The Villainous Director Is Raising a Child!

Thunk.

The commander idly kicked aside the heap of approval documents scattered across the floor with his boot.

"The database check is already done. Director Chae Junhyeok is currently suspended from duty under disciplinary action. In other words..."

The commander's eyes glinted, cold.

"Personnel authority, budget authority, and the experiment-approval authority at the heart of all this — every last bit of it was transferred to you. To the name Park Wonjin. One hundred percent."

"...!!"

"From the moment that seal went onto the letter of delegation, every legal responsibility arising in this institute falls on Park Wonjin. On you."

"Th-that was only changed on paper a few hours ago! For the past several months the Director led the experiments and signed off on them himself! I was shut out of it completely!"

Park Wonjin shrieked, veins bulging with the injustice of it.

But even after hearing that desperate protest, the commander only narrowed his brow.

"Don't insult an investigator."

"What...?"

"The data doesn't lie. For years now, the one running day-to-day operations here was you, Park Wonjin. Chae Junhyeok's name only went onto the experiments a few months ago."

The commander looked down at Park Wonjin with emotionless eyes and went on, hard.

"The background check is done too. The assessments of Chae Junhyeok were remarkably consistent. Incompetent, dissolute, a thoughtless good-for-nothing."

"Th-that's...!"

"And a man like that spearheaded high-level biological experiments on Awakened? You think that holds together?"

The commander tapped Park Wonjin's chest with his index finger.

As if reading a criminal his charges.

"You sat some idiot figurehead in the chair and worked the strings from behind. Then, once he'd outlived his usefulness, you took the title back. Am I wrong?"

"No! Absolutely not!!"

Park Wonjin's eyes rolled white with the injustice of it, and he screamed at the top of his lungs.

"You have no idea the filthy things that bastard got up to behind the scenes! He was always running around with the Bawi Guild Master cooking something up, and he bought expensive artifacts by the dozen!"

The commander let out a snort.

"A diamond-spoon brat with money rotting in his pockets collects pricey toys — since when is that a crime? And the Bawi Guild Master?"

He laid out the facts in a voice laced with scorn.

"Chae Junhyeok chasing after Han Jewoon like a lunatic and getting decked at a banquet is a famous little story. You take a stalking victim and his stalker and call it a conspiracy?"

"You... you thick-skulled, brainless bastards!!!"

There was no getting through to them. No — everything pointed to him as the culprit.

Park Wonjin lost his reason, veins standing out, and lunged to grab the commander by the collar.

Thwack—!

"Guhhk!!"

The commander's boot drove precisely into the pit of Park Wonjin's stomach.

"Khh... urk..."

Breath punched out of him, Park Wonjin couldn't even manage a scream as he rolled across the floor and collapsed in a graceless heap.

"Watch your mouth."

The commander brushed off his trouser cuffs as if something filthy had touched them and flicked a hand, bored.

"We'll sort the small fry later. Take the body of the operation — Park Wonjin — into custody first. The rest, secure the scene."

"Sir! Understood!"

"Wh-what are you— mmph! Let go of me!! Do you know who I am?! Let go!!"

Pinned to the floor, Park Wonjin writhed like an earthworm and thrashed.

But when two hulking special-forces soldiers wrenched his arms behind him from either side, he was subdued more helplessly than a tantruming child.

"Haul him off."

Park Wonjin was dragged out into the corridor like a piece of freight, an arm locked on each side.

Along both walls of the corridor, researchers stood white with terror, hands on their heads, pressed flat against the wall in a dense line.

Passing through that crowd, Park Wonjin whipped his head from side to side, throwing out desperate looks that begged for rescue.

But no one would meet his eyes.

That was when it happened.

In the thick of all those researchers.

In that hellish scene where every last person stood with head bowed, trembling, one single man who hadn't caught the terror came into Park Wonjin's view.

A man leaning crooked against the wall, arms folded, taking in the whole situation as if watching a play.

The instant he met that arrogant gaze, Park Wonjin's reason snapped clean through.

"You... you son of a bitch!!!!"

Arms twisted back by the soldiers, Park Wonjin screamed until his throat threatened to tear.

"This was you, wasn't it?! This is a trap you set!!!"

Just as Park Wonjin's vile snarling rang down the corridor.

