The flatline tone was still ringing in Han Yoo-jin's ears as he sped out of the hospital parking garage.
He checked his rearview mirror. No police cars yet. Just the silent, imposing glass tower of Sun-in General Hospital, where the original Han Yoo-jin was currently cooling rapidly.
Yoo-jin gripped the steering wheel with one hand. The other hand clutched the hard drive in his jacket pocket.
It felt radioactive.
Inside this piece of metal was the ghost of a genius and the sins of a conglomerate.
His phone buzzed. It was a push notification from a financial news app.
[BREAKING: Titan Entertainment Stock Halted After Rumors of "Key Executive" Health Issue.]
"They know," Yoo-jin whispered. "They know the battery just died."
He stepped on the gas. He needed to get to the bunker before Titan locked down the internet.
The server room at Starforce was humming with activity.
Kang So-young (Ghost) plugged the hard drive into her air-gapped rig. She cracked her knuckles.
"Okay," she said, her eyes reflecting the scrolling code. "Let's see what the ghost left us."
She hit enter.
The screen flooded with folders. Thousands of them.
> /Accounting/Bribes_2018
> /Trainees/Illegal_Contracts
> /Apex/Chart_Manipulation_Logs
> /System/Source_Code_v1.0
"Holy sh*t," So-young breathed. "He didn't just leave a resignation letter. He left a nuke."
She opened a folder labeled 'The Vault'.
It was empty.
"What?" Yoo-jin leaned in. "Where are the songs? Director Min said there were 400 unreleased tracks."
"They're gone," So-young said, pointing to a command log. "Look. 'Auto-Delete Sequence Initiated upon Heartbeat Cessation'."
Yoo-jin felt a cold smile touch his lips.
Version 1 was thorough. He didn't just die; he took his legacy with him. Titan's "Golden Era" was officially erased. They had nothing left to release.
"Wait," So-young pointed to a single file remaining in the root directory. "There's one left. Created... twenty minutes ago."
Filename: The_Truth.mp3
"Play it," Yoo-jin ordered.
So-young clicked the file.
It wasn't a song. It was a voice recording. The raspy, dying voice of Version 1, set against the rhythmic beeping of his heart monitor.
"This is Han Yoo-jin. The real one. If you are listening to this, I am dead. And Titan Entertainment killed me."
The recording continued, detailing ten years of forced labor, medical captivity, and the systemic manipulation of the K-Pop industry. He named names. He gave bank account numbers.
It was a confession from the grave.
"If we release this," So-young whispered, looking terrified. "It won't just destroy Titan. It will destroy the industry. The public will lose faith in K-Pop entirely."
Yoo-jin looked at the file. She was right. This was a scorched-earth weapon.
"We don't release the audio," Yoo-jin said. "Not yet."
"Why? It's the kill shot!"
"Because Titan will claim it's a deepfake," Yoo-jin said. "They'll say we used AI to fake a dead man's voice. They have the media on their payroll."
He looked at the 'Chart Manipulation' folder.
"We need to trap them first. We need them to lie on record."
He turned to So-young.
"Can you find the daughter? Han Yuna."
So-young typed furiously. "Found her. She's at a boarding school in Jeju. Titan pays the tuition."
"Send a private security team," Yoo-jin said. "Get her out. Bring her to Starforce. If Titan realizes the father is dead, they might try to use the daughter as leverage against me."
"On it."
Yoo-jin stood up. He grabbed the hard drive.
"I have a press conference to attend."
The next morning, the Titan Entertainment headquarters was under siege.
Rumors of the "Ghost Producer's" death had leaked, though no name was attached. Shareholders were panicking. The lobby was packed with reporters demanding to know if the pipeline of hits had dried up.
Director Yoon Tae-min stood at the podium in the briefing room. He looked calm, but Yoo-jin—watching from the back of the room—could see the sweat beading on his forehead.
[Target: Yoon Tae-min]
[Status: Deceptive]
[Stress Level: 99%]
"The rumors are false," Yoon lied smoothly into the microphones. "Our head producer is in stable condition. In fact, to prove the stability of our company, we are announcing a new comeback."
The screen behind him lit up.
APEX - NEW SINGLE: 'ETERNAL'
Produced by The Legend.
Coming This Friday.
The reporters scribbled furiously. The stock price, which had been plummeting, ticked up slightly.
"The Golden Era is not over," Yoon declared, smiling his vampire smile. "We have hundreds of songs in the Vault. 'Eternal' is the best one yet."
Yoo-jin scoffed quietly.
He knew the Vault was empty. Version 1 had deleted it.
Which meant Yoon was lying. He didn't have a song. He was buying time to have his team frantically write a fake one and label it as a "Legend Original."
Yoo-jin pulled out his phone. He opened the Starforce official account.
It was time to pop the bubble.
He typed a message.
@Starforce_Official:
Titan is lying. The Vault is empty. The Legend is dead. And he left his last song to us.
He attached a 10-second clip. Not the confession. Just the sound of the typing.
Click-clack-click-clack.
And then, the flatline.
Beeeeeeeeeeep.
He hit Post.
The reaction was instantaneous.
