Seoryeong swallowed dryly, her eyes locked on the dark phone screen.
The moment the National Intelligence Service agreed to her terms, she had forced the subdued agents into chairs at the dining table and begun her vigil. She would release the account numbers one by one during the conversation—feeding them slowly, deliberately. If she mentioned the casino account too quickly, they would end the call immediately.
While waiting, she rinsed her mouth and wiped the blood from her face with a damp cloth. She tried to contact Channa. No answer. Then Jun Pilgyu. Nothing.
Anxiety gnawed at the edges of her thoughts. Without realizing it, she had started biting her nails—a childhood habit she thought she'd abandoned years ago.
_I can't rely on Channa anymore. Not on the front lines._
What she needed now was someone different. Someone who, even if caught and exposed, wouldn't become a liability. Someone who wouldn't flinch at physical violence or threats.
Someone already **accustomed** to this world.
_Someone like the Instructor..._
**Ring. Ring.**
The old phone on the dining table began to vibrate.
> **Caller ID Hidden**
Her body jolted. Tension seized her chest like a fist closing around her heart. Her pulse hammered so loudly she could hear it in her ears.
With trembling fingers, she picked up the phone.
"Hello?"
---
The night her husband didn't come home.
The night everything shattered.
She had held the phone exactly like this—waiting, hoping, desperate. It felt as though all those unanswered calls had crossed months of nightmares and finally led her to this single moment.
So many things she wanted to ask.
So many things she needed to say.
_Too many._
"Seoryeong."
Her breath caught.
A familiar voice—hoarse and low, wrapped in a softness that made it unmistakable. **Hyeon's voice.** Her husband's voice.
"It's been a while, hasn't it."
Three words, and her throat closed completely.
"Are you hurt?"
She should have answered. Her tongue felt like stone, heavy and unwilling to move.
_After disappearing without a trace... this is all you can say?_
_You shameless, heartless bastard._
Rage surged through her veins—white-hot and unforgiving. But she couldn't unleash it. Not yet. She squeezed her eyes shut instead, swallowing the fire burning in her chest.
Closing her eyes like this... it felt like stepping back in time.
To a life so happy it seemed foolish now.
Only she had changed. Hyeon's soft voice and calm demeanor remained exactly as she remembered—unchanged, untouched by the months of silence that had nearly destroyed her.
"Seoryeong, why did you do it?"
That familiar, gentle voice spoke again.
"I heard you tried to defect to the North. That you drained several accounts. What exactly is going on?"
Her jaw tightened.
"...Then why did **you** do that to **me**, Hyeon?"
Silence on the other end.
"In that situation—what was I supposed to do?" Her voice cracked, raw with accusation. "You left me first. You left me, left this house, and vanished. **I'm still here.**"
Tears slid down her cheeks, but her face remained blank—a mask she had learned to wear. She bit her lip hard enough to taste copper as she began writing foreign bank account numbers on a scrap of paper.
Her hands shook so violently the digits looked like wriggling worms.
The agents across the table stared at the paper, unblinking.
"You already know I'm a shadow agent for the National Intelligence Service, right?"
"Yes."
"Then you understand my position."
She said nothing.
"I can't see you again, Seoryeong."
Her pen stopped.
"I'm sorry. But we can't meet again. I **can't**."
His tone was gentle—so impossibly gentle—but his words struck harder than any blow. Harder than the fists that had left bruises blooming across her face.
"Don't be ridiculous."
Her lips trembled as the words escaped.
"Show yourself to me. **Right now.** Otherwise... I don't know what I'll do."
"Seoryeong—"
"One phone call isn't enough." Her voice hardened, sharpening into something dangerous. "I want **everything**—or nothing at all."
She glared at the agents across the table, searching for someone to devour with her fury.
"Who are you really loyal to? This country? Your superiors?" A bitter laugh escaped her. "Whatever it is—if you don't come to me, I'll **destroy** everything."
Silence.
"Everything you've protected and cherished for so many years. I'll burn it all to the ground."
---
_I shouldn't be acting like this._
She wanted to show him her gentle side. The soft, loving wife he had married.
But what came out instead was the whining of a child denied what she wanted most. Small. Pathetic. Naked in her desperation.
She hated herself for it.
And yet—she couldn't stop.
She was **starving** to reconnect that broken bond. Whether they lived or died, killed or saved each other—she needed to feel that warmth again. To fill the gaping hole where her heart used to be.
"Then you have to listen to me carefully, Seoryeong."
Hyeon sighed—a sound so familiar it made her chest ache.
"That's the only way I can come back to you."
Her pen hovered mid-stroke.
"I want to see you too. I... **miss you** so much, Seoryeong. Have you forgotten how good I was to you?"
Her breath stuttered.
"I love you as much as you love me."
The words should have been balm on an open wound.
Instead, something cold slithered down her spine.
"After everything is over, I'll go back to the house where we used to live."
**Ding-dong.**
The phantom sound of a doorbell echoed in her mind—her husband coming home, pressing the button, waiting to be let in.
_Just a fantasy. A delusion born from chaos._
The ordinary life she had once taken for granted flickered before her eyes like old film footage. Breakfast together. His coat hanging by the door. The sound of his keys dropping into the bowl on the entryway table.
"Until that time comes, wait calmly."
_But... this is strange._
Even though she was talking to him directly—hearing his voice for the first time in months—she felt **lonelier** than when she could only miss him.
Something was **wrong**.
Out of sync.
