When Whales Fight, the Shrimp's Back Breaks
When whales fight, the shrimp's back breaks.
What kind of company nearly kills an employee, hands them a single ampule, and makes them clock in the very next day?
The answer is this goddamn Lobotomy Corporation I work for, for fuck's sake...
Granted, that single ampule was a K Corp product worth a Wing employee's annual salary, so I was grateful for that much — but making me come in the next morning was still a bit much, wasn't it?
By the time we finished talking it over in the medical bay, the sun was already up and it was time to head to work.
"Haaah."
Yuri let out a small yawn. Her footsteps toward the Safety Team corridor felt unusually heavy.
"Couldn't sleep?"
"What about you, Han?"
"Same."
Yuri rubbed her eyes with a tired face.
"After everything we talked about yesterday, it wasn't exactly easy to just fall asleep."
"Yeah, fair enough."
The dream. Carmen. The Single Evil, Multiple Virtues. Impurities. And the future. Just thinking about it still left my head a tangled mess. Even so, it didn't feel as suffocating as before. Because I knew I had precious coworkers who believed in me.
"Still..." Yuri said carefully. "You look better than yesterday."
"I do..?"
"Yes... just a little."
"Thanks..."
At that moment, the briefing room door opened.
"You're here~"
It was Team Leader Mir. A coffee can in one hand, a stack of documents in the other. She was smiling, but her expression looked thoroughly rotten — or was that just my imagination?
And behind her came Deputy Leader Doyun, carrying documents of his own.
"Team Leader..?"
"Why do you look so pissed?"
"Ah~ the Command Team bastards."
Mir dropped into her chair and waved a hand dismissively.
"They've got a real talent for spiking people's blood pressure first thing in the morning. World-class, honestly."
We're fucked... The one thing you absolutely had to avoid at this company was friction with other departments...
"What... happened this time?" Yuri asked with an uneasy face.
"It's about you two."
Fuck.... What fresh hell is this goddamn company cooking up today...
Mir flipped through the documents with casual flicks of her fingers.
"Starting today, personal Abnormality management assignments begin."
"Well, the time was about up. Still, after what happened, I figured they'd wait a bit longer..."
"New hires usually start after a week. They're just sticking to the schedule. But that's not the problem."
Mir rested her chin on her hand. The corner of her mouth twisted upward.
"Normally, they start you on TETH-class and work up gradually, right? But the veeery high-and-mighty people over in Command took one look at the record of you two surviving a top-tier WAW-class entity and got real excited. Never mind who made that happen in the first place... haah..."
"Ah..."
"'Combat-ready personnel,' or whatever they called it." Mir laughed irritably. "They dressed up pure bullshit to sound almost reasonable."
Yuri muttered under her breath. "Are they out of their minds?"
I don't know who those people are, but if even sweet Yuri is swearing, they must be something special.
"They are." Mir nodded immediately. "I think so too."
She slid one of the documents toward Yuri.
"Yuri. HE-class assignment."
"I... I'm a new hire, though?"
"Yeah. I know." Mir took a sip of her coffee. "Still, it's one of the Safety Team's existing managed entities, so it's relatively stable. Easier for us to respond to, too."
Yuri carefully looked down at the document. A black ceremonial robe. A long veil. Black butterflies drifting through the air around it. And a pair of funeral twin blades held in both hands.
"It's from the Funeral of the Dead Butterflies line at HQ. A subspecies, of course." Mir tapped the document with a finger. "Funeral Director of the Black Harmony. Quiet most of the time, but if someone dies nearby, things get... a lot worse. And if your mental fortitude bottoms out during management or suppression—"
Doyun quietly finished the sentence from beside her. "You die instantly."
"I can't even pretend that isn't terrifying."
"That's just how HE-class works at Lobotomy. Still, your limbs stay intact and cleanup is easy, so it's not the worst." Doyun said it matter-of-factly. "Being left with a corpse at all is already lucky."
"Deputy Leader... you're really bad at comforting people."
"I'm simply stating facts."
Hard to argue with that. From WAW-class onward, finding body parts to send to the bereaved family was difficult enough.
Then Mir's gaze turned toward me.
"Haah... Han." She held out a new document. "You're WAW-class."
My mind went blank for a moment. Uh...? The WAW-class they said you can't even recover a body from?
"What..!!??"
"Mercenary of the Bloody Scar."
I slowly took the document. A female-form Abnormality wearing a red hood. A tattered coat. An old long gun. And an axe caked with dried blood. A chill ran down my spine.
"This...?"
"Looks familiar, right? A subspecies of the Red Hooded Mercenary that escaped yesterday. Official designation: Hound of the Bloody Scar." Mir leaned back against her chair. "Combat power is top-tier WAW."
"You're giving a new hire a WAW-class? Isn't this assignment a mistake?"
"Oh, it's a massive mistake. That's why I'm pissed right now, remember?" Mir laughed irritably. "But the actual management isn't as hard as you'd think. Of course, those damn Information Team idiots couldn't even handle that and let it escape..."
"It has enough reason that management isn't particularly difficult. Not the worst, all things considered."
"Still, assigning that to a new hire seems like the problem in the first place..."
"That's what I'm saying! Haah... those bastards." Mir let out a long sigh. "I get that the Information Team had an incident and they're short-staffed. What I don't get is why they're trying to fix it by grinding Safety Team new hires into paste."
"If they made the mess, they should clean it up themselves. The same people who nearly killed our precious new hires can't even do their own jobs... seriously..."
"The Information Team itself isn't at fault, so... well, if incompetence is a crime, then they're guilty, I guess..."
