Chapter Text
He passed a body slumped against a wall, an arm bent beneath it at an unnatural angle. Another corpse lay face-down a few meters ahead, the armband already stripped. They had all been reduced to mere numbers now—shapes in uniform, their individuality erased.
In-ho stepped over the bodies without pausing; the smell of iron barely registered. His eyes swept over the Players still moving through the corridors, their heads darting with constant vigilance.
None of them were the person he was looking for. Every time a figure turned, his gaze flicked to the jacket, searching for 456—and finding only strangers.
Gi-hun should have been easy to spot. He moved differently from the others—always a touch slower, always broadcasting in ways he seemed painfully unaware of. And yet, as In-ho surveyed the clusters of Players moving like wolves in a maze, he couldn’t find him anywhere.
He took another corridor—narrower, darker, less trafficked. Then he heard it: footsteps. But they did not sound like the usual shuffling of frantic Players...
A guard stepped into view from a side hallway. Even with the mask, In-ho recognized him instantly. It was in the way he walked—not the precise, rehearsed stride expected from the guards, but something more relaxed. Too much time spent outside the system. Too much pretending to fit in.
The guard froze the moment he saw In-ho, spine snapping straight as though habit and muscle were warring to correct a deviation.
“Sir,” the guard said in a low voice, the modulator crackling faintly. “I was keeping an eye on the cameras. But when I saw 456 get separated, I got distracted. People were starting to notice me lingering...”
In-ho’s expression hardened into a glare. “You compromised surveillance because you got distracted?”
“I kept the feeds running as long as I could,” the guard replied, his tone too quick. “I set up a loop, but there wasn’t much else I could do from there without drawing suspicion...”
Inside, every part of In-ho bristled. His instincts screamed to lash out, to punish, to cut the weakness out before it spread. But he couldn’t. This man was his only pawn on the board, his only set of eyes and hands.
And Yun had been useful once. Still was, technically. But usefulness only extended as far as obedience.
“Next time,” In-ho said quietly, “you inform me before making changes.”
The guard nodded immediately. “Understood.”
Before In-ho could send him away, Yun pulled something from his jacket and extended it in his gloved hand.
“I found this in one of the corridors,” he said. “I thought you’d want to see it, sir.”
It was a pill bottle—Gi-hun’s. In-ho didn’t snatch it, but the way he picked it up was more rushed than he would have preferred.
The label was partly torn, the cap cracked, showing signs of having been dropped in a hurry, perhaps kicked once or twice before being left behind.
He stood silent for three full seconds.
Then, in a voice deliberately neutral, he asked, “Where?”
The guard gestured back the way he’d come. “North corridor, second junction near the alcoves. I swept the branching halls, but there was too much movement. I couldn’t stay long without drawing attention.”
A muscle twitched in In-ho’s jaw.
Of course. Of course Gi-hun wouldn’t stay put. Of course he would wander off, drawn by whatever reckless impulse burned under his skin.
In-ho closed his fingers around the bottle and resumed walking without another word. The guard fell into step behind him automatically.
In-ho then lowered his voice, ensuring the microphones in the walls wouldn’t pick it up: “The VIPs. Are they all in the lounge?”
“For now,” Yun confirmed. “Two are still betting... and drinking. One keeps asking to switch screens; he’s suspicious of the loops. I’ve managed to keep him occupied with reruns of the eliminations—those seem to be his favourites.”
In-ho nodded. That bought them some time—not much, but enough to finish laying the groundwork.
“And what about the Host?” In-ho asked.
Yun hesitated for a moment. “He’s still inactive, I believe. His signal hasn’t moved from the suite.”
Inactive. That could mean he was either waiting or watching, both of which tightened the margin for error.
“Recruiter?”
“With the Host, sir.”
In-ho’s pace never faltered, but something in him settled, like a snare locking into place. Pieces were moving, threads tightening. The VIPs were easy to appease—their appetites predictable, base. But the Host and the Recruiter were different. They were the real threat. Their desires, their whims—the system oozed outward from them like a fresh wound. If the collapse began at the top, the system would eat itself alive, but for that to happen, In-ho needed...
