Chapter 34: Promotion Team’s Business Trip

The warm atmosphere froze in an instant.

Mujae, who had been left speechless, asked again.

“Why did you do something like that?”

They called it a week-long business trip, but how much hardship had he really gone through?

Besides, Hallakgoong was the one who suffered the most among them. Consumed by heavy guilt from what he had experienced in the mortal world, he nearly got trapped in a labyrinth.

‘Hey, do you remember?’

Zack gestured, as if at a loss for words. He too had starred in a thriller movie as Hallakgoong’s friend, but until now, he hadn’t asked anything.

Knowing the consideration of such friends, Hallakgoong rolled his eyes.

“…No. That’s why I turned it on to check.”

The day he flew from the Northern Ice Hell to the Seocheon Flower Garden.

He was extremely tired and his whole body ached, but Hallakgoong couldn’t fall asleep.

So, while everyone else was deep in slumber, Hallakgoong turned on the computer in the office.

And watched the thriller movie where he played the villain.

“So what happened?”

Even so, Mujae couldn’t say, ‘Mother, your son acted like a madman and suffered terribly,’ in front of his mother, so he asked. Seeing his friend’s deadly serious face, Hallakgoong grinned mischievously.

“It was fun.”

“Really??”

“Yeah, the villain acted really well… Wait, hold on.”

The two friends almost showed that their fists could fly even in front of each other’s mothers. Hallakgoong hurriedly added an explanation.

“First off, I’m really sorry and thankful and I love you, my friends.”

“…You’re saying things you’d never say normally, so you do have a sense of danger, huh.”

To his dumbfounded friends, Hallakgoong began to tell his story.

“As I said before, I’m human.”

Hallakgoong’s eyes drifted off to another world.

“After my father, who made strange flowers, passed on to the afterlife, my mother had to work as a servant in other people’s homes.”

And the lingering heat had not yet completely faded.

“I was born a servant. From the moment I could understand words and walk, I learned how to serve the master’s porridge.”

Even though it happened hundreds, thousands of years ago, the anger hadn’t faded. Well, Mujae thought, it made sense, since the perpetrator was still lying unconscious right before their eyes.

“…Then one day, I just couldn’t endure it anymore.”

In Hallakgoong’s mind, the scenes from that day replayed vividly.

The day he was unjustly beaten by the master until he bled.

His mother, standing in the glow of the sunset streaming through the room.

He, slamming the door in anger and shouting.

‘Why do we have to live like this! Where is my father!’

‘Gung….’

His mother couldn’t even cry; she was just sad and forlorn.

‘You said he’s not dead? You said he’d come back? I’m already fifteen. If he was coming, he should’ve come by now!’

He didn’t realize that his mother’s heart was not just breaking, but being torn apart. Wongangam finally decided to take out the last shred of hope she had and hand it to her son.

‘Take this with you.’

A fragment of a Flower Comb, split in half.

Wongangam’s hope, tightly wrapped in silk deep within a drawer.

‘Your father went to Seocheon.’

‘What?’

‘Your father was called by the Jade Emperor and became a manager of the afterlife as a human.’

Faced with his mother’s sorrow, as cold as the lakebed under the ice, he couldn’t even ask what nonsense she was spouting.

“That was the last time I saw my mother alive.”

“Huh?”

Mujae and Zack’s jaws dropped at Hallakgoong’s unexpected words.

“That day, I ran away with the Flower Comb Fragment.”

Mujae recalled Hallakgoong’s story he had heard before in the greenhouse.

‘…I wandered the whole world and ended up looking like a beggar.’

It seemed this was what had happened before that. Hallakgoong’s grip tightened on his mother’s hand.

“After that, I met my father and proved that I was his son.”

Hallakgoong clenched his teeth again as Sara’s story came up. Out of Hallakgoong’s sight, Zack gestured to Mujae.

‘Never get on his bad side.’

“My father told me to take his flowers. So I asked why.”

Mujae gestured to Zack.

‘What if we already bought some?!’

“He said I had to give them to my mother.”

Hallakgoong’s deep-seated resentment was obvious, gritting his teeth even harder than he had for his former master.

“Are you kidding me? My mother died while I was out looking for my father. Even though he knew, he did nothing, and then grilled me to make sure I really was his son….”

‘So then you took the flowers and went back to the mortal world?’

Even though it was a tragic story, Zack pressed on, interested. Hallakgoong nodded.

“Yeah, I went back to the mortal world with the ‘signature’ of the Seocheon Flower Garden, the Flowers of Rebirth… grabbed a few forbidden plants, too.”

Zack nodded in understanding. Then, catching Mujae’s eye, he explained in sign language.

‘It means Hallakgoong saved his mother.’

“Wha…what? Is that possible?”

As Mujae stared in disbelief at the sign language, Hallakgoong’s voice turned cold.

“That’s the reason my father was called by the Jade Emperor in the first place. ‘He grew flowers that shouldn’t exist in the mortal world.’ But the man must have foreseen my mother’s death. After testing me in every way to make sure I was really his son, he handed over those forbidden flowers he’d hidden away.”

“I see.”

“He told me to go back and save my mother.”

Mujae looked at Wongangam. Hallakgoong’s mother, looking as if she were in a deep sleep.

“But then what went wrong? Why is she like this?”

“Yeah.”

Hallakgoong noticeably shrank.

The friend who said he often visited his mother must have agonized over these moments every time.

“The Flowers of Rebirth were fine. Bone Rebirth, Flesh Rebirth, Blood Rebirth, Breath Rebirth… but the Soul Rebirth Flower was the problem.”

“Soul Rebirth Flower?”

