5315-chapter-35
Won didn’t know how to react. His behavior felt unfamiliar and dirty, but a strange heat spread through her body. She gritted her teeth, trying to ignore the surge of warmth.
“Dirty…”
“What’s dirty? I’ll do more than this with you.”
“More than this?”
“Were you just going to hold my hand when we’re making out? Is that what you think I was going to teach you? You’re more of a baby than I thought.”
The word ‘baby’ came out of his mouth again, and Won’s heart sank. There was no one in the world who could call her that, even someone a few years older than her.
“If I’m a baby, you’re a pedophile.”
“Well, that’s a problem because I’m a law-abiding, model citizen.”
Sucking on the lollipop, he smiled, but he didn’t seem troubled.
‘More than anyone else, you pay lip service to the law.’
A straight, normal, unmemorable face is often referred to as a ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ card. Top Dog’s face was the antithesis of that.
If you were an interviewer, you would throw the application into the shredder without looking at the qualifications. If you were a parent at a wedding meeting, you would go blind with worry for your child.
If she looked at his features one by one, there was nothing wrong with it, but altogether, it was reasonable.
“Sweetie, you really don’t want me to call you that? Okay, I won’t.”
He stepped back, holding the lollipop between his index and middle fingers like a cigarette. He apparently decided that was a line not to be crossed.
“I don’t really like ‘pretty girl’ either, got it?”
“No, that’s different. ‘Pretty girl’ isn’t too far out of line, and I gotta call you something.”
Won was stunned by the man’s confession that he knew he was pushing it. It showed his incredible intuition and ability to gauge others.
It wasn’t in Won’s nature to be a pushover. She was overcome with a strange sense of entitlement and declared, “If you call me whatever you want to call me, then I’ll be calling you whatever I want to call you.”
“So, we’ll be giving each other nicknames? Thrilling.”
Top Dog smirked back, licking the candy that he stole from her. As if she didn’t already hate him enough, the sight of the shrunken candy made her head spin.
‘He’s such a jerk.’
There was nothing worse in the world than giving away something and then taking it back.
He shoved the lollipop into her mouth without permission, then took it away. Maybe it was because it was taken away as she was enjoying it, but she felt pissed the more she thought about it. It was just candy and her irritation stemmed from something so small.
Won thought about the most uncool, uncute, insignificant name possible to call him.
“Chump.”1 okay so the korean word actually used here is a slur for the old + disabled so i watered it down bc im not abt to use that
Top Dog, who had been licking the lollipop, came to a screeching halt as if someone yelled to stop moving.
Won watched with interest as the first hint of trepidation appeared on his otherwise laid-back face, he then broke the atmosphere with a nervous look.
“That’s not another man’s name, is it?”
Won looked at him with a blank stare.
“Well?”
“It’s definitely not a name for someone your age, someone above me… Your dad’s friend? No matter how I think about it, it’s an old name. Are you into old men? Is it your first love? Maybe an ongoing love?”
“Whatever.”
Won didn’t say anything positive or negative, but somehow his mood turned serious. She was surprised at how self-conscious he was, thinking that she would use the name of her first love as a nickname for him. She thought it was normal to assume that it would be the name of someone she didn’t like.
“Sweetheart, you shouldn’t take anything with an expired date. It isn’t good past its sell-by date.”
“Maybe it gets better with age, like kimchi.”
“Kimchi is also inedible if it’s too old. Let’s eat fresh ones instead of picking up old ones, okay?”
“You too…”
Won looked him up and down, then slowly continued.
“I’m not sure if you’re fresh.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m confident in my physical age. I can confirm it with you anytime you want, just ask.”
Won intended to hurt his ego, but when he stroked his body, she could tell through his clothes that it was lean and toned. She admitted that it would be natural for him to be proud of himself, but she kept her expression blank.
“The very fact you care about the age of your body means you are far from fresh.”
“So I’m not fresh and not young, so where should I be?”
The man’s eyes twirled in a questioning manner.
Not too old, not too young; that is what people call the right age, not the wrong age. Won didn’t bother to correct Top Dog’s misunderstanding though, as she wanted to give back what she received.
When she remained silent, he became nervous and babbled.
“Think about it, pretty girl. When a man gets old, he doesn’t age like wine, he becomes spoiled. There’s no reason to pick up someone at that age. You aren’t spoiled, are you? Were you punished for breaking up someone’s perfectly good family because you wanted something spoiled?”
‘No way.’
If Won left him alone, he could write a good novel. It was a bit surprising that he had such a common-sense mindset for a guy who has a face that people would mistake as having a preference for cigarettes over lollipops.
Not wanting to interrupt his creative endeavors, Won decided to leave.
“I’m going first, chump.”
“Who the hell is that jerk, huh, pretty girl? I’ll have to find out.”
Ignoring his rambling, Won walked ahead.
Out of respect for his imagination, Won didn’t say anything.
There was nothing else for her to do, so she wandered around the ward. She couldn’t openly look for the back room because of the CCTVs, but she couldn’t stay idle either. She had to do some sort of snooping.
Won’s first stop was the library.
It’s a recurring theme in shows that when books are touched in a certain location, bookshelves move by themselves, revealing a hidden entrance to secret rooms. In other words, it’s a trick that doesn’t exist in reality. There was no point in having a secret place where even a three-year-old baby could accidentally find the entrance.
‘It would be best to check.’
Under the guise of selecting a book, Won searched for any hidden devices with predictable results. Leaving the library, she walked down the hallway with her arms crossed.
‘If only I could find the blueprint for this facility somewhere.’
Of course, if there is a secret room, it wouldn’t be on the blueprint. If she compared the area shown on the plans with the area of actual space, she could get an idea of where it might be.
She checked, but the library didn’t have the blueprints. If they did, they likely would be filed away with the rest of the hospital’s paperwork.
‘This place isn’t big enough to use an off-site storage facility, so it is probably in an off-limits room inside the hospital.’
Hospitals have a lot of paperwork to store due to the nature of their business. Patient lists, medical records, prescriptions, surgical records, test results… Although computation has replaced much of this with electronic files, the volume is still enormous. Hospitals often use specialized logistics storage services with advanced security systems for as long as medical law allows for record retention.
However, this facility isn’t very large and not like normal hospitals. It has various, unsavory corners, so it is unlikely documents will be sent to the outside.
‘There were one, two… four areas that were marked off for non-employees.’
The emergency room on the first floor, one on the second floor, one on the third floor, and an iron gate in front of the stairs to the basement. The floor no-go area was a pharmacy, and she didn’t check the third floor.
Given the layout of a typical hospital, the basement probably contains facilities like mechanical rooms, generators, and medical waste storage. She saw a nurse refer to a man in coveralls who came out of there as ‘the mechanical guy,’ and other nurses often pushed carts full of patients’ clothes and bedding down there. She guessed that the laundry and linen room were in the basement as well.
‘Maybe they don’t just have a filing cabinet, but it’s in the back room too…’
While she was thinking about it, she heard a commotion from somewhere. Breaking out of her thoughts, Won spotted a group of patients in front of the audio-visual room. Wondering what was going on, she took a moment to observe and realized Black Cat was surrounded by female patients.
‘What’s happening?’
Curious, Won approached them. For some reason, she saw Black Cat looking like a child being scolded by a parent. She leaned in and listened to what was happening.
