The Lawyer Who Reads Tomorrow - Chapter 124
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
Chapter 124
“I told you. This bastard, he’s the type who doesn’t even care about his own younger brother.”
Ah.
404 thought.
That dream again.
A tiresome dream.
It repeated every day, yet the conclusion never changed.
The thugs who kidnapped him and his invisible hyung.
Hyung.
“Oh? Look at this? The kid’s eyes are open.”
The dream always started like that.
That day when he was suddenly dragged away on his way home and lost consciousness.
404 struggled to move his bound body.
It was useless.
In this tiresome dream, not once had the miracle of untying the rope and escaping ever happened.
“Ugh…”
Smack-.
As soon as he regained consciousness, searing pain rushed in.
404 coughed and writhed, trying to steady his shaking head.
It had no effect.
They didn’t stop.
“Ji Tae-min, Tae-min.”
The face of the man calling his name, somehow knowing it, was hidden behind a mask.
But he already knew.
Having the same dream hundreds of times, 404 had wandered endlessly.
For someone stuck in the same place, there had been countless opportunities to analyze this damned situation.
It was a situation he had analyzed as much as the dream that had repeated hundreds of times.
404 coughed and glared at the man.
Again, a burning sensation followed.
“This bastard, look at this. Is this really Hwan’s younger brother? Don’t his eyes look a bit different?”
The men who had been giggling among themselves soon called Hyung.
That too was the wrong approach.
Hyung had left home long ago, and they hadn’t heard from him even once since then.
Even more so after Father started a family with Stepmother.
404 spat out the blood rising from his throat.
“Ignoring us again, this bastard…”
The man muttered to himself and kicked the wall with his foot.
“Ah, fuck! That hurts!”
“Idiot, who told you to kick the wall with your foot?”
“This son of a bitch won’t answer the phone!”
“That’s because you’re doing it. Use your head a little. Hey kid, you, this one. Take a clear photo of Ji Tae-hwan’s younger brother’s face and send it.”
One of the men lifted his chin up.
He couldn’t resist.
404 had never been able to properly resist even once in this damn repeating dream.
Because that was reality.
Even though the sensation of his body trembling was also a sensation only possible in dreams, he glared at the man while frozen.
“Don’t do it.”
“Ha- look at this bastard. He really is that bastard Hwan’s younger brother. Right. Still putting strength in his eyes, this bastard-”
Several more impacts were added.
The sound of clicking and taking photos had already passed.
The sound of seemingly sending photos to Hyung was the same.
His vision blurred.
His dream self had writhed in anger, but the current 404 didn’t even feel anger.
What remains is silence.
A quiet analysis of why this dream keeps repeating like this.
“Huh?”
The man made a confused sound.
That’s right. 404 had been confused too.
Hyung.
That hyung who he had only seen a bit when he was a newborn.
“Why?”
Another thug who had been waiting spat and asked.
Then the man holding the mobile phone widened his eyes and continued speaking.
“…He says he’s coming?”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Hwan really… says he’s coming…”
404 gasped for breath.
Now it was hard to tell whether it was himself in the dream gasping for breath, or himself in reality breathing.
“Hyung…”
What came next?
The dream passed quickly.
Hyung, that’s right.
Hyung came.
It was a hyung he had only known by name.
Seeing those empty eyes that held neither anger nor sadness, 404 froze.
Why had hyung, who he had only seen in photos, come all the way here?
Really to save him?
Why?
There wasn’t that much affection between them.
Not for him, and not for hyung either.
But still, hyung came.
“I told you, you stupid bastards.”
But hyung was not a savior.
There were no cool words.
There was no dramatic rescue like in movies.
One helpless human tied to a rope and trembling, hyung. And…
“How long do you think you’ll be fine sticking behind Kang Hwan-pil?”
The man shouted angrily.
Hyung, the hyung at that time – I couldn’t see his face properly.
What kind of eyes he was making.
Whether he was worried about me at all.
I couldn’t see any of those emotions.
“That’s not for you to worry about.”
There was only a man coldly spitting out words about his own safety.
“You son of a bitch! Because of you, I-!”
“Let’s stop with the ticklish talk. That’s why you resorted to cowardly shit.”
“Cowardly? Cowardly? When Kang Hwan-pil is just dangling around below, cowardly!?”
“Yeah, you idiot. If you’re done talking, let the kid go and speak to my face. What is this, fuck.”
“…Huh? What? Idiot?”
The man who had lost his mind grabbed his own throat tightly.
404 closed his eyes around that point.
How long would this repetition continue? Maybe it would be forever while trapped in this paralyzed body.
It’s not particularly sad.
Sadness was an emotion that had already passed through him completely years ago.
However.
“Hyung.”
Did I scream when I called for hyung for the last time?
I couldn’t remember that.
“Hyung.”
A dull pain spread from the back of his neck down his entire spine.
404 closed his eyes.
Finally, this damn dream was coming to an end.
* * *
‘I’ll give you freedom.’
404 opened his eyes.
‘I’m sorry.’
He thought he heard those words.
It was such an uncertain sound that he couldn’t remember if it had been spoken with a proper voice.
‘End… freedom… so that means…’
His head was buzzing.
When he opened his eyes, an unfamiliar ceiling came into view.
‘404…’
404.
