Passion Novel - Volume 6 - Chapter 141 - Escape

The moment Jeong Taeui opened his eyes, he knew something was wrong. He seemed to have heard a commotion, and when he opened his eyes, it was still pitch black outside.

At first, he thought he’d misheard. He blinked his eyes a couple of times, still not fully awake, then tried to close them again. But then, this time, he definitely heard a sound. It was a distant sound. The bustling, murmuring sounds of people moving busily, quite far away.

Jeong Taeui opened his eyes. He fumbled by his head and picked up his watch. It was just past 3 AM.

Outside, the bustling noise continued. Jeong Taeui got out of bed and went outside.

The annex corridor was silent. The inner courtyard, the main courtyard, and the other rooms indoors were as quiet as a mouse, not a sound to be heard. The noisy area was beyond the annex wall, in the other buildings of the villa. Occasionally, he heard someone running busily from beyond the nearby wall, shouting something unintelligible. The voices, sounding as if they were waking the sleeping, came from far and near.

It seemed only the annex was quiet. The two sides, separated by a single door, were as isolated as they usually were, completely different spaces.

“…What in the world is happening at this hour…”

Jeong Taeui muttered, raking his disheveled hair back. He double-checked his watch, wondering if he’d misread it, but only a few minutes had passed since he last looked.

It was an abnormal commotion.

At this hour, beyond that wall, countless people—perhaps everyone staying at the villa—were awake and moving busily. As if they were all preparing to go somewhere together.

Jeong Taeui stood idly in front of the inner courtyard, then suddenly turned his gaze to the corridor, still shrouded in the freezing, dark night, with dawn still far away. The door at the end of the western corridor, always guarded by someone even in the middle of the night, should have someone there now, but there was no one.

Jeong Taeui’s eyes widened. He strode towards it. But after pushing the door a couple of times, he clicked his tongue. The door was firmly locked from the outside.

“What the heck. If they set fire from outside, we’ll all be cooked alive.”

Jeong Taeui grumbled under his breath.

Even if there was no one guarding the door, he couldn’t get out like this. There was no way to unfasten the latch from the outside, nor was it a flimsy door that could be easily broken without proper tools.

But what could be happening?

If so many people were awake and moving at this hour, it couldn’t be a trivial matter.

Jeong Taeui rubbed his chin for a moment, then looked back. Unlike the outside, the annex, enveloped in silence, had nothing moving within it. It was as if Jeong Taeui was the only one left in the annex.

Suddenly, feeling truly isolated, Jeong Taeui walked towards Jeong Jaeui’s bedroom. However, just as he was about to reach Jeong Jaeui’s bedroom, crossing the inner courtyard diagonally, Jeong Jaeui emerged from inside.

Jeong Jaeui, too, was disheveled as if he had just woken up, but with no trace of sleepiness on his face, he came out to the inner courtyard. And he quietly listened to the sounds outside.

“…How long have you been out, Taeui?”

“I just woke up, thinking it was a bit noisy. The commotion doesn’t seem to have been going on for too long.”

Jeong Taeui shrugged and muttered.

They both fell silent without a word, listening to the sounds outside again. As time passed, the restless murmur of the crowd did not subside; if anything, it seemed to grow louder.

“Did a fire break out?”

Jeong Taeui blurted out, looking at the pitch-black night air, knowing it wasn’t true. Jeong Jaeui remained silent, lost in thought.

Such an occurrence was rare. Only a few possibilities came to mind. Either a VIP—certainly no ordinary VIP if such a crowd was stirring—had arrived unannounced in the middle of the night, or intruders like a band of robbers had broken in, or some catastrophe had occurred that would warrant so many people waking up.

Jeong Taeui looked around the corridor again.

In the annex, distinctly separated from the outside and utterly still, it seemed there was nothing moving but themselves. Everything had stopped. Time, sound, space. As if only they existed.

It was then.

A portion of the commotion seemed to break off, and the noise of a smaller group drew closer. Several footsteps approached from beyond the wall, accompanied by low whispers.

The footsteps stopped beyond the door at the end of the western corridor. There were about five or six presences there. Soon, clang, clunk, two heavy sounds echoed in succession, and the door opened. And one person entered from there.

As the door opened, it was as if the commotion from the other side had seeped into this one. The annex itself was still quiet, but restless sounds poured in through the open door.

The person who entered through the open door walked in with somewhat hurried strides, as if they had come to wake the people inside the annex. After a couple of steps, they slowed down for a very brief moment upon spotting Jeong Jaeui and Jeong Taeui in the inner courtyard. But then they quickly strode forward again, approaching them and speaking.

“You were already awake. Was it noisy even here?”

It was Raman.

He was dressed in a white thobe and ghutra. He approached them dressed as if he had just arrived from a faraway desert country in the dead of night, or was just about to leave, smelling faintly of sand.

His gaze lingered for a moment on Jeong Taeui’s face. But then it casually swept past, settling on Jeong Jaeui.

“I came to say a quick farewell. I seem to need to return to my home country immediately. It probably won’t take too long.”

Perhaps because of the deep night, there was no smile on his face. But his expression was stern and composed, not at all affected by the uneasily stirring atmosphere outside.

