Roaming the seas without law had clearly dulled discipline—liquor bottles rolled across the floor, and the stench of rotting fish bit at her nose.

Seoryeong continued curling up like a scared girl, but the moment a pair of military boots approached, she slammed her knife down into the man’s foot and drove her knee hard into his chin.

“Ugh...!”

She shot out the lights she’d marked earlier, glass bulbs shattering one by one. Darkness crashed down like a net, and immediately, frantic Chinese screamed from all directions.

“Grab that crazy bitch—!”

Rifles fired wildly. Empty liquor bottles shattered and sprayed glass. Bullets punched dents into the hull, and Seoryeong slipped through the chaos, ducking behind parts of the patrol boat for cover.

“Hoo...”

It was none other than Lee Wooshin who’d taught her how to take down armed opponents bare-handed. It was his hand-to-hand combat training.

“Ugh, ngh...!”

She twisted a man’s arm until it cracked and smashed his face with her fist. The darkness was dense, and the ship rocked every so often, but Seoryeong didn’t hesitate—she spun and landed a kick to his abdomen.

“Ah...!”

She chose to disable, not kill—targeting joints, breaking them clean.

“Graaagh...!”

With knuckle dusters on both hands, she shattered an attacker’s clavicle. These soldiers were smaller, weaker, their eyes less focused than Wooshin’s. Their balance was off. Their reflexes were slow. Even while fighting, a single man’s silhouette filled her mind.

Bang, bang, bang—!

Bang, bang—!

Now they were closing in from both sides, firing as they came. As the bullets rained, Seoryeong grabbed the railing and flung herself up, swinging around with momentum to kick one of them square in the head.

“Guh...!”

She rolled across the deck and grabbed the back of another’s knee, yanking it in the opposite direction with a snap.

“Haa, haa...”

Even she thought her body was reacting too sensitively.

Though her chest heaved and her breath came fast, she wasn’t afraid—not even when facing enemies larger than herself. Her entire body was crackling with alertness, blood boiling with the urge to fight.

“Augh, aaaaagh...!” 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

She bit down on her opponent’s wrist, then wrenched his shoulder joint clean out.

“Ugh..., ngh...!”

Her agile legs smashed into his temple, and her elbow cracked outward to break his arm. Her focus only deepened.

Darkness. Oversized men. Her stomach churned faintly, but this kind of fear—her body moved like it had endured it countless times before.

Her brain, her blood, her senses—swollen with instinct.

Seoryeong gritted her teeth. Something black and primal was driving her now.

“――.”

Blood flecks now sprayed across her face.

She aimed her pistol only at calves or bludgeoned their heads until they were caked in blood. With ruthless precision, she brought them all down. She was faster, crueler, more instinctive than before. This wasn’t what Lee Wooshin had taught her.

“......”

A sudden chill of wrongness made her fingertips tremble. But before she could register the unease—bang, bang, bang—rifle fire resumed. Seoryeong ducked low and bolted upward.

She scrambled over the bridge, wedged herself behind a chain anchor point, and fired a single round from her handgun.

Then, with a loud clang, she shattered the lock using the bolt cutter. The coiled anchor chain began to unravel—

With a whirr and a roar, the chain descended fast—like a serpent unleashed—crashing straight down onto the soldiers below.

“Argh—!”

With a thunderous impact, the deck trembled violently. A scream pierced the air—then silence. Only scattered groans followed, as if the entire boat had been robbed of its breath.

Filthy bastards drunk on cheap booze...

Seoryeong held her trembling knees, pulled herself upright, and descended the deck again. She gathered all the rifles strewn across the ground and hurled them into the ocean, then shattered the instruments in the pilothouse.

“Haa...”

Finally, silence on the ship. Seoryeong perched on the rail, catching her ragged breath. Then she glanced down at the back of her hand.

“......”

Her knuckles were swollen, skin torn, glistening with someone else’s blood. That off-feeling from earlier—what was that?

When she retraced it, a sharp chill raced up her spine. A raw, primal survival instinct—as if etched into her bones.

Could it be... related to those childhood memories that Kiya the priest had mentioned? But Seoryeong shook her head.

That was a path she’d already abandoned—knowledge she’d chosen to leave buried. There was no point in looking back.

Then what now? She’d already blown this wide open. At this point, it’d almost be a relief to just get captured.

The ship rocked gently in the waves, shrouded in darkness. As she rested, a strange sensation crept up her back—like a massive sun rising behind her.

From her spine to the nape of her neck to the back of her head—blinding light erupted. The once-quiet deck now tilted hard as something big plowed through the water.

“――!”

