“A-Are you insane, mister?!”

“Call the police! Call the police!”

Shin Haesu gestured with his chin toward Officer Lim, who was standing behind him in plain clothes.

“I am the police. Officer Lim, let’s start by confiscating the perpetrators’ phones.”

“Yes, sir!”

It was Haesu’s day off. To prevent any unnecessary complaints when searching the girls’ belongings, he had asked Officer Lim for assistance.

“What the hell! Don’t touch me! I swear, I’ll report you all for sexual harassment—kyak!”

Officer Lim, having seen the students curse and lash out at their teacher, subdued the girls roughly.

There were five of them, but a total of seven phones were confiscated.

“Yuri, is it just these five?”

At Haesu’s question, Yuri quietly recalled the past. To her, every student had been a perpetrator. Even those who merely watched and turned away—she resented them all.

But she knew she couldn’t punish everyone. If nothing else, she wanted these five, the ones who had directly tormented her, to face proper consequences. Yuri nodded deeply.

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Ham Yuri, you f***ing b***h!! Ugh!”

Kang Juri foamed at the mouth and lunged at Yuri, but Officer Lim swiftly twisted her arm and restrained her.

Bang!

“What the hell is going on here?!”

Just then, the door burst open, and a middle-aged woman shouted. The homeroom teacher flinched and took a step back upon seeing her.

“Principal…”

“What do you think you’re doing in my school? If you’re going to question students and conduct an investigation, you should formally request the school’s cooperation, shouldn’t you?”

The homeroom teacher bit her lower lip before stepping forward again.

“I’ve reported this to you multiple times, but you ignored me.”

“Kim Sujin, shut up! Where did this strange thing crawl in from, calling itself a teacher and polluting my school?”

The moment the principal arrived, the perpetrators regained their confidence. Kang Juri violently shook off Officer Lim’s grip and clung to the principal.

“Grandma! That b***h twisted my wrist—it hurts so bad!”

“That crazy b***h dared to lay a hand on my granddaughter…!”

Schlick.

At that moment, Haesu stepped forward, shielding Yuri with his body.

“Yuri, you’re recording properly, right?”

“Yes.”

At Haesu’s words, Yuri directly lifted her phone and pointed it at the principal and the perpetrators.

“W-What? What are you recording? Give me that!”

“An audit from the Ministry of Education is coming to Seongyeong High School today. Just a little digging, and the filth was overwhelming. Turning a blind eye to school violence is the norm here, not to mention leaked exam questions, award rigging, and competition entry controversies… The Criminal Investigation Division at Gangjin Police Station will also be launching an investigation soon. I advise you to cooperate sincerely rather than attempt to destroy evidence and increase your sentence. Principal.”

“W-What are you talking about? I have nothing to be ashamed of! I am completely innocent!”

Ignoring the principal’s protests, Haesu scanned the students and continued.

“Then, I’ll see you all at the police station.”

“Hey, wait a minute…”

Haesu met Officer Lim’s gaze and nodded. With the confiscated phones in hand, he walked out of the classroom with Yuri.

As they walked down the hallway, he studied Yuri’s homeroom teacher’s face. It was filled with worry.

“Will you be all right staying here? You’ll be the one taking all the heat.”

She clenched her fists tightly before nodding firmly.

“Yes, I have to be. If Yuri could muster the courage to stand up, then I must find the courage to fight as well.”

Even in an era where student rights often outweighed teacher authority, there were still true educators. Haesu gave her a small nod, silently cheering her on.

Kang Juri and the four others had been bullying Ham Yuri for a long time. Naturally, they hadn’t considered erasing the evidence while tormenting her.

So even before forensic analysis was performed on the confiscated phones, an overwhelming amount of evidence of assault and verbal abuse poured out.

Following Yuri’s testimony, they visited the locations where she had been bullied and secured clear evidence of the violence through CCTV footage.

A dark room, illuminated only by the glow from the monitor.

A video meticulously compiling all the details and evidence of Ham Yuri’s group harassment, organized by date, was being uploaded to a website.

Haesu hovered the mouse cursor over the [Upload] button but turned his head at the last moment.

“Yuri, are you sure you want to upload this? No matter how much we try to cover and conceal it, rumors will spread. Can you handle that?”

Yuri, sitting curled up on her chair with her knees tucked in, stared intently at the monitor before nodding.

