The light above flickered.
The alley reeked of grease and waste, but Gin Chan barely noticed. He leaned against the cracked wall, hand to his temple, feeling the steady throb behind his eyes. It was the third time that morning. His vision pulsed—lights stretching and contracting like breathing lungs.
He blinked slowly.
Once.
Twice.
The pain subsided, just enough for clarity to return.
Something was wrong.
Not just the usual burn of exhaustion. Not just memory fragments or the echoes of his past deaths.
This was deeper.
A sickness that wasn't born of battle.
He inhaled through his nose, exhaled through his teeth.
Calm.
Control.
Focus.
But the rhythm was off. His body didn't obey the way it used to. Each step now felt like it could be his last.
He had to know.
---
Daehwa Memorial Hospital loomed grey and glassy against the morning fog. A dull steel monolith that reeked of antiseptic and quiet despair.
Gin stepped through the revolving doors, hood drawn, black uniform beneath his coat. No announcement. No hesitation.
He moved past the waiting crowds—children in wheelchairs, old men slumped in worn seats, nurses sprinting between trauma bays. The mundanity of life continued around him, but it all felt too loud, too close.
The hospital buzzed with morning chaos. Gin stepped through the wide glass doors, hood drawn low, black cloth beneath his coat. The scent of antiseptic and anxiety clung to the air.
He moved past the crowd without slowing—elderly patients in wheelchairs, a young boy coughing into his mother's jacket, nurses wheeling beds toward diagnostics. His focus tunneled, step by step.
Then, a soft hum.
Faint. Gentle. Almost forgotten.
He turned his head instinctively toward the sound.
But too late.
A group of interns in white coats rushed past him, blocking his view. Someone bumped his shoulder. Another nurse apologized, laughing nervously.
He turned fully now, eyes scanning.
And for just a moment, through a narrow gap in the crowd, he saw a figure in a sky-blue coat walking away. Hair long, black as ink. Shoulders slightly hunched.
A song still lingered in the air behind
And he moved on
---
"You have a tumor, Mr. Park," the doctor said.
Gin didn't blink.
The man—a slim figure with white-rimmed glasses—adjusted the scan on the monitor.
"It's aggressive. Frontal lobe origin. We suspect it's already spread to adjacent regions. You've likely been experiencing hallucinations. Focus lapses. Tremors. Mood disorientation."
Gin sat still.
"There's no treatment," the doctor continued, "not with this stage. We can manage the symptoms. Maybe prolong cognitive function. But... months, maybe. Possibly less."
Gin said nothing. Just stared at the pale glow of the x-ray.
The doctor cleared his throat. "Without intervention, your nervous system will slowly shut down. First your focus. Then motor skills. Eventually, it'll be like a flickering light."
Gin finally spoke.
"And then it goes out."
"Yes."
He stood without a word and left.
---
Outside, the city moved with its usual rhythm. But Gin felt the edges of that rhythm blur and tremble.
The clock had started.
Good.
That meant it was time.
---
The bait came days later.
Ruko sent the encrypted message while Gin was sharpening his blade.
> Movement. High-value judge. No location registered publicly. Gone three days.
One GPS ping—Daehwa Seaport.
Coordinates attached.
Gin frowned. The judge—Baek Ji-ho—wasn't just any name. He was the Syndicate's legal fortress. He made evidence disappear. Convictions vanish. Families suffer.
And now he was hiding.
Too easy.
Too clean.
But Gin didn't have the luxury of waiting.
The pain in his head was louder now. Blurred shapes at the edge of his vision. Hands that trembled when still.
You're running out of time, the doctor had said.
He donned the coat. Loaded the silenced sidearm. Sheathed the blade.
No backup. No armor. Just steel and resolve.
He was ready to bleed.
---
The wind cut like knives at Daehwa Seaport.
Containers stacked like rusting tombstones. Cranes dormant above like metal vultures. Somewhere in the skeletal maze, Judge Baek Ji-ho was trying to vanish.
Gin moved like smoke.
He found the man within minutes—disguised in a merchant's coat, a passport in hand, briefcase gripped too tightly.
"Mr. Baek," Gin said softly, stepping into his path.
The judge turned. Recognition widened his eyes—
Gin drove his fist into the man's ribs. Baek collapsed, gasping.
Two bodyguards rounded the corner.
