Seojoon's pov)
The morning after the storm, the city woke up to the smell of damp earth and cold wind.
The sky was still pale, heavy with clouds that hadn't decided whether to rain again.
I stood at the edge of the park, hands buried deep in my coat pockets, watching a few leaves spin down the path.
The message Minji sent last night had been short and oddly polite.
'Tomorrow. 10 a.m. at the old park near the river. Don't be late.'
No explanation. No warmth.
But something in the tone told me this wasn't just another talk about the past — this was where our revenge began.
I spotted her sitting on a bench near the pond, her posture perfect as always, a pair of sunglasses shielding her eyes and her long blue hair tied in a braid.
Even dressed simply — beige coat, black scarf — she still looked like she belonged to another world.
The world Taejun Kang had built.
And the one we were about to tear apart.
When I approached, she didn't look up right away.
Only when I stopped beside her did she say,
"Right on time. You haven't changed much."
"I could say the same about you," I said quietly, sitting beside her.
Minji smiled faintly, but it didn't reach her eyes.
For a while, we just watched the pond together — the ducks gliding across the gray water, children laughing in the distance.
It was almost peaceful, in the most cruel way.
Finally, she spoke.
"I've been thinking about what you said last night — about revenge."
I turned slightly. "And?"
She took off her sunglasses, revealing tired eyes rimmed red from sleeplessness.
"I thought of an evil plan," she said. "I want him stripped of everything. I want Taejun to watch the empire he built rot from the inside."
The name — Taejun — rolled off her tongue like venom.
I realized then she never called him Kang when she spoke to me.
It was always Taejun.
Maybe it made him sound smaller. More human. Easier to hate.
"You're sure you can handle what comes after?" I asked softly.
"If he finds out—"
"He won't," she cut in sharply. "Not until it's too late."
She reached into her bag, pulling out a thin folder and handing it to me.
Inside were printed reports — company ledgers, stock performance charts, and an internal memo from Kang Industries.
I frowned, flipping through them.
"How did you get these?"
Her lips curved. "I may be his wife, but I'm not blind. He keeps everything locked away in his study. Passwords, files, contacts. And men like Taejun…" — she paused — "…they always underestimate us male omegas they've destroyed."
There was a strange, cold pride in her tone that made my stomach twist.
"This isn't just about money," I murmured.
"No," she said. "It's about image. He's a man built on reputation. Take that away, and he crumbles."
I met her gaze. "You've thought this through."
"Every detail," she said quietly. "But I need your help for one thing."
Her hand brushed mine on the folder. "You knew people before… the ones he used to 'borrow' from, didn't you? The debtors?"
My chest tightened. "Yes."
"Find them," she said. "Find anyone he's stepped on, anyone who'd want to see him fall. If we can make his shareholders doubt him, if his reputation cracks—"
"—the rest will collapse on its own," I finished.
She nodded. "Exactly."
We sat in silence again, the weight of what we were planning hanging between us.
Then she looked away, whispering,
"I don't care if I lose everything. I just want him to lose first."
I stared at her profile — calm, composed, but the smallest tremor in her fingers betrayed the truth.
She wasn't calm at all.
She was unraveling — slowly, beautifully, dangerously.
Later.
We moved from the bench to a narrower path beneath a stand of bare trees. The air tasted of wet leaves and something like possibility — dangerous, electric. Minji folded the folder back into her bag with careful hands, as if she were putting a scalpel away after surgery.
"Names," she said before I could ask. "Who do you remember that he stepped on? Who would enjoy watching him fall?"
I blinked. The question felt like someone asking me to light a match in a room full of dry paper.
"There's the broker, Lee Han-su. Taejun ruined his fund two years ago when he shifted a merger. Han-su's creditors still whisper about it." I named another or two — small people Kang had used and discarded, contractors who'd been paid late, one temp agency that lost clients after Kang stole a contract. "They're all petty in their own ways, but if we push the right button…"
Minji nodded once, hard. "We don't need all of them. We need the one who will refuse to be quiet. The one with teeth." She tapped the folder, eyes on me. "And you said you knew someone on the inside at Kang Industries — someone who resents him. Can you reach them?"
I thought of old favors and older debts. I thought of the nights I'd kept my mouth shut for the sake of survival. The idea of calling any of those ghosts made my skin prickle, but the anger that had lived under my ribs for years flickered, willing.
"I can try," I said. "But it'll take time. And we'll need proof — something concrete the board can't ignore. Leaks. A paper trail." My voice surprised me; it sounded steadier than I felt.
Minji's gaze sharpened. "Then we make a trail. Small at first — a rumor seeded in the right ear, an anonymous tip to a financial journalist, a ledger planted where the auditors can find it. Make them look twice. Once shareholders see a wobble, panic spreads faster than truth."
