KTSR | Chapter 36

‘Damn it. Did I overdo it? If I get hit now, I might really be done for.’

Every time Seon Ijin closed his eyes tightly and opened them again, the ugly face with the proud scar he had made was getting closer. When the guy was right in front of him, Ijin clenched his teeth and shut his eyes tight. But nothing happened.

“What is this?”

Ippal asked, picking up a plastic bag next to Ijin. Ijin blinked slowly and answered.

“Seasoned salt…”

At that answer, Ippal turned around with a face trying hard not to laugh. The lackeys, who had already caught on, had red eyes and wet lips. They were at the bottom of the food chain, except for the jockeys and debtors, and they were just sniffing around for rumors of some amazing drug.

Except for Ippal, who was closest to a promotion.

Who would have spread the scent of this drug to the lackeys? It was Ippal.

But Seon Ijin had something he called seasoned salt. If it was real salt, it would be for dipping fried chicken, and if not… today would be like a second birthday.

“Then can I use this? I mean, I was going to eat fried chicken, but there was no salt.”

“Eat it…”

Ijin answered slowly.

Now, Ippal had lost the thought of beating or pinning down Ijin to check the bag, but instead, he was in a hurry to get Ijin out of there. Reducing the number of mouths to feed was more important.

“Alright, alright. Just get lost. Go sleep or do whatever you need to do, whether it’s sucking up to the executive director or whatever.”

Pushed from behind, Ijin was out of the break room in an instant. It was strange how easily they let him go, so he turned around to see the door slam shut. Through the crack, he saw the lackeys raising their arms and cheering before disappearing.

Ijin blinked blankly and muttered to himself.

“…They get so damn happy over a bit of salt. Idiot bastards.”

***

The thugs, including Ippal, crawled on the floor.

Ippal dropped his pants, shook his erect member dripping with semen, and looked up at the ceiling with a silly grin.

As he sifted through his chaotic memories, he found himself drifting back to the most glorious time of his life—his high school days.

Back then, he used to coax nerds out of their money, waste time in pool halls and bowling alleys, and skip class whenever he could to hang out at karaoke bars with girls from the nearby commercial high school. He even frequented a brothel with a heart-shaped “ng” consonant on its sign, sneaking in with a fake ID. That was where he first got acquainted with some gangster seniors.

Looking back now, they were nobodies. He didn’t even know where they were anymore.

He recalled that the car that took him and his friends to the graduation ceremony had been stolen.

Pyeon Yonggwang had been disappointed. He had vowed not to live like those useless seniors—washed-up gangsters with no pride.

But damn it… to rot in a place that reeks of horse dung.

“Freaking hell. No way… Ugh.”

Ippal muttered as he ejaculated once more.

No way, no way.

Even as clear semen dripped from him due to the drugs, he kept stroking his unyielding member with his hand. His vision was a kaleidoscope of dazzling colors. It felt like he could see the filaments flickering at an incredible speed.

Lost in the ecstasy, he didn’t even notice the break room door opening.

“Damn. The smell of cum is enough to rot my nose.”

The cheerful voice stretched out like a broken cassette player, failing to register in Ippal’s drug-hazed mind.

Kwon Hyeongdo kicked aside the thugs blocking his path and strode toward Ippal.

Judging by the silly grin plastered on his face—despite being beaten to the point of bruising and vomiting—it hadn’t even been fifteen minutes since he took the drugs.

“Let’s see.”

Kwon Hyeongdo looked around and found a clean chopstick.

On the table lay a torn drug packet—the same one he had tricked Seon Ijin with, calling it salt.

Leisurely, he tore open the chopstick wrapper and shoved the stick into Ippal’s nostril.

With both nostrils blocked, Ippal giggled, as if getting high again from the residual drug granules absorbed through his mucous membranes.

Kwon Hyeongdo stepped back at Pyeon Yonggwang’s quick hand gesture.

“Is it too strong? I adjusted it from what we use for horses.”

It was a drug he had gone through a lot of trouble to obtain. After so much laundering, its origins were murky, but according to the dealer he had tracked down in a nearby city, this was the distribution line.

He needed to verify if both the drug and the dealer’s words were legitimate—and this seemed like the perfect opportunity.

Kwon Hyeongdo pulled an empty syringe from his pocket and drew blood from Ippal’s arm.

He was going to compare it with the horse doping test results to see how much they matched.

“Is the old man in Yangyang now? Or was it Eumseong?”

Kwon Hyeongdo scratched his head. Ippal laughed as if crying and ejaculated once more. His member was bright red and swollen, looking quite painful.

“I don’t know, but I guess I should send it once.”

The reason for creating this sample was to see if he could get a hand in the drug distribution line using it as bait.

