The following web novel series is a work of fiction. It contains high levels of violence, which may be offensive to some readers. It also explores potentially controversial themes such as police brutality. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Reader discretion is advised.

The Reunion

♣ Chapter 1

The Repeat Sign

Yonghyeon knocked on the door. Joowon was crouching next to him by the wall, ready to ambush whoever opened it, while their fellow detectives were hiding in the stairway.

Everyone remained dead silent with their ears on the wall to pick up any presence inside, but they heard nothing. Still, it was certain someone was inside. The power meters were rolling, and the mail they had seen in the mailbox last night had been taken.

“Delivery,” Yonghyeon announced.

His team managed to identify who was running the scam call office and where it was located after identifying the account of the cash mule they’d arrested, then getting testimony from the person who made fake accounts, who chose to flip. They’d even heard about a Chinese restaurant that made frequent deliveries to the scammers’ office.

The team waited until the call came through, and finally, the moment they’d been waiting for arrived.

After a moment of silence, the reply finally came. “Leave it by the door.”

But they hadn’t planned for this. Maybe the culprit suspected something was off.

Yonghyeon and Joowon made brief eye contact. They had come this far chasing a string of clues. The guy behind the door must have sensed something amiss when the cash mule called. Those with long criminal records had instincts almost as honed as a detective’s.

The team was uneasy.

Joowon, frowning, pointed at the doorknob, signaling she would just kick it down.

In reply, Yonghyeon frantically waved his hands. They both knew it would be better for everyone if they finished this without a brawl.

“Okay, you got it,” Yonghyeon said. He placed the food in front of the door and walked to the stairs, walking in place to mimic the sounds of his descent, before silently returning to the door.

Yonghyeon joined Joowon in pressing his back to the wall. As they waited for the man to emerge, Joowon’s thin patience was running out.

Then, click. The gray door finally opened. Yonghyeon jumped up and shoved his arm through the gap as Joowon yanked the doorknob. The man behind the door hurried to close it, but it was too late. Yonghyeon and Joowon barged in followed by their fellow detectives.

“Hands on the ground! All of you! As of 17:39, you are all under arrest for fraud.”

The man who opened the door tried to make a run for it through the window, but Joowon snatched his arm, twisted it behind him, and slammed him against the wall.

“Ow, it hurts! I said it hurts, damn it!”

“It’s supposed to hurt, dumbass.”

“You f*cking c*nt...!”

Ha. It wasn’t her first rodeo hearing derogatory remarks like that, not to mention the prejudices she’d had to suffer from fellow officers from day one on the Violent Crimes Unit.

All she did back then was analyze calls, never going into the field. Some of the detectives started a betting pool on how long she would last, but that was way back. Now, the team had practically forgotten that she was a woman.

It’d be foolish to expect a criminal to do better. Most saw female detectives as a joke, spitting words like “b*tch” or “chick,” both of which Joowon found offensive.

As she pressed his throat against the wall, a saying came to mind. “Spare the rod, spoil the criminal.” His face was practically buried in the paint.

“Stop moving. The more you resist, the more painful it will be.”

“Agh, f*ck!”

“Even a fraud like you has the right to an attorney to defend against any statements made against you. Got that? What a country we live in!”

And then came the cuffs. The man started to howl in fury. Joowon grimaced a bit, but it wasn’t the noise that made her uncomfortable. She caught a whiff of a familiar stench, like moldy grass, as the man continued to thrash. In fact, Joowon had noticed it the moment she entered the unit.

What is that...? I know I’ve smelled it before...

The other detectives might’ve missed it, but it couldn’t get past Joowon’s sharp senses.

Meanwhile, Yonghyeon and the other detectives cuffed the scammers and rounded them up. “Y’all trying to run a call center in here?! Take their phones and count heads.”

The walls inside the room were soundproofed like a recording studio. No wonder the detectives couldn’t hear anything from the hall. Desks, laptops, and cell phones were all over the place.

