Lee Rang was no longer a man.He was a rumor. A shadow. A ghost whispered in alleyways.
After Seo-rin's blood stained his hands, the old Rang had died. What remained was someone else—someone who breathed rage and wore silence like a second skin. To the masked men, he was a fugitive. To the police, he was a stain they could not scrub away. But to himself, he was nothing—just a vessel carrying two chains heavy enough to drown him.
Seo-rin's. His father's.Metal pressed against his chest with every breath, reminding him of the graves that now lived inside him.
The masked men tried to hunt him. They set traps, spread whispers, bribed informants. But each time, they found only smoke—false leads, broken decoys, shadows of someone who had stopped existing.
Rang had become a phantom. And phantoms were harder to kill than flesh.
It was in a back-alley teahouse that his silence broke.
The place stank of cigarettes and rain-soaked wood. Few customers sat there, all bent over their cups, faces hidden. Rang's hood hung low, his tea untouched. A cracked mirror on the wall gave him back a reflection he no longer recognized—eyes hollow, jaw set too tight, like a man waiting for war.
That's when he heard it.A voice—low, calm, cutting through the smoke like a blade.
"You wear grief like armor… but armor cracks."
Every muscle in Rang's body tensed.He turned.
She stood there.The woman of shadows. Half her face veiled in silk-black fabric, eyes burning amber against the haze. Wan.
Rang's throat tightened. He half rose, fury coiling like a snake."You again," he spat. "Why save me? Why haunt me?"
Wan stepped closer, her movements fluid, deliberate, the kind of grace that belonged to both assassins and dancers."Maybe," she said softly, "I don't need to know you… to decide you matter."
The words cut deeper than Han's blades ever had.Seo-rin's ghost flashed behind his eyes—the same whisper, the same warmth. He forced it down, but the ache stayed. His hand clenched around the cup until porcelain cracked in his palm.
"Enough riddles," Rang growled, voice breaking. "What do you want?"
Wan slid something across the table.A card. Inked coordinates. Below them, one word:
Tunnel.
Rang's pulse spiked. His chains clinked in his pocket."You expect me to walk into another cage?"
Her eyes sharpened, almost daring him."You're already in one. You just don't know who built it."
Before he could move, before he could demand more, she was gone. No footsteps. No sound. Only a faint trail of perfume in the smoke.
Rang left the teahouse at dawn, but the city didn't feel like his anymore. Shadows watched him. The storm followed him. Every corner whispered Seo-rin's name.
He drifted into the underbelly of the streets, into dens where silence ruled louder than words. Once, a masked man caught him, pressed a knife against his ribs. Rang's lips curved into something between a smile and a snarl.
"You want me?" he whispered. "Buy me first."
The man hesitated, then leaned in, confused.And that's when Rang struck. Swift. Precise. No wasted breath. The body collapsed before the echo of the knife left the walls.
By night, the masked men spoke his name not with command but with fear. He was no longer prey—he was a ghost who asked for blood and money and then disappeared into nothing.
But ghosts can't rest. They're pulled where the living cannot go.
The coordinates led him to the edge of the city—an abandoned district where rust clung to concrete and the air stank of mildew. The roads ended in silence, swallowed by earth.
And there it was.A tunnel. Its mouth yawning black, scarred with faded paint. Numbers sprayed in cracked white:
404.
The symbol burned in his mind. Seo-rin's chain. His father's chain. The whispers Han had left behind in prison.
His fists tightened. One chain in each hand, biting into skin until blood welled.
For a moment, he thought he heard her again—Seo-rin's faint voice, carried in the hiss of wind. Protect him.
Rang closed his eyes. The chains felt colder than ever, heavier, like they wanted to drag him forward.
"Enough," he whispered into the void.The storm growled above him. The tunnel swallowed the sound.
And with a single step, Lee Rang disappeared into the mouth of 404.
"Rang stepping into the tunnel where everything will shift."