"You're being transferred."
The words came like a knock to the chest.
Ji-hoon followed silently, past the same pale green walls, the buzz of fluorescent lights, the echo of footsteps that now felt like his own shadow.
After Yangpyeong. After Afterlife. After the raid.
Now this.
He expected Park Seo-yeon. But another woman waited. Cold, sharp eyes. A different energy.
"I'm Prosecutor Kim," she said. "Special Investigations Unit. I'll be taking over your case."
Why now?
She slid a photo across the table. The prison visitor's room. A guard in the background. A familiar face.
"We don't know who he is," she said. "He doesn't exist in the system."
Su-yeon's plant.
"I think you do know," she added.
Ji-hoon stayed still. Calm.
You've played this game before.
Then—she said it. The name. Afterlife.
So she knows.
"Some of us have been tracking them for years," she said. "The disappearances. The experiments. The third consciousness."
Ji-hoon's heart pounded. But the third self? It listened. Still. Watching.
"You want me to talk," he said.
"I want you to help me find Min-ho and Su-yeon before Afterlife does."
"Why should I?"
"Because they're about to start the first procedure."
"What procedure?"
"One that removes the third consciousness completely."
Ji-hoon went cold.
"Their first subject," she said softly, "is Lee Su-yeon."
→ [To be continued in Episode 34]
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