“You’ll be well rewarded, as promised.” Mireuk licks his lips. “Wake Seokga.”

“Now,” whispers Yeomra, and before Kisa has the chance to do so much as tense, the death god is lunging out of the tunnel. He’s like an arrow shot straight for Jang’s heart. With a startled cry of surprise and rage, Jang shifts into her tiger form, leaping away from Yeomra’s outstretched hands, which hold a pair of shackles similar to the ones binding Mireuk.

“Go, go, go!” Somi urges, and together they sprint for Seokga’s crumpled heap. On the slab of rock, Mireuk is silent, but Kisa knows in her bones that the god’s clouded eyes are watching her acutely as she bends over his son. She does not like the weight of his stare, as if he is not threatened at all by her presence, but merely impassive: like he’s watching an ant futilely crawl up a wall moments before being smushed. Kisa swallows in fear as she hooks her arms around Seokga’s armpits.

“Fuck, he’s heavier than he looks,” pants Somi as she tries to lift Seokga by his feet—but a heartbeat later she’s crashing into a cavern wall, having been struck by a snarling Jang. Yeomra is shouting something from the other side of the cavern, claw marks ripping across his face as he stumbles back to his feet, but the jangsan beom has turned her murderous gaze on Kisa. She hears nothing as Jang’s hot breath steams onto her face.

“Kisa,” the tiger sneers, yellow fangs glinting. “Give up.”

Yeomra is still shouting, and if Kisa were to look at the death god, she would see that his hands were raised toward the stalactites and that, swirling upward from the dark ground, skeleton soldiers are forming, crawling to their feet with rictus smiles. She is unable to move, however, as Jang’s yellow, red-stained eyes narrow at her. In her arms, Seokga stirs.

“Put him down,” the tiger demands in Jang’s voice, looking bored.

Slowly, eyes on the red thread—which has urgently arranged itself into a crude but understandable pictograph, an instruction—Kisa obeys. Jang licks her chops, smiling in the way only an apex predator can.

A moment later, at the thread’s urging, Kisa launches into action, fueled by adrenaline and anger. Hand gripping the now-solid string, Kisa leaps over Seokga’s body. Jang swipes a clawed paw at her, but Kisa jumps to the side, winding the Red Thread of Fate around the tiger’s outstretched leg. The thread does most of the work, snaking around the furred limb, but Kisa is still panting in concentration as she continues the binding.