“Has something happened?”

“I’ll know in detail once I go, but they say a terrorist attack has occurred. It’s a targeted attack—against people in high-ranking positions—so I’ll need to take a few armed men with me and assess the situation in my home country for a while.”

Raman spoke calmly. Jeong Taeui raised an eyebrow slightly. If it was this man’s home country, it was a nation whose public security was relatively stable in the Middle East, despite occasional terrorist threats. For such a place, if a specific class was targeted, it would be difficult to consider it religiously motivated.

Even though it was a land where large and small conflicts—even small-scale terror attacks not covered by the media—occurred not infrequently, it would have been easier to understand if religious leaders had been targeted instead.

“Please be careful on your return.”

Jeong Jaeui quietly bid farewell. Raman, looking down at him as he nodded slightly, suddenly looked as if he had something more to say, parting his lips, but in the end, his mouth did not open. With a brief “That’s all for now,” he turned without hesitation. And he walked back out the way he came. As if he had simply dropped by to say goodbye.

The door closed again. But this time, it wasn’t locked from the outside. Four or five people followed Raman in, and one of them stood in front of the door.

It wasn’t the usual Arab man who guarded that spot. This man was a little taller and leaner. Among the others who entered, two or three were familiar faces, and two or three were unfamiliar. It seemed that was what he meant by taking “a few armed men.” Taking capable individuals back to his home country.

In fact, if you thought about it, this was his villa. It would be stranger to leave armed guards here while the owner was absent. So it was normal for the armed guards to return with him when he left, just like now.

He looked at the new faces, probably not as skilled as the original guards. But Jeong Taeui soon sighed and shrugged.

No matter how clumsy they were, unless one was an utter novice, it was impossible to push past them from inside and escape. Jeong Taeui wasn’t exactly a master fighter; he was merely as accustomed to fighting as an average man—or perhaps slightly more so than most average men—and Jeong Jaeui was by no means a useful combatant in terms of fighting. It was never easy for one person to face four or five people and overcome them without any tools or situational constraints.

“Well, in hindsight, it was ridiculous to have such skilled guys guarding this place anyway.”

On this peaceful, resort island, this isolated island that would be the last to be embroiled even if conflicts arose all over the world, what kind of disputes could possibly arise that would warrant keeping so many fighters here? It was far more efficient for them to follow Raman back to his home country and prepare for conflict, just like now.

Raman, having left the annex, seemed to have departed immediately.

For a while after that, the villa remained noisy with murmuring sounds, but after about an hour, the noise gradually subsided. Soon, an unsettling silence fell over the villa, and the annex, save for the changed faces of the people, became quiet again as if nothing had happened.

“…If they’re calling back even the guys who were out on assignment, the incident must be quite serious.”

Jeong Taeui scratched the back of his neck and sighed.

A terror attack targeting the leadership of that country. Its purpose and identity remained unknown. He glanced at Jeong Jaeui. Jeong Jaeui seemed lost in thought but said nothing.

But.

Jeong Taeui gazed fixedly at Jeong Jaeui.

Perhaps something might change. Though he didn’t know how, for instance, if it wasn’t terror but a coup that caused a political upheaval… Well, it wasn’t his country. Anyway, it was a nation where any bloodbath would only involve relatives playing among themselves.

Jeong Taeui scratched his head. He walked back to his bedroom, looking up at the sky, which still seemed a long way from dawn.

The stars were still so numerous they seemed to pour down, briefly capturing his gaze.

He hadn’t slept well last night.

After all, he went to bed late.

After thinking he’d finally get out, only for it to be thwarted, he worried about when he might get a chance to leave, wondering if he’d have to stay here forever. And every time, Raman’s face came to mind, churning his stomach, making it difficult to fall asleep.

However, once he fell asleep, he usually slept quite deeply, but last night, he woke up in the early morning due to an untimely commotion. He stayed in that restless noise for a couple of hours and finally fell asleep shortly before dawn.

So Jeong Taeui had every right to be sleepy. He usually woke up early, but on a day like this, it was fine to sleep in. Even on days like this, with so much time on his hands lately, no one would say anything if he slept all day. (Though he couldn’t actually sleep all day.)

That’s why, when Jeong Jaeui woke him up, he thought, “Huh?” in a sleep-addled state. As he groggily opened his eyes, feeling as if someone had touched him in his sleep, Jeong Jaeui was sitting by the bed, looking down at him.

He looked at the clock; it was a little past 8 o’clock.

It was later than his usual waking hour, but not late enough for Jeong Jaeui to wake him. In the past, Jeong Taeui had never been woken by Jeong Jaeui after that one time, when Jeong Jaeui, worried because Jeong Taeui had fallen asleep early in the evening and hadn’t woken up by 3 PM, had knocked to rouse him.

“Why?”

Jeong Taeui pressed his stiff eyelids with his knuckles and sat up. He glanced at the clock again out of habit, thinking he hadn’t slept enough but might as well get up.

“It’s noisy outside.”

Jeong Jaeui said quietly.

His tone was so ordinary and tranquil that Jeong Taeui stared blankly at him for a moment, not understanding his words.

