You Have Been Defended [EN]: Chapter 252

Crossing your arms while browsing a wedding dress shop leaves no room for other interpretations. It’s a clear sign of impatience or disapproval.

Kim Sung-woo and Gu So-jeong are preparing for their wedding. This fact is central to understanding the unfolding events.

Besides that, Sang-gil also included a transcript of their conversation in the attached materials.

Although it didn’t contain any decisive evidence, there was a note saying it was attached just in case.

[-Would I do that on purpose? I feel sorry and grateful to Ms. Gu too. That’s why I want to resolve it faster than anyone else. So please wait a little longer.

-How much longer can I wait? Such a huge thing…

-Ms. Gu, I told you not to talk about this at the hospital. What if someone overhears?]

It was a short conversation, and although there was no explicit subject mentioned, it was clear that they were talking about the incident where cephalosporin [an antibiotic] was intentionally injected into Seol Hyeong-seok, and Dong-jin was framed for it.

This alone may not be conclusive evidence, but when combined with other evidence, it could be enough to suggest that the two were in a cooperative relationship regarding this case.

“…How on earth did Kim Sung-woo coax Gu So-jeong?”

At first, I thought the reason Gu So-jeong committed such a serious act was because she was threatened by Kim Sung-woo.

In my previous life, she had no involvement in the incidents surrounding Seol Hyeong-seok and Dong-jin, so it was difficult to understand why she suddenly got involved in this.

But now I understand.

I don’t know how deep their love is, but as they promised their future together, Gu So-jeong was the most suitable partner for Kim Sung-woo in this scheme.

Suddenly, I remembered that Gu So-jeong had expressed sympathy for Dong-jin.

Nevertheless, Gu So-jeong made this choice for the sake of her future husband’s success.

For her, who comes from a disadvantaged family, there would be no more stable marriage prospect than a husband who is the son of a large hospital director and a doctor.

“Haa…”

Before I knew it, a sigh escaped my lips.

I roughly grasped how the people involved in the incident were connected.

It was confirmed that Seol Hyo-seok silenced the guards who knew about the witness.

And Seol Hyo-seok contacted Kim Sung-woo, and Kim Sung-woo is engaged to Gu So-jeong, who injected cephalosporin into Seol Hyeong-seok.

But even if I hand over all the evidence secured so far to the investigative authorities, can they all be punished?

Currently, the situation doesn’t look very promising.

Aren’t Seol Hyo-seok, Kim Sung-woo, and Gu So-jeong all tied together like a string of candy [a Korean expression for being closely connected]?

If Seol Hyo-seok explains away the meeting with the guards and the bugging device, Kim Sung-woo and Gu So-jeong will also likely get away with it.

Seol Hyo-seok and Gu So-jeong are connected by Kim Sung-woo, but Kim Sung-woo doesn’t appear suspicious on the surface.

“Hmm.”

In fact, strictly speaking, there is no concrete evidence that Seol Hyo-seok installed the bugging device.

Chief Bae only confirmed that the bugging device existed.

So, Seol Hyo-seok can simply deny knowing about the bugging device, and the guards can claim they met because they wanted to inquire about their brother’s accident.

It seems necessary to delve deeper into the relationship between Kim Sung-woo and Seol Hyo-seok.

Did Seol Hyo-seok order Kim Sung-woo to harm Seol Hyeong-seok, and Kim Sung-woo then ordered Gu So-jeong to carry it out?

If so, there must be something Kim Sung-woo received in exchange for cooperating with Seol Hyo-seok.

‘The only thing I can think of right now is the director’s reappointment…’

So, did Seol Hyo-seok trade for the director’s reappointment in my previous life as well?

No, a more fundamental question arises.

Was Seol Hyo-seok the one who orchestrated this incident in the first place in my previous life?

In my previous life, Seol Hyeong-seok died on the operating table.

Dong-jin’s skills were not sufficient to save him.

And this would have been the same result even if it was the former chief, not Dong-jin, performing the surgery.

If so, Seol Hyo-seok didn’t need to trade with Myungdae Hospital officials.

