Four men with menacing appearances were facing off against Mo Chang-gwi.

Mo Chang-gwi dug into his ear with the hilt of a knife, frowning.

“Yeah, I'm a madman. So, which one of you is the captain?”

A pirate-like sailor picked up a nearby iron rod and said as he approached,

“Why do you care who the captain is?”

“Not you, then.”

As he spoke, Mo Chang-gwi stepped forward and stabbed the sailor twice in the left side of his neck where the carotid artery was. It was a casual, natural motion—like sticking a toothpick into an apple.

Thud, splurt—

Blood gushed from the sailor's neck. Mo Chang-gwi grabbed his collapsing head by the hair and slashed his throat once more. The sailor’s neck opened up like a fish’s gills.

As one sailor was instantly taken down, the others finally grasped the gravity of the situation and all drew vicious weapons, charging at Mo Chang-gwi.

“W-what the hell!”

“Kill that bastard!!”

Mo Chang-gwi grinned at the approaching sailors.

Whoosh, swing—clang!!

One sailor swung a metal pipe wildly, but it didn’t touch Mo Chang-gwi. It only struck the unlucky deck. In that brief moment of stunned hesitation, a cold blade was driven deep into his side.

Thud, squelch—

“G-guhk.”

Mo Chang-gwi lifted the blade upward, twisting his organs, then pulled it out.

At the same time, a sharp kitchen knife slashed in from the side. Mo Chang-gwi dodged with a slight tilt of his head, grabbed the attacker’s wrist, and stabbed the knife into his elbow.

“Aaaagh!”

As he pulled the knife back, he ducked under another sailor’s iron rod and sliced the ankle of the sailor holding the kitchen knife.

“Urghk!”

Crash!

In the meantime, the iron rod slammed down where Mo Chang-gwi had been standing. Curling one corner of his mouth, he closed in on the opponent and slashed his ankle, knee, side, armpit, and finally his throat in quick succession.

Shhhhhhck—!

His movements were as fluid and fast as if following a prewritten script. The sailor couldn't even think of resisting, as if entranced by the blade.

Thud—!

Three sailors fell to the floor almost simultaneously, spurting crimson blood.

The last remaining man was leaning quietly against the wall, smoking a cigarette.

Covered in blood, Mo Chang-gwi twirled his knife as he approached and asked,

“You the captain?”

Hiss—exhale—

The man simply blew out cigarette smoke in silence. Mo Chang-gwi flicked his hand.

Whack—!

The knife flew, cutting off the end of the cigarette and embedding into the wall beside him.

“When someone talks to you, you should answer, no?”

The man, previously stiff as a board, nodded slowly while gripping his trembling hand.

“Y-yes… I'm the captain.”

“Good, so you can talk. From now on, answer immediately when I ask something. Otherwise, we’ll all end up fish food in Nagasaki. Got it?”

“…Got it.”

Mo Chang-gwi walked up to the captain and tapped his cheek with the blood-covered flat side of the knife.

“Don’t act all high and mighty just ‘cause you’re a captain. Watch your tone.”

“Understood…”

“Good. Now turn this ship around and head for Nagasaki. Can you do it alone or not?”

The captain instinctively glanced at a sailor moaning on the floor, his elbow and ankle slashed.

The rest were motionless, but that one looked unlikely to die from his injuries.

“I need a helmsman. At least two people….”

“Two, huh… use him. Hey, kid.”

At Mo Chang-gwi’s call, a boy who had been cowering in a corner after being beaten by the sailors stood up abruptly.

“Y-yes, sir.”

“You gonna help him steer, or die?”

“I-I'll steer! I’ll steer the ship!”

“Good. Start by cleaning up the blood.”

“Yes, sir!”

The boy, as if he hadn’t just been beaten senseless, moved quickly to wipe the blood and helped move the bodies with the survivors, throwing them into the sea.

And so, the ship carrying Mo Chang-gwi headed toward Nagasaki, Japan.

Meanwhile, at Nampo International Port—

“Ha… damn it, we can’t find that bastard?”

—Nothing.

—Looks like he already left.

