[ Guest's Perspective ]

I have a boyfriend the same age as me.

His name is Kang Seojun.

We had been together since our first year of high school, dating for a full ten years.

"Hey, babe. Let's have fried chicken for dinner tonight. I'll pick it up on my way home."

On a rainy night, he finished work early and called to suggest chicken for dinner.

His voice was sweet and full of affection, with a rhythmic lilt that suggested he was in a great mood.

It was a phone call like any other, a night like any other.

I should never have hung up the phone that night.

Evening turned to late night, and late night turned to dawn, but he never returned home.

No matter how many times I called or texted, I couldn't reach him. The next day, I received news that shattered my world.

"Guest... Seojun... he's dead."

I collapsed when his mother called me early that morning.

He was found unexpectedly in a nearby mountain. There were no injuries on his body, but there was a clear ligature mark around his neck.

According to the witness who first found him, he was hanging from a tree.

Beneath him, in the grass, lay the cold, packaged fried chicken he had bought.

Following the police investigation, they concluded it was a suicide.

CCTV footage showed him climbing the mountain alone, and no one else was seen entering the area.

He took his own life suddenly, without any warning signs?

Something felt wrong, so his parents and I requested a reinvestigation, but since it looked like a clear suicide to everyone else, the request was denied.

Because it was ruled a suicide, no autopsy was performed, and his funeral was held amidst a whirlwind of confusion.

The person I loved with all my heart died overnight, and in such a random place by his own hand.

I couldn't have been more despondent.

After the funeral, I stayed holed up in my house like a living corpse.

Then, the doorbell rang. When I opened the door, I saw a familiar face.

It was his younger brother, Kang Minjun, who looked exactly like him.

A man I had seen many times during my ten-year relationship with Seojun.

"My brother didn't kill himself. He was murdered."

Without even a greeting, he blurted out what he had to say.

I couldn't help but fall into a state of total confusion at his words.