Surprise ripples through the chamber in his wake. The assembled group of lieutenants, captains, and some soldiers are shocked to their core. They expected brutality, and I gave them mercy instead. Some of them don’t know what to make of it—I notice the confusion furrowing their brows. Their uncertainty if their Baekho-je has gone soft.
But most others understand. As I turn and scan the room, I catch Do-gil’s eye. The potbellied lieutenant who challenged my fitness to lead just weeks ago, questioning if I’d lost my grip on sanity, gives a respectful nod. An acknowledgment that he realizes he was wrong.
I’m still sane. I’m still fit to lead.
“Dismissed,” I say to the chamber.
The men file out in orderly silence. All except Min-gyu, who lingers near the doorway until we’re alone, his expression thoughtful as he approaches.
“The others expected a much more severe punishment,” he says. “After what happened to Lieutenant Nam they thought...”
“I know what they thought. I considered it. Woo-sik’sfailure was significant, and there was a time when I would have made an example of him without hesitation.”
“What changed?”
“I realized that cruelty is not always necessary,” I say. “Sometimes encouragement—and the drive to better oneself—is enough. In Woo-sik’s case, I believe it will be.”
Min-gyu considers this for a moment, then nods. “That’s wise of you, Baekho-je. Did Black Shell bring you to that realization? What he did, what he showed you about yourself?”
My mind lingers on Noh Myeong-su for a brief moment. The monster murdered my family when I was a child and then poisoned my son. He nearly took Monroe from me. All of this over the thirty-year grudge that consumed him until there was nothing left but hatred and the need for revenge.
“Not quite,” I say finally. “But someone else did.”
Min-gyu doesn’t get the opportunity to ask who. He simply nods as I stride out of the chamber and leave the Claw Lounge altogether.
The afternoon light is fading for dusk, and I have a little rabbit to go home to. No longer do I allow my work for the Baekho Pa to encroach on my private life.
That comes before all else these days.
The drive home gives me time to reflect, the familiar streets of Busan passing by outside the windows of my Genesis G80 as I navigate traffic.
Min-gyu might not have known who the person who changed my perspective was, but all that matters is I do.
Monroe has changed me.
Her love has healed wounds I didn’t even know I had, teaching me I could be more than the cold bastard I’d convinced myself I needed to be. I can still lead the Baekho Pa with discipline and strength, serving as the great Silent Hunter of Busan when the situation demands it.
But I don’t always have to be cruel. The darkness doesn’t need to consume me the way it consumed Myeong-su.
He truly allowed it to destroy him from the inside out.
If his story about my father was true, if Seo Jung-hoon really did betray the Hyeonmudan and cause the deaths of Myeong-su’s family, including his pregnant wife... then I understand his grief and rage.
I know what it feels like to lose an unborn child, your future ripped away from you by forces beyond your control.
But understanding doesn’t mean forgiveness. What Myeong-su did—turning his pain outward and making innocents suffer for his loss—was wrong. He traumatized a four-year-old boy and spent thirty years hunting him down.
His grief didn’t give him the right to create more grief. It was not his place to poison my son and terrorize the woman I love.
Human nature is messy and illogical sometimes. People do terrible things for understandable reasons, and the line between victim and villain is often thinner than we’d like to admit. Myeong-su crossed that line long ago, and in the end, he paid for it with his life.
But I don’t have to follow in his footsteps. I can break the cycle of all-consuming revenge that has defined so much of my existence.
I’ve already done so by choosing my love for my rabbit over all else.
The drive goes by quicker than expected. Seemingly within a blink of an eye, I’m pulling into the parking garage of the apartment I share with Monroe in Namcheon-dong.
Once I ride the elevator up, my mind has turned off any Baekho Pa related matters. I’m fully present mentally, focused on the beautiful, sweet woman waiting for me inside.
