Evening had fully fallen, and the three of them sat around a shabby pojangmacha (street stall) near the police station. Under the streetlamp's glow, steam curled up from the fish cake broth, the warm scent teasing their hunger.
Yoon Tae-sik topped off his glass and raised it high, calling out in a mischievous tone, "A toast—to us, who made it back alive!" He widened his eyes in exaggerated comic flair as he hoisted his glass.
Choi Do-yoon, a tired smile on his face, clinked his glass against Yoon's. "We really... all made it out alive," he said softly. At those words, Jung Hae-jun silently lifted his own glass in agreement.
Bitter soju burned down their throats, and all three grimaced in unison. Even that reaction felt like a small ritual to wash away the day's exhaustion.
After a few moments, as a slight buzz from the alcohol set in, Yoon Tae-sik was the first to speak quietly. "To be honest... I was really scared last night." In the tiny tent on the corner of a busy street, the air suddenly grew heavy with his admission.
Yoon fidgeted with his cup and continued, "When we were caught in those hallucinations... I was so afraid we'd actually end up shooting each other. That scared me more than anything." His voice quivered. At that, Choi Do-yoon's eyes widened in surprise, turning toward Yoon.
Yoon managed a bitter smile and shook his head. "Ah, I shouldn't be saying this and killing the mood, right?" he added, attempting to laugh it off.
Choi Do-yoon set down his glass and responded quietly, "No, I felt the same. Back then... I almost pulled the trigger without realizing you were right beside me." He paused, then admitted in a hushed tone, "Honestly, my hands are still trembling a bit."
Jung Hae-jun listened to them in silence, remaining at the table. Hearing his teammates lay bare their feelings made his chest ache.
Yoon Tae-sik lifted his gaze, guilt written on his face, and looked at Choi. "Detective Choi... you must have been terrified when I had my gun pointed at you. I'm sorry."
Choi quickly shook his head, a faint smile on his lips. "When you played that recording of the monster's scream on your phone, Detective Yoon... honestly, I was impressed. You must've been scared out of your mind, yet you still had the presence of mind to do that…."
Yoon's face flushed, and he hurriedly waved off the compliment. "Aw, that was nothing… it just popped into my head at the right moment. Truth be told, my legs were shaking like crazy…" He let his words trail off with a self-deprecating sigh.
Their eyes met, and a faint laugh escaped both men. In that gentle laughter was relief and reassurance, and a newfound trust born from surviving a night of horrors together.
"Good work, all of you," Jung Hae-jun said quietly. Yoon and Choi turned toward him as he spoke. He took a slow breath, then met their eyes. "If it weren't for you two... I could never have done it alone." It was a simple, heartfelt truth.
At that, Yoon Tae-sik vigorously shook his head. "No, Captain—don't say that! We only made it through because you led us." Choi Do-yoon nodded in firm agreement. "That's right. You never gave up until the very end."
But Jung Hae-jun only shook his head with a faint smile. "No... I never said it out loud, but I know the truth. I know you were afraid, yet you held out to the end. Thank you."
Yoon Tae-sik's eyes suddenly grew red. He quickly turned aside, bringing his cup to his lips to hide the tears threatening to spill. Choi Do-yoon wordlessly tilted back his own glass. The words they couldn't speak aloud floated between them, dissolving into the soju.
Before long, the heavy atmosphere lifted, and lighthearted jokes began to flow inside the stall. Red-faced from drink, Yoon Tae-sik grinned and teased, "You know, Detective Choi—when you fell into that sewer water, the look on your face was priceless."
Choi Do-yoon shot back immediately, "And you, Detective Yoon—screaming your head off like that... you looked like some kind of goofy astronaut."
Jung Hae-jun listened to their banter and couldn't help a quiet chuckle. His soft laughter drifted out of the pojangmacha, seeping into the city night. Bit by bit, the night grew deeper, and in the place where the dreadful red mist had lifted, small jokes and the rhythms of ordinary life were finally returning.
As they passed the soju around for one last round, Jung Hae-jun suddenly became aware of the hard shape of the red crystal shard tucked in his pocket. The realization made him slowly rise to his feet. "I should get going," he murmured.
Yoon Tae-sik glanced at his watch and nodded. "Alright. We should probably wrap up, too." Choi Do-yoon quickly slurped down the last of his broth and got up from his seat as well.
After settling the bill, the three of them stepped out of the stall. They walked together to the mouth of a side street where each would head their separate ways home, and there they came to a stop. Under the pale glow of a streetlamp, Yoon Tae-sik bowed deeply. "Captain, you worked really hard today. Get some rest when you get home."
Choi Do-yoon smiled and bowed as well. "Yes, sir. Please rest well tonight—sleep tight!"
Despite the weariness in his eyes, Jung Hae-jun returned their bows with a warm smile. "Alright. You two get home safe. See you tomorrow."
With that, Yoon Tae-sik and Choi Do-yoon each disappeared into the night, heading opposite ways. Even after their figures vanished around the corner, Jung Hae-jun remained standing there for a long moment. The reality that the case was finally over began to sink in… yet in one corner of his heart, an inexplicable emptiness and anxiety were taking root.
He drew in a slow breath and touched the red shard in his pocket with his fingertips. The cool, solid feel of it pressed against his skin. Is it really all over now…? he wondered, but no answer came.
He didn't head home. Guided by the nagging unease in his gut, Jung Hae-jun instead found himself walking back toward the police headquarters. He moved quietly through the late-night city—streetlights casting a cold glow on the pavement, the sounds of traffic growing ever more distant. Though the incident was over, the anxiety in his heart refused to fade. Following that feeling, he eventually stepped into the darkened first-floor hallway of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency building.
