"The Code of the Walls"

A heavy silence fell after that terrifying sentence. Min-Sol pressed herself against the cold wall, feeling her heartbeat pounding in her ears like war drums. The room seemed to shrink around her, and the walls, lined with pale white, appeared to be sucking the air from her lungs.

"Who are you?" she whispered again, her voice trembling. "And how do you know I’ll forget my name?"

This time the reply came quieter, like a snake hissing: "I’m patient number 404. No names here, names are a luxury we don’t have. Here, you’re just a number in Do-Hyun and his family’s filthy records. Listen carefully… they’ll come back soon to give you the (stabilizing dose). Don’t swallow it. Hide it under your tongue, then flush it down the toilet."

"Why are you helping me?" she asked suspiciously. In her world, every offer of help was a trap carefully laid by Do-Hyun.

"Because I need someone whose limbs haven’t withered yet. I need (eyes) that the drugs haven’t dulled. Tomorrow, they’ll start the (cleansing session). Be ready… and don’t cry. Crying in Cheng-An is considered a sign of instability, and it will increase the dosage."

The voice cut off suddenly. She heard the metallic squeak of wheels approaching her cell. Min-Sol collapsed onto the bed and pretended to sleep, squeezing her eyes shut tightly.

The iron lock clicked sharply. A nurse entered, walking with military-like precision. She didn’t speak a word, placing a plastic tray with a cup of water and a bright blue pill beside Min-Sol’s head. She stood silently, watching her with terrifying scrutiny.

Min-Sol slowly opened her eyes, feigning lethargy. Her trembling hand took the pill and put it in her mouth under the nurse’s watchful gaze. She drank the water, then opened her mouth to show the nurse, as if she were a child in school.

The nurse nodded and left without uttering a word. As soon as the door closed, Min-Sol spat the pill into her hand. It was sticky and bitter, like a piece of nightmare. She ran to the corner of the room and threw it into the drain.

In the middle of the night:

Min-Sol couldn’t sleep. She watched the pale moonlight reflecting from the small barred window. Suddenly, she heard a strange sound… not knocking this time, but a metallic "scraping."

She looked under the door and saw a small folded piece of paper being pushed through the narrow gap. She grabbed it quickly and opened it. It contained a carefully hand-drawn map of the floor, ending with an arrow pointing to the "old morgue," with neat, trembling Korean writing underneath:

"Do-Hyun didn’t bring you here to heal you.

 He wants to erase the (memory) that threatens his political future. Tomorrow, the doctor will ask you about the night of May 10th… Don’t tell the truth. Say you don’t remember. Lying is your only ticket to survival."

Min-Sol froze. May 10th—the night she saw Do-Hyun washing his hands of blood that wasn’t his own. The night her so-called “madness” began.

Suddenly, the lights in the hallway flickered on. A human scream ripped through the adjoining room… Room 404. The sound of brutal beating, and the crackle of an electric prod discharging into a human body.

"No! Please! I remember! I remember everything!" pleaded her mysterious neighbor.

Min-Sol pressed herself against the door, putting her ear on the cold metal, tears silently streaming down her cheeks. She realized now that Cheng-An was not a clinic, but a grinder of souls—and her survival depended on becoming a monster cleverer than the cage she had been placed in.

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