Chapter 120
The moment I heard the words police substation, my eyes snapped toward Do Kijeong.
Ignoring my reaction, Do Kijeong continued the call with a serious expression.
“Yeah. Okay. I understand. Hang up for now. We’ll talk when I get there.”
A moment later, he ended the call and looked at me with a confused expression.
“Hyung, what happened?”
“Ah, well... Seungcheol got involved in an assault case. He’s at a police substation right now.”
“An assault?”
I was caught off guard by the completely unexpected situation.
“He said he was too shaken up to call earlier, and that he can’t come today.”
While explaining, Do Kijeong hurriedly began gathering his belongings.
“Hyung, are you going there yourself?”
“Yeah. That guy’s from the countryside, so he probably doesn’t have anyone nearby he can call.”
He looked apologetic.
“Kibaek, sorry. I think I need to leave first.”
“Then I’ll go with you.”
“No, it’s fine. There’s no reason for you to get dragged into this too.”
“Forget it.”
I looked at him.
“Hyung, have you ever been to a police substation before?”
Do Kijeong shook his head.
“I thought so.”
I smiled faintly.
“What reason would a model student like you ever have to visit a police station?”
I continued.
“You said he got involved in an assault case, right?”
“I’m practically an expert when it comes to things like this.”
Working in film production meant getting dragged into all kinds of strange incidents whether you wanted to or not.
Before my regression, I had been involved in especially many of them.
As a result, I had ended up visiting police stations fairly often and had become quite familiar with situations like this.
Do Kijeong tilted his head at my claim that I was an expert.
I continued.
“Which substation is it?”
The taxi stopped in front of the police substation.
I got out and quickly looked around.
Across the two-lane road, I spotted a convenience store.
I immediately headed toward it.
“Hey, Min Kibaek. Where are you going? The police substation is over here.”
Do Kijeong looked back and forth between me and the station entrance before quickly following me.
“Kibaek, where are you going?”
“At times like this, it’s better to buy some drinks and hand them out.”
“Ah... drinks.”
We bought a box of vitamin drinks from the convenience store and headed back to the police substation.
I pushed open the glass door and stepped inside.
The whole interior came into view at once.
Do Kijeong entered behind me, looking slightly nervous.
“How can I help you?”
A police officer behind the reception counter looked at us.
“Ah, thank you for your hard work.”
I bowed politely.
“I heard someone named Woo Seungcheol is being questioned here over an assault case?”
“Ah, Woo Seungcheol...”
The officer’s gaze naturally shifted toward two men sitting on a long bench in the corner.
At that moment, one of the two men, a man wearing a beanie, recognized Do Kijeong and jumped to his feet.
“Kijeong hyung!”
“Seungcheol!”
Do Kijeong also recognized him and raised his voice.
The officer glanced between us and asked in an almost emotionless tone,
“What is your relationship with Woo Seungcheol?”
“We’re close seniors and juniors.”
Then I quickly handed him the box of vitamin drinks.
“And this...”
“Oh, you really didn’t have to... ahem.”
“No, it’s nothing.”
I smiled politely.
“You’re working day and night to protect society, so please have one each while you work.”
Then I asked,
“By the way, what exactly happened here?”
The officer awkwardly accepted the box of vitamin drinks and briefly explained the situation.
“Breaking and entering... and assault?”
According to the officer, the first report had come from the victim, Kim Hyuntak, who claimed that someone had entered his home without permission.
But when the police arrived at the scene, Kim Hyuntak, the supposed victim, was being beaten by the assailant, Noh Geumbong.
“Then the victim is...?”
After roughly understanding the situation, I asked about his condition.
The officer pointed with his chin toward a man in his early forties who was filling out a victim statement farther inside.
“That man over there.”
The man in his early forties had light abrasions on his forehead and lips.
At first glance, he looked serious and respectable.
But he also seemed aware of us.
He kept glancing in our direction with an irritated expression.
Then the officer quietly lowered his voice.
“The victim’s lawyer is on the way.”
He looked at us.
“You should hear the details after the lawyer arrives.”
Then he added in a quieter voice,
“If possible, I’d recommend settling this peacefully.”
“Huh? Ah, yes.”
Perhaps the vitamin drinks were already having an effect.
The officer winked at me and lowered his voice even further.
“When I looked into it, that victim, Kim Hyuntak, turns out to be pretty famous.”
“This could get troublesome if you’re not careful.”
“Famous...?”
At the word famous, Do Kijeong and I both turned toward the man filling out the statement.
But despite what the officer said, I had never seen his face before.
“He’s some kind of... writer.”
The officer lowered his voice again.
“A writer?”
“Yeah.”
He thought for a moment.
“What kind of writer was it again...?”
Then he remembered.
“Ah, right. A webtoon artist.”
“Apparently, he’s extremely famous.”
He scratched his head.
“What was his name again...?”
Then his eyes lit up.
“Chopung. Yeah, Chopung.”
Wait.
Chopung...?
The creator of Youth Nonsense, currently ranked number one in views on N Portal’s webtoon platform?
At that moment, a memory from before my regression flashed through my mind.
Ah... this guy.
Wasn’t he involved in some kind of nasty scandal later?
I think it was around 2018...
I was trying to remember when the officer spoke again.
“From what I heard the victim saying earlier, I don’t think he has any intention of settling.”
The officer advised us that if the victim pushed for full punishment and the case was sent to the prosecution, a criminal record could remain.
And if things went badly, the offenders could even receive prison sentences.
“I see. Thank you for the advice.”
