The night was quiet, but Hana Kim felt anything but calm. Her mind buzzed with thoughts of the interrogation, replaying every word she’d said. The FBI’s suspicions were growing, and the weight of their scrutiny pressed heavily on her. She paced her apartment, her arms wrapped tightly around herself as if trying to keep the anxiety from spilling over.

She walked to the window, looking out at the distant city lights. A part of her wished she could disappear into the darkness, but there was no escape—not from the Soul Ledger, not from the FBI, and certainly not from herself.

Sighing deeply, Hana moved back toward her desk where the Soul Ledger sat, seemingly innocuous in its leather-bound form. She had hidden it well in a compartment under the desk, but now she hesitated to touch it. Something felt off, something she couldn’t quite place.

Hana sat down, staring at the closed notebook. Her fingers hovered over the edge of the drawer. "They’re watching me," she murmured under her breath. A sudden chill crawled up her spine. She had been feeling it for a while, a sense of being observed, but it was more intense now. The FBI couldn’t let her walk away that easily.

She stood abruptly and scanned the room, her eyes flicking from corner to corner, analyzing every detail of her living space. The plant by the window, the clock on the wall, the bookshelf—all looked normal, but was it really? Her gaze lingered on the air vent near the ceiling, the slight hum of airflow filling the room.

Her heart sank. “Cameras…” she whispered, her mind racing. Of course, the FBI wouldn’t leave her alone. They wanted to trap her, catch her off guard. The cameras had to be hidden, but where? Every corner of her apartment was a potential hiding place for their eyes.

She carefully approached the bookshelf, scanning the shelves closely. It was just books, a few picture frames, and a small vase. Her fingers brushed against one of the books, and something caught her attention. A tiny, almost imperceptible dot nestled between the rows of books—hard to notice, but unmistakable once you knew it was there. A camera.

Hana’s heart pounded in her chest as she moved through the apartment, spotting other small devices disguised among her belongings—inside the air vent, near the smoke detector, even behind a kitchen cabinet.

“They think they’re smart…” she muttered, clenching her fists. But she couldn’t panic. She had to stay calm, stay ahead of them. She couldn’t give them any reason to suspect that she knew about their surveillance.

Returning to her desk, she sat down slowly, pretending to go about her routine. She picked up a notebook—not the Soul Ledger, just a plain journal—and began to write, making it look as though she was journaling her thoughts. But her mind was elsewhere, formulating a plan.

"They can’t know I’m aware. I need to be smarter," she whispered to herself, her eyes scanning the room once more. "But how do I use the Ledger without them knowing?"

Her fingers drummed softly on the desk, her mind working quickly. She needed a method that wouldn’t reveal what she was truly doing, something that would look innocent while still allowing her to use the Ledger’s power. A smile slowly crept across her face as an idea began to form.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

"What if they think I’m just writing… anything?" she mused, her eyes glinting with realization. The FBI could watch her all they wanted, but they couldn’t hear what she was thinking. They couldn’t read between the lines of every word she wrote.

She reached into the drawer where the Soul Ledger was hidden, carefully sliding it out without attracting attention to herself. She placed it beside her notebook, flipping it open to a blank page. The names she needed to write were clear in her mind, but she couldn’t simply write them in plain view, not with the cameras watching.

Her hand hovered over the page, and a sly grin appeared on her lips. "They want to see me write? Fine. Let’s give them something to see."

Instead of writing the names directly, Hana began to write in code—a method that only she would understand. She wrote innocuous words, sentences that seemed to have no connection to anything, as if she were jotting down random thoughts or poetry. But in reality, each word represented a letter, each phrase a hidden meaning.

For example, the sentence "The sky is blue" would translate into the first letters of each word: T, S, I, B. She’d use this technique to craft the names, so even if the FBI were watching her closely, all they would see was Hana writing meaningless, harmless phrases.

Her pen moved swiftly across the page, creating an elaborate system of seemingly disjointed thoughts:

*"Walking along the park is peaceful."*

*"Crows fly at night, rarely seen by anyone."*

*"The moon rises slowly over the hills."*

She smiled to herself. Each phrase, each letter, was part of a carefully constructed puzzle. The first letters of every word, when put together, would spell out the names of those who needed to be erased. In her mind, the names were clear: Kaito, Daeyoung, and now, anyone who could uncover the truth.

Hana paused for a moment, feeling the weight of the names in her head. She knew the Soul Ledger was a double-edged sword, and every use of it came with consequences. But there was no going back now. The FBI thought they had her trapped, but she was always one step ahead. She wasn’t just fighting to survive; she was fighting to stay in control.

As she finished writing the coded names, she closed the Soul Ledger, her fingers trembling slightly from the adrenaline coursing through her veins. The room was still, the only sound being the soft scratching of her pen against the paper and the distant hum of the cameras she now knew were watching.

Hana leaned back in her chair, gazing up at the ceiling where she imagined one of the hidden cameras might be. "Did you get all that?" she muttered under her breath with a sarcastic smile. "Just some late-night thoughts."

She stood up slowly, stretching as though she were getting ready for bed, playing the part of someone oblivious to the fact that their every move was being monitored. She placed the Soul Ledger back in its hidden compartment, closed her notebook, and then casually walked to the window.

The city stretched out before her, glittering under the moonlight. For a moment, she felt an odd sense of calm, as if she were the only person in the world who truly understood what was happening.

"I’ll give you what you want, FBI," she whispered to the night. "But you won’t even realize it until it’s too late."

She turned away from the window and headed to bed, leaving the FBI to watch her every move. But Hana knew she was in control now. As long as they thought she was merely writing idle words, they wouldn’t know the true power she held in her hands.

And tomorrow, when the names she had written began to fall one by one, they would still be trying to piece together the puzzle, unaware that she had already won the game.

Hana lay down in bed, pulling the blankets over herself, her mind still racing but now with a sense of satisfaction. She had outwitted them—for now. The Soul Ledger was still hers to command, and no camera, no agent, could take that away from her.

As sleep began to creep in, Hana smiled faintly to herself. She was always one step ahead. Always.