The Disaster Management Bureau agents snapped their heads around.
"Whoa!"
Wires tipped with Jin Nasol's ornate nails shot out and snagged the mer-child's sleeve.
This was the personal weapon of A-squad's assistant manager.
"Huh? Look, fireworks!"
The child laughed.
Hearing the tainted mer‑child's giggle, Jin Nasol sliced the most lethal appendage first—the part that secreted paralytic and infectious fluids.
Slice.
"Aaaagh!"
The enormous tail attached to the mer-child dropped to the floor. Blood and slime burst out.
"It hurts! It hurts!"
An agent's counter‑strike missed by a hair.
Without a pause, Jin Nasol yanked the now‑crippled mer-child in with her wire and clamped the child under one arm.
"Eek!"
Then she announced.
"Take one more step and it dies."
"…!"
It was a perfectly rational choice.
'Her legs aren't in perfect condition.'
Her calf, still numb from the bell‑blade trap, had already forced her to burn items just to keep up with that ominous cat.
Trying to fight two Bureau agents, grab the loot, and run in this state would be idiotic.
And Jin Nasol loathed idiocy.
So, she chose.
"I said stay back."
"…!"
Words failed, but the gesture spoke plainly.
"Hold on, Bronze-ah."
Agent Choi, who valued every single life, raised both hands as if to yield while frantically hunting for alternatives.
But…
That was not the Bureau's textbook response.
'Hostage.'
The textbook agent, Agent Bronze, stared at the villain with dark eyes.
These scum planned to steal the twelve shells that could save twelve children.
'Even though those people could escape without them.'
Letting them go would doom those kids.
The Bureau's priority was crystal clear.
Maximize lives with minimal sacrifice.
—If one civilian must be lost to save many more.
'So be it.'
"…Bronze-ah?"
Agent Bronze made his decision in a flash.
He raised his glass handgun and charged.
"Hey—!"
At that exact instant, another creature moved.
Jingle.
"W‑Wait…!"
Amid Baek Saheon's startled cry, the cat sprang soundlessly off his shoulder.
Clamped in its jaws was an Angel's Sigh conch, pulled straight from Baek Saheon's bag.
"No!"
The cat sprinted straight at Jin Nasol.
"…!"
She reflexively braced to kick and flick her wire, yet the cat wasn't aiming for her.
It veered slightly, down and sideways.
"Huh? Kitty doll…"
Straight to the mer-child in Jin Nasol's grip.
The cat pressed the conch, still clenched in its teeth, tight against the child's ear.
"…!"
From within the shell flowed a tingling voice.
Hummm.
It was a hum as lovely as a soprano's aria, a lullaby a parent once crooned.
A stirring phrase of a national anthem, a jubilant hymn brimming with life.
But only one phrase.
A single melody drifted softly, tenderly from the shell and tickled the child's ear.
"…Huh?"
The tailless mer‑child froze.
Hm, hmmmm, hmm, hmmmmmhh…
Bleeding slowed.
Ulcers shrinking on face and limbs, the torsion of infection easing, vocal cords returning to proper shape.
It wasn't a full rewind to a pristine child, but the rampant infection faltered, and the human life still inside flared like kindling catching flame.
Next moment—
"Huuu…"
With a deep sigh, the child was once more simply a sick little boy.
"..."
"..."
Everyone, stunned by the miracle, hesitated on pure instinct.
"W‑What's going on? Mom…!"
The boy burst into hysterical sobs, the hallucination collapsing, Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace gone, and horrific reality laid bare to naked eyes.
"…!"
'It even breaks the brainwashing…!'
And as the child was banished from that blissful dream and kept bawling, the cat, astonishingly, crept into his arms and let him cling for comfort.
"K-Kitty…"
Even when the child yanked its head with a rather rough grip, the cat sat motionless.
That only made it creepier, yet the signal was unmistakable.
That creature was friendly toward children.
'Is this a ghost story whose rules change by age?'
Ever an elite of the Field Investigation Team, Jin Nasol kept analyzing, yet she did not release her hostage.
She merely stopped overtly subduing the child. No one could predict how that cat‑shaped danger would react.
But…
"Really, these people are out of their minds."
Someone exploited that tiny opening.
"…!"
A glass bullet flew.
Jin Nasol saw it. One agent fired the glass handgun at her legs while another, already in range, tried to bind her torso.
'Hah.'
She deliberately let herself topple backward.
Her body, suddenly limp and boneless, slipped past their grapples by a hair.
At the same time she flung the hostage straight into Agent Choi's arms.
"…!"
The moment Agent Choi caught the child, who was still clutching the cat.
'There are hostages everywhere.'
Jin Nasol made the cold calculation and kicked the door.
'We're pulling out.'
The other Daydream employees, reading her intentions, moved to follow. Baek Saheon gripped the bag holding the remaining eleven Angel's Sighs and bolted.
[This way]
The cat looked up.
"…!"
The ominous cat quietly stepped out from the arms of the child held by Agent Choi.
"Why are you…"
The quadruped creature walked among the frozen onlookers. Then, after passing by everyone, it stopped in front of something.
The severed tail of the young mermaid, the one Jin Na-sol had cut off.
A strand of the ulcer mass.
[This way]
The cat's form crackled as it turned to face the people.
"W-What are we supposed to do with that…?"
[This way]
Its blood-red eyes looked directly at me.
A gaze that seemed to already know everything about me.
"..."
Fucking hell.
Baek Saheon quickly grabbed the tail with his gloved hand, trying to stuff it into the waterproof pouch on the front of his bag.
But Agent Choi was faster. He snatched the tail away before he could.
"Ah…!"
Agent Choi, still categorized as a 'child', firmly gripped the still-wriggling tail that was desperately trying to parasitize him, and spoke to the cat.
"You provoked the attack because you needed this, didn't you?"
Silence.
"What use is this tail?"
The cat did not speak.
And yet, it answered.
[This way]
By fixing its gaze on the employees of Daydream Inc.
"…!"
Agent Choi secured the tail in a containment case and then hurriedly began scribbling words on the ground with the chalk he carried.
A point of connection where the gaze of the Twinkle-Twinkle Dragon Palace and the Mermaid Grave intersects.
