Kinn, or rather what was left of him was barely more than a wobbly body with a crushed skull. Blood had already begun to spread in a sludgy dark maroon pool below the crumpled body.
Something that once could have passed for a human face was now an almost unrecognizable mask of damaged tissue. From where he was, Minho could make out the knocked-out teeth and splintered bones showing beneath the bulk of the body.
The other punks that accompanied Kinn who had barely registered on Minho's radar had known better to run for their lives when they left the dumb one to fend for himself. They were smart for that―something that Minho only wished he could pull.
The fact that Renjun let Kinn mastermind the whole operation was the dumbest of ideas. Why he thought Kinn could make a leap from running drugs and slaves and his casino 'acquaintances' was beyond anyone who knew Kinn. At least, that was the last time he tried to pull a job.
"You want to tell me how to man my business?" Jae Hyun fixed Minho an unimpressed stare. "Come on, give it to me… let's hear it. Guys, come along, looks like we got new ideas someone would like us to try out."
There was a tense silence for a minute.
"Out with it!" Jae Hyun yelled.
His words fell on the boy like a death knell. Minho could practically smell the man's anger building up, but at that point, Minho was so pissed off at the man that he could hurl almost anything at him without thinking twice.
"What is wrong with you?" Minho choked, summoning courage that he didn't even have before he even grasped the words himself.
There was no going back now that he had started talking, and he thought he might as well just go on and give Jae Hyun a piece of his mind. Every one of the thoughts he had been stifling so hard gave out onto his tongue in a torrent he could barely control.
"This is what you live for? This…" Minho said, pointing at the heap of Kinn's mess on the floor. "Reducing actual human lives to this? Tell me do you ever get tired? Doesn't it gross you out?"
Jae Hyun looked at Minho amusedly.
"Does this thrill you? Do you have a soul, or any shred of humanity in that black heart of yours?"
Jae Hyun didn't so much as flicker, almost like he didn't want to betray his thoughts. His strange calmness however proved far more disturbing than if he'd lashed back at him. Given that he was still rageful, it would make sense if he lashed back at Minho.
"Are you done throwing your little tantrum yet? Jae Hyun asked patronizingly. "Or did I interrupt you from purging more of that angst out of your system like some feisty, ill-tempered brat?"
Minho's self-control was completely betraying him. Of course, he was a smart mouth that could charm his way out of anything, but given the grave state of the matters at hand, this didn't seem like one of those situations. He let out a hoarse, skeptical haggard laugh―or cry, or both free.
"You aren't human… you know that right," he rasped, hating the reedy strain eating away at his voice. "You're a monster in well-tailored suits trying to blend in with the rest of the society."
That's all it took for Jae Hyun to snap. His face hardened and he cocked a brow, relishing as Minho almost peed his pants as he strode even closer to him.
"And you think you can pass your judgement on anyone? I've been letting you get away with so much, and you now think you can say anything to me now?"
"I'm telling you… you are inhuman! How are you content doing this? How do you sleep at night? Could you just stop acting like a goddamn psycho for once!"
The words ripped one after the other as though Minho like he couldn't control them. He was too fed up at this point to even calculate his words. Besides, what was the worst Jae Hyun would do? Smash him into bits too?
"I'm the psycho? You know, you do forget fast. You are really delusional if you honestly think you're perceptive enough to see through me… or anything beyond what I let you see. I do my best to be gentle with you. But if you're not going to appreciate that too―" Jae Hyun barked.
"Oh, you mean the patchy tenderness you pulled back there? Yeah… like I was dumb enough to not know it was a stunt. What… you were afraid they were going to know who their sweet Jae Hyunnie really is huh?"
Jae Hyun raked his hair in frustration, not knowing what to do with Minho, because surely an argument was the least of things, he wanted to engage in. Besides, there were more pressing issues to attend to. So, this was a painful waste of his time. Minho however, was relentless in his pursuit.
"It's all just a game to you. No? Reeling me in just to push me back out? Why are you even keeping me here, why won't you let me go live my life?"
Jae Hyun's men stood back, watching in horror how Minho had the guts. Surely, the boy must have had a death wish, because granted Jae Hyun's temper, no one would ever cross him. Maybe they had been around him to know better than Minho who wouldn't quit yammering.
"Oh, I'm the one playing games?" Jae Hyun scoffed coldly. "That's rich coming from a worthless sad-eyed cock warmer bought off an auction who fancies himself as a soul reader." Minho flinched. "Yeah… did you forget?"
Jae Hyun's shrill words made Minho turn red in frustration. Shame and fury pierced through him so cruelly that he felt a tear sting, causing him to shrink back like the words burnt. Of course, it was true that Jae Hyun bought him off an auction, but how was it sensitive to remind him that he was responsible for how he ended up in the vile man's hands in the first place?
"You think I'm that blind to see beneath that cold void you call a heart?" Minho cracked, "You can't even look around the corners of your funhouse without me picking your sick scent."
"Mind yourself." Jae Hyun barked, pulling his gun from its holster.
Minho's defiance left him the second Jae Hyun aimed the barrel against his hammering pulse. Some instinct called at him to submit and avoid driving Jae Hyun even more insane.
Yet, that stupid part of his brain took the better part of him. "You wouldn't dare―"
He had barely formed a coherent sentence when a gunshot obliterated the rest of whatever he said, the round dismantling into Kinn's lifeless body that lay merely inches away from him, before Jae Hyun aimed the gun back at him, looking anything but winded.
"Say that again. I wouldn't dare do what exactly?"
Minho let out a mumble as he registered the levels to which he had pushed the devious man. "Please, Jae…" He trailed off, unable to say what he meant to tell him. "Why are you doing this to me? What did I ever do to you to deserve this?"
"Not so high now, are you? You still wanna run your mouth?" Jae Hyun asked, fixing Minho a glare devoid of any emotion.
When no response came from Minho, he retorted. "Yeah, that's what I thought. We're quite done here with your childish tantrums, yeah? Jae Hyun looked at Minho unapologetically, unbothered by how he shook or even the tears that flowed freely down his cheek.
Jae Hyun barked out harshly, his words overtaking Minho's senses. "You can't afford to defy me. You don't have that luxury, you hear me? All those acts are as unbecoming as delusions of you thinking you're that important to me. You lose it the second you forget which of us is the owner and which is the owned."