Green Deluge
“Haha, what a mess.”
“Aigoo~ If it isn’t President Jeong! It’s been a while!”
“Ah, President Oh! I heard you pulled off something big recently!”
“Madam Kim, you’re here too?”
“Young lady, how long has it been?”
Once the brief congratulatory speech ended in the lavish banquet hall, the elegantly dressed guests busied themselves exchanging greetings.
They paid no attention to the expensive food already laid out. Instead, they searched for familiar faces, then the acquaintances of those faces, and the acquaintances of those acquaintances, eager to make an impression.
Amid the crowd, a young boy slipped sideways with a forced smile.
Ha… I just want to go home and play games.
He was the son of parents who had suddenly become wealthy through an unexpected windfall. Overnight, he had become a “young master.”
Being able to spend money freely as a middle schooler had been nice at first, but his parents, now with leisure, began craving higher status.
When they started meddling in politics, his discomfort only grew.
For years he had forced smiles at strangers whose names he didn’t know, exchanging polite greetings. Even when he met people his own age, they had always been rich, so conversation never flowed.
Longing to throw off the stifling suit and lounge in a comfortable T-shirt on his bed, he headed toward a quiet corner where no one’s eyes would reach him.
Then he spotted someone leaning against the railing.
It was a girl about his age, wearing a navy dress that left her shoulders bare.
Through her short black hair, her eyes carried an unreadable melancholy that drew his gaze.
“Um…”
Drawn in without thinking, the boy approached and spoke.
When she turned to look at him, embarrassment finally caught up and he stammered.
“Ah… well, there weren’t many people our age over there, so I thought…”
“Aha.”
The short, noncommittal sound made him scratch the back of his neck awkwardly and start to turn away.
Then her voice followed.
“Bored?”
“Huh?”
The girl pushed herself off the railing in front of the massive window, yawned openly without caring who saw, and continued.
“I mean, everyone and all the food are way over there, yet you came all the way here.”
Following her gesture, he looked around and finally noticed how few people wandered this area. He nodded.
“I was just looking for a quiet spot…”
“It is quiet. No one wants to walk this far for drinks or food, and the private rooms for secret meetings are on the opposite side.”
The boy spoke, his tone slightly awkward, as if he had forgotten something.
“Oh, I’m Go Junwoo.”
Go Junwoo deliberately left out any mention of his parents, not wanting to give off the impression of a nouveau riche. He explained that he had decided on a university but hadn’t started yet.
Every peer he had met while following his parents always asked about family background or parents’ jobs first, then looked down on him. So he avoided bringing it up elsewhere.
Looking at him with a hint of expectation in her eyes, the girl answered.
“I’m Kim… Arin.”
Arin felt a little depressed.
Part of it was having to wear a tight dress while thinking of herself as male, surrounded by so many people. But that wasn’t the biggest reason.
While preparing for this mission, she had realized something by chance.
She didn’t know the names of any of the people she worked with.
It wasn’t that she had forgotten. She had never asked in the first place, and had never even thought to ask—until someone else’s question made her notice.
She always said she came from another world, but it had only been a habit. Deep down, she had been unconsciously refusing to accept that this place wasn’t the world she had lived in.
Realizing this again left her troubled and depressed.
Especially once she understood that she had been viewing the people here as something other than fellow humans—mere lookalikes from another world—she had stopped trying to get close by asking names. Now everything around her seemed warped.
Including herself in the mirror.
Whenever she thought about eventually returning, the question of how she would return followed. Then came thoughts of what she would do returning in this body, whether she had truly just been caught up in an anomaly. The thoughts chased one another until her head spun. She had moved to the corner and leaned against the railing.
…The night view really is pretty.
Maybe because she was looking down from over a hundred floors up, the lights from buildings and streetlamps below looked like tiny stars.
Yet staring at the strange sight of stars both above and below only reminded her of the view inside the Yellow Door. Disgust quickly filled her. She closed her eyes, sighed, and downed the drink in her glass in one go.
Um…
Someone spoke to her then.
“Your speech was excellent as well, Madam Mayor.”
“No need to flatter me like that, Oh Secretary.”
The Mayor had entered a private room to change out of the uncomfortable dress she had worn for the short speech. She waved off her secretary, who was offering the clothes she had prepared in advance.
“More importantly, is everything ready?”
“Of course. It will be brought up exactly on schedule.”
“Excellent.”
While fixing her makeup, which had smudged slightly during the change, the Mayor told the secretary to make sure the final preparations were thorough, then sent her out first.
She took out her phone and checked the time.
With a stiff expression, she muttered that thirty minutes remained until the scheduled time, then changed her face to a neutral one and stepped outside.
