Seo Yoon wakes up at 03:00 AM. Again.

Another night wasted. Another morning she dreads waking up to. Post-university life wasn’t supposed to feel like this—empty, stagnant, like she’s waiting for something she doesn’t remember losing.

Her apartment is quiet. Too quiet. The kind of silence that doesn’t feel normal. Like something is missing.

Then, she hears it.

A hum. Faint. Childlike.

At first, she thinks it’s in her head, the remnants of a dream clinging to her consciousness. But it lingers. The soft, eerie melody winds its way through her skull, curling around her thoughts like an old memory trying to resurface.

It’s coming from inside her room.

Seo Yoon doesn’t move. Her breath feels too loud.

The sound presses against her skin, light but invasive. A nursery rhyme. A song every child in Korea knows.

“Kkogkkog sumeora, meolikarag bolla.”

She stiffens. The air in the room changes—dense, suffocating. The hum grows louder, slipping under her skin like a whisper she can’t shake. Her fingers clench around the blanket as her heart pounds in her ears.

Then, just beyond her door—a voice.

Soft. Playful. Mocking.

“Hide well… I might see your hair.”

A shiver runs down her spine. She knows that voice.

Not the person, but the tone—the kind adults use when coaxing a child into a game.

Her eyes dart to the mirror across the room. The reflection of her dark silhouette stares back, barely visible in the dim light. The air feels heavier.

Slowly, she reaches for the bedside lamp. Her fingers tremble as she twists the switch.

Light floods the room.

Nothing. No one.

Silence swallows everything whole. The humming stops.

Seo Yoon exhales, chest tightening as she scans her surroundings. Everything is where it should be.

But her reflection isn’t.

She isn’t moving, but her reflection is.

And it’s smiling.

Seo Yoon is not smiling.

Her stomach clenches. A cold, creeping dread slides down her spine, freezing her in place. The grin in the mirror is too wide, stretching just past what should be humanly possible. Her reflection tilts its head slightly, like it’s looking at something behind her.

A sharp gasp rips through her throat. She scrambles backward, knocking over the lamp. The sound crashes through the suffocating silence, sending her pulse into overdrive. She squeezes her eyes shut.

Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.

She forces her breathing to slow. When she opens her eyes again—

The mirror is normal.

Her reflection is still. Expressionless. Hers.

Seo Yoon’s hands shake as she grips the edge of the blanket. This isn’t real. It was a hallucination. Sleep deprivation.

She doesn’t remember falling asleep.

But when she wakes up the next morning—

her hair is wet.

Somewhere Else—Someone Is Still Looking

The rain hasn’t stopped in weeks.

Jung Hyun-seok stands in the middle of the street, his sign lifted above his head, ink smudging from the damp air. His throat is raw from shouting, but no one is listening.

No one ever listens.

People walk past him. Some glance his way before looking back down at their phones. Others pretend not to see him at all. He’s used to it by now.

It has been years.

Years since his son disappeared. Years since his name became nothing but a whispered tragedy, a case file gathering dust in some forgotten drawer. Years since he stopped being a man and became just another fixture on the street—a protester clinging to a ghost.

Jung Soo-min.

The name feels foreign in his mouth now. Like it belongs to someone else.

He adjusts his grip on the sign. His hands are trembling. He knows they want him to give up.

The authorities stopped acknowledging him long ago. The media never cared. People tell him to move on. But how can he move on when his son is still out there?

When he knows, deep in his bones, that someone took him?

He lowers the sign slightly, staring at the wet pavement beneath his feet. The city moves on without him. The world forgets the lost.

But he won’t.

He can’t.

And somewhere, just out of sight, someone is watching him.

Elsewhere—A House That Is Not A Home

A child sings softly.

Her voice is sweet, innocent. Trained.

A woman hums along, brushing the girl’s hair with slow, deliberate strokes. Her hands are gentle, but her grip is firm—too firm.

The child does not flinch. She knows better.

From the doorway, a man watches, his expression unreadable. He listens as they sing together.

“Kkogkkog sumeora, meolikarag bolla.”

The woman finishes braiding the girl’s hair and presses a kiss to the top of her head. A loving gesture. A rehearsed act.

Then, she turns to the man. Her eyes glint with something cold.

“It’s time,” she says.

He nods, already reaching for his coat.

There’s someone they need to bring home.