Younger Sister
Ri Su-jin, the sex broker who had been supplying foreign prostitutes to Annam, Siheung, Hwaseong, and Suwon.
She hadn't been the only one dragged down into the abyss with her.
"You think I'm gonna die alongside Manager Ri? Just you wait and see!"
On a rainy pre-dawn morning, Heo Soon-ja—one of Ri Su-jin's closest compatriots—slipped into a container yard to hide.
A veteran brothel worker since the 2000s, she was technically Ri Su-jin's senior by experience alone.
Heo Soon-ja crept between the pallets, her senses sharp, scanning the area. A moment later, she emerged clutching a velvet pouch wrapped in plastic.
"Found it…!"
She opened the pouch with a face alight with relief.
Inside: rolled bundles of cash, a cold wallet holding roughly 100 million won in stablecoins, and twenty prepaid travel vouchers that could be sold immediately at 95 percent of face value.
It was her emergency stash—saved specifically for a situation like this.
She was in the middle of fleeing.
Her plan had been to help Ri Su-jin, who had safely crossed into Yanbian, wrap up the Korean operations in her stead. But the moment that bitch had stepped off the boat, she'd probably been grabbed by the public security bureau.
Her object of loyalty was gone.
"I gotta stay alive too, right?"
Heo Soon-ja muttered as she crawled out from between the pallets.
She did feel sorry for Ri Su-jin, in a way. The woman had worked hard—truly hard. She'd paid her underlings well.
But in Heo Soon-ja's eyes, Ri Su-jin was already a woman who couldn't survive anymore. How could someone pinned to the front page of Renmin Ribao for trafficking minors possibly make it? A lot of the girls had already been caught.
She was confident she could survive on her own. But—
"This is Incheon Coast Guard. Identify yourself and raise your hands."
"Who the hell is it?"
"Heo Soon-ja. You are being arrested for violations of the Act on the Prevention of Money Laundering and the Management of Criminal Proceeds, and for participation in a criminal organization."
"No way. My fate is just fucking rotten."
Waiting for her as she crawled out was the police.
Of course, she wasn't the only one caught. Most of Ri Su-jin's organization members—those who had followed her to China, and those who had realized too late that they were truly finished and tried to bolt—had already been picked off.
It was the result of a full-scale operation by the NIS and police, who had missed the main target and were now going after everyone else. Heo Soon-ja laughed nervously as she complied with the arrest.
"I wasn't following that bitch, you know."
She regretted her loyalty to Ri Su-jin only after it was too late.
Alongside Heo Soon-ja, people of various nationalities were swept up.
"I don't know anything! I was just working as an interpreter here!"
"Ms. Sokchanna? We're executing a search warrant."
"That evil manager told me to do everything!"
"But your name is listed on the signature line of the local certification documents in Cambodia. That makes you an accomplice under the Immigration Control Act."
"Really?"
Sokchanna, a Cambodian interpreter for K-International Marriage, clamped her mouth shut.
The charges themselves were minor—at worst, a deferred prosecution. The real problem was visa revocation and deportation.
As she sniffled, the face of her boyfriend—the one she lived with—flashed in her mind. Her first boyfriend. His innocent face.
They had been each other's first. The precious man she still slept cuddled against every night.
Their visas expired around the same time, so they'd planned to get married as soon as they returned to Cambodia. But now—what would happen?
Sokchanna's vision blurred with despair.
But, thankfully—
"It's not just you, Sokchanna. We can get through this together."
"Pitment…?"
"Yeah. I'm scared too, but we're going together."
Her devoted boyfriend gripped her hand tightly. If you get deported, he said, I'll go to Cambodia with you.
Sokchanna held his hand, tears welling in her eyes. Because of that evil manager, she'd been put in a dangerous situation. She couldn't earn money anymore. But she told herself it wasn't all the worst thing in the world.
Thanks to her boyfriend, she could at least manage a smile.
But there were people who had no hope at all.
"Where the hell am I supposed to get prostitutes now?"
"Manager…"
"Ri Su-jin, that bitch, clearly promised me… fifteen girls by next May… five of them elite-class! I signed the contract and paid 600 million won in advance… what happens to that!!"
The lament of a brothel owner who had paid Ri Su-jin 600 million won upfront for prostitutes.
Honestly, Ri Su-jin's offer had been incredibly tempting. The five elite-class girls—just looking at their profiles, you could tell these women would make serious money. Ari, a 172cm tall Korean-Chinese former hotel employee; Natalia, a Ukrainian blonde who spoke Korean; Pai, a Thai woman with G-cup breasts who seemed destined to be the ace of the house…
But every prostitute he had been promised was part of Ri Su-jin's scam.
The 600 million won advance had vanished into thin air. The labor supply had become opaque. He was so stressed he couldn't sleep, and now there was a hole for fifteen girls—just one or two missing arrival dates would have been bad enough. The owner was drinking whiskey by the bottle, unable to believe this miserable, heartbreaking reality.
"Fucking Chinese bitch!"
That's why you don't trust Korean-Chinese people.
