The Villainous Director Is Raising a Child!

"The witness will now enter."

Creeeak—.

The moment the heavy wooden door swung open, a flash blinding enough to wash my vision white came pouring in.

"Click, click, click, click, click—!!!"

Hundreds of camera shutters battered my ears like machine-gun fire.

I narrowed my eyes and walked, alone, into the storm of light.

A grand hall that called to mind a vast colosseum.

A lavish chandelier hung from the high ceiling, but the air was heavy and stale, thick enough to smother.

Tiered seating ringed the central witness stand on every side.

Packed into it, wall to wall, were countless reporters and spectators, glaring at me like starving beasts eyeing their one chance to tear into me.

Breaking that vicious hush, someone's shout went up like a starting gun.

"That piece of trash!"

That one cry set it off, and razor-edged condemnation rained down from all sides.

"Doing that to minors! And you call yourself human!"

"Did fattening yourself on children's blood feel good? You devil!"

"Lock up Chae Junhyeok! Lock him up!"

Curses and damnations poured down.

But I crossed straight through the middle of the uproar, face impassive, and walked toward the witness stand.

And in the front row of the spectator seats.

There I spotted one familiar face.

Park Wonjin.

He sat cuffed, under the fierce watch of courthouse guards posted on either side of him.

His eyes, the moment they found me, blazed like glowing coals.

The bloodlust rolling off him was fit to tear my throat out on the spot, but his own state was wretched beyond words.

Hair a wild tangle, face grimy, the look of a man who hadn't washed in days, caked in filth.

Looks like he's been through the wringer.

The high and mighty Deputy Director, who'd lorded over the institute like its king, had been reduced to a complete beggar overnight.

That was when it happened.

"Silence in the hall! Everyone, your attention, please."

Someone's solemn voice cut through the air.

I slowly lifted my head and gazed straight ahead.

"Witness Chae Junhyeok. Raise your right hand and take the oath."

I slowly raised my right hand to shoulder height.

Then, looking down at the oath laid out before me, I began to read aloud.

"I swear."

My voice, low but firm, rang out across the hushed hearing chamber.

"I, the witness, in attending and testifying at today's hearing, do swear according to my conscience to tell the truth as it is, hiding nothing and adding nothing, and should I speak falsely, to accept the penalty for perjury."

Reading done, I signed the oath and calmly raised my head.

There sat the five hearing committee members who would question me today.

Hm… exactly like the briefing.

It matched, down to the last letter, the member roster Lee Jinwoo had slipped me ahead of time.

Their leanings, their factions, their minor weak points — I'd already pinned all of it down from the reports.

I ran my eyes left to right, sorting them out quickly.

First, seated dead center, the committee chair, weighty and grave in bearing. 'Number One.'

A thorough centrist who leaned toward no faction and moved by principle alone.

To his left, an intellectual-looking middle-aged woman in sharp metal-framed glasses. 'Number Two.'

A centrist who prized facts and data over feeling.

To Number One's right, a prickly-looking middle-aged man with a deep crease between his brows. 'Number Three.'

A hardline government man who spoke for the government's position.

At the far left end, an elderly gentleman with an anxious cast to his face. 'Number Four.'

Bureau to the bone, and said to be close with the Bureau Chief besides.

Most likely the one with the best odds of helping me today.

And last, at the far right end, a woman who looked strikingly young among the members. 'Number Five.'

The one unknown — too new to have a read on her leanings yet.

Two centrists, one government, one Bureau… and one unknown.

The groundwork was laid.

I waited, at ease, for their mouths to open.

The first to speak was Number Two.

"Witness. Do you clearly understand exactly why you stand here today?"

"Yes. I do."

"Good. Then let's confirm the basic facts first."

She gazed at me over her glasses and asked, crisp and clear.

"Witness, is it correct that you currently hold the post of Director at the [Nest] Research Institute under the Bureau?"

The most routine of identity checks. I brought my mouth close to the microphone and answered, short and clear.

"Yes, that's correct."

The tedious barrage of questions carried on from there.

Appointment date, scope of duties, past career — all of it on page one of the list of questions I'd anticipated.

Hands folded neatly, I recited the model answers I'd prepared like the most earnest man in the world.

Ten minutes or so of that dull probing passed.

Once the basic background check was done, the air in the hearing chamber shifted subtly.

About time we got to the heart of it.

As if on cue, control of the floor passed to Committee Member Number Three.

He came at me aggressively, right off.

"Witness. Recently an alarming 'anonymous tip' was submitted to the government."

"An anonymous… tip, you say?"

Number Three nodded coldly.

"That inside the Nest Research Institute, 'illegal experiments' lethal to the human body were being carried out on minor Awakened who lack the capacity for sound judgment."

The moment the words 'minors' and 'illegal experiments' left his mouth, the hall began to stir.

"In response the government immediately assembled a special investigation team and conducted an emergency search and seizure of the institute. And…."

He paused a beat, then declared in a firm voice.

"We uncovered the fact that those horrific experiments, which until now had only circulated as rumor, were in reality being carried out."

At a gesture from him, the enormous screen at the front of the hearing chamber flared to life.

[Project R]

Clinical trial records, dosing data for unidentified drugs, and even mosaic-blurred photographs of the children.

By anyone's eyes, plain evidence of illegal biological experimentation.

