chapter 29

Chapter 29: The Breaking Point

Midnight struck.

Across social media platforms, on independent news sites, and through encrypted forums, the story detonated like a bomb.

#LumaFiles began trending within minutes.

Clips from the LYNX folder. Transcripts. Survivor testimonials—Eunha had included anonymized statements from the others affected, people who had reached out over the past few weeks. The narrative wasn't just about Sae-jin anymore.

It was about a system. A network.

The world was finally watching.

---

At Luma Entertainment headquarters, chaos ignited. Emergency meetings were called. PR managers screamed into phones. Executives scrambled to spin the narrative.

Baek Do-jin was nowhere to be found.

By dawn, a warrant for his arrest had been quietly issued. But he had already fled.

Ji-hoon watched the sunrise from his rooftop, the city still humming in the distance. His phone rang nonstop—journalists, former colleagues, even strangers. But he ignored them all.

Then a message came in from an unknown number.

> "You think this ends here? You don't know who you're really dealing with."

Ji-hoon stared at it for a long time, then deleted it.

He wasn't afraid anymore.

---

Eunha met with Seo Haneul again that afternoon in a safe location. Together, they mapped the aftermath:

Two board members resigned.

Luma's stocks plummeted by 37%.

A parliamentary inquiry into abuse within the entertainment industry was officially launched.

Survivors began sharing their stories. Some anonymously. Some boldly, faces uncovered.

The ripple effect had begun.

"I thought I'd feel… relief," Eunha said quietly.

"And instead?" Haneul asked.

Eunha looked out the window. "It feels like we only cracked the surface. But at least the silence is broken."

---

Late that night, Ji-hoon visited Sae-jin's memorial for the first time in weeks. He brought lilies—her favorite—and placed them beneath the framed photograph of her smiling.

"We did it," he whispered. "They can't erase you anymore."

He stood there in silence for a long while, letting the wind carry his words.

---

But across the city, in a private lounge hidden beneath another entertainment agency, a man in a tailored suit scrolled through the story on his tablet.

He smiled.

"They've only seen one piece," he said to his assistant. "Shall we prepare the rest of the game?"

The assistant nodded. "Already begun, sir."

The man leaned back, shadows masking his face.

Luma was only the beginning.