It Was a Disappearance (3)

"You already know how the Bureau got started, right?"

"Yes, sir. I heard it began with the first survivor's testimony."

"That first survivor was Sol's father."

"I'm sorry?"

Kwon Mu-seop's matter-of-fact revelation caught me completely off guard.

The first survivor of a special zone. That man was Agent Lee Seop?

"He wasn't originally a government agent?"

"No, he was a civilian. Put yourself in his shoes and you'd have a situation almost exactly like yours."

That, I genuinely hadn't known.

Come to think of it, the first survivor's name had been censored with that awkward bleeping sound. If they couldn't reveal his real name, they could have simply used an initial like they did with the victims mentioned earlier.

That bleep seemed less like an original redaction and more like post-processing applied later, after the real name had briefly been made public.

"In the beginning, the NIS tried to get a handle on the situation, but they couldn't do a single thing. Then Sol's father got dragged back into a special zone — and after that, we found our way of entering the zones ourselves."

"You found a way in?"

"Yep. You know all those abandoned buildings and abandoned tunnels we use to enter the zones? Every single one of them was established based on information Sol's father brought back."

"How on earth did he..."

"Even he couldn't really explain it. Someone helped him, and he said he couldn't even tell whether that someone was actually human."

"……"

Had he received some kind of divine revelation?

If Lee Seop hadn't figured out how to enter the zones, zone exploration would never have been possible in the first place.

People like me — and countless innocent civilians — were living perfectly ordinary lives one moment and yanked into a special zone the next.

Pure bad luck, like a doll caught in a claw machine, stripped of any will of our own.

And yet the Bureau could freely enter most zones at will.

Because they had secured access routes connected to each zone.

Those routes were scattered across all of Seoul, mostly taking the form of abandoned buildings and abandoned tunnels.

I'd always wondered how those access points had been created — and it turned out this, too, was one of Lee Seop's achievements.

In any case, it was through Lee Seop that the Special Management Department first set foot inside a special zone.

With that, everything Lee Seop had said was proven true, and the department came to a sobering realization:

This bizarre phenomenon was far bigger than anything they were equipped to handle.

Eventually the Special Management Bureau was founded, and Kwon Mu-seop had been a soldier transferred in from a special forces unit at that time.

And so, centered on that special forces unit, zone exploration officially began.

The government spared no expense in support, and back then the top priority was simply understanding what the zones actually were.

And they truly did learn a great deal.

Virtually everything known about special zones today — the Bureau's entire current framework — had essentially been established back in the era when Agent Lee Seop was still around.

There were heavy sacrifices along the way, but everyone held on, sustained by the conviction that they were inching forward, step by step.

Then one day, that fragile hope simply snapped.

"Sol has always said her father passed away."

I spoke up again.

"I was told he died in the line of duty as well. But is that actually true? Did he really die?"

"Strictly speaking, he went missing. Four years ago. Inside a special zone."

Kwon Mu-seop answered flatly.

"That's what escalated into an all-out war. At first we were just trying to find him, but it spiraled more and more out of control."

Launching a total war to find one missing agent.

On the surface it sounded almost romantic, but the reality was nothing of the sort.

"Do-woon, what do ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you think would happen if a primitive human got into an elevator?"

"They'd be trapped inside, helpless."

"Right. A single button press would take them out, but a primitive human couldn't manage even that much."

Naturally. They wouldn't even know what a button was.

"They wouldn't know how to press it. They might press one by accident and end up wandering some random floor, or pry the doors open and fall down the shaft. The odds of them pressing the right floor button and escaping cleanly are vanishingly small."

"Is that what we are, exploring these zones?"

"Exactly. A primitive human can't operate an elevator. Maybe if a modern human showed them a demonstration — but on their own, it's nearly impossible. Sure, if you threw infinite time and manpower at it, you might eventually figure it out. But what we need to understand isn't how to operate one elevator. It's the nature and rules of thirty-seven spaces that kill people at the drop of a hat."

Kwon Mu-seop wasn't exaggerating.

The reason I'd been able to develop my various workarounds was the Bureau's rulebook. Strip away that background knowledge and tell me to start from zero, and I wouldn't have managed anything either.

I'd have been like a primitive human trapped in an elevator for the first time in my life.

"That's what made Sol's father so extraordinary. He kept unraveling the zones' systems entirely on his own. Although... thinking about it now, he probably did have one. A modern human whispering him the secrets."

Kwon Mu-seop chuckled briefly, as if recalling the old days.

But his smile faded quickly, and a low murmur followed.

"He was an asset we could never afford to lose. That's why we searched for him like madmen — and never found him. We tore apart dozens of zones looking. Nothing."

The desperate campaign had lasted nearly two years.

They never found Lee Seop.

Countless agents died, and eventually the higher-ups put a leash on the frenzy, refusing to permit it any longer.

They cut personnel and changed the Bureau's entire direction.

Those who had been wounded or left disillusioned walked away from the Bureau.

