When You Gaze Into a Workplace With Fewer Than 5 Employees, the Workplace With Fewer Than 5 Employees Gazes Also Into You
How to Survive in a Good Small Guild
Chapter 1
1. When you gaze into a workplace with fewer than 5 employees, the workplace with fewer than 5 employees gazes also into you.
I swear, I could have survived being rejected by any company in the world. Confidently. With my chin up.
Because I had prior experience working at a workplace with fewer than 5 employees. Explanation complete.
For those who didn't quite follow that, allow me to elaborate: by law, a "workplace with fewer than 5 employees" is granted several exemptions from labor protections, ostensibly to ease the burden on small business owners.
But some companies treat the "workplace with fewer than 5 employees" as a golden opportunity to become the ultimate sh*thole that escapes every law on the books. They will demolish everything you thought was common sense, commit logic-defying atrocities, and show you exactly what the worst company on earth looks like.
"So this place is…"
I looked around, bewildered.
My last memory was definitely of dozing off mid-overtime at that sh*thole of a company. So why did my body feel this light?
I got out of bed, thoroughly inspected my surroundings — the room, the mirror, all of it — and arrived at one conclusion.
Just like in the most classic romance-fantasy clichés, I had transmigrated.
"Okay. Not bad."
I had no particular attachment to my previous life. My parents passed away the moment I became an adult; I'd gotten a job at a sh*thole company, turned into a horrible person, and lost touch with all my friends as a result…
So why not just treat this as a second chance handed to me, and enjoy a brand-new life?
I dug through the memories of the body I now occupied. Fortunately — or unfortunately — the memories were still there, faint but present.
"Audrette Lavendel, twenty-one years old this year."
Sadly, she was no noble lady but a commoner. Still, there was a small house registered in her name. And even a job she commuted to every day.
I was working at an information guild, right.
Just like the original me, Audrette Lavendel had lost her parents, inherited nothing but a house, taken a job at an information guild, and lived a busy, harried life every single day. And then it seemed my soul had drifted into the body she'd worked to death.
An information guild, huh… I don't know the first thing about that line of work. Hold on.
I was mulling over how to adapt to my new life when, all of a sudden, a stunning realization hit me.
What if this is one of the romance fantasies I've read?!
Transmigrations almost always happen inside a romance fantasy with an "original novel." Which meant that maybe — just maybe — I simply hadn't noticed yet, and this world had an original too!
If so, then knowing this world's future made me perfectly optimized for working at an information guild!
That's it. My information guild is going to soar.
The memories weren't fully intact yet, so which guild exactly was hazy — but regardless, I was confident I could grow it into the greatest information guild in this world.
Because an information guild is, by definition, a place where…
"One martini, with a single olive floating on top, please."
"How did you know the passphrase?"
Once you infiltrate the place through such suitably clandestine rituals…
"I'd like you to investigate one person for me."
"I'm afraid even we cannot dare touch that individual."
…It becomes the kind of organization that gets entangled with every major power player imaginable — the crown prince, the Grand Duke of the North, a saint, whoever — and becomes their indispensable ally.
Yes! First, figure out which world this is, then exploit my knowledge of the original!
If it turned out this world had no original novel, that would be a shame… but even so, working the romance-fantasy clichés should let me dig up information faster than anyone else, shouldn't it?
It stung that I couldn't live the luxurious aristocratic life of your average romance-fantasy heroine. But even so, I was confident I could embrace my new life with a happy heart.
Anywhere was fine, as long as it meant escaping a workplace with fewer than 5 employees! Yahoo!
Isn't it almost time for work?
Following the original Audrette's memories, I threw on some plain clothes and headed for the information guild.
Though honestly, it's not exactly discreet.
Unlike the information guilds of typical romance fantasies, the place where I worked had its name plastered right out front of an ordinary office.
GLOBAL INFORMATION NETWORK GUILD
And why was the name so ugly? It sounded exactly like a sh*thole startup pretending to be the next big thing.
Tilting my head, I stepped inside the information guild. There, beneath the dim lighting, three people were already seated at their desks.
Are these my teammates?
I was sifting through hazy memories, trying to figure out how to greet them, when someone's bark rang out.
"Why are you here at this hour?!"
"…Guild Master?"
Thankfully, the face jogged my memory.
The Guild Master. A man in his mid-forties. The living, breathing archetype of a boomer tyrant.
"Uh… it's ten minutes before my shift starts, though?"
"A newbie showing up later than me? Is that supposed to make sense?!"
"I'm sorry…"
"And you're just going to drop your bag at your desk the second you walk in?"
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Do you not know what you're supposed to be doing?"
"Um… and what would that be, sir?"
"I told you — the moment I walk in, I get my coffee first!"
"Ahh… right. My apologies, sir…"
I bowed deeply once more.
There it was. The Guild Master of the information guild where Audrette Lavendel worked was — fitting for an information guild — not dashing, not mysterious, just a plain old boomer tyrant.