"The so-called [Project R]."

In that instant.

"Click, click, click, click—!!!"

Murmur, murmur.

The hearing chamber turned to bedlam in a heartbeat.

Hundreds of flashes burst like machine-gun fire, strobing between the screen and my face, and shocked shouts went up here and there.

"S-so it was really true…!"

"The government already had all the evidence locked down! There's no wriggling out of that!"

"That devil of a man! Lock him up right now!"

Amid the downpour of flashes, I gazed up, unruffled, at the words 'Project R' on the screen.

Committee Member Number Three paid the bedlam of the hall no mind and kept up his offensive against me without let-up.

"The witness was assigned to this institute roughly thirteen months ago. And exactly seven months after that assignment, your name went onto this 'Project R' as its overall lead."

His eyes swept from the documents to me and back.

"After that you held the lead position for about half a year before abruptly stepping down from all authority not long ago, as confirmed. Am I correct?"

I didn't deny it and gave a short nod.

"Yes, that's true."

"Your name going on as lead would mean you knew what the project involved and signed off on it."

Number Three fixed a fierce glare on me over his glasses and charged straight at the heart of it.

"So I'll ask you point-blank."

He gripped the microphone tight and raised his voice.

"Witness. Did you… know the truth of this horrific 'Project R'?"

In that instant a silence fell over the murmuring hearing chamber, as if cold water had been dashed over it.

Hundreds of eyes, dozens of cameras, and the members up on the platform besides.

Every gaze bore down on my lips alone.

In that split second of silence, the voice of the man who'd come to the waiting room earlier struck my ears like a phantom sound.

["If a question about 'Project R' comes up, answer that you know nothing, no matter what. Testify that the institute never ran any such experiment, and that the disclosed documents are all fabrications."]

The Bureau Chief's desperate warning.

I slowly closed my eyes, then opened them.

And toward the microphone, in a voice as calm and clear as could be, I answered.

"Yes. I knew."

The words were barely out.

"Click click click click—!"

"Tatatatak!"

A tremendous barrage of flashes, as if a bomb had gone off, blanketed my vision white.

At the same time, the clatter of hundreds of reporters hammering out breaking bulletins like mad swallowed the hearing chamber whole, like a sudden downpour.

It was the moment the Director, the institute's own head, formally admitted to the illegal experiments.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

A dull cracking sound rang out from the platform.

Committee Chair Number One struck the gavel down hard and shouted.

"Order! Order in the hall! The examination is still under way! Reporters, take your seats!"

At the chair's bellow the hall gradually settled, and I slowly opened the eyes I'd kept shut.

In that instant Number Four, seated at the edge, snatched up his microphone in a rush.

"Witness! That statement just now… are you certain?"

Unable to hide his dismay, he fired off questions in a trembling, rapid-fire voice.

"Do you mean… that you, the witness, admit illegal human experimentation targeting minor Awakened was carried out inside the institute?"

I looked straight into Number Four's wavering eyes and nodded.

"Yes. I admit it."

"Hah…."

Number Four gaped, as if he couldn't believe it, then asked again, anxious.

"Is that truly correct? Could it be that you haven't fully grasped the workings of your post and are misremembering? Or that under outside pressure you're stating something untrue—"

He was desperately trying to build me an 'escape hatch.'

A Bureau man through and through, all right. Enough to bring a tear to the eye.

But I had no need of his help.

"No."

I cut Number Four's words off clean and nailed it down, firm.

"My memory is accurate. [Project R] was in fact carried out."

"……!"

"The forced mana injections recorded in the documents, the sustained abuse of the children, and the murderous training that made them fight monsters until the point of death."

I laid out the horrific circumstances in words more horrific still.

"Every bit of it was an experiment that was in fact carried out here at the Nest Research Institute."

Number Four slumped back against his chair with a look that said it was all over.

As the specifics came spilling out of me, the barely settled hearing chamber plunged once more into an uncontrollable maelstrom.

Gasps close to screams, shouting, reporters' cries all tangled together into bedlam.

At the center of that chaos, Committee Chair Number One, who had kept his silence all this while, spoke up gravely.

"Witness."

He gazed at me with sharp eyes, as if to pierce clean through, and asked in a weighty voice.

"That answer just now… is it a confession of your own guilt?"

At the chair's weighty question I answered without a hair's breadth of hesitation.

"No."

At that short, flat denial, Number Three beside him kicked back his chair and shot to his feet.

"See here, witness! Are you playing word games? You admitted all of it with your own mouth just now! That there were illegal experiments! And now, after that, you say it's not a confession — are you insulting this sacred hearing?!"

But I calmly resettled my grip on the microphone, my voice composed yet edged with a wronged man's grievance.

"Committee Member. Please, calm yourself and hear me out to the end."

I drew one deep, steadying breath and pressed on, enunciating clearly, as if for the whole hearing chamber to hear.

"'Project R' was carried out, certainly. But all those horrific experiments… were not carried out by me."

"……What did you say?"

The moment every gaze in the hall fixed on my lips, I slowly raised my arm and pointed at the front row of the spectator seats.

"Every one of these unethical experiments…."

My fingertip aimed precisely at the bound man.

"…was carried out under the sole direction of the man right there — Deputy Director Park Wonjin."

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