Aftershock (3)

Nearly a month had already passed since the New Year arrived.

Haa—

The breath leaving her lips still hung sharp and white in the air. The cold, it seemed, had no intention of letting go anytime soon.

Baek Yi-seo was in an excellent mood on her way home from work. The reason was simple: two dramas currently tearing through the ratings charts.

"What am I watching tonight?"

Even though the genres sat at opposite ends of the spectrum, the happy dilemma alone was enough to put a smile on her face.

She wanted to catch both live. The problem was that the two shows started at exactly the same time. So her method never changed.

Watch the romance first. Then catch the crime thriller the moment it uploaded.

It was the only way to see both as fast as humanly possible. Baek Yi-seo did it that way, and so did plenty of other people.

Still, tonight carried an extra weight of anticipation. Forest of Crime had dropped a massive piece of bait — and the press had already run with it.

Gil Ara's acting controversy. And the death flag that followed.

What would happen?

Would Lee Eun-ju die?

Or would Lee Seo-jun pull off a dramatic rescue?

Nobody knew yet. It would all come out soon enough. But she could at least make a guess, right?

The analysis post circulating through the communities had struck Baek Yi-seo as pretty convincing. Gil Ara was far too valuable a character to burn through so early. If Baek Yi-seo had been the writer, she would have twisted herself into knots trying to keep her in the story longer.

But the writer of Forest of Crime hadn't done that. Or maybe — couldn't.

Three episodes so far. Lee Eun-ju's total screen time: roughly ten minutes. She would probably die tonight, just like everyone expected. A classic cliché — sacrificed to the plot, becoming the catalyst for Lee Seo-jun's awakening.

She got home, showered, and waited. Before long, Baek Yi-seo was staring at the pre-broadcast commercials. Her choice, in the end, was KBC's I Love You Who Loves Me.

Forest of Crime could wait. She always watched it right after anyway.

Phone in hand, she tapped along with the live chat flooding in real time.

This was how she made the same content even more fun — sharing real-time reactions to every scene as it happened.

She could also track the other show's pulse in real time — ready to flip channels at a moment's notice. But that was a problem for later.

Bracing herself against the incoming wave of secondhand butterflies, Baek Yi-seo steeled her heart.

She sank so deep into the drama that checking her phone never even crossed her mind.

"Wall slam!!!"

An unexpected accident had forced Yoon Bin into an unintentional wall slam. Their faces hung barely an inch apart. Two people frozen mid-gaze — somewhere between panic and butterflies. Closer to butterflies, if you had to pick.

That ambiguous feeling punched straight through the screen and flooded the room in soft pink light.

Ah!

And then the mid-episode commercial hit. The timing was almost insulting.

Baek Yi-seo grabbed her phone. Now came her favorite part — sharing the emotional wreckage of what she'd just watched with everyone else.

The chat, which had been relatively calm, erupted the second the commercial break hit. Baek Yi-seo rode the wave of shared euphoria for a short while. The afterglow of those butterflies still hadn't faded — but she had something more urgent to check.

The pulse of the neighborhood next door.

"I wonder how it's going over there?"

She didn't want spoilers, but she wasn't allergic to them either. So she opened the Forest of Crime live chat just to get a read on the atmosphere.

And what she found was an ocean of question marks.

"What the hell?"

The chat was pure chaos. She couldn't get a read on anything. Under normal circumstances, abandoning a drama mid-episode was unthinkable. But this time, curiosity crushed conviction. If it turned out to be nothing, she could always flip back.

She picked up the remote and changed the channel. Commercials were still running on that side too.

"What on earth is going on?"

Judging by the reactions, every prediction she'd made was worthless.

Countless question marks still ruled the chat. Then the commercials ended, and Forest of Crime resumed.

Shhhk—shhhk—

The sound of a blade being sharpened. And then a beautiful woman appeared on screen.

"Uh……? Holy shit."

Forest of Crime began under a mountain of expectation.

A dark night. Inside a hair salon, Lee Hyeon-woo was drinking the coffee Lee Eun-ju had brought him.

Everyday conversation between Lee Eun-ju and Lee Hyeon-woo continued. Lee Seo-jun's character made a sweet, awkward play for her attention.

The viewers felt a deeper pang of pity. But that feeling never had a chance to land — the scene cut away.

