Chapter 25
"February 8, 2004. The first victim was discovered near Socho Mountain in eastern Gyeonggi Province. Over the next five years..."
The Unsolved Crimes Division of the Seoul Police Department.
The dark office was illuminated by the beam projector displaying photos of the victims.
"The perpetrator attacked anyone, regardless of age or gender, as long as they were alone at night. There were a total of 15 victims."
In the corner of the office.
The head of the Unsolved Crimes Division was sitting almost slumped over.
He was watching the detective's briefing with a visibly annoyed expression.
"Over a thousand police personnel were deployed, but not even a single strand of the perpetrator's hair was found in this case..."
At that moment, a detective approached the team leader.
"Team leader."
It was Inspector Oh, a large man with sharp eyes, who had encountered Juwon before.
"Yeah, what is it?"
The team leader's annoyed gaze shifted to Inspector Oh.
"There's someone I'd like to recommend for this case."
"For the Gyeonggi Eastern Serial Murder Case?"
"Yes."
"Who is it?"
"A friend who has solved an unsolved case before. They also uncovered a murder disguised as a traffic accident. They have a knack for finding hidden truths."
"Which department are they from?"
"They're with the Violent Crimes Team in Gangjung."
"Hmm."
The team leader pondered for a moment, then nodded with the same annoyed expression.
"Fine, go ahead."
At that moment, in Gangjung City.
"There's been a stabbing nearby!"
Team Leader Gu Jin-gu of Team 2 and the members of Team 3 rushed to the scene after receiving a call.
"Which alley did you say?"
Downtown Gangjung City.
It was Saturday evening, and the streets were packed with people.
"The alley next to Gangjung Karaoke! Officer Kim, go ahead first!"
Team Leader Gu Jin-gu, who was struggling to move through the crowd, waved to Juwon and Officer Kim Seok-ho, who were ahead of him.
"Yes!"
Juwon and Officer Kim Seok-ho picked up their pace.
But then, Terra's voice stopped Juwon in his tracks.
[Turn right here.]
'Right here? That would take us the long way around.'
[There are fewer people this way. It may be a detour, but it will save a lot of time.]
Juwon immediately turned his body to the right.
"Officer Kim, this way!"
"Yes!"
After running two blocks, they could see the Gangjung Karaoke that Team Leader Gu had mentioned.
Juwon kept running and glanced to the side.
Unlike the alley he was running through, the main road was packed with people.
Compared to where Team Leader Gu was stuck, there were fewer people here, but it still would have been impossible to run through.
If he hadn't followed Terra's direction, he would have been stuck in that crowd and been significantly delayed.
Just as he was thinking how incredibly fast Terra's calculations were...
"Officer, over there!"
Officer Kim Seok-ho pointed to an alley up ahead.
A crowd had gathered in a circle.
Between them, a red liquid stained the ground.
Blood.
"Please step aside! We're the police!"
Juwon and Officer Kim Seok-ho quickly pushed through the crowd.
As they did, they saw a man lying on the ground, bleeding.
"What the..."
Officer Kim Seok-ho froze.
The man was clutching his bleeding stomach, and his arms were covered in tattoos to the point where no skin was visible.
This guy... no matter how you looked at it, he was a gangster.
"Group fight?"
Officer Kim Seok-ho and Juwon's eyes met.
Juwon quickly took off the jacket he was wearing and covered the fallen man's abdomen.
"It looks like a stab wound."
"Yes, it seems he was stabbed with a fairly large weapon."
"Press here, Officer."
At Juwon's words, Officer Kim Seok-ho pressed the bleeding area with Juwon's jacket.
Then, Juwon looked around and asked the people nearby,
"Has anyone called 119?"
"Ah, yes! But it's already been 10 minutes, and they still haven't arrived..."
Just then, in the distance, paramedics in orange uniforms were running towards them.
They, like Juwon and Officer Kim Seok-ho, seemed to have been delayed by the large crowd.
"Paramedics coming through! Make way!"
The paramedics immediately began assessing the victim's condition.
Then, Terra spoke.
[Juwon, leave the victim to the paramedics and go after the perpetrator. There are no CCTV cameras here. If you lose him now, it'll be hard to catch him.]
