The Anonymous Buyer
"Hah, this is trickier than it looks……"
The real problem was that you had to read the stats on every last hamster card and bend your strategy around them on the fly. Twelve hamster cards in all — not a number to take lightly.
Hamsters that needed selling had to be whisked off to the market before it was too late. By losing the haggling.
Hamsters that couldn't be sold yet — the ones needing feeding, grooming, or taming — had to be managed just as sharply, and just as quickly. By winning it.
And to control the outcome of the haggling in the first place, you had to count cards.
"Now, let's begin the haggling."
At the host's voice, every eye in the room swung back to the table.
"Ms. Hwang Juyeon, please choose a child from the pen and place it in the cage."
Having checked her hand, Juyeon drew out a single hamster card and laid it down.
Cuteness: zero.
This was one you absolutely could not put on the market yet — one that had to be raised with care.
The community cards were still face-down, and even on her three-card hand alone, Juyeon's draw looked decent enough.
"Shall we see how the haggling turned out?"
Community: ♦5 ♥8
Juyeon: ♠4 ♦4 ♥4
Dealer: ♠6 ♦7 ♣9
"Ah……"
"Ms. Hwang Juyeon, three fours. Dealer, a five-to-nine straight."
If the community cards had fallen a little kinder, she might have built a full house — maybe even four of a kind.
No — if even one community card had come out different, the dealer would have been left holding a mere high card, and Juyeon's three of a kind would have carried the day.
"You've lost the haggling, Ms. Hwang Juyeon. I'll be registering 545 with the market."
The host lifted the hamster card out of its cage and set it down in the empty space on the right side of the table.
At once a border drew itself around the card, just as before — black, this time, unlike the white cage.
"Now, let's begin the haggl—"
Hosu had just moved to deal the next cards when he stopped short and turned his head toward the market.
"Oh! An anonymous buyer has purchased 545!"
545's card vanished without a trace.
……Hold on.
Someone bought 545?
"Huh?"
Juyeon was wearing the same baffled expression I was.
"545 sold?"
"Yes. An anonymous buyer has purchased 545."
But 545's cuteness stat was……
"That one had zero cuteness?"
Someone is actually buying this.
"Tastes do vary, as they say."
That much was true.
……
But that wasn't what had me on edge.
What if someone out there really is buying those hamsters?
What if — just maybe, what if — those 'hamsters' are……
"Now, let's begin the haggling."
No. Don't think about it.
There was nothing I could do about any of it right now anyway.
Juyeon had every right to play the game her own way, and every right to do whatever it took to win on her own terms.
"Ms. Hwang Juyeon, please choose a child from the pen and place it in the cage."
"This one."
Wildly extreme stats.
I couldn't tell whether Juyeon's hand was good or bad.
Had she judged it bad and decided it was fine if the thing sold? Or judged it good and decided to keep it and raise it?
Or maybe she'd simply concluded that sold or unsold, it made no difference.
Though of course, with obedience that low, there was every chance the creature would be discarded by its owner the moment it changed hands.
"Shall we see how the haggling turned out?"
Community: ♦K ♥Q
Juyeon: ♦A ♣6 ♥7
Dealer: ♠3 ♦2 ♥6
"In a case like this — both sides holding nothing but a high card, with the community cards ranking highest — the community cards are excluded from the calculation."
"Ah……"
"Ms. Hwang Juyeon, seven high. Dealer, six high. You've won the haggling, Ms. Hwang Juyeon."
Apparently that wasn't the outcome she'd been counting on.
Just as I thought. Hers was the sort of personality that drew its lines quietly.
She'd resolved to sell it off precisely because her hand was bad.
"What action will you take with 446?"
"'Tame.' I'll tame it."
"Hm……?"
The stats hadn't budged.
"446 has refused your touch."
"I'm sorry — since when is that a thing?"
"It depends on the child's personality."
"Ha."
Incredulous laughter burst out from every corner of the room.
Even Yu Hyeonjae raised a hand to his mouth and ducked his head.
"Now, let's begin the haggling."
The cards were dealt anew.
This was the fourth round of haggling. Eight cards went into every round, and with three rounds already behind us, nearly half of the fifty-two-card deck had been spent.
It was about time the outlines of the remaining cards began to come into focus.
"Ms. Hwang Juyeon, please choose a child from the pen and place it in the cage."
"This one…… no, wait — this one. Why did it climb so fast……?"
Juyeon reached for a card, then hurriedly swapped it for another.
The very first hamster card she'd put forward, back at the start.
The one she'd won the haggling for and then 'fed,' bringing its hunger down to 1.
The host had said it was advantageous to keep hunger from exceeding 5. Statistically speaking.
Which meant a hamster could devour one of its fellows without its hunger ever crossing that line.