He didn’t let himself finish that thought, not even internally. Here, even his thoughts felt like they could be eavesdropped.
Yun, however, seemed content to fill the silence.
“It’s strange being back here, isn’t it, sir?” he mused, almost conversationally. "The procedures are nearly identical to those in Korea, but the experience feels completely different. I believe it’s the repetition combined with experience that changes our perception. Identical inputs lead to different cognitive outputs.”
In-ho glanced at him, incredulous. How had this guard, once cowering under In-ho’s shadow, become comfortable enough to speak this way? Even more unsettling—why, exactly, had In-ho allowed it?
“Do you know what else I noticed, sir?” the man prattled on, “No matter the setting, the psychology converges the same way in here. Drop people into this place, no matter the country, no matter the rules—and within minutes, the behavioural patterns align.”
In-ho shot him another sidelong glance. Yun’s voice had taken on that disconcerting tone of fascination, reminiscent of the way he spoke years ago—back when In-ho had first met him. That was why he had recruited him in the first place. But now, his comments made him want to smack the fake doctor over the head, instead of offering him a job.
“A different country, different architecture, different rules tailored for a new demographic. Yet the results remain nearly identical,” the guard continued, undeterred by In-ho’s rising irritation. “Players become the same desperate creatures: efficient in their cruelty, quick to adapt when cornered. The games don’t change with the location, it seems. It is kind of amazing to observe...”
In-ho’s jaw tightened further. He felt the stirrings of his old self, the sick curiosity he had once entertained, and his anger rose—not at the guard, but at the echoes of his past judgments and the blind confidence that had allowed so much to unfold.
The man beside him continued, unaware of the impact his words were having. “Also, I don’t mean to overstep, sir, but… I’ve been also observing some of the interactions between you and 456. Just me, of course—I erased the footage before anyone else could see. But… I think you need to be more careful, sir. 456 is showing signs of dissonance, even more pronounced than before. Environments like this are dangerous for someone with partial recall. He’s acting on instincts he doesn’t fully understand, trying to reconcile things he can’t access. That cognitive dissonance can become volatile very quickly.”
In-ho gave him a warning glance, but he either didn’t pick up on it or chose to ignore it.
“He remembers in fragments,” Yun insisted. “Bits and pieces without any context. That could backfire if he starts filling in the gaps with wrong information. I’m not convinced that keeping him in the dark is the right approach here, sir.”
In-ho stopped and slowly turned his head. Yun fell silent immediately.
“Are you,” In-ho asked quietly, “offering me a personal advice?”
The guard straightened, hands at his sides, not trembling—but close. “I’m… voicing a legitimate concern about the subject’s stability. If he has no one to turn to except the Recruiter, you risk losing control over the narrative. I mean… wasn’t I assigned to make observations like this, sir?”
The guard shifted his stance uncomfortably, as if he had already prepared himself for a possible reprimand.
Instead, In-ho said, “Return to your post. I want every camera in the west corridors prioritized. If 456 is alone, that won’t last long.”
Yun hesitated for just a moment before nodding. “Yes, sir.”
He turned and walked away quickly, boots thudding in precise rhythm—as if In-ho’s glare had reinvigorated the old discipline back into his bones.
Once the corridor was empty again, In-ho glanced down at the pill bottle still clutched in his hand, his reflection warped across the plastic surface.
His approach with Gi-hun—containment and restriction—had led only to resistance and suspicion. Every attempt to shut a door merely drove Gi-hun to search for an open window.
Maybe Yun had a point, although the man would never hear In-ho admit it. A hint of truth, carefully deployed, might tether Gi-hun just enough to keep him from tearing blindly at every lock. But even that idea tangled itself into a web of contradictions. The truth was a volatile substance; if the wrong memory surfaced or the wrong connection sparked, all the groundwork In-ho had built could come crashing down.
Once they got out of these games, Gi-hun was meant to walk away. Move on. Live his life.
