You Have Been Defended [EN]: Chapter 568

[……Attorney Cha Ju-han appeared on a media outlet, claiming that a certain orphanage concealed and neglected the fact that juvenile A was using drugs. Furthermore, he presented evidence that the orphanage’s claim that they couldn’t properly manage juvenile A because they hadn’t seen him since he ran away was also false, causing a great shock. Kim Seong-sik reports the details.]

When I woke up in the morning, Kang Min-jae and Tae-sik were sitting side by side on the sofa, glued to the news.

I knew they were excited because it had been a while since they’d been involved in such public activities, but it was still a bit much to see them staying up all night, obsessing over every reaction.

Kang Min-jae had practically camped out in the living room.

Around 3 a.m., when I stumbled out of my room for a drink of water, I found him sitting on the floor, eyes glazed over, just staring at the news.

Next to him, Sang-gil had been furiously scrolling through the internet on his phone, hunting for juicy posts.

The only difference now was that Tae-sik had replaced Sang-gil, but the scene was otherwise identical.

“Aren’t you going to sleep at all today?”

“Nope. I’m running on four cups of coffee.”

“If you crash later…”

“I won’t. Too many interesting developments are bound to pop up during the day. Can’t miss those.”

The post we’d checked out during the broadcast yesterday had truly become legendary.

The author had braced themselves for a defamation lawsuit, but as the post went viral, the comments became increasingly daring.

Of course, now that Woo-shin had decided to throw the House of Angels under the bus, he wouldn’t be so foolish as to sue people and stir up even more public anger.

“There’s an article about that legendary post.”

“That reporter’s got guts.”

“They’re playing it safe, saying it’s what ‘netizens’ [internet citizens] are saying. Still, it’s pretty bold.”

“They couldn’t resist the clicks. It’s the most attention-grabbing story right now.”

Tae-sik chimed in.

“Is anyone still calling our claims absurd?”

“A few, but they’re mostly people who haven’t grasped the full picture. We anticipated and refuted every possible counterargument, so what else can they say? They just don’t understand our points and stubbornly insist it’s nonsense.”

“We kept mentioning on the broadcast that those fake English nicknames were probably paid shills [people paid to post biased opinions], so I guess they didn’t deploy any comment bots?”

“Nah. I think they shifted their strategy. Now they’re vaguely complaining that the lawyer is being too aggressive towards the House of Angels, that his attitude is unpleasant, and that everyone’s just blindly attacking anything related to Woo-shin. Oh, and some people are saying that broadcasting Seong-yoon’s interview is just sensationalism without any regard for the child.”

Tae-sik scoffed at Kang Min-jae’s words.

“Not thinking about the kids? He’s providing food and shelter for a kid he’s never even met. Those critics wouldn’t lift a finger themselves.”

“Well, technically, *I’m* not the one taking care of him.”

Tae-sik’s employees were the ones directly caring for him, so strictly speaking, I wasn’t the one doing the day-to-day work.

Still, Seong-yoon seemed genuinely happy with his new life.

He was still worried about Jung-min’s addiction, but he had regained a lot of his spark compared to when we first brought him in.

Now he seemed to be joking around with the employees he lived with, and he seemed to be sharing stories from the bottom of his heart.

“I was too wiped out yesterday, so I went straight home and didn’t make any concrete plans for the future. I wonder if everyone else is still asleep.”

“Checking the group chat, it looks like Jong-hyun crashed about an hour ago. And Officer Heo said he was heading to work.”

“Then I should head to the police station first. I did make a public statement on the broadcast, after all.”

We had agreed to hand over the photo of Seong-yoon and Jung-min in the van, which we revealed on the broadcast, to the police.

Heo Min-woo had been worried that the drug investigation unit would continue to dominate the investigation because of the case’s complexity, but yesterday’s broadcast should have given him some leverage.

I had deliberately chosen my words carefully on the broadcast so that Heo Min-woo could take the lead in this investigation.

Now, the drug use case and the abuse case couldn’t be handled by separate departments.

The van driver who had the drug-addicted student had been exposed, and the public was assuming the van driver was the one supplying the drugs.

Besides, I had mentioned on the broadcast that investigating the call history of the orphanage staff could identify the van driver, so the prevailing opinion was that the two were working together.

“Go wash up. We’re heading to the police station.”

“I already washed up at dawn.”