The numbers that made up his current self.
Becoming a hacker was easier than enduring a paralyzed body.
He had nothing else to do, and Hyung spared no effort in supporting him.
[Lee Yeon-woo]
He had also gained a new name.
Ji Tae-min, who had been processed as dead at that time, no longer existed in the world.
Lee Yeon-woo with a paralyzed body, and 404 who was free only on the internet.
Only one person remained from that crude combination, someone whose identity was unknown.
“404?”
Then a familiar voice rang out, breaking the silent air.
404 blinked his eyes in response to the call.
‘I’ll give you freedom.’
It wasn’t the voice of my hyung who had made that promise.
It was a bit more cold, and yet sunken.
Really.
Sung Tae-hyun.
“…Hyeon.”
Still, my voice wouldn’t come out properly.
It was the same even after several years had passed.
With my hopeless body left in the nursing home, my mind wandered the internet.
Because only when I was working was I free.
The jobs that hyung used to bring me too.
After hyung left, this person named Sung Tae-hyun…
“Ho… sa…”
Sung Tae-hyun smiled as if he understood.
It really is Sung Tae-hyun, isn’t it?
404 thought.
Really, it’s Sung Tae-hyun.
A face I’d never seen even though we’d worked together.
He really found out my identity and came all the way here.
“This is the first time I’m seeing your face.”
Sung Tae-hyun said that and smiled.
Somehow, I felt like I was going to cry.
* * *
“Brachial plexus injury, generalized spasticity…”
I was reading the previous medical records.
Well, there were a few threats exchanged.
Section Chief Han Kyung-ho quickly led me to the desk when I said I would proceed with paying the medical bills first.
“So, seriously, this patient is in bad shape.”
He cleared his throat awkwardly while gauging my reaction.
“But wait, what kind of relationship does our lawyer have with this patient to even pay on their behalf?”
“Who knows.”
Was there really a need to tell him that much?
When I looked at him, Han Kyung-ho continued speaking, considerably softened by the hospital bill payment.
“I’m really curious, you know. For us, the nursing home just dumped her on us without any handover—”
“Without any handover?”
“Uh, um. Well… anyway.”
This really was a mess of a hospital.
Though once the 404 issue was roughly resolved, it would be a place I’d never come back to.
Strange. It was a bit different when Mother was here.
Of course, that was so long ago that my memory might have been idealized.
“I’m human too. Still, since she’s come to the 3rd Floor Ward, well… she is my responsibility…”
“Then please take good care of her.”
Having finished the payment, I took my card back from the employee and looked back at him.
“No, well, since she’s in the VIP Ward, I naturally…”
“Where was she originally?”
At that question, Han Kyung-ho hesitated for a moment, unable to answer.
As expected.
I didn’t know much about hospital systems, but whatever happened in this closed ward in the mountain valley wouldn’t easily leak to the outside.
That must be why 404 specifically called me all the way here.
Maybe things were quiet now because I was here, but this hospital seemed to have some unsavory secrets.
“Well… haha. I’m a bit busy, you know?”
Han Kyung-ho suddenly let out an awkward laugh as he continued.
“Well, I gave you all the medical records I know about. You can just look at those, why bother people? Right?”
He spoke while backing away as if retreating.
“Ah, the sedative won’t be administered in the afternoon, so the patient will wake up. Come see her then, come see. Okay?”
“….”
Before I could even grab him, he disappeared.
To exaggerate a bit, it was a speed that could cover 100 meters in under 10 seconds.
“Um… our manager is a bit busy in the afternoon.”
Only one employee who had helped with the payment made eye contact with me and smiled awkwardly.
“The patient will wake up in the afternoon… You can wait in the hospital room. Manager Han Kyung-ho approved it.”
It was a strange attitude.
At first they were on high alert, but after I paid the money, they loosened up a bit?
No, it was a little different from that too.
I felt somewhat uneasy.
“Why was the sedative administered?”
“Ah!”
The employee smoothly continued speaking as if they too had a prepared answer.
“Patient Lee Yeon-woo has been having occasional seizures lately. There are records of sedatives being administered several times because of that.”
“…I see.”
According to protocol, it didn’t seem particularly strange.
Then why had 404 contacted me so desperately?
If he had suffered a seizure while working, there’s no way I wouldn’t have known.
Even so.
‘I’ll find out soon enough.’
If there’s something they don’t know that I do know.
‘404 knows how to communicate clearly.’
Not just blinking or shaking his head like Manager Han Kyung-ho mentioned.
They seem to have no idea that he’s been communicating with me through chatting all this time.
They said they put all the computers in the storage room…
Roughly calculating, it seems that after being transferred to this nursing hospital, 404 couldn’t contact anyone because there was no computer.
And.
“….”
Returning to the hospital room where 404 was sleeping, I sat down on the guardian chair and lifted up my mobile phone.
“404….”
Can he move through this mobile phone too?
The mobile phone unlocked after recognizing my face.
This is the same too.
There was what looked like a phone stand attached to the bed, so if the caregiver hung the mobile phone there, he could have used it.
If only I knew what to look for.
It was when I was about to touch the screen to try running other apps.
“S….”
A heavily hoarse voice leaked out.
“…!”
When I turned my head, 404 with his eyes open was looking straight at me.
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