It was right on the edge.
"Shall we see how the haggling turned out?"
Community: ♦10 ♣8
Juyeon: ♠5 ♠K ♥K
Dealer: ♥A ♣A ♣2
"Ms. Hwang Juyeon, a pair of kings. Dealer, a pair of aces. You've lost the haggling, Ms. Hwang Juyeon."
Juyeon didn't look particularly torn up about it.
She'd shipped the dangerously hungry one out of the pen, after all.
"I'll be registering 845 with the market."
845 passed inside the black border.
For hamsters with hunger balanced on a knife's edge like that, it made no difference whether she won the haggling and 'fed' them, or lost and sent them to the market.
The outcome of the haggling didn't matter.
All that mattered was getting them out of the pen.
And it was precisely there that a question surfaced in my mind, unbidden.
Was that really enough?
What if a hungry hamster was registered at the market, and……
"Now, let's begin the haggling. Ms. Hwang Juyeon, please choose a child from the pen and place it in the cage."
"This one."
……what if that hungry hamster went unsold until the next one arrived at the market……
……and what if its hunger went on growing, and growing……
"Shall we see how the haggling turned out?"
Could they eat their own kind in the 'market,' and not just the 'pen'?
"You've lost the haggling, Ms. Hwang Juyeon. I'll be registering 555 with the market."
The moment 555's card was moved in beside 845's, the black border around 845 warped and stretched until it had swallowed 555 too.
The corners of the host's mouth curve smoothly upward.
"Oh!"
Hosu pointed at the 'market.'
555's card was gone.
"It sold?"
"845 has eaten 555."
"……I'm sorry — what?"
The hunger stat that had climbed all the way to 7 had, at some point, dwindled back to 0.
One more round of haggling came and went, and with fewer than eight cards left in the deck, the cards were gathered up and shuffled anew.
"We count these six rounds of haggling as a single set. And any defective inventory left unsold when a set ends must, of course, be disposed of."
And with that, even 845 — the one that had devoured its own kind — vanished away somewhere, gone for good.
Of the twelve hamsters she'd started with, the only one to sell without incident was that cuteness-zero one.
Nine hamsters now remained in the pen.
"Haaah……"
The freelance magician ground her teeth, fingers flitting restlessly above her knees.
It looked as though she were playing something, drumming out a rapid run across invisible keys — probably her own private method of keeping a lid on it all.
From that point on, Juyeon's play grew colder. And more desperate.
I had no idea how large a 'fragment of Life' each hamster was worth, but she had to sell as many as she possibly could.
Which meant she couldn't afford to neglect a single one, or toss any of them onto the market carelessly.
Only by calculating the cards more ruthlessly could she cut down on her failures.
Time slipped by, and by the middle of the fourth set, when only a few hamsters were left—
"Huh? Unni, your nose! You're bleeding!"
"Mm. I'll go with this one. It has to sell."
Hers was the gaze of someone for whom nothing remained in the world but herself and the cards.
I have no doubt whatsoever that some many-eyed gambler's die was watching the sight with deep, deep satisfaction.
"You've lost the haggling, Ms. Hwang Juyeon. I'll be registering 546 with the market."
"Your counting seems to be getting more precise by the round."
Yu Hyeonjae, too, was watching with evident fascination.
'Betting with hwatu — Korean flower cards — in place of chips, and when the cards come out, each player's hwatu hand gets flipped face-up as well……'
That uncanny variant of Texas Hold'em.
The rules clearly hadn't been improvised on the spot — which meant he'd played it before, and that he trusted it enough to stake lives on it.
Going by his manner, it didn't look like a gambling addiction so much as a taste for the game, but……
"Oh!"
I turned my eyes back to the table.
"An anonymous buyer has purchased 546."
From everything I'd observed, most hamsters with a cuteness of 6 or higher sold almost immediately.
Save for a buyer or two with…… distinctive tastes.
"Now, let's move on to the haggl—"
"—What is this?"
A sharp cry cut through the air out of nowhere.
Everyone fell silent, watching to see what would happen.
Juyeon was glaring at the dealer.
"The card is gone. What is this?"
She was pointing at the pen.
There should have been two hamsters left in it. There was only one.
"What happened? You didn't even announce that anything ate it."
"Oh."
Hosu's brows knit in visible displeasure.
"The one devouring the children needn't be one of their own kind, you know. Wouldn't you say?"
Ah.
The dread I'd somehow ignored, somehow smothered, came smoldering back up, poking its head out once more.
What if someone out there really is buying those hamsters?
What if — just maybe, what if — those 'hamsters' are……
What if they aren't really hamsters at all?
What if they stand in for living, breathing human beings?
What if something real — something with actual substance — is buying human beings?