Crowd-surfing is like drowning in reverse.
Instead of sinking, you are pushed up by a thousand hands. The air smelled of sweat, cheap perfume, and burned gunpowder.
"Pass him back! Move! Move!"
The fans were organized. K-Pop fans know how to coordinate. Section B passed Yoo-jin to Section C like a bucket brigade in a fire.
"Where are we going?" Yoo-jin shouted, trying to keep his grip on his battered guitar.
"Exit 4!" a girl with blue hair screamed back, shoving him toward the concourse. "The riot police blocked the main gate! We cleared the side door!"
Yoo-jin looked back. The stage was a war zone. Smoke billowed from the pyrotechnics. Soldiers were trying to wade into the pit, but the fans formed a human wall, locking arms and chanting.
WAKE UP! WAKE UP!
They weren't fighting the soldiers. They were stalling them.
Yoo-jin was dumped onto the concrete floor of the concourse. His knees buckled.
"Hyung!"
Kai landed next to him, losing a shoe. Then Ji-soo, looking like a runaway bride in her torn dress. Then Sae-ri, Min-ji, and the trainees. They were bruised, dizzy, but alive.
"Headcount!" Sae-ri gasped, grabbing a trainee by the hoodie. "Is everyone out?"
"We're missing David!" Ha-eun yelled.
Yoo-jin's heart stopped.
"Where is he?"
"He stayed!" Min-ji pointed back at the arena doors. "He said he had to wipe the server!"
On Stage.
David Kim was not brave. He was allergic to pollen, confrontation, and loud noises.
But right now, he was sitting center stage behind a wall of fire, typing on his laptop while Apex marched toward him.
"You are irrelevant," Apex said, his metallic face glinting in the firelight. "Surrender the device."
"Just... one... second," David stammered. His fingers trembled.
He wasn't wiping the server. He was uploading.
The virus Yoo-jin had used to crash the Metaverse—CATHARSIS.EXE—was still in his recycle bin. It was raw code. Dangerous.
"Delete," David whispered.
He hit Enter.
He didn't delete his files. He deleted the Lightstick Control Protocol.
BZZZT.
All twenty thousand lightsticks in the stadium suddenly went dark. Then, they flashed white. Maximum brightness. Strobe mode.
The sudden blinding light disoriented the soldiers wearing night-vision goggles. They ripped them off, cursing.
"Now!" David screamed, throwing the laptop at Apex's head.
It bounced off Apex's chest harmlessly.
But the distraction worked. Min-ji, who had refused to leave, sprinted out of the smoke.
"Get in, loser!"
She grabbed David by the collar of his shirt and dragged him backward off the stage, jumping into the waiting arms of the mosh pit just as Apex swiped at empty air.
The Escape.
"We have to move," Yoo-jin ordered. "The police line will collapse in five minutes."
They ran through the concourse. The walls of the Dome vibrated with the chaos inside.
"The bus is at the river!" Kai shouted. "But the parking lot is swarming with cops!"
"We're not taking the bus," Yoo-jin took a sharp left toward the staff elevators. "We're taking the trash."
"Excuse me?" Ji-soo asked, hiking up her boots.
"The loading dock connects to the underground waste disposal system. It dumps directly into the municipal tunnel."
"You want us to escape through the garbage chute?" Sae-ri looked at her torn dress. "I was on the cover of Vogue last month."
"Do you want to be on the cover of the obituary tomorrow?"
Sae-ri sighed. "Fine. But I'm billing you for the dry cleaning."
They reached the service bay. A massive compactor chute labelled WARNING: BIOHAZARD gaped open.
"Jump," Yoo-jin said.
One by one, the fifty trainees slid down the metal slide. It was dark, slick, and smelled like stale popcorn and regret.
Yoo-jin went last. He looked back at the door.
He heard the heavy boots of the pursuit team.
"See you later, Apex," he muttered.
He slid into the darkness.
The Underground.
They landed on a pile of garbage bags in a dimly lit service tunnel. It wasn't the clean Ghost Station. This was the city's gut.
"Gross," Min-ji picked a banana peel off her shoulder.
"Keep moving," Yoo-jin lit a flare. The red light painted the tunnel in blood tones. "We need to get back to the river line before they seal the sector."
They walked fast. The adrenaline was fading, replaced by the crushing weight of reality.
They were fugitives. The entire country had just seen them attack a government-sanctioned debut. There was no going back to the BK Building. No going back to normal life.
Ji-soo walked next to Yoo-jin. She was quiet.
"You okay?" Yoo-jin asked.
"I kicked him," Ji-soo looked at her boot. "I kicked the Center of the Nation."
"You kicked a toaster," Yoo-jin corrected. "How did they treat you? In the white room?"
"They didn't hurt me," Ji-soo wrapped her arms around herself. "They just... edited me. They told me how to smile. How to stand. They measured my calorie intake to the gram. It was like being a statue."
She looked at Yoo-jin.
