Precautions of a Snakepit - Chapter 69

The nurse’s eyes shifted downward to see the bulge in Dr. Madison’s pants that was visible through his lab coat.

He was familiar with the ridiculousness of what Dr. Madison had on his lower half. If Won tasted anything outside of those dimensions, she wouldn’t feel right when she had s*x with another man.

In effect, it was a declaration that Dr. Madison would not share Won with anyone but ‘He’ and ‘the candidates.’

It was an enormous act of exclusivity, even by their standards of polygamy, where sharing a female is a given.

“Uh, I see. You’re right.”

Dryly swallowing, the nurse nodded in agreement. The hierarchy between them is obvious, both by birth and status. He had no intention of looking down on the newcomer, much to Dr. Madison’s chagrin.

“How’s No.3 doing these days?” Dr. Madison asked, pushing up his glasses.

Watching the light slide across the white frames of his glasses, the light reached a point and sharply flashed, making the nurse think of the man.

The patient is known as No.3 in the hospital.

Cha Mu-jin, the illegitimate son of the President of K Group.

He has the looks of his mother, a famous actress, and a bad temper. In a sense, he was a more formidable opponent than the openly defiant No.1 and the visibly aggressive No.2. He showed no signs of slowing down after quite a while, too.

“Ah… well, it is what it is. We’ll just have to make sure he stays that way until the ceremony.”

“Please be careful not to damage even a fingertip. I don’t care what happens to his mind, but his body is important. It isn’t pleasant to wear clothes that have a stain on them, right?”

“Yes, you’re right.”

At Dr. Madison’s insistence, the nurses agreed. A staff member, who wasn’t part of the group, invaded the room.

“I’m going to go check on him to see how he’s doing.”

Concluding the conversation. Dr. Madison tore his gaze away from the monitor and exited the nurses’ station.

***

Won looked back. She felt as if someone was watching her.

‘Must be the mood.’

She rubbed the nape of her neck and twirled the pen around her fingers.

She stared at the blank page, wanting to pour out all the information in her head and organize it, but she knew that writing it down would give it away. She realized it as soon as she entered the ward, but living under 24-hour surveillance was not for the faint of heart.

On this mission, Won had been reminded a thousand times how precious freedom is, and how great a civilizational gain it is to have access to the internet.

Dr. Hudson, for one, would have made a killing if he had the internet. The books he translated? Just type his name into any online bookstore and a list will pop up. It’s safe to say that his struggles were largely due to the lack of internet.

‘If I had the internet, I could easily find out about the person named Seo Hee-hyun…’

Won’s hand, which was twirling the pen, stopped.

‘Why am I thinking about something so useless?’

She quickly picked up her pen, which was about to fall from the floor, and composed herself.

Seo Hee-hyun had nothing to do with her assignment. She doesn’t need that information to get Target. It’s just somebody supposedly involved with Top Dog’s personal life…

‘Get a grip.’

The rule is that the mission takes precedence over personal curiosity.

She steeled herself and ran through a mental list of what she needed to know about the rescue and escape.

D-Day is the next night the CCTVs are turned off.

After completing the “groundwork.” she will head to the vault. She won’t have time to stop by the doctor’s office after taking Target out. She needs to make sure she grabs the information in the safe beforehand. Next, she’ll head to the nurses’ station and steal the key to the gate, then crash the hospital’s computer system. Finally, she; ‘ll enter the secret area of the religious room, rescue Target, and exit the hospital. The route and method were set.

But there was one obstacle in the way. The combination to the safe. She needs to open it to get the information inside.

The problem is, she only knows one digit of the four-digit code. All she knows is that the first digit is 9.

The combination of numbers that can fit in the other three digits is 3 to the power of 10.

She needs to find one correct answer out of a thousand possible ones.

‘Top Dog’s intuition pays off here.’

She thought about asking him to pick three random numbers from 0 to 9 and include the possibility of duplicates.

‘No way.’

Intuition isn’t a one-size-fits-all. If it were, she would win the lottery. Won decided to put her regrets to rest and look for an alternative.

Waiting for Ms. Yang to come to her senses would be the safest and surest way of getting the answer, but that would be like lying under a persimmon tree and waiting for red wine to fall. It is, however, a much more likely gamble than hoping Top Dog can guess the three digits of the password, but if she’d unlucky, Ms. Yang might not wake up until after D-Day.

‘Should I go near Ms. Yang and fool around?’

Looking back at past cases, it didn’t seem like Ms. Yang could stay sane for very long. If Won was too far away, Ms. Yang could look for her but forget what she was trying to do. To prevent that, Won needed to be close to Ms. Yang.

‘Let’s go around the ward and look for her.’

As much as Won wanted to go to her room and stand there 24/7, she knew she couldn’t do that. They didn’t have that close of a relationship.

She has to wait until she is outside of her room. If Ms. Yang is in her right mind, she’ll come out of her room to meet Won. However, she may lose track of her purpose and slip away, so Won will need to catch her beforehand.

Won started on the first floor and went through the ward as casually as she could like she was just exploring out of boredom.

‘There’s Ms. Yang.’

Won spotted her and walked over. Seeing Won, Ms. Yang rushed over, grabbed her sleeve, and said, “Pretty unnie, I want to go to the bathroom. Please come with me.”

***

The miracle of Moses was unfolding in real-time as Dr. Madison walked down the hallway with his hands stuck in both pockets of his white coat.

Everyone in his path, whether hospital staff or patients, moved out of the way, and the conversations were hushed. Some patients made a small game of it.

The Dictator of the Ward. A psychopath, demon, maniac, tyrant, viper, mad scientist… They had different names for him, but the results were the same.

Fear and avoidance.

They had all been involved with him at least once, in one way or another, and knew in their bones they didn’t want to be involved with him again. They didn’t want to know where he was going or what he was going to do. They were more concerned with avoiding eye contact.

Because of that, Dr. Madison had unrestricted freedom in the ward. He could stumble into a secret room in broad daylight and no one would notice.

He unlocked the door with his master key, stepped through the hidden entrance, and reached his destination in a matter of moments.

“Long time no see.”

Spotting his target, Dr. Madison greeted him with his trademark smile.

“How have you been, Cha Mu-jin?”

Looking down at the man glaring at him with bloodshot eyes, Dr. Madison added with a chuckle.

“You’re so unlucky. I had three other candidates, but No. 3 just happened to be chosen.”

The next moment, Dr. Madison’s expression dramatically changed, like he saw something pitiful.

“Why don’t you just give up, Cha Mu-jin? Why are you holding on so tight, like somebody is going to come along and save you? Dream on, because miracles like that don’t happen.”

Then, as if he were performing a one-man show, his reply was self-deprecating.

“Well, I guess we’ll wait and see, Cha Mu-jin. Your eyes are telling me that, but I’ve heard that if someone comes to rescue the prey that has fallen into the snake-infested pit, the rescuer will end up being eaten by the snakes.”

Faced with eyes that were telling him he was crazy, Dr. Madison cupped his chin with both hands.

“I have one question, Cha Mu-jin.”

Tilting his face to one side like a child, he continued in an innocent tone.

“Weren’t you different not so long ago? You were on the verge of mental collapse, and I made you that way, and then all of a sudden you were fine like you were revived. Like a sheep that was dying from starvation or a fish that was revitalized by a drop of water that fell from the sky. The rain filled you with hope.”

Despite his wistful expression, the long, slit eyes behind his glasses glowed like a snake.

“What is the identity of that drop of water that fell from the sky? I think… Since Lee Won was admitted to the hospital, you have regained your strength. What do you think, Cha Mu-jin? Is it just a coincidence?”

Kofi