The Cop Is Too Strong [EN]: Chapter 6

Playground near Baekha Apartment.

Shin Hae-soo stared silently at the young woman huddled under the gazebo.

“Student, you need to come out.”

At Hae-soo’s words, the young woman wriggled and slowly crawled out from under the gazebo. Her school uniform was filthy from the cramped space.

The other students giggled, unaware of the seriousness of the situation.

“Look at that bitch, so funny.”

“She’s a natural at this, a real natural.”

Her legs and arms were covered in small bruises, and her cheek was scratched.

Hae-soo looked at her with cold, impassive eyes and spoke.

“Student, did these students do this to you?”

The young woman remained silent, as if she had swallowed her tongue.

Hae-soo suppressed his anger as he looked at the snickering perpetrators.

Then, Officer Lim, who was huffing and puffing in the corner, spoke up.

“Team Leader Shin, let’s hand this over to the Violent Crimes Unit. They’re not juvenile offenders, so we need to show them what’s what. I’ll radio it in.”

“Yes, call it i…”

“I, I fell down the stairs!”

The young woman shouted, repeating the words with her small fists clenched tightly.

“I fell down the stairs by myself! So please, just leave.”

“Wow, Ham Yu-ri is so cool.”

“She nailed it. Awesome.”

“That’s right. She just rolled down all by herself. Like a snowman.”

Hae-soo’s gaze turned heavy. No matter the circumstances, if the victim doesn’t want to press charges, there’s nothing he can do.

Hae-soo reluctantly secured the students’ identities with Officer Lim, dispersed them to their homes, and took the victim, Ham Yu-ri, home.

Surprisingly, the victim’s house was in Baekha Apartment, right next to the playground.

Hae-soo stopped her before she went inside.

“Yu-ri.”

Ham Yu-ri turned her body halfway around without a word.

Hae-soo handed her a piece of paper with his phone number on it. He didn’t have business cards yet, so he was giving it to her this way instead.

“If you ever get the courage to ask for help, contact me, okay?”

Yu-ri paused for a moment before reaching out and taking it, then went into her house.

On the way down in the elevator, Officer Lim stared intently at Hae-soo.

“Is there something on my face?”

“Yes.”

Hae-soo was flustered by Officer Lim’s answer and turned to look in the mirror. Officer Lim chuckled at the sight.

“Just kidding.”

“Um…”

Hae-soo awkwardly touched his face.

***

A few days later, Shin Hae-soo was escorting a drunkard as usual.

The most difficult cases were the drunkards who didn’t directly commit violence against others but caused trouble in stores.

“…Makgeolli [Korean rice wine]! Bring me makgeolli and green onion pancakes!”

“Sir, this is a hamburger restaurant. We don’t have makgeolli.”

“I have money!! Here, here!! Don’t ignore me!”

A drunken middle-aged man scattered crumpled thousand-won bills everywhere.

“Sir, you can’t do this here. Let’s go outside together. Officer Lim, please pick up the bills.”

“Yes, sir!”

A drunkard who can’t even support himself feels much heavier than his actual weight. Hae-soo was practically dragging the middle-aged man out.

Ring ring ring ring

At that moment, Hae-soo’s cell phone rang. Police officers always kept their ringtones on in case they received a call when the radio wasn’t working or in special cases.

Hae-soo supported the middle-aged man with one hand and answered the phone. It was an unknown number.

“This is Officer Shin Hae-soo.”

-…

There was no sound. No ambient noise either. Hae-soo frowned and asked again.

“I answered the phone. Please speak.”

“Are you going to eat green onion pancakes? I was just… Ugh, urgh!”

“Sir, sir! Oh no.”

“Ugh…”

The middle-aged man’s earlier menu was vividly displayed on the white marble floor of the fast food restaurant.

Hae-soo had no choice but to move the middle-aged man outside while holding the phone, then put the phone back to his ear. But the call had already ended.

Hae-soo cleaned up the mess with Officer Lim, took the drunkard home, and finally opened his phone again.

It wasn’t the time for spam calls, and he wasn’t expecting any deliveries. It kept bothering him. Hae-soo called the number back.

[…The other party is not answering the phone and will be connected to voicemail. Beep]

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Let’s go back.”

“Yes, sir!”

After going on two more dispatches and returning, the radio rang.

-This is Baekha One, a report of a suicide at Yongsu-dong Baekha Apartment.

