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Chapter 1 / Prologue

Past midnight, the sedan carrying three men sped through a tollgate on the outskirts of Gyeonggi Province. Merging onto the national road, the car cut fiercely through the sparse pools of light cast by the occasional streetlamp.

At the wheel, Yang Man-ho glanced in the rearview mirror at his boss, Jung Ji-man, seated in the back. Though he had urgent news to deliver, the sight of the man calmly scrolling through his phone made it difficult to speak.

He knew exactly what held his boss's attention—the photo gallery. Lately, whenever he had a spare moment, Jung Ji-man found his greatest joy in looking at pictures of his young son.

Well past middle age, Jung had fathered a child late in life. That son, now four years old, had turned the boss of the Jacheong faction's world completely upside down.

A son...

Yang Man-ho still couldn't fathom it. How could Jung Ji-man have willingly registered on his family registry the child of a woman whose husband he himself had killed?

After the boy's birth, everything about Jung Ji-man changed. His life, once steeped in cynicism, had mellowed into the quiet warmth of a spring day. The night-industry empire he once ruled was now being systematically dismantled.

This was nothing like the man Yang Man-ho had known all these years. Could such a transformation be called a miracle? His thoughts branched out like sudden lightning. But as the hidden past behind that very word—miracle—surfaced in his mind, Yang Man-ho's face hardened in an instant.

[You will meet him before long – Lee Seok-eon –]

A message from a dead man.

The name Lee Seok-eon sent a chill of cold sweat down the back of Yang Man-ho's neck. It was an unfamiliar sensation. A man he'd believed dead—back from the grave.

He looked again in the rearview mirror, intending to discuss this news. But Jung Ji-man, once cold as a viper, now sat with an unshakeable smile on his lips, still absorbed in his phone.

Yang Man-ho swallowed his words and returned his gaze to the road ahead. Then, without warning, beyond the headlights, a massive truck veered across the center line.

Realizing it was barreling straight toward them, Yang Man-ho yanked the wheel with animal instinct and slammed the brakes.

Screech—

With the shriek of tires, the car hurtled off the road. Because the ground was elevated, it didn't stop—it rolled and crashed against boulders as it tumbled down a cliff.

After what felt like an eternity, the car finally came to a halt, its interior filled with deployed airbags. Smoke began to rise slowly from both ends. How long had passed? Yang Man-ho, who had blacked out, barely regained consciousness. Even in his daze, his first thought was of Jung Ji-man in the back.

"Chairman... sir!"

He turned his head with great effort. Jung Ji-man lay unconscious, his forehead bloodied. Then, he caught the smell of gasoline—some part of the car must have ruptured during the crash.

Yang Man-ho struggled to release his seatbelt, but the airbags made it nearly impossible. Just as he tried again, a movement in the darkness outside caught his eye.

He looked up in alarm. In the gloom, a figure calmly struck a match and lit a cigarette. The flame illuminated a face he knew all too well.

"Lee... Seok-eon?"

Yang Man-ho froze, uttering the name in disbelief. But the other man didn't react. His expression was unrecognizable—cold, fixed, like a grim reaper come to claim his soul.

Could it be... that this accident was deliberate? Yang Man-ho stared in horror. In that moment, the man leisurely tossed the burning match toward the wrecked car.

Whoosh—

With a dull roar, savage flames erupted.

---

1:00 AM. Wreaths of condolence began to fill the corridor outside the VIP funeral hall on the basement's first floor. The endless procession of floral tributes made it clear that the deceased had been no ordinary figure.

Behind them, countless men in black suits filled the hallway, standing at rigid attention.

Shortly after, employees from the funeral service company arrived with baskets overflowing with chrysanthemums and began decorating the mortuary.

As hundreds of white chrysanthemums covered an entire wall, the sole surviving family member, Kang Hae-ju, leaned against the wall, gazing blankly at the scene.

[The Deceased, Jung Ji-man]

The familiar nameplate and portrait felt strangely foreign today. Hatred and pity—two names for the same man—hovered on her lips, separated by a razor's edge. Suddenly, like a flashback, her vision went white, and a bitter memory surged vividly into her mind.

"Filthy woman. You're filth. How dare you act so high and mighty!"

A man's hard fist flew at both her cheeks.

Thud. The sound of something falling startled Hae-ju back to her senses, pulling her from the nightmare of the past. But it wasn't the dull blow against her eardrums from long ago—it was the clatter of someone dropping something across from the funeral hall.

"Executive Director?"

A calm voice reached her ears. Like a rusty machine grinding to life, Hae-ju turned her head with difficulty. There stood her secretary, Kwon Young-jun, alongside a funeral service employee.

She recalled then that Ji-man had died in a traffic accident. The car had been completely incinerated, and the bodies were badly mutilated, they said. Hae-ju curled her numb fingertips.

She couldn't believe that the end of a man who seemed destined to shake the world until his last breath could be so utterly hollow.

Just then, the funeral employee cautiously held out mourning clothes. Hae-ju stared down at them. Her secretary spoke gravely.

"Please change into these."

"...Yes."

Lifting the corners of her lips with difficulty, Hae-ju took the clothes and headed to the side room. At the sound of the door opening, the nanny who had been putting the child to sleep rose from her seat.

"Chan-i is asleep."

