Chapter 223
Chapter 223
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 223
Chapter Title: Even If I Fall Into a Ghost Story, I Still Have to Go to Work
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Bell chime.
Ting-a-ling.
The clear sound was proof of existence.
Evidence of some divine energy that repels evil.
Ting-a-ling.
Next came footsteps.
Quick, unhesitating steps marching straight toward their goal like an alert.
Lively, but not frivolous.
The footsteps drew steadily closer to the officetel, casting a shadow at the open door before pausing for a moment.
And then...
"Let me see, the first citizen on the scene... no."
A Disaster Management Bureau agent appeared.
A long scar crossing his throat.
A smile.
Hyunmu Team 1.
The man who was once my boss.
"Looks like there's a cult company here."
Agent Choi.
His mouth smiled as he spoke, but his eyes, scanning the situation, held not a trace of mirth.
Agent Choi swept his sunken gaze over the blood-soaked living room and the corpse that had gouged out its own eyes before dying.
And then he spoke.
"Not a coincidence, right?"
"...!"
Ting-a-ling.
Agent Choi reached toward his back as if to signal with his hand. But he knew what was there.
A massive guillotine blade.
An illusion arose, as if blue light gleamed from its edge.
Agent Choi moved his arm...
"Well then..."
"I'll surrender!"
Kang Ihak raised both hands and dropped to his knees on the floor with a thud.
"...?!"
But Agent Choi didn't even blink.
"Is that so? Even better."
"Wait! Just a moment!"
Kang Ihak, desperately blocking the guillotine barrage, spoke even faster.
"Heh, Agent, you remember me, right? We met in that expensive conch shell Darkness!"
"Of course I do."
Agent Choi grinned.
"The cult company employee who tried to escape using injured kids as hostages?"
"That was Butterfly Deputy's solo action, not me!"
The security chief watched their back-and-forth with blank, bewildered eyes.
"We came looking for some usable Darkness, but realized it was way beyond us and were just about to head back!"
"Oh~ So no connection to this incident at all?"
"Does that matter? What matters is..."
Kang Ihak quickly turned his head and solemnly asked the security chief.
"Is Director Cheong still there?"
"Already... hung up."
"Okay."
Kang Ihak flashed a broad smile and turned back to Agent Choi.
"You can buy the Darkness-related info we've gathered at rock-bottom prices!"
Kang Ihak formed a circle with his thumb and index finger, leaving a short, intense impression.
"Come on, rock-bottom? A good civil servant pays proper value for goods. Citizen. As payment..."
Agent Choi smiled and withdrew his hand from behind his back.
One step forward.
"I'll give you a nice funeral meal."
The guillotine flew.
Thud.
But a beast's black forepaw blocked it.
"...!"
The security chief's mutated left arm.
Yet between the massive, vicious claws, the guillotine had dug in deep, nearly slicing it apart.
Sizzle.
The contact surface burned.
Just looking at the mangled forepaw made it seem like unbearable pain, but the security chief didn't flinch.
He simply stared at Agent Choi across the guillotine.
"Look... we're just gonna... go back... We won't do anything stupid... let us go... we'll cooperate..."
"Hey now, how can we get cooperation if we let you go..."
Agent Choi's smiling reply cut off.
His eyes fixed on the security chief again.
His expression changed.
"...You."
As if realizing the identity hidden by the security team's daytime uniform, now revealed through the mutation.
...The night Director Ho had imposed restrictions.
The security chief I met in the dream incubator, where Agent Choi had caught me as a spy.
"......"
For an instant, tremendous conflict and impulse surged across Agent Choi's face.
But the next moment, it was suppressed and vanished.
His dry tone regained its businesslike slickness, priorities restored.
"...Even security team? Wow, this is no small matter. We'll need full statements. As soon as possible."
"There's a misunderstanding. We were just here for some side income, yes, guarantee that part and..."
"I'll tell you everything."
"...!"
Lee Seonghae raised her right hand and stepped forward.
"D-Deputy?!"
"Yes?"
"Y-Yes ma'am."
Without even glancing at Kang Ihak, Lee Seonghae said brightly.
"We have to help agents working hard on citizen rescues."
"......"
"So, could you put away the guillotine? The security team guy looks like he's in a lot of pain!"
Agent Choi peered into Lee Seonghae's face as if gauging her, then withdrew the guillotine with a habitual smile.
"Shall we?"
And he quickly listened to her briefing.
Lee Seonghae recounted in full the 'man on the screen's' actions and the crisis that seemed certain to spread uncontrollably.
I thought she might mention the USB in her hand, but she glanced alternately at the security chief and my transport cage and skipped it.
As if she thought it would bring trouble to us.
"Okay."
...And during that time, the guillotine blade stayed right in front of the transport cage bars.
