The File That Shouldn’t Exist | Episode 2 – A Korean Psychological Thriller
Episode 2: The File That Shouldn’t Exist
Author:Kavitha.V
Silence didn’t leave when Eun-chae reached home.
Even as she closed her apartment door, it followed her inside—the kind of silence that doesn’t scream, but listens. She slipped off her shoes and turned on the lights. Everything looked normal. Yet nothing felt safe anymore.
On the table…
That USB drive.
The bloodstains had darkened. They were dry, but still looked disturbingly fresh. She didn’t touch it. She just stared.
Jaejoon’s face flashed through her mind—late nights, unfinished coffee cups, sentences that never reached an ending.
If anything happens to me, don’t trust what you see.
She opened her laptop. The glow of the screen lit half her face. When she plugged in the USB, her hands trembled slightly. Not fear. Anticipation.
A folder opened.
A single directory.
PROJECT_SILENCE
Her heartbeat skipped.
She clicked.
Inside were audio files, video clips, and text documents.
The first file was titled:
JS_Entry_01
Jaejoon’s voice filled the room.
Low. Exhausted. Real.
“If you’re listening to this… I didn’t make it.”
Eun-chae forgot how to breathe.
“They don’t erase people,” he said.
“They erase versions of the truth.
And when the truth disappears… people disappear automatically.”
She paused the file.
No tears came. Not even shock. Just a hollow emptiness spreading through her chest.
She opened the second file.
A video.
A dark room. The camera shook slightly. Jaejoon sat at a table. Behind him, the wall was covered in photographs, maps, and red strings—like something from a conspiracy film.
Except this was real.
“Project Silence isn’t a person,” he said quietly.
“It’s a system.”
He leaned closer to the camera.
“Journalists. Whistleblowers.
Witnesses.
They don’t kill us.
They make sure no one remembers us correctly.”
The video glitched.
The screen went black.
A new message appeared.
“Stop watching.”
The laptop shut down on its own.
Eun-chae flinched.
The power was still on. The Wi-Fi was working. But the laptop was dead.
Her phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
Again.
This time, she didn’t answer.
A message appeared.
“Good girl.”
Her stomach twisted.
Rain hammered against the window. She closed the curtains. Checked the locks. Checked them again. Still, the feeling of being watched refused to leave.
On the kitchen counter, she noticed a notebook.
Jaejoon’s handwriting.
She had never seen it before.
The last page held a single line:
“Eun-chae knows more than she remembers.”
A memory surged forward.
Three months earlier.
Jaejoon working on his laptop.
She had brought him coffee. As files copied onto a USB drive, she had asked casually,
“Isn’t this dangerous?”
He smiled.
“That’s why it matters.”
And then—
Silence.
Had she heard something she wasn’t supposed to?
Had she forgotten something on purpose?
Her phone vibrated again.
This time—
A saved contact.
Her own name.
Caller ID: EUN-CHAE
The call answered itself.
On the line…
Her own voice.
Crying.
“If you’re hearing this… don’t open the last file.
I already made that mistake.”
The call ended.
The room fell silent.
But now, the silence wasn’t empty.
It was alive.
Watching.
Waiting.
And Eun-chae finally understood one thing:
Jaejoon hadn’t disappeared.
He had been erased.
And she—
She was part of the process.