Chapter 16
Chapter 16
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 16
Chapter Title: I Just Memorized It
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I just memorized it.
Light filled my vision.
The ear-splitting noise from the shaking building vanished, and a brief void washed over me, as if all senses had been severed.
The floating sensation in midair stopped, and when I opened my eyes.
No office or anomalies remained before me.
"Is it over?"
The time was evening, with the sunset casting an orange glow.
In the middle of a silent construction site, she and I stood.
Her face was bewildered, still gripping her sword as if unable to accept the situation.
Seeing her like that, a smile crept onto my face unbidden.
Her body was still covered in the marks of battle.
Soon, as she scanned our surroundings and our eyes met, she wiped the blood from her face with her forearm and flashed a bright smile.
The blood smeared, making a mess, but it didn't matter.
"Over!"
She plunged her sword into the ground, shouted like it was the end, and collapsed backward with her arms spread wide.
"Haa... I really almost died. Those Human-Faced Gorillas suddenly went berserk, and if I'd been even a little slower... ugh—"
I walked over to her and plopped down beside her.
'This suit is expensive.'
Whatever.
As I lay back immediately, strength drained from my entire body.
Even with Auto Save, the mental fatigue didn't vanish.
Manually transcribing letters, sprinting full speed to the fifteenth floor, dodging the dolls' grasp, and even playing mind games with the Human-Faced Monkey.
My civilian stamina had reached its limit long ago.
I'd just been forcing myself to hold on.
"Still."
I turned only my gaze at her voice.
Her fist thrust up toward the sky caught my eye.
"For a hastily thrown-together team, don't you think our teamwork was pretty good? Right?"
I raised my fist and bumped it against hers.
"Agreed."
After that, we fell silent.
We stayed like that for a while.
As my breathing steadied, strength slowly returned to my muscles.
I slowly sat up.
I felt her turn her head to watch my movement.
"Could I ask a favor, by any chance?"
It was something I'd had in mind since writing my resignation letter.
It was about the letters.
No matter how I thought about it, it didn't look right for an ordinary person like me to personally deliver letters from people who had visited this company years ago and gone missing.
Dozens, hundreds of them, not just one or two.
So.
"What is it? Tell me. I'll do pretty much anything!"
"Then... could you deliver these letters to the bereaved families?"
"...The letters?"
I gave her a simple explanation of the situation, facing her puzzled look.
"Actually, when I was using the work computer earlier, I found letters left behind by people who had come to this company in the past. It might be meddlesome, but still."
I looked at her.
"I want to deliver them to the people who are still waiting for these letters."
She stared at me for a moment, unable to continue.
With an exclamation, she sat up, pulled out a pen and notebook from her pocket.
"If it's something like that, of course! I'll do it anytime. That's not even a favor. It's nothing."
At her expectant gaze, I opened my mouth right away.
"First, Song In-kyung. Hired April 2021. Paju City, Gyeonggi Province... The content of the letter is... like this. And then next—"
After dictating for a while, as I was about to say the next one, I turned at her urgent voice.
"W-Wait a second!"
She was looking at me, sweating coldly.
Her notebook was already filled densely with writing.
"If I missed anything, I can repeat it."
She held out her hand and stopped me.
"Not that. By any chance, do you know how many letters there are?"
'Number?'
Recorder's Pen.
The number in the upper right corner came into view.
"...14,231."
Her eyes changed as she looked at me, like she was seeing something incomprehensible.
"You're saying... you remember all of them right now?"
I couldn't lie here.
"Not just the addresses... but the contents of the letters too?"
The letters were the final records left by the victims.
Not a single character could be changed; they had to be delivered intact.
...No helping it.
Time for the 'genius cosplay' again.
"Just."
"Just?"
"I just memorized them."
I said it nonchalantly.
As if it were truly no big deal, calmly, like stating something trivial.
"You think that's as easy as it sounds? Just one letter has—"
"Hmm. Is it? I didn't find it particularly hard."
For a moment, an expression crossed her face like she'd seen someone utterly obnoxious.
***
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[Anomaly Broadcast: Code 120053]
[Broadcast Time 07:15:12]
[Broadcast ending soon.]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
As the screen went dark, the Anomaly Gallery fell silent.
[Not Human] : ...
[Veteran84] : ...
[Hopeless Life] : ...
[Pacheonhwang] : ...
[Future SCP] : Mommy?
It hadn't started that way.
When the newb entered the building, the gallery had been the exact opposite—ablaze with excitement.
From Hopeless Life and Not Human's private betting pool.
To those slipping into appreciation mode like they were watching Nephthys.
[Taste Expert] : Been bored lately, but this is pumping my dopamine lololol
[Caroo is Truth] : Fr, my commute to the Management Bureau was dragging
[Keen Eye] : But isn't this a new newb? Wasn't the last one 119532?
ㄴ[Horror Cross-Eyed] : Gramps. What era are you even living in, seriously.
[Spectator Why Bingui] : Ugh, seeing newbs die messes up my sleep. Better grab some popcorn quick.