'The perpetrator?'
Juwon raised his head.
"!"
There were red footprints on the ground.
Only Juwon could see them.
[These are the footprints of the perpetrator who stabbed the victim and fled. It seems some blood got on his shoes. Go straight.]
Juwon immediately started running.
Officer Kim Seok-ho, who was helping the paramedics, turned his head abruptly.
"Detective, where are you going?!"
At the edge of the city.
Not far from where the victim, stabbed with what appeared to be a knife, had fallen.
'Here?'
[As the perpetrator moved, the blood trail became fainter. The last trace of blood is here.]
In front of a small building.
Juwon stopped.
[From inside the building, you won't be able to track the perpetrator's trail using footprints.]
Juwon nodded and entered the building.
Next to the elevator on the first floor.
Juwon stood in front of a large bulletin board listing the names of companies on each floor.
"The first floor is all cafes and restaurants..."
[The customers in the cafes and restaurants we saw when entering the building were all in groups.]
"You think the perpetrator is alone?"
[Yes. If there were two or more, the victim would likely be dead.]
"...Wait."
Juwon's finger stopped as he scanned the company names on the bulletin board.
3rd floor: <Clean Water Purifiers>, <Cool Air Conditioners>, <Anytime Loans>.
"Anytime Loans? Could the victim be..."
[You're thinking it might be related to illegal private lending and organized crime.]
"It's not impossible. Even though the number of organized crime members has decreased recently, they're not entirely gone."
Juwon pressed the elevator button.
[It seems worth checking out.]
The hallway on the 3rd floor was quiet.
Only the sound of Juwon's footsteps could be heard.
Juwon reached the end of the hallway.
An office with a sign that read <Anytime Loans>.
Murmuring voices could be heard through the crack in the door.
Creak—
Juwon entered.
Inside the roughly 700-square-foot office, large men dressed in black were sitting here and there.
"Are you here for a loan?"
A female employee who appeared to be in her early 20s smiled and stood in front of Juwon.
"..."
Juwon glanced at the employee and, without answering, scanned the office.
At the same time, Tera began her analysis.
"Um... you're here for a loan consultation, right? Hey, boss? Let's go to the room together... hey?"
A man who looked like a weasel turned his head slightly upon hearing the employee's voice.
"What's this?"
Short-cropped sporty hair, muscles bulging through a black short-sleeved shirt.
Juwon immediately knew.
This place was a loan office run by gangsters.
It wasn't clear whether it was an illegal loan shark operation with sky-high interest rates or not...
[The interest rates here exceed an average of 600 percent. According to the records in the ledger held by the man sitting in the corner.]
At Tera's voice, Juwon's gaze shifted to the man sitting in the corner.
Then, in an instant,
[Zoom function activated.]
Tera's voice echoed, and the pages of the ledger magnified, appearing before Juwon's eyes.
‘Borrowed 2.9 million won and repaid 5.8 million won?’
[These are inhumane illegal lenders with interest rates reaching up to 4,400 percent.]
At that moment, the weasel-like man who had been staring at Juwon strode over.
"If you're here to borrow money, just borrow the money, okay?"
The weasel stood in front of Juwon in a threatening posture.
At his words, the man sitting in the corner with the ledger closed it with a thud.
‘Tera, what’s the analysis result?’
[Look at the water dispenser.]
Juwon's gaze turned to the water dispenser.
Then, the bottom of the water dispenser glowed yellow.
It was marked by Tera.
[There appears to be what is presumed to be bloodstains. However, confirmation is needed.]
Juwon nodded.
"Can I have some water first?"
"Water?"
The threatening weasel tilted his head, then nodded as if he understood.
"Sure, have some water and think carefully about how much you want to borrow."
"Okay, then I'll get some water from the dispenser..."
But then.
"Wait."
The man sitting in the corner with the ledger stood up.
The weasel in front of Juwon spoke.
"What's wrong, boss?"
"Back pocket of his pants."
The man with the ledger pointed to Juwon's waist.
"It looks like handcuffs."
"What?!"
Instantly, all the thugs in the office turned their gazes toward Juwon.
