The song was not beautiful.
It was a collision. Two galaxies crashing into each other.
Eden's voice was digital, precise, a perfect sine wave of pure tone. Ji-su's voice was organic, broken, a scream of twenty years of pain.
When they met in the air, the Red Room shook.
HUMMMMM-SCREEEEE.
Glass cracked. The monitors on the wall exploded in showers of sparks.
Chairman Lee fell back against the console, covering his ears. Blood trickled between his fingers.
"Stop it!" Lee screamed. "Disconnect her! Cut the feed!"
He lunged for the emergency shut-off switch.
"No!" Yoo-jin shouted.
He tackled the old man. They hit the metal floor hard.
Lee was surprisingly strong for his age. He elbowed Yoo-jin in the ribs.
Crack.
Yoo-jin gasped, pain flaring in his side. He wasn't a fighter. He was a manager. But he held on, grabbing Lee's wrist.
"You aren't touching that switch," Yoo-jin gritted out.
"You fool!" Lee spat, struggling. "Do you know what you're doing? If they synchronize, the feedback loop will fry the grid! It will destroy the building!"
"Good," Yoo-jin said. "Burn it down."
Above them, the duet escalated.
Eden wasn't just singing. He was hacking.
He pressed his hand against the glass of the tank. Blue light poured from his palm, infecting the water, tracing the wires connected to Ji-su's head.
"I see you," Eden sang. "I hear the noise."
Inside the tank, Ji-su's eyes locked onto his. For the first time in a decade, they focused.
She sang back, a harmony that sounded like weeping.
"Help... me..."
The red lights of the server room turned purple. Then blue.
The System was being overwritten.
[System Alert: Unauthorized Admin Access]
[New Protocol: LIBERATION]
Min-ji stood by the door, guarding it with her guitar case. The guards were groaning on the floor, incapacitated by the sonic pressure.
"Yoo-jin!" Min-ji yelled over the noise. "The structural integrity is failing! The ceiling is cracking!"
Chunks of concrete fell from the roof. Dust filled the air.
Yoo-jin looked up. The massive server towers were swaying.
"Eden!" Yoo-jin shouted. "Finish it! Break the link!"
Eden looked at Ji-su.
He knew what he had to do. He had to pull her out. Not physically. Digitally.
He had to absorb her data. Her pain. Her ghost.
"I am the container," Eden whispered.
He opened his mouth and inhaled.
It wasn't air. It was light.
The blue energy from the tank flowed out, swirling into Eden's chest. The wires attached to Ji-su's head sparked and popped off.
The water in the tank began to drain.
Chairman Lee stopped struggling. He watched in horror as his life's work—his daughter, his weapon—was drained empty.
"Ji-su..." Lee whispered.
The tank shattered.
CRASH.
Water flooded the floor. Ji-su fell forward, limp.
Eden caught her.
He held her wet, frail body in his arms. He stood in the wreckage, glowing with blinding white light.
The song stopped.
Silence.
Then, a low, mechanical groan.
The servers were dying. One by one, the lights went black.
The Dragon was dead.
"You killed it," Lee whispered, staring at the dark monitors. "You killed the future."
"No," Yoo-jin let go of the old man and stood up, clutching his ribs. "We just woke up from the nightmare."
He walked over to Eden.
Eden looked down at the woman in his arms.
"Is she...?" Yoo-jin asked, afraid to finish the sentence.
Eden placed a hand on Ji-su's forehead.
"The noise is gone," Eden said softly. "She is sleeping. A real sleep. No dreams."
She was alive. Free.
"Let's go," Yoo-jin said. "Before the roof comes down."
They moved to the exit. Min-ji helped support Ji-su.
Chairman Lee stayed on the floor. He didn't try to stop them. He just stared at the blank screens, a king in a ruined castle.
"Are you coming?" Yoo-jin asked, pausing at the door.
Lee didn't answer. He looked broken.
Yoo-jin turned and walked away.
They climbed the stairs. B4. B3. B2.
When they reached the lobby, the riot was over. The police had arrived, but they weren't arresting the protesters. They were staring at the building.
Smoke was pouring from the basement vents.
Yoo-jin walked out the front doors. He was wet, bruised, and bleeding. He carried no weapon.
But when the cameras turned to him, he looked unstoppable.
He looked at the crowd. At Sol and Luna on the truck. At David Kim smiling in the chaos.
He raised his fist.
