New Member Welcome Party (2)
“Ah, why are you talking about work so seriously in a place like this?”
The tense atmosphere froze at those ominous words, and Paeng Ju-hyeok barged in. He scolded Ok Rin, muttering that she was an old-timer who worried about things that didn’t matter, and of course Ok Rin snapped back.
“Even your age is young…! The salt I ate has more than the rice you’ve eaten!”
“Yeah, since you live by the sea, that makes sense, old hag.”
Ok Rin’s counterattack was swift. Paeng Ju-hyeok took a palm strike infused with the subtlety of martial technique on the back and let out a strange yelp once, then rubbed his back while muttering.
“Stop wandering off to other things and introduce me. It’s the first meeting with new members, so a good senior shouldn’t start with work talk.”
Ok Rin, gritting her teeth but obediently following Paeng Ju-hyeok’s advice. I muttered in disbelief.
“…Hey, isn’t this the Murim Alliance’s rulebook? Aren’t we supposed to avoid discussing work here?”
The words Paeng Ju-hyeok had just said—close to nonsense from a Murim perspective—were a statement that could spark a life-or-death fight at any moment. It was an insult to a great senior in the martial world far above the division.
“Ah, our department members are all busy running around outside, and there are many deaths, so we don’t have time to make friends. So we just let our guard down and talk as friends. Usually we treat them according to age, but this old hag doesn’t get much respect for her age…”
*Thud.*
A dull sound echoed, and Paeng Ju-hyeok clutched his side and bent over.
“Ugh, that’s why I can’t get my age value…”
“As the thunderclap said, Ok Rin. A sorcerer mixed with the blood of a monster. Talismans, soul-capturing arts, and a bit of formations too.”
“Quickly explain. After you finish explaining, it will take some time to persuade the other three to take off their hoods. Ah, why do I keep getting these cheeky things.”
“It’s not cheeky, it’s caution, you young thing. You probably have experience of being burned after carelessly showing your face.”
Paeng Ju-hyeok snorted again. I mentally added the work tip “If you don’t want to be noticed by anomalies, hide your face” and chose my words.
“Perhaps…”
The only way I could determine right now that this guy wasn’t an anomaly was one method. Asking if he came to work alone when I arrived at the Management Records Bureau. I polished this line well.
“When did you come to work? That should be enough.”
This was a natural question to ask a senior. It was natural for a new recruit to be interested in work. I was about to complete the sentence when I suddenly realized something was off.
There was a better way to deal with the anomaly hiding in the Records Bureau.
“Eh, why did you stop talking?”
“…Paeng-hyung, where is the restroom here?”
I hurriedly changed the direction of the sentence I was about to say.
***
“Ah, this way is the restroom. I should have said it earlier.”
I grabbed Paeng Ju-hyeok’s shoulder, who was smiling awkwardly, and hurriedly told him about the conversation I had with Byeol yesterday.
“…That’s a big deal.”
“Yes. Since Paeng-hyung personally showed me opening the door to the Management Records Bureau, he’s definitely a person, but I don’t know about the other four.”
I explained the possibility that the anomaly who stole the appearance of the record keeper had sneaked in by hitching a ride on the others’ arrival. Since they were all wearing hoods that hid their faces, it would be hard to notice the subtle changes in expression compared to usual. After breathing heavily and throwing out the theory, I calmed my breath and added one more line.
“Up to this point is the surface-level conjecture.”
***
“So, surface-level?”
I nodded.
“I was given several clues, and I analyzed them to the best of my ability. While thinking about whether any of them could be the anomaly or not. But it felt too coincidental.”
Paeng Ju-hyeok’s lips curved into a smile. Nodding his head, urging for the next conjecture.
“First, the anomaly. …No. Starting from Byeol-nim’s explanation, isn’t it too contrived?”
I recalled the anomaly who had said exactly that there would be four people coming. Didn’t we need to say the number of people participating in the welcome party?
“Well, perhaps that person’s personality is a bit meticulous, so he might have said what he did.”
I thought it was closer to mischief than meticulousness, but badmouthing a senior isn’t a good habit. I let Paeng Ju-hyeok’s words slide. In fact, from the moment I asked for the reason, I was already giving him some hint that my conjecture was true.
This was, so to speak, the grading process. I gave him the next evidence.
“This isn’t the only thing. The fundamental reason I thought an anomaly could be hiding among us during the welcome party is the dream I had last night.”
In fact, this dream was the most ‘coincidental’ part among the events leading up to the welcome party. I had a dream of a demon path user vowing revenge right before the welcome party. It was too timely, wasn’t it?