And as the survivors were forcing the organization back into shape, it began.

"The Bureau was restructured and zone exploration resumed. Naturally, his name came up constantly. We had to discuss how things had been done in the old days."

Lee Seop figured this out.

Lee Seop did it this way.

If only Lee Seop were here.

It was a situation where those conversations couldn't help but repeat themselves.

"Then at some point, anyone who spoke his name started showing physical symptoms."

On the mild end, light dizziness.

In serious cases, nausea and full loss of consciousness.

At first they wrote it off as coincidence. After it repeated a few times, they suspected some kind of illness.

"And then, finally, they were all taken at once. The agents from our division who'd been analyzing his files around the clock — every one of them, simultaneously, into the same special zone."

Was that phenomenon coincidence, or contamination?

There was no way to know.

Only one thing was certain: every single agent taken that day died.

"They were dragged there suddenly, but theoretically it should have been an easy zone to escape. The rules and the escape route were already fully mapped out."

"Then why..."

"That zone ignored every rule on the books and attacked. Only our own people — the ones dragged there that way."

"Was that zone the Railroad Station with a Blaring Siren?"

"Yeah. That's the one."

Kwon Mu-seop forced a smile, his brow furrowed.

And only then did I finally understand.

Why they had merely watched while Lee Sol was trapped in the Railroad Station.

If you knew the rules — and prepared just a little — pulling one person out of the Railroad Station wasn't difficult.

Walk in with money or a silver ring, buy a ticket, done.

Twenty minutes. No — if you hurried, it could be managed within ten.

But they couldn't. That's why.

That's why all there had been was a report.

"...So Lee Sol's father didn't die in the line of duty. He's still in there?"

"We don't know."

Kwon Mu-seop added with a sigh threading through his voice.

"There's no way to confirm it."

I frowned at his answer.

Something felt like it was on the tip of my memory, but it wouldn't surface.

When I underwent hypnotherapy with Kim Woo-in.

When I saw Lee Seop's face and heard his name.

Whatever came just before that — I couldn't remember it.

As if I'd seen something important.

"Anyway, that's the situation you walked into. First, as the benefactor who saved Sol. And then, as someone with the same special constitution as her father."

"I see."

"I didn't explain any of this beforehand because there's no guarantee you'll end up playing the same role he did. And frankly, I didn't think it would do you any good. Your head was already full enough — I figured if you heard all this on top of it, you'd just be scared stiff."

An understandable reason.

Quite apart from the snake coiled up inside Section Chief Kwon ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Mu-seop's belly.

"But I figured it was about time to tell you anyway. Now that I've confirmed the crow attached to you."

"Do you truly believe that crow has been giving me hints?"

"I do."

Section Chief Kwon Mu-seop nodded without a shred of doubt.

But I still found it hard to accept.

Let's grant that the crow was a modern human taking pity on primitive humans trapped in elevators.

Even so, why did it have to be this unhelpful and this merciless?

We were human. We could communicate perfectly well.

It didn't need to play this game of toss-and-roll; a straightforward word would have earned understanding and cooperation.

So why go out of its way?

Three possibilities came to mind.

Its methods of approaching me were limited.

Or it didn't much care whether I lived or died.

Or — if neither — all of this was just our own wishful interpretation.

And yet, judging by the results, it was hard to entirely dismiss Kwon Mu-seop's reading.

We had brought a special zone's operation to a halt.

We had figured out how to operate an elevator that no primitive human could ever have cracked.

"So that's why you took me on personally. To verify the possibility."

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner."

"It's fine. I understand all of it now."

Even the Bureau's reasons for keeping me alive made perfect sense.

Because I had use value. And honestly, that wasn't a bad thing for me, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠either.

Kindness without a reason rarely lasts.

A concrete alignment of interests, paradoxically, was far more trustworthy.

When I nodded, Kwon Mu-seop smiled as if grateful.

Then he spoke again.

"Yesterday — you asked whether I was close with Sol's father, remember?"

"Yes."

"He and I were like you and Si-eon."

"So not very close, then."

"No, we were close."

Kwon Mu-seop laughed at my studied distance, looking equal parts amused and exasperated.

"Really close. From the moment he was just some civilian ajusshi, I was the one looking after him, covering for him... It was exactly like you two. And Si-eon's on permanent high alert because he never knows when you'll get dragged off next, doesn't he?"

That much was true.

Whenever I was pulled into a special zone, Cha Si-eon's voice would reach me before I could even take stock of my surroundings.

Whatever else I might say about the man, I had to admit I owed him for that.

"Has Team 1 not come out of the field yet?"

"They're on their way out now. Back at headquarters within two hours."

It had been a while since I'd see Team Leader Cha — the real one, not Alpha.

When I saw that face, would I feel even a flicker of gratitude? Or would the old irritation win out as always?

Curious to find out for myself, I quietly looked forward to my handler's return.

And he never came back.