Secret Love

The Shaman

(Haru and Min-jun say goodbye to their parents. Haru rejoins Team Jipuragi and move towards the next plan)

Haru and Min-jun hugged their parents as they stood before the departure gate. Hana and Min-ryu was reluctant to leave, but Min-jun convinced them it was for the best.

"Take care of each other, alright?", Hana sobbed.

"We'll update constantly, mama", said Haru.

Min-ryu hugged Haru the longest. He took a good look at her and smiled.

"My Haru, you're so strong. I'm proud to have you as my daughter", he said.

"Father, I promise you. Everything will be alright", Haru smiled.

The siblings waited until their parents disappeared through the gates. Min-jun spotted the men that had been watching over his parents.

Min-jun smirked; they're probably scrambled to report back to Han-seok. Min-jun beckoned Haru to head back to Geumga Plaza.

They met up with Team Jipuragi at Miss Kwak's snack bar. Haru was surprised to see Mr Nam staying up all night to go through each of the folders in the Guillotine file. He found quite a few interesting things about Daechang Daily, including the current director killed his own brother over the president seat.

"Mr Nam, did you find anything else?", Vincenzo asked.

"There's a shaman he trusts and follows blindly".

"Oh, this should be easy", Min-jun chuckled.

"How can he takes advices from a fraud like that?", Cha-young scoffed.

"You know how people are...", Miss Kwak chimed in, "...The less you know about something, the easier you believe it".

"We should check if he's truly a fraud or gifted", said Vincenzo.

"I should go and finish reading it", Mr Nam finished his meal and went back to office.

"Min-jun, Miss Haru, get An and Chul-wook. Go and grab our shaman", said Vincenzo.

The siblings wasted no time. Haru drove and Min-jun, An and Chul-wook went in, knocked the shaman unconscious and placed him in the trunk.

They tied him up at the rooftop on a chair. Haru brought in a stack of Daechang Daily to be used as the base for their fire.

When the shaman woke up, he struggled in his bound. Chul-wook took off the bag from his head and rip the tape off before continuing his task.

"I'm telling you, Daechang Daily burns the best", said An.

"When newspapers are full of lies, you should use them to start a fire", said Chul-wook.

"Hey, who are you guys?", the shaman asked.

"Who do you think?", said Min-jun as he brought forward a large fuel can.

"We brought you in, so you can read our fortune", said Chul-wook.

Vincenzo stepped forward and the rest stepped back. Haru pulled out a bag of popcorn to be shared with Min-jun while An and Chul-wook helped Vincenzo to interrogate the shaman and start the fire.

"We should've brought the marshmallows earlier".

The shaman struggled to blow out the fire while Vincenzo, An and Chul-wook were trying to set him ablaze. The Lee siblings enjoyed it as if they were watching their favourite TV show.

The shaman gave in and spilled everything that Vincenzo wanted to know. Vincenzo gave him instructions before setting him loose.

LATER

The tenants of Geumga gathered in Larry's studio, to decide who would play the shaman. An gathered the votes in a pot and sat back in front.

"Alright, we all have voted for the person, who will act as the shaman. I will now count the votes", said An as he set the pot down.

Everyone, including Haru and Min-jun, voted for Vincenzo, giggling at the various ways people had written to vote him. The last vote stated Hong Cha-young, no doubt it was Vincenzo who did it.

While the act was up, the Lee siblings were advised to stay out since no doubt that Daechang Daily was one of Babel's payrolls and was the one responsible of dragging Min-jun's name to the dirt. The two Lees sat in Jipuragi and began to read more on the Guillotine file.

Haru made a diagram, linking each crime to Babel as Min-jun searched for more information and evidences. Suddenly, Min-jun became silent and Haru went over to see what he was looking at.

It was a list of names under Han-seok's folder. Both of them knew those names.

"What are you two looking at?", Vincenzo, Cha-young and Mr Nam entered, still in their costumes.

Haru turned the laptop towards them. "These are the ones Han-seok killed during middle and high school. Two of them, Park Chang-min and Kim Yeon-shin, were Min-jun's friends".

"Chang-min told me he was going out that night when we were supposed to do our project. He said he would come over later, but he never did...", Min-jun sighed solemnly.

"...Yeon-shin..., he accidentally tackled the ball from Han-seok during gym, that's all. That weekend, we were supposed to go out for a sleepover at another friend's house".

"I remember his parents came to us, crying and saying Yeon-shin had been missing for hours and they can't make a report since it wasn't 24 hours yet", said Haru.

"I went out with my father, searching for Yeon-shin. I prayed that he was still alive, probably tripped over and passed out. I found him days later, Mr Cassano, dead as Han-seok stood over his body, smiling like a crazed person. He took Yeon-shin's watch, the one he had saved his money to buy one", said Min-jun.

"Why did he take the watch?", asked Mr Nam.

"Some sort of trophy, y'know, like how serial killers do", said Haru.

"He made Chang-min jumped from our school rooftop because he caught Chang-min trying to pick the lock on other lockers. Chang-min was just trying to pull pranks on our friends because that's just who he was, but Han-seok twisted it and telling him that he will tell the headmaster that Chang-min was stealing other people's stuff", Min-jun's blood began to boil.

Mr Nam scrolled down. "It says here he was diagnosed as a psychopath at 16".

"He was already one when we first met him", said Haru, peeking at her arms.

"Was that why his father sent him to the States?", Vincenzo asked.

"He was afraid of what his son will become. Han-seo was tortured by him all the time. After we moved, he told me he resorted in using drugs and alcohol to cope with the pain because the therapy wasn't working".

"Why would he be using drugs? Gosh, that jerk", Cha-young grunted.

"In the end, his father covered everything up with money, sweeping them all up under the rug", said Min-jun.

"That's why he's hard to beat. He's the biggest monster of them all", said Vincenzo.

"Even the biggest monster can be killed", said Min-jun.

"I think I know what to do", said Vincenzo.