"A cop?!"
Juwon let out a sigh.
It seemed the handcuffs had slipped out of his pocket while he was taking off his jacket to press on the victim's wounds.
He just needed to check something quickly.
This was getting annoying.
Reluctantly, Juwon pulled out his police badge from his pocket.
"I'm a police officer."
The weasel, who had been about to turn away, turned back to face Juwon.
"What’s a cop doing here?"
"Can I have some water?"
"There’s a convenience store out front, buy it yourself."
"Then how about we conduct a search?"
"What? No, why are you suddenly barging in and talking about a search?!"
The weasel spat out in an irritated voice, taking a threatening stance.
Juwon, with a faint smile on his lips, stepped closer to him.
"The police received a report and are here to conduct a search. Got a problem?"
"A report? What report?"
"An anonymous report. Something about you guys creating a sense of unease, or something like that?"
"No, what sense of unease are we creating..."
At that moment...
"Then let's go out and do it," the man in the corner said.
'It’s going to be tough to get to the water purifier, isn’t it?'
[Since entering this building, there have been no traces of the perpetrator. Except for what appears to be bloodstains on the bottom of that water purifier. We need to check it.]
Juwon looked at the man in the corner and opened his mouth.
"Let’s have a glass of water first, then start."
Then, the weasel blocked Juwon’s path.
"Do you have a warrant?"
The weasel-like eyes narrowed even more.
A slightly different, more menacing gaze.
"No matter how messed up things are, can the police just barge into an office without a warrant? Huh? No matter how we look, it seems like you’re the one in the wrong here, Detective."
"……."
"Did you come alone?"
At the weasel’s last words, the air in the office grew cold.
The burly men looked like they were about to pounce on Juwon any second.
That’s when it happened.
"Did I come alone?"
A voice came from behind Juwon.
"Have you ever seen a cop go alone?"
Juwon quickly turned his head.
Somehow, they had found their way here—Detective Kim Seokho, Officer Han Geonwoo, and Team Leader Gu Jingoo, who looked pale as if he had been running and was now exhausted, stood behind Juwon.
They moved to Juwon’s side.
"You weasel-looking punk, what would you do if the cop came alone?"
At Team Leader Gu’s words, the weasel slowly backed away.
Then the burly men who had been sitting moved to the weasel’s side.
"……."
In an instant, a standoff had formed.
Of course, the Violent Crimes Unit 3 didn’t seem to be at a disadvantage against the burly men.
Except for Juwon and Officer Han Geonwoo, who had relatively mild faces, the rest of the team had tough looks, making it hard to tell who were the thugs and who were the cops.
Detective Kim Seokho, who had been scanning the burly men with sharp eyes, whispered quietly to Team Leader Gu.
"Team Leader, do you recognize any of them?"
Usually, when you work as a detective, you end up managing the local gangsters in your jurisdiction.
So, you get to know some of them and build relationships to manage the area.
But Team Leader Gu Jingoo shook his head.
"They all look similar, but no. What about you? Didn’t you used to handle the guys from Gangjung-dong?"
"That was a long time ago. After getting kicked out of the team and demoted, I barely got involved because I was worried about my mother’s hospital bills."
The two let out a small sigh.
What Juwon wanted was to search this place.
But to do that, they needed a warrant, as those guys said.
But getting a warrant wasn’t easy.
As the two were deep in thought, that’s when it happened.
"Hey! What are you doing?"
Juwon suddenly snatched the notebook from the female employee’s desk.
The weasel laughed.
"There’s nothing in there, Detective. Why are you doing this…?"
"Kim Sungjung, 35 million won, interest rate 600%. Lee Sooyeon, 17 million won, interest rate 500%. Seo Jiwoung, 20 million won, seriously… interest rate 1,000%?"
It was thanks to Terra.
[…Shin Yuhyuk, 30 million won, interest rate 700%. All of this was recorded in the ledger.]
"The legal maximum interest rate is 20%. You guys are way over the line."
"W-what…?"
The weasel’s eyes widened.
But it wasn’t just the weasel. The man in the corner also looked flustered.
Juwon placed the notebook back on the desk and said,
"Let’s just check one thing, just one."
