They discharged him two days later.
No visitors.
No calls.
No one to argue that he should stay.
Dr. Seo signed the papers herself.
"You'll need rest," she told him. "Proper food. And follow-up tests. I don't like what I don't understand."
"I'll come back," he said.
It wasn't a promise.
It was a fact.
She hesitated, then handed him a card.
"Direct number," she said. "If anything feels wrong."
Her fingers brushed his.
The hum inside him steadied.
Again.
She noticed.
Again.
Their eyes met for half a second too long.
Then she stepped back, professional mask returning.
"Take care, Han Jae-Min."
He walked out of the hospital wearing borrowed clothes and a borrowed name.
The city did not notice him.
It rushed past in suits and school uniforms, headlights and street food steam, funeral posters and new advertisements.
On every large screen—
his old face.
KANG TAE-HYUN, 1996–2026.
Visionary. Philanthropist. Genius CEO.
The man who had died to stop a secret.
The man now walking under those screens in a body no one would ever photograph.
The room Han Jae-Min rented was in a building even delivery drivers avoided.
Fourth floor.
No lift.
A staircase that smelled of mold and cigarettes.
He unlocked the door.
And stepped into silence.
The room was small.
A single mattress on the floor.
A desk littered with pencils and empty instant noodle cups.
A narrow window looking straight into another building's wall.
No photos.
No warmth.
Just existence.
He stood there for a long moment.
This was where a boy had slowly disappeared.
He moved to the desk.
Touched the sketchbooks stacked unevenly.
The moment his fingers made contact—
the world slipped.
Not a vision.
A bleed.
Emotion surged through his nerves like ink through water.
Loneliness.
Crushing.
Daily.
A hunger that was not only physical.
A desperate want to be seen.
He staggered back half a step, breath sharp.
"…So this is what you carried," he murmured.
The boy had drawn faces.
Hundreds of them.
Strangers from buses.
People in cafés.
Imagined women.
Imagined families.
All detailed.
None finished.
Every page stopped just before the eyes.
Because Han Jae-Min had never known how to draw a future.
Tae-Hyun closed the book.
"I will," he said quietly.
His phone buzzed.
The cracked screen lit unevenly.
Unknown number.
He answered.
"…Hello?"
A man's voice came through, nervous, sharp.
"Jae-Min? Where the hell have you been? You didn't show up for work, and the landlord's asking questions. You trying to disappear?"
Work.
"Yes," Tae-Hyun said calmly. "Actually. I am."
The man swore. "You owe two months' rent. And don't forget—you signed that contract. You don't get to walk away."
"What contract?"
A pause.
Then a low chuckle.
"Don't play dumb. The one you signed with Helix subsidiary lab. Night sanitation. Basement level. You think they'd hire a dropout unless it was for places they don't want names on?"
His chest tightened.
Helix.
Even this boy's life had brushed the edge of his empire.
"When do I start?" Tae-Hyun asked.
"Tonight," the man said. "If you still want the money."
The call ended.
He stared at the dark screen.
Then he smiled.
Small.
Cold.
"They brought me back to my own grave," he whispered.
He set the phone down.
Closed his eyes.
And tested himself.
He focused inward.
On fatigue.
On malnutrition.
On the trembling weakness in the limbs of a boy who had never been trained to survive power.
The hum rose.
His heartbeat shifted.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
Muscle fibers tightened.
Oxygen use optimized.
Pain folded inward.
Not gone.
Repositioned.
When he opened his eyes again—
the room looked sharper.
Sounds clearer.
The city louder.
His body stood straighter.
Stronger.
Not healthy.
But no longer fragile.
A knock came suddenly at the door.
Hard.
Aggressive.
He turned.
Opened it.
The landlord stood there with another man. Thick neck. Tattooed forearm. The kind of person who collected fear as rent.
"You," the landlord snapped. "Hospital stay doesn't erase debt. We agreed. Tonight."
The other man stepped forward.
"Or we take something instead."
He reached out.
Grabbed Tae-Hyun's shoulder.
And instantly froze.
His fingers spasmed.
His breath hitched.
His pupils dilated violently.
"What—what did you—"
Tae-Hyun looked down at the hand on him.
And focused.
Just a little.
The man's knees buckled.
He collapsed to the floor, gasping, sweat exploding from his skin.
The landlord stumbled back in horror.
Tae-Hyun released him.
The man lay there shaking, alive, terrified, unharmed.
But changed.
Tae-Hyun stared at his own hand.
Not shaking.
Not human.
"Tell him," Tae-Hyun said calmly to the landlord, "that the debt will be paid."
His eyes lifted.
"And that this room is no longer cheap."
The landlord nodded violently, dragged the man away, and fled.
The door slammed.
Silence returned.
Tae-Hyun exhaled slowly.
Power pulsed through him like a second bloodstream.
This body.
This city.
This life.
All connected to what had killed him.
He picked up his phone.
Scrolled.
Found the Helix Crown headquarters address.
Tonight, he would walk into the underground of his own empire.
Not as a king.
But as a ghost.
And ghosts were much harder to stop.