Her expression hardened for a moment, then eased again.
"Anyway, until they get new people, the Safety Team is covering for them. And wouldn't you know it — that falls on you."
"Yeah." Mir gave a dry chuckle. "Of all the rotten luck..."
Her gaze dropped to my waist.
"Ah, right. This one needs to be handled." She snapped her fingers. "While you were out cold, we remeasured your weapon's output."
"Penitence?"
"Yeah. It was originally ZAYIN-class — nothing special, just the filler they hand out to new hires."
"Right."
"It's climbed to WAW-class levels now."
I froze.
"For real?"
Mir wiped the amusement from her face a little.
"The output itself is completely different. Honestly, it creeps me out a bit — what with that dream of yours yesterday and everything. Still, with the Abnormality assignment, you're getting new gear too." She flipped through the documents. "Han keeps using Penitence. But your armor switches to Bloody Scar — Red Hooded Mercenary line E.G.O armor."
Mir smirked. "At least your survivability is guaranteed."
Yuri carefully raised her hand. "What about me?"
"You get both new."
Mir pushed two cases toward her. Yuri opened them slowly. A pair of funeral twin blades of black metal. And armor in the form of a black ceremonial robe. Black butterfly motifs were engraved throughout.
"Wow..." Yuri's eyes lit up a little. "They're beautiful."
"Both are Funeral Director of the Black Harmony E.G.O gear. The name is Requiem, and unusually, it's WAW-class equipment — so use it well."
Yuri carefully lifted one of the blades. "It's lighter than I expected..."
"On the flip side, the second your mental fortitude drops, your head comes clean off, so be careful."
"Team Leader..?"
"I'm not joking~ It's that good a weapon — you take the trade-off."
I couldn't laugh at all. When the company invested this much, it meant they expected results to match.
At that moment, the briefing room door burst open.
"Oh~ the newbies."
It was Nova. She walked in shaking a container of green liquid, eyed our equipment, and whistled.
"Whoa. Why is the new hire gear this good?"
"Because Command lost their minds." Mir sighed. "During work hours, stick with Nova and learn as much management as you can. She'll help you out."
The corner of Nova's mouth curled up. "Nice~ Looking forward to how fast you break."
"...Senior."
"I'm kidding. Funny, right?"
Those eyes... that is absolutely not a joke... crazy senior...
Then Mir tapped the desk with a finger. "But I'm not kidding about this." She looked at us. "Managing Abnormalities a lot really is the fastest way to get stronger."
"Managing..?" Yuri looked puzzled.
"Yeah." Mir rested her chin on her hand. "The longer you manage Abnormalities, the higher your E.G.O adaptability climbs. Your mental fortitude and body get tempered. Your output stabilizes over time, too."
Doyun quietly picked up the thread. "E.G.O equipment is ultimately a resonance with the Abnormality. The more you handle it, the more familiar it becomes."
I listened in silence. I already knew all of this. Lobotomy Corporation — even in the game, employees grew through repeated management work. Lobotomy had a virtue system, but it seemed things had shifted now that this was reality. Still, the absolute rule held: the longer an employee survived, the stronger they became. The problem was that it required countless overtime shifts — and being the one living through it firsthand made the whole thing a lot less appealing.
Nova grinned. "In simple terms: don't die, keep grinding, and you get stronger~"
"That's an awfully crude way of putting it."
"But it's true, isn't it?"
Mir stood up and stretched. "And after work, from six onward." She smiled at me. "I'll personally oversee your swordsmanship and weapon techniques."
"For real?"
"Would I say it for nothing? You made that kind of resolve yesterday — I should match it." Mir grinned playfully. "Just don't start sniveling on me, okay?"
"I'm already scared."
Yuri muttered quietly. "I really want to quit."
"Too late. There's no such thing as quitting at our company."
"Anyway." She waved a hand roughly. "Everyone get to your work~ I'm off to do management. Good luck~"
With that, Mir left the briefing room first, swinging her coffee can. Matching her exit, Doyun gathered his documents and rose from his seat.
"Then we should be going as well."
The corridor leading to the Safety Team containment zone. Deputy Leader Doyun and Senior Nova walked ahead, while Yuri and I followed behind. Footsteps rang out in a steady rhythm against the steel floor. Beyond the walls, the faint hum of machinery mixed with a low vibration.
The corridor split in two at the center. To the left, a dark passage leading to the lower floors. To the right, a corridor of flickering red lights leading toward the Safety Team containment zone.
Deputy Leader Doyun stopped walking.
"Where are you going, Deputy Leader?"
Doyun glanced down at the documents in his hand and said briefly, "Down below, to manage an ALEPH-class."
"Ah.... um... good luck..?!"
Yuri stiffened for a moment, then clenched a small fist as she said it. Doyun looked at us briefly. And for just a second, the corner of his mouth lifted.
Then his gaze shifted naturally toward Nova. His expression changed ever so slightly — something almost pitying. A face mixed with a sigh.
"You two hang in there as well. It looks rather dangerous. Especially watch out for that lunatic."
"That hurts, Senior~" Nova grinned from up ahead. "I'll have you know I'm an incredibly kind senior to my juniors?"
"I highly doubt that..."
"Caught me."
Nova snickered, then suddenly spun around. "Alright, newbies~ Today's goal." The corner of her mouth slowly rose. "Don't die."
"Is a workplace that sets that as a goal even normal?"
"Don't go looking for normal at Lobotomy."
Clunk.
The massive blast door began to open slowly. Nova smiled.
"Now then — let's go meet your new Abnormalities~"