"Miss Audrette! Just getting in?"
"Yes, er, yes?"
A man who looked slightly older than me struck up a conversation. Racking my memory… this person was…
"Do you have a task for me, Assistant Manager?"
"Ha-ha! Today is the day our information guild makes its grand leap forward! I've booked three meetings today, so prep for all of them — keep it agile, and make it supes A-plus!"
"Ah, yes, sir…"
Right. The Assistant Manager was a villain drunk on his own passion, famous for stirring up work and then leaving underlings to suffer through it.
Worse, he was convinced he was young and trendy, so he kept sprinkling his speech with bizarre loanwords and made-up slang.
"Three meetings today!"
"Yes. How wonderful…"
Dodging his gaze, I scurried backward toward the break area to brew the Guild Master's coffee. That was when the last woman at her desks spoke up.
"Audrette! Senior staff!"
"Ah, Susanna."
Susanna — my co-worker who'd joined the same year as me. She…
"Hehe, you'll make mine too, right? We're classmates, after all!"
"…Sure."
"Judging by the mood, the Guild Master's gonna clock out early today… but I won't be done with my work by then, so can you cover it, Audrette? I'm planning to leave sharp! Right on the dot!"
"Excuse me? And what exactly am I supposed to get out of that?"
"Hm? That's not the important part. Anyway, I gotta clock out sharp!"
"……"
Hold on. Something felt very, very wrong here.
Only then did the original Audrette Lavendel's memories snap into focus.
Boomer tyrant Guild Master. Passion-villain Assistant Manager. Gen-Z senior staff. And me.
One, two, three, four. You have got to be kidding me! This is another workplace with fewer than 5 employees!
That's right! Now I remembered! There had never been multiple teams — this guild was just four people total, including me! Which meant this life, too, was a workplace with fewer than 5 employees!
No. No, no. I have to work at a workplace with fewer than 5 employees AGAIN? Strapped to these villains?
Of course the original Audrette Lavendel worked herself to death — every single guild member was a villain! And Audrette Lavendel had been a complete fresh-out-of-school rookie, without an ounce of workplace cunning to her name!
Right — according to my memories, Audrette Lavendel hadn't even finished compulsory schooling, so she had no credentials to land a proper job anywhere! That was exactly why she'd ended up at this sh*thole!
I spent a moment in flat denial of reality, then worked up the nerve to probe the situation.
"Um, by any chance… how many paid leave days do I have left?"
"Paid leave? What on earth are you talking about? Did you have a dream or something? Where would you get paid leave?"
…According to Audrette's memories, the word "paid leave" did exist in this world.
"What about weekly rest allowances? Overtime pay? A minimum wage?"
"Audrette, get ahold of yourself. You looked worn out yesterday — did you eat something bad?"
The Guild Master clicked his tongue.
"Our guild is a workplace with fewer than 5 employees, so none of that applies!"
"……!"
Are you KIDDING me!
At last, I understood.
I had transmigrated into yet another legally unprotected workplace with fewer than 5 employees!
"If you want to quibble about rights, you should've gotten hired by a prime contractor. What do you expect, working for a subcontractor?"
A subcontractor to a sh*thole, no less. I had no idea who this "prime contractor" was, but I could already guess: they'd look down on us and dump every impossible job imaginable on our heads!
"Aaaaahh… Yes, sir…"
"Go make my coffee!"
"Mine too, Audrette, pretty please!"
Half my soul already departed, I brewed coffee for the Guild Master and Susanna, then trudged back to my own desk.
"……"
There, piled to the rafters, sat all the work the passion-villain Assistant Manager had dumped on me.
I stared down at it for a long, long while with hollow eyes. Could I not just… quit?
But I have no résumé to speak of.
Two months on the job. If I quit now, it wouldn't even count as experience.
"Aaaaahh…"
I sat down and suffered for a good long while.
Back to a workplace with fewer than 5 employees? Back to a sh*thole? A senior staffer at a guild that was supposed to be some glamorous information guild out of a romance fantasy, but was actually packed to the brim with unhinged villains?
And then, mid-suffering, my eyes snapped open.
"Hey, ever since you joined that weird company, you've gotten kind of weird yourself…"
"Don't you think you're being way too selfish toward your own teammates?"
"Seriously, are you allowed to act like that at work? You say the strangest things."
In my past life, I survived two years at a workplace with fewer than 5 employees.
And enduring those two years taught me one truth.
When you gaze into a workplace with fewer than 5 employees, the workplace with fewer than 5 employees gazes also into you.
Eighty percent of who I am today was forged by that bastard Park Geo-seong.
Recalling the name of the sh*thole company's CEO from my past life, I smiled — slowly, sweetly.
A human sh*thole, deploying now.
I was absolutely, one hundred percent confident I could adapt flawlessly to this unhinged sh*thole of a guild.