The studio apartment in Incheon was a box of sterile white walls and the faint, lingering scent of cheap detergent. It was a "safe house," though Kang-joon knew it was more of a cage. Starline had sent him here to keep the fire from spreading to the other trainees, but they hadn't taken his phone—not yet. They wanted him reachable in case the legal tide turned into a tsunami.
Kang-joon sat on the edge of the bed, the blue light of his smartphone illuminating his face in the dark room. He wasn't calculating percentages or reciting physics equations. He was just tired.
Ninety-six lives. He had been a trainee who failed his debut 96 different ways. He had been the one who lacked talent, the one whose agency went bankrupt, the one who got sick, and the one who was simply forgotten. But he had never been a criminal.
He scrolled through the portal sites. His name was still pinned to the top of the search rankings, but the tone had shifted from curiosity to a heavy, stagnant disgust.