I held my breath.
So the smoke couldn't escape.
...So the opponent could know nothing.
Agent Choi listened to Lee Seonghae's testimony word for word, as if committing it to memory, without relaxing until the end.
Only at the very last did he withdraw the guillotine.
"Well then, thanks for cooperating."
"No problem! Helping good people is a good deed!"
"Wow~ Really? That's my daily routine. Proper self-realization through work. Helping good citizens. But..."
Agent Choi looked at the golden mark inside Lee Seonghae's mask.
The elite team's Dolphin deputy.
"Why are you with Daydream?"
"......"
"You know plenty of good people die because of what that company does, right?"
Lee Seonghae smiled thinly.
"For now, I'm making sure they can't do bad things where I can see them!"
"Yeah? How about just quitting?"
"......"
Lee Seonghae didn't answer. And Agent Choi stopped the conversation there.
Yes.
It was a situation happening simultaneously to multiple broadcast editors. The agents had probably been dispatched together and split up to cover areas.
And having learned all they could here, they'd leave cleanup like bodies to the forgery team, and Agent Choi would go help the rest of Hyunmu Team...
I knew.
Because I used to do it too.
I'm fine.
No, not fine so much as... my dull brain couldn't reach a proper conclusion anyway.
I didn't know what I was feeling.
I just watched through the transport cage bars as the familiar figure left the officetel door...
"You there."
Agent Choi, holding the door, turned back as if unable to hold it in, approaching close and whispering low.
To the security chief.
"You know me, right?"
"......"
"You know the employee using the alias Deer too."
The security chief met Agent Choi's eyes.
"What happened? Don't give me that 'missing after the train ghost story, declared dead' crap. What happened after."
"......"
"...Did you really board the Wish Grant?"
The security chief answered slowly.
"Wish Grant... boarded."
"......"
Expression drained from Agent Choi's face.
"And?"
"......"
"And what happened?"
The security chief carefully tapped my transport cage and turned his head this way...
"No."
The guillotine blade struck the bars.
"Supernatural disaster use prohibited."
A familiar light sparked from beyond the bars.
"Come on, sir. Suddenly showing up at a scene with a suspicious transport cage like this? Anyone would think it's a mobile isolation unit for supernatural disasters."
"......"
"Want me to split it in half and check? See what it's for."
"It's not... that."
"Then answer me."
"......"
The security chief didn't answer.
Because he couldn't confirm my intent.
And as the silence stretched a few seconds, Agent Choi—who needed to wrap up and join civilian rescues, with a supernatural disaster present—showed impatience... then seemed to give up.
On getting an immediate answer here.
"Fine. Whatever... You don't have to tell me. Your freedom."
Instead, he chose another approach.
"But after a hot bowl of seolleongtang, you might feel like talking."
The moment Agent Choi reached into his pocket with a grin, I realized.
"And it's suspicious anyway. The whole situation."
"...!"
"Daydream just hears rumors and comes hunting Darkness... The timing of the report is awfully convenient, isn't it?"
Eerily precise intuition.
"Witness statements from people found at disaster sites often yield more when given time to think slowly."
And what emerged from his pocket...
A glass prison transport device.
"We'll provide a waiting area at the Bureau for your rest."
The agent had changed his mind to transport all Daydream Corporation employees at once.
'...No.'
I needed to finish the job and return with the USB.
I released the smoke.
The moment I tried to slip out of the transport cage.
"Hold it."
A cold voice echoed through the officetel.
A new person had entered unnoticed and grabbed Agent Choi's arm.
"Cool your head."
"...!"
A tall woman wearing the Signet Double-Edged Sword.
Hyunmu Team 3, Ha-geum Team Leader.
The agent I'd met at the Jolly Theme Park stood there.
Right.
"Handling cult companies is the team leader's job when they're present. You rookies go to the broadcast station."
"......"
"Still young, full of hot blood. Even trying dirty tricks."
"Come on, sis. I'm practically twenty still."
Agent Choi smiled thinly, but his words carried an undercurrent of urgency.
"But I have more to say..."
"I said go, Agent."
"......"
"We've rescued everyone from the chaos. Now head to the station and sweet-talk the bureau chief. You're perfect for it."
Agent Choi froze in place for a moment, then finally turned and walked away.
His footsteps faded as he dashed out the door.
......
"Whew."
Ha-geum Team Leader straightened up, glanced over the two masked people, and spoke.
"Alright, you two from the Field Exploration Team have nothing more to say? Better get going."
"...!"
"Yes, thank you!"
"Wait a sec. Can the security team go too?"
"Ah, these two have business with me. Not throwing you in jail, so don't worry."
"Oh, then we'll wait..."
"Yep. Thanks!"
