The Fall
Truthfully, no one believed everything the mayor said about being wronged.
She had no way to prove she had been unconscious and tied up until recently, or that she had only just woken up.
Moreover, the marks on her arm could have been self-inflicted if she had the means, and if she were the mastermind behind this incident, it would have been easy for her to stay hidden until now.
But even if they could not believe her, there was nothing they could do about it.
With no evidence at all, driving her out or disposing of her simply because she seemed suspicious would obviously become the spark that shattered this already fragile alliance.
“So, is Number One the team leader?”
“She is only the most senior member. Team leaders rarely participate in operations.”
“That makes sense. The more experience you gain, the more responsibility and administrative work you end up with.”
“…Ah, yes… hmm.”
Though she looked no better than a beggar covered in dust, the mayor still wanted to maintain a dignified appearance befitting her position. She smiled gracefully while conversing with the Support Team, then turned her head and met Arin’s eyes.
‘No matter how you look at her, she seems far too young.’
To the mayor, Arin’s height was not particularly short, yet her face and demeanor made her appear like a girl who had only just become an adult, even if she were older.
The large pistol and tomahawk axe at her waist over the navy dress somehow signaled that this girl was no ordinary person, but that contrast only made her look even younger.
Still, she was a politician who could smile and agree even when she did not understand or did not believe something.
Hiding her true thoughts, the mayor naturally extended her hand to Arin and spoke with a smile.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Kim Arin. Working for the Anomaly Response and Management Agency at such a young age—you must be quite the talent.”
“Ah, yes.”
The mayor watched with interest as the girl gave a perfunctory reply, as if she were only accepting the handshake out of courtesy, then turned her gaze to the boy who had been talking with Arin.
‘Hmm… I believe that boy is the son of Chairman Go, who has been sniffing around since last year. He is not from the Anomaly Agency, so perhaps they simply met here?’
The distance between them made it hard to believe they had known each other before, so the mayor made that assumption and began quietly calculating.
Survival and escape came first right now, but once they got out, she needed to make sure none of these elements could be turned against her—and instead use them to her advantage.
Because the secretary who had always been by her side was highly likely to have caused or been deeply involved in the incident, she had to prepare even more thoroughly and carefully.
“More importantly, you mentioned going down to the eightieth floor… Do you have a method?”
“That is…”
“Ah, Mayor, I will explain that!”
“Let me tell you what happened…!”
Whether it was because of the mayor’s title or because their desire for power outweighed their fear, the people who had done nothing but complain while descending suddenly rushed forward to answer, eager to curry favor with her.
“Well… we drove the zombies into the elevator shaft…”
“That girl is also a monster…”
Before the Anomaly Agency staff could stop them, they poured out the information with wild gestures, and in an instant the office floor had split into several factions, as if it had become a social gathering.
‘These crazy bastards.’
Arin felt more dumbfounded by the sight of them playing politics in this situation than angry at being called a monster and placed on the same level as the zombies or their merged forms. She could not bring herself to refute them.
Letting out a sigh at the scene, Arin headed toward the elevator door to resume work and recalled the mass of flesh writhing at the bottom of the shaft. She rubbed the back of her neck.
She had to choose between continuing the same method—risking a giant monster forming and bursting out of the shaft—or descending the stairs while dealing with zombies one by one using their limited bullets, which reduced the chance of a monster forming but increased the danger.
‘The Support Team told me to prioritize information relay, but honestly, I am not as insane as Team Leader Alpha…’
Arin had been growing more impulsive lately and struggling to sleep, but she attributed it to accumulated fatigue from lack of rest. She ignored the whisper in the corner of her mind that kept telling her to abandon everyone.
‘Junwoo looks flustered. Well, he never liked the idea of his parents entering politics.’
Unable to think long because she did not know how the situation would unfold, Arin made her decision and relayed her plan to the Support Team first.
“Really…?”
“Yes. This plan requires a certain height to fall from, so it becomes harder to use the lower we go anyway.”
Arin proposed using the same operation for only two more floors, then switching to directly eliminating the zombies one by one as they had done at the beginning.
However, there was a slight difference in that plan, and it concerned how to deal with the monster that would form from the accumulated corpses in the shaft—the most worrisome factor.
After hearing the details, which contained many loopholes, numerous risks, and seemed highly questionable in feasibility, the Support Team could not think of any safer or more reliable alternative and simply nodded.
“…It seems there has been a change in the operation?”
At that moment, a woman’s voice from behind broke the silence.
“Mayor, please rest. This is our area of expertise.”
“Yes, I know you are professionals. But given the situation, should we not all work together?”
“Even in an emergency, civilians must be protected. It is not as if the police would ask a passing citizen to make an arrest because they are afraid.”
The mayor said she understood and dragged out her words, then turned to look at the others.
