Dong-ho arrives at the Provincial Office searching for Jeong-dae's body and agrees to help document the dead.

Dong-ho recalls witnessing soldiers open fire into the crowd, shooting Jeong-dae before he fled in terror.

Eun-sook warns Dong-ho that the army is returning to the city that night and urges him to leave.

Dong-ho's mother arrives at the Provincial Office and pleads with him to come home immediately.

Dong-ho promises his mother he will be home in time for dinner but does not leave.

Jeong-dae's soul awakens after death, trapped inside his badly crushed corpse in a pile of discarded bodies.

Jeong-dae's soul focuses its attention on his sister Jeong-mi and realizes she has also been killed.

Soldiers douse the pile of bodies with petrol and set them on fire, severing the souls from their corpses.

Jeong-dae hears a thunderclap and senses multiple souls departing at once, realizing Dong-ho has just died.

Eun-sook is brought in for police interrogation and struck seven times across the face by her interrogator.

Eun-sook retrieves a proof from the censor's office and finds its pages almost entirely blacked out with ink.

An unnamed prisoner describes being repeatedly tortured after his arrest, while crammed into cells with dozens of others.

Jin-su dies by suicide, leaving a photograph of children's bodies in the Provincial Office yard beside his note.

Dong-ho's mother is arrested at a protest and smashes a photograph of Chun Doo-hwan hanging at the police station.

The Writer visits Dong-ho's middle school during her research and sees his photograph for the first time.

Dong-ho, a middle-school boy, becomes a volunteer at the makeshift morgue inside the Provincial Office while searching for his friend Jeong-dae, who was shot dead by soldiers during the uprising. After refusing to leave despite warnings from friends and his own mother, Dong-ho remains behind and is killed when the army retakes the building. His friend Jeong-dae's soul narrates its entrapment near his rotting corpse until soldiers burn the bodies and Jeong-dae senses Dong-ho's death. Years later, Eun-sook endures police interrogation and brutal censorship, while an unnamed prisoner survives torture only to watch Jin-su eventually succumb to the long shadow of trauma. Dong-ho's mother spends decades grieving and protesting the regime responsible for her son's death. Finally, a writer travels to Gwangju to research the uprising and honor Dong-ho's story.

The headline events of the Gwangju Uprising and its devastating aftermath.

Dong-ho tends to badly damaged corpses at the gymnasium morgue, covering the most horrific bodies with cloth.

Dong-ho reflects on watching his grandmother die and wonders how long a soul lingers inside the body.

Jin-su arrives at the Provincial Office with more coffins and tells the volunteers to close up by six.

An old man arrives at the makeshift morgue searching for his missing son and granddaughter among the bodies.

Jeong-dae's soul brushes against other souls in the pile of bodies but cannot communicate or understand them.

Jeong-dae clings to a cherished memory of his sister laughing out loud while he pretended to sleep.

Eun-sook recalls seeing Dong-ho standing armed among the men at the Provincial Office and scolding him to leave.

Eun-sook and another student hide in a hospital overnight, listening to gunfire coming from the Provincial Office.

Eun-sook attends the play and watches actors mouth and scream censored lines, then quietly mouths Dong-ho's name.

Despite being threatened with execution, the imprisoned militia members quietly sing the national anthem together at their trial.

Two years after his release, the unnamed prisoner spots Jin-su at a roadside stall and sees his haunted face.

Female factory workers form a human wall to protest union arrests, and police beat them brutally.

Seon-ju travels to the hospital to visit the dying Seong-hee and turns back at the last moment to say goodbye.

Dong-ho's eldest brother blames the middle brother for failing to bring Dong-ho home, severing their relationship.

The Writer's father brings home a secret photograph book of the Gwangju Uprising, and young Kang sneaks a look.

Inside the gymnasium morgue, Dong-ho tends carefully to the dead while reflecting on the soul, as Jin-su organizes the volunteers and bereaved families arrive to search for their loved ones. Meanwhile, Jeong-dae's trapped soul reaches out to other spirits while clinging to tender memories of his sister. Eun-sook witnesses Dong-ho's final night, hides from the army's assault, and later channels her grief into a devastating moment of private mourning at a censored play. The unnamed prisoner and his fellow captives show quiet defiance by singing the national anthem at their mock trial, while he and Jin-su spend years trying to rebuild fractured lives. Seon-ju's history of labor activism and state violence culminates in a last visit to her dying mentor, as Dong-ho's death continues to fracture his family and haunt those who survived.

The human moments of grief, solidarity, and quiet resistance surrounding the uprising.

Dong-ho wonders why the national anthem is sung for civilians who were killed by their own nation's soldiers.

Dong-ho's middle brother warns him that Special Warfare Command soldiers will kill everyone when they return to the city.

Trapped near his rotting corpse, Jeong-dae begins to lose his sense of age and personal identity.

Soldiers arrive with new bodies, some with their faces dipped in paint to erase their identities entirely.

After the uprising, Eun-sook calls the Provincial Office complaints department daily to protest the water fountain being turned back on.

Mr. Seo visits the publisher's office and is shown his nearly destroyed, unpublishable manuscript proof in silence.

Eun-sook realizes her swollen cheek has healed but understands she will never be able to forget the seventh slap.

Jin-su escorts the women out of the Provincial Office at midnight but chooses to return to the building.

An army officer immediately shoots the boys who surrender from the Provincial Office, and they fall in a straight line.

In their final meeting, Jin-su tells the unnamed prisoner that the lives they had before the conflict were like glass.

Seon-ju receives a package from Professor Yoon containing a recording device and tapes for her to record her testimony.

Seon-ju recalls being sexually abused by soldiers who demanded a false confession that she was a communist spy.

Dong-ho's mother thinks she sees Dong-ho outside her house, still appearing as the middle-school boy she lost.

Dong-ho's mother's final memory is of Dong-ho in the sunlight, continually pulling her out of the shade.

Dong-ho's older brother meets with the Writer and gives her permission to tell Dong-ho's story.

Dong-ho confronts the moral contradiction at the heart of the uprising while Jeong-dae's soul loses its identity to decay and erasure, unable to answer who murdered him or why. Eun-sook's ongoing encounters with censorship and state repression reveal the government's campaign to erase the truth, while small moments of clarity remind her that trauma lives permanently in the body. The unnamed prisoner discloses the darkest secret of the uprising's final night — the surrendering boys who were shot immediately — and Jin-su's last conversation reveals a soul broken beyond repair. Seon-ju must decide whether to give voice to memories of sexual violence she has long buried, and ultimately chooses silence. Dong-ho's mother is haunted by visions of her lost son, and the writer finally receives a blessing from Dong-ho's family to bear witness to his story.

The moral ruptures, buried truths, and emotional reckonings that define each survivor's story.