– You guys are using the tails, huh?
"…!"
– If you tell me where and how you use it, I promise I won't fight anymore until we get out of here~ I swear it on my honor as an agent! ^^
– Is it something you use to escape? I know all about you running away on the escape vessel. So where and how do you use it?
'This crazy bastard…'
But Agent Choi had his reasons for confidence.
– The cat seems to want us to talk, too, right?
-x-X-x-
[10]
"Agh, seriously!"
With the cat starting yet another countdown, Baek Saheon glanced about.
'Not wearing the target for this…'
Thankfully Kang Yihak crouched first and began writing.
– How much will you pay us if we tell? haha
Another lunatic…
– We're completely broke ㅠㅠ You rich guys suck it up! Don't want Kitty to pop your head, right~
"Eyy."
'You lil shits…!'
In the end, under the pressure of the countdown, Baek Saheon wrote the answer himself in place of his money-crazed colleague, using his best judgment.
– You already know, right… The tail's an entry pass for the escape run.
– But we never brutally cut the tails off of the mer-children. We only took the minimal amount from already fully infected general entities. We need to survive too…
'Telling them we butchered a kid would make them flip!'
Even so, Agent Choi didn't blink.
– How is it used? Fuel? Ticket? Sacrifice?
Was it safe to spill this much?
[6]
Damn it.
– An admission ticket.
As he wrote, Baek Saheon instinctively glanced toward where the cat had been. After squeezing him with that killer countdown—are you satisfied now, you psycho bastard?
But the cat was gone.
"…!"
It was now standing in front of the window.
Standing… on two legs.
[This way]
The cat's posture was uncanny.
As if something else were forcing it to move, it stood eerily upright on two legs near the window and lifted its left front paw, pointing sharply westward.
That direction was…
…The escape vessel!
And with that, it dropped below the window.
"…!!"
People rushed to the window and looked down, but below—there was nothing.
The cat had vanished.
"...Hah."
The air suddenly felt lighter.
As a few people caught their breath and began thinking rapidly—
"The escape vessel… the escape vessel!"
Baek Saheon tore at his hair.
"That's it! The cat meant for us to board the escape vessel and get out!"
"What?"
"I-It said, 'Prepare for death'! I thought that meant something else, but now it seems it was a warning! If we don't all escape by boat, it'll kill us…!"
"…!"
"We have to get out of here—"
But the Daydream Inc. employees didn't forget the danger so quickly. The Disaster Management agents were still here. And…
The memory of what the cat had just done.
"..."
At that moment, Agent Choi fell into thought.
The cat had forced them to sever the mer‑child's tail, then used the conch shell to heal it.
Any adult would have recognized that as a friendly act toward children…
"Hmm."
Thinking of that, Choi calmly wrote on the ground.
– The cat showed us where the conch shells were and even demonstrated the cure. Clearly it wants us to use them to save as many kids as possible…
– Unless you'd rather risk being slaughtered by a monster for your greed?
'Damn it.'
But Choi didn't stop there.
– Otherwise, will you cooperate only until we're all safely out?
"…!"
– Make sure you escort every child out safely, using the conch shells on the escape vessel.
"..."
Jin Nasol shoved Baek Saheon aside and strode forward without hesitation. She barely blinked as she wrote.
– Any foolish moves and you're shot.
"Okay~"
Thus, a strange temporary alliance was born.
It was a team capable of utilizing both the sensory perception of the Mermaid Grave and the Twinkle-Twinkle Dragon Palace, with enough personnel to both handle the biological disaster and protect multiple children at once.
'…Was it leading us into this?'
Ryu Jaekwan's eyes twitched slightly.
Just what kind of supernatural phenomenon was that rumor in the form of a cat, to lead to something like this…? No, what mattered for now was getting out of here safely and completing the mission.
Wait!
Yes, and he wasn't even alone anymore. They had a rookie now, too…
"Grapes!"
Ryu Jaekwan spun to face his superior grimly. Their rookie must still be searching for survivors among the children…
"We have to find him at once. If someone's left behind…"
"Hold on, hold on! Calm down. We're meeting this evening anyway. We'll pass by and pick him up on the way out."
That was the problem…!
'We can't take these maniacs with us…!'
"I'll… threaten them a bit first."
Agent Choi, instead of keeping the conch shell with Baek Saheon, demanded the tail tissue of the general infected creatures as collateral, and verified that the employees weren't lying about the location of the escape vessel.
He even pretended to wrestle over the conch shell to discreetly attach a tracking device to it, completing the precautions.
"All set."
Finally, they firmly agreed to meet in front of the building near the escape vessel.
"Now let's gather the kids."
"…Yes."
In any case, the encounter between that lunatic pseudo-pharmaceutical company and Agent Grapes was now inevitable.
Ryu Jaekwan felt a chill in his chest, but resolved that he should spot the rookie first and make him cover his face with a hood or something.
If he said he wanted to protect the rookie's identity from the cult-like pharmaceutical staff, his superior would probably understand.
"By the fountain!"
"Yes."
But the moment they met Agent Grapes at the central fountain of the city—
"Agent!"
Ryu Jaegwan realized his plan had been meaningless.
Through the suncatcher he had been holding up reflexively—just in case—he saw it clearly.
The rookie agent, who turned back after noticing them…
"I've been gathering and organizing the children by age group!"
Half of his face was covered in ulcers.
"..."
Ryu Jaegwan came to a halt.
Cold sweat ran down his back as his trembling eyes scanned the childlike figure of the rookie agent…
Below the torso, long umbilical cord-like masses of cellular tissue dangled.
From his waist, thick chunks of flesh extended outward, with ulcers hanging from him like a tail.
It was grotesque and horrific. But because of the setting in an underwater city, and because the form resembled a tail…
This biological disaster was referred to as the merfolk.
"But playing together is so much fun…"
The mer-child, who had once been an agent, smiled and waved.
"Can't we stay just one more day?"
Upon seeing the rookie fully infected by the biological disaster, the two agents stopped in place, their faces completely drained of color.
-x-X-x-
A rookie agent had been infected.
"Agent?"
Ryu Jaekwan had already experienced similar situations multiple times.