The Violent Crimes Special Investigation Unit and Special Mobile Task Force ultimately failed to catch Mo Chang-gwi. Only after collecting all the CCTV and black box footage and analyzing it in the port’s control room did they finally spot him.

“That bastard changed clothes again.”

“He's a slippery one, isn’t he.”

Sharing Mo Chang-gwi’s outfit details was useless. He had changed clothes three times just at the international port.

On top of that, he hunched his back and altered his gait when moving—he was a master of disguise, making people mistake him for someone else entirely.

Seeing him board a barely visible ship hidden behind larger vessels, the team leader exclaimed excitedly,

“That one—where’s it headed?”

Haesu zoomed in on the ship’s identification number. The youngest quickly looked it up on the adjacent computer.

“Shanghai.”

“…Shit.”

It had already departed three hours earlier. For the Coast Guard to locate that ship in the open sea was impossible.

“Let’s just return for now.”

A rare failure.

No, it was the first failure since the creation of the Violent Crimes Special Investigation Unit.

On the way back to headquarters, the car was filled with chilly silence.

Oh Gaeng suddenly kicked the front seat.

Bang!

“What the hell is this! Damn it, we just got splattered with crap trying to clean up after those bastards from Hyoseong Penitentiary. Would it kill them to immediately report an escape?”

The youngest, driving the car, flinched at the scolding but said nothing.

In the heavy atmosphere, the team leader tried to rally the detectives.

“Exactly. What’s so important about being ‘Korea’s top prison’? Anyway, this isn’t over yet. That bastard Mo Chang-gwi—we’ll chase him to the ends of the earth and catch him. Come on, straighten your backs, lift those shoulders!”

“Yessir…”

“Yes, sir.”

As soon as they arrived at headquarters, the Violent Crimes Special Investigation Unit immediately sent a cooperation request to China’s Shanghai authorities, including information about Mo Chang-gwi.

[A vicious criminal has illegally entered your territory. Please assist in the investigation and arrest.]

[Understood. Our local police are competent. We will arrest him ourselves and extradite him to Korea.]

The team leader clicked his tongue.

They were basically saying: “We’ll handle it. Don’t come to Shanghai.”

A few days later—

The Violent Crimes Special Investigation Unit was handling smaller cases while searching for traces of Mo Chang-gwi online only.

However, there was no news from Shanghai.

“If they found the bastards, they should say they found them. If it’s hard, say it’s hard. If they lost them, just say they lost them. Shouldn’t they at least say something?”

Haesu, who had been doing push-ups with the youngest member on his back, got up and walked to his desk as he spoke.

“I actually asked them this morning. We should’ve gotten a response by now…”

[Investigated through multiple avenues but couldn’t find them. Is this false information?]

“Hmm…”

At Haesu’s lukewarm reaction, the other team members crowded around to check the monitor and all frowned deeply.

“These bastards, are they even looking? Maybe they need to get screwed over by someone like Mo Chang-gwi before they realize how serious this is.”

But Haesu quietly sank into thought.

“What if he didn’t actually go to Shanghai but somewhere else?”

“Well… Isn’t Shanghai the best place for that bastard to go underground?”

“The informant gave us so little to go on. If only we knew which country he was targeting at the time…”

The guy who tipped them off about Mo Chang-gwi had already gone deep underground by the time they tried to find him.

It seemed like he went into hiding as soon as he reported Mo Chang-gwi, fearing he might be hunted down.

“Yeah, no kidding.”

Suddenly, Haesu sprang to his feet. The team leader also stood up in a fuss at the sight.

“Charge is up! He’s moving! Let’s go, let’s go.”

“Where are you going, hyung? Just let Haesu go by himself. Haesu, go wherever you need. Let us know if you need help.”

“Yes.”

As Haesu headed out, his eyes met the youngest member’s.

When the youngest jumped up and grabbed his car keys, Haesu raised a hand, palm toward the ceiling, and gestured downward, motioning him to sit back down.

The youngest’s face turned glum.

Hyoseong Correctional Facility, visitation room.

Haesu, being a VVIP due to inmate management staffing issues, was granted the privilege of using a special room for direct meetings instead of the standard visitation booths.

Chomp chomp chomp

The man sitting across from Haesu was Number 11, who had shared a cell with Mo Chang-gwi.

