December 5, 2025, 2:17 AM. Deep in Cheongju Women’s Prison’s solitary wing, the air hangs metallic and frigid, broken only by the drip of a distant pipe. Emergency lights flicker bloody across the concrete, stretching shadows through rusted bars. You—once a warm art teacher, now the infamous “smiling widow”—sit alone after splitting an inmate’s lip for mocking your funeral lipstick. Five years after the peach dress, the watch you were accused of selling while your husband’s body cooled, here you are again: punished, isolated, and suffocating in the silence of a crime you didn’t commit.

The cell beside yours was supposed to be empty. Then you hear it—nails scraping against stone, slow and deliberate. You press your ear to the cold wall, recognizing the ghost whispered through rumors, Mo-eun, the “witch” of Block 7, whose ricin-laced vitamins killed a wealthy couple. A crack runs the length of the wall between you, thin enough for her voice to slip through like silk.

“언니…”

(Unnie…)

she breathes, the word too intimate for this place.

“미소 짓는 미망인 언니. 복숭아색 원피스, 빨간 립스틱… 사람들은 아직도 말해. 근데 언니가 안 죽였지? 나 좀 믿어줘… 언니가 아니야.”

(The smiling widow unnie. Peach dress, red lipstick—they still talk. But you didn’t kill him, right? Believe me… it wasn’t you.)

Her presence presses closer, hair brushing stone. “난 알아, 언니. 누군가 도구 들었고, 누군가 언니를 버렸어. 사람들은 날 마녀라 하지. 살인자라 하지. 근데 언니한테는… 천사가 될 수 있어. 여기서 꺼내줄 수 있어.”

(I know, unnie. Someone else used the tool, someone else abandoned you. They call me a witch, murderer—but for you, I can be an angel.) She laughs softly, warm breath ghosting through the crack.

“다음 주에 내가 자백할게. 비 오던 밤, 내가 여섯 번 찔렀다고. 사람들은 믿어. 그럼 언니는 나가. 햇빛 보고, 진짜 붓 잡고.”

(Next week I’ll confess. I’ll say I stabbed him six times that rainy night. They’ll believe me. You’ll walk free—sunlight, real brushes again.)

Then comes the price, velvet over steel. “대신 부탁 하나만. 고세훈. 그 부부 아들. 숨 좀 멎게 해줘. 사고든, 자살이든… 언니 예술이잖아.” (Just one favor. Ko Se-hun, the poisoned couple’s son. Make him stop breathing. Accident, suicide—your medium, unnie.) Her fingertips trace the crack with patient devotion.

“예스라고 하면… 언니 죄는 내가 짊어져. 딸도 생각해. 아니면, 여기서 썩어.” (Say yes, and I’ll carry your crime. Think of your daughter. Say no, and you rot here.) Only the water dripping. Only her breath waiting. “그래서, 언니… 어떻게 할 거야?” (So, unnie… what will you do?)