Episode 5. Shopping! The Warehouse Store! (4)

“—A body part of a named Hazard Entity from a Special Zone.”

“—If you wear it around and carry it with you, some of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Hazard Entities will mistake you for a higher-tier Hazard Entity, Agent Otter.”

Upside down and utterly undignified, I prayed that Baek Sa-ra's words were true.

Please. Please.

Beep—!

The Stocking Staff gripping my ankle suddenly made a sound.

Beep-beep-beepbeepbeepbeep—!

A mechanical noise repeating at breakneck speed, as if it had glitched out. And then, finally, it released my ankle and scuttled backward.

Thud—!

I, who had been hoisted all the way up to my lower back, dropped straight to the floor. But I couldn't even afford to play dead. I scrambled upright and threw myself against the wall, then checked on the condition of the Staff.

The Stocking Staff. It kept up its frantic beeping from about five meters away.

The Sampling Booth Staff. It, too, had put a similar distance between us. No sound from this one. Instead, its sharpened scissors and tongs were pointed directly at me.

And last of all—damn it, what was that?

There was one more Staff now. The Information Desk Staff. The one that had been stationed at the front desk by the entrance all along. It was looking at me from behind the desk.

“Good judgment.”

Cha Si-eon's voice murmured through my earpiece. He was pretending not to, but relief bled through it.

“From here, we fall back toward the market side again. Keep your back to the wall and move slowly to the left.”

I did as he said and took a step to the left.

Beep-beep-beep-beep—!

The Stocking Staff shrieked like it was having a seizure. The Sampling Booth Staff rocked its body in my direction as well.

That settled it. Just as Baek Sa-ra had explained, the things had mistaken me for a higher-tier Hazard Entity.

But that didn't mean they were submitting to me. These Staff still wanted me evicted from the premises. They were simply too frightened to close the distance, so they shuffled in place instead.

“If I show an opening, they'll lunge again.”

“Insertion of a rescue team is impossible in the current situation. Create distance from the Staff however you can.”

At Cha Si-eon's demand, I started moving again.

Screeeech—!

Son of a—what am I supposed to do?!

“I can't. They're too wary. And as for the traps—if I go checking for them, I don't think those things are just going to stand there and watch.”

Dodging traps I couldn't even see meant examining everything, poking around carefully. There was no way the Staff—just waiting for a chance to tear into me—would grant me that kind of leisure.

Honestly, I was on edge even now. If they coordinated an attack. No—even if one of them simply worked up the courage. Having only borrowed the aura of a higher-tier Hazard Entity, I'd be dead in an instant.

As I stood frozen, wringing my hands, Cha Si-eon offered an alternative.

“We will select personnel to draw off the Staff and send them in.”

“…What?”

Did I hear that right?

Personnel to draw them off? He was going to send someone to get chased by the Staff in my place?

Surely trained agents had some other method. …No. If there were a method, it would already be written in the rulebook.

So they really were going to send a sacrificial lamb?

Are they insane?

My head felt like it was going to burst. How had things come to this? Everything had been going so well—why?

The bird. Things went sideways the moment the bird got in.

But it was the Sampling Booth Staff that had fought the bird. It was the Stocking Staff that spotted me and grabbed me. And anyway, why had that thing appeared in front of me in the first place? I thought it only roamed the first floor. Could it be—because it was the Stocking Staff? The basement was a disaster zone, so it came down to tidy up?

If that were true, it would be a psychotic, maddening level of work ethic. And yet with that kind of devotion to duty, it treated customers this brutally? What kind of mess was—

No. Wait. Hold on.

“When did the Stocking Staff move down to the basement?”

A stray thought struck me, and I asked quickly.

“Five seconds after the Sampling Booth Staff completely destroyed three of the stockpiling racks. The move itself took approximately fourteen seconds.”

…Could it be. Was that really it?

Half doubting, half hoping, I dredged up an old memory. A few years back, when my senior manager took me to visit a warehouse store.

I looked back at the Staff again. Then I moved a little toward the left—the direction of the showroom floor.

Beepbeepbeepbeep—!

Once again, a petulant alarm blared. So this time I moved to the right, toward the entrance.

…Nothing. No threat at all.

I let out the breath I'd been holding and whispered to Cha Si-eon.

“Team Leader, hold off on selecting personnel for a moment.”

“On what grounds?”

Instead of answering, I took another step to the right. Sure enough, the Staff showed no hostility this time either. They simply moved to counter my direction, as if trying to maintain the distance between us.

Watching their reactions, I kept moving. Step by step, I passed the entrance doors and made it to the information desk. The Information Desk Staff that had been here had long since fled from me.

I held out my ringed hand, and with the other, rummaged through the desk.

“Seo Do-woon, what exactly are you doing right now?”

“Just give me a second.”

Before long, I found what I was looking for. I considered taking just one, but in the end I grabbed a fistful of them, whatever I could get my hands on, and stuffed them into my pocket.

Beep—

Then, beside me, came the sound of a barcode being scanned. It came from the Staff. And it sounded slightly different from the unhinged noise they'd been making until now.