[Lol Rupping] : Lmao Ru, is it Chuseok today? Viewer count is insane.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[Live Viewers: 531]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
The broadcast viewer count had already neared half of the total Anomaly Gallery users, less than ten minutes after starting.
The newb 120053 who had appeared after clearing the 'Gwangju Station Anomaly.'
Almost no one in the gallery didn't know that newb's name.
Clearly a rookie by the entry number.
Yet their actions showed skill surpassing even the most jaded rotten-water veterans.
As late-joining users trickled in one by one, the viewer count ultimately surpassed half.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[Live Viewers: 612]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
But despite the hot interest, few truly expected much from the newb.
There was curiosity thanks to their prior clear of the 'Gwangju Station Anomaly.'
But almost no one believed it would lead to clearing this one.
Most were just watching the broadcast with an explorer's eye, hoping for some hint or clue.
'New Employee First Day Anomaly.'
No Anomaly Gallery user was unaware of it.
Countless entrants had challenged it and never returned, with dozens of recorded videos archived in the gallery.
And those videos always pointed to the same conclusion.
Impossible.
The gallery had judged that this anomaly could never be cleared by a solo or duo—small numbers.
Surface level, it was only Stage 2, but the actual latent danger was higher.
Moreover, it was one of the rare 'growth types.'
The more employees, the larger the company grew, and in one worldline, it had even reached Stage 3—'Disappearance Class.'
At that point, the company's size rivaled dozens of Olympic stadiums combined.
Considering the dangers lurking inside and the employee count, at minimum it required over a hundred people—a large-scale investigation team—for an appropriate response.
The problem was the invitations.
This anomaly's invites were randomly sent to the 'unemployed.'
Those two conditions completely blocked deploying a certain number of investigators.
An absolute wall that seemed impossible to surmount.
That wall, which had seemed impenetrable.
Began to shake the moment newb 120053 entered the building, crumbling the anomaly's towering reputation.
The newb never once sought help from the gallery.
They moved solely on their own judgment.
Even though there should have been biases or oversights.
Without a single mistake, they approached the truth from the smallest clues.
Punch-in time.
They realized the rule through the name and blocked the replacement.
The receiver.
They saw through the intercom's role and found the hidden rule on the monitor.
15th floor.
Within thirty minutes of entering, they realized floors 1-14 were all traps.
Emergency stairs.
Instinctively sensing the threat.
They intentionally started a fire inside the building to lure the anomalies.
Nearly unbelievable.
No hurdles or dangers approached newb 120053 until they reached the fifteenth floor.
[Cream Bun] : Kyaa— this is so fun. But when's this getting released?
ㄴ[Nike] : Released?
ㄴ[Cream Bun] : Yeah, isn't this a movie?
ㄴ[Nike] : It's a live stream?
ㄴ[Cream Bun] : ?
ㄴ[Nike] : ?
ㄴ[Cream Bun] : That? Them spitting cool lines at each other, smirking stylishly, and climbing the stairs? That's not a movie but a docu and live stream?
Soon, relative deprivation—a monster—struck the many users who watched the footage.
[Title: Lmaooooooooo]
—Author: Anomaly Gallery's Longest Member
Someone's stabbing their teammate over a protein bar.
No one trusts their back 'cause who knows when a knife'll go in.
Lmaoooooooooooo
"You go first?"
"This is my role?"
"You guys'll just stab me in the back if I turn. Right? Right? Right?"
Ah.
No.
...Did I join the wrong gallery?
This isn't Anomaly Gallery, it's some magical girl or romance novel gallery, right?
Everyone knows lolololololol
[Not Human] : Yup. This is Romance Novel Gallery. Just press the Anomaly Gallery exit button in the top right.
[Solo Nick Friend] : You get shot with envy too?
[Real Ru] : Fr lol
[Title: Suddenly hit with reality hard.]
—Author: Muscle Growth.
Seeing that high school girl earlier.
Made me realize how weak I am.
Hitting the weights.
[Organism] : ...? Teacher. Is that all you felt?
ㄴ[Muscle Growth] : Yeah. What else is there? Oh, one thing.
ㄴ[Organism] : At least you're human.
ㄴ[Muscle Growth] : That newb 120053 on the broadcast? Judgment and everything else is top-notch. Just one thing lacking. Muscles! Getting out of breath there? Seriously wanna lock 'em in solitary and feed 'em nothing but protein bars for a month straight, weights only. Fr
ㄴ[Organism] : Just move on. That's probably best.
[Title: One-Line Summary]
—Author: Serious Junkie
......lol
Bro fixed it a bit.
Forgot to mention unfolding the paper before.
[Veteran84] : How can someone less than a month in be better than me.
ㄴ[Not Human] : ...A month?
ㄴ[Veteran84] : ..One week.
ㄴ[Not Human] : ...One—week?
ㄴ[Veteran84] : Fuck, three days.
ㄴ[Not Human] : ...Three—days?
ㄴ[Veteran84] : Stop, you maniac!