* * *
Late that night, the Seoul Metropolitan Police building was sunk in silence. In the deserted corridor, motion-sensor lights clicked on and off with each of his steps.
Jung Hae-jun walked slowly on, passing the familiar Major Crimes office with a warm canned coffee he'd pulled from a vending machine. Now that the tension of the day had finally released, a wave of exhaustion pricked at his eyes. He paused for a moment by a window and gazed out. The city lights sprawled below were as bright as ever, but to Hae-jun they felt strangely distant and unreal.
"Long night, ain't it, Detective Jung."
A voice suddenly spoke up from behind, startling Hae-jun enough that he nearly dropped his coffee. He spun around in alarm.
In a shadowy corner of the corridor stood a man with a tangled beard and a battered old jumper. He looked like a homeless drifter, but the gleam in his eyes was anything but ordinary. It was none other than Fog.
Jung Hae-jun's eyes widened. "So you've shown up again... What's your game this time?" he demanded warily.
Fog gave a faint smile and jammed his hands into his jumper pockets.
"I know exactly what's gnawin' at your mind, Detective," he drawled. "That name... Lee Seo-ha. In the end, everything's gonna lead right to her."
Hae-jun instinctively glanced around. A disheveled, homeless-looking man appearing out of nowhere in the police HQ hallway would be hard to explain if a colleague happened by. At the same time, that uncanny aura that always accompanied Fog prickled at Hae-jun's nerves.
"You're right—Lee Seo-ha… that name kept coming back to me," Hae-jun said, his voice low and tense. "We didn't exactly stop the Specter itself, but thanks to that name, I could put a few puzzle pieces together." As he spoke, his jaw tightened at the memory of the crimson fragment. "And... we found this there…."
Hae-jun reached into the inner pocket of his jacket and pulled out a small evidence bag, holding it up for Fog to see. Inside the clear plastic, the red crystal shard glinted with an icy light. "This fragment with the star-shaped pattern—what the hell is it? Who's behind all of this?" he demanded. His eyes were fixed on Fog, sharp as blades.
Fog arched his eyebrows but made no move to take the bag. Instead, he waved a hand dismissively. "Whoa there. Ya'd best be careful with that thing. Go messin' with it too freely, an' it might just put you under its spell."
Hae-jun flinched at Fog's ominous tone, but he only gripped the evidence bag tighter.
"Cut the riddles and tell me right now," he growled. "The truth. Everything you know." His breath came short and rough; desperation tightened his voice, but his gaze remained locked and unwavering.
Fog lifted one corner of his mouth in a crooked smirk and murmured as if reciting an old verse, "That crimson star mark... it's the sign of an ancient curse, an ill-fated bond from long ago."
Hae-jun's breath caught, and in that moment Fog's gaze turned distant and melancholy.
"Someone hiding in the red mist is starting to show their true colors," Fog went on, his tone eerily calm. "The Hallucination Ghost was merely a shadow of that figure." His words—colored by that lilting provincial drawl of his—echoed with an uncanny eeriness in the empty hallway.
Jung Hae-jun took a step closer, pressing him urgently. "Who is it you're talking about? And… where is Lee Seo-ha?"
Fog met Hae-jun's stare directly.
At that exact moment, the air in the corridor turned biting cold, and several of the fluorescent lights flickered out one by one. In the dimness, Fog's silhouette seemed to waver, hovering in midair.
"Detective Jung," Fog intoned, his low voice drifting through the darkness. "If you intend to chase the truth, you'd best steel yourself. There are far scarier things watchin' you from back there in the dark."
He jerked his chin toward the far end of the corridor, where the shadows gathered thick beyond the reach of light. Hae-jun's eyes followed instinctively. He saw nothing—only an empty hallway swallowed in shadow. A cold sweat prickled down his spine.
He was about to turn back when Fog's voice came again from behind him, a final word of warning: "Find Lee Seo-ha... that's the key to calling the dawn."
Startled, Jung Hae-jun whirled around. "What do you kn—" he began, "what do you know about Lee Seo–"
But Fog was already gone. In the span of a breath, the corridor was empty, as if he had never been there at all. Only silence and emptiness surrounded Hae-jun.
Jung Hae-jun stood rooted to the spot, his face grim and his heart pounding. The can of coffee clutched in his hand had long grown cold.
* * *
Hae-jun let out a long breath and began walking slowly down the corridor. The place where Fog had vanished—and the words he had left behind—floated through Hae-jun's mind. "Red star mark… someone hiding… find Lee Seo-ha…." Each phrase bristled with foreboding.
He closed his hand around the red crystal shard in his pocket once more. For an instant, he could almost see that star-shaped pattern throbbing with faint light before his eyes.
Stepping out of the building, he was met with a gust of cool night air. Jung Hae-jun paused and looked up at the sky. It was a starless night, yet he had the uneasy feeling that invisible eyes were watching him from somewhere above. In that moment of lingering dread, it finally dawned on him—the long, long night had come to an end. The frenzied night of mist was over at last.
But where the mist had lifted, unsolved riddles and lingering darkness remained. Jung Hae-jun grit his teeth and steadied himself. When dawn comes, we start again. The "real enemy" they had yet to encounter was still out there, lying in wait in the darkness.
He slowly started walking. His solitary figure stretched as a forlorn shadow under the streetlights as he left the darkened police headquarters behind. Beyond the moonless sky, from some unseen place, it seemed he could catch the faintest whiff of red mist drifting past. Hae-jun suddenly turned back, but the cold night air behind him was silent and empty. Still, his instincts whispered that beyond that veil of darkness, a new threat was quietly drawing near. The opening act of a story that was not yet over was already stirring once again in the shadows….