The Workplace

After meeting with Sheng, Joonjae placed another call. Someone picked it up on the third ring.

"Meet me at the hideout," he ordered without saying any greeting.

"Ehhh? But I just fell asleep, boss!" a slow voice came from the receiver.

"Meet me there in half an hour," Joonjae said, ignoring the whining from the other end.

"So cruel, boss," the voice complained. "I demand a pay rise!"

"Just get there!" Joonjae snapped and hung up the phone. He was not keen on hiring this person but he was the best candidate for the job. No one else came close to the skills this person possessed.

Joonjae sighed and revved up the engine. He pulled up and sped off.

….

Half an hour later, he parked the car in front of a modest apartment building. From the outside, it looked like an ordinary apartment building of six floors. An old, wiry looking man was sitting at the guard's station. He looked up to see Joonjae approaching him.

"Which unit are you visiting, sir?" the guard asked.

"Unit 511," Joonjae replied. The guard took out a large records' book for guests to register in.

"Please sign your name here," the guard pointed at an empty space. Joonjae signed it with a fake name and handed it over to the guard.

"The elevator does not work," the guard informed him. "Please take the stairs."

Joonjae politely nodded and climbed the staircase. Finally, he reached the fifth floor.

The fifth floor had five apartment units. The corridor was not long since each apartment were small in size. As he passed by the apartments, he could hear the voices of the people living in them. They were engrossed in their own world, oblivious to the mysterious man who was strolling in the corridor outside of their homes.

Joonjae walked straight towards the end of the corridor where unit 511 was located. He raised his hand and knocked on it ten times. After the tenth knock, a small scanner emerged out of the keyhole. Joonjae pressed his finger on it. Then a retina scanner popped up from the peephole of the door.

Joonjae placed his eye in front of the scanner while a laser light checked his pupils for verification.

"Identified," a robotic voice announced from a small mic. "Please enter, Boss."

The door flew open. Joonjae stepped into the house.

The place was empty. There was not a soul inside the house and no furniture in it. There was only a large bookshelf, leaning against the wall of the living room. Joonjae strode over to the bookshelf and gently nudged it. The bookshelf slid open to reveal a secret elevator behind it. Pushing the button to go down, Joonjae stepped into the lift.

It took him all the way to a secret facility underneath the building. The decor of the facility was vastly different from the one above.The underground basement was posh. The walls were fully white but were covered with high tech monitors which showed different public areas of the country.

There were gadgets of almost every kind; touchscreen tablets were displayed elegantly on the tables while a series of spy equipment were carefully organized around the room. There was not a wire out of place; Joonjae liked to keep his workplace as tidy as possible.

The employees were sitting in their own cubicle. There were no paperwork or files in the office. Everything was filed and recorded in a central database which was created by the top hackers' team in the world. It is impenetrable, making it the most advanced database system in the world.

The centralized database also held information of all registered citizens of the country. If Joonjae wanted any information, all he had to do was click one button, and the details will be presented to him. He had access to any logical information he desired.

Joonjae walked over to his cubicle and pressed the intercom.

"Come in," he ordered. A loud groan was heard from the other end.

After a few seconds, someone knocked on his door.

"Come in," he said. A skinny boy in his late teens walked in. He was barely seventeen years old. He was tall and lanky, with freckled skin. His hair was untidy but his innocent appearance made him popular with girls of his age.

"You ruined my beauty sleep!" he complained, letting out a large yawn.

"It's just afternoon," Joonjae frowned. "Why were you sleeping?"

"Did you forget?" the boy asked in annoyance. "You made me look for that bloody shaman all throughout the night!"

"Oh yeah! I forgot to tell you. He's abroad," Joonjae informed him.

"You could not have told me this sooner?" the boy exclaimed. "I lost one whole night's sleep!"

"I forgot," Joonjae smirked.

"Don't lie! You were deriving a sadistic pleasure in making me work all night without sleep!"

"Maybe I was," Joonjae said in a cryptic tone. "But forget about all that. I need you to look into this."

He handed over the USB stick to the boy.

"I want you to check the legitimacy of this vide, Yoseob," Joonjae said in a serious tone.

"What's this?" Yoseob frowned.

"An USB stick containing a video," Joonjae said. After a short pause he added," Sheng gave it to me."

"That old geezer?" Yoseob frowned. "He's a sleazeball! That slimy pervert only knows money. He wouldn't give you this unless there was something in it for him."

"That's what I want you to find out," Joonjae replied. "I want you to monitor his every move. Where he goes, whom he meets etc. And also check out the video's contents. The symptoms of the crime match with the arson incidents we're investigating."

Yoseob's eyes widened in surprise. "You mean to say there is a video here which shows another possible demonic arson attack?"

"Yes," Joonjae said in a grave tone. "Once again, the mother was possessed and manipulated into killing her husband. Strangely, there was no mention of any such attack in the news."

"Maybe the police are covering it up," Yoseob shrugged. "Or maybe they think it was simply the case of a woman with mental issues and hence saw no reason to publicize it?

"Possibly," Joonjae admitted. "But still. Watch the video and see if it is authentic or fake."

"Right away boss," Yoseob nodded and exited the room

Even though Yoseob was underage, he is a genius hacker and programmer. He was expelled from his school upon turning 16 because he hacked into the website of the school to prove how vulnerable the site is. The school management did not heed to his words and expelled him.

However, after he started to work for Hwang Joonjae, Yoseob learned how to tackle his enemies. He programmed a deadly virus and put it into the school's management system. When the head teachers tried to use the system, they found pictures of naked girls in it. The school's Board of Directors implemented all possible ways to remove the pictures but to no avail. No one was able to get rid of the naked girls.

In the end, they had to resort to calling Yosoeb and have him clean the viruses from the computers. It was satisfying to see the school management beg him for help. After a little taunting and humiliating them, Yoseob agreed to do it for an exorbitant fee.

Once he fixed the computers, they tried to recruit him back to school but he declined. He would rather work for Joonjae.

….

Yoseob sat at his desk, with a computer in front of him and at the same time, had a laptop on his lap. He scanned through the video on his computer's monitor and transferred images from the USB stock to the laptop, searching for their faces throughout the millions of citizen's data. He did not get any news but came across a photo ID which looked similar to the man burnt to death in the picture.

The citizen's ID showed that the man had died a week ago.

"The video is real," Yoseob concluded. He took out the USB stick from the laptop and headed over to his boss' room to inform him.

"So the police hushed it up," Joonjae said, deep in thought as he listened to Yoseob.

"Yes boss," Yoseob replied. "But the man is dead and his wife is in the mental asylum since last week."

"She's still alive?" Joonjae questioned. In the cases Joonjae investigated so far, the possessed victim died as soon as the demons leave their bodies after the attacks. How was she alive? Was the case not related to any possession and simply the work of an insane woman?

"Let's go and pay her a visit," Joonjae declared. Yosoeb groaned. He had thought of going back home after handing over the investigation report to the boss. But now he'll be dragged around the city by the ruthless Mafia.

"Let's go!" Joonjae ordered as he wore his jacket.

Cursing his luck, Yoseob followed suit. It was going to be a long day.