The moment she re-entered the banquet hall, people approached as if they had been waiting, saying the next election looked promising or that her speech had been wonderful. She greeted them naturally while glancing around, memorizing unfamiliar faces.
She ignored those in black suits with earpieces and focused only on the ones who stood out oddly from the banquet atmosphere. Quietly, she murmured to herself.
Anomaly Response and Management Agency… They didn’t send many.
“Madam Mayor, did you say something?”
“Hehe, nothing. More importantly, you mentioned interest in hosting the next event…”
Time passed in a friendly atmosphere. The closed doors opened and staff wheeled in carts carrying large boxes.
The Mayor’s eyes lit up at the sight. She slipped aside, and the deputy mayor stepped forward instead.
“Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention for a moment?”
As if they had known the schedule, the chatting guests naturally formed a circle around the boxes. After a brief pause, the deputy mayor began reciting a speech full of formalities and flowery language.
“…We have brought the future we will see right here!”
Following the prepared script, the deputy mayor finished and reached behind him. The boxes split open on all sides, revealing a massive cake intricately decorated with buildings and roads.
Gasps of admiration rose from the crowd. Just as the deputy mayor reached for the faintly glowing cake knife, security guards who had received some message hurried over and whispered to him.
“…Really?”
Visibly flustered, the deputy mayor repeated the question, then cleared his throat and drew everyone’s attention again.
“Everyone, I’ve just received some news. Please listen calmly. There is currently a fire in this building…”
And at that moment, the cake exploded.
Countless tiny blades mixed with chunks of bread and white cream flew out. The deputy mayor, standing closest, and the people around him were struck by the fragments.
“Kyaaaaah!!”
“Wh-what?! Call an ambulance! Call an ambulance!”
The music stopped. Screams and the smell of blood instantly filled the hall.
While the security team moved quickly to calm the guests in the chaos, the Anomaly Response and Management Agency agents disguised as guests tried to determine whether this was a simple terrorist attack. For some reason, neither their radios nor phones worked.
…What a mess.
While chatting lightly with Junwoo, Arin took in the chaotic scene and quietly picked up the bag she had left in the corner.
Realizing from the others’ reactions that communications were down, she exchanged a subtle signal with them to prepare.
“Ah, Miss Arin! From what they’re saying over there, uninjured people are supposed to evacuate downstairs. Let’s go together!”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, I need to find my parents too…”
Junwoo, who had apparently gone to ask, came running back out of breath and grabbed Arin’s hand to turn her around. At that moment, a loud alarm rang and the sprinklers burst, pouring water down.
The already chaotic banquet hall became even more uncontrollable with the sudden downpour. Pulled along by Junwoo through the panicked crowd, Arin looked up at the ceiling.
More precisely, she stared at the streams of water falling from it. She raised her palm, caught some water, and brought it in front of her eyes.
“The water color… it’s green?”
The water filling her palm and coloring the entire banquet hall carried an unknown greenish tint.
“I brought the first-aid kit!”
“The deputy mayor first! He’s in the worst shape!”
While everyone was getting soaked, a security guard who had fetched a first-aid kit somewhere pulled out bandages and gauze and rushed to the deputy mayor.
Shrapnel from the exploding cake was embedded all over his back, but they didn’t dare remove it. Focused only on stopping the bleeding until paramedics arrived, the guard attempted emergency treatment. When the deputy mayor, who had seemed unconscious, let out a groan, the guard leaned down and asked.
“Deputy Mayor, are you awake? We’re doing emergency treatment right now, so please don’t move…!”
“Kgh…”
“Deputy Mayor, if you move…!”
“Kgh…”
“Deputy Mayor?”
The deputy mayor stopped making sounds. The guard, uneasy, brought his ear close to the man’s mouth. The next moment, a scream burst out.
“Aaaah!”
“What—?! Deputy Mayor! You can’t do this!”
The previously limp deputy mayor suddenly lifted his head and lunged at the guard, biting his face. The sight was so incomprehensible that the other guards froze for a second before rushing to pull him off.
“What’s going on over there…? Huh? Huh, aaaaah!!”
While everyone’s attention was on the deputy mayor, other injured people suddenly attacked those nearby, biting and injuring them all at once.
Even as the sprinklers continued, people who had been maintaining order under the guards’ guidance finally panicked at the successive incidents and ran toward the entrance. The guards fought to contain the chaos without even having time to fully grasp the situation.
“Ha… This doesn’t look like a simple terrorist attack after all.”
“Terrorist attack?!”
Because he had been looking toward the entrance, Junwoo hadn’t seen what was happening in the middle of the hall. He asked in a flustered voice. Arin let go of his hand and exchanged glances with the support team.
“No wonder Alpha was being so nice. He already knew this was coming, huh?”