An agent who miscounted the final step and stepped onto the wrong stair. An agent who endured two days without a drop of water, only to be contaminated by a raindrop falling into the membrane of their eye…
They just disappear.
Just like that.
Without context, without warning.
The kind of eeriness that some find entertaining is what people often call an ghost story…
But for the person involved, it was only natural for it to feel like a common tragedy.
Just like now.
"Bronze-ah."
At that moment, his superior quickly bumped his shoulder and slung an arm around him.
"…!"
And with a finger on his back, he wrote one word.
So the infected rookie agent wouldn't notice.
Calm.
"Grapes-ie! But hey, we should get going. Your hand's about to disappear too, right?"
"Ah…"
The rookie agent, Kim Soleum, looked down at his right arm, which had been severed and vanished, and answered rather brightly.
"It's fine! The Mermaid Princess said she'd give me a new one. I'll be okay!"
"…Is that so?"
"Yes! Look over here, I even got this…"
Kim Soleum lifted a few items the children had given him and proudly showed them off.
In reality, they were all worn-out, shabby trinkets, glittering only in the eyes of the Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace. The kind of toys only young children, not full-grown adults, might like.
"…Right. Just a sec."
The two of them let Kim Soleum continue playing with the kids and quickly stepped aside to speak in hushed urgency.
"I don't know what the hell happened, but the infection's already way too deep."
Half his face was covered in tumors, and the infection core, manifesting as a 'tail', had grown far too large.
Normally, something like this wouldn't happen after just three days.
Had he actually entered the 'Ocean Palace' and come back? Or maybe something went wrong when he came into contact with the kids? Or perhaps Kim Soleum himself simply had a body that was exceptionally vulnerable to biological disasters.
Either way, while rare, it wasn't impossible for a rookie to experience such a thing. But with his mind already seeming contaminated, it was hard to confirm anything through him right now.
Or maybe…
"You don't think that cat…"
"..."
…A more dangerous entity had intervened.
Maybe to push them along.
Ryu Jaekwan's face turned pale, then snapped back to focus.
"The conch."
It was the cure.
"We need to bring it. Right now!"
"Wait."
Agent Choi grabbed his arm.
"That cat seemed to give the cure to save the children."
"But Agent Grapes still looks like a child on the outside…"
"Listen to me. If that cat's a high-risk phenomenon ranked higher than even the dokkaebi trick our Elder set up… it might not recognize that guy as a 'child' anymore."
"…!"
Ryu Jaekwan nearly shouted, 'So what, do we just give up?!'
But his superior, Agent Choi, was looking at 'Agent Grapes' with an unreadable expression.
"..."
Then, after calming his junior, he walked back over to Kim Soleum among the children.
"Grapes-ie."
"Yes?"
"Then would it be okay if you just stayed here altogether?"
"Yes!"
Ryu Jaekwan couldn't hold back and yanked the back of Choi's collar.
"Sunbae!!"
"Hey, hey, I'm asking to check how far the infection's gone. …It's serious. It's not just physical, it's in his thinking, too…"
"..."
"Let's get him out now."
"Then…"
"No, I mean the way we always do."
Agent Choi sighed and patted his junior's back.
"Bronze-ah, Bronze-ah. Get it together. Our escape method isn't based on infection levels. It's based on the time of disappearance."
"…!!"
That's right.
According to the Disaster Management Bureau's escape protocol, a child wouldn't vanish into nothing if their disappearance had occurred within the last 1000 days.
And Agent Grapes had only been here for three days. He still met the criteria!
"All we have to do is convince him to leave. I'll send him out, so just keep the kids from scattering, okay?"
Then he turned toward the infected Kim Soleum and called out in a cheerful voice.
"Let's come back to the Ocean Palace next time, Grapes-ie! But how about we play balloon ride on the way? Just like when we came here earlier, floating up, nice and easy!"
It was one of the escape routes identified by the Disaster Management Bureau.
Do you remember?
Wasn't it said that children's books with a surprise appendix titled 'How to Get to the Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace' were often found scattered throughout the playrooms?
In truth, those books contained an additional passage.
At the very back of the books that had 'How to Get to the Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace' written in them, there were rare instances where a method for returning from the Ocean Palace was included.
That particular page was composed with advanced vocabulary and steps comparable to professional manuals, demanding a level of reading comprehension impossible for preschoolers.
All attempts to identify the required materials for the 'returning from Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace' ritual had ended in failure.
So, to actually use this escape method, the agents carried the necessary supplies with them directly.
Fortunately, because the entire preparation process was so irrational and obstructed, the escape method itself was narratively sound.
Up until this very moment.
"It's not going up…"
"…!!"
This time was an exception.
Agent Choi, with a look like he might bite his tongue, almost gawked at Kim Soleum dangling from the balloon, but managed to keep a straight face.
Originally, a child tied to the 'going home balloon' would close their eyes and gently float into the sky, and when the balloon eventually popped, they would fall—
And be found rolling out from a slide.
That was how it was supposed to work…
But the balloon wasn't rising at all.
This had never happened before.
That's because no agent had ever been this deeply infected…!
Moreover, the degree of infection usually matched eerily well with the symptoms of a year of disappearance.
So, any child still within the viable window for escape always floated upward with the balloon.
But now, a new irregular had occurred.
– If the subject is severely contaminated, the balloon cannot rise into the sky, rendering the escape method useless.
Like a parasite gripping its host tightly, refusing to let go.
The tumor-tail, ulcerated and grown from Kim Soleum's back, lay heavily grounded and squirming.
'…Is he almost fully merged with the ulcer mass?'
Thinking about that bizarre collective entity resembling the Ocean Palace, Agent Choi's brow twitched.
Yet his mouth spoke casually.
"Oops~ I must've under-inflated it! Let's try a different way, okay?"
"Okay…"
And the moment Ryu Jaekwan, who had been with the children, saw the two returning empty-handed, he immediately sprang into action.
"Bronze-ah."
"We need to get the cure right now. The prepa—"
"Bronze-ah."
Agent Choi paused briefly, then spoke slowly…
"Did it ever occur to you that, if Grapes was in his right mind, he would've given up his spot to a child?"
Ryu Jaekwan's hands froze.
"It did."
