저승사자 (Grim Reaper)

Breaking News

Tragedy has struck the Bupyeong-gu district of Incheon City seemingly overnight. Approximately 100 people were massacred in cold blood, including the Mayor, Sa Gikkun. Police speculate that this massacre was done by the crime syndicate known as 늑대의 형제애 (The Wolf Brotherhood). The police are still investig -

I turned the TV off. I knew the police would suspect the local crime syndicate, 늑대의 형제애. That’s why they’re the perfect scapegoat. I slowly stood up from the sofa and went to the bathroom. I took one last deep breath as I looked at my reflection in the mirror. Drops of blood were still dripping down my fingers and onto the barrel of my pistol. I stood up from the sofa, staining the wood as I made my way to the bathroom. I washed my hands and dried them, along with my pistol. Afterwards, I grabbed a piece of paper, writing something on it. I then made my way to our room…well it wasn’t our room anymore was it. A bitter smile appeared on my face. I opened my vest and took out a photo of you. As I stared at you, tears began falling down my cheeks and the memories overflowed my brain. 

“We were happy right?” 

Gaeul?

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I still remember the day I met you. You just moved in next to me and asked for my help. I had just finished a “job” that day and was pretty tired. My mind said to just ignore you and go to my apartment. And yet…there I was, helping you move your things inside. Afterwards, you thanked me and introduced yourself. I told you to forget about me but you insisted. When I told you my name, you complimented it, saying it was a beautiful name for such a kind hearted person. You seemed surprised at my silence. What you didn’t know was that something inside of me reacted to your words. For the first time ever in my life, I felt…warm, but I brushed it off and stood up to leave. To my surprise, you grabbed my arms and glared at me. You said that I didn’t have any manners and told me to start over. You held your hand out and reintroduced yourself as did I. Afterwards, I asked if I could leave and you smiled. As I was about to leave your apartment, you did something that would impact my life from that point on. I was so surprised my body became frozen. For reasons that I would find later in life, you gave me a hug. Afterwards, you hurriedly pushed me outside. I was beyond puzzled by your actions. I walked back to my apartment and slept for the night, well…I tried to. My brain couldn’t fathom why you’d hug me so suddenly. It kept replaying that scene over and over. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. And I also noticed. Did you cry a little when you hugged me?

The next day I woke up to knocking on my door. I didn’t have a good night's sleep for once and felt a bit of headache. I stumbled to the door and opened it. It was you once more, standing there with a smile and holding a plastic bag. It was filled with some bread and a lunch box. My mind grew suspicious of you. Were you a spy? An assassin? A hired mercenary? But something just doesn’t feel right. After receiving an object from a stranger, I would immediately start checking it carefully. The object could be poisonous, deadly, toxic or any other means to eliminate me. And yet here I am, inside my apartment, eating the bread you bought with you watching me from across the table. I never allowed anyone inside my apartment unless they went through a thorough inspection. And yet I welcomed you inside without much thought. After finishing the bread, I asked you who you really are. My cold emotionless face turned to worry as I could see you smile bitterly. The eyes are reflections of the soul and yours…it’s filled with much sorrow and loneliness. Yet…there was still hope. After what seemed like an eternity, you asked me for, to my surprise, a dinner. My eyes perked up and my mind warned me that this is 100% a trap and I’ll die tonight if I went to that dinner. But yet again…I agreed on it without much thought. 

Throughout that day, I was acting very strange. I felt…enthusiastic. I spent the entire afternoon preparing to look my best, and not to prepare my best. My mind was slowly filled with thoughts of you. And somehow…fragments of memories of you and I. Have I met you before? I put aside those thoughts and went to your apartment. As you opened the door, my breath was taken away.

You wore a beautiful blue sparkling dress and you complimented it with a blue silk outer. It wasn’t very fancy at all. And yet I thought to myself at that moment ‘She’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen in my life’. We walked to the parking lot together and I drove you to a fancy restaurant. My “job” paid so well that I could retire now and never worry about money ever again. I never thought of retirement until…I guess until I met you. We ate dinner in silence that night until you told me about a special place that you wanted to show me. I agreed and we drove there afterwards.

This special place was certainly not what I was expecting. You got out of the car first and I followed shortly after. You stood by the building with that same bitter smile. I asked if you were fine but you answered me with another question ‘You don’t remember anything do you?’ I just looked at you in confusion and you sighed. We went inside and stood by the door. To my surprise, you grabbed your necklace and at the end of it was a key. You unlocked the door and told me to follow you. We went inside the house and upstairs towards a bedroom. I started to feel a sharp pain in my head. Flashes of memories kept coming to me. Memories of you, this place and… of us? As we went in front of the room, the pain in my head kept getting worse. You noticed this and asked if I were fine. I told you I was and you opened the door. There were two beds and some drawings on the wall. You told me to sit down on the left bed as you sit on the right. You started to tell the story about us. How we were both orphans that relied on each other. We lived on the streets until we found this abandoned house. Well, at least we thought it was abandoned at first. You told me that after a few months, some people with black suits came to the house and kidnapped me while you slept. As you finished telling this story, the pain in my head escalated to the worst it’s been. My mind showed me memories of my childhood. How I was kidnapped and brainwashed until I became like this. I remembered how I was electrocuted in the head to the verge of death. As I began to get calmer, I held your hand and said to you that I remember everything. As tears streamed down your cheeks, you lunged to hug me but I held you back. I told you everything about my job. I was a mercenary for hire. The best in the industry. I had 100 contracts and 100 confirmed kills. I had killed many people before being a mercenary. Bad. Good. Guilty. Innocent. None of it matters. I killed whoever I was told to kill. I thought that you’d be mortified. But then I felt that your lips were on mine. After that you held both sides of my head and our foreheads met. You told me that it isn’t too late to back away from this life. With tears streaming down, I made a promise to you that I would leave everything behind and change. For you. For us.

