“Does Jung Pilgyu know you’re in the Special Ops Team?”

“Of course he does...!”

But despite her answer, Channa scratched her lips awkwardly.

“My brother-in-law quit the NIS and came into the company with me. But, well, my skills aren’t exactly average, you know? So I said I’d only go wherever paid the most, no matter what.”

“Do you go on a lot of dispatches?”

Channa shook her head.

“Normally I work remotely from the office, but this time I had to bypass a physical security system, so there was no choice.”

By now, they had turned into a narrow alley packed with all kinds of souvenirs.

“Channa, I actually like this company.”

“Do you, really?”

“Yeah. There are way more assholes than I thought, and they do an insane amount of bad things.”

“.......”

“That gives me hope.”

Channa looked at her with an expression like she’d just lost her appetite.

“Your husband used to be an NIS agent. He’d probably hate this.”

“.......”

“How much do you think Kim Hyun would be disgusted by you right now?”

When Seoryeong burst out laughing, as if genuinely delighted, Channa shuddered and turned away in horror.

“Unnie, you’re only pretty when you smile pretty. That laugh? It’s scary,” she muttered, shaking her shoulders.

Seoryeong stifled her laughter and looked off into the distance.

A child carrying a worn basket was following what looked like tourists. The kid was beaming, offering colorful bracelets and chattering to draw their attention.

Maybe about ten years old. The child had bright, clear eyes and wore frayed clothes, but the stitching where they’d been patched was neat, and not a single stain marked them. It struck her—this child was clearly well cared for.

“Where’d you go for your honeymoon, unnie?”

“Ah...”

Channa’s question brought her drifting mind back to focus.

“I went to Jeju Island.”

“......Was it... nice?”

The careful question came under the pretense of clearing her throat. Seoryeong gave a faint, flickering smile.

“There wasn’t a single bad moment, honestly. Not when I was with my husband.”

“.......”

“I don’t know where he’s hiding now, but sometimes... it really feels like he’s right next to me. It’s ridiculous, I know, but... sometimes I really feel it. Am I crazy?”

The laugh burst out when she saw Channa’s solemn face. She’d gone far too quiet.

“Unnie, just don’t believe anything. Not feelings, not instincts, not attraction, not men... Question everything. Even contracts, even compliments. Especially if someone tries to flirt by saying you’re prett—”

“You’re pretty, boss!”

“......!”

Suddenly, a bright and innocent voice cut Channa off.

“You’re pretty!”

The Korean was clumsy, but surprisingly clear. The child who had briefly caught her attention earlier was suddenly right in front of them.

“Channa, what do you do when someone says you’re pretty?”

“...Tell them to go have fun or whatever.”

Channa fanned her hand, muttering “Jesus Christ” under her breath.

Seoryeong bent down to examine the bracelets the child held out.

Polished stones of jade green, soft pink, and coral shimmered with strange beauty. Each was strung together from stones that had been carved and carved again.

And when she noticed the simple little engraving inside, she reached for one.

“......!”

Her expression froze instantly. Her eyes scanned their surroundings, alert and sharpened.

“What is it all of a sudden?”

“I just...”

An unexplainable sense of wrongness crawled over her skin.

How could she describe it...? A sharp, cutting stare like something slicing through flesh. But the split-second sensation vanished into the crowd before she could latch onto it.

Rather than speak, Seoryeong yanked Channa’s arm roughly.

“Let’s go back.”

“Huh?”

“Sorry, but... just go back.”

“Are you okay?”

“.......”

“Unnie, your face is freaking me out right now—you look really bad...”

“It’s just a bad feeling.”

The truth was, she wasn’t okay at all. A cold sweat broke out, and her skin prickled. The fact that there was no concrete reason made it worse.

Clutching Channa tightly, she forced her way back through the crowd.

Behind them, the child called out, “Pretty boss lady!” in a disappointed voice. But at the same time, it felt like she could hear nothing at all. Her senses overloaded. Her vision swam. She couldn’t breathe.

