So-min’s lungs burned as she skidded to a halt just shy of the dense woodline. Her mind raced, cutting through the panic: Running deeper into an unfamiliar forest in the dark is a death trap. She would lose her sense of direction within minutes, trapped in the freezing damp while the facility guards combed the brush with thermal gear.

Instead, she dropped low into a ditch tucked behind a heavy bed of wild ferns and exposed pine roots right at the wood's edge. From here, she could monitor both the facility's perimeter fence and the winding asphalt road carving through the mountain pass below.