He was going to die anyway, so there was no reason to engage in behind-the-scenes dealings.

‘But he might have lived if he had gone to a hospital with a more skilled surgeon.’

At that time, it was understood that the former chief deliberately took on the surgery to help the director’s reappointment by securing a VIP patient and to get promoted himself.

But when I think about it, if Seol Hyeong-seok dies at Myungdae Hospital anyway, Chairman Seol will no longer have any reason to support Myungdae Hospital.

Rather, he would harbor resentment.

So, no matter how much Seol Hyo-seok promised to help after acquiring Hanyoung Group in the future, the director’s reappointment is decided within the next year or two, so it would have been difficult for a deal to be made.

It’s not enough to say that the former chief simply insisted on the surgery to avoid losing a VIP patient.

But if we assume that the former chief also made a deal with Seol Hyo-seok, it becomes natural that he insisted on performing Seol Hyeong-seok’s surgery.

In this life, Seol Hyeong-seok was diagnosed with glioblastoma [an aggressive type of cancer that can occur in the brain or spinal cord] when the former chief was still at Myungdae Hospital.

The former chief was the one who scheduled the surgery.

So, if the former chief and Seol Hyo-seok made a deal, it must have happened before the surgery was scheduled.

However, as the problem related to Lee Se-hyung broke out, the former chief left Myungdae Hospital, and the schedule was passed on to the new chief as it was.

‘He conspired with the former chief to harm his brother, but suddenly the former chief disappeared…’

Seol Hyo-seok may have tried to find another trading partner.

Above all, the new chief who appeared after the former chief left saved Seol Hyeong-seok, who he thought would die, with his excellent surgical skills.

He lost the best opportunity to eliminate Seol Hyeong-seok naturally, but he didn’t want to miss the opportunity presented by his brother’s glioblastoma.

Isn’t this when Seol Hyo-seok proposed a deal to Kim Sung-woo again?

If this hypothesis is correct, it is understandable that Kim Sung-woo was not noticeable in my previous life.

“I don’t think the former chief will testify…”

The former chief will probably have his medical license revoked and face a prison sentence.

He is caught up in too big of a scandal, and there are multiple cases against him.

I doubt he would reveal anything further, considering he has already lost everything…

I heard that once you obtain a medical license, it’s incredibly difficult to lose it permanently, with a high probability of reissuance, around 97%.

The former chief will be aiming for that opportunity, and he won’t do anything that attracts attention in order to achieve that.

I paused for a moment and picked up my cell phone.

-Oh, Attorney Cha.

“Chief, I’m sorry to contact you while you’re resting on the weekend. Is it okay to talk for a moment?”

-Oh, yeah. It’s okay. I was watching TV at home anyway.

Park Young-gi answered the phone cheerfully, without showing any signs of annoyance despite the sudden call.

“I’m calling about the chief of neurosurgery at Myungdae Hospital who issued Lee Se-hyung’s false diagnosis. Jin Soo-yong.”

-Ah, that person. Why that person?

“There’s a case I’m working on right now, and there’s a possibility that Jin Soo-yong is involved.”

-A case Attorney Cha is working on?

“You’ll be quite interested. I think you know that Hanyoung Group Executive Director Seol Hyeong-seok is in a vegetative state, and it’s suspected that the incident was intentional.”

What’s the point if the former chief doesn’t speak up?

The prosecution will uncover everything if they investigate.

Since the prosecution has already thoroughly investigated the Lee Se-hyung case, it won’t be difficult to shift the focus and re-examine it.

Their deal failed, but they may be able to find a clue to corner Seol Hyo-seok.

* * *

The weekend passed in an instant.

Maybe because I’ve been working so intensely every day, I decided to rest comfortably on Sunday, but I ended up wasting the whole day sleeping.

I parked my car in front of the office and was about to go up when my cell phone rang.

The caller was Kang Min-jae.

“What.”

-Attorney, why aren’t you here yet?

“I’m on the first floor right now.”

-Why are you coming so late? I haven’t seen you much lately. Why are you so busy? You’re not even taking on new cases.