She spoke like she'd rehearsed it all in her head until the outline was a weapon. And maybe she had. Maybe nights at Kang's kitchen table, watching him eat as if he hadn't taken everything, had given her a long, cold rehearsal.
We argued the shape of it out loud. Planting distrust without being traced. How to prod Lee Han-su into going public without making it look like a coordinated attack. How to use a shareholder meeting — the right projection, the right question — to make a mole squirm. It was tactical, sterile, strangely intimate: two ruined people arranging the bones of someone else's ruin.
"I can't be reckless," she said. "If he suspects, he'll bury me. He'll destroy anything I've built that could help us."
I couldn't look at her then. She was an exposed thing — fierce and fragile at once.
"Do you—" I started.
"—want me to call him?" she finished for me. "Yes." Her hand closed on the strap of her bag. "I need to speak to him first. Throw him off. See if his guard is down. If he's careless tonight, we learn something. If he's sharp, we wait."
She looked at me, steady as a blade. "If I sound weak, if I cry, you have to pretend you don't hear it. If I sound fine, you have to back me up. We play our parts."
I swallowed. "And if he asks about you being at that café? If he wonders why you're back late?"
"Lie," she said. "Say I had a client meeting. Say the corporate tax filings took longer. Make it boring. Make him believe the small, boring version of me. He will never suspect the bored housewife of plotting anything sharp."
She pulled her phone from her bag. The screen lit her face in a pale rectangle. For the first time since we'd started, I saw her hesitate. That one strong omega who'd been steady in the café now looked like someone about to step off a ledge. For a second I almost offered to take the call for her, to play the passive role she wanted me to, to be the coward so she wouldn't have to be brave.
She dialed.
Her voice on the first ring was paper-thin. I wanted to tell her to hang up, to run. But she didn't. She waited until the click of a familiar connection sounded, and then she said, carefully casual, "Taejun? I'm home later than thought. We need to talk."
The voice on the other end — my hand clenched so tight I thought I'd break my nails — answered with that smooth control I've heard for years, the voice that commands conference rooms and dinner tables the same way. "Are you with the child? Is something wrong?"
Minji's fingers tightened around the phone. For a heartbeat she almost broke. I could see the old fear rise in her throat like bile.
"No," she said, steadying her voice. "Everything is fine." She smoothed the lie like a practiced seam. "I was delayed. I had to do something for the charity. I'll be home soon."
A short silence. The sound of chairs scraping, the distant echo of footsteps. "Bring me some documents when you get back. Important. The board will want numbers."
That last phrase — the board will want numbers — made something in me twist. She recovered smoothly. "Of course," she said.
He added, unnecessarily, "Don't be out late. You know I don't like it."
Minji's hand trembled as she ended the call. For a long time we sat in the hollow between one lie and the next, both of us hearing the click still ringing in our bones.
"You played it perfect," I told her. It came out like a prayer and a verdict at the same time.
She gave a small, humorless laugh. "I've learned how to play parts." Then she slid her phone back into her bag and closed it with a soft, resolute motion. "Now you call the others. Tonight, quietly. Once one man whispers, the rest will listen."
I nodded. In my head I started a list — Han-su, the temp agency manager, a junior auditor I half-remembered at Kang Industries who'd once been demoted for questioning Taejun's numbers. The names were scavengers; they'd feed.
As we stood to leave the park, the pond behind us seemed darker, like the world had lowered itself to hear what we were about to do. Minji straightened her coat and for an instant — as she pulled the scarf around her throat — she looked almost like the woman she'd been before the bruises: composed, impossible, and dangerous.
We walked back toward the street, and the city's ordinary noise swallowed our footsteps.
But even as we moved among the crowd, the plan had made the world feel smaller, close, conspiratorial. Like the space between us and them had narrowed.
When we reached the corner, Minji stopped and looked at me, eyes clear.
"Tonight," she said softly, "you make the calls. I'll set a dinner tomorrow with one of his directors — public enough to be noticed. We tilt the first stone."
I didn't realize I was holding my breath.
She smiled — a small, quick thing that didn't reach her eyes. "And Seojoon?" she added.
"Yes?" I said.
"If anything goes wrong," she whispered, "you disappear for a while. Don't be here. He's sharper than you think."
The word disappear felt like an order and a benediction. Fear and relief braided in my gut.
I nodded. "Understood."
We parted then, each moving into the streets with the fragile armor of our plans. I walked back toward the part of the city where I'd spent years keeping my head down, and Minji walked toward her gilded cage.
As I turned the corner, my phone vibrated — an unknown number. I almost didn't answer, but curiosity, or fate, or some quieter madness made me pick up.
A text blinked on the screen: "Be careful. He's watching more closely than usual."
No signature. No sender.
I folded the phone into my palm and felt the world tilt. Someone else was already moving their piece. The plan had teeth I hadn't accounted for.