But… If they got out, and Gi-hun remembered, truly remembered—everything—he wouldn’t move on. He would dig. Hunt. Unravel himself into martyrdom, again and again, until there was nothing left to salvage. The Gi-hun who remembered everything wasn’t the type to just let it go.
And In-ho… he wasn’t sure he could endure watching that unravelling again.
His thoughts were abruptly interrupted when a voice echoed up ahead—familiar and too loud as it bounced off the corridor walls.
“…How the hell do you know Ga-yeong? Did you meet here? Or did you both get involved in these games together?”
It was Gi-hun.
At first, a sharp wave of relief washed over him. Gi-hun was alive. But that feeling quickly turned into irritation, overshadowing the relief. He was loud again; in a place where noise was nothing but bait for danger.
How could this man, who had survived not one, but two full rounds of the games, completely lack any instinct for self-preservation?
In-ho moved toward the sound, keeping close to the wall as the corridor turned into another passageway.
A new voice cut through—young, female and scathing.
“Do you ever shut up? You ask way too many questions for someone with just one functioning brain cell."
Gi-hun bristled audibly. “I’m serious—how do you know her?”
“I just do. And you were supposed to answer my questions. Where is she?"
“I’m not telling you anything until you tell me...”
“Oh my god, you know what? Forget it! I’m leaving now.”
“Like hell you are...!”
In-ho moved closer until he could see into the adjoining corridor.
There he was—Gi-hun, shoulders tense, chin lifted in that familiar, infuriating stubbornness. Facing off with a girl half his size; the same girl from earlier, Player 150, the one who had glared at Gi-hun as if she had already picked the spot where she'd bury him.
And there, wrapped around her upper arm like a threat, was the red-band.
Tagger.
Everything else faded into insignificance. Questions, context—it all fell away. All he could see was Gi-hun, standing within reach of someone whose only objective would be to gut him before the timer ran out.
And In-ho moved before he could think better of it.
His hand slipped soundlessly into his pocket. Fingers curved around the hilt of the knife he’d taken from the man he'd killed. It settled into his grip like memory. One clean breath steadied his muscles; then he moved.
Three quick strides. A sharp pivot.
An arm wrenched across the girl’s shoulders, the other flashing the blade up to the soft skin of her throat. She made a harsh, startled sound—more fury than fear—but it cut off in his grip as he locked her against him.
He didn’t look at her; all his attention was on Gi-hun.
“Run,” he ordered.
For the briefest moment—just a flicker—something softened in Gi-hun’s expression. His brows lifted, his shoulders relaxed, and In-ho could have sworn he caught a glimpse of relief.
But it vanished almost instantly, swallowed by shock, then confusion, and finally anger, settling on his face like a returning mask.
“What the hell are you doing?!” Gi-hun snapped, stepping forward instead of back like he’d been told. “Let her go!”
In-ho’s grip on the knife didn’t waver, but his patience did. Why couldn’t Gi-hun, for once, just follow orders?
“She’s wearing red—she’s the Tagger. Move.”
“No, no, wait, she’s—”
“She’s a threat,” In-ho snapped, tightening his hold as the girl jerked her elbow back against his ribs. “Get out of here.”
The girl snarled through clenched teeth, writhing in his grip with feral frustration. “Get your hands off me, you smug-faced asshole!”
In-ho’s jaw twitched. He knew he should have subdued her already—slammed her into the wall, knocked her unconscious. That’s what the situation demanded. Instead, his arm adjusted carefully around her narrow shoulders. She was too small. Too young. Even his moral detachment could only allow him to go as far as to hold her still.
And, of course, Gi-hun would find the one vulnerable child in the building and start a conversation. Why did he always do this? Why did he have to pull innocence into the games’ machinery?
Gi-hun took another step forward, glaring as if he were the one holding the knife. “I said let her go! She wasn’t attacking me—she was talking!”
“Talking?” In-ho echoed, incredulous. “She’s the Tagger. Do you even understand what that means—or have you forgotten the rules already?”
