The Invisible Cage

Kim Byeong-ho flung one of the doors open. Without a single word, he shoved Cheong-hyun inside and slammed it shut. In the quiet room, muffled voices from the corridor drifted in occasionally through the thick wood.

“If that bastard runs away, consider your head gone. Keep a sharp eye on him.”

“Yes, sir. Leave it to me.”

After that, absolute silence settled in—a heavy, sinking stillness that felt completely sealed from the outside world. Lifting his gaze, the first thing that caught Cheong-hyun’s eye was the massive window taking up the far wall.

“…….”

Beneath the window, which was strictly designed to be unopenable, sat a small bed, a nightstand, and a set of neatly folded clothes. The room itself was compact, but to Cheong-hyun, who had spent the last ten years squeezing into a cramped, dilapidated shack with his younger brother, this space felt overly spacious.

Right next to the main room was a bathroom with its white door slightly ajar, occasionally catching the scent of a pleasant fragrance. Everything here felt incredibly foreign.

He couldn’t comprehend why he was standing in this place. It felt as if he had been violently swept away by an unstoppable current—like a sudden, catastrophic accident.

Though Kim Byeong-ho had explicitly ordered him to wash up, Cheong-hyun had already endured a grueling scrub under freezing water back at the hospital dawn. There was absolutely no need to wash again. Back when he was covered in monster blood during field operations, there were times he had to camp out and pull guard duty for two days straight in the worst conditions. As long as he didn’t reek, it didn’t matter.

He had no intention of being finicky about comfort. Cheong-hyun found a spot against the wall, slid down, and curled up tightly. Resting his head against his arms—a hard-earned habit from occupying hostile combat zones—he closed his eyes.

Since there was absolutely nothing he could do right now, he intended to leave the suffocating reality behind and catch a brief moment of sleep.

More than anything, he needed to organize his thoughts. He needed to figure out what he wanted to do next, or rather, what he had to do.

In that brief, shallow state of rest where dream and reality blurred, a horrific nightmare took hold. He found himself sprinting through a pitch-black, endless tunnel until his lungs burned for air. At first, he ran without knowing why. But then, he spotted a figure standing right at the tunnel’s exit where a faint light spilled in. In the next split second, he saw the terrifying silhouette of a massive dump truck barreling straight toward the person from the opposite side.

Before he knew it, Cheong-hyun was screaming at the top of his lungs. Hearing the desperate shout, the person standing at the edge of the tunnel slowly began to turn around. He could never forget the blurry silhouette of that man—the broad, dependable shoulders, the ash-grey eyes catching the light, and the sharp, perfectly balanced features.

The man standing at the end of the tunnel was Lee Tae-eon himself—the civilian Hunter body Cheong-hyun had inhabited for the past ten years.

Screeech—!

Tires tore violently against the asphalt, and a deafening horn echoed through the darkness. A blinding flash of light exploded. Watching it unfold with wide eyes, Cheong-hyun desperately reached his hand forward. The very tips of his fingers barely brushed against the man’s jacket, and then—

“Gasp…!”

Cheong-hyun’s eyes snapped open as he bolted upright from his curled position, gasping for air.

“Ha, haaa…”

His heart pounded violently against his ribs as if he had just finished that frantic sprint in reality. A harsh, metallic rasp tore from his throat with every strained breath, and his entire body was drenched in cold sweat.

What was that? What did that mean—

The person who had stood perfectly still at the end of the tunnel, staring directly into the headlights of the oncoming truck. If that really was himself… no, if that was the real Lee Tae-eon.

A sharp, terrifying thought pierced heavily through his mind.

He had finally remembered the one vital truth he had been desperately trying to ignore: What happened to the body of Lee Tae-eon after the accident?

If… by some horrific, absolute worst-case scenario… Lee Tae-eon had died.

A pitch-black sky. Voices screaming frantically at him. The distant, wailing echo of sirens. Those were the very last scenes Cheong-hyun remembered before losing consciousness. But if that body ultimately failed to survive…

“Then… right now…”

Tae-hoon is completely alone.

With violently trembling hands, Cheong-hyun pushed against the wall and forced himself onto his feet. Panting heavily as if the room had been starved of oxygen, he rushed toward the exit and blindly grabbed the doorknob. He threw his weight into twisting it, but the mechanism merely spun uselessly in his grip, completely disconnected from the lock.

What do I do… how do I—

Bang—!

“Open the door! Please, open this door! I have to leave. I need to get out of here right now!”

“The door stays locked until the Manager returns. Just sit tight and wait.”

Bang, bang—!

Uncaring of the blood beginning to smear across the metal, Cheong-hyun frantically pulled and twisted at the handle, screaming with raw desperation. Yet, the voice from the other side remained completely unmoved. By the time his mind felt like it was boiling over, Cheong-hyun slid down against the wood, his frantic eyes scanning every corner of the room.

Before long, his gaze locked onto the dark bathroom. He lunged inside, tearing through the space to find anything that could be used as a weapon. But the moment his head swung toward the mirror, he locked eyes with his own broken reflection.

“Ha… haaa…”

His eyes were incredibly hollow, and his lips were so deathly pale he barely looked human. His pupils were completely unfocused, resembling someone heavily drugged, radiating the terrifying, unhinged aura of a man pushed to his absolute limits.