The moment he heard the radio message, Hae-soo felt as if a dagger had been stabbed into his chest.

Officer Lim also seemed to sense something and looked at Hae-soo with a serious expression. She listened to the radio slowly.

“Soonnet… Dispatch to Baekha Apartment.”

Residents were gathered near the flower bed of Baekha Apartment.

“Tsk tsk… How could this happen?”

“What should we do? Is the house price going to drop?”

“Ugh, how gruesome…”

“So young… What a waste.”

“Police. Please step aside for a moment. Please step… aside.”

Hae-soo paused when he saw the body. It was a school uniform. The same as Ham Yu-ri’s school uniform. It had fallen headfirst, so the face was unrecognizable.

With a dark expression, he picked up his cell phone and called the number from earlier again.

Ding-a-ling ding ding ding

The ringtone was coming from very close by. At the same time, Hae-soo’s knees hit the ground.

“Team Leader Shin!”

“Yu-ri, it was Yu-ri’s call… I…”

Then, a thought suddenly flashed through his mind. Hae-soo raised his hand to check the time.

9:37 PM, the report came in at 9:03 PM, and the call came in at 8:38 PM.

Hae-soo desperately prayed to the ability that had turned him back to the past, to that god.

‘Please, please turn me back to the past!’

***

As soon as he shouted inwardly, the surrounding environment changed completely.

It was dark, but suddenly a pure white light poured down. The floor was also white. It was a fast food restaurant.

Hae-soo immediately checked the time. 8:37 PM, exactly one hour earlier.

Ring ring ring ring

As soon as he checked the time, the phone rang. Hae-soo threw the drunkard aside and answered the phone.

“This is Officer Shin Hae-soo.”

-…

Still no words. Hae-soo held a paper bag from a nearby table to the drunkard’s mouth and said.

“Is this Yu-ri?”

Only then did he hear a sound from the receiver. At the same time, the drunkard grabbed the paper bag and vomited a lot.

-Yes…

Hae-soo tapped Officer Lim on the shoulder and started walking first.

“Stay there, don’t hang up, I’ll be right there.”

-Hic…

“Team Leader Shin? Team Leader Shin!”

Hae-soo ignored Officer Lim’s shouts and drove the patrol car towards Baekha Apartment. Anything could happen on the way.

Hae-soo continued to talk to Ham Yu-ri.

“Yu-ri, you have something to tell me, right? Tell me, I’ll help you.”

Yu-ri was silent for a few seconds, then replied in a cracked voice.

-…No. I dialed the wrong number.

“Huh? No, Yu-ri, wait!”

Click

“Yu-ri, Yu-ri?”

The call was disconnected. She didn’t answer when he called back. Hae-soo blamed his poor speaking skills and pressed the accelerator even harder.

He arrived at Baekha Apartment three minutes after the call was disconnected.

The elevator was on the 12th floor. He couldn’t just wait.

Hae-soo quickly climbed the stairs as if his thighs would burst. Ham Yu-ri’s house was on the 8th floor.

Knock knock knock!

“Yu-ri, Yu-ri!”

He kept calling, but the ringtone didn’t sound from inside the house. Without hesitation, Hae-soo ran straight to the roof.

Bang!

“Yu-ri!”

He roughly opened the rooftop iron door and shouted. But no matter how much he looked around, he couldn’t see Ham Yu-ri.

He clung to the railing and looked down, but the railing was thick and slanted, so he couldn’t see properly below.

‘Where the hell is Ham Yu-ri?’

Hae-soo moved towards the elevator. He was going to pick the lock to Yu-ri’s house and check inside. Fortunately, the elevator was nearby. He pressed the elevator button and took a deep breath.

“Hoo, hoo…”

-14th floor. The doors are opening.

The elevator doors slowly opened. And inside, he saw Ham Yu-ri, standing with her feet together and burying her face in her knees.

“Haa…”

Hae-soo let out a long sigh of relief.

Yu-ri raised her head at the sound. Her eyes were swollen with tears.

She widened her eyes when she found Hae-soo.

“Officer… ?”

Hae-soo smiled as warmly as possible, extending his right hand to her.

“You did well calling.”

***

At Ham Yu-ri’s house, Shin Hae-soo explained the situation to Officer Lim and took some time alone.

Officer Lim waited in the patrol car because Yu-ri didn’t want her there.

There was no one at Yu-ri’s house. She lived with her father, but he wouldn’t be home until almost midnight.