Phones in the press room started buzzing. Reporters looked down at their screens, then up at Director Yoon.
"Director!" a reporter from Dispatch shouted. "Starforce claims the Vault is deleted! Is 'Eternal' actually written by the Legend?"
Yoon faltered. "Starforce is... they are jealous. They are spreading malicious rumors."
"They posted audio of a flatline!" another reporter yelled. "Did the producer die?"
Yoon's eyes darted around the room. He looked like a trapped animal.
Yoo-jin stepped forward from the back. He wasn't wearing a disguise this time. He was wearing a sharp black suit.
"He died last night at 11:42 PM," Yoo-jin said, his voice cutting through the noise.
The cameras swung to him.
"Han Yoo-jin-ssi!"
Yoon pointed a shaking finger at him. "Security! Remove him!"
"I have proof," Yoo-jin said, holding up a USB stick. "I have the server logs showing the mass deletion of the Vault at exactly 11:42 PM. The moment his heart stopped."
He walked up to the podium. The security guards hesitated. This was the man who crashed the Shilla Hotel. He had an aura that made people step back.
"Director Yoon," Yoo-jin said, standing next to the man who had enslaved his original self. "If 'Eternal' exists, play it. Right now."
Yoon turned pale. "It... it is not mixed yet."
"Play the demo," Yoo-jin challenged. "Play the stems. Play anything."
Yoon stood frozen. He couldn't play anything. Because it didn't exist.
The silence stretched. It was heavy and suffocating.
"He can't," Yoo-jin told the reporters. "Because the ghost took his music with him."
Yoo-jin leaned into the microphone.
"But he left one thing behind. A receipt."
Yoo-jin plugged the USB into the podium's laptop. The projection screen flickered.
Instead of a song, a spreadsheet appeared.
[Titan Ent - Chart Manipulation Ledger]
[Payment to Melon: 500M Won - 'Love Dive']
[Payment to Streaming Farms: 200M Won - 'Silence']
The room erupted. Flashbulbs blinded everyone.
"This isn't music," Yoo-jin said calmly. "This is the price list. Every hit song Titan released in the last five years was bought, not listened to."
Yoon lunged at him. "You traitor! You stole that!"
Yoo-jin sidestepped effortlessly. Yoon tripped and crashed into the podium, sending water bottles flying. It was a pathetic sight. The vampire had lost his fangs.
"I didn't steal it," Yoo-jin said, looking down at the fallen director. "The author gave it to me."
He turned to the cameras.
"Titan Entertainment is a fraud. The Golden Era was a prison. And today, the prisoners are free."
By sunset, Titan Entertainment was a crime scene.
Prosecutors were raiding the building. The stock had crashed by 40%, triggering an automatic trading halt. Director Yoon was being led out in handcuffs, screaming about a conspiracy.
Yoo-jin watched from the Starforce office window.
The "Cider" tasted like ash. It was over. But the cost was high.
The door opened. Mina and Hana walked in. They were holding hands with a small girl in a school uniform.
Han Yuna.
She looked exactly like the photo. She looked exactly like Version 1.
"We got her," Hana said softly. "Titan tried to block the car at the airport, but Director Park threatened to livestream it. They backed off."
Yuna looked up at Yoo-jin with wide, frightened eyes.
"Are you my dad's friend?" she asked.
Yoo-jin knelt down. He looked at the child whose tuition had been paid for by his own death.
"Yes," Yoo-jin lied gently. "I was his best friend. He asked me to look after you."
"Where is he?" Yuna asked. "He never visits."
"He went on a long trip," Yoo-jin said, swallowing the lump in his throat. "But he left you something."
He pulled out a bank book. He had transferred the entirety of his personal savings—and the bonus from the 'Hunter' success—into an account for her.
"He wanted you to have this. For music school. Or whatever you want to do."
Yuna took the book. "He liked music."
"He loved it," Yoo-jin said. "He loved it too much."
He stood up.
"Mina, take her to the guest dorms. Get her anything she wants to eat."
Mina nodded, her eyes wet. She led the girl away.
Yoo-jin turned to Hana.
"Titan is finished," Hana said. "Apex and Aurora are cancelling their schedules. The public is boycotting them because of the chart rigging. We won."
"The vacuum is dangerous," Yoo-jin said. "When a giant falls, it crushes everything nearby. The industry is going to crash."
He looked at his System interface.
[Mission Complete: The Usurper.]
[Reward: System Source Code Key.]
[Objective Updated: Rebuild the Industry.]
"We aren't done," Yoo-jin said. "We exposed the fake idols. Now we have to prove that real ones still exist."
He walked to his desk.
"We're releasing the Repackage Album next week."
Hana stared at him. "Next week? The industry is burning!"
"That's why we release it," Yoo-jin said. "To be the only light in the smoke."
He opened a new project file.
Title: REBOOT
"Version 1 is dead," Yoo-jin said. "It's time for Version 2 to start writing his own history."
He looked at the empty chair where he used to sit as a nervous assistant.
"Ghost," he spoke to the empty air. "Rest well. I'll take it from here."
He hit the first chord. It was a major key. Bright. Hopeful.
It was the sound of a new beginning.