Chapter 122: Is This the Penalty?
"Answer the phooone— the phooone— pick uuup—"
I was sitting in the office, staring at my phone, when it rang. It was the call I'd been waiting on, so I picked up at once.
"Hello?"
"Hello, Mr. Suhwan. This is Jang Seokmin, PD of Rolling Man."
"Ah, yes. You're here?"
The man on the line was the person in charge of the variety show set to film today.
"Good to meet you. This is the first time we're seeing each other in person, isn't it?"
We traded a brief hello and headed straight for the office near the zoo entrance, so he could spell out exactly where they needed our cooperation on today's shoot. A mid-level manager had already come by and covered the basics, but this visit was to lock in what had actually been decided.
"What we're filming here today is a kind of penalty challenge. You know most of our cast are tremendous cowards, right?"
"Of course. That's what I watch it for."
"Your zoo is a place where our members can get thoroughly terrified, and we can still shoot in perfect safety. Isn't that so?"
I nodded. Honestly, with me around, even the most dangerous predator couldn't lay a finger on anyone. They were smart enough to get into scrapes without ever letting a scrape turn into an incident, and if, against every odd, something truly dangerous started to take shape, I could always cut it off with a magic word.
"For now, what we're thinking is to scale the difficulty of the penalties by ranking."
"Do you already have something in mind?"
"The winning team basically gets a tour, and the penalty team does a one-day zookeeper experience. The winners play with the rabbits and the cats, and the penalty crew cleans somewhere like the tiger enclosure, or feeds the animals. That sort of thing."
The PD's plan gave me a moment's pause. To my mind, doing it the other way around might have been a little easier—every dog and cat in our zoo was a long way from ordinary. Still, it was their call, so I nodded as if it didn't matter to me either way.
"That's more than doable. They can go into the tiger enclosure, and even ride on a tiger's back."
"......But is it really safe?"
"Of course. I don't know if it's my ability or what, but the kids are smart, every last one of them. They understand perfectly well that attacking people wouldn't do them a bit of good."
The big predators were docile enough that I could have turned them loose like the other animals. The only reason I didn't was simple: people were all too likely to be terrified.
"No matter how dangerous it gets, the worst of it would be taking a Nyangnyang Punch from a tiger."
"......Isn't that plenty dangerous on its own?"
"Ah, it's fine. I guess you could say it hurts less than you'd think? They're not really hitting you."
The PD nodded, looking faintly unconvinced—the face of a man deciding that if it was safe, then it was fine. Or, more precisely, something closer to I'm not the one doing it, so... whatever.
"Then I'll be counting on you for today's shoot."
"Don't worry. There won't be any problems."
The PD nodded as if he were praying that would turn out to be true, then headed straight out to greet the celebrity cast. And the moment they were gathered, he started filming.
"Everyone. You remember the results of the race we ran last week, right?"
"Oh, right! Hyung. You said you'd sort out the prize and the penalty later. Are we getting them today?"
"That's right. Would you take a look behind you?"
At the PD's word, the celebrities turned toward the entrance of our zoo.
"I know this place! It's that zoo that's been huge lately. The one run by the Awakened Individual—the Druid! I've been dying to come!"
"Today's prize for the winning team is a tour of this place, and the penalty team's punishment is a one-day zookeeper experience here!"
"AAAAAH!"
"Wooooow!"
The moment the PD finished speaking, the cast split clean in two: those who cheered, and those who screamed. Among the screamers, no less, were people who had sworn they wanted to visit our zoo, and everyone watching them couldn't help feeling sorry. It only got worse from there. The winning team was made up of members famous for their rotten luck, while the penalty team was nothing but people who always landed on their feet, and that drew even more sympathetic groans from the sidelines.
"I wanted to look around! I didn't want to do a zookeeper experience!"
"Noona, just give it up and do the zookeeper thing. We'll be off looking at the animals."
"I knew better than to trust that traitor!"
