The technical data Ara forwarded was dense and detailed, the kind of documentation that came from someone who had spent years buried in a single project and knew every layer of it from the inside. Min-joon sat in the back seat of Han's car with his phone tilted to catch the morning light, reading through it carefully while Han drove them back toward central Daejeon. Tae-hyun was in the front seat and Chan-young sat beside Min-joon, looking out the window with the particular unfocused gaze of someone still settling after the physical and psychological effort of a first task.The diagrams showed the task dependency network clearly. Five players, ten tasks each, but at specific intervals the tasks crossed. Task three for the Daejeon player would have an outcome that directly altered the conditions of task four for the Cheongju player. Task six was the most complicated point, all five players' tasks converged at the same time in a shared event, the nature of which the diagram did not full

Min-joon held the phone against his ear and did not move for two full seconds, processing the urgency in the woman's voice and everything it meant."Where?" he asked."There is a small bookshop in Mapo-gu," the woman said. "Older building, green door. It closes at seven in the evening. Be there by six." Another pause, shorter this time. "And Mr. Kang, I mean what I said about coming alone. Not because I do not trust your people. Because the architect's team uses thermal imaging to track group movement patterns around meeting points. One person reads differently from two."The call ended.Min-joon lowered the phone and looked at Tae-hyun, who had heard enough of the conversation to understand the shape of it even without every word."Alone," Tae-hyun said flatly."She gave a specific technical reason," Min-joon replied, already pulling up a map of Mapo-gu on his phone. "Thermal imaging for group movement patterns. If I go with someone, it flags the meeting before I even get through the

They moved Ji-soo out of the bookshop at six forty, just before closing time, using a method that Choi Jin-woo coordinated remotely with the efficiency of someone who spent most of his time watching movement patterns and therefore understood how to manipulate them. Choi arranged for two resistance members in Mapo-gu to make distinct, trackable movements in the area around the bookshop, creating a digital and thermal footprint that would read as Ji-soo departing in a completely different direction from where she actually went.It was not perfect, but it bought time.They brought Ji-soo to a safe house the resistance used in the western part of Seoul, a second-floor flat above a small dry-cleaning business, unremarkable from the outside and kept deliberately sparse inside. Ara had arranged the use of it months ago for exactly these kinds of situations, people who needed to be kept safe and out of sight while information moved around them.Ji-soo sat at the small table in the main room a

The address in Jongno-gu was a building that looked like most private serviced apartment blocks in that part of Seoul, well-maintained without being distinctive, the kind of place that catered to people who needed extended stays and privacy without the visibility of a hotel. The vehicle Ji-soo had given them was confirmed parked in the narrow side street adjacent to the building.Director Park's traffic camera data put it there for four consecutive days.Min-joon sat at the safe house table with Han and Tae-hyun and went through the options methodically. Ji-soo had moved to the small back room to rest after Tae-hyun had insisted on it with gentle persistence, pointing out that she had been running on adrenaline for hours and that exhausted people made poor decisions about their own safety, which she had accepted with the brief, slightly surprised expression of someone not used to being looked after."We go tonight," Han said, studying the building's exterior from satellite imaging on

The building in Jongno-gu was quieter than Min-joon had expected for a Thursday night in central Seoul. The side street where Director Woo's vehicle was parked held only a few other cars and the thin orange light of street lamps that did not quite reach the building's entrance. Director Park's plainclothes unit had positioned itself at both ends of the street according to the message she sent Min-joon as he and Han pulled up, two officers at each end, dressed as ordinary pedestrians and moving with the natural, unhurried pace of people who had been trained to look like they belonged somewhere.Min-joon and Han stopped in a parking bay half a block from the building and sat for a moment, looking."Twelve units," Han said quietly, looking at the building's face. "Ground floor has a lobby. No obvious reception, the kind of building that uses key card access.""Ji-soo said Director Woo uses intermediaries," Min-joon replied. "He will have registered under a false name. We cannot use the i