The morning broke not with birdsong, but with chaos.
Screens across the city — in homes, markets, offices — flickered with urgency. News anchors, their voices sharpened by panic and mystery, relayed the same story, over and over.
> "A body was discovered late last night in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of Seoul…"
"Signs of torture… a red thread tied around the wrist…"
"Authorities are baffled — and terrified."
"An emerging assassin, now known only by the code name: Red Trace."
In a small diner tucked into a cramped alley, a television hung above the counter like a sacred icon. The patrons huddled below it, eyes glued, coffee cups forgotten.
In a department lobby, receptionists paused mid-task to listen. Foot traffic slowed. Even ringing phones were left unanswered for just a moment longer.
In a precinct not far from downtown, a man in a dark police uniform stood near the break room's television, his badge clipped perfectly on the chest — badge number 3127. Neatly pressed sleeves. A face unreadable.
Officer Jin Myung.
But beneath that mask of civility and silence was Gin Chan.
He didn't smirk. He didn't flinch. He simply watched the news about his own handiwork.
> "This is just the beginning," he thought, voice silent in his skull. "The calm before the storm."
He turned, walking away as casually as if he'd just finished his coffee, his shadow stretching long behind him. He left behind whispers, sideways glances, and flickering screens that couldn't grasp the storm brewing inside him.
---
Far from the noise, in the older edge of the city — near where cobblestone streets once held carriages and imperial guards — stood a building not marked on common maps.
Old, yet not abandoned. Grand, but shrouded. It rose like a forgotten relic wedged between modern glass towers — seven floors of obsidian stone and steel-beamed edges. The locals called it Murok Hall, but no one knew who owned it. The city claimed it was donated centuries ago by a shipping tycoon named Baek Murok, who vanished along with his entire fleet in 1883.
They said the building was cursed. It never saw direct sunlight, no matter the season. No windows opened. No tenants ever came or left. But its lights were always on.
Inside, on the fifth floor, behind a black reinforced door with no handle, sat a room colder than winter.
The room was oval, with walls paneled in dark mahogany. Five massive screens hung across the curvature — five faces on video call. Four men and one woman. Each face wore wealth like a second skin — rings, silk, clinical smugness.
In the center of the room, seated in a high-backed leather chair with golden studs, was a man in a black three-piece suit. No tie. Just a jet-black shirt beneath.
His hair was white. Snow white. Slicked back so perfectly it looked sculpted from ice. His eyes — pale silver with rings of deep storm grey — did not blink often.
Kang Seo-Yul.
The Veiled One.
Broad-shouldered but lean, tall even while sitting, he emanated a stillness so unnatural it disturbed the flow of air around him. Everything in the room bent to his gravity.
The five faces argued — loud, overlapping voices.
> "This Red Trace could unravel everything—"
"We should silence the precinct before they investigate—"
"Why panic over one rogue killer? He got lucky—"
"No, we move assets from Sector Eight—"
"You're all missing the point—"
Kang didn't move.
Then, one word — cold, calm, barely above a whisper.
> "Enough."
The air died.
All five screens went mute instantly. Silence coiled in the corners of the room.
He finally moved — not to speak, but to lean slightly forward, fingers laced together, eyes fixed on the central camera like it owed him a truth.
> "Tell me," he said, voice like velvet dragged across glass. "Are we afraid of one corpse? Or the man who made it?"
Silence.
Then one of the men answered, carefully:
> "It's not the corpse, Chairman Kang. It's the message."
Another replied:
> "This... assassin. He made it theatrical. Public."
A third voice chimed in, more nervous:
> "The Red Trace might know more. If he strikes again, it could reveal—"
But another dismissed it:
> "We've seen worse. He's just another pawn playing hero. The sky is still ours."
The room splintered again with rising voices. But the moment Kang lifted his hand — gently, like commanding a wave — everything stopped.
He tilted his head.
> "The death does not interest me," he said. "But the man... Red Trace. That... is worth watching."
They waited for his command.
> "Increase security. Triple eyes on the precinct. But do nothing else."
One of the dissenters dared a response:
> "But Chairman Kang, should we not—?"
He raised his hand again.