The celebrities split into the winning team and the penalty team and started squabbling, but under the PD's lead they still made their way into the zoo.
"Whoa, the animals are actually all just walking around!"
The instant they stepped inside, the celebrities couldn't wipe the wonder off their faces at the sight of so many animals. At the PD's signal, I walked up to them.
"Everyone. This is Druid Shin Suhwan. He'll be guiding your tour today, and he'll also be helping the penalty team with their zookeeper experience."
"Hello!"
I came up a little flushed at the rare chance to meet actual celebrities, and they welcomed me with bright, easy smiles. We shook hands one by one, traded a few light greetings, and then the PD spoke again.
"I told you the penalty team would be doing a one-day zookeeper experience today, remember? Aren't you excited to find out which animals you'll be in charge of?"
"Tigers! It's gotta be tigers! I have to see that guy fight a real tiger!"
"Hey! How am I supposed to fight a tiger!"
I watched them bicker all over again, and then the spinning wheel that showed up so often on TV made its appearance.
"A t-tiger?! We're really going into the tiger enclosure?"
"There's an elephant on there too! A crocodile, and a giraffe! Are you trying to kill us?!"
Once the penalty team saw what was written on the wheel, they protested hard. The one famous for his golden hands even grabbed the PD by the collar.
"Please, calm down. You don't honestly think we'd try to get our cast killed, do you? We only go ahead once we've confirmed it's all safe. Right, Druid?"
Every eye swung toward me at once, and I nodded.
"I personally guarantee it's safe. No one is going to get hurt. Absolutely not."
The penalty team still looked skeptical, but with the PD driving the show forward, they had to spin the wheel at once. It was the wheel that decided where each of them would go. It whirred around and gave up its results almost immediately: two people into the elephant enclosure, two people into the tiger enclosure.
"Hahahaha! Serves you right! Go on, try strutting in front of a tiger! Ack—AAAH! This hyung's actually hitting me!"
There was another round of scuffling in the middle of it, but the shoot went on.
"Shall we start with the winning team's tour?"
At the PD's word, I led the winners straight to the area where the small animals mostly gathered. For some reason, the animals were packed in there shoulder to shoulder. Dogs and cats, of course, but raccoons, rabbits, and all sorts of others, crowded together in a living heap.
"Wow, they're seriously cute."
At the sight of them, the winning team lit up and went right over. They were small animals, so the celebrities didn't look the least bit afraid. They were going to regret that choice.
"Ack! AAAH! Why—why are you hitting me!"
"Kyaa! My bag! Hey, you can't take that!"
"Uwaaaaaaah!"
Some of them were eating a barrage of Nyangnyang Punches from the cats. One had a bag snatched clean away by the raccoons. The member who served as the group's leader had the worst of it—he ran afoul of Maru and was dragged off just like that. By the time the animals finally let them go, not one of them could be called intact.
"What kind of prize is this! This is the penalty!"
One member, who had been overjoyed at a rare win, screamed something close to a wail. Whether the PD had no interest in that outburst or not, he moved straight on to the next segment.
The penalty team's punishment had begun. First up was going into the elephant enclosure to clean and to feed.
"......We're really going in?"
The moment the penalty team reached the elephant enclosure, they tried to grab the PD by the collar again. And no wonder. Bbwoobbwoo was rolling a massive bundle of tires this way and that, calling it exercise, and every time that trunk of his shifted, tires weighing a thousand pounds or more lurched and swayed. The PD, perfectly at ease because he wasn't the one going in, shoved the two horrified people into the enclosure anyway—a short man, and a man whose entire persona was the crotchety old-timer.
"It really is safe, right?"
Maybe the coward routine wasn't just a bit for the cameras, because they looked genuinely terrified. I smiled lightly and led them over to Bbwoobbwoo. As we got close, he shoved his trunk in my face and started being a nuisance.
"Hey—knock it off, you're being a pain!"