"…!"
"That's exactly why he should be prioritized. Most agents think like that. If you don't prioritize them… they'll give up their lives too easily."
"..."
"Saving the agent means saving more lives."
Ryu Jaekwan's superior fell silent for a moment, as if at a loss for words.
Then sighed softly.
"I… I don't know. It's not like we can assign rankings to human lives…. Wouldn't it be better to save him just because he's a comrade?"
"..."
"Was our bureau… always like this? I feel like it used to be different…. But at some point, everyone started staking their lives on that principle."
"Because they realized it was necessary."
"..."
Ryu Jaekwan knew full well that Agent Choi's silence leaned closer to disagreement than agreement.
Still, even Choi let out a small sigh of resignation.
"Anyway, fine. Grapes must be saved."
"…!"
"Let's go see those cult-company bastards."
But before that.
From the remaining eleven Angel's Sigh conches, they would have to set aside one for the agent.
That left room for only ten others.
"Ten children. We'll have to choose."
"..."
Agent Choi's eyes dimmed, but regardless, he moved toward Grapes.
"You said you sorted the children by era, right? Can you show me how?"
"Yes!"
Agent Grapes had diligently categorized the children.
Somehow, he had managed to gather all twenty-something children scattered across the entire city.
'…Did they gain the ability to communicate with each other after becoming infected and connecting to the hive?'
Ryu Jaekwan pushed aside the chilling speculation.
"These ones all know the same songs!"
The children were sorted—
From kids of the 2010s, all the way back to those from the 1960s.
And a few were explained a little differently.
"These kids… seem like they came from a slightly different place."
They had six fingers, or no whites in their eyes, or claimed to be from countries that don't exist on Earth.
Agent Bronze immediately placed them at the end of the priority list—there was a high chance they weren't 'civilians'.
…It didn't feel good.
Assigning ranks to human lives.
Ryu Jaekwan felt a deep fatigue he had momentarily forgotten.
…Tired, as always.
And so, he implicitly prioritized children who had gone missing more recently.
Because with the intel they had now, those children had the highest probability of successfully escaping.
"…But still, we'll bring all of them for now."
"..."
Ryu Jaekwan slowly nodded.
"Alright. Grapes-ie, the kids might get scared now, so how about we walk and play together? We'll see the Mermaid Princess tomorrow. Today, you can play with me."
"Okay!"
They decided to hide Agent Grapes among the children to protect him as much as possible from Daydream Inc.
If it were revealed that he was an agent, he'd become a target. A group like Daydream's elite team would likely know that the Disaster Management Bureau prioritized agents' lives over civilians'.
'A contaminated agent… is an easy target.'
At least until they could secure a conch shell and treat him.
With that, they hastened their steps.
And shortly after—
"Ooh! Over here!"
At the agreed-upon location, a staff member wearing a pony mask was waving, and the rest of the employees watched warily.
'They didn't run off.'
Ryu Jaekwan confirmed that the tracking signal attached to the conch shell by Agent Choi was still active, and joined up with the members of Daydream Inc.
They flinched at the sight of dozens of 'merchildren', but perhaps due to the lingering influence of the cat, they didn't act rashly.
They simply kept a clear distance.
– This way.
After a brief exchange of written notes, the two factions began moving, each cautiously keeping the other in check.
Downward, into the depths of the city.
"This place… it's where the kids usually don't go, right?"
Even seen through the eyes of the 'Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace', it wasn't particularly beautiful or remarkable.
A shaded place under a bridge.
In reality, it was beneath a rusted iron bridge that somehow hadn't collapsed, beside a stream of black, contaminated water.
There, a small door waited.
However…
"We can't see it."
The door wasn't visible to the infected children at all.
Just like the conch shells, they simply didn't appear to them.
"..."
Then.
Agent Choi, aware of Daydream's staff watching closely for any slip, calmly closed his eyes and reached out with his hand.
…Okay. He passed through.
"Ah. So it works if we just trick our senses. If you walk in with your eyes closed, you can go in."
The only problem was that they'd have to get all twenty-eight children to do it.
"Hey, kids! Let's play a game. Let's see who can walk with their eyes closed the longest!"
"Um…"
"But it's scary."
Usually eager to play together, a few of the children now hesitated, fidgeting strangely.
As if they instinctively felt something was off.
'Damn it.'
…One ominous thought struck the agents. Would they have to leave behind the kids who couldn't pass this threshold?
But then.
"Are you a scaredy-cat?"
"…!"
"I-I'm not!"
"Then close your eyes!"
Kim Soleum began encouraging the children.
"You know that shiny thing you see when your eyes are closed? You can see it, right?"
"Yeah, I see it!"
"Look closely. If you can't see it yet, just walk a little and it'll show up."
Amazingly, he succeeded in getting the children to walk forward with their eyes closed.
"..."
"Agent…"
"…Ah, let's go."
Agent Choi, who had been watching the scene in a bit of a daze, quickly came to his senses.
He tapped the shoulder of the anxious Agent Bronze and began to walk.
"Let's go!"
The children, with their eyes closed, safely passed through the 'wall' and entered.
And then.
"Huh."
A place that was not the Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace revealed itself to them.
From the perspective of Daydream Inc.—that is, from the viewpoint of the ghost story 'Mermaid Grave'—it was nothing more than a slightly less rusted, harsh-looking steel corridor compared to the outside.
It resembled a hastily built emergency passage for authorized personnel.
But in the eyes of the children…
'Nothing's there.'
Just a white rectangular path.
As if all texture had been stripped away.
It seemed this area couldn't sustain the illusion of the 'Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace'.
A space, presumably, somewhat isolated from contamination.
'…This is getting more and more suspicious.'
All the more reason, a veteran would know, that this was likely the correct path. So he hastened his steps.
"Should I keep my eyes closed?"
"If you open them, you'll see something amazing, right?"
Thankfully, the children didn't collapse in fear or burst into tears. If anyone started to cry, Agent Grapes distracted or comforted them.
"..."
They reached the end of the corridor.
What was visible through the suncatcher item was the true scene beyond.
"Ha."
A roughly constructed, ramshackle terminal.
It seemed there had once been a total of seven escape pods.