"If you keep messing with the Intelligence Service and causing trouble for the country, it will only delay my return. Is that what you want, Seoryeong?"
A pause.
"By the way—have you finished writing down the account numbers?"
There it was again. That odd feeling.
His words were gentle, yes. His tone exactly as she remembered. But something **unsettling** lurked beneath each syllable. Like a wrong note hidden in a familiar melody.
The voice belonged to her husband.
But it felt like speaking to a stranger wearing his skin.
_Is this Hyeon's true face as an NIS agent?_
_Or is it something else entirely?_
"Are you... confused about something, Hyeon?"
She turned her stiff neck slowly, choosing her words with surgical precision.
"You think I'll prepare dinner for you when you come home?" A cold smile touched her lips. "Yes. I'll feed you warmly enough. But after that—you won't see the light of day. **Just like I didn't.**"
Silence.
"You'll rot by my side **forever**."
---
**DING-DONG. DING-DONG. DI-DING-DONG—!**
The doorbell shrieked through the apartment.
Seoryeong whipped her head toward the entrance, heart slamming against her ribs.
_Wait. Wasn't that sound just my imagination?_
**BANG BANG BANG. BANG BANG BANG—!**
Loud, furious knocking—fists slamming against wood with violent intent.
**BANG BANG BANG—!**
_In the middle of the night... who knocks like that?_
"Is there someone else you're expecting?"
She frowned at the agents, but their confused expressions answered her question. They had no idea either.
In the middle of a conversation with Kim Hyeon—**who the hell was interrupting now?**
Suppressing the rage clawing up her throat, Seoryeong rose from her chair. She approached the intercom slowly, warily—
And when she saw the face on the screen, her mind went completely blank.
All the chaos vanished.
Even her husband's voice faded to static.
"...Instructor?"
Lee Wooshin was **attacking** her front door.
Not knocking. Not waiting. **Kicking** it—his boot slamming into the metal with enough force to shake the frame.
_What the hell?_
_How does he even know where I live?_
Before she could process anything, the cover of the door lock keypad slid open.
Wooshin began pressing numbers.
Calmly. Deliberately. Without the slightest hesitation—as if he'd known the code all along.
His eyes rolled upward slightly as he worked, like a man possessed. The sight was unsettling enough to make her skin crawl.
_Has he lost his mind?_
Seoryeong yanked the door open before he could finish.
"Instructor! What are you **doing**?!"
She was about to demand an explanation, breath heavy with irritation—
When her hair was suddenly **wrenched** backward.
A sharp pain lanced through her scalp, forcing a groan from her lips. Wooshin's grip locked her in place, immobilizing her completely.
His eyes swept across her face.
The bruised lips. The swollen eyes. The purplish hue spreading across her cheekbones.
His expression hardened into something terrifying.
"Don't tell anyone I ever taught you anything."
"...!"
"And in a situation like this—" His teeth ground together audibly. "—it didn't even **occur** to you to contact your instructor?"
He released her hair.
"Move."
Without waiting for permission, he barged into the apartment.
---
"Wait! Instructor—!"
Seoryeong scrambled after him, pulse racing.
When Wooshin surveyed the destroyed living room—the shattered furniture, the overturned chairs, the unconscious agent sprawled on the floor—his rage vanished.
It didn't fade.
It **froze**.
His face became a mask of cold, chilling calm. The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.
Seoryeong hesitated, unsure what to say.
His gaze moved methodically across the scene: the groaning agents, the blood on the floor, the signs of struggle written into every broken object.
One eyebrow rose slightly.
It was impossible to tell if he was impressed—or deeply disappointed.
_The phone._
She suddenly remembered and pressed it back to her ear.
But before she could speak, Wooshin's hand shot out and **snatched** it from her grasp. He switched it to speaker mode before she could react.
"—I regret leaving like that. But still, Seoryeong... could everything we had have been fake? I was sincere when I married you."
A pause.
"I can still clearly imagine your skin."
Lee Wooshin **laughed**.
The sound was sharp, mocking—a blade wrapped in velvet.
Then, without warning, he leaned down and pressed his lips to the nape of Seoryeong's neck.
She went rigid.
Her white skin flushed instantly—heat spreading across her cheeks, her throat, her chest.
Mortified, she shoved at his shoulders, trying to push him out of the apartment. Getting rid of him seemed like the only way to restore some semblance of control.
But he didn't move.
Not an inch.
Instead, he walked casually to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of water. He moved through her home as if he owned it—as if he had every right to be there.
Seoryeong stared at him in disbelief.
With her phone stolen and Wooshin becoming increasingly unpredictable, she could no longer focus on the voice still droning through the speaker.
Then—
Wooshin opened a kitchen cabinet.
He found a bottle of cooking oil.
And before she could react, he was pouring it down one of the agent's throats.
He forced the man's head back with one hand, angling it precisely. Oil flooded freely into the victim's mouth, his nose, his eyes—
"**GAGGH—UGH!**"
The agent writhed, choking violently as the liquid invaded his airways. His body convulsed, legs kicking uselessly against the floor.
Wooshin watched with flat, emotionless eyes.
"—We just misunderstood each other. I love you, Seoryeong. So just listen to me. You know no one can give you love like I can. You know that, right?"
"Know **what**, you bastard?"
Lee Wooshin hurled the oil bottle against the wall.
It shattered with a deafening **CRACK**, glass exploding across the kitchen.
His voice dropped—low, lethal, dripping with venom.
"Shut up before I come over there and rip your tongue out **myself**."