“Hello?”
“Han Ji-woo?” Ji-woo slammed on the brakes, the sudden jolt making her bite her tongue. She cursed under her breath. It was Seo Ki-seok.
“Hello? What do you want?”
“Where is Tae-joon?” A single bead of sweat trickled down Ji-woo’s temple. He knows, she thought. He already knows everything.
Ji-woo frowned, an inexplicable sense of defeat washing over her. A crushing weight settled on her chest, as if shackles were tightening around her lungs.
“Bring him,” the voice on the phone commanded. “If you think you can break our contract like this, you’re mistaken. I’ve let you have your way until now, but don’t make me angry. You know the consequences.”
Her panic rising, Ji-woo wrenched the steering wheel, turning the car around and heading back toward the dock.
The cloying, chemical stench of drugs mingled with the rank smell of fish, seeping from the cabin.
“So, who’s this one?” a man with a jagged scar across his cheek asked, nudging the bound prisoner with a dirty boot. He glanced at the youngest of their crew. “He’s pretty calm. What is he, some kind of government suit?”
Most people they brought to the ship cried and begged for their lives. Today’s guest, the scarred man thought, was no fun at all.
“I don’t know,” the younger dealer mumbled.
“Well, it doesn’t matter. Whoever he is, he’s leaving with a hole in his head.” The scarred man gestured to the younger dealer. “Bring it.”
As the scarred man raised his right hand, the ship’s lights winked out. Across the dark water, the lights on the surrounding fishing boats extinguished in unison. An oppressive silence fell over the sea, a shroud for the sin about to be committed.
“What are you doing?” the scarred man snapped when the young dealer didn’t move. “I said bring it. Don’t make me repeat myself.” He slapped the younger man, who seemed to be in a daze. “What the hell is wrong with you today?”
“Be careful,” the young man said.
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s a trap,” he whispered into the darkness.
While the two had argued, Seo Tae-joon had worked the cloth from his head. He was now on his feet, standing directly behind the scarred man. In a flash, he drove a hidden blade into the man’s back three times, then shoved the body over the railing. It hit the water with a heavy splash.
Everyone on deck froze, staring as if they’d seen a ghost. A heartbeat of silence, then chaos.
“Get him!” someone screamed.
Ten men swarmed out of the cabin, and the massacre began. Knives stabbed from every direction, but Seo Tae-joon was a blur of motion. His hands darted up, down, left, right, a whirlwind of defense. He met the flurry of attacks with chilling precision, deflecting blades and knocking them aside as if they were toys.
His heart hammered in his chest, pumping hot blood through his veins. The men found it impossible to land a single blow. One by one, they staggered back from his effortless counters and tumbled into the frigid sea. Within minutes, Seo Tae-joon’s hands and face were slick with blood. It was more than just madness gleaming in his eyes; it was a cold, methodical purpose.
A loud crack shattered the night. A bullet tore through Seo Tae-joon’s thigh and buried itself in the deck planks. The young dealer stood there, pointing a pistol at him with trembling hands.
“Don’t move! Or I’ll shoot, you bastard!” he cried, his voice shaking.
Seo Tae-joon turned. The moment the dealer saw his blood-soaked face and predatory eyes, the color drained from his own. Seo Tae-joon closed the distance, his steps slow and deliberate, and pressed his own forehead against the cold steel of the barrel.
“Do it,” Seo Tae-joon said, his voice steady. “You can’t be more than twenty, can you?”
The young man could only stand there, shaking, paralyzed with fear. Seo Tae-joon reached out, grabbed the dealer’s hand, and adjusted his grip on the gun.
“Hold it like this,” Seo Tae-joon instructed calmly. “And pull the trigger.”
The young man hesitated. With a sudden, brutal economy of motion, Seo Tae-joon drove a fist into his throat. The dealer collapsed, clawing at his neck as he gasped for air, his face turning a dusky blue. Seo Tae-joon picked up the fallen pistol and stepped into the cabin. It was a makeshift drug lab.
The first thing he saw were gaunt old men, their backs curved over a long table, their hands moving in a nonstop rhythm as they mixed and packaged powders. They seemed utterly oblivious to the carnage outside. Flasks, purification equipment, and plastic wrappers littered the floor. Seo Tae-joon’s jaw tightened when he saw that it wasn’t just the elderly—children were among them, forced to do the same work.
A sudden spray of bullets tore through the cabin from outside. Windows shattered. Seo Tae-joon dropped low, pressing his back against a wall. One of the workers was hit, slumping forward onto the table, dead. The others didn’t even flinch, their hands moving with the grim, uninterrupted rhythm of the damned.
Seo Tae-joon checked the remaining rounds in the pistol. He carefully raised his head to peek through a broken window. In the pale moonlight, he could just make out the silhouettes of snipers on the surrounding boats.
Bracing his arm on the shattered window frame, he took aim. One by one, the shadows on the other boats fell. The remaining shooters, now panicked, began firing wildly, their bullets chewing up the deck. The barrage slowly dwindled as he picked them off.
Last one, Seo Tae-joon thought, and squeezed the trigger. Click. The hammer fell on an empty chamber. Fuck. He ducked back into the cabin, desperately searching for another weapon. Just then, a deafening crunch of metal against metal echoed from outside, followed by a violent shudder that ran through the entire vessel. The shooting stopped. Seo Tae-joon crawled toward the doorway to see what had happened.