Basement Level 10
“It’s the work of the unleashed anomalies.”
A reaper gripping a scythe soared through the sky, slicing through the bodies of office workers who had taken refuge on the rooftops.
“Ugh.”
I frowned at the unexpected result and pulled back. Its appearance was that of a reaper, so I had assumed it would quietly collect souls and withdraw. That was not the case. Watching a scene straight out of a slasher movie made my stomach churn.
Kyaaaaaaah!
In the middle of a crosswalk, a bizarre human with a loudspeaker grafted onto its head unleashed a scream. The high-frequency wail was powerful enough to shatter every nearby window.
This was the end of the world.
What was happening in Seoul was unfolding simultaneously across the entire globe—Tokyo, Beijing, New York, Sydney, Paris, London. In every nation’s most “prosperous” city, the same phenomenon was erupting.
I set my phone down on the table and let out a long sigh.
Do not read disaster texts sent through your phone.
As of this moment, a national state of emergency is declared.
If you see strange people outside or hear voices calling for help, ignore them with everything you have.
The news was throwing everything it had into trying to control the situation. But the broadcast cut out almost immediately, replaced by a different scene.
The president himself was delivering a national address. The moment I saw his face, I understood at once.
He had three eyes.
The president had been consumed by an anomaly as well. I didn’t know exactly what had eaten him, but one thing was certain: the nation’s leadership was no longer functional.
“God is saving us. The heavenly light that shines upon me!”
Other countries were in similar shape. The American president stood on a podium, drunk on rapture, screaming that God was shining upon them, that they should behold the light bathing him. But what illuminated him was not light—it was black blood. Soaked in it, he burst into mad laughter and sprayed a baptism of blood across the stage.
If even America had fallen like that, any hope of resolving the crisis had completely vanished.
“So this is the end of the world.”
“Yeah. That’s what it looks like.”
Haaaah.
I let out a bitter sigh. Regression would restore everything to how it was, but even after regressing I doubted this situation would be fully resolved.
Should I post it?
No. Better not. The gallery regulars were already living hard day by day. I didn’t want to dump photos of the world ending on them and drag them into despair. Even if regression made it as if it never happened, I had no desire to give them that hopelessness.
“Shall we head up to the thirtieth floor together to watch the end of the world?”
“Let’s do that.”
To mark the final chapter of our lives, we decided to meet our end on the highest floor. I took the meat toilets with me and rode up to the thirtieth.
“Director, you’ve got some fine wine in here.”
Clang.
I smashed the glass of the display cabinet and pulled out the finest bottle. Meeting the end of the world while drinking wine seemed like the proper way to do it. I shared the bottle with Senior Seo In-seo and watched the world collapse.
Wheeeng. Wheeeng. Wheeeng.
Suddenly the lights in the director’s office began to flash crimson.
Warning. Warning. Warning. Warning.
“The Management Bureau already went down ages ago—what’s with the warning now?”
I snapped at the broadcast that was ruining the mood.
The extinction of humanity has been observed.
Extinction Prevention Protocol is now active.
Basement Level 10 has been unlocked.
“Huh?”
At those words I dropped my wine glass.
Extinction Prevention Protocol? Basement Level 10 unlocked?
Every single phrase was just barely comprehensible—and they matched exactly what the dad-joke old man had told me.
“It could be an anomaly’s doing. Stay calm.”
“Yes.”
Right. It could be an anomaly’s work. The unidentified anomaly that had seized the Management Bureau was the kind that spread through broadcasts. That announcement might be a deliberate lie meant to toy with me.
Anomaly — Body Snatcher is tracking you.
Hssss… this is the first time the message window has ever issued me a personal warning, isn’t it?
Cold sweat slid down my forehead. Not once had the message window ever warned me like this.
Hoo. Hoo. Hoo.
I fell into the illusion that a cold blade was pressed against the back of my neck. Or maybe it wasn’t an illusion. Something might be after my life—the life that could leap across death and space-time. My throat felt like it was being crushed.
There’s definitely something on Basement Level 10.
Title: What’s on Basement Level 10?
Author: AnomalyScreenshotter
What’s on Basement Level 10? Tell me.
Hurry.
The old man explained what existed on the tenth floor. After listening all the way through, I made my decision.
“I have to go down.”
Descend to Level 10 and press the button. That was the only way to ultimately resolve the current crisis.
“Why?”
“There’s something on Basement Level 10 that can stop the end of the world.”
“Huh? You’re believing that broadcast? You already went down to Level 9 and saw it—there’s nothing there.”
“I believe it.”
More precisely, I believed the dad-joke old man. It was worth staking one life on.
The Body Snatcher is tracking you.
And I have no choice but to trust what the dad-joke old man said.
The chill the message window gave me refused to fade. For the first time since I started encountering anomalies, it was issuing a warning. I would go down to Basement Level 10 and press the button. If the old man was right, this crisis would end for certain.
“Hey, hey, wait a second…”
“What is it?”
“It’s gone quiet outside.”
At Senior’s words I looked out the window. The world was silent. The screams and shouts had cut off completely.
“Oh, fuck.”
I moved quietly to the window and stared out. Every anomaly had stopped hunting humans and was staring as one at the building that housed the Management Bureau. Humans and anomalies alike were charging toward the building in a single mass.