In the spots where some alien, mechanical-technology escape pods had already launched, only dust, filth, and dried infectious fluid remained.
But there was one left. A massive capsule-type escape pod.
Covered in blood.
As they approached, the door's device spoke.
[Please ve■fy removal of infect■ ■■■.]
Hmm.
– So you just have to show it a severed tail?
When a few employees from Daydream Inc. only nodded weakly in response and said nothing, Agent Choi quickly added one more thing.
– To the cool person who answers quickly: 50,000 won, haha
– I thought it was to prove you'd hunted an infected entity and helped stop the spread! That's how you get access to the pod, haha
As soon as that answer came back, Agent Choi nodded and immediately handed over cash.
"Yahoo!"
Then, ignoring the giggling employee in the pony mask, he turned around and called out,
"Alright then… Grapes-ie. Want to come over here? And let's bring that friend you were just talking to as well!"
"Yes!"
Kim Soleum, standing among the children, took one child by the hand and walked toward the escape pod.
Fortunately, it seemed the Daydream employees hadn't realized he was an agent.
Ryu Jaekwan, on alert, reached into Baek Saheon's bag and yanked out several conch shells as if robbing him, handing them to Agent Choi.
"This…"
Baek Saheon's quiet stream of curses, swallowed in frustration, didn't make it through.
Agent Choi smiled and lifted one of the conch shells, approaching Grapes.
"If you just close your eyes for a second, it'll be over quick…"
But at that moment.
"What's that?"
"Whoa! It's a real white spaceship!"
The child standing beside Grapes suddenly ran toward the escape pod.
"…!"
"Let's go together!"
Grapes followed the child, running all the way to the front of the escape pod.
"Wait…!"
Forcibly boarding an infected child onto the escape pod will trigger rapid shedding, causing ulcers to erupt across the entire body and resulting in total loss of life signs.
Do not attempt under any circumstances.
It must not happen—!
To make matters worse, the Daydream Inc. employees immediately shifted into an aggressive stance. Agent Bronze stepped in to block them.
"Grapes-ie!"
"Huh?"
At that moment, Grapes turned at the sound of his name.
Naturally, his tail brushed against the escape pod's door device.
"…!"
The message displayed the same message again.
[Please ve■fy removal of infect■ ■■■.]
"Wow! You were right! It flashed just now!"
"Right?"
In that brief moment, Agent Choi ran over and yanked both of them back.
Watching the scene through the suncatcher, Agent Bronze let out a short sigh and dropped his threatening posture toward Daydream Inc.
A tense silence lingered in the air.
"Ha. Still, at least the escape pod isn't attacking. That's a relief."
Agent Choi didn't even have time to wipe the cold sweat from his brow before he raised the conch shell.
But…
"..."
Agent Bronze felt something strange from the scene he had just witnessed.
The device had reacted again the moment a living tail made contact.
And his superior's words…
– At least the escape pod isn't attacking. That's a relief.
"…!"
Could it be.
"If we just treat the kids, hand them the severed tails, and board them…"
"No."
"…Bronze-ah?"
"This… this isn't what we think."
Agent Bronze reread the text on the device.
[Please ve■fy removal of infect■ ■■■.]
It read as if one were meant to remove an infection, like killing the infected merfolk, and verify it.
But…
"This is already a ruined city. Judging by how hastily this escape pod space was constructed, it must've been built in a rush during the final collapse as a last-ditch escape attempt."
"And?"
"That would mean most of the people expected to use this escape pod were already infected."
"…!"
Agent Bronze turned again toward the last remaining escape pod.
"And if it really was the last remaining means of escape, it wouldn't be strange for it to have been designed under the assumption that everyone was infected."
"…That makes sense."
Agent Choi's eyes lit up.
"In that case, to minimize the risk of contagion spreading to other locations…"
"Yes."
Both agents turned their gaze to the tails.
Those grotesque biological masses, leaking infectious mucus.
"It means the directive is to sever the infectious appendage—the tail—and then board the escape pod."
Then, the device's message took on a completely different meaning:
[Please verify removal of infectious protrusion.]
It wasn't telling them to hunt and kill another infected being.
It was telling them to remove their own infection source: the tail.
Only coherent beings who had severed their tail and 'verified' it could safely board.
"Wait. Then that means…"
"Yes."
For the first time today, a faint smile of exhilaration appeared on Agent Bronze's face.
"We don't need to fully cure the infection. If the children simply cut off their tails and verify it, they should be able to board the escape pod without the conch shell."
"…!"
"And if we only use the conches on the kids who are at risk of dying from blood loss when cutting their tails…"
As long as they distribute them correctly—
"We can all get out. Together."
Not a single child left behind.
They could rescue everyone from this supernatural disaster.
* * *
That's it!
I clenched my fist discreetly.
I was still among the children, so I wouldn't be noticed, but I had to stifle the sighs of relief and joy that kept trying to escape my lips.
'We did it.'
By naturally merging Daydream Inc.'s intel with the Disaster Management Bureau's, they had reached a conclusion similar to the one I'd reasoned out.
How much effort had it taken to steer everyone to this conclusion without raising suspicion…!
It's been a truly brutal day.
I swallowed hard.
'…Even getting infected was a wise choice.'
It would be a lie to say it wasn't horrifying and revolting.
But the benefits gained by becoming infected were too valuable to give up.
From concealing my identity completely from Daydream Inc. employees by hiding behind the tumor covering half my face, to ultimately giving them a direct hint toward the conclusion: 'you can enter the escape pod if you sever the tail'…
It had been the one and only correct answer. It was the only way to break through every obstacle naturally, without arousing suspicion.
And…
'…I might be able to take myself off the suspect list too.'
That cat.
Agent Choi knew I could transform into a 'stray animal'. After all, he was the one who recommended the item.
Of course, due to the effects of the fake Necronomicon, the two couldn't be directly linked, but you never know. After escaping, suspicion might still arise.
'Better to bury it with something stronger.'
That's why I chose to attempt infection up to 'the limit of what my rationality could endure'.
Gradually increasing the infected mucus, deliberately ingesting it little by little.
'This was the limit.'
This current state, with half my face engulfed in tumorous boils.