Leaning against the wall, watching it all unfold, Chae Junhyeok's whole air flipped in an instant.

The coldly observing eyes were gone without a trace; in their place stood nothing but a spoiled brat scared out of his wits.

"Hey! Park Wonjin!! Where do you think you're going?! You said you'd take responsibility for all of it! You told me to just keep my mouth shut and stamp the seals!!"

"...What?"

"What about the budget and the experiment schedule?! I don't even know the system login password! You changed it all last time!!"

Chae Junhyeok clung to the commander and pleaded, whining.

"You can't just take this man away! Without him the institute falls apart! This man did all the work!!"

"...Grrrgh!!"

Park Wonjin's eyes rolled back in his head.

His blood pressure shot to the crown of his skull, and he was on the verge of clutching the back of his neck and keeling over.

Th-that, that... that swindling son of a bitch of the highest order! Pulling an act like that in a situation like this?!

"Shut up! Shut your mouth!! That's all lies!! That bastard's acting right now!!"

Park Wonjin frothed at the mouth and raged, but the commander, watching the display, shook his head and clicked his tongue.

Slap—!

The commander roughly flung Chae Junhyeok's hand off, as if it were a nuisance.

"Step back."

At the icy bark, Chae Junhyeok flinched and shrank back with exaggerated haste, and the commander brushed his clothes straight and jerked his chin at his subordinates.

"What are you standing around for? Haul him off, now. Gag him so he can't run that mouth anymore."

"Mmph!! Mmmph!!!"

In the end Park Wonjin was dragged along the floor like an animal, mouth stopped up.

I watched Park Wonjin's back as the soldiers carried him off like freight, and only then let out the long breath I'd been holding.

So... this event really was now.

Thank heaven I'd reread the notebook where I'd jotted down the original's plot the moment I got back to my quarters after Han Jewoon's warning.

[ The Nest Research Institute Government Raid Incident ]

In the original novel it was an episode that flew by in passing, buried in the power game between the government and the Bureau.

But its repercussions were anything but light.

Because this incident is the point where Chae Ganghyeon resolves to seize total control of the government.

And the more tragic part was the horrific effect this incident had on the children.

If things had gone as they did in the original, the one hauled off in those cold cuffs today wouldn't have been Park Wonjin — it would have been 'Chae Junhyeok.'

The Park Wonjin of the original was on a different level entirely from the fool who'd just made a spectacle of himself.

He was far better informed, and above all, cunning and meticulous as a snake.

He'd caught the government's suspicious movements early and, just before the raid, executed a flawless tail-severing.

He'd seamlessly falsified years of approval documents and data logs to make it look as though Chae Junhyeok had been the true power holder of this institute from the very beginning.

And so he'd dumped every bit of the blame onto the stupid Chae Junhyeok and thrown him out front as the perfect bullet shield.

And the result was ghastly.

Hauled off with no idea what was happening, the 'original's Chae Junhyeok' was subjected to coercive investigation bordering on torture, wrung out to the very soul.

The case was buried thanks to the Bureau Chief's behind-the-scenes maneuvering, but...

Returning a broken wreck, he poured every bit of the horrific humiliation and trauma he'd suffered straight onto the children, as if venting.

This incident was the starting point where the abuse of Cha Yul and the children spiraled into something cruel beyond all control.

Knowing that catastrophe, I'd had to lay the board out anew.

The strategy was simple.

Use the evaluation to quietly pull my own foot out of the center of power, and sit Park Wonjin in the chair where the blame would land.

Fortunately the Bureau Chief's reaction fell within the range I'd predicted, and the rumors of the Director's downfall and the incompetent-good-for-nothing talk I'd deliberately spread played their part handsomely too.

Drunk on that mood, Park Wonjin must have believed he'd finally seized control of the institute.

And so, foolishly, he'd danced to my design flawlessly.

Because unlike in the original, he was far too hasty.

My checks against him had cut his standing down much further than in the original.

Nothing to be done, Deputy Director.

The hardships he was about to face were vivid before my eyes, but no sympathy came.

Because he nearly killed Sea-ah.

As the price for that, this much was cheap, if anything.

Go eat some prison food and suffer down to the bone.

I turned away without a shred of regret.

