darkened. Kwon Chaewoo hurried down the unlit corridor, pressing his eyebrow bone with his blood-clotted hand.

The acrid breath he had endured and endured burst out like ash, burning his esophagus. The terrible cycle Kwon Giseok had experienced was now aimed at him. An unprecedented anxiety was evident in his footsteps.

—Chaewoo, it was the ship. The ship.

Just then, the sound of frantic keyboard typing clearly came through.

—It was strange that all the hounds suddenly lost contact, so I investigated the passenger ship and found that all the passengers except your sister-in-law and that kid had forged identities. It seems they intended to black out everyone, anticipating you would send hounds with them.

Damn it, Kwon Chaewoo cursed at his own complacency. His aura turned so chilling that no one dared to speak to him, but his bloodshot eyes, filled with murderous intent, trembled intermittently as if enduring pain.

“Did you track the chip?”

—…The last location is just the damn ocean.

Kwon Yijoon’s voice was heavily laced with a thick sigh. The Kwon family’s hounds all had chips implanted in their bodies without exception. But their location was neither land nor near the harbor, but in the middle of the vast ocean, which was utterly baffling to Kwon Yijoon. Kwon Chaewoo’s eyes sank even more sharply.

—We’re searching everywhere, but they didn’t just evaporate, they’re gone. There’s no trace of their arrival.

“Look for them near the coastal port, not the passenger terminal, focusing on ships.”

“What?”

“They must have switched in the middle. Either repainted the ship, or transferred Yiyeon to another boat.”

His strongly clenched knuckles turned white.

“And the ship tickets.”

“What?”

“Something all passengers touched equally.”

“…!”

“Perhaps the other side couldn’t distinguish all the hounds disguised as civilians. So they thought it would be efficient to put in fake passengers and cleanly black out everyone. It’s highly likely they mixed anesthetic gas in the ventilation or it was absorbed through skin contact.”

At that, Kwon Yijoon’s hands became busy, rapidly typing on the keyboard.

Kwon Chaewoo pulled up the mask he had lowered to below his eyes. His fiercely upturned eyes were sharp as a knife’s edge, and his already light-colored irises gleamed even more like a beast today.

Just then, the sound of a propeller gradually grew louder from afar. His jet-black hair swayed wildly, pushed by the strong wind.

‘The way you’ve lived will ultimately harm that woman. You, the hound, the Kwon family, will kill that woman. You will lose everything again.’

If So Yiyeon was gone, if he lost her like this—

His dream of living a normal life, his promise to be a good father, all would be in vain.

His heart, which grew boundlessly whenever he thought of her, suddenly tightened as if it were fainting.

If Yiyeon disappeared, Kwon Chaewoo would never see morning anyway. He would just be trapped in a long darkness. Not a dog, not a plant, not a person, just something useless.

The man who had wanted to cling to her would perhaps die in a more pathetic and ugly state than Kwon Giseok.

Kwon Chaewoo thought of himself left alone for years, for decades, and felt as if all the moisture in his body had instantly dried up. The warmth of holding her in his arms still lingered around his forearms, but it felt unreal, like a terrible nightmare.

Rather than losing her so futilely, it would have been better to live with her indifference and neglect.

He realized that even the feelings of clinging and pleading with her, only after being cornered again, were his own selfishness and coercion.

Even the moment he had obediently bowed his head, pretending to be thoughtful and waiting, was actually harboring an absurd greed. It was only after losing her like this that Kwon Chaewoo truly began to empty his heart.

Just please be alive, in any form.

He desired only that.

If he met Yiyeon again, he would not dare to stand as her equal with the word “husband.”

He swore again and again that he would simply be a woman’s eternal servant.

“…It’s underground. Yiyeon is somewhere underground.”

His regret-stained eyes looked straight ahead.

“—You, the hound, the Kwon family, that woman…”

Just then, he suddenly stopped walking and instinctively grasped a disturbing word.

“Brother, find out if any of the hounds I purged are still alive.”

“—Those bastards are all torture experts!”

Fertilizer and torture. Yiyeon gnawed at her fingernails, repeating Hwang Joyoon’s words.

So, to summarize his words, in order to make the rare plants, which are the raw material for Summer, bloom…

Yiyeon, who had been pacing in the cell, stopped in shock, when suddenly, clank, clank, two burly men roughly opened the door and entered. Yiyeon froze, seeing the large men. All sorts of bad things she could imagine swirled through her mind.

They were dressed head to toe in black military-like uniforms and immediately grabbed Yiyeon’s arms.

“Who, who are you, what are you doing!”

When Yiyeon screamed, Hwang Joyoon immediately reacted from the next room. “Yiyeon, Yiyeon…!” He cried out desperately and pitifully, yet seemed somewhat excited, as if he knew this was coming.

The men who burst into the room firmly held Yiyeon’s arms, one on each side, and dragged her out as if she were a suspect. Yiyeon tightly closed her eyes at the sudden bright lights. Behind her, Hwang Joyoon’s tearing screams still echoed.

“Yiyeon, don’t be scared…! It’ll be over soon. Just, just give them blood!”

—And the senior who said that was banging his head against the wall, coughing out a dry, hacking laugh.

Yiyeon hadn’t seen his state directly, but he seemed to have deteriorated considerably while confined here.