“Let’s talk when I get up there.”

-I don’t think we’ve had a company dinner in a long time. How about pork belly for dinner with the manager tonight?

“I said let’s talk when I get up there. I’m on the first floor right now.”

-Ha, you’re really going to say that and then conveniently forget about it. Answer me now. Quickly!

He was grumbling so much that I hung up the phone.

I was waiting for the elevator, but he couldn’t wait and called again.

“Okay. Let’s eat pork belly. Are you happy?”

-Attorney Cha, I hear you’re having pork belly today?

“…Ah, Chief Bae?”

Ha, I thought it was Kang Min-jae, but it’s Chief Bae…

At Chief Bae’s suggestion that he wanted to meet right away, I got back in the car.

The place he wanted to meet was a hotel room nearby.

From now on, I have to avoid Seol Hyo-seok’s attention, so it will be difficult to meet in the Hanyoung Group headquarters building like before.

“Have you thought about it a lot?”

“I have. Did I make you wait too long?”

“No. It’s understandable that it took you some time.”

From his perspective, there would have been many things to consider.

In the first place, it’s only natural that he would have a lot to consider, as he would have no one to blame if he made a hasty decision based on my words, someone who has no connection to Hanyoung Group, and problems arose later.

“It took me a while to confirm the chairman’s intentions.”

“The chairman’s intentions?”

“If CEO Seol is really the one who harmed Executive Director Seol, whether the chairman can truly disown CEO Seol. I needed to know that.”

As Executive Director Seol Hyeong-seok is in a vegetative state, Seol Hyo-seok is practically the only son left for Chairman Seol.

As a father, he will naturally be hoping for Seol Hyeong-seok’s recovery, but he will also be considering the worst-case scenario.

In that situation, if he believes that he has to send his remaining son to prison as an instigator of attempted murder, Chairman Seol may want to protect him, no matter how bad his son is.

If Chairman Seol takes that stance, no matter how strong Chief Bae’s resolve is, the things he can do will be limited.

Chief Bae would have no reason to expose Seol Hyo-seok’s crime if he goes against Chairman Seol’s wishes.

“I don’t think I need to explain it in detail. Anyway, I also believe that if Hyo-seok really harmed Hyeong-seok… it’s right to pursue it to the end. I haven’t reported it to the chairman definitively yet, but the chairman also seems to think that there will be no exceptions, even if Hyo-seok is responsible.”

Chief Bae, who always referred to the two brothers by their titles, called them by their given names, and the feeling I got was different.

I think he made a very significant decision.

The word “truth” floating above his head reinforced that feeling.

“Has there been any new information in the meantime?”

“There has been.”

Now that he has sincerely decided to expose Seol Hyo-seok’s case, I didn’t need to hide anything anymore either.

I laid out the photos of Kim Sung-woo and Gu So-jeong that I had obtained from Sang-gil in front of him.

“What is this?”

“You’ll recognize this one. This is Gu So-jeong, the nurse who injected cephalosporin into Executive Director Seol Hyeong-seok. And this one is…”

“Kim Sung-woo, a doctor in the Department of Neurosurgery at Myungwoon University.”

Kim Sung-woo has no apparent connection with Seol Hyeong-seok, so I was a little surprised that Chief Bae knew him.

“Does the chief know all the faces of the neurosurgery medical staff?”

“That’s not it. But…”

Chief Bae took out a photo from the envelope next to him and placed it on the table.

“After that day, I assigned someone to follow CEO Seol Hyo-seok. I thought something more would surface if I tracked who he was meeting.”

The photo he handed me showed Seol Hyo-seok and Kim Sung-woo entering a high-end restaurant.

“But that’s strange.”

Chief Bae handed me the next photo and said.

“Why is Dr. Kim Sung-woo going to look at dresses with Nurse Gu So-jeong?”

In that photo, Kim Sung-woo was also with Seol Hyo-seok.

But there was a clear difference from the previous photo.

Kim Sung-woo was holding a woman’s hand.

“He’s meeting someone like this.”

And that woman was not Gu So-jeong.