The morning after my birthday, Seoul woke up to a food scandal.
I saw the first sign at the subway station—a businessman in a wrinkled suit clutching a Moon & Son "Morning Glory Roll," his eyes glazed as he chewed mechanically. When he dropped his briefcase, he just stared at it like he'd forgotten what to do next.
Mrs. Park confirmed it when I delivered her usual matcha chiffon. "That bakery," she hissed, pulling me into her tearoom. "I ate one of their red bean buns yesterday and forgot my own granddaughter's face for three hours."
Moon & Son's flagship store smelled like a hospital.
Through the spotless windows, I watched their bakers move with eerie precision. No flour smudges on their identical white uniforms. No joking over misshapen pastries. Just rows of perfect golden croissants under LED lights too bright to feel welcoming.
Dae-ho elbowed me. "Check the nutrition labels."
Every item listed methylcellulose—a food additive that mimics gluten's texture in half the time.
"Industrial baking," I muttered. "They're sacrificing flavor for speed."
A salesgirl offered us free samples. The roll tasted hollow, like eating air trapped in golden-brown wrapping paper.
Taehyun's message arrived hidden in a bag of Sunyang rice flour.
Back dock. 3:15 PM shift change. 6 minutes max.
No signature. No explanation. Just the sharp, efficient handwriting I'd come to recognize.
Dae-ho whistled. "Your boyfriend's got connections."
"He's not—" I cut myself off as Jeong's mist curled around the note before dissolving—his only contribution to this entirely human conspiracy.
The loading dock reeked of sourdough starter gone bad.
Taehyun waited by the dumpsters in a delivery uniform two sizes too big, the Sunyang insignia carefully unpicked from the collar. Up close, I saw the shadows under his eyes—darker than yesterday.
"They're not just cutting corners," he said, pressing a lab report into my hands. "That additive cocktail? It's causing temporary cognitive fog. The board calls it 'product loyalty enhancement.'"
The chemical breakdown made my stomach turn. Propylene glycol alginate. Calcium propionate. All "safe" individually, but combined in amounts that skirted legal limits.
Dae-ho squinted at the tiny print. "This would make bread feel authentic while being mostly filler."
A shout echoed from inside. Taehyun stiffened. "Five minutes. Manager's office has the real supplier contracts."
The infiltration was almost too easy.
3:16 PM: Dae-ho jammed the lock with a honey-dipped yakgwa fragment—sticky enough to resist picking.
3:17 PM: I photographed files labeled Project Morning Glory - Cost Optimization. The numbers didn't lie: 73% less fermentation time, 58% cheaper ingredients.
3:18 PM: A crash from the flour storage room—Taehyun's diversion.
At 3:19 PM, as we slipped out, I left one of our vanilla-miso brioches on the quality control desk. Let them taste what real time and care could do.
The fallout hit before closing time.
By dusk, Seoul's food forums were flooded:
"Moon & Son bread gave me stomach cramps!"
"I blanked out for two hours after their scones!"
"Where's the actual butter in their 'artisan' croissants?"
Taehyun appeared at our back door just as rain began to fall, his knuckles scraped raw. "They fired the night shift baker," he said, accepting the ice pack I offered. "Claimed he 'mismeasured ingredients.'"
Jeong's mist brushed my wrist—brief, approving—before dissolving into the steam rising from our proofing cabinets.
Dae-ho grinned. "So when's the next mission, 007?"
Taehyun looked at me, really looked, for the first time since this began. "Your move, sajo." The old term for master baker—half challenge, half respect.
Outside, the rain washed Moon & Son's flyers from our doorstep, their perfect golden croissants dissolving into gray sludge.