Able to understand the hive's will and the strange telepathy shared with the children, yet without losing my own sense of self.
…Strangely enough, the dokkaebi trick that turned me into a child actually helped. Maybe because it forcibly fixed me in the form of 'my child self'.
In any case, I'd kept the option of taking a Nostalgia Candy if things went south…
But now it looked like I wouldn't need it.
'Perfect.'
I believed in you, agents…!
The Supernatural Disaster Management Bureau really is different from that damn psychopath potion company!
It was… actually kind of touching.
'This is the classic Disaster Management Bureau-style resolution I haven't seen since before the Dark Exploration Records took off…!'
Trying to save as many as possible, and actually succeeding in the end.
Maybe it was because I was in a child's body, but my chest swelled with emotion. Sniff.
Of course, this being a ghost story, about half the time these kinds of attempts ended in total annihilation, but this time, things were going smoothly.
Now all we had to do was time our escape together…
Tingle—
'…Huh?'
That's when it happened.
A strange sensation began crawling up from my tail.
Tingle—
'Above?'
My head shot up.
…Beside me, a child in a blue dress muttered softly.
"Weird."
She was right.
"Weird."
No, it wasn't just that one child.
All twenty-seven children standing near me lifted their heads to look into the air.
Every single young mer-child… who still had their tails attached.
"The Mermaid Princess… is angry."
It seemed so.
All the hosts sensed something, from somewhere no one could pinpoint.
A threat to survival.
She was searching for where it had been triggered…
And now, she had found it.
The Mermaid Princess.
Tingle—
"Grapes-ie?"
"Right now."
A chill swept down my spine.
My mouth moved on its own, quickly.
"The Mermaid Princess is on her way."
BOOM.
The ceiling collapsed.
And hundreds of tumor masses began to surge downward.
When you think about it, it's strange.
The disaster that occurred when a Disaster Management Bureau agent once tried to forcibly load an infected child onto the escape pod.
Acute molting occurs. Ulcers erupt across the entire body, and all vital signs are lost.
Contamination spreads rapidly, resulting in death.
If this were the escape pod attempting to eliminate internal threats, the reaction was far too… deliberate.
It was more like the action of the infection source itself.
Right.
It makes more sense to interpret it as the doing of the 'biohazard-merfolk'.
A punishment dealt to a host that dares to break away from the hive.
A retrieval of energy.
But this information was known only to the Disaster Management Bureau agents, while, conversely, more detailed intel about the escape pod was only available to the employees of Daydream Inc…
Fragmented information.
And that's exactly why no one could've reasonably predicted what was happening now.
"Ah."
A child raised a hand.
"It's the Mermaid Princess!"
BOOM!
With a thunderous crash, a mass pierced through the ceiling and smashed into the terminal.
Kyarararara—!
A sound like children laughing—no, like ulcerated tissue colliding—filled the entire station.
Countless tumor-like tendrils, spewing horrid mucus, descended and braced themselves like feet.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud!
Like spiderwebs hanging down, flesh masses that excreted mucus extended limbs like tentacles and clung to every wall of the shattered terminal.
From the massive infected hive came its most grotesque core was a monstrous shape that now coiled before the 'Ocean Palace'.
Kyarararara!
It slammed its meaty mass down, blanketing the terminal.
THUD!
"Fuck!"
Baek Saheon stood frozen, screaming, then shoved back the employee who tried to push him forward and quickly retreated.
A company employee was snatched by the fleshy mass.
The sound of a skull cracking, blood and mucous being sucked out.
'Gotta get out!'
Clutching the bag containing the conch shells, he bolted toward the escape pod.
But at that moment—
Someone grabbed the back of his neck.
"…!"
A young mer-child.
No, he'd already confirmed who it was through that halo, but had kept quiet until now…
'Kim Soleum!'
The infected Kim Soleum slammed the back of Baek Saheon's head to the floor.
"Agh!"
In that moment, a mass of flesh flew past overhead.
Baek Saheon swallowed hard.
'Move recklessly and die.'
The infected mass had very clearly wrapped itself around the escape pod at the center.
Then Kim Soleum, with a strange expression, began looking up at the grotesque mass of infection.
'What is he doing.'
"Why are you—"
The surroundings turned disturbingly quiet.
"..."
Baek Saheon frantically looked around.
…All the mer-children were looking up at the sky with the same expression, raising their hands.
"Princess!"
"It's the Princess!"
The two agents also turned their eyes to the massive figure that had burst through the ceiling into the terminal.
Their gazes blanked.
Come here.
A dazzlingly beautiful mermaid form appeared, as if sunlight had poured in from the terminal ceiling—
Filling the empty white space.
Beautiful.
Like a living statue of the Mermaid Princess, the enormous mermaid glowed with a divine aura.
Overwhelming awe, admiration, and enchantment filled their minds—emotions that one should rightly feel in the presence of a being so great.
Come here.
TheemptywhitevoidisoverlaidbythebeautifulTwinkleTwinkleOceanPalaceAsmallgoldenfangshapedplazaglimmerslikeachapelFillitwithpraiseworshipandaffectionandlookuptoyourmasterchildButthereisnosuchthingasanescapepodhereThisisaplaceofprayerAplacetopraytotheMermaidPrincessand
"Damn it."
Agent Choi lifted his suncatcher and barely managed to block his view.
Beside him, his hoobae mimicked the action and spat blood, having bitten his tongue to jolt himself back.
But again, the gaze from above…
Come…
"Elder!"
A flash burst from Agent Choi's hand.
A flicker of light, burning within the lantern.
Red and blue fire pushed back the golden glow of the mermaid's halo.
Dokkaebi House.
The Dokkaebi House blazed, creating a space of illusion.
Where the flames reached, tile-roofed houses wavered, and the shadows of dancing, singing dokkaebis flickered.
A fleeting moment where anomaly repelled anomaly.
"We won't last long, during that time…!"
They had to sever as many tails as possible and get the children into the escape pod.
The mermaid—no, the fleshy mass—raged and tried to reach the escape pod again, but the space around it distorted, forcing it to circle near the ceiling. Now's the chance…
Whoosh.
The adults in suits scrambled toward the escape pod.
Those wearing animal masks.
The employees of Daydream Inc.
