On a busy street on the outskirts of Hanyang, Lee Youngwoon rushes through the crowds on his fastest horse. A few hours ago, he received information from one of his intelligence details in Haeju that Heechul had fired his emergency flare. Each person in his Operation has their own emergency flares with their unique colours, so they can ask for help in moments of need. The fact that he knows that Heechul would not use his emergency flare foolishly only makes his stomach burn with worry. He tightens his grip on the bridle, the journey seems like the longest test of time.

When he finally gets to the base of the Haeju rebels, a horrifying scene unravels before his eyes. In the front yard, about fifty men lie unconscious, their clothes and faces covered with blood. Lee Youngwoon immediately signals to his followers to tend to the injured men. As he looks through the front yard, Heechul and Dongchun are not among those injured.

Lee Youngwoon starts to rummage through the residence. It takes him about fifteen minutes to find a strange empty land behind the residence. As he gets closer, the smell of blood becomes unbearably strong. He starts to quicken his steps. Deep down inside, fear has already filled his heart.

The empty land is scattered with arrows. On the tails of these arrows engraved the symbol of the Royal Palace. This is a special kind of arrow, which can only be used by the Royal Army. There is no doubt in his mind that this place has been attacked by the soldiers of the Royal Army. As he walks further out into the land, he starts to see it. A scene that breaks his heart into a million pieces.

Heechul and Dongchun lie next to each other in the middle of a pile of arrows. On each of them is about twenty arrows, piercing through every inch of their bodies. Lee Youngwoon immediately runs to check their pulses. Heechul and Dongchun's bodies are as cold and lifeless as ice on a snowy night. He suspects they have been dead for a few hours now, probably ever since he fired that emergency flare. 

Lee Youngwoon slowly reaches to close their eyes. For a moment, he feels as if all the blood in his body has been frozen, and he cannot move. Second time. This has been the second time now. Scenes from fifteen years ago start flashing in his head. The people closest to him. On the ground of their own residence. Their bodies bloody and lifeless, just like Heechul right now. This time, it was his favourite student. His colleague. His trusted confidante for more than ten years.

Suddenly, Lee Youngwoon notices something in Heechul's hand. He slowly pulls it from the other's hand. It was a small bottle with only a few drops of liquid left inside. There was something strange about the way Heechul was gripping the bottle tightly, as if he had wanted to show it to whoever would discover his body, in this case, he was certain was Kim Youngwoon. Heechul was always a clever man, Lee Youngwoon is sure that in his last moments, he would have thought of ways to leave them a message. 

As he examines Heechul's body more closely, he discovers large bruises running from Heechul's hands up to his arms. The bruises looked like blood veins if they were actually outside his body instead of inside. Lee Youngwoon makes a mental note of these bruises, then continues to look through Heechul's pocket. In the deepest corner of his pocket, a small envelope sits neatly. The envelope is addressed to Hankyung. Lee Youngwoon is surprised for a second, then carefully puts both the bottle and envelope inside his pocket. He signals for his servants to take care of Heechul and Dongchun's bodies, then finds his way back to his horse. There is work for him to do in Hanyang.

As soon as he gets back to his residence, Lee Youngwoon sends a letter to Sungmin enclosed with the bottle he found with Heechul's body. Sungmin is currently with Kyuhyun in the mountains of Bukhansan. As far as he knows, there is an excellent doctor there who has saved Sungmin's life twice. He instructs Sungmin to find out from the doctor what kind of liquid was in the bottle and what it could do to the human body. The Haeju rebels were good at potions. Perhaps, this was one of the poison that they had used to defend against the Royal Army.

His mind suddenly shifts to what Eunhyuk had reported to him a few nights ago. Could the white shadow seen appearing roaming through the night of Hanyang a few nights ago really be the Phantom Killer? Did the Phantom Killer really exist, or was he no more than a figment of imagination or a piece of folktale that the midwives tell their husbands and children? And if he was real, could he have been the one behind the purge of the Haeju rebels? A million questions spin around in his head. Lee Youngwoon slowly sits down in his seat, his hands massaging his temples.

After a long while, he decides to take a walk outside for fresh air. A million thoughts occupy his mind. When he looks up again, he is already standing outside the gates of Seowangmyeong.

Outside the gates of Seowangmyeong, there is an old maidenhair tree that stood there for hundreds of years. In the autumn, the maidenhair leaves turn into a golden colour that shines throughout the forest, but at the moment, all the leaves are gone. The cold winter seems to have taken all of its colours, leaving only lifeless, lonely branches.

Lee Youngwoon stands motionlessly for a second. Under the shade of the maidenhair, a man sits quietly. In the darkness of the winter night, the shadow looks more like a statue than a human. As he comes closer, Lee Youngwoon's heart drops.

"Hankyung ah," he speaks lowly, "what are you doing here?"

The man calmly turns around and looks at him, in his eyes, an endless sorrow dominates.

"Lee seonsaengnim," Hankyung gives him the slightest smile, "I'm so sorry."

"Why are you sorry?"

Lee Youngwoon widens his eyes in surprise.

"I have to return home, Lee seonsaengnim. My mother has been very sick. I don't think she will make it this time."

Hankyung says, his voice as low as the ground beneath their feet.

"That's nothing to be sorry for, Hankyung ah. Go home and take care of your mother, and come back when you are ready."

"I don't think I will come back, seonsaengnim." His voice again is low, almost like a whisper.

"Why not?"

Hankyung lets out a deep sigh.