“She’s a child—just let her go and let her talk—you don’t have to—”
The girl stomped back on his foot hard enough to make In-ho’s grip jolt. “I’m not a child, you geriatric pigeon!” she snapped at Gi-hun, then pivoted her glare at In-ho. “And you—knife-happy asshole—you have no idea what’s really going on here! Get your hands off me.”
Her pulse fluttered beneath the blade, but she didn’t tremble—not with fear, anyway. She glared like she had every right to.
Something felt off. Something wasn’t adding up, and the longer she squirmed and snarled, the more that wrongness itched at the back of In-ho’s mind.
Gi-hun seemed oblivious—or simply didn’t care. “Let. Her. Go!” he shouted fiercely, clearly ready to pull her out of In-ho’s grip with force if need be.
“Oh my god, shut up!” the girl hissed—not at In-ho, but at Gi-hun. “You want every desperate idiot nearby coming our way? Keep yelling like that, and we’re both dead.”
The irritation in her voice wasn’t just exasperation—it was fear. And that… didn’t add up at all.
Why was she worried about drawing attention if she was the threat?
Before In-ho could sort through the confusion, heavy footsteps echoed down the corridor. A man skidded around the corner, his face glistening with sweat, hair stuck to his forehead, and his pupils so dilated they swallowed the colour of his irises.
He wasn’t wearing an armband; but he had a knife.
And both Gi-hun and the girl muttered in unison at the sight of him, “Shit.”
The man’s face contorted with rage, veins bulging on his forehead as he lunged forward. “You little bitch! You played me!” He pointed the knife at them. “They won’t let me out! They say I’m still the Tagger. You tricked me!”
The girl snapped back instantly. “Yeah, well maybe try not being an idiot next time—!”
But the man was already consumed by fury. He charged at them, knuckles whitening around the knife as he advanced.
In-ho didn’t waste time demanding context. He swore under his breath, yanked the blade away from the girl’s throat, and shoved her forcefully to the floor. She twisted mid-fall, quickly scrambling to her knees.
The man closed the distance in seconds.
In-ho intercepted him, blade raised to strike—but the opponent swung wildly. His arm crashed into In-ho’s wrist, nearly knocking the knife free. The impact sent them crashing into the wall, the thud reverberating through their bones.
The man was stronger than he looked—broad shoulders, thick arms, built like someone accustomed to hard work or intense training. In-ho aimed the knife toward the man’s gut, but in response, the attacker slammed an elbow into his side, sending a jolt of pain through his ribcage. They grappled, feet sliding across the slick floor, muscles straining as their limbs became entangled and the blades clashed.
Both caught each other's wrists, the knives pinned between them. In-ho twisted sharply, looking for an escape, but the man drove a knee into his already bruised torso. The knife slipped from In-ho’s grasp, clattering to the floor with a cold metallic scrape.
The man pushed In-ho back and slashed upward toward his head. In-ho barely registered the threat before a flash of movement caught his eye.
Gi-hun.
With no weapon and no plan, just raw panic and reckless energy, he threw a punch at the man’s jaw. The hit connected with a loud crack, but the aftermath left Gi-hun gasping. He doubled over, clutching his ribs with a broken sound, his body no longer built to absorb force like this.
The attacker barely faltered, turning toward Gi-hun with a snarl, knife raised and ready for the kill.
Just as In-ho was about to move, someone else moved faster—the girl. Seemingly out of nowhere, she’d seized In-ho’s fallen knife and slashed at the Player’s forearm. The cut wasn’t deep but ragged and messy, enough to splatter blood all over the floor.
The man snarled, off-balance but not down. The girl quickly backed away, her chest heaving as if she had sprinted for miles. She tried to look defiant, chin up, jaw set—but fear clung to her like sweat. Her knuckles were white against the hilt of the blade. She raised it high above her head, her movements awkward but determined, muscles tensed to bring it crashing down—
And then she froze. Her arm locked mid-motion.
Her expression changed in a single heartbeat. Her eyes—wide, too wide now—betrayed everything: the weight of consequence, the irreversibility of what she was about to do.
