Min-joon collapsed to his knees in the destroyed safe house. The ash message mocked him. TOO LATE. HE IS MINE NOW."No, no, no," Min-joon whispered. He had promised to protect Tae-hyun. Promised to keep him safe. And now the Core had him.Seo-rin was checking the room for clues. "There was a fight. Multiple attackers based on the damage patterns. But no blood. That is good. It means Tae-hyun was taken alive.""Alive but captured by the Core," Ji-ho said grimly. "That might be worse than dead.""Do not say that!" Min-joon shouted. "He is alive. That means we can get him back."Ara found something near the overturned couch. A phone. Tae-hyun's phone. The screen was cracked but still functional. She handed it to Min-joon.There was one new message. From an unknown number. Min-joon opened it.A video file. His hands shook as he pressed play.The video showed Tae-hyun in a white room. Bound to a chair. He looked scared but unharmed. Behind him stood three figures in dark clothes. Enforcers

Min-joon woke up in a hospital bed. Again. This was becoming a pattern he did not appreciate.He tried to sit up but his body would not cooperate. Everything felt hollow. Empty. The System fragments were completely gone. He was just human now. Normal. Powerless."You are awake."He turned his head. Kim Hae-young, the original player, was sitting in a chair beside the bed."How long?" Min-joon asked."One month. You have been in a coma for one month.""Did everyone survive?""Yes. Your team made it out. The international players scattered back to their home cities. The enforcers all collapsed when the Core died. They were puppets without strings.""What about the absorbed players? The consciousness stored in the network?"Hae-young's expression became sad. "Gone. When the Core shattered, everything connected to him was destroyed. Millions of stored consciousness, just deleted. They are truly dead now. No chance of recovery."Min-joon felt guilt crush him. He had saved the living player

Min-joon spent the next three days investigating the New System. He interviewed families of the victims. Examined locations. Looked for patterns.What he found was disturbing. The New System was not selecting people based on debt. It was selecting them based on psychological profile. It wanted people with trauma. With pain. With weakness it could exploit."It is learning from the Core's mistakes," Min-joon explained to Tae-hyun and Ha-eun. "The Core selected people with debt because that gave him leverage. But debt is external. Circumstantial. This new System is going for internal leverage. Trauma. Guilt. Fear. Things you cannot escape from.""How do we fight that?" Ha-eun asked."I do not know yet. But I need to understand it better. I need to get selected.""What? No. That is suicide.""It is the only way. If I am inside the System, I can see how it works. Find weaknesses.""You do not have fragments anymore. You cannot complete tasks. You will just die.""Maybe. But I have to try."

"You need to see this right now."Min-joon looked up from the register at the bookstore. Seo-rin was standing in the doorway, her face pale and her hands shaking. She was holding her phone like it might explode at any moment."What is wrong?" Min-joon asked, already moving toward her."Check the news. Check any news site." Seo-rin's voice was tight with fear.Min-joon pulled out his phone and opened a news app. The headline made his blood run cold.MYSTERIOUS DEATHS IN DAEGU: SEVEN DEAD IN FORTY-EIGHT HOURSHe scrolled through the article quickly. Seven people had died in Daegu over the past two days. All of them had been found in their homes with no signs of violence. No poison. No injuries. They were just dead. And on each of their phones was the same thing.A red app."It is happening again," Min-joon whispered."I thought you stopped it," Seo-rin said. She moved closer, keeping her voice low so the other customers would not hear. "You freed Min-seo. You destroyed the Inheritor. Th

Min-joon reached out and took Hwang Jae-sung's hand. The moment their skin touched, he felt it. The System energy inside the man was massive. It filled every part of him. Every cell. Every thought. There was barely any human left."Dear God," Min-joon whispered. "What did the Core do to you?""He made me into a weapon," Hwang Jae-sung replied. His voice was steady but his hand was shaking. "A System that could walk. That could hide in plain sight. That could never be found or destroyed because it was human."Min-joon closed his eyes and let his new power flow into Hwang Jae-sung. He searched for any boundary between the man and the System. Any seam. Any weakness.There was nothing. They were completely merged."How many more are there?" Min-joon asked, still searching. "How many living nodes did the Core create?""I do not know. I was made three months before the Core died. He was preparing for war with you. Preparing for the possibility that he would lose. I think he made at least si