She swallowed dryly and looked around. The thought of being confined again in a dark, isolated cell made her nerves taut and her senses acutely aware.

Along both sides of the corridor, gray iron doors were lined up like built-in wardrobes. Every time Yiyeon walked down the corridor, bang, bang, bang—! the iron doors collided and shook violently.

The sounds of people rattling their throats, crying, or screaming “Aaaah!” conveyed their pain directly.

Soon, through a small window, her eyes met those of a few people. Their tired pupils moved slowly from side to side, parched, and the window was covered in dirty handprints and bloodstains. She turned pale and trembled.

“Gyubaek…”

“…”

“Gyubaek…!”

Her throat felt choked, and no sound came out.

“Where, where are you, where are you going now?”

The guards only scanned their key cards and entered another section, showing no reaction whatsoever.

That place was entirely white from ceiling to floor, and people fully equipped with white protective suits, masks, shoe covers, and face shields passed by.

Yiyeon blinked at the sudden change in atmosphere, but then stiffened again when she saw their boots were soaked in bright red.

“Sooguk Pharmaceutical doesn’t just need blood, it needs adrenaline secreted in large quantities.”

She recalled Hwang Joyoon’s frantic words.

“…Adrenaline?”

“Yes, blood mixed with adrenaline!”

“What does that mean—”

“Especially adrenaline, secreted in large quantities by humans in situations of fear, anger, and threat.”

“…!”

“Only blood mixed with that could make the rare plant bloom. That’s why they needed this slaughterhouse to cultivate the flowers in large quantities…! Do you get it now? Summer is a monster! And those bastards are all torture experts!”

The men held Yiyeon and turned corner after corner, going deeper into a secluded area. The moment the smell of blood rushed into her nose, Yiyeon bit the opponent’s arm with all her might without thinking.

Even if she got hit, she would not enter that ominous place.

The man she bit frowned and immediately raised his hand. Her nape was grabbed by a rough hand, and his agitated breathing settled.

Yiyeon, hunched her shoulders, thought of only one person amidst all this. The man who promised to chase her to death, even if the soles of his feet were worn to shreds.

Her loyal husband.

Yiyeon steadied her powerless heart and her eyes flashed once more.

“Stop for a moment.”

Just then, a deep voice intervened between the three.

“I’ll take that person.”

“Excuse me?”

The guards frowned and looked back.

“I urgently need someone for case S-17.”

“…”

“What’s with that look? Do you not know who I am? Are you defying the general manager here?”

“…I apologize.”

At the low reprimand, the rock-solid footsteps gradually faded away.

Yiyeon clasped her hands together and breathed heavily. She wanted to say something, but when her eyes met the strict expression of the other person, words wouldn’t come out.

It was Director Jo Gyeongcheon of D Hospital, who had been finally selected for the Hwaidom project.

“I warned you, didn’t I…!”

Jo Gyeongcheon threw the documents on the desk and raised his voice. Yiyeon had just safely exited the experimental area, borrowing the white gown he had abruptly given her.

Perhaps because her body had been stiff with tension all the way to the relatively safe office, her lower abdomen began to ache gently. Yiyeon bit her lower lip and subtly rubbed her belly. Her spine was damp with cold sweat.

“…Professor, what I’m thinking is—”

“This will make sure no one recognizes you.”

Jo Gyeongcheon cut her off and opened the closet, taking out a new gown and protective suit.

“Professor…! This is clearly an illegal experiment, and Summer is a drug. From the ingredients to the method of making it, nothing about it is normal! Making medicine with adrenaline obtained from torturing people is unethical…—!”

“In case it happens, though it shouldn’t, if anyone asks, say you’re a tree doctor from D Hospital.”

“Professor!”

“You saw nothing here. Just keep quiet and leave.”

“We have to tell the outside, release the people trapped underground, and report it immediately.”

“…”

“Professor!”

As he showed no reaction, her voice rose in frustration.

“Yiyeon, I’m the one who discovered that terrible plant, and I’m the one in charge.”

Jo Gyeongcheon didn’t say, “Thanks to you getting lost and falling into the swamp back then.” In truth, he didn’t want Yiyeon to know about such a horrific matter.

Unless one was a person sponsored by the Kwon family like himself, even the minimum of life was not guaranteed.

From discovering the rare plant, making it bloom, mass cultivating it, and finally completing Summer, a truckload of researchers went missing and died.

Among the students he had raised, So Yiyeon was the most untainted child to be involved in such a thing.

She was the most suitable person to rush to ailing trees, smelling of fertilizer.

“Stop talking nonsense and just get out of here quickly.”

“…No.”

“You brat…! Do you really want to suffer here?”

He turned red in the face and pressed down hard on Yiyeon’s shoulder.

“There’s a boy who was dragged here with me.”

Yiyeon’s voice trembled thinly.

“He’s only eight years old, how can I just run away by myself…!”

Her pale face, driven by a maddening feeling, contorted helplessly.

She could somewhat understand Yoon Jooha’s heart, who had deliberately walked into the fire pit despite clearly having a way to survive.

Just then, she paused, her trembling hand hidden in her gown pocket.

A cold metal object fit perfectly in her hand.

“…”

She had found a lighter.