“Weren’t you glued to the news and the internet the whole time?”

At my question, Kang Min-jae chuckled, as if he knew something I didn’t.

“You’ve got a lot to learn, don’t you? After watching it a few times, you start to see the patterns. It’s true that a lot of interesting posts pop up at dawn, but they usually start to taper off around four o’clock. Then they surge again around seven or eight o’clock. Know why?”

“Why?”

“First off, the people who are up at dawn usually crash around five o’clock. They want to get some sleep before the first train runs, or before the sun comes up. Otherwise, they’ll start feeling guilty about ‘what was I doing while everyone else was being productive?’ And the reason it picks up again around seven or eight o’clock is because the people who were asleep at dawn are waking up or heading to work.”

“Wow, Kang figured out the pattern faster than me, and I’ve been unemployed for ages. I always wondered why people disappeared around four or five o’clock.”

“You get ready to drive. It’s lucky Officer Heo is already at work. We can go straight to Gangnam Police Station and hand it over to him. There’ll be a ton of reporters there.”

Tae-sik pouted at my words.

He grumbled about how Jung-hyuk also comes to our house because of Kang Min-jae, and how long he’d have to keep playing chauffeur, but I pretended not to hear him.

“Looking at the morning news, it seems like everyone’s camped out in front of the police station. After the initial report, the police gave them a general overview and the House of Angels’ side of the story, but there haven’t been any official announcements since then.”

“Then the front of the House of Angels must be swarming too.”

Tae-sik shook his head, covering his eyes with his pot lid-sized hands.

“The guys monitoring the House of Angels are seriously annoyed right now.”

“Why?”

“They say the reporters are blocking their view. Plus, they’ve parked their cars so tightly in the alley that they can’t even get out. They need to be able to tail them immediately if something unexpected happens, but how can they?”

With the House of Angels under such intense scrutiny from reporters, they wouldn’t be able to sneak So-eun to Japan, at least for now.

But this kind of attention is just a fleeting bubble that will burst in a few days.

It’s easy to create a media frenzy, but it’s incredibly difficult to keep it going.

After the reporters gradually disperse, they’ll definitely try to send So-eun out before another scandal erupts.

Even if she doesn’t have surgery right away, they’ll figure they need to act fast, or they might miss their chance to get So-eun out of the country.

Still, since Go Yoon-soo had decided to go through with the surgery to the point of sacrificing the House of Angels, now was the time when even the slightest movement had to be detected.

I was getting worried about not hearing back from reporter Kirihara.

If there had been any activity, he would have contacted me immediately, but I should reach out to him first to see if he’s picked up on anything, even subtle movements.

“Where’d Kang go?”

I changed my clothes and came out, but Kang Min-jae was nowhere to be seen.

“He said he’s going to Gangnam Police Station, so he’s fussing over his clothes so he can get his picture taken a lot.”

He’s just wearing a suit anyway, how much different can it be even if he fusses?

“Then I should have a cigarette.”

Kang Min-jae paying a little attention meant he was going to spend at least 30 minutes choosing clothes.

I opened the terrace door and stepped outside.

I was going to sit on the chair, but I realized I hadn’t cleaned it in ages, so I decided to just stand and smoke.

I gazed at the scenery outside the terrace, my mind blank.

“What is it?”

Our house is on the 4th floor.

When you step out onto the terrace, you can see the roof of the detached house across the street and the scenery beyond.

Everything was normal up to that point.

I noticed something strange when I glanced down below the terrace fence.

“What’s wrong?”

There were a lot of people in the alley.

A drab, colorless group of people, all busy making phone calls or talking with serious expressions.

Reporters.

“Why are there reporters in front of our house?”

“Why else? They came to get an interview with you. Earlier, Soo-il said he saw some reporters in front of your Pyeongchang-dong house too.”

Kang Min-jae, who had finished getting ready with surprising speed, stood next to me and said nonchalantly.

“When I was replacing Sang-gil this morning, the reporters tried to barge into the villa with me when I came in, so the villa security company stopped them?”

Tae-sik added.

I knew there would be some reporters.

But I didn’t expect this many.

I thought they would be concentrated in front of Gangnam Police Station or the House of Angels, but why were they at our house…….

“Is this your first time? The manager said there are a lot of people in front of the company too.”

“So why do they keep getting the address wrong?”