"..."
Agent Choi's eyes darkened.
At the same time—
'I have to follow…!'
Baek Saheon was grinding his teeth, watching the same scene.
Now was the time to run, but the problem was that Kim Soleum still had his hand gripped tightly around Baek Saheon's head, holding him down.
'Fucking hell.'
Cunning flashed in Baek Saheon's eyes.
Was there a way to push him off?
This little… Since the fucker looked like a child, maybe he's physically weaker than him? No, wait. He's contaminated. He might be even stronger.
Still, one thing was clear. Most contaminated individuals often lacked signs of human intelligence.
Madness and bizarre rules governed their minds!
"Excuse me. Shouldn't you be more worried about the big one above me? She can't come in right now. Shouldn't you be cheering her on?"
The bastard was baiting him.
Ah. Did turning into a mer-child make him unable to understand words? Then Baek Saheon could just write on the ground!
But just as he tried to scrawl the same message on the dusty floor with his finger, the pressure pinning his head down vanished.
"…!"
It worked!
Baek Saheon shot up, ready to bolt… only for Kim Soleum to press him back down again.
"Argh!"
'Why, again!!'
Then Kim Soleum began writing on the floor.
– Carry me.
"…?!"
– Carry me and run.
"What the actual f—"
A dazed Baek Saheon blurted out without thinking.
"To where?"
Kim Soleum turned his gaze.
Toward the opposite side of the escape pod.
The passage going out.
"…?!"
-x-X-x-
At the same time—
"Are they all morons or what?"
Jin Nasol twitched her temple as she looked at the Daydream employees clinging to the escape pod like moths.
Even if they got inside, how exactly did they plan to get out?
The path for the escape pod's launch was completely blocked by that filthy biological disaster mass.
They were acting like clueless punks blinded by rewards instead of reading the room.
"Ooh! Is there like, a spot on the escape pod where we can shoot a laser beam or something??"
Ignoring the money-obsessed rookie's nonsense, Jin Nasol assessed the situation.
'…Why the hell am I the one stuck doing this?'
It soured her mood to think she was doing all the work while the regular team staff loafed around, but if she wanted to escape, she had no choice.
'That flesh lump started going berserk the moment the mer-children were brought near.'
Hmm.
As a test, she grabbed one mer-child by the scruff of the neck and prepared to toss it toward the biomass—
Smack.
"You're out of your mind."
"Excuse me?"
The sharp glare of a furious government agent stopped her.
Agent Bronze.
Having completed a quick emergency ritual under Agent Choi's protection, he had shed his child form through the dokkaebi trick and returned to his adult self.
A necessary decision, as the situation was escalating fast.
Clenching his teeth, he growled at the employee in the butterfly mask like he was spitting poison.
"You saw him as a real child, didn't you!"
"If he can't use the conch, he's just an infected freak, isn't he?"
"Even without it! If he just cuts off the tail, he can board the pod. So stop—"
"Hey."
Jin Nasol interrupted, barely suppressing her irritation.
"Even if you board, then what? You think you can pry that thing off the launch gate?"
"..."
"So, do you have bombs stashed in your pocket or what? No? Yeah, I figured."
Of course not.
And it wasn't even certain whether human firepower would work, whether it was a biological disaster or a ghost.
"Let's just throw a few of them outside and scatter the focus, then make a run for it. Take whoever's left if you want."
"But Assistant Manager! The cat told us to take all of them! If we leave any behind, we'll get cursed or lose our reward… There's even that saying, 'a cat always returns a favor'— Ugh!"
"We're about to die and you're worried about a curse? Go cry about it when you're outside, yeah?"
That cat hadn't shown itself again.
Chances were, it was a one-off irregular phenomenon.
"So forget the cat or whatever—"
"Please cooperate with the civilian rescue."
The capture cable sprang out from Agent Bronze's hand.
Jin Nasol scoffed and grabbed her own special equipment.
'No time left.'
He had to incapacitate her fast.
Agent Bronze gritted his teeth, glancing toward Agent Choi's flames. The infected hive's call was beginning to pierce through the warped space and infiltrate the illusion of fire.
Come here.
The mesmerizing golden light began to take hold of the children once again.
Somehow, please, just hurry. No, even if they cut every child's tail, it was becoming impossible to see how they could all escape from this place…
Did they… have to make selections?
With grim eyes, Agent Bronze reached out his hand—
F O U N D Y O U
A malevolent gaze slammed into the space.
A description of a terrible, overwhelming being filled the room like a divine descent.
Yes. It was descending.
Descending!
"Lord Cat!"
A voice soaked in rapturous madness burst from behind the pony mask.
All the humans froze.
Bells, voices, laughter, deception. ThecalltoabeautifulGermaniclandtoeternalrotdecayandmindlessservitude!
B E H O L D
The children once enthralled by the biological disaster staggered, lowering their heads.
Their collective psychic disarray shook the infected hive, and even the towering image of the Mermaid Princess began to tremble.
Then came telepathy.
C U T I T
A forceful command.
C U T I T
The children began tearing off their own tails.
With faces twisted in madness and terror, they screamed toward the sky. Then, sobbing, they ripped their own tails off.
Blood and mucus sprayed in all directions. It was a hellish sight.
"…!"
The anomaly was devouring the anomaly…!
Ryu Jaekwan struggled to his feet and began stopping the bleeding of several children. But his mind had begun to comprehend the language of a different dimension. Wouldn't you like to know the horrific truth of this world? Madness shall set you free. It shook his thoughts.
...
What?
So this world is actually…
"Bronze-ah!"
Ryu Jaekwan jerked his head up.
The sound of that malevolent scripture had vanished without him realizing.
All that remained were the children standing stiff from mental shock, bleeding from the spots where their tails had been—
Kyarararara—!
—and the giant tumorous mass, writhing violently.
The creature, now severed from every single host, shrieked in rage. Or perhaps, in instinctive panic at the threat to its survival.
Agent Choi's Dokkaebi House was starting to collapse…
'No.'
Priorities.
Agent Bronze quickly scanned the group. That's right. First, the agents—
But Grapes was missing.
"…!"
Where had he gone?
He looked through the children, but the agent was truly gone.
