The ride back to Seoul was a blur of silence, tension, and two sisters doing their best not to implode.

Rae sat with her knees bouncing, arms crossed, bruises forming under her hoodie.
Rin clutched the stolen flash drives like they were loaded guns.

“She’s alive,” Rin finally said. “Mi Na. She’s not hiding anymore.”

“Yeah,” Rae muttered. “And she’s sending welcome notes now. Cute.”

They didn’t speak again until they reached home.

The front door opened before they could knock.

Do Bong Soon stood there in sweats, arms folded, eyes unreadable.

No lecture. No scolding. Just one question:

“Did she speak to you?”

The girls froze.

Rin stepped forward. “You knew. You knew she was alive, and you didn’t tell us?”

Bong Soon nodded slowly. “I didn’t want to believe she was still capable of this.”

Rae flared. “You don’t get to protect us with lies. She’s building machines, Mom. Real people. Twisted into weapons.”

“I know,” Bong Soon said. “Because I found one fifteen years ago.
He was my first clue she never stopped working.”

Flashback — 2010.

Bong Soon tracked a strange assault case in Daegu. One attacker lifted a truck off the ground. No record. No trail.

She found him days later, unconscious, dumped in a hospital alley. His bloodstream was full of synthetic compounds.

No ID. Just a scar across his chest in the shape of a zero.

“I realized then,” Bong Soon said, voice low, “that Mi Na didn’t disappear.
She recruited herself into the shadows. Used the legacy as a template… and rewrote the rules.”

Rin pulled out the flash drive.

“She’s got files labeled Project Split. With our names.”

Bong Soon stiffened.

“Split was her theory. That twins born into the bloodline would evolve in opposite directions—one physical, one mental. But if split too far… they'd become unstable.”

Rae frowned. “Unstable how?”

“You’d either destroy each other…
Or fuse into something stronger than either of you alone.”

Rin shook her head. “She’s planning something. Ji Woo isn’t her endgame. She’s the prelude.”

Bong Soon sat down slowly.

“Then we’re out of time.”

She stood and walked to a small cabinet—one neither daughter had ever seen opened.

Inside were two metal cases.

She handed one to each of them.

Rae opened hers: reinforced gloves. Leather-lined. Embedded with shock-absorbing tech. Custom.

Rin’s: a wristband interface linked to an encrypted mobile network and remote override key.

“I made these years ago,” Bong Soon said quietly. “Just in case this day came.”

“Training ends now.
You’re not girls with powers anymore.
You’re soldiers in a legacy war.”

Rae tightened her gloves.

Rin powered up the band.

And for the first time, they weren’t scared.

They were ready.