Thankfully, it wasn't total ruin. But the brothel owners of Annam and Siheung—those who had been introduced to Korean-Chinese and Southeast Asian girls through Ri Su-jin—were all screaming in unison.
Especially the owners who had been burned right before Ri Su-jin fled to China. They were completely broken.
Ri Su-jin hadn't just been a broker. She had been the hub of the sex market—handling the supply chain, the currency exchange routes, and even arranging sham marriages.
The sex industry in Annam and its surrounding cities was in a state of panic.
The chat of brothel owners worried about the collapsed supply chain—no new prostitutes coming in, overstayers fleeing.
The paying customers were mostly unhappy too. "If you're paying 180,000 won, why eat Korean-Chinese girls?" "Same quality, harsher rotation, the girls are in bad shape." "Running full-house shifts, the girls' service is shit." "I just pick one girl and go steady, so I'm fine. You guys are just being cheap."
Everyone connected to the sex industry was suffering.
And among them, a portion—well, actually, more than a portion. The number was still growing.
In any case, there was one target for the workers' resentment.
"Ri Su-min. What the hell is that bitch doing now?"
The only family member of the Prostitute Queen Ri Su-jin.
Ri Su-jin had fled to China and been caught, yet this suspicious woman was still holding onto her police position.
Ri Su-min, the naturalized police officer.
It had already been ten days since her sister was arrested.
Ri Su-min had become afraid to check her smartphone. There were simply too many people harassing her.
She checked her phone, thinking, It can't be this one.
As expected, a veiled threat.
Ri Su-min wasn't surprised anymore. Since it was sent anonymously, this one was at least on the mild side.
There were plenty who threatened her far more bluntly.
You pay your sister's debt. Work at our brothel as compensation. If we tag you as "Spy Sister + New Face," you could easily pull 25 a month. At least you're presentable enough to use. Let's schedule an interview soon…
Crazy bastards.
Every time Ri Su-min encountered these disgusting threats, she shivered.
Work at a brothel… do what? Is that something you say to a police officer?
It was true that Ri Su-min was relatively familiar with the sex industry because of her sister's business. But she had never even imagined living as a prostitute.
Not even now, with her sister caught in China.
"That's not going to happen… never."
Ri Su-min had already lost a lot.
Right after her sister was arrested, she had been transferred to the Gyeonggi Southern Police Agency Training Center—essentially a standby order.
It wasn't just her career that was ruined. Her real estate was frozen under seizure preservation, and the account she used to receive allowance from her sister was frozen too.
Life without a guardian was harsher than she'd imagined.
She couldn't quite grasp it yet, but it would become more tangible with time. The life of an ordinary police officer scraping by on a net salary of 2.8 million won…
She hated it.
"Sigh."
What Ri Su-min thought of was her sister.
For over a decade, her sister had been her guardian, her fence, her provider.
Was she being tortured right now? Or just… questioned?
One worthless guy had said, "Your sister might become a mystery soon," but surely not that far.
In any case, it had been a fall too rapid to process.
But Ri Su-min wanted to believe it wasn't all bad.
If her sister had safely settled in Yanbian and become a mastermind behind the scenes… Ri Su-min would probably have been torn apart, caught between the NIS and her sister.
But Ri Su-jin had fallen completely. Her threat was gone.
At least… I don't have to worry about her dying?
The brothel owners whining about their ruined lives could be ignored. She needed to stay vigilant, but for now, she was still an active-duty police officer.
Everything was fine, except for the tightness in her chest whenever she thought of her sister, and the nagging doubt about whether betrayal had really been the right choice.
"Sigh."
Ri Su-min had finished her job training for the day and was on her way home.
These days, she lived in a goshi-tele in Suwon, near her transfer assignment.
She'd moved out of the officetel her sister had bought for her because too many Korean-Chinese people kept coming to complain. The cramped space made her think of too many things when she lay down—especially the goshiwon she'd lived in with her sister when they first came to Korea, which made her hate it even more.
She was considering stopping by a café instead, when—
"Officer Ri Su-min."
A man's voice rang in her ear.
Ri Su-min froze where she stood.
She knew exactly who owned that voice.
The man who had tracked her sister all the way to China under the bizarre status of "civilian informant." Unlike her sister, he had returned alone and unscathed.
That voice's owner was also another reason Ri Su-min had moved to Suwon.
She never wanted to see that man again.
So she had accepted the transfer to the Gyeonggi Southern Police Agency without complaint and buried herself in a goshi-tele near the assignment location.
"Joo Sung-hyun."
Suwon was far too close a city to the terrible man who had chased her sister all the way to China.
Ri Su-min stared blankly in my direction.
Maybe she was startled—she didn't even look at the old iPhone 6s in my hand.
One of the spoils I had secured before handing Ri Su-jin over to the public security bureau. Besides emergency contacts, it held a lot of information.
I showed it to her, wondering if she'd recognize it, but Ri Su-min looked dazed. Her face seemed a bit thinner, as if she'd been through a lot of emotional strain since her sister's fate was sealed.
But nothing would change.
"I saw your sister off properly."
I needed to finish up the 999's younger sister before I could comfortably return to my normal life.
For now, I was thinking about taking Ri Su-min's virginity today.