Editor’s note: The names of the women working in Miari interviewed for this article have been changed to protect their privacy and safety.

In a narrow alley in northern Seoul, plywood boards cover the windows of a brothel. Earlier this month, demolition crews attempted to enter Miari Texas by force in the latest attempt to eradicate South Korea’s last red-light district and make way for new residential towers.

Inside the brothel, a welded steel barricade now blocks the entrance as sex workers resist eviction. A court has ruled that they must leave, but they insist they have nowhere else to