The Body Snatcher has located you.
It will spare no effort to kill you.
“Fuck, run!”
I scooped Senior into my arms and sprinted. The elevator was already waiting on the thirtieth floor.
“Why did you bring that?”
“You never know.”
I was also carrying the Vampire Queen in my arms. I had genuinely brought her just in case.
She seems to put up some resistance, so she might work as a shield?
I had grabbed the vampire on pure instinct, but it felt like a surprisingly decent choice. Still, the current situation wasn’t something that could be solved just by carrying a vampire.
“Whoa, holy shit.”
The elevator reached ground floor and had just started descending toward Basement Level 1 when—
Thud. Thud. Thud. Thuuud.
The elevator shook. The ceiling buckled inward. The Body Snatcher anomaly—having consumed every other anomaly and every human in Seoul—had reached the elevator.
“Already?”
We had been quite far away.
The ceiling crumpled, creating a gap. The reception-desk lady shoved her head through.
“Kieeeeek!”
I reflexively hurled a test tube. Crack. It shattered, smearing blood across her skin.
“Useless. We won’t fall for that again.”
“This time our minds exist only to kill you.”
But the reception-desk lady did not turn into a ghoul. She smiled a spine-chilling smile and reached out.
“Kieeeeek!”
I screamed and thrust the Vampire Queen forward.
“You think something that weak can stop us?”
“Ghk—”
“Pathetic. Can’t even speak properly.”
The Vampire Queen was useless even as a shield. The reception-desk lady snorted, swatted her aside, and stretched a hand toward me.
Ding.
If the elevator doors hadn’t opened at that exact moment, I would have died. I scrambled away from the elevator on all fours.
“Trying to run? You think you can make it down to Level 10 from here?”
♩ ♪ ♫ ♬ ♩♩ ♪♫ ♪♬♩
♫♬♩ ♪ ♩ ♪♬
♬♩ ♪♫ ♪ ♫♬
♩♩ ♪♩ ♪♫♬ ♬♩
My legs slowed. The piano anomaly’s song was sucking my mind toward it.
“Give up.”
“You can’t escape.”
Every door that should have been sealed stood wide open. Anomalies of every kind blocked the path ahead, shaking my mind and trying to pin my body in place.
Fuck, will this even work?
I uncorked a test tube and forced the Vampire Queen’s blood into my mouth.
“I run before I turn into a ghoul.”
The force binding my body and mind vanished in an instant. I had used an anomaly to defeat anomalies.
Damn it, it’s too fast.
But the steps that had quickened began to slow again. My body was turning into a ghoul. The transformation was far too rapid. At this rate I would become a ghoul before I ever reached Level 10.
“Trying to run again?”
Manager Kim Yul-ryeong closed in and stretched out her hand. Just before her fingers touched me, my heavy body suddenly lightened.
“Puppy! Thank you!”
The puppy whose name I couldn’t even remember had given me a command: descend to Basement Level 10 with everything I had. Thanks to the order transmitted through will, even as a ghoul I did not lose my reason.
“Urgh. Aaaagh.”
While issuing the command, the puppy also told me her name.
I can’t hear it.
But her name never reached me. Even if I had heard it, her name was still just “Puppy.”
“Urgh. Uuuugh. Ugaaaaagh!”
Blood erupted behind me and a roar shook the entire building. Because the puppy bought me time, I managed to reach the elevator heading down to Level 2.
“Why are those things so fast all of a sudden? There’s zero restriction compared to usual.”
“Their shelf life is up. The causality that was forcibly injected into them is being released.”
“Is the Causality Generator normally like that?”
“No. The opponent’s power is simply that strong.”
Maybe because it was an anomaly capable of ending the world. Its strength was grotesque.
Kuuuung.
We reached Level 2 and sprinted down the corridor. The ceiling trembled—vibrations from the puppy and the Body Snatcher clashing.
“Faster!”
My physical abilities, vastly enhanced by becoming a ghoul, let me drop to Level 5 in no time.
“Ah?”
The vitality wrapping my body vanished completely.
The puppy was dead.
She had thrown her own body forward for my sake, sacrificed herself, and met her end.
“Kieeeeek!”
I had to reach Level 10 before those things arrived. I wrung out every last drop of strength and charged forward with everything I had.
“What did it mean by ‘trying to run again’? Have you met that thing before?”
“Ah, about that… I can’t tell you.”
Today’s events had taught me one truth: there are no absolutes in this world.
“Regression” was not absolute.
I arrived at Basement Level 9.
“What the— Basement Level 10 actually exists?”
An emergency door had appeared on the wall that had once been completely blank. I opened it and stepped inside, then raced down the stairs to Level 10.
Use the Causality Reset Device?
Consumes a portion of the causality accumulated by humanity to correct the error.
Every solution the dad-joke old man had described was essentially a regression button. It carried the drawback of demanding a considerable price, but pressing it would resolve the current crisis for certain.
“See you alive, Senior!”
In a perfectly square room stood a single red button. I smashed the glass covering it and pressed down.
The sensation of the world collapsing washed over me at the same moment a message appeared before my eyes.
Available regressions reduced from 23 → 9.
A message that my lives had decreased.
Correcting the error.
When I opened my eyes, I was in a hospital.
It was the moment right after the subway accident, when I had been admitted.