“Yes, please upload it.”

“All right.”

Haesu clicked Upload. The incident was now on YouTube, the most popular video-sharing platform in the world.

This was Yuri’s idea. She had spent the investigation period thinking of ways to make her tormentors suffer even more.

[Exposing the Group Bullying at S****** High School in Gangjin. Please share widely.]

┗Are you kidding me? What kind of monsters do this?

┗No wonder demons are losing their jobs.

┗These are second-year students at Seongyeong High. Their names are Kang **, Kim **, Jang **, Kim **, and Oh **.

┗We have their info. Who’s coming with me to teach these scumbags a lesson?

┗Purge the school’s corrupt leadership, the Ministry of Education better step up, and give those kids the harshest punishment possible!

┗The school is trash. This is what happens when the system enables bullies. The Ministry of Education better do its job this time.

┗That girl looks kinda cute, though?

┗Are you brain-dead? Agreeing.

The video spread like wildfire, picked up by every famous YouTuber. Within days, dozens of articles were published, and a national petition was filed.

Unlike news articles that had to pass through newspaper editors, this video, uploaded directly to YouTube, was beyond external influence.

Furthermore, aside from Kang Juri, whose grandmother was the principal, the other perpetrators came from average or below-average backgrounds, leaving them with little external protection.

A few days later, at the local police station.

The perpetrators had gathered once more. The social backlash had been severe, and they seemed to have finally realized the gravity of their actions. Their faces looked utterly drained.

As Haesu entered the interrogation room, he observed their expressions closely.

“You all look much better after just a few days.”

“…F*** off.”

“I curse you…”

Clearly, a few days of internet backlash wasn’t enough to rehabilitate them.

“Come in.”

The perpetrators tilted their heads in confusion. All five were already here—who else was coming in?

Then, in walked Ham Yuri, dressed neatly. The room erupted into chaos.

“Ham Yuri!”

“Yuri, I was wrong! I’m really sorry! Please forgive me, just this once, let’s settle this!”

“Yuri, I barely hit you! You know that, right? This was all Kang Juri’s idea! I got beaten up if I didn’t go along! I’m a victim too!”

“Shut up, you little— Yuri, Ham Yuri.”

Kang Juri fell to her knees in front of Yuri, clutching at her pant leg.

“I… I really regret everything. I’ll repent for the rest of my life. Please, just this once, please settle this with me, okay?”

Her desperate expression was pathetic. Yuri’s hardened expression wavered slightly.

“Haah…”

Laughter. The room fell silent for a moment. The source of the sound was Ham Yuri. She looked down at Kang Juri, who was clutching the hem of her pants, and gave her a genuine smile.

“All because of... something like this…”

A single tear traced down the corner of her eye. Yuri met Haesu’s gaze and nodded.

“It’s over now. From now on, I will never settle.”

“Yeah, you did well.”

At Yuri’s words, Kang Juri’s expression twisted, as if she had never begged in the first place. Like a demon, her face contorted, and she suddenly sprang to her feet, lunging at Yuri.

“You... you f***ing b****!!”

CRASH!!

However, Yuri was a beat faster. She pushed Kang Juri back with all her strength, sending her tumbling over a chair and onto the floor.

Yuri shot her a cold glare before turning and walking out of the interrogation room.

“…F***… f***…”

Kang Juri did not get up. She remained in that position, cursing through her tears.

The investigation concluded swiftly. With the public’s attention on the case, all five perpetrators received prison sentences.

The ringleader, Kang Juri, and her boyfriend, Kim Eon-seok, were sentenced to three years in prison.

Seongyeong High School was exposed for various corruptions, leading to the dismissal of nearly half of its staff, including the principal, vice principal, and complicit teachers.

The night shift at the district police station ended at 9 AM. After the next team arrived for the shift change, Haesu changed clothes and headed toward the parking lot. There, he spotted a familiar face—Yuri—standing with a middle-aged man.

Yuri, her eyes fixed on him, watched silently for a moment before speaking.

“You noticed right away, didn’t you? I cut my hair, Haesu.”

“You recognized it immediately. This is my father.”

The middle-aged man beside her finally met Haesu’s gaze and extended his hand. His face was heavy with guilt.

“I’m… Yuri’s father…”

“Yes, I’m Sergeant Shin Haesu.”