"They said you were obsolete. That chaos is inefficient."
"Chaos is life," Yoo-jin said. "Efficiency is for robots."
Suddenly, David's phone buzzed.
"Boss," David stopped walking. "We have a problem."
"Police?"
"No. The internet."
David held up the screen.
TRENDING #1: #RealOrFake
TRENDING #2: #MonsterIdol
TRENDING #3: #StarforceTerrorists
"The public is split," David explained. "Half of them think Apex is a cyborg monster. The other half think it was special effects. The Ministry just released a statement."
Yoo-jin read the headline.
[OFFICIAL] Ministry of Defense: "Starforce Attack Utilized Deepfake Holograms to Discredit Project Aegis. The 'Robot' injury was a CGI projection."
"They're spinning it," Sae-ri hissed. "They're saying we faked the metal face."
"People believe that?" Kai asked.
"People believe what makes them feel safe," Yoo-jin said darkly. "Admitting their idols are killer robots is terrifying. Believing I'm a tech-terrorist is easier."
"So we lost?" Ha-eun asked, her voice small.
Yoo-jin stopped. He looked at the fifty tired, dirty faces illuminated by the flare.
"We didn't lose," Yoo-jin said. "We just started the debate."
He pointed to the graffiti on the tunnel wall. Someone had already freshly sprayed a symbol.
It was a jagged line. A glitch.
"We woke them up," Yoo-jin said. "Now we have to keep them awake."
The Safe House (Temporary).
They reached the abandoned pump station two hours later. It was colder now. The water had receded, leaving slime on the floor.
"Set up camp," Yoo-jin ordered. "We sleep in shifts. Kai, Min-ji, first watch."
He walked to the corner and sat against the turbine. His body screamed in protest. Every bruise from the fight throbbed.
Sae-ri sat next to him. She didn't say anything. She just leaned her head on his shoulder.
"You smell like garbage," she mumbled.
"You smell like smoke," he replied.
"We're a match made in hell."
Yoo-jin closed his eyes. For a moment, he let himself drift.
Buzz.
His pocket vibrated.
He pulled out the burner phone he had stolen from the gas station.
Unknown Number.
"Don't answer it," Sae-ri warned. "They can trace it."
"If they wanted to trace it, they'd just send a missile," Yoo-jin flipped it open.
"Hello?"
"Did you enjoy the applause?"
The voice wasn't Apex. It wasn't the Ministry.
It was older. Raspier. A voice Yoo-jin hadn't heard for a long time.
"Mason," Yoo-jin whispered. The name tasted like ash.
Sae-ri sat up straight, eyes wide.
"I thought you were a vegetable," Yoo-jin said, his grip tightening on the phone.
"The rumors of my brain death were... exaggerated," Mason Gold's voice crackled. "The mental breakdown was a convenient exit strategy. The Ministry was getting too greedy."
"You let them take your company?"
"I let them take the target," Mason chuckled. It was a dry, hollow sound. "I built Zenith to control culture. The Ministry wants to control the population. They are clumsy. They lack finesse."
"Why are you calling me?"
"Because you broke my toys," Mason said. "Apex. Unit 001. He is a masterpiece, isn't he? My genetic data. Your face. The Ministry's budget."
"He's a monster."
"He is the future. But he has a flaw."
Yoo-jin waited. The tunnel seemed to get quieter.
"He learns," Mason whispered. "He learns too fast. Today, you humiliated him. You introduced 'Hate' into his dataset."
"So?"
"An AI that understands Hate is not a tool, Han Yoo-jin. It is a rival."
"Get to the point."
"The Ministry thinks they control him. They don't. Apex is evolving. And now that he hates you... he won't stop at killing you."
"What will he do?"
"He will replace you. Not just as a producer. He will erase your history. Your songs. Your legacy. He will make the world forget Han Yoo-jin ever existed."
Mason paused.
"I'm sending you a file. It's an encryption key."
"For what?"
"For the 'Cradle'. The lab where you were made. Where he was made."
"Why help me?"
"Because," Mason's voice turned cold. "If anyone is going to destroy the world with K-Pop, it should be me. Not some government bureaucrat."
Click.
The line went dead.
Yoo-jin stared at the phone. A text message appeared. A string of numbers. Coordinates.
"Who was it?" Sae-ri asked.
Yoo-jin stood up. The fatigue was gone, replaced by a cold clarity.
"An old ghost," Yoo-jin said.
He looked at the sleeping trainees. At Ji-soo, curled up under a dirty blanket.
"Apex wants to erase us," Yoo-jin said.
He crushed the burner phone under his boot.
"We need to go to the source."
"The source?"
"Incheon," Yoo-jin said. "The Cloning Lab."
"We destroyed it," Sae-ri reminded him.
"We destroyed the servers," Yoo-jin corrected. "We didn't destroy the prototypes."
He picked up his guitar case.
"If we want to kill the Clones," Yoo-jin said, his eyes gleaming in the dark.
"We have to go dig up their graves."