Prosecutor Kim Seo-Jin - Chapter 87

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

I’m Really Curious (1)
“Yes, I can.”
My voice was confident, though some might have found it audacious.
But the prosecutors here were different.
What they expected from me was a monster capable of solving unsolved cases.
Their attention was converging.
Their eyes gleamed with curiosity about how I would solve it.
Then Yoo Min-tae, the Chief Prosecutor, twirled the ballpoint pen in his hand and spoke.
“You suspect homicide? What’s your reasoning?”
“The family’s claim that he had no reason to commit suicide troubles me.”
“That’s it? Even when breadwinners face hardship outside, many hide it at home and force themselves to smile.”
I shook my head.
“I’ve heard that people who commit suicide show signs one way or another. That’s why families suffer when they realize it too late. And the police’s claim that they found no evidence is suspicious.”
The prosecutors listening to our exchange laughed.
“Wow! The youngest one who came today has the audacity to argue with the Chief Prosecutor!”
“Chief Prosecutor, we’d love to see the myth of this case being solved!”
Though thrown out as jokes, their remarks weren’t mere mockery.
They genuinely wanted to know how this case would end.
Yoo Min-tae felt the same way.
He tossed the documents he was holding toward me and spoke.
“Give it a try.”
Permission granted.
I lowered my head, and Yoo Min-tae’s voice continued.
“But be careful. You need to consider the police’s feelings too.”
The police had lost one of their own.
A colleague they’d been close with had committed suicide and passed away.
But if a prosecutor appeared claiming it was homicide….
“If relations sour, both sides suffer.”
There was a bigger problem.
If I claimed homicide but it was ruled suicide, the police would publicly criticize the Prosecution Service.
“I’ll approach this carefully.”
When I answered, Yoo Min-tae looked at the other prosecutors and chided them.
“Hey, you all should learn from this. If something seems suspicious, dig into it until the end. You lot have gotten lazy.”
“Yes, we were so lazy we couldn’t leave yesterday either. So let’s start the meeting.”
“Sorry. Let’s have the meeting….”
The meeting continued.
I looked around at the prosecutors and reflected.
I’d been on a really good team at Gangwon District Prosecutors’ Office, and I liked this place too.
Except for one person—Choi Hee-jun.
He was the first to betray me when I was Seo Jun-kyung, and he criticized me the most harshly.
That voice still brushes past Seo Jin’s ears.
“I anticipated something like this would happen. Prosecutor Seo Jun-kyung has always been a womanizer!”
“Whenever he drinks, he talks about how his executive secretary has large breasts and says he’ll definitely drag her to a motel. He spouts such vulgar obscenities that are barely fit to mention….”
At that moment, Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun’s eyes met Seo Jin’s.
Seo Jin met his gaze and smiled faintly.
‘You’re going down.’
The meeting ended.
As I stepped into the hallway and headed toward my office, Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun—the one I’d just marked for destruction—stuck close to my side.
“I’m Choi Hee-jun.”
His small eyes earned him the nickname ‘Squint.’
They curved in a way that made him look genuinely kind.
The type who’d buy everything if he met an elderly woman selling vegetables at the market.
On top of that, he was tall and handsome.
He’d mentioned his goal was to coast through his prosecutor career before moving into politics.
Yet this bastard pressed himself against my side.
Apparently, being a relative of Prosecutor General Kim Young-jun, he wanted to cultivate a closer relationship.
That’s what I thought, but….
“Why are you trying to take on that case? Do you really think it’s homicide?”
Surprisingly, he questioned me about the case.
“Pardon?”
“Your family member died—wouldn’t the police have conducted a thorough investigation? They would’ve dug with everything they had. But nothing came up, right?”
He laughed, his squinting eyes crinkling.
On the surface, he looked like a kind senior prosecutor teaching his junior.
But the man before me was Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun, whose insides were filled with pretense.
I stared at Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun intently.
“I wanted to verify because nothing came up. I’ve seen many cases like this in Gangwon Province.”