Yet, staring at his own desperate state had the opposite effect—it made him profoundly calm. He took slow, deliberate steps toward the glass. His bony hand traced the mirror’s surface before sliding up to tightly grip the heavy metal showerhead hanging beside it.

He hesitated several times. He took long, deep breaths, closed his eyes shut, and clenched his fists so hard his nails dug deeply into his palms.

When his eyes snapped open again, the desperate, panicked look in the mirror was entirely gone, replaced by a man who had made his final choice. Cheong-hyun raised the showerhead and slammed it into the mirror with all his might.

Shatter—! Crash!

After three violent strikes, shards of heavy glass exploded in every direction like crushed sand. Cheong-hyun knelt down, selected a large, jagged piece, and wrapped his fingers tightly around it. Then, grabbing the flexible metal shower hose to use as a cord, he hid himself right beside the bathroom door, completely holding his breath.

The suffocating silence made his knees tremble. Somewhere in the distance, the sharp, rhythmic ticking of a clock echoed. After waiting a brief moment in the dead quiet—

Knock, knock—

“Guide, what’s going on in there?”

Knock, knock!

“Guide, answer me! Guide!”

Thud!

“Guide, did something happen?! f*ck, of all times…!”

The frantic pounding at the main door suddenly ceased, replaced by the sharp, metallic clicking of a master key turning in the lock. Following a loud click, the door swung open in a panicked rush.

“Guide, where are you?!”

Heavy combat boots trampled ruthlessly into the room before immediately veering toward the slightly open bathroom door. Calculating the distance by the sound of the footsteps, Cheong-hyun tightened his grip on the hose. The exact moment the guard pushed the door open and poked his head inside to scan the room—

Swish—!

Cheong-hyun whipped the metal hose over the man’s head, looping it tightly around his neck. Using every ounce of strength left in his gaunt frame, he violently choked the guard’s thick neck backward.

“What the— Ack!”

The guard frantically clawed at Cheong-hyun’s hands in shock, but within seconds, his eyes rolled into the back of his head, foam bubbled at his lips, and he went completely limp. Cheong-hyun eased the unconscious body down against the wall and placed two fingers against the man’s neck to check his pulse. A powerful, steady thudding vibrated against his fingertips.

As he suspected, the man wasn’t a civilian; he was a high-ranking Mutant laced with monster DNA. Cheong-hyun had spent years observing from the sidelines in active combat zones, knowing full well that a Mutant wouldn’t die from something like this.

Had they fought face-to-face, he would have been utterly overwhelmed by raw strength. Therefore, this was… a necessary choice. Cheong-hyun rationalized the violence to calm his own conscience.

“…I’m sorry.”

He couldn’t bring himself to whisper a hollow plea for forgiveness. Cheong-hyun’s lips parted slightly before he turned away, still tightly clutching the jagged shard of glass. He didn’t even notice that the sharp edge had sliced deeply into his palm, drawing fresh blood.

He slipped out of the room into the corridor. The artificial sunset had fully transitioned, drowning the entire hallway in a thick, pitch-black darkness.

Ditching the elevator, Cheong-hyun located the emergency exit, threw the heavy door open, and sprinted down the concrete stairs. Every time a motion-sensor light flickered awake, his instincts automatically checked the floor number. The moment he reached the ground floor, he held his breath and pressed his body flush against the steel door, straining his ears for any sign of movement.

His heart beat so violently against his ribs that he was terrified someone outside would hear it. Thick beads of sweat drenched his hairline, tracing down his jawline and dripping onto the floor.

After monitoring the quiet for what felt like an eternity, he detected absolutely no presence beyond the threshold. He had no idea when reinforcements would descend the stairs to capture him; he couldn’t afford to waste another second. Cheong-hyun took a firm grip of the heavy handle and pushed it open with everything he had.

A sliver of bright light cut through the darkness. The sharp, agonizing screech of the heavy door echoed in his ears like metal scraping against a chalkboard.

The moment the brilliant illumination hit his eyes, Cheong-hyun held his breath and bolted. At the far end of the spotless marble lobby, a long row of massive glass doors overlooking the black night stood wide open.

The lobby was completely deserted. The heavy, rhythmic thud of Cheong-hyun’s bare feet slamming against the polished floor echoed loudly through the vast space. Thud. Thud.

His own footsteps felt unnaturally slow to his senses. It felt as if some invisible force was manually dragging out time itself; the perception of his surroundings, the shifting space, and even the shallow breaths he forced himself to hold felt painfully drawn out.

Thud. Just as he pushed his foot forward for another stride—

Cheong-hyun’s eyes locked onto a deep, ominous crimson glow bleeding across the dark landscape outside. Following the light, his gaze traveled up until it hit an incredibly massive, towering barrier wall.

“…….”

His frantic steps slowly ground to a halt. A colossal steel structure completely encircled the entire Center. The walls surrounding the perimeter were so agonizingly massive they felt suffocating.

The towering wall enclosing the facility clearly wasn’t built for mere protection. The main exit was an iron bunker-style gate structure; unless someone on the inside manually authorized it, escaping was a physical impossibility.

The entire layout was explicitly engineered to ensure not even a single rat could slip out alive.

The structural design was completely different from the modest Center he held in his memories. The moment his eyes landed on the army of heavily armed security guards patrolling beneath the lights, the brutal reality finally crushed his chest.

There was absolutely no way out.