BENEATH THE SURFACE

The city outside roared on, but the safehouse held its breath. Nestled in a forgotten alley between two abandoned warehouses, the place was nearly invisible to outsiders. The interior was dimly lit, scattered with tech gear, empty coffee cups, and maps laced with pins and string.

Audrey stood near the window, half-shrouded by curtain shadows, her arms crossed as she watched the reflection of neon signs flicker on the glass. Behind her, Damian kicked his boots up on the couch and tossed a handful of chips into his mouth.

"Well," Damian mumbled through a crunch, "if Kang didn't suspect us before, I'd say he's definitely sweating now."

"His eyes during that tea session?" Hana chimed in from the kitchen as she flipped a packet of ramen. "Dude looked like someone pissed in his incense sticks."

Kenzo sat cross-legged on the floor, his laptop balanced on his knees, the glow casting angular shadows across his cheekbones. His screen was a stream of decrypted code—lines and lines of Kang's hidden data. He didn't look up as he spoke.

"I have access. Full system. Surveillance backups, private messaging history, faculty communications..."

Audrey turned slightly. "Already?"

"He stores everything," Kenzo muttered. "Meticulous to a fault. Password was a cipher built from his own research titles. Narcissist."

Damian let out a low whistle. "He basically handed us his black box."

"Not handed," Kenzo said. "He just never imagined someone would figure him out."

They gathered around as Kenzo projected the files onto the wall. Folder after folder appeared. Some were labeled innocuously—"Intern Logs," "Behavioral Study Notes"—but their contents were damning.

Hidden videos. Names. Internal memos with coded endorsements. Financial transactions from shell companies.

Hana's jaw clenched. "He's been doing this for years. This whole university's been his hunting ground."

Audrey's fingers tightened around her elbow. "We're going to bring him down. But we do it right. Clean. No one's going to question what we uncover."

Later, as the others dispersed to their tasks, Kenzo stayed back at his station. His fingers hovered over the keys, but his mind was elsewhere—playing back the image of Audrey at the podium earlier that day.

She had spoken with such precision. Her voice, calm but razor-sharp, never wavered. And he hadn't just watched her lecture. He had studied her. The way her eyes flicked toward Kang with surgical intent. The way she anticipated the students' discomfort—not to avoid it, but to draw it forward like truth pulled from darkness.

Kenzo blinked slowly.

Audrey had always been there for the team. Especially him. Her quiet guidance, her ability to pull him back from his spirals of overanalysis. She never pressured. Never judged. Just listened. Grounded.

His logic told him she was a teammate. An essential strategist.

But his chest said something else. Something unfamiliar.

Was it admiration?

Or something more?

"You're zoning out again," Hana said, dropping onto the couch beside him with a bottle of tea. She smirked, raising an eyebrow. "Let me guess—reviewing Kang's firewalls in your head?"

"Something like that," Kenzo muttered, turning back to his screen.

But even as the data flickered in front of him, part of his mind remained suspended in that lecture hall. Watching her. Listening to her voice. Feeling... steady.

An hour later, the team regrouped in the center of the room. Audrey had spread out a large paper map with key locations marked in red. Damian leaned over it, chin propped on one hand. Hana sat cross-legged, picking at the cap of a pen. Kenzo stood nearby, hands in his pockets.

"We have two choices," Audrey said. "We either go public with this now—which risks exposure and Kang burying the rest—or we bait him into confirming everything himself."

Damian grinned. "I vote trap. Traps are fun."

"Fun isn't the goal," Audrey replied, but a flicker of amusement crossed her expression. "We want him on record. Signed, sealed, ruined."

Kenzo tried to focus, but his eyes kept drifting—back to Audrey, to the way she folded the map with delicate precision. The small crease between her brows when she was deep in thought.

She steadied him. She always had.

And that realization hit harder than any encrypted folder.

"I've been texting Min Seo," Hana said suddenly, her voice low. "She's okay. Confused, but okay."

Everyone turned to her.