Even when Kang Min-jae mentioned on the broadcast that I had been kidnapped and came back to life, there were a lot of interview requests, but there weren’t this many people gathered in front of the house.

“It’s obvious. They keep sending interview requests through the company email, and even our personal numbers, but since we ignore them all, they came directly.”

“Ha.”

“Let’s go for now. They can’t get into the villa anyway, so if we just drive out, that’s it. They’ll follow us, but we’re going to the police station anyway.”

Kang Min-jae seemed to be enjoying this situation, though he was trying to hide it from me, but it was obvious.

* * *

“Attorney Cha Ju-han! Please answer some questions about what you said on the broadcast yesterday!”

“How closely do you think the orphanage and the van driver are connected?”

“People now believe that Woo-shin used a child from an orphanage under the foundation to kill the lawyer! What are your thoughts on this?”

“Do you think the orphanage was trying to control the children by confining them and feeding them drugs?”

“Where is the victim student now?”

“Are you protecting him?”

Reporters blocked my path and mercilessly shoved microphones at me and Kang Min-jae as I got out of the parking lot and entered the police station entrance.

I’d been subtly revealing Tae-sik’s appearance here and there, but I had to prevent Tae-sik’s face from being plastered all over the news, so I left him in the car.

I should have brought Tae-sik with me.

He would have stopped people from getting this close.

“We came to the police station to file a report, not to give an interview. Thank you for your understanding.”

Kang Min-jae said very politely with a smile, but the reporters didn’t care.

They pressed even harder, bombarding us with questions.

“Who is behind the group that kidnapped and tried to kill Attorney Cha Ju-han?”

“You said you heard directly who was behind it, please reveal it!”

“Is it Woo-shin?”

“If it’s Woo-shin, then the dump truck accident is also related to the orphanage of the Woo-shin Welfare Foundation. Can we see this as Woo-shin constantly trying to kill the lawyer?”

“Attorney! Please answer just one question!”

Listening to their questions, I could see that they were thinking along the lines I intended.

And they thought that my interpretation wasn’t far-fetched and made sense.

The reason they were doing this was because they wanted to hear me say ‘Woo-shin is a son of a bitch’.

Even if I said a hundred times that Woo-shin was trying to kill me, it wouldn’t be accepted as fact.

It only had meaning when the investigative agency confirmed that Woo-shin’s actions were criminal.

Even if I declared here that Woo-shin was guilty without presenting proper evidence, my credibility would plummet, and I would only look like I was desperately trying to smear Woo-shin.

“Attorney Kang Min-jae! Former President Kang Kwan-woong passed away due to an attack. I’m curious how you feel about these things happening around you!”

At that moment, a young reporter’s question pierced my ears.

I instinctively started searching for the reporter who had asked that question and quickly spotted the person holding a cluster of microphones close to Kang Min-jae’s tightly closed lips.

Around that time, the barrage of questions gradually subsided.

The reporters also seemed to realize that the reporter’s question had crossed a line.

The atmosphere instantly turned icy.

“…….”

Even so, everyone waited for Kang Min-jae’s answer.

“Kang, don’t answer.”

Without even looking at Kang Min-jae’s expression, I pushed through the reporters who were blocking our way and walked ahead.

There had been many reporters who had asked Kang Min-jae about Kang Kwan-woong’s death before.

There was even one crazy reporter who had asked him to say a few words to the person who killed Kang Kwan-woong on the day of the funeral.

Kang Min-jae had already experienced the pain of losing Kang Kwan-woong, his only family.

He would have already connected the dump truck rushing towards me with Kang Kwan-woong’s case.

In that moment, Kang Min-jae would have projected Kang Kwan-woong onto me, and I suspected this was what had driven Kang Min-jae to do the reckless thing of running towards the dump truck.

“…….”

The reporters who had been swarming around us like bees couldn’t enter the police station.

I quickened my pace.

I just wanted to quickly hand over the data to Heo Min-woo, get out of this media circus, and go back home.

In reality, there was no need to come here to give the files directly to Heo Min-woo.

I could have used the National Police Agency’s secure email.

Even so, the reason I came here in person was to show my face to the reporters gathered at the police station and keep the story alive.

I knew that the reporters would hound me and ask absurd questions.

I just didn’t expect them to ask Kang Min-jae such a loaded question.

“Lawyer!”

As I was about to go up the stairs to the second floor, Kang Min-jae stopped me.

“What.”