“Well, it’s noisy enough outside at this hour. There was a commotion last night, so maybe people are making more noise than usual. There are barely any people in the annex anyway, so how noisy can it be outside…”

Jeong Taeui muttered in a sleepy voice, as if wondering why he was being woken up for such a trivial matter, and stretched. His mind seemed to clear a little.

And as his mind cleared, Jeong Taeui’s words trailed off.

It was noisy outside.

He seemed to dimly understand what Jeong Jaeui was saying. Faintly, he might have misheard, but a heavy sound seemed to echo from afar.

The expression vanished from Jeong Taeui’s face.

It was a familiar sound. A sound he had heard many times before. He had heard it directly several times, and it frequently erupted in reference videos during tactical and strategic lectures in the military or at UNHRDO.

The sound of artillery shells.

It was very similar to the sound of anti-material weapons, probably weapons with power comparable to anti-tank guns or mortars.

But surely, he must have misheard. Why would there be artillery fire on this peaceful, uneventful island? Even if war broke out on the mainland beyond the sea and the entire territory of Tanzania was engulfed in conflict, it was almost certain that artillery shells wouldn’t fly this far, involving this island.

Jeong Taeui looked at the clock again. It still showed a little past 8 o’clock. It was a peaceful time when people would gradually start their day with breakfast.

“Like a bolt from the clear blue… no, a bolt of thunder. The weather is nice, but why does it sound like thunder… it really sounds like artillery.”

Jeong Taeui scratched his head and muttered. His gaze, fixed on Jeong Jaeui, grew increasingly gloomy.

What’s wrong today? In the early morning—or rather, the middle of the night—there was a sudden uproar outside that woke him up, and now, in the morning, a familiar but unpleasant sound wakes him again.

However, the immediate problem wasn’t difficulty sleeping. The grand sound from afar was gradually drawing closer. Moreover, it wasn’t long before shouts and screams began to mix with the sound. Jeong Taeui faintly frowned. Then he got out of bed and went outside.

Once he stepped out of the bedroom, the clamorous sounds became even clearer.

From quite a distance beyond the wall, a faint sound, as if the entire ground was trembling, was heard. That sound pushed inward like spreading fire, growing louder.

The expression vanished from Jeong Taeui’s face.

He hadn’t misheard. If he misheard this, with explosions going off one after another, he absolutely shouldn’t tell anyone he used to be a soldier. Even calling himself UNHRDO would invite ridicule.

“That last one sounded like a mortar…”

Given the almost negligible time difference between the firing sound and the impact sound, it was probably a light mortar, or an anti-tank gun… Now he could hear machine gun fire. And the sound spread throughout the entire villa, with piercing screams and artillery sounds erupting everywhere.

“Hey, hey, what are we supposed to do when a person is disarmed like this?”

Jeong Taeui clicked his tongue softly and muttered. Naturally, he had no weapons.

He wondered what kind of weapon would work against anti-material destruction, but Jeong Taeui didn’t even have a small self-defense pistol, no, not even a knife.

Meanwhile, the sound of artillery was drawing closer. Whether it was related to the terror attack that caused Raman to return to his home country or not—it would be harder to say it wasn’t related if it was a targeted attack on the same specific group on the same day with little time difference—this was an impossible situation.

Even if they were to intercept, it was common sense in all combat to precisely smash the place where the opponent would be most damaged. There was no instance of attacking a resort villa like this, which, to put it bluntly, would have no effect on Win-sun even if the entire house were blown up and everyone inside died.

Then.

Jeong Taeui suddenly had a thought and frowned slightly. He had a bad feeling.

Come to think of it, hadn’t something similar happened before? He even felt a strange déjà vu. Such a quiet morning. Immersed in that silence with people, but then an engine sound that tore through the stillness. The sound of exploding shells. A house with a large hole torn through it, one side of the wall completely collapsed.

The only similarity to the present was the clamorous sound tearing through a quiet morning, yet this strange déjà vu, a chill running down his spine, clung to him and wouldn’t let go.

Surely not.

…Ah, no way. No matter what. Look, even looking at the explosions popping everywhere. Unless someone can be in two places at once, shells can’t be exploding simultaneously everywhere.

Jeong Taeui rubbed his goosebump-covered arms and shook his head.

But what if.

If it was the person Jeong Taeui was thinking of.

…Then that guy truly was insane.

The increasingly closer sound of explosions seemed to have finally hit the center of the villa.

Even the inner courtyard of the annex, always isolated from the outside wall, which had been immersed in quiet stillness even during the commotion of last night as if it were a different world, was now stirring. The people residing inside, to monitor them or to serve them, peered around the corridor with bewildered or terrified faces. Impatient men had already drawn their guns.

They looked as if they wanted to rush out immediately. Their faces were etched with impatience, as if they wanted to leave the annex and find out what was happening in the villa, and whether their family or friends had been harmed.

But because of their duty, they hesitated, unable to rush out immediately. Then, as if they had made up their minds, they conversed among themselves, and then all but two rushed desperately towards the door. The two remaining men held their weapons ready to fire and scrutinized Jeong Taeui and Jeong Jaeui with rigid gazes.