Hae-ju nodded unconsciously. The nanny left, and instead of changing, Hae-ju slowly sat down and watched the sleeping child.

Dressed hastily in a black kids' suit, the boy lay oblivious to the world. Hae-ju reached out and quietly brushed the stray hair from his forehead. At the sight of him, familiar afterimages surfaced in her mind. She closed her eyes, forcing them away.

Even after she had changed into mourning attire, the funeral hall's corridor remained restless. The unrelenting stream of wreaths flooded not only the VIP hall but also encroached upon spaces reserved for other families.

"Are you all right, sister-in-law!"

One of the men who spotted Hae-ju shouted in a booming voice. Behind him, a sea of black suits bowed their broad shoulders in unison, as if paying respects to the head of their organization. Hae-ju noticed the startled faces of mourners from neighboring rooms.

Orders from above, absolute obedience. This was a world governed by one-dimensional convictions. And Hae-ju realized, with a quiet jolt, that she too had grown accustomed to this culture.

Her face was pale and without makeup, yet her sorrowful bearing drew attention even in a funeral hall where grief was expected. Her long white neck looked cold enough to shiver.

After scanning her surroundings calmly, Hae-ju made a polite request to the man who had greeted her so loudly.

"There are other bereaved families here. Please lower your voices."

"Yes, sister-in-law!"

In a quieter tone, the black-suited men bowed again with disciplined precision.

Returning to the mortuary, Hae-ju slid back against the wall. Once more, the nameplate caught her eye. Jung Ji-man, boss of the Jacheong faction. The name of her dead husband—and his identity.

So, this is your end, after all.

She felt no sadness. Truly. Right now, all she wanted was... to sleep, after so many sleepless nights.

---

3:00 AM. Several sedans pulled up sharply in front of the dim hospital funeral hall. The men waiting there frowned and moved to block their way.

"Who are you?"

Before the question was finished, men emerged from the cars, pulled clubs and baseball bats from the trunks, and charged without warning.

The first scream had barely died when the guards were overpowered by the black-suited assailants. Taking the entrance in a flash, they rushed down the stairs.

From the quiet corridor outside, the sound of a commotion reached Hae-ju, who had been leaning against the wall with her eyes closed. Instinctively, she opened them.

Tension gripped the air, sharp as a wire. She rose to investigate the disturbance, but Young-jun burst in, pale with alarm.

"Executive Director! You need to take cove— Ugh! "

Young-jun crumpled, struck on the back of the head by a club. In an instant, a brutal brawl erupted.

Hae-ju stood frozen, watching the carnage unfold before her. Seeing real, lethal violence up close, her body turned to stone; she couldn't even breathe.

Shrill screams rose and fell, then silence fell swiftly over the area. The onlookers trembled in terror at the gruesome scene. As hospital staff rushed from afar, the black-suited men blocked their approach. Then, they bowed and shouted toward the upper floor.

"You have arrived, hyung-nim!"

At that moment, towering behind them, a man in a black suit far taller than the others descended the stairs. It was like a slow-motion scene from a film.

Revealed fully, the man began walking toward the mortuary. Hae-ju narrowed her eyes to make out the figure approaching with unhurried strides.

Thump, thump. An inexplicable tension sent her heart racing wildly. The man's shoulders loomed large as he drew nearer—like a warrior returning from battle—and his shirt was streaked with the vivid crimson aftermath of the fight.

As the dark silhouette sharpened into a clear form, the blood in Hae-ju's veins turned instantly to ice.

"H... how!"

The voice barely clawed past her throat, dying at her lips. The man, striding directly toward her, stepped into the mortuary with his shoes on, as if he needed no permission from the chief mourner.

As the door slowly closed behind him, the chaos outside receded like an ebbing tide. The man stood before the portrait, draped in the aura of a black reaper.

For a long moment, he gazed at the face in the photograph. Then, slowly, he turned his head and met her eyes. His gaze reminded her of a white aspen in a winter forest.

"Should I offer a prayer for the deceased?"

At the low, familiar voice, tears welled up suddenly. Space and time warped; countless moments from the past flashed before her like a panorama.

Hae-ju stared blankly at the man who had appeared before her once more. What she had only dreamed of was finally unfolding in reality.

No trace of consolation could be read on his face as he looked at her. Despite the dark, oppressive wave that crashed over her, she found herself unconsciously stepping toward him.

"Lee... Seok-eon?"

As if in a dream, she murmured his name. It had been five years. Five years since she'd last spoken his name aloud. At the sound of it, a faint smirk crossed his face.

"Honored. You still remember my name."

His low, measured voice, the sharp contours of his face—they were exactly as she remembered Lee Seok-eon from long ago.

But the tattoo trailing down the left side of his neck and the scar at the edge of his brow were new. Without realizing it, Hae-ju stepped closer and reached out to touch his cheek.

"Is it really you?"

The question felt absurd even as she asked it. Lee Seok-eon had died five years ago—or so she'd been told.

'That bastard you were tangled up with is dead!'

The hideous sentence still echoed vividly in her ears. Could the man before her be a mirage? He stood unmoved by her touch, looking down at her with languid eyes. He was no illusion.

Lee Seok-eon was alive. Right here, before her, whole and present. A burst of tearful, joyful laughter escaped her. Unbelievable emotions danced wildly within her.

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