“Gangwon Province and Seoul are different. There are CCTVs on every street, in every store, and dashcams in every vehicle. If something isn’t here, it doesn’t exist. So don’t waste your energy for nothing….”
As I listened to Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun’s voice, I felt something.
‘This bastard knows something.’
I couldn’t be certain.
But I sensed something dirty beneath the surface.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t open his mouth like this.
‘Whenever that moment comes….’
I imagined the moment I’d have his corruption in my grasp.
That’s when his face would crack wide open.
I looked forward to seeing what would happen to those squinting eyes that had been smiling so innocently.
I smiled slightly and bowed respectfully toward Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun.
“Thank you for the advice.”
Watching the moment the blood drains from the faces of men like him.
That was an addiction more potent than any drug.
Shortly after, Seo Jin walked down the hallway with his hands full of coffee and snacks.
Refreshments to offer the investigators and administrative staff he would be working with here.
Nothing makes a better first impression than this.
“Hello?”
Seo Jin greeted them warmly as he entered the office.
The waiting investigators and administrative staff cheered at the sight of the snacks.
Had the administrative staff from the Gangwon District Prosecutors’ Office witnessed this scene, they would have said something like this.
“Don’t eat it! It’s poison!”
*
*
*
That afternoon.
Seo Jin was at Gimpo Bridge.
The place where the police officer’s body was discovered—a fisherman with a rod cast into the water was visible.
The name of the police officer who took his own life was Eom Young-jin, with the rank of Police Sergeant, stationed at Jongno Police Station and assigned to the Violent Crimes Division.
He was found here a week after going missing.
Detective Eom Young-jin had been investigating the collusion between entertainment establishments and the police.
On the day he went missing, he was conducting surveillance stakeout in front of a room salon.
‘The only clue is one thing.’
The dashcam from the surveillance vehicle.
Detective Eom Young-jin’s final voice was recorded there.
-Hello? Yes? Where? Yes, I’ll head over now. I think I can be there in about ten minutes. Yes.
Detective Eom Young-jin ended the call and spoke urgently to his partner.
-I’ll just step out for a moment and be right back.
-Hey, where are you going!
-Just for a moment, just a moment!
Detective Eom Young-jin hurriedly left the vehicle.
And that was the end of it.
A week later, he was found as a corpse.
‘The police immediately launched a massive investigation and examined Detective Eom Young-jin’s call records.’
The problem was that there was no record of any call at that time.
He clearly had spoken to someone, but that fact vanished without a trace.
And according to the testimony of his partner who was with him, Detective Eom Young-jin constantly spoke of wanting to die.
Based on that testimony, the police hastily concluded it was suicide.
Seo Jin walked slowly along the river’s edge, observing his surroundings.
The lower reaches of the Han River are desolate.
Moreover, it was still February, and the wind blowing across the river was freezing his skin.
Seo Jin bent at the waist and placed his hand against the water.
It was numbingly cold.
If the February river was this cold, the chill of January would be unimaginable.
When water temperature drops below freezing, human survival time is less than fifteen minutes.
Detective Eom Young-jin must have thrashed about in that frigid water before his life slipped away.
Desperately thinking of his family….
Seo Jin closed his eyes.
It felt as though he could hear the detective’s voice through psychometry.
“Young-jin, you poor bastard. Didn’t you know this would be buried if we didn’t make it a case? You should have thought about the ones who’d have to live without you first. Sigh….”
Seo Jin withdrew his hand from the river and straightened his back.
Then he murmured the detective’s words.
“Buried if we don’t? Didn’t know? It gets buried….”
Several pieces fell into place.
-Detective Eom Young-jin had been investigating the collusion between entertainment establishments and the police.
-The police want this case buried.
There’s definitely something here.
As I approach the truth of this case, it feels like I’ll confront something terrifyingly corrupt.
‘If this case gets resolved….’
South Korea will be thrown into chaos once more.
Seo Jin brushed off his hands and walked toward the vehicle.