“But if we know in advance how things will proceed, would that not reduce confusion if something goes wrong?”
The ultra-high-rise building, which had not been built long ago but had become a landmark due to its height and splendor.
Below it, countless people of various professions were bustling about.
‘What is the fire suppression status?’
‘The fire is at such a high location that we are facing difficulties.’
‘What about rescuing people inside?’
‘We have evacuated as many people from the lower floors as possible, but we cannot even enter the floors above the fire…’
Urgent radio transmissions continued to pour out from the temporary command center set up by the fire department, and the situation was similar on the police side, where officers were cordoning off the area to keep people away from the danger zone.
‘What is the cause of the fire?!’
‘What is the current status of the civilians trapped inside…!’
On one side, even though an emergency briefing had already been held, reporters were grabbing the already busy personnel and firing questions without giving them a moment to breathe, desperate for any scrap of information they could turn into an article.
‘Hey, look at that!’
At that moment, the camera crew, who had been focused on the building with bright red flames shooting into the dark night sky, noticed something and called the reporters in a commotion. Attention gathered, and the zoomed-in screen showed a broken window.
Because it was night and the location was high, the reporters could see nothing but the reflection of light on the broken glass, but those holding the cameras could vaguely make out the situation.
A massive, indescribable shape hanging from the wall outside the window.
And a woman clinging to that massive shape.
Moments later, the glass wall was torn away and the shape fell downward. People outside the cordon stepped back in surprise, and soon a thunderous crash rang out as fragments of broken pavement scattered in all directions.
“What the hell is that…?”
The nearest firefighters tried to approach first to check whether it was an explosive hazard, then recoiled in shock and let out short screams. The police officers armed with rifles also sensed something was wrong, released their safeties, and surrounded the area.
“…No way… Is that a person?”
When the dust settled and the lights shone on it, what appeared was a lump of flesh with limbs and features still clearly visible, as if people had been kneaded together like clay.
It was even more grotesque than the monsters created by mad scientists stitching together corpses in horror movies. Simply looking at it induced nausea, but what made it even more horrifying was the fact that it was moving.
Amidst the red blood spraying from various places, it dripped a contrasting green liquid. Sensing the approaching police officers, it lifted what was presumed to be its head—an oddly shaped appendage—and rolled its eyes.
“Eek!”
One officer, faced with a head and eyes that looked as if photographs of multiple people’s faces had been cut up, mixed, and overlapped, tried desperately to calm his trembling body before finally falling back.
[Grrraaaahhh uwooooorrr!]
And when its mouth opened, an incomprehensible, unpleasant sound echoed across the scene.
“The fire department and police, who had been refusing to cooperate, have now requested assistance.”
‘Reason’
“Approximately ten minutes ago, one entity fell after breaking through the building’s exterior wall.”
‘Cause’
“It appears to be an entity created by the liquid used by the phenomenon terrorist group Genesis, which we have been monitoring. However, unlike previous cases that only revived dead entities, this one seems to be creating an entirely new entity.”
Judging the situation to be more severe than expected, J immediately sent the data up the chain of command and finished a brief report before waiting for instructions.
Despite all the preparations and precautions, the scale of the terrorism had exceeded expectations, leaving J anxious, but ultimately, additional personnel could only be deployed with approval from above.
‘I never trusted those private security teams in the first place.’
A massive corporation with its own counter-terrorism team and considerable scale—what good were all their security equipment and screenings if they could be breached this easily, or even willingly opened from the inside?
The Anomaly Agency’s Support Team had gone to inspect, but that was only a facility check. Personnel resources had faced extreme opposition and could not be verified at all.
Time had been short, so they could not screen everyone related to security, but they should have at least forced verification of the actual operators.
“Haa…”
Suddenly wondering what the point of thinking this now was, J calmed down, acknowledged that his own carelessness was part of the cause, and waited for a response.
‘Additional deployment…’
When a voice finally came through, J straightened up to listen, only to be unable to hide his bewilderment at the next words.
‘…On hold.’
“Excuse me?”
‘Confirmed that on-site personnel can handle it.’
“But there are still civilians inside the building where the phenomenon occurred who could not evacuate…”
‘Not a consideration.’
“…Understood.”
In truth, J had expected this.
The Anomaly Response and Management Agency’s job was to focus solely on eradicating or containing phenomena, regardless of how many civilians died. The current situation on site was not yet out of control, after all.
‘That thing is still moving!’
‘When is the special forces coming?!’
‘Just shoot it!’
As proof, the lump of flesh that had fallen outside the building was currently being fired upon by the police but had not been neutralized—yet it also could not cause further damage.
Unless the police and firefighters who requested cooperation brought in high-ranking officials and begged them to come because they did not want their support funds cut, the higher-ups who had already refused cooperation were unlikely to suddenly change their minds unless an unexpected situation occurred.