The afternoon at Daon Solution was submerged in a silence broken only by the dry clacking of cheap keyboards. The air in the office was stale, smelling of instant coffee and old dust.

  In the corner seat, farthest from the air conditioner, Kang Tae-yoon (formerly Jin-woo) sat staring intensely at his monitor. To an observer, he looked like a man wrestling with a complex algorithm. In reality, he was playing the classic Windows game, 'Minesweeper'.

  Click. Click. Flag.

  "Hmm. A 50/50 chance. To click or not to click, that is the question."

  Outwardly, he was the textbook definition of a 'Wage Thief'—a useless middle-aged manager parachuted into the company. But inside his brain, the seemingly random grid of the game was overlaying with the schematic of Daon Solution’s server architecture. Every click was a simulation of a packet breaching a firewall.

  "Um... Manager Kang?"

  From the desk across, Assistant Han So-hee peeked her head up like a timid meerkat. She hunched her shoulders, terrified of being seen talking to him.

  "This... these are the basic materials for the Sungjin Group project. Team Leader Park said you should take a look at them too. But... well... I'm not supposed to give them to you directly..."

  Tae-yoon clicked a mine—BOOM—and turned away from the Game Over screen with a bright, clueless grin. He took the documents.

  "Oh, Assistant Han! Entrusting me with such a grave mission? Is this one of those documents that self-destructs in 5 seconds like in 007? Should I chew it up and swallow it immediately?"

  Han So-hee, flustered by his nonsensical joke, fidgeted with her fingers.

  "Ah, no... just reading it is fine... If there's anything you don't understand, please ask me very quietly. I... I get scolded if my voice is too loud."

  At that moment, a chill swept through the office.

  Assistant Lee Hyun-ah, the office queen bee with a sharp tongue, walked toward the fax machine. As she passed, she deliberately kicked the leg of Tae-yoon’s chair with the tip of her heel.

  Thud.

  "Ah, move over a bit. You have zero situational awareness. Is your job description 'flirting with Assistant Han' as soon as you clock in?"

  Assistant Lee didn't apologize. Instead, she scanned Tae-yoon with eyes full of undisguised disgust. She tossed a crumpled paper cup and a small trash bag onto his desk.

  "Since you're moving, take this out. You're a parachute hire, so you probably have nothing to do anyway. You should at least handle the office sanitation to earn your paycheck, right? Oh, and the break room is out of water."

  The temperature in the office dropped to sub-zero.

  Assistant Han, like a frightened squirrel, buried her head behind her monitor. Team Leader Park Chil-sung, witnessing the bullying, swallowed his blood pressure medication and pretended not to see, kicking the back of his own computer tower instead.

  "Damn it! Why is the server lagging like this! Who is maintaining this?! Are you all playing around?!"

  Tae-yoon looked at the trash Assistant Lee had thrown at him and let out a hearty, clueless laugh.

  "Assistant Lee, you have a keen eye. I actually hold a Level 1 Certificate in Advanced Trash Compactology. I can compress this paper cup into a work of art. Want to see?"

  "Just go throw it out. You smell."

  At her venomous remark, Tae-yoon saluted playfully.

  "Yes, ma'am! Sanitation Manager Kang Tae-yoon, commencing operation 'Clean Sweep'!"

  As he walked out with the trash, Team Leader Park shot him a glare. "Leaving already?" But Tae-yoon just waved. "World peace begins with office hygiene, Team Leader!"

  As he exited into the worn-out hallway, he heard Assistant Lee’s scornful voice behind him.

  "I really wonder what the brain structure of that old man looks like..."

  Evening. 'Moonlight Cafe'.

  After work, Tae-yoon visited a small cafe near the office. The owner, Madam Chae, wiped a glass with a towel and welcomed him.

  "My goodness, Manager Kang! Your face looks even more aged than this morning. You look like you've had an out-of-body experience. Did that personality-disordered Assistant Lee shake your soul out again?"

  Tae-yoon rested his chin on the counter, making a mock-serious face.

  "Madam Chae, today I experienced being both an Invisible Man and a Janitor simultaneously. But strangely, whenever I come here, the color returns to my face. Are you a wizard?"

  "Oh my, your jokes are still terrible! Here, a latte with extra sugar. Drink this and try to be a little less transparent tomorrow."