For me, due to the atmosphere set by this guy who had the malice and martial arts I couldn’t even estimate, ‘I’ll mock the one who ruined my masterpiece,’ some unease remained inside me. Of course, this might be a fragment of the future seen through some supernatural intuition. It’s said that a truly high-level martial artist can read the secrets of heaven. But I thought of other possibilities.
“Hmm, are you saying that someone is manipulating your dream? I’m being cautious to say this, but have you heard of ‘heart disease’?”
I shook my head.
“There are other possibilities.”
“What, are you going to talk about anomalies coming in and out of dreams?”
“No.”
I looked at the four people faintly visible beyond the corridor. More precisely, Ok Rin, the only one among the four who was showing her face.
“Soul-capturing arts.”
If it’s a technique that controls a person’s mental state, it can sufficiently induce dreams. ‘Or make them believe hallucinations are dreams.’ There wasn’t much difference between the two.
“Then let me ask this. When did Ok Rin have the chance to cast soul-capturing arts on you?”
Paeng Ju-hyeok added various explanations. If it was a genius like Lee In-sa who reached the Hwajeong realm with soul-capturing arts alone, maybe not, but according to Ok Rin’s skill level, a catalyst was needed. Like staring at a shaking coin, or a pre-work that disrupts mental power through incomprehensible geometric patterns to dull the soul.
“If soul-capturing arts were so versatile, wouldn’t everyone in the world have learned it?”
“There is a catalyst.”
“Huh?”
“The Management Records Bureau.”
I raised my index finger and pointed to the ceiling. The ceiling here was also the floor of the Preservation Archive. “I know that the Preservation Archive is a place where people don’t usually go. But, even so, there were too few people.”
Even when I was led by the peculiar hand of the anomaly, and even when I came to participate in the welcome party, I didn’t see any other person heading to the Preservation Archive besides me.
Considering that there are countless precedents recorded here and that the Rituals Department’s regulations were mostly made by referring to precedents, there should be someone coming in and out at least once. It’s a good thing for those coming to work that there was no accidental encounter, but was the reason there was no one really just because there were few people who could come?
Or had someone made it so that people couldn’t come?
“As the ancient Zhuge Liang’s Eight Formation of Stone Puppets, a sufficiently powerful formation can control a person’s soul and overpower the mind, right? I think the bookcases themselves in the Preservation Archive are such tools. Under special rules unknown from the outside, arranged so that it operates as a formation that bites people and protects secrets.”
“It should be possible to use the formation made of bookcases as a catalyst for soul-capturing arts. Since the mental state is already somewhat dulled.”
And I moved my finger again. Today, it was the brushes and books placed quietly on the table.
“What about these rule drafts? If it’s those books that can be seen with the Murim Alliance’s inner energy, they should be able to serve as catalysts as well.”
My conjecture was this. While coming in and out of the Management Records Bureau, the soul-capturing arts itself was already cast. It was just not activated. It was a kind of prohibition that activates by performing a specific action.
The effect of the inherent soul-capturing arts would have been activated as the sentence ‘There is a new member welcome party’ by the anomaly. Upon thinking about it, there was something slightly odd about the direction of my thoughts.
As the anomaly had joked whenever I was bored, I was a second-class. If it was a fight with a normal demonic cult gang, maybe, but a life-or-death battle with a bizarre anomaly was outside my capacity. The idea of figuring out the anomaly’s identity alone was far from my usual self.
“‘One of them is an anomaly!’ would mean, instead of ‘Damn, I have to figure out who the anomaly is alone,’ ‘Kyaaak, help me Paeng-hyung!’ I should be shouting. It would be much better to have two people team up rather than fighting alone.”
“After Byeol-nim, Paeng-hyung came and gave another clue, right? There was an anomaly who invaded the Management Records Bureau by impersonating someone else’s corpse. The unease is being concretized and strengthened step by step.”
I recalled the appearance of the anomaly who kept saying ‘This new recruit is sharp’ and liked it.
“So, my conjecture is this. The new member welcome party of our department is a place to test the new recruit’s courage and sharpness.”
I thought about the martial artist’s physical abilities. Even if I lowered my voice, if I thought about the martial artist’s overwhelmingly strong senses, they probably could hear everything. In fact, I didn’t really intend to hide it. To properly hide it, I would have tried to use secret writing at least.
Unfortunately, since I’m still second-class, I can’t use high-level internal energy to transmit voices. With the certainty that the other test takers would hear this conversation, I finished the sentence.
“Is that wrong?”