The triumphant cheers in the conference room died as abruptly as if a switch had been flipped. Ryu's message cut through the celebratory haze, a sliver of ice in their moment of warmth. The image of Nam Gyu-ri, the architect of their misery, slipping out a back door, vulnerable and alone, was an irresistible target. It was also, almost certainly, another trap.
The team's elation curdled instantly back into paranoia.
"We can't trust him," Da-eun said immediately, her voice sharp with suspicion. The victory had energized her, but it hadn't erased her caution. "This is it. This is the real trap. The protest was just the bait. He lures one of us to an isolated service tunnel, and they grab us. No witnesses."
"She's right," Yoo-jin agreed, his mind already working through the permutations. He paced away from the screen showing the message, putting physical distance between himself and the tempting offer. "We can't trust the source. We absolutely cannot engage directly. But," he added, a dangerous glint in his eye, "we also cannot ignore the possibility that it's true. We don't send one of our own. We don't confront her. We only verify."
He pulled out his personal phone and scrolled to a contact buried deep in his list, a name without a company affiliation, listed only as 'Nightcrawler.' It was a freelance paparazzi photographer he kept on a quiet, informal retainer for emergencies—a man with a long lens, questionable ethics, and an uncanny ability to be where he wasn't supposed to be. Yoo-jin made the call, his voice low and commanding.
"I have a tip for you. It's a big one. The Innovate Dynamics showcase event at the Gangnam convention center. Forget the protest at the front. The real story is at the back entrance, service tunnel B. A very high-value corporate target is about to exit. I need a picture. Just one clean shot of who comes out of that tunnel. Stay distant. Use your longest lens. Do not be seen. I will triple your usual fee for the image, quadruple it if it's exclusive."
He listened for a moment. "Good." He hung up without another word. He had leveraged the chaos, using a deniable third party to get eyes on the enemy without risking his own people. It was the only sane move.
As if summoned by the resolution of one crisis, another phone began to ring. It was Yoo-jin's work phone this time. The caller ID glowed with a name that made his stomach clench: 'Baek Sung-ho - Editor, Prime Dispatch.'
This was it. The confrontation over the hit piece. Yoo-jin took a deep breath, straightened his shoulders, and answered, putting the call on speaker for the entire team to hear. His face was a neutral mask. "Han Yoo-jin speaking."
The editor's voice was a low, gravelly grumble, accustomed to intimidating people. "Han Yoo-jin. Baek Sung-ho here." There was a pause, a rustling of papers. "About that story my reporter has scheduled on your company's supposed contract issues… We've been monitoring the situation downtown."
Yoo-jin said nothing, letting the silence hang.
"In light of the… public demonstration," Baek continued, the words tasting like acid, "currently happening at the OmniCorp event—a demonstration that seems highly critical of OmniCorp and highly supportive of your artists—we're putting the article on hold indefinitely."
The team exchanged looks of stunned disbelief.
"Running a story that paints you as a corporate predator at the exact same time your fans are accusing your chief rival of being a corporate bully… it would make us look like a mouthpiece for corporate retaliation," the editor grumbled, clearly furious at having his exclusive story torpedoed by a spontaneous public relations nightmare. "We'll need to 'further investigate' the claims from our source before we can proceed. Don't expect to hear from us anytime soon."
The line went dead.
For a moment, the room was utterly silent. Then, a slow, disbelieving laugh bubbled up from Da-eun. "He blinked," she said, her voice filled with awe. "We made Prime Dispatch blink."
They hadn't just disrupted a party; they had neutralized a nuclear warhead aimed directly at their reputation. The public narrative they had unleashed was so powerful, so authentic-seeming, that it had scared off the most feared journalistic pit bull in the country. It was a massive, unqualified, paradigm-shifting victory. The sense of triumph that returned was even sweeter than before, heady and intoxicating.
It was in that precise moment of heady triumph that Min-ji's voice cut through the air, small and sharp. "Oh no."
The joy evaporated instantly. "What is it?" Yoo-jin asked, turning to her, his heart lurching.
Min-ji didn't answer. She just pointed to her main screen, where she was still monitoring the fan communities. The celebratory posts about the successful protest had been replaced by a frantic, panicked series of messages.
"The police have started making arrests," she read aloud, her voice trembling slightly. "They're clearing the street. There was a clash near the front line… They pushed back, but the police were ready for it." She scrolled frantically. "One of the fan leaders… a user named 'EclipseForever12'… she was one of the first to post your leak, Jin. She organized the initial rally point."
Min-ji's fingers flew across the keyboard. "There's a picture," she whispered, her voice cracking. "From one of the news sites."
She projected the image onto the main monitor. The picture filled the screen, stark and brutal in high-definition. It was a news photo, perfectly framed, capturing a moment of raw drama. It showed a young woman, no older than twenty, her face streaked with tears, being gently but firmly guided into the back of a police car by two officers. Her hands were cuffed behind her back. But through the tears, her expression wasn't one of fear or shame. It was one of defiant, heartbreaking pride. She was wearing a faded, well-loved Eclipse concert t-shirt.
The sense of victory in the room vanished, not just fading but being violently ripped away, replaced by a cold, sickening horror.
Jin stared at the photo, his face completely ashen. The blood drained from his face, leaving him looking like a ghost. The abstract concept of his "Stampede Gambit," of "weaponized love," had just become devastatingly, horrifyingly real. He had called on the devotion of his fans to win his war, to protect his new family and his own stolen legacy. And this girl, this loyal child who had loved his music enough to stand up for him, was now in jail because of him. She was a casualty in a war she hadn't even known she was fighting.
The victory was real. The Prime Dispatch threat was gone. The lawsuit against Da-eun's family now seemed petty in comparison to the public relations disaster OmniCorp was facing. They had won. They had unequivocally won the battle.
But as Jin stared into the tear-streaked, defiant eyes of the girl in the photograph, the triumph felt hollow, rotten from the inside out. He had won by sacrificing one of his own.