> "No. Let him strike."
The screens flickered — panic behind composed faces.
> "Let's not interfere... yet. I'm curious who will die next."
He stood.
The temperature in the room dropped.
> "I'm going to watch another death," he said. "If any of you have different ideas... you may follow."
No one moved.
No one spoke.
They knew what he meant. If they followed, two deaths would occur — and one of them would be their own.
He smiled thinly. Turned. Walked out.
And just like that, the Council of Shadows ended their meeting — frozen by the knowledge that someone, somewhere in the city, was next.
And Kang Seo-Yul would be watching.
---
Back in his sparse apartment — the kind given to officers who had no family and no complaints — Gin Chan sat before a monitor that cast pale light on his face. The room was silent except for the steady clatter of keys and the occasional low hum of the CPU fan.
The name still echoed in his head like a bell rung in a crypt:
> Kang Seo-Yul.
He typed it into a private browser, shielded by scrambled VPN layers and rerouted encryption. The search results were instant, overwhelming, curated with precision.
> "Kang Seo-Yul donates ₩50 billion to national children's hospital"
"Kang Seo-Yul: Building a Better Korea, One School at a Time"
"Tech Giant, Philanthropist, Visionary: The Man Behind the Smile"
"Mayoral Candidate Expected to Win by Historic Margin — 99.9% Support Rating"
Photos splashed across articles like propaganda paintings. Kang shaking hands with doctors. Kang surrounded by smiling orphans. Kang speaking to prisoners about reform. Kang handing over golden keys to new homeless shelters. Smiling. Always smiling.
He wasn't just known — he was worshipped. A beacon of hope in a city drowning in corruption.
The city's name was Daehwa — "Great Harmony."
How poetic. And how ironic.
Kang Seo-Yul wasn't just poised to win the mayoral election. He had already been crowned in the hearts of the people.
Gin Chan stared at the screen, fingers still, heart steady.
> "You hid in plain sight," he thought. "Veiled by generosity... but soaked in blood."
---
But Gin wasn't without tools. Minjae's last words before death weren't just a confession — they were a map.
He had mentioned offshore transactions, logistics chains, laundering fronts. Kang's mask of legitimacy was wide — but not flawless. Somewhere in the weeds, a few businesses had not been sanitized enough.
Gin's search deepened. Disconnected nodes. Unusual shipping logs. Matching aliases. Weeks of patient threading.
Then two companies stood out. On the surface, legal. But beneath?
Ghost employees. Strange accounting. Private shipments under police clearance that had no destination logs.
The first company: Haejin Dynamics — a "pharmaceutical exporter" with a distribution center near the port.
The second: CorOne Labs — a "research and environmental tech firm" with a suspicious number of "waste disposal permits" and private trucks.
Both had names cleared by the city registry. But both were rotten at the core. Gin saw the links Minjae couldn't hide.
But he also saw something else: neither business had direct media ties to Kang. Publicly, they were not connected. Quiet affiliates. Used as dead drops and cleanup machines. The kind of companies only insiders knew belonged to the Nexcore Initiative.
Which meant Gin could destroy them without triggering alarms — yet.
---
He acted as Officer Jin Myung. No mask. No need.
Using warrants approved by upper branches — officers who didn't know the full picture but trusted Jin Myung's meticulous record — he launched quiet raids.
First, Haejin Dynamics.
Seized documents. Illegal opioid prototypes. Foreign chemical shipments listed as fertilizer.
Second, CorOne Labs.
Destroyed evidence of underground waste burns. Traced payment ledgers to shell accounts linked to prison contractors — trafficking, under a different name.
Gin let the headlines run as if it were a natural crackdown.
> "Rogue Labs Busted in Police Sweep"
"Officer Jin Myung Leads Precision Takedown — Commended by Supervisors"
"Public Safety Hero or Rising Star? Jin Myung Earns District Respect"
Inside, he didn't smile. Not even once.
Because he knew this was still the surface. He had just scraped the algae off a rotten hull.
He had fire in his veins now. These were just the first dominos.
But his actions, as careful as they were, had lit a small flare in the darkness.
One that would soon
be noticed.
He didn't care.
He welcomed it.
---