She couldn’t go through with it, In-ho realized.
The man lunged forward, knife poised, his eyes burning with wild hunger, aiming directly at her.
In-ho moved—but he was too far away to intervene.
Gi-hun wasn’t.
He stepped into the line of fire, taking the knife from her frozen grasp without a moment's hesitation. He didn’t swing it, didn’t even move it; he simply held it out.
The attacker’s momentum did the rest; the blade sank into his chest with a wet, sickening sound. The man’s eyes widened in stunned disbelief—then went dull as his knees buckled.
Gi-hun was still holding the handle as the man’s body slid off the blade and collapsed to the ground.
For a long, suspended heartbeat, no one breathed.
Gi-hun stared down at his hands, as if they didn't belong to him anymore. Blood was smeared across his skin in thick, uneven strokes—wet in the creases of his fingers, drying in streaks along his wrist, and seeping into the corner of his sleeve. His breath came in short, stuttering gasps—like each inhale had to fight its way past something lodged in his chest.
The girl didn’t speak. She stood stiff beside Gi-hun, frozen in shock. Her freckles stood out sharply against the sudden pallor of her skin.
In-ho pushed himself upright from where the fight had thrown him against the wall, ignoring the dull ache rippling through his bruised ribs. Pain was manageable. What knotted in his mind was not.
He had failed. Again.
He had pushed Gi-hun into the jaws of the system, thinking he could control the bite, guide it, shield him—keep his hands clean of the one act that forever marked a soul. Now Gi-hun’s hands bore the red proof of that failure, a crude cuff he could not remove. Another piece of innocence had been violently torn away.
The dead man’s body twitched once—just a reflex, not a sign of life—then stilled for good.
A monotone voice echoed through the air from somewhere above: “Player 402, eliminated. All taggers have been removed from the game. The game is over. Congratulations to all remaining players wearing the blue armband.”
In-ho’s gaze drifted to the girl’s arm. Red band. It was as clear as day. But the announcement had just declared all taggers dead...
Before he could piece it together, the familiar thunder of boots pounded down the corridor.
A guard appeared, rifle raised, and his gaze swept the scene methodically: the corpse, Gi-hun frozen in place, In-ho standing deceptively composed, and the girl—her red armband still in place.
In-ho saw the guard’s finger twitch on the rifle. Maybe the girl did too. She jolted—like survival itself had smacked her in the back of the head. She yanked the red band down and rolled up her sleeve, revealing the blue beneath, turning it toward the guard.
Understanding clicked into place in In-ho’s mind. Clever girl.
The guard paused. Then, with a curt nod, he tapped his receiver. “Clear.”
He turned back to the three of them and spoke in that flat, lifeless cadence all guards were trained to use.
“Proceed to the exit. Follow the lit signs.”
Thin blue arrows flickered to life along the wall in a slow, pulsing sequence. The guard turned and left without granting them a second look.
In-ho let out a breath through his nose, his exhale quiet and slow, as if anything louder might shatter the fragile thread holding Gi-hun upright.
In-ho glanced at the girl, and any resentment he felt toward her involvement in this chaos that pushed Gi-hun to the brink faded almost instantly.
She stood rigid, posture all brittle defiance. But her hands betrayed her—shaking subtly, fingers twitching, useless without anything to hold. Her eyes shone with tears that refused to fall, pupils still dilated with the aftershock of a kill she hadn’t committed.
When she caught In-ho watching her, her expression snapped shut like a slammed door. She swiped at her eyes with the back of her wrist, as if trying to beat the tears into submission.
“T-Told you,” she muttered shakily, “you don’t get what’s going on, a-asshole.”
There was no bite in her tone—only exhaustion.
She flicked her chin toward Gi-hun, who remained rooted in place. “G-Get that dumbass and l-let’s get out of here,” she urged. Her voice softened, something unreadable flickering in her eyes as she darted glances between the corpse and the man who’d just created it.
In-ho moved—carefully, quietly. He approached like a person stepping onto thin ice, aware that something beneath the surface might crack.