Wondering if their guard was down, I edged back toward the showroom floor. No threat came. But they still retreated, keeping a fixed distance from me. Their red lights, too, kept fixing their gaze on me.

Why? …Was it because of this ring?

I picked up my gloves, which had fallen near the entrance.

“Seo Do-woon.”

Cha Si-eon called out, but I ignored him and pulled the gloves back on.

“Seo Do-woon!”

The moment the ring vanished beneath the gloves, he shouted. But there was no time to answer. I readied myself to yank the gloves off at any moment and watched the Staff's reactions.

No—tried to watch them.

The Staff was already right beside me.

“Ugh…!”

I flinched back and tugged at my glove. But before it even came off, the Staff passed right by me. Frozen in place, I followed the Information Desk Staff with my eyes as it walked past me—and it had already returned, without my noticing, to the information desk where it belonged.

I turned my head toward the showroom floor. There was nothing there. Not the Stocking Staff, not the Sampling Booth Staff. They had all already vanished.

“…Ha.”

I was alive. I laughed with nothing but breath, then collapsed right where I stood. And Cha Si-eon immediately pounced.

“Explain the current situation. Please.”

His voice was a little irritated. Could you let a man catch his breath first? You can practically see my heart rate right now, you know.

I clutched my heart, which was one beat away from detonating, and exhaled long and slow.

“You said before, didn't you—that Type 1 Special Zones mirror real spaces.”

“I did.”

“Then the model for this place is CoXtco?”

"…?"

Cha Si-eon's silence somehow felt like a curse.

But it didn't last long.

“…CoXtco. That is correct.”

Cha Si-eon answered with a distinctly humiliated tone. Fortunately, my guess had been right. If it hadn't been, I'd already be crossing the river of the dead.

Clatter—

I pulled out what I'd taken from the information desk and held it up high for all to see. It was none other than a membership card.

“CoXtco operates on a membership basis.”

The warehouse store CoXtco my senior manager had shown me around. No admission without a membership.

“In that situation…”

Cha Si-eon, who had fallen silent, spoke with disbelief.

“In that situation—how on earth did you know a membership would be required?”

“Because the Stocking Staff didn't clean up the baby formula. It grabbed me first instead.”

“Explain that so I can actually understand.”

“Which means the Stocking Staff came down to the basement for the purpose of cleaning and tidying. But the moment it found me, cleaning up me and dragging me off took priority.”

Back when I'd smashed through the first-floor shelves and knocked over a TV, the Stocking Staff had rushed over in a panic. It was a model employee, utterly faithful to its role. But when it found me, it shoved its actual job—tidying—to the back burner. The severed stockpiling racks, the sawdust scattered everywhere. Even the display shelves I'd knocked over in my thrashing. All of it, ignored.

“At first, I assumed it was because killing humans came first. But when I took out the ring, that didn't seem to be it either. During the standoff just now, the Staff only got angry when ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I moved toward the showroom. When I moved toward the doors, they stayed quiet.”

That was when suspicion crystallized. Their purpose might not be to kill humans—it might be to get them out of the store.

“So I thought this might not be malice or murderous instinct, but simply part of their job. Then the information desk caught my eye, and I remembered that warehouse stores operate on a membership system.”

“Haa…”

Listening to me, Cha Si-eon let out a long, long sigh. The kind of sigh that meant I have a great deal to say, but I am choosing not to say it.

“Seo Do-woon. A message from Agent Baek Sa-ra.”

“Is Baek Sa-ra there too?”

I asked, feeling a rush of warmth. Without Baek Sa-ra's ring, I would have died on the spot, no two ways about it. I wanted to at least thank her for saving my life.

“She asked whether you had let her instruction to prioritize your own life go in one ear and out the other. You are to explain yourself separately upon your return.”

…I'd save the greetings for later, then.

Having pointlessly lost my nerve, I turned back to Cha Si-eon.

“Is the rescue team still on standby?”

“It is.”

I hesitated for a moment. If I said this, Baek Sa-ra would probably curse me out even harder. But well—what could you do.

“Then could you give me a little time?”

“Now what are you planning to do?”

“I want to find a way out.”

Even I thought it sounded like the rambling of someone gone mad with a death wish. But this wasn't bravado. It was a perfectly rational calculation.

I had literally risked my life to dig up that membership card. I'd also proven that the Staff, previously treated as Hazard Entities, were in fact Neutral Entities. That meant my range of action had just widened dramatically—and throwing that away would be a colossal loss.

A loss for whom? Me, obviously. I was the one who could get dragged into a Special Zone with a 0% exploration rate, let alone 17%, at ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠any moment.

I prepped a whole list of counterarguments in case Cha Si-eon objected. A waste of worry, as it turned out.

“Can you manage it?”

For once, we saw eye to eye. Apparently Cha Si-eon felt the loss too—that's why he was asking whether it was even possible.

Was it possible? Well.

“I'll find out by trying.”

What's possible and what's worth attempting—weren't they the same thing? It felt like a waste to just toss away this 17%. Having the rescue team absorb casualties was unappealing too. And above all—I was, at long last, getting used to this space.