I smacked that troublesome trunk hard enough to raise a sharp thwack. The reaction, though, didn't come from Bbwoobbwoo. It came from behind me.
"Gyaah!"
"He hit the elephant's trunk!"
The two of them recoiled from me in horror, looking as if they fully expected the elephant to rampage at any second. Little by little, though, they began to unwind. Far from getting angry after taking a hit from me, Bbwoobbwoo quietly draped his trunk right back over the top of my head.
"You two should touch him too. It's fine."
At that, they edged in and started getting acquainted with the elephant, marveling as they went—softer than expected, squishy, solid.
"Now, about the cleaning...... Honestly, there isn't much to clean at our zoo. We've trained them to relieve themselves in designated toilets, so there's no waste to clean up at all."
The moment I finished, Bbwoobbwoo headed for the toilet as if he'd been given a cue and took care of business with obvious satisfaction.
"......He just flushed, didn't he?"
"Yes. We've taught every animal in the zoo to do it that way."
The two of them stared at Bbwoobbwoo with expressions caught somewhere between disbelief and wonder, then started cleaning at my direction. Calling it cleaning was generous. It amounted to picking up the things Bbwoobbwoo had smashed while showing off his strength.
They finished quickly, so I decided to throw in a little something extra. I had Bbwoobbwoo let them up onto his back and take them around for a lap. There was no saddle or anything of the sort, so it would be a bit uncomfortable, but it would still make a decent experience in its own way.
Once the elephant ride was done, they fed him a mountain of fruit, as if to thank him for his trouble. They had to heave up watermelons and the like to get them to his mouth, straining so hard you had to wonder whether that was the real penalty. Leaving Penalty Team One looking oddly satisfied behind me, I headed for the tiger enclosure. This time it was a man and a woman—the muscle-hyung character, and the golden-hands character.
"Before you go into the tiger enclosure, there's one thing to watch out for."
"Something to watch out for? Is it dangerous?"
"Ah, no, nothing like that. They've just got a bit of an issue when it comes to food...... When you feed them, you can't play around. Just toss it, or put it straight into their mouths."
Having their meals snatched by Namcat and the raccoons at every turn, the tigers had a habit of losing their temper if you played games while feeding them. At any rate, once I'd passed along the one and only warning, I took the two of them into the tiger enclosure. I could feel them go tense the moment we stepped into the pen where the tigers were resting.
"It's a tiger!"
"Oppa, do something! It's a tiger!"
"I—I'm a person!"
Listening to the two of them trade lines like a comedy duo, I looked at the tiger that had come up to me. He walked over brimming with dignity, then promptly betrayed that whole performance by flopping flat on the ground, belly bared, and I reached down and rubbed it.
"Come here and pet him. It's fine."
The two who had been trembling with fear edged closer at the sight of a tiger who was, somehow, rather cute. They flinched when he let out a rough, gravelly growl, but they gathered their courage and started touching him.
"He likes you, too. Then, would you like to try feeding him?"
I held out the sack I'd prepared ahead of time, a cloth bundle stuffed with chicken. The moment it appeared, the tigers came crowding in. Hemmed in by several of them, the two were wound tight with nerves, but they flung the chicken just as I'd told them to, toss after toss. Bit by bit they forgot to be afraid, and the fear gave way to delight. They even grew comfortable enough to climb lightly onto the tigers' backs, and by the time the penalty was winding down, both of their faces looked thoroughly at ease.
"Hehe. This doesn't feel like a penalty at all. More like some kind of special tour."
"The tiger was cute."
The two of them were laughing, bright as anything, while the winning team stood there with faces like they'd bitten into something rotten.
"We're the ones who won! Why does it feel like we're the ones who got punished!"
The winning team cried out, but astonishingly, not a single person paid them any mind.
Still, once every bit of filming was over, they enjoyed touring the zoo to their hearts' content. Whatever the road there had been, the ending, at least, seemed to leave everyone satisfied.