As soon as their hands clasped, the man held on tightly with both hands. Then, lowering his head, he began to weep.

“Officer, thank you. Thank you so much. This is all my fault. She’s my only daughter, and I failed to protect her…”

Haesu hesitated for a moment before gently patting the man’s back.

“Take good care of her from now on. And remember, it’s not your fault. The blame lies with the perpetrators.”

Ham Yuri had cut her once-long hair short, changed her name, and transferred to another school. Though she didn’t have to, she wanted to leave. That school was still full of tormentors.

A month had passed since Haesu was assigned to the Dongbu District Police Station in Gangjin City.

During that time, he had traveled to the past six times and learned a few rules:

• Time rewinds exactly 60 minutes.
• It only works at the crime scene, under the condition that the victim has either died or suffered permanent injury.
• It can only be used once per day.
• To activate the ability, he must will himself to go back while internally saying the trigger word: “Reset.”
• If the victim is conscious at the moment of reset, they retain memories of the previous timeline.

However, these memories only form after the reset point. If he resets at 9 AM, going back to 8 AM, the victim remembers everything from after 9 AM. This phenomenon was difficult to verify due to a lack of test cases.

Most people simply experienced vivid déjà vu.

Haesu was now faced with a deep, unresolved question.

‘Why did I receive this ability…?’

Yes, this was an ability. At first, it had been a chance to correct a single mistake in the past. But now, being able to use it freely when needed, he could call it a power.

After finishing his shift, Haesu shaved neatly, put on a well-pressed black suit, and polished his shoes.

His destination: a memorial park.

Before him was an urn, next to which stood a photograph of a middle-aged man in a police uniform and a young man with a scowl on his face.

[Late Shin Jeong-seok]

Today marked exactly twelve years since his only family, his father, had passed away.

Haesu stared at the photograph in silence. Why hadn’t he smiled in that picture? Every time he looked at it, regret filled him. It was the only proper photo they had together, another regret.

‘Father…’

He recalled that day, twelve years ago.

He had skipped gym class to hang out and gotten into a fight.

The apartment complex where he lived had a hallway-style structure, with ten units per floor, five on each side of the elevator.

Ding-dong.

- 7th floor. The doors are opening.

As soon as the elevator doors opened, Haesu instinctively took a step forward—but then stopped.

A stranger stood before him.

A man wearing a black cap, a hoodie layered under another hoodie, and a mask.

Even though Haesu was a fearless high school junior with newfound confidence from training at a gym, the man’s eyes alone froze him in place.

Just for a moment, but in that instant, Haesu instinctively read the meaning in his gaze.

‘Should I kill him or not?’

A chill ran down his spine. Sweat trickled down his back. Avoiding eye contact, he forced himself to step out. The man entered the elevator and descended.

“D-Dad!!”

When he got home, his father was hanging from the balcony.

The case was quickly closed. No traces of foul play were found. The elevator’s CCTV had been broken for a long time.

- Haesu, how about we go fishing this weekend?

- Whatever. Do as you like.

But Haesu’s father was not the type to commit suicide.

A man about to kill himself doesn’t make plans to go fishing with his son.

Yet the only shred of evidence Haesu had was that man’s gaze. The gaze of a killer.

Of course, the desperate cries of a naïve high schooler were ignored.

Now, years later.

Haesu had become a police officer to uncover the truth and catch the culprit, but the case files revealed nothing. The surrounding CCTVs had long been erased.

It was like searching for a needle in the desert.

But he refused to let go.

Because he believed in one thing: the desire to kill.

That monstrous gaze—such a person would kill again. If he kept investigating murder cases, he would find him.

He needed to return to the violent crimes unit.

Slowly, Haesu raised his palm and stared at it.

With this miraculous ability, he didn’t need money or connections. He could return to the team without bowing to anyone.

‘I will find him. I swear it.’

On his way home from the memorial park, Haesu stopped by a convenience store to fill his empty stomach.

“Hello.”

As usual, he greeted the store owner, expecting the usual warm response. But there was none.

He glanced toward the counter. No one was there.

Had he stepped out? Just as he moved forward to grab some food, his foot hit something.

“Sir?”

The store owner was lying on the floor between the counter and the shelves. In his right hand, he clutched a small piece of paper.

At that moment, the voice of a news anchor flowed from the TV.

[…The drawing for the 1,006th National Bank lottery has concluded. See you next week.]