Lee Seonghae followed Kang Ihak, who bolted from the spot. The two Field Exploration Team members left the officetel.
Ha-geum Agent watched their retreating backs with a somewhat bitter expression, then approached the security chief.
And...
Lowered her gaze.
To me.
"Golden Mascot."
...!!
"Or should I call you the resort owner?"
Ha-geum Agent smiled wryly.
"Why so surprised? After hiring you as resort staff."
Ah.
"Work that changes one's existence leaves scars. Like... recognizing a former employer."
But for calling it a scar, the agent's expression wasn't bad.
Instead, she bent toward the transport cage and said,
"And I owe you thanks."
...Thanks?
"For safely sending home the citizens caught in the resort."
"......"
"Hiring adults without coins to pay, giving kids experience tickets for an overnight stay."
"If it had a red zone back then, it would've been a supernatural disaster wave for sure, but thanks to you, it's registered as a phenomenon for now."
In an inexplicable strange shock, I gazed at Ha-geum Agent.
Yes.
That was... undoubtedly a decision I'd made before.
And I was still the owner of that resort.
Unchanged even after all that happened.
"So, about that..."
"......"
"No matter how I think about it, the resort owner doesn't seem to match Daydream Corporation's vibe."
Ah.
"Caught in a contract?"
...!
"Looks like Daydream finally figured it out. How to wield supernatural phenomena."
"......"
"A naturally pure being wouldn't easily fall for such a corrupt promise. They don't know human malice well."
"Not that far gone? But... your aura's different."
Ha-geum Agent tapped the transport cage. As the security chief moved to stop her, she slightly raised both hands, then continued...
"You look really worn out."
"......"
"Not like the vibrant figure I saw at the resort before. Something... turbid. Reminds me of that Magic Bunny's inner form, the red mascot."
...I remembered.
The grotesque, melted red mascot form after losing its shell.
And the blue mascot who absolutely didn't want to show its face without the mask.
"Want to run? Before losing more."
"......"
"Hm... I see."
Ha-geum Agent, her brows slightly furrowed in pity, pressed them and pondered deeply.
"Then, what do you want most right now?"
"......"
I want to at least look human.
That would've been the right answer.
It was my interim goal.
But... unconsciously, I moved the smoke...
Vague and impractical.
I hadn't lost myself; this was my original form. I'd just realized the truth.
I thought I should retract it.
"...Hm."
Surprisingly, Ha-geum Agent began rummaging in her pocket.
"Hong Team Leader compared it to a lantern... but for someone shrouded in black mist like you, my old one might be better."
And she held something out toward the transport cage.
A small item.
A round one made of jade and silver...
"Even if you can't see, you can hear the sound."
Bell.
"When you've lost yourself, can't see an inch ahead, the world blurs with confusion and delusion."
"Follow that sound."
Ting-a-ling.
"It'll remind you. Who you truly were."
The clear chime rang from the bell.
Ha-geum Team Leader gave it to me.
"It'll help."
"......"
I formed a hand from the smoke and took the bell.
The same time.
Outside the officetel, in a Seoul alley.
"Whew."
Kang Ihak sighed and started walking.
'Didn't make a single penny here.'
So regrettable! No matter how she thought, she could've snagged at least an item.
She clicked her tongue ruefully at Lee Seonghae walking a bit behind.
'Not betting, huh.'
Regrettable. Next time, figure out how to use this boss for side income!
Of course, working with elite team meant she'd prefer other bosses.
'Deputy Jinna Sol spends way more generously!'
Though she couldn't choose freely, or it wouldn't be a company.
'At least broke even.'
Keep pushing forward. Kang Ihak shrugged inwardly, then cheerfully spoke to Lee Seonghae.
"Deputy, do we get taxi fare support back to HQ..."
Lee Seonghae stopped walking.
"...?"
"As expected."
That instant.
Kang Ihak felt a sharp chill down her spine at the intense premonition from the person emerging from beyond the alley.
The 'screwed' sensation.
"You've come this way."
Another agent.
One who finished his rescue duties and was heading back to the Bureau to report instead of the broadcast station.
The agent Agent Choi had called while dashing to the station.
Bronze.
"Notice: Supernatural disaster experiencers will undergo isolation at the Disaster Management Bureau for listening and protection purposes, minimum half a day to indefinite."
Kang Ihak immediately turned to run. She'd judged item use in that moment.
She saw.
Lee Seonghae behind her raising her hand urgently.
'...!'
As if about to use gear or ability, the reflexive hesitation from Kang Ihak—that instant.
"......"
'Ah.'
Lee Seonghae behind her.
Waved her raised hand at Kang Ihak with a smile.
A farewell greeting.
"Transporting."
Before blacking out, Kang Ihak saw the massive glass barrier descending over her.