  Tae-yoon took a sip of the sweet latte, staring at the sunset through the window. No one knew that this mundane routine of being ignored and alienated was actually the calm before the storm.

  Buzz.

  The smartphone in his pocket vibrated microscopically. On the screen, a single Red Warning Light appeared on the Daon Solution server map he had mirrored.

  "Right. Let's just drink coffee for now. Tomorrow morning, there's going to be some wailing in the office."

  Tae-yoon’s finger tapped the table lightly. One press of the Enter key could solve everything, but the Ghost had no intention of revealing his claws just yet.

  The Next Morning.

  Tae-yoon’s second day at work started peacefully. At least, until Team Leader Park started tearing his remaining hair out.

  "Sungjin Group... Bid documents... Security clearance... Ah! Where are my pills!"

  Team Leader Park had his head on his desk, muttering like a possessed man. Next to him, Tae-yoon was sharpening a pencil with meticulous care, like a craftsman.

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  "Team Leader, when blood pressure is high, classical music is best. Shall I perform Beethoven's Symphony of Fate with my mouth? Dun-dun-dun-duuuun~!"

  "Manager Kang! Shut up! Go to the break room and remove the frost from the freezer! The noise is driving me crazy!"

  At the random order, Tae-yoon stood up, brandishing a small pocket knife. "Yes, sir! How did you know my major was Cryogenic Engineering?"

  Just then, Assistant Lee threw a thick stack of documents onto Tae-yoon’s chest.

  Thwack.

  "De-ice the fridge, and then type all of this up. If even one number is wrong, don't expect to go home tonight."

  Assistant Lee applied lipstick while looking in her mirror, not even glancing at him. Assistant Han, watching from the side, turned pale and approached Tae-yoon.

  "Um... Manager Kang. I'll do the typing. You just... handle the frost..."

  "Assistant Han! Do you have nothing to do? Didn't I tell you not to help others?"

  At Assistant Lee’s sharp rebuke, Han shrank back. Tae-yoon grinned and secretly placed a candy from the convenience store on Han's desk.

  "Assistant Han, eat this and recharge your sugar. You need clear eyes to see through my X-ray glasses later."

  Han So-hee blushed to the tips of her ears, and Tae-yoon headed to the break room.

  Deep in the freezer compartment, behind a thick layer of ice, lay the terminal port connected to Daon Solution's main server. Pretending to scrape away the ice, Tae-yoon skillfully unscrewed the panel and lightly tapped the internal signal receiver.

  4:00 PM.

  A strange silence fell over the office.

  Tae-yoon, dozing off by the copier as usual, heard a microscopic high-frequency sound. It was a sound inaudible to ordinary people—the scream of a server right before it dies.

  "Huh? Team Leader, the monitors over there look like the blue ocean... Are we going on a group vacation?"

  At Tae-yoon’s nonsense, Team Leader Park looked up.

  Instantly, every monitor in the office flashed blue simultaneously and went black.

  [SYSTEM ERROR]

  "W-What?! Did the server crash?! Assistant Lee! Assistant Han! Check it now!"

  Team Leader Park screamed. Assistant Lee frantically pounded on her keyboard, but it was dead. The main database containing the Sungjin Group bid proposal had gone completely dark.

  Panic ensued.

  In the midst of the chaos, Tae-yoon leisurely returned to his seat and poured a stick of instant coffee into a paper cup.

  "Oh dear, the server must have gone on strike because of the heat. Should I go buy a latte for the CEO?"

  The sound of him stirring coffee with a plastic stick echoed through the silence. In the center of the pandemonium, only Tae-yoon’s eyes shone with a cold, calculated light.

  "No! My bid proposal! If this is lost, we all have to jump into the Han River!"

  Team Leader Park grabbed his monitor and let out a wail close to grief. The office was a battlefield. Assistant Lee, her face pale, was unplugging and replugging cables behind the desktop, her usual arrogance completely gone.

  "Team Leader, the keyboard isn't responding! The mouse cursor is gone too! Is this an external hacking attack?"

  Her voice trembled. Assistant Han was pressing the power button repeatedly, tears welling up in her eyes.

  At the center of this hellscape, Tae-yoon stood leaning against the break room entrance, chewing on the end of his coffee stick.