However, thanks to Seon Ijin, the plan changed a bit.

Kwon Hyeongdo figured there had to be someone among the staff with connections to the drug distributor. And if such a person existed, the chief executive officer wouldn’t have let them go easily.

After narrowing it down, he identified a few who, despite being sent out on assignments, always returned to this place instead of going to other establishments.

Coincidentally, one of them was the very guy Seon Ijin had bitten.

So, even if he hadn’t been bitten by Seon Ijin, he wouldn’t have been able to go anywhere else.

Stupid guy. Wanting to pick a fight with Seon Ijin so badly that he walked right into the trap.

Kwon Hyeongdo flicked the items on the table with his foot and sat down. His legs were so long that even when crossed, his knees were bent quite a bit.

“Seon Ijin is really a lucky jockey.”

Kwon Hyeongdo’s eyes sparkled.

No matter how you looked at it, he recognized the substance in the powder packet, which looked like nothing more than table salt, and threw a party. That meant he was someone who already knew enough.

Kwon Hyeongdo’s suspicion turned into certainty. This was the pipeline.

***

It seemed like Seon Ijin had caught a bad cold.

It felt like a giant bell was ringing inside his head. His head was pounding as if it were about to split, and as he got up and washed, heat radiated from his face, armpits, and entire body.

He stubbornly forced down breakfast, but he could barely taste anything.

Even as a strong urge pulled at him to return to his lodging, he moved on autopilot—like a horse running in circles to turn the millstone—heading toward the office.

“Uh…”

An unusual noise came from inside. Ijin realized it a beat too late.

As he blankly lifted his head, he noticed a television placed across from the black leather sofa. It seemed to be the latest model, thinner on the sides than any he had seen before.

Ijin didn’t even have the energy to question why there was a television, so he plopped into a chair.

Kwon Hyeongdo, who was lounging on the sofa with his arms spread out, watching a serious undercover cop show, lifted his head.

“Why do you look like you’re about to die?”

Ijin couldn’t hear what Kwon Hyeongdo was saying, as it overlapped with the loud voice of the cop declaring, “I’m that detective!”

His body was trembling so much that even turning on the computer was a struggle.

“Hey. The race is the day after tomorrow, why do you look like that?”

Kwon Hyeongdo asked again, but Ijin didn’t respond.

Kwon Hyeongdo turned off the foreign drama, which was as entertaining as an ant’s fart, and approached Ijin. His characteristic heavy footsteps, thud, thud, were giving Ijin a headache.

“What’s wrong? Are you sick?”

“Go.”

Ijin mumbled, pressing his forehead. He slowly moved the mouse to open Word. Kwon Hyeongdo watched him for a moment, then went to his desk, grabbed a yellow file, and handed it to Ijin.

“This is from the tickets sold yesterday.”

The work… never ends.

Ijin looked at the documents with tired eyes.

The races continued until the ground froze.

In the mornings, the earth was slightly frozen, thawed by noon, and then froze again at night. By next month, there would likely be a break.

That was the critical point.

With revenue dropping, the Colosseum needed to find other sources of income. That was when the jockeys often disappeared—only to return days later.

Some never came back. And those who did… weren’t in their right mind.

Soon after, they vanished again.

That’s why, in winter, they took extra care of their bodies. In a situation where they had to earn money at a nearby construction site to pay off interest, if they got sick and couldn’t repay, the outcome was obvious.

But because of that stallion-like Kwon Hyeongdo…

‘No, that’s an insult to horses.’

Ijin shook his head and flipped through the file.

As he skimmed through, he noticed that the betting amounts had indeed decreased.

Before, he wouldn’t have recognized it—but after repeatedly observing the flow of incoming money, he could tell.

The scale of the bets was gradually shrinking.

And this time, it was the largest drop yet.

This is bad. Ijin bit his lip. They needed to pull in as much as possible before the break period.

“The races aren’t interesting. This isn’t a place to invest in raising horses or people in the first place.”

Kwon Hyeongdo spoke as if he had read Ijin’s mind.

Ijin clutched his throbbing head as he read the numbers. His palms were burning, and his forehead was even hotter.

“Instead, we should sell the horses and send the people to work in the business or the house to earn their keep…”

Kwon Hyeongdo continued to ramble, but Ijin couldn’t hear him.

One, ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand… No.

One, ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, million… No…

He counted the numbers over and over, but they wouldn’t make sense. His thoughts felt sluggish, tangled.

Ijin squeezed his eyes shut, then forced them open again.

How much money is coming to me from here?

How much debt do I have left?

How many races are left…?

“Or maybe, like the name suggests, we should see who survives between humans and beasts…”

“Just shut that mouth of yours!”