After that day, I did one last job and quit. I stopped being a mercenary. It was hard imagining these hands that were used to harm, being used for something else. But there you were. In every step that I took to change my life, you stood by me with patience and kindness. I thought that my story would have a happy ending. I was very naive. After about a year, tragedy struck. I was just coming home after buying the ring. It should have been the best day of my life. But it was the complete opposite. As I opened the door, I dropped the plastic bag containing the ring. There was blood everywhere. Everything was wrecked. But the worst was yet to come. I rushed to our room and found…you.  Lifeless on the bed and in pieces. In the middle of the bed was a video tape and a letter on it. I opened the letter and there was only one sentence on it. ‘You will always be the 저승사자.’ Rage was slowly building up inside me but I tried to stay calm. I picked up the videotape and played it. And that was what made me snap. Once the video was over, I went outside and downstairs to the basement. I stood by a metal door. The door I swore would never open again. I entered my passcode and entered the room. I turned the light on and looked at all the weapons and firearms inside. There were enough weapons here for a small army. From that day on, I swore vengeance on the people that did this to you.

For one whole year, I poured everything that I had to find the people responsible for your deaths. What I found was so much bigger. Decades of corruption in this town. All the suffering, pain and struggle that people had experienced was because of one man at the top, Sa Gikkun. I had suspected from years ago that the mayor had been doing something fishy behind the scenes. Turns out my hunch was correct. Drug trafficking, human trafficking, theft, corruption, murder, and that was just the tip of the iceberg. The people that killed you were just henchmen of Sa Gikkun. He wanted me back in the game. Back to be the 저승사자. Well…he’s gonna get what he wants. 

After one whole year of preparation, I executed it on the eve of September 23rd. I had tracked down the locations of every single person connected to Sa Gikkun. Lucky for me, most of them had met up for some celebration. All I had to do was set off a bomb and kill the survivors. After that I went to more locations, killing off stragglers that didn’t come for the celebration. It was almost 3 am when I arrived at the mayors’ house. It was really easy. Kill off the guards from a distance with my sniper rifle then sneak inside. The house didn’t have any sensors. The doors weren’t even locked. I sneaked inside and walked to his bedroom. I fired off my pistol, startling him awake. I lunged at him and put my gun to his temple. He was scared for dear life and offered me anything he could. None of that mattered to me and I said to him ‘You wanted the 저승사자 back right? Well you got it.” I pulled him off the bed and slammed him to the floor. After that, I broke him piece by piece. First I broke both his arms and legs. Then I punched him so hard, his jaw dislocated. All the rage that I had built up over the course of one year exploded that night. After one punch, came another, and another, and another, until I could only see red. That was when I stopped. I wiped the blood covering my eyes. To my surprise, Sa Gikkun was still alive. Well that wouldn’t be for long. I got out of his house to my car and grabbed a canister of gasoline. I went back inside and poured it all over the house. Once that’s done, I poured the rest of it all over his barely alive body. I knelt down in front of him and pulled his hair up to whisper “I’ll see you in hell”. Afterwards, I got out of the house and threw a molotov inside. I stood by the house and watched as it began to engulf in flames. After some time, I could hear his screams of pain and suffering. I lit up a cigarette and went home.

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I didn’t deserve to live after everything that I did. There was so much blood spilled by these hands that I knew how this must end. I wiped my tears with my other hand, and cocked the pistol. I brought the pistol to my temple, ready to end everything and reunite with you. Hell was where I belonged but even if I got just a glimpse of your face and that beautiful smile, I’d spent an eternity in those fiery pits. But just as I was about to finish it all, my phone rang. I wanted to ignore it but I couldn’t. Something was pushing me to answer the call. I sighed and wondered who the caller could be. As I picked it up, tears streamed down once again. It was your half-sister, Jiwon or as she likes to be called, Liz. She called and asked how I was doing. That warm voice, laced without malice or evil, only kindness. She reminded me of you. As I continued crying, she comforted me by saying “Come on oppa, Gaeul-unnie won’t like seeing you like this. She’ll probably come down from heaven and beat you up if you don’t stop crying.” For the first time in a year, I let out a laugh. She continued and said “Come on oppa. Stop crying and let’s pay unnie a visit, okay?” I said yes and disconnected the call. I wiped my tears off and closed my eyes. As I took a deep breath, I decided for myself that I have a new purpose. I’m going to keep living and protect the angel you sent to save me. I’m going to keep Jiwon safe for all eternity.