"She said... she still dreams about it. Even though she doesn't remember everything. She just feels scared when it's dark."

Audrey's expression softened.

"I can't stop thinking," Hana continued, eyes narrowed, "how many girls like her are out there. Polite, brilliant, trying to get by. And Kang—people like him—they ruin that. They twist it."

Damian's jaw was tight. "Then we untwist it. We burn the rot from the roots."

Kenzo looked at Audrey again. She met his gaze—steady, knowing.

And he knew, then, what grounded him.

It wasn't logic. It wasn't code.

It was her.

(PoV: Professor Kang)

The early autumn sun filtered through the tall panes of the lecture hall, casting long shadows on polished floors. Professor Kang Jiwoon stood at the front of the classroom, his lecture notes aligned with surgical precision on the podium, his voice measured as he discussed cognitive dissonance theory.

But today, something was wrong.

He could feel it.

It was in the air—an intangible tension, a cold edge prickling against the back of his neck like a breeze that didn't belong.

His eyes swept the room.

Rows of students sat in obedient silence, but not like before. Not quite. A few leaned into their notebooks, not to take notes, but to whisper. There were glances—quick, deliberate. When his gaze passed over them, they looked away too quickly. Or not at all.

It wasn't fear.

It was suspicion.

He continued speaking, voice even, but the dissonance in the room pressed against his skin like glass.

"The process of rationalizing two conflicting beliefs," he said, gesturing to the slide on the screen, "often leads to unconscious justification. An authority figure can shape these justifications over time—"

More whispering.

He caught the eye of a girl in the second row—Jiwoo. Quiet, studious. But today, she stared back at him with a furrowed brow. Not confusion.

Discomfort.

He faltered. Just for a beat.

"—resulting in patterns of loyalty that may persist... even in the presence of—"

A student snickered. Not loud. Just enough.

Kang's jaw clenched.

He clicked to the next slide and forced his voice into smoother cadence. "—of moral misalignment."

They heard something.

They knew something.

His thoughts spiraled back to the guest lecture. Audrey's voice echoing like a blade: What do you want from me that no one else can see?

She hadn't said his name. But she didn't have to.

He'd underestimated her. Them.

At the end of the lecture, Kang closed his laptop slowly and scanned the students again.

No one met his gaze.

A strange hush settled, almost respectful, but not the kind he was used to. There was no awe. No admiration. Just quiet calculation.

He stepped out into the hallway after class, passing two students who quickly stopped their conversation as he neared.

"Did you hear what she said about grooming?"

"I know! It felt like she was talking about this class—"

Silence.

They noticed him.

He walked faster.

In his office, Kang paced.

He scrolled through student evaluations, hoping to find confirmation that this was paranoia. But the numbers were shifting. Slightly. Just enough. Anonymous feedback with words like "uncomfortable," "strange energy," and worse—"manipulative."

He slammed the tablet onto the desk.

No. No, this was salvageable. It had to be.

He had spent years crafting this persona. Years earning trust, embedding himself in the university's structure like bedrock.

And now? Cracks were forming.

His burner phone buzzed.

Seong Jae.

He answered curtly. "What?"

"You're spiraling. I can hear it in your voice."

"They're turning the students."

"Of course they are," Seong Jae replied. "That was their whole strategy. Subtle contamination. Poison in the well."

Kang rubbed his temples. "I need to make an example. Regain control."

"You make a mistake now," Seong Jae said coolly, "and they'll use it against you. No more girls. No more shadow transfers. Not until we clear this."

Kang's knuckles whitened around the phone.

"Then what do you suggest?"

"You remind the university why you're untouchable. Publish. Lecture. Maintain your image. Let them look, and find nothing. While we hunt the real problem."

Kang didn't respond.

Because the truth was—it was already happening.

He could feel the walls closing in.

Not because of anything they'd proven yet... but because of doubt.

And once doubt took root, it spread like rot.

He sat back, fingers steepled, and stared at the glowing city outside his window.

They were inside the walls now. He could feel their breath on his neck.

But he would not go down easy.