The NIS Comes Calling
NIS Supernatural Disaster Response & Analysis Room, B3 level of the National Intelligence Service headquarters. A dozen computer monitors crowded the space with communication logs and dense maps of Seoul.
Keyboards clattered under the agents’ fingers as Yoon Seoha, team leader of the analysis unit, pointed to a single red dot glowing on the large central screen.
“This is the result of cross-referencing the access logs TubeLive just sent us against the telecom subscriber data. The location is unit 302 of a corridor-style villa in Sillim-dong, Gwanak-gu, Seoul.”
Her deputy shot up from his seat.
“If we’ve pinpointed the location, we need to deploy the rapid-response team and a hunter strike force immediately. There’s a real chance this person is the one who triggered the Supernatural Disaster.”
“No. We stand down the special forces.”
Yoon Seoha shook her head with absolute finality.
“Armed entry is not permitted under any circumstances.”
An agent seated across the conference table spoke up.
“We can’t rule out the possibility of a terrorist. Identical disasters erupted nationwide right after Hachiko’s broadcast. The connection between the two events is undeniable.”
“A connection is not the same thing as malice.”
“They could have deliberately caused the disaster and then offered the solution.”
“If that were true, there would have been no reason to reveal the condition for restoring the victims’ faces in the second broadcast. No demand for payment. No display of power.”
Another agent cut in, face set hard.
“Even so, we should at least station armed personnel around the building. If something unexpected happens, we’ll have no way to respond.”
Yoon Seoha brought up footage of the first broadcast and the Mapo-gu scene side by side on the main screen. Hair that froze the moment red socks were put on. The Black Woman collapsing under the mint scent. Citizens reclaiming their faces and waking.
“Our only method of response has been the rules that being gave us. Even an S-Class hunter’s mana failed, yet the mint scent Hachiko spoke of worked.”
Her gaze swept slowly across the room.
“And you want to send gun-toting troops into that being’s home? That isn’t securing a target. That’s provocation.”
The conference room fell silent.
“This is the entity that explained the Supernatural Disaster that blanketed the Republic of Korea last night and gave us the survival rules of red socks and mint scent. If we threaten it with force, we may close the only exit of salvation still open to humanity with our own hands.”
Yoon Seoha straightened her suit jacket and rose. Her eyes held a conviction cold and unshakable.
“I’ll go alone.”
“Team Leader, that’s too dangerous.”
“That’s exactly why I’m going alone. We have to show first that we harbor no hostile intent.”
She looked once more at the map marked with the red dot.
“I intend to hear for myself why this being chooses to deliver strange revelations to us in the form of TubeLive broadcasts from a corner room.”
Around the same time, in a narrow, dim one-room studio in Sillim-dong, Gwanak-gu.
“I’m alive… I’m actually alive…!”
I checked the breaking news on my phone and let out a long breath. The screen kept looping reports of mint spray melting black hair and cocooned citizens reclaiming their faces.
The mint-scent nonsense I’d blurted out on pure impulse had actually saved people. The crushing guilt in my chest lightened, just a little.
“It really worked…”
The relief didn’t last. The last two related articles tightened around my throat all over again.
“What the hell?! The NIS? They’re tracing the origin?!”
I clutched my head on the bed. A clear, slender voice rang through the tiny room.
If I stayed put, NIS agents would kick the door in for sure. Even if I confessed, “I just made up a ghost story and it became real,” who would believe me?
Terrorist who spread a Supernatural Disaster. Suspect in a mass-disappearance case. Research subject after an unexplained physical transformation. No matter which future waited for me, it was far worse than being an ordinary unemployed bum.
“I have to run. Pack and get out right now!”
I dragged an old backpack out from under the bed and frantically stuffed in my bankbook, phone charger, and emergency cup ramen.
Then I opened the bankbook and my hands stopped. Balance: 4,120 won.
“Wait. What am I going to eat once I’m out there?”
I was the guy who’d started streaming because I couldn’t even cover the 350,000-won rent. Taking a taxi far away was out of the question; even lasting a few days in a jjimjilbang would be a stretch.