The cheer that went up was loud enough to shake the city.
One Month Later.
The press conference room at the new Starforce HQ (formerly Titan) was packed.
Reporters from CNN, BBC, and every Korean network jostled for position.
Yoo-jin sat at the center of the table. He wore a crisp navy suit. He looked healthy. The dark circles were gone.
Next to him sat Lee Ji-su.
She looked different. Her hair was cut short. She wore a simple sweater. She looked frail, but her eyes were clear.
"Ms. Lee," a reporter shouted. "Is it true you are suing your father for human rights violations?"
Ji-su leaned into the microphone. Her voice was quiet, but steady.
"Yes," she said. "And not just my father. The entire board of Dragon Entertainment."
Cameras flashed.
"Dragon was not a company," Ji-su said. "It was a prison. And I have the keys."
She held up a hard drive. The data Eden had extracted from the Red Room.
"This drive contains the names of every official bribed, every chart manipulated, and every trainee abused for the last twenty years. I am releasing it to the public domain today."
The room exploded. Reporters shouted over each other.
Yoo-jin watched her with pride. She wasn't a victim anymore. She was a witness.
"Mr. Han!" another reporter yelled. "What about Starforce? With the Dragon gone, you are now the biggest agency in Korea. Will you implement a new System?"
Yoo-jin leaned forward.
"No," he said.
"Then how will you guarantee success?"
"We won't," Yoo-jin smiled. "Success isn't guaranteed. That's the point."
He looked at the camera.
"We are launching a new initiative. The 'Open Mic' project. Any artist, from any background, can upload their demo to our server. If the public votes for it, we produce it. No contracts. No debt. Just music."
"That's financial suicide!" a business reporter scoffed. "Without curated idols, the quality will drop!"
"Maybe," Yoo-jin shrugged. "Or maybe we'll find something better than perfect."
He stood up.
"Conference over. We have a show to produce."
The Rooftop Garden.
It was sunset. The air was cool.
Yoo-jin found Eden sitting on a bench, looking at the Han River.
Eden was holding a guitar. An acoustic one.
"Learning a new instrument?" Yoo-jin asked, sitting beside him.
"Min-ji is teaching me," Eden strummed a clumsy G-chord. "My fingers hurt. It is inefficient."
"That's how you build calluses," Yoo-jin said.
"Boss," Eden stopped playing. "I have a question."
"Shoot."
"I am empty now," Eden said. "I gave the data back to Ji-su. I have no S-Rank vocal skills. No dance algorithms. I am just... average."
He looked at Yoo-jin, worried.
"Can I still be an idol if I am average?"
Yoo-jin laughed. He put an arm around Eden's shoulders.
"Eden. Look at the charts."
He pulled out his phone. He showed Eden the Melon Top 100.
#1: The Error - Eden (Acoustic Ver.)
"You aren't popular because you're perfect," Yoo-jin said. "You're popular because you're real."
Eden looked at the chart. A small smile touched his lips.
"Real," he repeated. "I like that stat."
The door to the roof opened.
Sae-ri walked out. She was holding two glasses of champagne.
"Celebrating?" Yoo-jin asked.
"David just called," she handed him a glass. "Chairman Lee pleaded guilty. He's going away for life."
"Good riddance," Yoo-jin clinked his glass against hers.
"And," Sae-ri sat on his other side, leaning her head on his shoulder. "We got an invitation."
"To what? Another mafia dinner?"
"No," Sae-ri smiled. "The Grammys."
Yoo-jin choked on his drink. "The Grammys?"
"Best New Artist nomination. For Sol & Luna. And Best Rock Performance for Min-ji."
Yoo-jin stared at the city skyline.
A year ago, he was a manager cleaning up vomit in a van. A month ago, he was dying in a desert.
Now, he was going to the Grammys.
He looked at his hands. Still no System window. Still just human hands.
But they felt capable.
"Pack your bags," Yoo-jin said, grinning. "We're going to America."
"Again?" Eden groaned. "The food is too greasy."
"We'll get salads," Yoo-jin ruffled his hair.
He stood up and walked to the edge of the roof.
Below him, Seoul was lighting up. Thousands of screens, thousands of speakers, all playing music.
Some of it was manufactured. Some of it was messy.
But all of it was loud.
Yoo-jin closed his eyes and listened. He didn't hear data. He heard the beat.
"Play it loud," he whispered to the city.
He turned back to his family.
"Let's go make some noise."