An Unfamiliar Ceiling
"Huh... an unfamiliar ceiling..."
I opened my eyes... and damn, that really was an unfamiliar ceiling.
No — the ceiling wasn't the problem, not exactly.
It was the enormous logo floating on the screen directly in front of me.
"What the... fuck."
The curse slipped out on its own.
Lobotomy Corporation.
The game I'd sunk hundreds of hours into. The game I'd plastered with every mod I could find just to scrape my way to Day 46. The devil's game I'd sealed away for good after a Claw caved my skull in on that forty-sixth day.
Its defining features? A deranged company that ground employees' minds into paste to extract Enkephalin. One Abnormality slip-up and an entire department went up in flames. A psychiatric simulator where management staff dropped dead at the end of every single day.
"Wait..." No way.
I frantically scanned my surroundings.
A pristine white auditorium. Desks lined up in neat rows. People in formal suits, every last one of them wearing a face tight with tension. And on the screen up front, a blue-haired woman who looked suspiciously like some shadowy mastermind, accompanied by a mechanical voice:
"Welcome, new employees."
Ah... it was real.
"This orientation is conducted for new personnel of Lobotomy Corporation."
Holy shit. It really was Lobotomy.
Of all the games I'd ever played — and there were plenty — why the hell did it have to be this place? I'd played Blue Archive just yesterday. I'd dropped Genshin, sure, but at least there you could live like a person. Even Limbus let you scrape by as a human being. So why dump me into the company that pulverized its staff like rocks in a mill?
"Going forward, you will be assigned to your respective departments and carry out Abnormality management duties."
The moment I heard that word, my mind snapped fully awake.
Abnormalities. The alpha and omega of Lobotomy — the sole reason the game's difficulty had gone completely off the rails.
Hold on. That meant Blue Star was real. That meant [CENSORED] was real. That meant WhiteNight was real.
"I'm insane..."
In the game, it had been nothing more than a few button presses. I'd been the Manager. I'd been Ain. One click and the work order went through.
But here, real people died. And it wouldn't be someone else — it would be me. For real.
Just then, a cautious voice came from the seat beside me.
"Um... are you all right?"
I turned my head.
Long red hair. A faintly nervous face. Even the trademark eyepatch. She was clutching an employee tablet tightly in both hands — the unmistakable look of someone facing her first day in the working world.
And pinned to her chest, an employee ID badge.
YURI
"...Huh?"
My brain short-circuited.
Yuri...? That Yuri? The Yuri from Limbus Company?
I must have been staring too hard, because she flinched.
"W-why are you looking at me like that...?"
"Ah — no, it's nothing."
I shook my head quickly.
"Your name just seemed familiar, that's all."
Of course it was familiar, Yuri. You're the nightmare of hundreds of thousands of Limbus players. Even Stars of the City — the kind of people who go around caving in skulls for a living — take a −45 hit to their sanity the second they lay eyes on you.
"Ahaha..."
Yuri laughed awkwardly.
"I'm incredibly nervous myself. It's a Wing, after all... I mean, I actually got hired by a Wing..."
Wow. It really was her. The mannerisms, the way she spoke, the appearance — all of it, straight out of the game.
Back when I'd been playing, I'd thought things like Yuri's cute. Seeing her in the flesh was a different feeling entirely.
Because I knew. I knew exactly how fucked this world was. And I knew exactly how this company chewed its employees up and spat them out.
"...Hah."
I already wanted to quit, and I hadn't even clocked in yet.
"Department assignments will begin shortly."
The instant those words landed, a chill ran down my spine.
Department assignments. Survival rates shifted depending on where you landed. This was a branch facility, so at least there wouldn't be anything like a Disciplinary Team — please, just let it be Control, Information, or Welfare. One of the early departments. Game logic or not, the early days only spat out ZAYIN and TETH-class Abnormalities. Relatively safe.
Ding.
My tablet screen lit up.
> Assigned Department: Safety Team
Ah...
I'd made it. I was actually going to live.
Heaven hadn't abandoned me after all.
Yuri glanced at my screen from the next seat and spoke in a small voice.
"I'm Safety Team as well. We're in the same department."
She smiled, just a little.
I stared at that smile, dazed.
She still didn't know. What kind of place this company was. What kind of tragedy awaited her in this wretched hole — that she was going to die here. How thoroughly unsafe the Safety Team really was. And what the two of us were about to witness.
"Department transfers will now begin."
The auditorium doors opened with the announcement.
I rose slowly from my seat.
This was it. The real beginning.
Life inside that hell of a company I'd watched countless times from the other side of a screen. Life inside a labyrinth packed with monsters that would cage and kill so many.