One drew a weapon. Gin snapped his arm, spun low, crushed a knee. The second reached for his radio. Gin closed the distance, elbowed him in the throat, dropped him with a sweep.
Cameras blinked overhead.
Good.
Let them see.
He hoisted the judge over his shoulder and disappeared into the rows of steel like a ghost.
---
The warehouse in Seungnam District groaned with silence.
Baek Ji-ho was bound to the chair, blood on his collar, wheezing.
Gin paced slowly.
"You think this makes you better than us?" the judge spat.
Gin said nothing. He was arranging tools. Camera light blinking red in the corner. Everything recorded. Everything clean.
Then—footsteps.
Slow. Unhurried.
The warehouse door creaked open.
Kang Seo-yul entered.
Not a projection. Not a voice on a phone. Not a shadow.
Flesh. Blood. Monster.
Tailored grey coat. Black gloves. Calm smile.
"You've been busy, Red Trace," he said. "Very cinematic."
Gin's eyes narrowed.
"You planned this."
"Of course. And you danced right into it. How poetic."
Gin stepped forward. The ache in his skull screamed. His limbs trembled. But rage burned brighter.
"You killed Yoon Seo."
Kang tilted his head.
"No," he said. "I ordered it. That's power."
Gin moved.
---
Steel screamed.
Gin's blade missed Kang's throat by inches. Kang ducked, countered with a curved dagger. Gin blocked, slammed his fist into Kang's ribs. Kang staggered but retaliated—his blade carving a line across Gin's shoulder.
They didn't speak.
No threats. No monologues.
Just fury.
Gin disarmed him briefly, drove a knee into Kang's gut, smashed him into a shelf. Metal collapsed. Blood sprayed. Kang reversed, slicing Gin's side.
Gin coughed, tasting copper.
Then—
A surge of dizziness.
Vision fragmented.
His hand trembled uncontrollably.
Kang saw it.
"You're sick," he said.
Gin ignored him.
Moved again.
He tackled Kang to the ground, straddled him, drove his knife toward the neck.
But the tremor struck again.
His arm froze mid-air.
Kang smiled.
And struck.
---
When Gin awoke, he was bound.
Steel table. Arms stretched above him. Chest heaving.
Kang stood nearby. Calm. Focused.
"I would've recruited you," he said, adjusting his gloves. "But you're too broken."
On a cart beside him, a circular saw began to spin.
Whirring.
Deafening.
Kang didn't taunt him. He didn't need to.
Gin saw the camera—still blinking.
He smiled, faintly.
"I'm already inside your walls," he rasped.
Kang's expression shifted.
Then steadied.
"Too late," he said.
The blade moved forward.
The sound tore the silence.
Gin's scream echoed only once.
---
Somewhere across Daehwa, a small red light blinked.
Ruko saw the feed.
Only part of it. Corrupted. Cut off mid-transmission.
He didn't speak. Didn't move.
Just stared.
Meanwhile, Daehwa roared with media frenzy.
BREAKING: Judge Baek Ji-ho Rescued from Kidnapping—Heroic Intervention by Mayoral Candidate Kang Seo-yul
Headlines burned across every screen.
> "A True Hero"
"The Face of Justice"
"Kang Seo-yul Saves the City Again"
Gin's body was never found.
The warehouse was torched.
The camera destroyed.
Red Trace framed once more.
The Syndicate cleaned house.
And in a penthouse overlooking the city, Kang Seo-yul stood before a mirror, wiping blood from his gloves.
He did not smile.
His shoulder throbbed. His abdomen burned.
He'd won the battle.
But a voice still echoed in his skull:
> Even a dying wolf can take your throat.
---
Darkness.
Weightless. Silent.
Then breath.
Gin Chan gasped, air scraping his lungs like razors.
He lay on the glass-like floor beneath an endless black sky. The timeless realm.
Whole again.
Unbroken.
But the pain remained in memory, stitched into his bones.
He sat up slowly. Fate's threads flickered above him like sparks from dying stars.
A figure lounged in the distance.
Death, seated on a throne of shifting bone and smoke, sipping something from a crystal glass.
"Yo," Death said, raising it in salute. "Long time no see, king of chaos."
Gin didn't smile.
Didn't speak.
He closed his eyes, felt the weight of one more unfinished life press against him.
Then opened them.
"I'm not done."
And Death, ever patient, simply smiled.
---