He came to Gi-hun’s side and laid a hand on his shoulder. Gi-hun jolted at the touch, his gaze, previously fixed on the lifeless body at his feet, yanked away as if something inside him resisted the pull back to the present.
And then he looked at In-ho; his eyes utterly hollow.
In-ho didn’t trust himself to speak. Words were too imprecise, too loud for the moment.
Instead, he let his fingers curl into the edge of Gi-hun’s sleeve—not pulling, not pushing, merely anchoring.
And Gi-hun moved. No questions asked. No arguments made. No hesitation shown. For once, he chose to follow, quietly.
But In-ho felt no victory in it—only the cold, unmistakable weight of failure settling in his bones.
In-ho let the faucet run warm over his hands. The motion was automatic—scrub, rinse, let the water carry the evidence away. He had done it so many times that the blood lifting from his skin barely registered anymore.
Standing beside him, Gi-hun remained still and silent. He held his hands under the stream, watching as the pink water trickled down the drain.
Around them, the bathroom cycled with noise, but it all passed like background static. Players washed themselves, dried their hands, and whispered nervously, preparing for the vote.
The girl—150—paused at the doorway, her eyes flicking between Gi-hun and In-ho. For a brief moment, it seemed she might say something, but she shook her head instead, muttering a few words that In-ho caught: “dumbass… asshole.” Then she disappeared.
Next, Player 410 lingered for a moment, concern etched on her face as she glanced at Gi-hun, but a gentle nudge from another player ushered her along before she vanished down the hallway.
070 and his crew hardly slowed at the sinks, treating the blood on their skin like a badge of honour as they admired themselves in the mirror with smug satisfaction before strutting out.
When the door closed behind the last of them, the room fell into a heavy silence, broken only by the steady hiss of the running water.
Gi-hun still hadn’t moved.
He stood with his hands under the running water, shoulders tense and jaw slack. The water carried away the blood in thin pink threads, but he made no effort to scrub or reclaim himself. His eyes were vacant, distant, as if he had stepped outside his body and left it behind.
In-ho remained silent, watching, caught in one of those rare moments where he felt at a complete loss for what to do or say.
Finally, Gi-hun withdrew his hands from the water, flexing his fingers slowly and awkwardly as if he were exploring someone else’s skin. He turned off the faucet, and the ensuing silence was deafening—no splashes, no murmurs of other players moving about, just the suffocating quiet of a bathroom that felt far too large for the two of them.
In-ho had spent hours trying to keep him quiet—but now, with Gi-hun silent at last, the stillness felt grating, almost unbearable.
But when Gi-hun finally broke the silence, In-ho found himself wishing he hadn’t.
“I killed someone.”
In-ho felt the impact settle into his chest, a familiar, tight burn: failure. He had tried to shield him, to control the uncontrollable, and yet here they were.
“You survived,” he replied quietly, his tone almost detached. “Whatever happened… it’s the game’s design, not yours.”
Gi-hun seemed not to hear him. He was lost in thought, staring at his palms as if they still bore the weight of a corpse, as if the blood had seeped deeper than mere skin.
“Was that the first time I killed someone?” he whispered. “It… it didn’t feel like it.”
In-ho chose silence over a lie. It was easier to let the question linger in the air. Gi-hun didn't seem to expect a response anyway; his words tumbled out as if he had no control over them.
“It didn’t feel like it was. I… I saw faces I can’t remember. It feels like I... I killed…”
“You need to push those thoughts aside,” In-ho said carefully, watching the tremor in Gi-hun’s fingers. “Now isn’t the time to dwell. We have to get through the rest of the games. Whatever happens here—whatever you’re feeling—you need to leave it behind and keep moving forward.”
Gi-hun turned to face him, and In-ho caught a flicker of something in his eyes—something other than dull shock—something defiant and familiar. Relief rose up in In-ho’s chest.
“It’s not something you just push aside…!”