I nodded.
“But we haven’t heard our side of the story yet.”
“Would it be all right if we spoke to them now?”
“Yes. Go ahead.”
The officer gestured for us to come behind the reception counter.
We walked over to where Woo Seungcheol and Noh Geumbong were sitting.
Woo Seungcheol repeatedly bowed toward us with an apologetic expression.
However...
The man beside him, Noh Geumbong, didn’t react at all to our arrival.
He only stared blankly into the air, looking half out of his mind.
“Kijeong hyung, I’m really sorry for calling you because of something like this.”
“It’s fine.”
Do Kijeong shook his head.
“But what exactly happened?”
Then he lowered his voice while glancing toward Chopung in the distance.
“Do you know who that man is?”
Unlike Do Kijeong, Woo Seungcheol deliberately raised his voice as though he wanted the other man to hear him.
“Of course I know!”
He glared in Chopung’s direction.
“He’s human garbage!”
Do Kijeong immediately looked toward Chopung in alarm.
Sure enough, Chopung’s brows tightened after hearing Woo Seungcheol.
Do Kijeong scolded him.
“Hey, lower your voice. Ahem.”
“No.”
Woo Seungcheol didn’t back down.
“Someone like him deserves to hear much worse than that.”
“He uses his fame as a weapon.”
“He treats the people working under him worse than human beings.”
“And on top of that, he extorts them and even threatens them—mmph!”
Unable to handle Woo Seungcheol’s reckless words, Do Kijeong finally covered his mouth with his hand.
Extortion and threats.
Treating people as less than human...
So was this related to abuse of power?
Having roughly guessed the situation, I removed Do Kijeong’s hand from Woo Seungcheol’s mouth.
“All right, all right.”
“First, calm down.”
“We need to hear exactly what happened before anything else.”
Woo Seungcheol blinked at me as though asking who I was.
Only then did Do Kijeong realize he had forgotten to introduce me.
“Ah, right. Everything was so chaotic that I forgot.”
He pointed toward me.
“I mentioned him sometimes, remember?”
“This is Min Kibaek.”
“He was my direct senior in the military, and he’s now the planning team leader at Big Picture, the production company that made my drama.”
The moment Woo Seungcheol heard my name, he looked shocked.
He immediately bowed almost ninety degrees.
“Ah! Hello. I’m Woo Seungcheol.”
“I’ve heard a lot about you from Kijeong hyung.”
“It would’ve been nicer if we met under different circumstances.”
I smiled lightly.
“For now, let’s solve this problem first. Then we can greet each other properly again with a smile.”
I told him that if we wanted to resolve the situation smoothly, he needed to explain everything from beginning to end without leaving out a single detail.
“Yeah, Seungcheol.”
Do Kijeong looked worried.
“If this goes badly, you could actually end up in prison.”
Even at those words, Woo Seungcheol didn’t blink.
Instead, he spoke boldly.
“I don’t care about that.”
“Of course, I know we were wrong to use violence.”
His expression hardened.
“But that bastard also needs to apologize for what he’s done to my friend all this time.”
There wasn’t the slightest hesitation in his eyes.
He looked like the kind of person who would rather fight injustice and go down spectacularly than compromise with evil.
Apologize to his friend?
Then this assault happened because of Noh Geumbong, the man sitting beside him.
Whether Woo Seungcheol’s attitude was courage or simple stubbornness could be judged later.
Right now, what mattered was confirming the facts.
“So what exactly did that man do?”
Woo Seungcheol looked at Noh Geumbong, who was still staring blankly into the air.
His expression became pained.
Then, as though he had finally made up his mind, he began to explain.
“My friend Geumbong wants to become a webtoon artist.”
“During the day, he works part-time.”
“At night, he stays awake drawing.”
“And whenever he can, he submits his work to webtoon contests...”
Then one day, a fairly well-known webtoon artist named Chopung contacted Noh Geumbong.
Chopung told him that he had judged one of the works Noh Geumbong had submitted to a webtoon contest.
Although Geumbong hadn’t won, Chopung said he saw potential in him.
He offered to train him and told him to start by working under him as an assistant.
Ha. As expected...
I could already guess where this was going.
How many people had been victimized by famous writers, famous directors, famous actors, or anyone else who used their fame and position to abuse those beneath them?
I had once heard a story about a famous drama writer who forced an assistant writer to do things that had nothing to do with writing.
Cooking.
Cleaning.
Even doing the writer’s child’s homework.
According to Woo Seungcheol, while working as Chopung’s assistant, Noh Geumbong had been subjected to constant verbal abuse and gaslighting.
Worse...
He hadn’t been paid his salary for several months.
Eventually, unable to endure it anymore, Noh Geumbong had fled the studio as though escaping.
After Woo Seungcheol found out what had happened, he insisted that his friend needed to at least receive the unpaid wages.
So he took Noh Geumbong and went to confront Chopung.
“To be honest...”
Woo Seungcheol lowered his eyes.
“I never imagined it would actually turn into a fistfight.”
“We only went there to beg him to pay the wages he owed.”
But even after hearing their situation, Chopung hadn’t cared at all.
Instead, he had hurled every kind of disgusting insult at them.
“And with things going like that...”
Woo Seungcheol looked toward Noh Geumbong.
“Geumbong eventually couldn’t take it anymore either...”
The more I listened, the more absurd it became.
The victimizer was acting like the victim.
As I listened to the story, I could feel the rebellious streak buried somewhere deep in my DNA slowly raising its head.