Something was approaching. A searchlight swept across the ship like a giant eye scanning for life. Seoryeong slipped down from the railing and flattened herself against the floor. A heavy engine noise was growing louder and closer by the second.

Another Chinese ship? Reinforcements? Or...?

Her heart thundered like it would break through her ribs. It looked like just a regular fishing boat at first glance.

Seoryeong shut her eyes tight and held her breath. If it was just some nothing vessel, please, let it just pass by quietly.

Then—clomp, clomp—slow, deliberate bootsteps crossed the railing and approached.

“......!”

She cursed silently and reached for her knife. Loading her gun would make too much noise—she’d be found instantly.

Under the moon’s shadow, a long silhouette slowly advanced. Likely a large man, sweeping a flashlight through the ship, clicking his tongue at the sprawled-out soldiers.

“What a mess.”

“......!”

Wait, wait a second...

That voice...

The moment her head whipped around, a blinding beam pierced her eyes like a needle.

Ugh...! She flinched, brows knitting tightly—but still forced herself to stare. Am I dreaming?

Her mind blanked out, thoughtless. The knife slipped from her hand and clattered to the floor.

What did I just... What did I just see?

Kim... Hyun?

Her eyes trembled.

***

“I told you, she’s flagged as a potential high-risk agent.”

Roughly twenty-one days earlier, Lee Wooshin had parted the hanging beads like curtains and stepped into a Chinese restaurant.

It was the same place that had recently been forcibly shut down—rumors had spread that it was secretly a Chinese black police station, stirring up public outrage.

Graffiti-stained wallpaper courtesy of the locals, broken liquor bottles littered across the floor. Hinges creaked with every gust of wind, and the light switches had been ripped out—only frayed wires dangled where they once were.

At the center of that wrecked restaurant sat Ju Seolheon, spine stiff and unmoving, not a hair out of place. Wooshin approached her, glass shards crunching beneath his boots.

The Deputy Director, eyeing one of his feet carefully, pulled out a chair for him—but Wooshin didn’t sit.

“I’ll bring Han Seoryeong back. She’s about to cause a major incident.”

The Deputy Director took a lazy drag from her cigarette. The smoke drifted out like a sigh as it burned through the white filter, making Wooshin’s face crumple slightly. She scoffed.

“You mean Equatorial Guinea?”

“She got on that ship planning to escalate this into a full-blown diplomatic issue. I’ve confirmed everything.”

“Ha...!”

Ju Seolheon pressed her fingers hard to her brow, cigarette still in hand.

“Han Seoryeong hasn’t let go of anything.”

“......”

“If anything, she’s only going to push further. Do you really think she’s going to just quietly back off now?”

Fuck, I forgot that... Wooshin’s knuckles whitened as veins bulged across the back of his hand gripping the chair.

He already knew what she’d been up to during the week she refused to answer his calls. Even just seeing the information Channa leaked to Chinese public security made it obvious what Seoryeong was aiming for—who she was trying to draw out.

But what struck harder than her lying about going to Equatorial Guinea... was the fact that she’d left him behind injured—because of Kim Hyun.

She kissed me like that, and now she’s chasing him?

“I’ll go after Kim Hyun.”

“......!”

For a split second, Ju Seolheon’s face twisted—then returned to neutral.

“Public security’s preparing a disguised fishing boat. Looks like they’re planning to pin this on the North Koreans—they’ve already contacted Yellow Sea fishermen. Probably planning to drown the Blast Corp agents and steal the cargo.”

If Seoryeong missed one thing, it was that Lee Wooshin himself was a seasoned agent.

He’d held over ten false identities, and was especially well-known in the Three Northeastern Provinces. Like Channa, he had a reputation—once a contractor, once a dog for the public security bureau. The moment he reactivated one of those identities, intel poured in.

What Seoryeong should really be wary of wasn’t the corrupt garrison—it was the fishing boat coming in after her. And Wooshin planned to be on that boat.

“Don’t tell me you used ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) your old identity?”

“What else do I have? Aside from fake names, what weapons are left to me?”

“......”

“Time is running out.”

During that week in the hospital, Wooshin had even found a new interpreter to send to Beta Team.

Someone who followed orders, knew foreign languages, and was trained enough to survive if thrown overboard.

It was Dong Jiwoo, who’d been on sick leave ever since the Grand Hotel tear gas incident. Wooshin had used brute force to recruit the guy, who lowered his head in shame before his former instructor. He gave him one of his spare masks—an overhead model with a filthy visor—and an action cam. But that alone wouldn’t cut it.

“If this blows up, you’re the one who’s going to be in the hot seat, Deputy Director.”

As a car passed by, headlights slowly circled across Wooshin’s face, then vanished.

“So give me Kim Hyun’s face.”