One cup ramen. One charger. A bankbook with 4,120 won. That was my entire fortune and my entire escape fund.
Even if I made it through tonight on this cup ramen, what would I eat tomorrow?
“If the NIS catches me I’m dead, and if I run I’ll starve to death.”
Still, the street might be better than getting dissected. At least I could die after eating the cup ramen.
I debated grabbing one more cup ramen, then weighed the backpack. Even the stuff already inside felt heavy on this body.
Until yesterday I’d been an adult man over 170 cm. Now I was a small, delicate adult woman around 155 cm.
My center of gravity had shifted, and the black oversized hoodie—far too big for this frame—kept catching on everything.
“Why is this clothes so damn in the way?! Kyaah!”
Hurrying with the backpack on, I lost my balance and went down hard.
Thud!
My butt hit the vinyl floor and silver hair long enough to reach my waist spilled over my face. Even the packed backpack felt heavy on these slender wrists.
The sleeves covered my hands so I couldn’t even grip the straps properly. I shoved the loose fabric up to my elbows and gritted my teeth.
“Ugh… why is this body like this… This sucks…”
It hurt enough to bring tears, but there was no time to rest. I pushed the tangled silver hair back and half-dragged the backpack toward the shoe cabinet.
The red socks on my right foot were still on inside out.
That was when it happened.
Knock, knock.
A dry, precise knock sounded from the other side of the front door.
I froze in front of the shoe cabinet. It was nothing like the Black Woman’s knock last night.
Not three times—two. No scraping on the iron door, no wet voice.
Just a thoroughly restrained, polite human knock.
No way… they’re already here?
My heart hammered wildly. I pressed myself against the shoe-cabinet wall and yanked the hoodie down to my nose.
After hiding the silver hair and red eyes, I switched on the video phone with trembling fingers. On the black-and-white screen stood a woman in her late thirties wearing an expensive black suit—alone.
No armed special-forces operators. No shields, no guns in sight.
Just a neat-looking woman with glasses quietly facing the front door. Without even pressing the talk button, I forced a voice through the iron door.
“W-who is it! I’m not saying a word until I call a lawyer! I’m exercising my right to remain silent!”
A thin, shaking young woman’s voice boomed out through the old iron door. The cold vibration of the metal traveled into the shoulder I had pressed against it.
“I… I did make something like a monster, okay! But I didn’t mean to! I never thought it would become real! I’m not opening this door no matter what, so go away!”
I was a complete idiot. Panicked, desperate to live, I’d just blurted whatever came out of my mouth.
Outside, Yoon Seoha adjusted her glasses and listened in silence.
She drew her National Intelligence Service ID from her jacket and held it up to the intercom camera.
“HACHIKO-nim. I am Yoon Seoha, Team Leader of the NIS Supernatural Disaster Response & Analysis Room.”
I pressed my face close to the screen. The photo on the ID matched the woman on the monitor.
“Please rest assured. Not a single armed agent has accompanied me. All surveillance personnel within a five-hundred-meter radius of this building have been withdrawn.”
Yoon Seoha put the ID away and took one step back. Then she slowly lowered herself onto one knee on the dusty, stained corridor floor.
The knee of her expensive suit trousers touched the cold concrete. Gray dust spread across the clean black fabric, but she never looked down.
Watching through the intercom, I went wide-eyed.
Why is she suddenly kneeling?
Yoon Seoha bowed her head deeply toward the front door.
“Thanks to the revelation of the mint scent you bestowed a short while ago, hundreds of citizens across the nation—including those at the Mapo-gu site—have reclaimed their faces and returned alive.”
Her voice was dry, yet it carried unmistakable reverence.
“On behalf of the government of the Republic of Korea and of humanity, I offer our deepest gratitude for the grace that saved our lives.”
My mind went blank white.
Revelation? Grace?
The mint scent was just something I’d thrown out because I’d been thinking about squeezing toothpaste into the door crack.
Still wearing the hoodie pulled low, I asked in a trembling voice,
“Um… you’re really not here to arrest me?”
Still on one knee, Yoon Seoha shook her head with absolute firmness.
“Who would dare arrest Hachiko-nim?”