The interrogation room.

"Heh heh heh……. Detective. Want me to tell you something fun?"

Yoon Seung-ho suddenly started rolling up his clothes.

"Here."

First, he pointed to his thigh.

"Here."

Second, somewhere between his collarbone and chest.

"And here."

Last, the back of his own hand.

"Khhheheheheheheh……!"

"Khhheheh. Know who did this? That bastard did it!!! That bastard stabbed me!!!"

The roughly treated scars carried every ounce of the pain he'd felt in the moment. Yoon Seung-ho rolled up his sleeves next. His arms were covered in countless slash marks. Choi Jin-cheol's brow furrowed on instinct.

"I— I'm a victim too!!!! Khhhehehahahahaha!!!!!"

Yoon Seung-ho convulsed as if his whole body were seizing, unable to stop laughing.

"You guys grabbed the wrong person!!!"

The scene shifted. Yoon Seung-ho was tied to a chair in an unfamiliar abandoned warehouse.

Bound arms. A blade skimmed across them, and red liquid began to cover the skin like a spreading tattoo. But Yoon Seung-ho's pain was dull. Barely felt at all.

Tremble—tremble—

"S-save me……."

He just shook, seized by the terror of death.

Thud!!

Then the thigh.

Thud!!

Above the chest.

Thud!!

Finally, the blade drove through the back of his hand, fusing Yoon Seung-ho's right hand to the chair. Stabbed three times, and he didn't scream once. He couldn't.

Pain? Almost none. On top of that, pure terror had him trembling like a leaf in the wind. That was all.

Haa—

A deep sigh cut the air. Yoon Seung-ho carefully lifted his head — and met the killer's eyes.

— Interrogation Room —

"Khhheheheheh. It was that bitch…."

"What?"

"That bitch!!! She's the real killer you're looking for! Khhhehahahaha!!"

— Abandoned Warehouse —

Yoon Seung-ho saw the face of the person in front of him. Cold enough to freeze bone. An expressionless face that seemed to hold pure emptiness. Yellow eyes glowing like a predator's.

Another killer. Lee Eun-ju was looking down at Yoon Seung-ho.

The lively chat froze solid in an instant. Then the commercial break hit.

The silence broke, and a flood of question marks seized the chat. Sudden, total confusion. Viewers plunged into full panic. But before anyone could collect themselves, the commercials ended and Forest of Crime was back on air.

— Interrogation Room —

"Crazy? Who? Me? Don't you fucking dare!!! The crazy one is that bitch……."

Yoon Seung-ho drooled through a small seizure.

"You know what that bitch said to me?!!!"

Khhk-khhk-khhk-khhk…….

"She said I was broken??? Said an instrument that can't make sound is useless? What the hell does that even mean? Fuuuuuck!!!"

Bang!!!

Yoon Seung-ho spoke as he relived the abandoned factory.

"She just left. With that fucking knife still jammed through the back of my hand!! Left me there bleeding out and dying!! Abandoned me alone in that dark place!!!"

In the flashback, after Lee Eun-ju left, Yoon Seung-ho pulled the knife out with his teeth. Pure survival instinct. Then he bit through the tape binding him, one strip at a time, and somehow managed to stem the gushing blood long enough to escape.

"Every night. Her eyes show up in my dreams!! So I decided. I'd catch her and kill her myself!! The cops? Fuck off!! If the law handles her, she still gets to live, right?? She has to die. By my hand. I have to end this nightmare."

Tak—

Yoon Seung-ho pointed at the photo of the second victim on the desk.

"This bitch. You know how she died? Of course you don't. That neat little cause of death written on the paperwork? You only know the result, so it doesn't hit you. I saw it. I was hiding nearby that day, waiting to kill her, and I watched the whole thing."

In the flashback, Yoon Seung-ho watched from a distance as Lee Eun-ju tortured a woman in her thirties with methodical, relentless cruelty. The torture went on and on. And the madness. Everything Yoon Seung-ho saw burned itself raw into the viewers' minds.

And then the end of the torture. The victim's sudden death. At the same moment, the madness vanished. What filled the space was nothing but suffocating silence.

Lee Eun-ju's emotionless voice rang out with perfect clarity.

!!!!