"I have been feeling like this for a while now. I have always wanted to have a family of my own. Growing up, I never even had a roof above my head. It was one street after another. But as I got older, my parents saved every cent they could to open up a food stall by themselves. And it got bigger, and bigger, to the point that the locals called me "the Prince of Fried Rice".

Hankyung stops for a moment as if living the memory in his own head.

"That's what I always wanted to have. A family with me, taking care of the family business, living every moment in life to the fullest. But somewhere along the road, I got caught up in all of this. After I met Heechul, I thought maybe I could have that one day."

Hankyung stops for a moment, sadness starting to fill in his eyes.

"But even he left me. I wrote to ask him to come with me. Before that, he wrote to me every week. Then, after I asked, he just went silent. There was no response from him again."

As if remembering something, Lee Youngwoon reaches inside his pocket for the envelope he found on Heechul. The envelope was addressed to Hankyung. But before he could say anything, he hears Hankyung speak again.

"He made his decision".

The hand reaching for the envelope suddenly stops. Lee Youngwoon can feel his heart drop for a second. If he gives Hankyung the letter, what will happen? If Hankyung knows the truth about Heechul, he will undoubtedly want to avenge his partner. Hankyung just said it himself, he never really belonged in this Operation. The truth will swallow him whole, and he will never be able to get out of this mission.

So Lee Youngwoon pushes Heechul's letter deeper into his pocket.

"Heechul is probably busy with the rebellion, Hankyung ah," Lee Youngwoon's voice is as soft as the air around them, "He has a mission to complete, but you have another purpose. You should move on."

Hankyung slightly scoffs at him. Move on? How can he move on when his whole heart and soul are somewhere else?

Something cold and wet suddenly lands on Lee Youngwoon's shoulder. As he turns to look, a snowflake starts to melt into his clothes. Another, then another. Gently, and unexpectedly onto his shoulders, his face, his hands.

But on Hankyung's face, something warm has started to fall onto his face.

One drop, then two drops.

Spilling out of his eyes. Onto the hard and coagulated ground.

In his hand, the bright red umbrella sits tightly.

But he does not use it against the falling snow, as if never even aware of its function against the hard and cold weather.

He tightens his grip on the last memory of the person he has loved for more than ten years.

Then, as sudden as the falling snow, he stands up from his seat under the maidenhair tree. His eyes look out onto an infinite emptiness, the sadness never seeming to subdue. He prostrates himself before Lee Youngwoon, taking three deep bows to the ground. A ritual of saying goodbye to their elders.

"Seonsaengnim, please forgive me for letting you down. Everything I know, I learned it from you. You have provided me with the most rewarding and respectable job I could ever get. I owe you everything I have. So, I can only beg for your forgiveness for leaving you like this."

Lee Youngwoon feels like his heart has been crushed into a thousand pieces, and those pieces become an invisible force that in turn suffocates him. On his face, a tear starts to roll down his cheek.

"I'm the one who has to apologize to you, Hankyung ah."

The words he wants to speak remain unspoken.

One day, he will tell Hankyung the truth. One day, he will face his anger, disappointment, despise, and hatred towards him. But today, Hankyung is so close to the freedom and peace he has always wanted.

"Seonsaengnim," he hears Hankyung whisper again, "if you ever see Heechul again, tell him I will be in Jeonju, waiting for him. I will wait for him, even until the end of times."

Lee Youngwoon nods at him. A smile appears gently on his face, even though he knows he is far from happiness.

"I will tell him, Hankyung ah. Take care of your mother. And yourself."

With that, Hankyung starts to walk away from him. His shadow seems like a statue moving rigidly. Above their heads, the sky is pitch black with no moon or clouds to be seen.

When he gets home, Lee Youngwoon fights hard with himself about whether to open the envelope addressed to Hankyung. Finally, he decides to check it out for any clues as to who did the attack on them. Inside the envelope is a letter with neatly written words.

"To my Hannie,

You could not imagine how happy I was to receive your letter after all this time. I was starting to worry that something had happened.

I am saddened to hear the news about your mother. If only I could do something to help. But your letter lit up something inside of me. Something that I had thought was dead a long time ago.

I have always said this, but I am not sure if you know the meaning of my words: You are one of a few exceptional men left in this world. The first time we met, I knew that you had managed to look through my heart and soul, despite the hard and tough exterior that I have tried to create all those years. When people look at me, all they see is a face prettier than all the girls in Joseon combined. When they got to know me a little bit more, they would start to think: "Ah, what a shame. What an in the disguise of a pretty man." And I never blame them. I know to some extent, they were right.

But for some reason, Han ah, you have seen in me something that even I cannot see at times. You have looked at my selfishness, and saw the excruciating pain that I had to endure. You have looked at the darkness inside my soul, and still found a light. You have looked at my arrogrance, my cheerfulness, my mischievousness, and saw pure sorrow. You have looked at my crimes, and still saw goodness. You are truly a special kind of person, and I am a better version of myself because of you.

So my answer is yes, Han ah. I will come with you to Jeonju. I want to build a family with you. I want to taste your fried rice every single day, for the rest of my life. I want to grow old with you. I never want to be apart ever again. If you could give me a few more months, I will come to Jeonju with you. Until things in Haeju settle down and my brother is safe, I will run to you. We can retire from all this fighting and politics, and open up a food stall just like your parents did. Give me a few more months, and I will give you my forever. 

Until that day, I will just have to hold you silently in my heart.

Your Chul."

A tear falls onto the letter, smearing the neatly written words. Outside Lee Youngwoon's window, the wind is howling to the pitch black sky with no moon or clouds.