Inspector Kim slowly raised his head.
A heavy silence settled over the investigation room.
It wasn't an ordinary silence—it was the kind that made everyone wait for a single word, as though it could change everything.
His deep breaths were clearly audible, loud enough to drown out the hum of the equipment surrounding them for a few fleeting moments.
Assistant Lee glanced at him again and again.
He opened his mouth...
Then closed it.
He looked away.
Only to look back once more.
He had been trying to suppress the question burning inside him, but in the end, he failed.
"Sir..."
Kim didn't turn toward him.
He merely responded with a quiet hum.
"Hm..."
Lee clenched his hands.
His expression revealed a fierce struggle between the respect he held for his superior and the urge to shout.
In the end, anxiety won.
"How can you sit there so calmly?"
His voice rose before he even realized it.
"I'm losing my mind."
He took a sharp breath before continuing.
"He's playing with us... and at this very moment, an innocent life could be hanging between life and death, at the mercy of someone we don't even know is still human."
Silence filled the room.
Kim picked up the cigarette that had nearly burned out in the ashtray.
He drew a long breath from it, as though trying to fill the emptiness inside him—the emptiness left by unanswered questions.
He slowly exhaled toward the ceiling.
The smoke curled upward in twisting streams before drifting back down in front of his face, like a painting brushed onto the air by an artist.
At last, he spoke.
"Assistant Lee..."
He paused.
"Do you know how storms are born?"
Lee frowned.
"What?"
A faint smile appeared on Kim's lips.
He stretched out a hand toward the cool breeze slipping through the open window, letting it pass between his fingers.
"Everything begins like this..."
he said quietly.
"A gentle breeze."
"Calm."
"Pleasing."
"But..."
He slowly closed his hand into a fist.
"Once it exceeds its limits..."
"It becomes a storm."
At last, he turned to face Lee.
"These are the laws of the universe."
"Fire was created to provide warmth."
"Water was created to give life."
"And the wind to refresh weary souls."
"But the moment anything exceeds its purpose..."
Silence lingered.
"It becomes an instrument of destruction."
His voice grew even quieter.
"The Purifier believes he can transcend those laws."
"But he's mistaken."
Kim looked directly into Lee's eyes.
"Anyone who violates a universal law..."
"Leaves a trace behind."
"No matter how intelligent they are..."
"No matter how perfect they believe their plan is..."
"They will leave behind a flaw."
"And a single flaw..."
He paused.
"Is enough to destroy them."
Lee remained silent.
He didn't fully understand what Kim meant.
But one thing had become painfully clear...
Inspector Kim wasn't talking only about the case.
He spoke as though he knew the Purifier far better than he should.
...
Meanwhile...
Inside Minsoo's house...
The atmosphere wasn't any calmer.
His band members had gathered around him, while Hemi and Suhyeon were there as well.
They reminisced about their early years together, their first meeting as a group, and the funny moments they had shared before fame found them.
Laughter filled the room.
But to Minsoo...
Those voices sounded distant.
Very distant.
As though they were coming from behind a thick glass wall.
He could see them smiling.
He could see their lips moving.
Yet he wasn't truly there with them.
His mind had wandered elsewhere.
Inside his head...
His thoughts were locking together with unsettling precision, like the gears of a complex machine struggling to complete itself.
Then...
The memory returned.
A pair of white shoes.
The footsteps of a woman walking away from him...
After driving two fatal knife wounds into his body.
His eyes widened slightly.
Those shoes...
They weren't unfamiliar.
He knew them.
In fact, he remembered every detail.
White on the outside.
Orange on the inside.
And bearing Hemi's signature, carefully written by her own hand.
He swallowed hard.
He remembered the day she had given them to him.
It was the very first salary she had ever earned after achieving success.
She insisted on buying him a gift.
Then, laughing, she signed her name on the shoes herself.
"Now no one will ever be able to steal them."
Another memory surfaced.
The early days of his fame.
A persistent fan had begged him to give her those very shoes.
He had smiled and refused.
He told her they meant too much to him to ever part with them.
But she wouldn't give up...
She pleaded with him...
Until he was left with no choice but to give in.
He pressed his fingers against his temples.
He could feel that something important was about to resurface.
Just one memory...
If he could only remember it...
Everything would finally become clear.
Slowly, he lifted his head.
His gaze settled on Soo Jin.
His eyes were calm...
Empty of any emotion.
"Soo Jin..."
The younger man looked back at him with a warm smile.
"Yes, hyung?"
Minsoo remained silent for a moment.
Then, in a hoarse voice, he said,
"I know you used to record everything during our early days."
Soo Jin chuckled.
"What's this about?"
"Did your brush with death make you nostalgic for the old days?"
Minsoo's expression didn't change.
He continued staring at him.
"Do you still have those recordings?"
The smile gradually faded from Soo Jin's face.
"...Yes."
Silence followed.
Then Minsoo quietly said,
"I want the recordings from 2013."
He paused briefly.
"June... specifically."
Silence fell over the room.
No one understood why he was asking for them.
Yet everyone could sense...
That this wasn't a casual request.
It was the beginning of something far greater.
Everyone was pursuing the case that would determine their fate.
But no matter how close the truth seemed...
No matter how obvious it appeared...
No one could truly say who was the executioner...
And who was the victim.
It is easy to wear masks.
Harder still is wearing them for so long that we begin to believe the image others have painted of us.
And when the time finally comes to remove them...
It is not merely a face that is revealed...
But a painful tearing apart of who we appear to be...
And who we truly are within.