Hae-soo sat across from Yu-ri at the dining table.

“…It’s okay to interpret that Yu-ri called because she had the courage to get help, right?”

“…I don’t know. I don’t know. Honestly… I can’t believe it.”

Yu-ri buried her face in her knees again. She had told her homeroom teacher, but the school had ignored it, and the perpetrators had said that the police were useless while bullying her.

Hae-soo was silent for a moment before opening his mouth.

“Yu-ri, good news travels slowly, and bad news travels fast. The police aren’t as incompetent as you think. Will you trust me, just this once?”

Yu-ri raised her head again and pouted.

“You’re like a boomer [older person].”

Hae-soo staggered for a moment at the unexpected attack, but he held on tight.

Yu-ri stared intently at Hae-soo with her marble-like eyes.

“Can you save me?”

Hae-soo met her clear eyes and nodded sincerely.

“I will save you.”

Hae-soo and Yu-ri made a pinky promise and left the house. She decided not to go to school for the time being until the matter was resolved.

As soon as Hae-soo left Yu-ri’s house, he made a call somewhere.

-Wow, now that you’re demoted, you even answer Shin-ddol’s [Shin the crazy] calls?”

“Team Leader, are you busy?”

-Huh? Why, I’m uneasy? I’m busy.”

“Even if you’re busy, let’s take one case. It’s a group assault case in Yongsu-dong.”

-Yongsu-dong is under the jurisdiction of Gangjin Police Station.

“The case hasn’t been officially filed yet. Please take it.”

-Aish, tell me about it.”

***

A vacant classroom at Seonkyung High School a few days later.

Ham Yu-ri and her homeroom teacher were sitting in their seats. She was holding the teacher’s hand tightly, but the trembling didn’t stop.

Creak-!

The classroom door opened roughly, and the perpetrators appeared. The same people who were at the playground.

“Aish, making us come during our precious lunch break…”

“Teacher, why did you call us here?”

“What, Ham Yu-ri, that bitch, came to school?”

“Your face looks better since you haven’t been beaten lately?”

They poured out swear words at Ham Yu-ri as if the teacher was invisible, even though she was there.

Criminal learning.

They were ignoring the students because the homeroom teacher had requested a school violence committee from the school, but it was ignored.

Ham Yu-ri had come with great courage, but she was overwhelmed with fear again when she faced the perpetrators.

The teacher got up and asked them to sit down.

“Yu-ri reported you to the police station for group assault. An official investigation will begin now. I called you in for an interview before that. Everything you do and say will be recorded, so be careful with your words and actions. First, put your cell phones here.”

“Huh? What the fuck, what?”

“Police? Investigation? Sounds so scary?”

“Recording? Fuck the recording.”

It was natural to ignore the teacher’s words, and they even cursed at her face.

A female student with a yellow hairpin strode up to Yu-ri and grabbed her hair.

“Hey, you bitch, what did we do to make you report us? You haven’t been beaten enough yet?”

Then, she raised her hand to slap Yu-ri in the face. The teacher was horrified and pushed the female student away.

“Kang Ju-ri!! What are you doing right now! Can’t you even see the teacher?!”

The female student who was pushed by the teacher, Jung Ju-ri, muttered while sitting on the floor.

“Wow, the teacher is hitting the student.”

“That’s right, the teacher is beating the student so hard.”

“Then it’s self-defense now, what are you doing, boyfriend!”

At Jung Ju-ri’s shout, one of the male students behind her approached the teacher and grabbed her hair.

“Kyaa! Let go of this?!”

“Teacher, bite down on your molars.”

Then, he struck the teacher’s face with his hand as big as a pot lid. The teacher closed her eyes tightly without realizing it.

Thud

At that moment, the male student’s attack was blocked by someone’s hand. When the student turned around, he saw the police officer he had seen at the playground before, standing tall in plain clothes.

Shin Hae-soo, his expression had changed to be as scary as a demon.

“How dare you to the teacher…”

“Let go- Aagh!”

Crack!

Hae-soo twisted his hand and dropped it behind him, grabbed his neck, lifted him up, and slammed him down on the desk.

Crash!!

He slammed him down so hard that the desk broke and his back hit the floor. The male student couldn’t breathe and gasped.

Hae-soo knelt on one knee and grabbed the male student’s hair with his big hand.

“Nice to meet you. Haven’t seen a police officer specializing in excessive force before, have you?”

< #6. Police Specializing in Excessive Force > End