In-ho cut him off, his tone sharper now. “Listen to me. Keep your focus on what I tell you to do, and we’ll find a way out of here. You were supposed to stay hidden. You should have avoided the other Players...”
“I was coming back,” Gi-hun interjected, almost defensively. “I didn’t mean to leave you. I was trying to help the other Players... but I lost my way. I was looking for you.”
The words struck somewhere In-ho wasn’t prepared to feel. He cleared his throat to not let it show, and nodded sharply. “Good.”
Gi-hun’s gaze fell again to his hands, fingers twitching over clean skin as if the blood were still there, refusing to let go. “I didn’t realize… how easy it is to become a killer. In the real world, it feels so far away. Something you need to choose to happen. But here…”
In-ho glanced down at his own hands, now white from gripping the sink tightly. “Things are different in the games. You don’t get out of here alive without staining your hands at least once.”
Gi-hun looked up, and for an instant, In-ho felt as if he caught a glimpse of something amnesia had robbed him of—an understanding of the darkness that had dragged them both under, forcing them to breathe in a world that sought to drown them.
“I was right, wasn’t I?” Gi-hun said quietly. “You didn’t start out as the Frontman… you were a Player.”
Yun’s words echoed in In-ho's mind—the dangers of keeping things hidden. Dodging questions from someone like Gi-hun might seem like a way to protect him... but it would never forge trust.
In-ho hesitated, swallowed hard, then replied simply, “Yes.”
Gi-hun’s gaze dropped to the ground, his frown deepening. It was clear that a battle raged inside him, and In-ho found himself wishing he could get a glimpse into those thoughts.
When Gi-hun raised his head again, there it was—that spark—the fire that refused to be extinguished. Just when In-ho thought it had been buried and stifled, there it was—the rebellion, the determination stirring beneath the numbness as if Gi-hun were slowly piecing himself back together. Back to the man who had once torn holes in the system just by existing within it.
“I’m going back out there,” Gi-hun said quietly, but the conviction underlined every word. “I’m going to stop these games.”
The words landed like a bruise, and In-ho felt sorrow instead of the expected anger. Years of telling himself the human psyche was malleable, containable—all of it seemed futile against the certainty burning in Gi-hun’s gaze. No matter how much the setting changed, how motivations shifted, or how many memories were stripped away—Gi-hun would always crawl back toward defiance.
“You won’t be able to stop human nature, Gi-hun,” In-ho sighed. His voice wasn’t even cold anymore—just worn, resigned. “No matter what you do, people are always going to act the way they act. You can’t change that.”
But Gi-hun didn’t waver. Of course he didn’t. His hands were still trembling faintly, but his eyes— that spark flared again, stubborn and unkillable, a vein of defiance In-ho had tried to extinguish and failed. It burned behind Gi-hun’s eyes like a match refusing to gutter in a windstorm.
“Maybe I can’t change everyone,” he admitted, his voice rough but gaining strength with each word, “but I can stop those rich bastards from thinking we’re just their playthings—something they can use, discard, and forget as if we’re nothing. I refuse to just roll over and play their games. I refuse to let them turn me into some... some monster.”
Gi-hun took him in then—not merely looking, but searching him, gaze scraping past the surface like he was trying to pry up buried truths with his bare hands.
“And you…” he began slowly, brows furrowed in that strange, piercing way of his, “I don’t know what your deal is, but—” he swallowed hard, “I can just feel... these games have done something horrible to you, too.”
In-ho held still, but something inside him recoiled, old walls groaning under pressure they weren’t built to withstand.
Gi-hun’s eyes still bore into his. “I know there’s more to you than you’re showing me. When this is over, we will talk. And you… you’ll tell me everything. Even if I have to rip every single answer out of you.”
In-ho felt the old ache settle in his chest. He knew that conversation would never happen. Couldn’t. In-ho could never allow it.
And yet, alongside that hard truth, a sharper one pressed in: Gi-hun would never let this go. No matter how often In-ho begged, manipulated, or ordered, Gi-hun would never return to a life pretending this had never happened.
In-ho will never be able to keep him quiet.