My destination was the 'First Special Medical Room.'

On the door, a red placard reading [ ABSOLUTE SILENCE / NO ENTRY EXCEPT AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ] hung menacingly.

A zone thoroughly sealed off under the pretext of Sea-ah's stability.

But with the institute in an uproar now, the watchful eyes had long since vanished.

I checked my surroundings, then twisted the handle without hesitation.

Click.

Beyond the heavy door, the scene was a completely different world from the pandemonium outside.

A cylindrical healing tank, blue recovery gel burbling inside it with a low mechanical hum.

Sea-ah, who was supposed to be inside it hovering at death's door with an oxygen respirator strapped on, was not there.

Instead, where my eyes landed was a wide patient's bed.

"Here, say ah~."

There, without a single injury, dressed only in a patient gown but perfectly fine, Sea-ah was breaking off pieces of cookie and putting them into her younger siblings' mouths.

"Tathty!"

"Noona! Me too! Me too!"

Hayun and Hajun clung tight to either side of Sea-ah, mouths open like baby birds, cheeks bulging fit to burst as they worked the cookies around.

"If you eat too much you won't have room for dinner, so let's stop here. Okay?"

"Otay-!"

"Yeah-!"

Their answers were spirited, but the children's hands slowed noticeably.

Hayun and Hajun puffed their cheeks out fat as squirrels, as if to make the cookies in their mouths last, and worked them very slowly.

At the head of the bed, Suho hugged a puppy plush tight to his chest, nodding off in helpless little dips against the oncoming drowsiness.

On the sofa in one corner of the room, Ari and Sihyeok had their heads together, chatting away cozily.

To put it more precisely, Ari was chattering nonstop at the side of the usual tight-lipped Sihyeok.

Sihyeok showed no sign of being bothered, just nodding along quietly and taking in the whole of Ari's endless prattle.

And in the opposite corner.

"Hoo, hoo..."

Even amid all this noisy peace, Cha Yul had stripped off his shirt and was silently doing one-armed push-ups on the floor.

"Well now~ it's chaos out there, and in here it's paradise?"

But far from being scared by my jab, the children broke into wide grins and rushed me like puppies wagging their tails in delight.

"Director!!"

"Waah! Director's here!!"

"Ungh...!"

In an instant, small fern-frond hands latched onto my waist and legs.

I wanted nothing more than to stroke their heads right then, but I barely managed my expression and kept up the stern act.

"Let go, would you? A pack of freeloading little gluttons, the lot of you!"

"Kya-hahaha!"

Just then Hayun, dangling from my leg, rose up on her tiptoes and stared hard up into my face.

Her bright, round eyes bored into my nose, and then all at once she burst into peals of laughter.

"Kya-haha! Director's a dummy!"

"What?"

"There's a reason!"

Hayun pulled her gaze off the bridge of my nose and abruptly thrust the cookie she'd been eating up at my mouth.

"Here! You eat too, Director! This is super tasty!"

Hayun rose right up onto her heels, urging me to hurry and eat.

"You like sweet stuff, Director! So come on, quick!"

Where she'd picked up such wrong information I couldn't say, but the kid grinned from ear to ear, eyes brimming with conviction.

"Uh... um."

Pretending to be won over, I took the cookie Hayun held out and bit off a piece.

I don't much care for sweets, but maybe it was the tension that had been drawn taut without a moment's slack since morning.

The thick rush of sugar on the tip of my tongue melted my raw-strung nerves into a drowsy warmth.

"...It is good."

Chewing the cookie, I dragged over the steel chair across from the bed.

Scrape— flump.

Sinking into the chair without ceremony, I brought myself eye to eye with Sea-ah, still playing patient on the bed.

"How's the body?"

At my question, Sea-ah gave a shrug.

"Perfectly fine. Honestly, it's embarrassing just lying here."

She rotated her arm lightly on the bed to show me, answering with cheek.

"Still, don't let your guard down. There may be no external injury, but the mental fatigue will have built up. Just in case, don't overdo it, whatever you—"

"Shh—!"

Sea-ah suddenly pressed her index finger to her lips and cut me off.

Then she tipped her upper body toward me and whispered in a very small voice.

"You're being way too sweet right now, Director. The kids can all hear you."

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