And then her eyes met the viewers'. More precisely — they met Yoon Seung-ho's. His body started to shake. The martyr's resolve from moments ago was already gone. Instinctive terror reclaimed his mind and body. He was next.

But Lee Eun-ju did nothing to Yoon Seung-ho. She simply cleaned the scene with clinical precision and walked away. Not a single trace remained in the space she left behind.

"Detective. You asked why I killed people? Simple. Because I have to kill her."

Yoon Seung-ho trembled and laughed, a sound that crawled under the skin.

"Khhheuuuuuhahaha!!!! So I killed too. Just practice!! To catch a monster!! I needed to become the same kind of monster!!"

Bang!!!!

The sound shook the interrogation room. Then a brief silence.

"That bitch is a monster…. She has to die…. So could you maybe untie me for just a second? Khhheheheheh…."

The scene shifted. Lee Hyeon-woo, dosed with sleeping pills, was tied to a chair. A short exchange of dialogue — and then the horrific torture began.

Or rather — a beautiful piece of music.

The point of view shifted constantly. From Lee Hyeon-woo's perspective, the red flower petals became blood spraying through the air. From Lee Eun-ju's perspective, the terrible screams became a melody that resonated deep in the chest. Lee Eun-ju conducting on a red carpet, Lee Hyeon-woo singing.

The mood of the music changed only after some time had passed. The instrument itself had changed. The brilliant high notes that had split the air were gone. Replaced by a deep, heavy mid-bass that filled the space as the performance continued.

CLIMAX.

And FINALE.

The performance ended. In Lee Eun-ju's ears: the thunderous applause of a full house, a curtain call. From a third-person view: sirens and shouting.

Bang!!!

A gunshot. Or the drumbeat announcing another beginning.

Lee Eun-ju, in a dress of red flower petals, took the stage alone. A quiet Encore, performed by turning herself into the instrument. She laid her body down on the red carpet — or a bed of petals.

The corners of her mouth lifted. Leaving behind a brilliant smile that made her look happy, Lee Eun-ju stopped breathing.

"They really cut a ton, huh?"

Ara turned off the TV after finishing the episode.

"At this level, it should ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠be fine."

Compared to the original, it had been thoroughly sanitized. She'd worried about catching a weird public image, but she felt relieved now.

Yaaawn—

"Already eleven. Time to sleep."

Click—

And just like that, with no idea what was coming, the lights in Ara's room went out.

MBS control room.

Led by Lee Yeong-min, the main production staff — Ha Il-gwon, Kim Eun-bi, and the rest — stared at the monitors.

"Th-the numbers are in!! Hah!!"

The data analyst looked stunned.

"How high?"

"Av-average viewership!! 25.6%!!!"

A massive jump of eight full percentage points from the previous episode.

"Peak viewership!!! 40.2%!!!!!"

A record for the ages.

"Reactions are starting to hit social media!!"

Time for the viewers, still gripped by madness, to start pouring out their feelings.

"The community posts that went dead are slowly starting to upload again!!"

They had crushed expectations into the dirt and shattered every cliché. But for now, the reaction still felt muted — like the ocean pulling back before a tsunami. Any moment now, a tidal wave of emotion would seize the internet.

"Director's cut goes up in thirty minutes."

"Got it."

"Marketing team! Upload the new poster to social media in ten minutes!!"

"Yes!"

The control room kicked into high gear.

"Director! When do we drop the behind-the-scenes footage?!"

"Upload that to YouTube in three days."

"Yes."

Clap!

Ha Il-gwon slapped his palms together.

"Alright! Time for us to launch a full-scale offensive!"

"Yes!!"

Reporters scrambled over each other to pump out articles. Social media was one thing — but the Forest of Crime community board, CrimGallery, had been completely nuked.

Every refresh shoved posts that had just gone up onto the next page. People didn't even have time to upvote the ones they agreed with. The server kept slowing down, new posts kept flooding in — and through the absolute pandemonium, one post rocketed to the top on a tidal wave of recommendations.

Fresh firewood tossed onto an already roaring blaze.

The star of the new poster was Gil Ara — a single image where innocence and brutality coexisted side by side.

Even as time passed, the heat showed no sign of cooling. And ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠then one more post went up.

Time passed.

A new fuse caught fire.