Motorbike engines, languages she couldn’t understand, hawkers shouting over each other—all of it crashed into her ears at once. The sharp spike of her overstimulated nerves made her nauseous.

“.......”

They passed through alleyways so quickly that she barely noticed the occasional sex worker on the streets. Sequined spaghetti-strap tops, tiny hotpants, giggling voices ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) trailing behind them—Seoryeong wiped her clammy neck with the back of her hand.

—All prepped and ready, sir.

—No issues.

—Same here.

Different voices came through the in-ear mic one by one.

Tiang, Blast Corp’s VIP client, was the head of a Thai gang and the biggest drug lord in Asia, moving hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of narcotics annually.

They manufactured industrial-scale drugs in Myanmar and smuggled them through Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macau, South Korea, and Japan, dominating all of East Asia.

Lee Wooshin, while working under contract for Blast Corp, also wore a hidden button camera for his NIS assignment. Every moment was evidence.

Deals like this were how Blast Corp earned enormous profits. It was even possible the company had used inside NIS intel to dodge crackdowns and disrupt enforcement on smuggling sites.

The smuggling would take place early this morning, along the Myanmar–Thailand border.

The Special Security Team’s task was to guard Tiang during the transaction. If the site was unexpectedly exposed and raided, they were to secure escape routes, execute counter-snipers, and extract Tiang safely.

Hearing something like that would make any ordinary person recoil.

Even if one wasn’t a saint, people naturally avoided illegal, dangerous work. Because such power—crude as it may be—could destroy lives in a heartbeat.

By that logic, the owl should’ve reacted the same way.

But instead, she’d said—what? The room was filthy, so she cleaned it?

“.......”

Bringing her along on this overseas dispatch had been intentional.

He wanted her to see with her own eyes that this was a world where morality didn’t apply—so she would quit Blast Corp of her own will.

At first, he used the trip as a bluff, a form of pressure. But getting her to talk had proven harder than expected.

If anything, her wariness had grown. She wouldn’t speak more than three sentences at a time. He’d thought bringing her to a dangerous place might make her more compliant.

During their marriage, she’d been delicate, dependent, and anxious—someone he assumed he could still control like before.

But that illusion shattered in a single conversation. She was only soft and kind when it came to “Kim Hyun.”

When he saw her casually seduce a man during the labor protest, Wooshin had decided: she had to be removed.

The old mission he’d shredded in the paper shredder could not be allowed to interfere with his current operation. He couldn’t let her keep hovering in front of him—a silent warning rang in his mind. That thought only grew more obsessive and rigid.

So he brought her on this Thailand assignment with clear purpose. And yet she wasn’t afraid. She didn’t recoil. She simply did what needed to be done, expressionless. That quietness—it unsettled him.

“Seven minutes, max.”

A young voice snapped him out of his spiral.

Wooshin looked down at Heo Channa, who had a flashlight clamped between her teeth as she worked on dismantling the security unit.

The Special Security Team had broken into the house of Tiang’s long-time subordinate before heading to the border zone at dawn. It was part of their premium customer service: gathering internal intel about possible faction disputes or surveillance.

But with an isolated intranet in place, they couldn’t access the data from outside. The only way was for Channa to physically enter the server room and hack it herself.

At last, a metal panel clattered loose, revealing two terminal ports.

“You’re the one who dug up the info on the guy who ran off with Han Seoryeong’s money, right?”

“......!”

Channa froze with her laptop halfway out of her bag.

“Well... it’s not like I did anything bad.”

“The bad stuff is what we’re doing right now.”

“.......”

“Did Han Seoryeong ever show signs of serious alcohol dependence in the last few months?”

“Huh?”

Channa turned to look at him as she connected a black cable to the terminal. In the dark, his pale face stood out, blank and unreadable—so cold it gave her chills.