This group was a part of a domestic criminal syndicate. They had preyed on a thousand people, scamming victims for up to twelve billion won in losses. As they had a system of their own and worked in a clandestine cell structure, it was hard to uncover the mastermind behind it all. It was almost like catching a ghost, since they could pop up anywhere in the country and make evidence vanish. The detectives had been chasing them for months.

These scam call operations were sly and meticulous. It was completely different from those sloppy old scam calls that blindly asked for money by threatening the person on the line.

This is how it worked: The scammers would first send a text message like the ones you get when you use your credit card. Let’s say we have this victim named Mr. Kim.

**** Bank

Dear Mr. Kim,

Your order for the “JointHappy Massage Chair” has been confirmed.

₩1,864,000 will be charged. Payment due on the next billing cycle.

Customer Service: 02-555-0100

Sent from the Web

Mr. Kim would think something was wrong because he had never purchased anything like that. He would call the customer service number provided in the message, anxious to find out what was going on.

The “service center employee” would pick up the phone and reply that it looked like someone had gotten a fake bankbook under Mr. Kim’s name. They would even mention that many had fallen victim to this crime recently, and ask whether they could send a report on his behalf to the police department that specialized in phishing crimes. Mr. Kim would say yes, and in less than five minutes get a call from the official police emergency number, 112.

Although Mr. Kim might have been confused at first, his heart would sink when he saw the number. The caller would say they were a lieutenant from a cyber investigation department, and even send an email saying that they had seen many similar cases lately. All very plausible.

The caller would then instruct Mr. Kim to download a police security app so they could check whether he had been hacked and prevent further crimes. As they weren’t asking for money, Mr. Kim would download the app through the attached link, trusting that this was an official security process.

But the app that Mr. Kim downloaded was actually malware. By the time the download was complete, all internet access would take him to the phishing website. The scammers could now tap or get remote access to the phone. Even if Mr. Kim tried to reach out to law enforcement, they could intercept the calls.

Now at the end of their plot, the scammers could induce all kinds of financial transactions from Mr. Kim, giving them access to all his information, from the account numbers to passcodes. And voila, they now had all the information they needed to drain Mr. Kim’s accounts and even get a loan under his name.

Once all the scammers had been secured, the detectives began searching the house. One of them found pieces of a bankbook lying on top of the trash bin. They must’ve tried to dispose of the evidence. Giseok, the team leader of the squad, signaled to Joowon.

Joowon dragged the man she had caught and made him sit on the sofa. It was obvious he was the one giving orders.

Giseok sat on the table in front of the guy, waving the shredded pieces of the bankbook in his face. “This is a fake bankbook, right?”

“N-no...! I just don’t use it anymore, so... I-I threw it out days ago!”

“Why would it be on the top of the trash if you threw it out days ago?”

“That’s because—”

“Don’t try to play games with me, smartass. What you say next will determine how easy or hard your life’s about to get. Can’t you see the big picture? We know all about this place!”

The man’s face showed a glimpse of nervousness.

It didn’t take long to find the evidence.

“Sir, we’ve found their call scripts and the list of victims.”

The scammers were pros, but so were the detectives. They were two sides of a coin. If there are crooks living on scams, there are detectives who devote their time to catching them.

“Well, I’d say that’s game over. Bring ’em in.”

“I-I really don’t know anything! I’m telling you, I was just following orders!”

“Yeah, yeah. Tell us all about it at the station.”

The suspects were loaded into a car and the team renewed their search once again for further evidence. All the fake bankbooks were gathered in one spot with the phones and laptops. It seemed like the investigation was going well, but Joowon’s head tilted in doubt.

As she glanced around, her eyes landed on something. The man had unintentionally glanced at something as he was being taken away. The ones who break the law know the law well.

With all of them caught red-handed in one fell swoop, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to get out of this... So why would he look back? What was he looking for?