“Young-jin? He was a good guy. But why the sudden interest?”
Seo Jin stood in the outdoor smoking area of Jongno Police Station.
The detective facing him was Eom Young-jin’s colleague.
Seo Jin smiled bitterly at the suspicious gaze and opened his mouth.
“Ah, I happened to know Detective Eom Young-jin. I was going to stop by and pay my respects after my transfer, but I heard the news instead.”
Of course it was a lie—I said it deliberately.
If I bluntly said I suspected murder, it could spark a conflict with the police.
But the detective didn’t let go of his suspicion.
He stared at Seo Jin with an uneasy gaze.
“…Young-jin knew a prosecutor?”
“Guess he didn’t mention it.”
“Well, sure, let’s say you knew each other. But why suddenly? You didn’t come here to ask what kind of guy Young-jin was.”
“I want to be certain.”
“About what?”
“Whether it was really suicide.”
The detective’s eyes twisted, then quickly became bloodshot.
His fists trembled as he spoke.
“…Prosecutor, you think we didn’t recognize him? You think we didn’t grieve? But it was suicide. It really was! His widow comes by every day requesting a reinvestigation, but what’s the point? There’s nothing there!”
The detective was agitated, but Seo Jin’s voice remained dry.
“I’d like to see the evidence first. You kept his personal effects, didn’t you?”
The detective pressed his forehead with his hand.
“So you’re saying you’ll reinvestigate? Fine, go ahead! And if it wasn’t suicide? Does that bring the dead back to life!”
“You’ll destroy everything.”
“What?”
“If it’s not suicide but murder, I’ll destroy everything connected to it. So let’s go.”
I brushed past the detective.
Then I headed straight for the building.
The detective stared at my retreating figure, his lips pressed firmly together.
“Got it! Let’s go! Come on!”
I glanced back at the detective following behind me.
He was striding after me, muttering curses under his breath.
I smiled faintly and turned my attention forward again, but….
Thud!
I collided with someone hurrying out of the building.
“Oh, I’m sorry….”
I apologized and looked up.
Then.
‘Huh?’
It was Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun.
He smiled awkwardly.
“Oh? Prosecutor Seo Jin? You said you’d take the case, but you came from the police station first? Impressive as always.”
In that moment, the world turned to black and white.
“A prosecutor? What do prosecutors know? Those desk-bound bastards understand crime scenes?”
It was the Police Chief of Jongno Police Station, a man with graying hair.
He lowered the blinds and slowly turned his gaze.
Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun was sitting on the sofa.
The Police Chief approached Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun and smiled wickedly.
“Ah, don’t misunderstand. I’m not disrespecting prosecutors. We just have different areas of expertise, right?”
Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun sighed and shook his head.
“Police Chief, but that bastard Seo Jin is just playing detective. He solved some ridiculous cold cases….”
The Police Chief waved his hand dismissively.
“That only worked in Gangwon Province. This is Seoul. And Seo Jin’s uncle is Prosecutor General Kim Young-jun, right? Do you really think he solved those cold cases alone?”
“…!”
“Think about the stupid shit Kim Yun-hwan pulled. He forced his way through to build his record, and that’s what happened. That bastard Seo Jin is no different. He’s just a punk riding on his family’s coattails.”
The Police Chief’s voice was resolute.
He stood beside Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun, massaging his shoulder as he continued.
“Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun, how did you become such a coward? You weren’t like this when you took down Seo Jun-kyung, were you? What, are you scared because he’s the Prosecutor General’s nephew?”
I saw Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun smiling awkwardly again.
Prosecutor Choi Hee-jun spoke with a forced smile, saying things no one had asked.
“I came to buy a meal for the police officer who worked hard on the previous case.”
I stood there blankly.
The Police Chief’s voice from the psychometry still echoed in my mind.
“How did you become such a coward? You weren’t like this when you took down Seo Jun-kyung, were you? What, are you scared because he’s the Prosecutor General’s nephew?”

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————