It was Mujae’s first time hearing of such a flower. That must have been the ‘forbidden plant.’

Hallakgoong nodded.

“I used the other flowers to make my mother’s body and even blew in the Breath Rebirth Flower. But the Soul Rebirth Flower was kind of weird.”

‘What kind of flower is that?’

“It’s exactly what it sounds like. A flower that revives the soul, brings it back.”

Hallakgoong drew a small flower on the floor with his finger.

“It’s tiny, and instead of regular petals, it has little firefly-like things attached, all blue.”

“So what happened?”

“You’re supposed to sprinkle its light on the person, and then the soul is revived as the light enters them.”

Hallakgoong tilted his head.

“But the light went out.”

“Huh?”

“The light went out and didn’t come back. She’s been like this ever since.”

Hallakgoong shrugged, as if he had already searched through tens of thousands of sources.

“Her pulse is fine, she breathes… she’s just sleeping for thousands of years.”

“…….”

“My father says he’s trying, but who knows what he’s doing. I don’t trust him anymore.”

“…….”

“I’ll handle it myself. Like always.”

At some point, Hallakgoong was wiping Wongangam’s face with a water-dampened cloth from the tray Seyoung had brought earlier. Watching him, Mujae felt as if someone was pounding on his chest from the inside.

‘So that’s why you made that deal with me?’

“Yeah.”

“What deal?”

Mujae’s interest shifted at this new story. Zack’s sign language and Hallakgoong’s explanation came at the same time.

‘He wants to go study abroad too.’

“I want to go study overseas as well.”

“What?”

Mujae’s eyes and mouth opened wide again. He squinted his eyes at the strange sensation at their roots.

“Wow… Is it just me, or is every team member only thinking about leaving?”

“No, that’s not it….”

‘What are you talking about! When did I ever!’

A flustered Hallakgoong and a wronged Zack. Mujae glared with his big eyes.

“See! One will leave as soon as their task is done, and the other will follow! Without even telling the team leader!”

Mujae unwittingly raised his voice in front of Wongangam. He hurriedly covered his mouth with his palm, but thankfully Wongangam continued to sleep peacefully. Zack smacked Mujae’s back.

“?!”

“It’s fine, Zack. If my mother wakes up because of that, Mujae will be my savior.”

Hallakgoong said with a hollow laugh. He already had a plan.

“Calm down…. There are only two things I’ve figured out about my mother.”

“What are they?”

“First, my mother’s current state is that her soul vessel is seriously cracked. With the vessel that holds her soul broken, her soul can’t return or leave.”

“I see.”

“Second, no one knows how to properly use the Soul Rebirth Flower.”

Question marks hovered over Mujae and Zack’s heads.

Surely, there was a common acquaintance who should know—the very person who made the flower!

But Hallakgoong shook his head, face cold.

“My father doesn’t know either.”

“How can that be? He’s the one who made it!”

Mujae raised his voice again. This time, Zack nodded vigorously instead of trying to stop him. Hallakgoong could only frown in irritation.

“I don’t know either. When I asked if I’d used it wrong, he said he’d never tried it himself.”

“Unbelievable.”

The Promotion Team’s outrage became one.

It was a complicated family history, but the conclusion was: ‘The boss is a jerk.’

Mujae and Zack patted Hallakgoong on the shoulder.

“You’ve had a rough time, Hallakgoong.”

‘Seriously. You’ve gone through everything alone, haven’t you.’

“No… well, there are plenty of people in the world who’ve had it worse than me.”

Hallakgoong looked blank as he said this. Having spoken his story aloud, he seemed even more astounded. At that moment, Mujae shouted determinedly.

“I’ve made up my mind!”

“About what?”

“I want to study abroad too.”

With the corners of his mouth hooked up to his ears, Mujae’s eyes gleamed as he seized the opportunity. Hallakgoong asked in disbelief.

“What?”

“You said you wanted to study abroad, right? Go see Zack’s homeland? Because of your mother?”

“That’s right?”

“Then you’ll be going when Zack goes home, right? And then I’ll be left alone on the Promotion Team, right?”

Mujae’s eyes glinted with madness. Just as Hallakgoong and Zack recoiled from Mujae’s unexpected reaction—

“But! What if I go too?”

“Uh…”

“Then it becomes a Promotion Team business trip! I wonder what the afterlife overseas is like!”

Zack pressed his forehead. He had experienced ‘Mujae-senpai’ when Hallakgoong wasn’t around.

Back then, Mujae had tried to use Zack, who had just joined the Promotion Team, to sneak into a reincarnation class.

‘I forgot, Mujae loves to audit classes.’

“Hey! Auditing?! I’m an official exchange student, thank you very much!”

Mujae shamelessly pushed for a study abroad that hadn’t even been decided yet. Overwhelmed, Hallakgoong finally stood up.

“Hey, get up.”

“Why? I have to give a definite answer in front of Lady Wongangam!”

And so, the Promotion Team bickered as usual.

In the end, Zack and Hallakgoong managed to restrain their noisy colleague and drag him to the door.

“Fine, fine~ I’ll go already!”

Just as Mujae finally turned to leave in surrender, something odd caught his eye.

“Huh?”

-Srrrk

At that very moment the door closed,

Wongangam’s hand was waving toward Mujae.

“What are you doing?”

“Ah, nothing… Maybe I imagined it.”

As Mujae tilted his head, Hallakgoong grabbed his arm.

To him, it just looked like Mujae was about to do something weird again.

“Stop looking and let’s go.”

“Okay.”

Still feeling uneasy, Mujae eventually followed his friends out.

Beyond the closed doors of the Hall of the Flower’s Heart, only silence remained once again.