  "Oops. Team Leader, maybe Sungjin Group is testing our skills? The blue screen looks very cool and refreshing, why is everyone so upset?"

  "Manager Kang! You crazy lunatic! Is this the time for jokes?! Go call the technical support team NOW!"

  Team Leader Park screamed, pointing a finger. Tae-yoon walked over slowly and tapped Park on the shoulder.

  "Team Leader, machines listen better when you hit them. I know this because I used to fix cultivators in the countryside. The angle is very important."

  While everyone’s eyes were glued to the black screens, Tae-yoon slid his foot under the main server tower. He gently touched his smartphone, hidden in his sock, to the secret port he had opened earlier.

  0.1 Seconds.

  In that fleeting moment, Phantom’s recovery code injected itself into Daon’s paralyzed veins, spreading at light speed.

  "Eei! Wake up, you tin can!"

  Tae-yoon tapped the side of the computer tower with the tip of his toe. A light, seemingly insignificant thud.

  Beep-beep-beep.

  Like a lie, every monitor in the office flickered back to life. The frozen cursors moved, and the bid documents that seemed lost forever were proudly displayed in the center of the screens.

  A heavy silence descended.

  Assistant Lee froze with her hands on the keyboard. Team Leader Park stood with his mouth open, staring blankly. Only Assistant Han widened her eyes and looked at Tae-yoon.

  "Huh? Uh? It's back? Manager Kang... what did you just do?"

  At Park’s trembling question, Tae-yoon took a loud slurp of his instant mix coffee and answered nonchalantly.

  "Ah, as expected, hitting is the best medicine for tractors and servers alike. I have a bit of Chi energy concentrated in my big toe. We got lucky, Team Leader."

  Tae-yoon walked past the dumbfounded Assistant Lee back to his seat.

  "Assistant Lee, the documents you gave me to type... they got a little wet while I was cleaning the fridge ice. Is that okay?"

  Assistant Lee couldn't even answer, staring at him with suspicion.

  Silence and doubt filled the room. Tae-yoon opened 'Minesweeper' again. But behind his glasses, his eyes were already burrowing deep into the internal servers of Sungjin Group.

  An hour had passed since the power was restored, but Assistant Lee’s eyes were still trembling. She nervously twisted her hair, glancing between Tae-yoon’s shoe and the server tower.

  "Team Leader, there is absolutely no way that old man fixed it. It was just a system glitch coinciding with the recovery timing. If kicking a server fixes it, then all engineers in the world should be soccer players!"

  Team Leader Park wiped his sweat and popped another pill. "Still... the timing was too perfect, wasn't it? Assistant Lee, you couldn't say a word back then either."

  "That was because I was just so dumbfounded! Manager Kang, if you luckily avoided an accident, just go make copies. Stop playing hero."

  Despite her forced sarcasm, Tae-yoon hummed a tune behind his monitor.

  "Assistant Lee, life is 70% luck and 30% skill. I used all my luck today, so I guess I should give up on the lottery. Ah, we're out of copy paper. Shall I refill it?"

  As Tae-yoon headed to the supply room, Assistant Han quietly followed him. She pulled a vitamin drink from her pocket and pressed it into his hand.

  "Um... Manager. Earlier... you were really cool. Everyone gave up, but you were the only one who didn't panic..."

  Tae-yoon grinned at the bottle.

  "Assistant Han, I'm the type who gets stronger in a crisis. I'm especially cold-blooded when choosing a lunch menu or when servers explode. I should drink this and increase the power of my X-ray glasses."

  Assistant Han blushed and smiled shyly. Watching from afar, Assistant Lee’s eyebrows twitched in displeasure.

  The peace didn't last long.

  Just before quitting time, Team Leader Park’s smartphone rang violently. As he took the call, the color drained from his face, turning ashen.

  "What? Sungjin Group's headquarters security network was breached? Through our subcontracted server? What kind of...!"

  Park’s hand holding the phone shook uncontrollably.

  The server recovery earlier was just the beginning. Someone had used Daon Solution’s old network as a stepping stone to touch the heart of Sungjin. It wasn't a simple glitch; it was the prelude to a catastrophe that could wipe the company off the map.

  Tae-yoon stood by the window with a cup of latte, muttering low.

  "See? I told you there would be wailing tomorrow."

  The true hunt had finally entered the stage where the predator confirms the beast caught in the trap.