TSTL 02

TSTL

Posted by Alex, Released on October 14, 2025

Chapter 2 “Why?”

“I thought you’d think I didn’t know.”

Finding the hidden diary wasn’t hard. His sister might have assumed he didn’t know—but she was wrong.

“Let’s see… huh, this is serious.”

Hyung-jin opened the diary and involuntarily groaned. She was completely obsessed—each page practically read like a hymn.

“With this, she won’t listen to reason. Well, did she ever?”

Back then, the family had strongly opposed the relationship. He had no stable job, and rumors about him were everywhere. But his sister had been head over heels, eloping in the name of love, and then showing up a year later with a baby—leaving the family no choice but to accept it. The outcome was their children’s deaths and her own destruction.

“I have to get that bastard away from her, somehow.”

The problem was that the jerk wouldn’t leave even if told to. He was the kind of guy anyone could fall for at a glance. Hyung-jin was only a middle school student, while that guy was a high school freshman—bigger, older, and a notorious thug. He was the leader of the school’s delinquent group.

“What am I supposed to do?”

There seemed to be no plan.

“Huh?”

While he was fretting, his eyes fell on a trash can stuffed in the corner. He hadn’t paid it much attention before, but there was a red envelope poking out—crumpled but clearly a letter.

“What’s this?”

The red envelope caught his interest.

He pulled it out and couldn’t help but snort.

“Of course.”

With that face, of course he’d get love letters. His sister must have crumpled one up and tossed it.

“A love letter… ‘To my beloved Hyun-ah’… tsk tsk, written by a goody-two-shoes.”

It was clearly written by someone with no experience with girls—a shy, earnest love letter.

“Park Kwang-seok… poor guy. Did he know his letter would end up in the trash?”

He clicked his tongue, ready to throw it away—but then he paused.

“Wait, Park Kwang-seok?”

The name felt familiar. He couldn’t place it at first, but when he traced back through memories—not his sister’s but his own dream life—he began to remember where he’d heard it.

“That Park Kwang-seok?”

Park Kwang-seok—the saying went, “If there’s No Hyung-jin among lawyers, there’s Park Kwang-seok among prosecutors.” He and Hyung-jin were known as spear and shield together in people’s minds. Unlike Hyung-jin—who had stayed in Korea after earning credentials and studying at Harvard—Park Kwang-seok had graduated from a Korean law school, topped the bar exam, and gone into prosecution.

Yet weirdly, they’d never met. When Hyung-jin started college, Kwang-seok was in the military; when Hyung-jin entered the military, Kwang-seok graduated. Later, when one became a prosecutor and the other a lawyer, their paths didn’t cross—Kwang-seok handled criminal cases, Hyung-jin mostly civil. Still, Hyung-jin knew the name for one reason:

“The grim reaper of school violence.”

It was a famous nickname in the legal field. Kwang-seok was notorious for being merciless toward school bullies—he pursued school violence cases relentlessly, even demanding that those cases be assigned to him. He would prosecute up to a third appeal if necessary; judges trembled at his tenacity. There was no leniency for “they’re just students” in his world.

“Wait… now that I think about it…”

He’d heard that Kwang-seok’s obsession with school-violence cases stemmed from being a victim himself. Rumor had it he’d successfully put the bully who tormented him behind bars.

“That was… in the summer, I think?”

His sister had come by in the fall, saying she’d divorced after suing. It seemed odd then—given Cho Hyuk-woo’s personality, Hyung-jin thought he would’ve beaten the man to stop the marriage. But at the time, Hyuk-woo had been in jail and couldn’t intervene.

“Oh?”

At the time he didn’t see the connection, but now it was starting to line up.

“I should look into this more.”

“As expected.”

Hyung-jin slipped into the high school and easily confirmed the relationship between Cho Hyuk-woo and Park Kwang-seok. Every day he watched as Cho stole, beat, and threatened others.

“So that’s how it is.”

Seeing it for himself made it clear why someone like Kwang-seok would hate school violence so much.

“You bastard! Bring me fifty thousand won!”

“But I don’t have the money…”

“I don’t care—steal it if you have to, you son of a—”

Cho hated anyone who was better than him. He mercilessly tormented those he saw as superior, but the school always turned a blind eye because he’d carefully positioned his underlings around him. It was hard to catch him in the act because he had people to take the fall. Hyung-jin could only watch from afar, spying with binoculars.

“How can I screw him over?”

Calling a teacher would just make Cho and his gang scatter. Even if they were caught, the school would treat it as “kids fighting,” and nothing would change. School bullying wouldn’t be a societal problem for years—if it was even recognized at all. So the school buried incidents and pretended nothing was wrong.

“What to do…”

It was a vicious cycle. The money he took would be wasted on Hyuk-woo, and his sister would only fall more deeply for him.

“How can I make that guy leave my sister?”

As he watched the sun sink, a thought suddenly came to him—an idea as the sunset painted the sky.

“Maybe…”

“Heh heh heh.”

From that moment, Hyung-jin’s life changed. Not abandoning his studies entirely—he still had his routine—but something was different. Instead of going home after school, he ran straight to the high school.

“My father’s pointless hobbies are actually useful.”

His father had many pointless hobbies—he’d obsess over something for a while, then drop it. One of those hobbies was photography.

Whirrr.

He filmed with a modern DSLR and smiled to himself. For the past month, he had followed them, pretending not to notice, gathering everything he needed. Now it was time to move.

“Who are you?”

Park Kwang-seok stopped dead as Hyung-jin stepped in front of him.

“You’re Park Kwang-seok, right?”

“Who are you?”

Seeing the boy in a middle-school uniform, Kwang-seok relaxed slightly.

“I’m here about Cho Hyuk-woo.”

“Cho Hyuk-woo?”

At the mention of the name, Kwang-seok shivered—the memory of the bullying was so vivid that just the name inspired fear.

“No, I wasn’t sent by him. To be precise, I hate that guy.”

“Hate him?”

“Yes. He flirts with my sister like he doesn’t know his place.”

“Your sister?”

“You know her—No Hyun-ah, right?”

“…Ah.”

The name made Kwang-seok’s face sour. He had been so aggressive toward Park because he’d found a love letter that Park had put into Hyun-ah’s drawer. One of Cho’s cronies had seen it.

“I honestly think I’d be a better match for your sister than that idiot.”

“I’m not good enough.”

“Not true.”

Kwang-seok was the top-tier talent destined to lead the prosecution—competent, respected, and perfectly managed in skill, character, and connections. The only issue was his ruthless stance on school violence.

“You still like her, though?”

“Well, it’d be a lie to deny it.”

Feelings don’t cool easily. Hyung-jin grinned.

“Would you like to meet her?”

“How? Cho would kill me if he saw me.”

“We just need to get rid of him for a while.”

“I don’t know how to fight.”

Kwang-seok and Hyung-jin were different types. The only self-defense Kwang-seok learned was elementary Taekwondo as a kid.

“That’s physical. But Kwang-seok and I will fight with this.”

He tapped his head.

“With your head?”

“Yes.”