Flowers Are Bait

“The eldest son, who was obedient to our parents like a puppet, suddenly became strange. Of course, our parents tried to deal with Yoon Joo-ha quickly, but Kwon Ki-seok found out about it.”

Kwon Chae-woo descended into the basement, stepping on the hollow iron stairs.

“…I don’t know, though. I don’t know if Kwon Ki-seok changed ‘overnight.’ I couldn’t even guess when he started acting that way, even though I saw it right next to him.”

When Kwon Chae-woo entered the confined space without any windows, he couldn’t breathe. However, there is only a small dressing table and a bed. In a shabby place where that was all there was to it, Kwon Ki-seok took off his glasses and relaxed.

An old but pretty-looking ivory-colored dressing table. Liquor bottles and glasses were scattered all over it. And a white powder. Summer.

Kwon Chae-woo’s gaze keenly scanned it all. Kwon Ki-seok was still dressed casually, adjusting his cufflinks and pretending to know.

“You’re late.”

He never spoke nonsense even after taking Summer. Kwon Chae-woo felt a strange sense of discomfort and gave strength to the twitching corners of his eyes.

“All I need is your thumb to stamp the inheritance papers.”

He muttered coldly and immediately slashed Kwon Ki-seok’s hand on the dressing table with a knife and poured out the bottle of alcohol.

The strong smell of alcohol assaulted his nose and filled the room. Kwon Ki-seok just slowly raised the corner of his mouth without any resistance.

“Chae-woo, you shouldn’t waste time.”

“I heard everything, what you said to Lee-yeon.”

With eyes now hazy, Kwon Chae-woo pulled out another dagger from his waist. As if peeling an apple, he pressed the blade against Kwon Ki-seok’s thumb. It looked as if the finger would be severed at any moment.

“.…”

“How the fuck can you starve someone to death?”

“…!”

Kwon Ki-seok’s eyebrows twitched at that.

The festering revenge, anger, self-reproach, and murderous intent were laced into the knife he was holding. With bloodshot eyes, Kwon Chae-woo began to sharpen his blade. Although his bones were pounding, he was persistent, like a seasoned butcher.

Kwon Chae-woo kept at it, expressing frustration while not letting up on his harsh task. Kwon Ki-seok, reacting instinctively, tried to pull away, but his drugged body was flattened, and the grim work continued.

“Miss Lee-yeon, I bugged your work clothes.”

With each grimace on Kwon Chae-woo’s face while slicing through the flesh, the robust dressing table shook.

“Ugh…!”

Crimson veins bulged on Kwon Ki-seok’s forehead, and blood trickled from the corners of his mouth as he bit his tongue to endure the pain.

“I deliberately chose a dull knife for you.”

“Uh, ugh…!”

Unable to move for the past few days due to gunshot wounds, Kwon Chae-woo spent his time checking Lee-yeon’s activities through the CCTV in the mansion. In the process, he accidentally overheard the conversation between the two.

Coincidentally, this happened when he finally regained strength and gripped the cello, Kwon Ki-seok’s harsh words streamed in. He was dusting off the dust from the cello for Lee-yeon when he heard their conversation through his earpiece.

He felt as if his knees were breaking, and his head splitting at the revelation.

Gritting his teeth, he got up and went to her, as if offering himself as a sacrifice. Perhaps he thought of his mother who might have eagerly awaited the sound of his cello every day, carrying guilt and self-reproach.

The arrow that he relentlessly aimed at her turned back on him.

It was the most painful performance of his life.

“You won’t die peacefully, Kwon Ki-seok.”

Kwon Chae-woo, with a rugged breath, inserted his thumb into the alcohol glass. Despite Kwon Ki-seok’s fingers being cut off without anesthesia and submerged to alcohol, he chuckled, intoxicated by the spectacle and drugged from Summer.

Kwon Chae-woo grabbed his collar and continued to punch him until the small room became a mess.

“Ugh… if do this, you won’t meet Yoon Joo-ha.”

“What?”

Kwon Chae-woo sneered and then regained his composure.

“Do you think I will send you to where Yoon Joo-ha is?”

Kwon Ki-seok’s fixation was solely on Kwon Chae-woo’s suffering, not death. Even if the place Yoon Joo-ha was in meant death, Kwon Ki-seok wouldn’t allow it. They should never meet again.

“Teacher, it’s my turn now, right?” Kwon Ki-seok started to not make sense, Summer getting into him.

There was a moment of hesitation in Kwon Chae-woo at the unfamiliar tone coming from Kwon Ki-seok.

“The way you’ve been living will eventually harm her.”

“…?”

“You, the hunting dog, the Kwon family, will end up killing that woman. You will lose everything again.”

It was unclear whether it was a muttered soliloquy or not. Whether ‘that woman’ referred to Yoon Joo-ha or someone else—

With a stern expression, Kwon Chae-woo stared into the dilated pupils of his relaxed opponent.

“Chae-woo, I won.”

“…!”

Kwon Chae-woo suddenly felt a chill in his neck and gestured to open a tank. He had no patience left to listen to Kwon Ki-seok’s nonsense.

With starving someone to death, he wanted to let Kwon Ki-seok experience it himself, driven mad by starvation. If Kwon Ki-seok had the will to live, he would escape, and if not, he would do nothing to save himself and rot.

Despite living with the highest position, in the end, all that remained of the man was an empty shell. Power, fame, and desire meant nothing to Kwon Ki-seok. It was only the intense jealousy, like a finger that had already melted into a lump, that he couldn’t let go.

Pitiful… ruthless.