He had a bottle of strawberry milk neatly placed beside him and was devouring his third cream bread.

“Mmm, mmm, how did you know my taste? I was fine even after that bastard escaped, but not being able to eat this stuff was tough.”

When Haesu stared intently at Number 11, the man looked down and added politely,

“…sir.”

Haesu let out a slight chuckle and replied,

“Haru, Number 17, told me.”

Hearing that Haru remembered such a trivial preference he had mentioned only once nearly twenty years ago brought a complicated expression to Number 11’s face. He was touched.

“…So Number 17’s name is Haru? That’s a… good name.”

“It is a good name.”

After finishing his strawberry milk in one go and brushing off his hands, Number 11 finally sat up properly.

“Alright, what do you want from me? Must be about the company, right?”

Haesu shook his head slightly.

“No. Mo Chang-gwi. Tell me everything you know—when he started planning to escape, why he did it.”

Number 11 leaned back with a surprised expression, trying to recall.

“Hmm… the reason, I don’t know. He was just quietly reading a book, then suddenly said, ‘I have to get out of here,’ and pulled it off that same day. It wasn’t premeditated.”

“…That’s really all?”

Haesu just couldn’t understand it. It wasn’t to regain his former glory or rebuild his organization, and it didn’t make sense that he left because prison life was too hard or boring.

He’d met countless criminals, but Mo Chang-gwi was someone who simply couldn’t be understood with a normal mindset.

Just then, Number 11 raised a finger as if something came to mind.

“Ah.”

“What? Tell me.”

“It’s a really small thing, but right before he said that, he did something.”

“What did he do?”

“He was turning a page with his hand, and it slipped, so he couldn’t flip to the next page. As you know, both his hands were totally wrecked. Who the hell turned a guy like that into such a monster…”

Haesu nodded slightly and replied,

“I did. I was trying to rip his arms off and ended up doing that. Should’ve just torn them off. Why’d I hesitate?”

Haesu trailed off, turning his gaze to the other side.

By then, Number 11 had put his knees together and folded his hands politely.

He had never faced Shin Haesu directly, but the rumors in the prison were widespread—he knew the guy was a serious fighter.

He had underestimated him because Haesu wasn’t company personnel, but he realized he’d been wrong. He needed to show respect.

“I-I just feel more comfortable like this.”

“Sure. Looks good. Alright, go back. Oh, and… the Dongyoungpa action leader is in there too, right?”

“Yes, he turned himself in a few days ago and came back.”

“He must be thrilled that Mo Chang-gwi escaped. Play with him properly.”

“Yes, I will keep that in mind.”

Number 11 even saluted as Haesu walked away.

Haesu swung open the doors to the Violent Crimes Special Investigation Unit headquarters.

“Charge is back!”

“You find anything?”

Haesu strode to his desk and raised one hand.

“Look up all articles related to finger, hand, or reattachment surgery. That bastard went to get his hand fixed. The one I wrecked.”

“His hand?”

“Yeah. We might need to search Japan too.”

In Haesu’s mind, Korea was the best in the region for surgery, but he figured Mo Chang-gwi, having just escaped from a Korean prison, wouldn’t risk undergoing long-term surgery here.

And it didn’t make sense that he’d go to China for surgery either. As a fugitive without a guardian, showing up there would be like a log rolling in on its own.

While they were combing through the data based on Haesu’s hunch—which was as much a lead as it was a guess—the youngest member suddenly raised his hand.

“There’s a weird article here.”

At his words, the team rushed over.

The article had been published the day before, and even the headline was strange.

[Murder + Wrist Theft Case?]

-A gruesome murder occurred at a hand reattachment specialty hospital in Osaka.

A male patient had both hands severed, and the doctor was found dead from a slashed carotid artery.

What’s bizarre is that the pair of severed hands left at the scene did not belong to the patient, but to someone else entirely.

[Mosaic Photo]

The hands at the scene were crushed and the bones completely shattered.

As soon as Haesu read the description of the hands, his brows furrowed sharply.

“Mo Chang-gwi.”

“What? Why, what about him?”

“Those are Mo Chang-gwi’s hands. We’re going to Japan.”