'No, it can't be…'
At that moment—
He heard the sound of someone running from the far end.
From the opposite side of the escape pod, the corridor leading out, a Daydream Inc. employee was sprinting toward them.
Black goat mask.
"…!"
And slung on his back, covered in blood with his tail completely torn off… was Kim Soleum, limp and unconscious.
Dripping blood, the employee shouted.
"MOVE!"
What?
"MOVE, YOU FUCKERS!"
Fwick—
Something glittering arced through the air from the goat-masked employee's hand.
Ryu Jaekwan turned his head.
The glass bottle struck the tumor mass of the biological disaster. From the mouth of the bottle, a thick, purplish-pink liquid began pouring out.
Surprise Syrup for Kids
(Grapefruit flavor)
★★★★
It was the potion Kim Soleum had picked, based on the security chief's advice.
If you converted it into Daydream Inc. terms, its effect would be…
Expose Potion
: Target temporarily loses reason and, while incapacitated, reveals their most emotional and honest secrets.
Incapacitation.
Kyarararara—!
The Mermaid Princess's figure, now doused in syrup, began to collapse.
Twisting violently, it slumped to the floor.
Dozens of tumor tendrils writhed inside the ulcers, calling to the children, but the connection was already severed.
However, that potion had been made for humans.
Which meant…
"That stuff doesn't last long!"
Just a very short opening.
"RUN!"
The agents dashed for the escape pod, dragging the children with them.
And then.
"Seriously, what a drag."
Amazingly, Daydream Inc.'s elite team member also sprang into action, quickly grabbing children and running straight into the escape pod.
"…!"
She even barked orders at her fellow employees.
"Grab them."
"Yes. Yes?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
After witnessing the insane events just now, they recalculated the risks of leaving the children behind and made the snap judgment to comply.
"If you send the escape pod out first and I'm not back yet—know that you're dead."
At that shout from the elite team, the employees inside the escape pod clenched their jaws and helped get as many children onboard as possible.
For those bleeding badly, they applied the conches.
The chaos was barely controlled, but time was running out.
"There are still some outside!"
"Now…"
[Verification complete.]
"All aboard!"
"Okay!"
Having also consumed his dokkaebi trick and returned to adult form, Agent Choi sprinted in last and slammed the escape pod door shut.
[Boarding confirmed]
And then—
[Beginning transport to destination]
Chiiiiik—
With a hiss of steam from the machinery, the massive escape pod began to launch from the tunnel.
"Ah…!"
Through the pod's window, they saw the giant mass moving to block the launch gate once again.
THUD!
Hundreds—no, thousands—of ordinary infected creatures surged into the terminal.
But it was too late.
The escape pod slipped through just in time and shot out beyond the city.
[In transit]
"Ha…"
They're alive.
As people relaxed slightly and slumped in their seats.
"There!!"
Far off in the opened view of the city…
"It's moving…!"
The massive cluster that had once clung to the castle called Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace…
Was lurching forward.
BAM.
The tremor reached the escape pod.
The hive of the biological disaster was not limited to what they had seen.
"W-What is that?"
It had burrowed underground, had spread across the entire city.
Endlessly crawling to the surface, it covered the city's center and spilled outward.
Flesh.
"Ugh…!"
The monstrous mass of flesh, now above ground, smashed the castle it had infested and hurled itself toward the escape pod in a final frenzy.
It slapped its sticky mass down on the ground with heavy, thudding weight, twisting itself forward.
The grotesque, horrifying, massive biological disaster reared up and revealed the mouth that had once been flush with the ground. A gaping hole lined with rows upon rows of massive, jagged teeth opened, roaring toward them.
Hurled flesh like missiles.
Sticking.
Latching on.
Catching—
Thunk.
"…!!"
The escape pod shook as it was struck by the ejected flesh.
"Aaaagh!"
"Quiet!"
But it didn't crash.
"Hrrk."
Agent Choi clamped a hand over an unknown staffer's mouth and looked back out the window.
"It's not as close as it looks. Everyone calm down!"
And then those who were finally able to gauge the biological disaster's scale realized something.
…It was so massive that it surpassed the range of human comprehension. The numbers were astronomical, so much so that it distorted all sense of distance.
"…Ha."
"Huff… huff, huff…"
In the end.
The enormous hive of the biological disaster couldn't leave the city's entrance and collapsed.
Kyararararara—
Leaving behind a strange vibration, like the sound of children laughing.
The city's underground foundation began to cave in, pulling the disaster down with it.
Into the deep sea.
"Ha…"
"..."
The escape pod quickly distanced itself from the scene, safely shooting up through the water.
People exhaled hard, cold sweat on their faces.
And then, not long after.
[Please board your capsule.]
"We've arrived…!"
The Daydream Inc. employees promptly began entering the capsule devices attached to the escape pod.
Once inside, a person would be enveloped in a bubble-like sphere of strange air and launched toward the surface, losing consciousness in the process.
When they woke again, they'd be back in reality.
That was the 'escape method'.
The agents, having overheard this procedure while managing the company employees through both carrot and stick, followed suit.
First boarding the children, then themselves.
Naturally, the youngest agent went first.
"Grapes-ie."
Because his contamination was so severe, they'd used a conch shell to prevent him from bleeding out.
He'd avoided death and recovered somewhat, though he still looked exhausted.
And since he still had the appearance of a child bearing remnants of an infected mer-form, he looked all the more pitiful.
"Um… Did it all work out?"
"Of course!"
Agent Choi grabbed his hand tightly.
"You did so, so well. Bet you were scared, huh? You can sleep now. We'll be heading back soon."
"Yes… Thank you."
Kim Soleum, blinking slowly, climbed into a capsule.
Soon after, he closed his eyes and took a deep, steady breath.
* * *
We did it.
As the capsule sealed shut, I barely suppressed a sigh of relief.
'I almost lost my mind.'
The aftereffects of reading the Necronomicon nearly shattered my sanity.
If I hadn't used the conch, who knows what might've happened… but it was a gamble I had no choice but to take.
'What else could've cut all the kids' tails at once, incite the Daydream employees, and shake off the biological disaster!'
It had been sheer luck that I'd been connected to the children via infection-based telepathy.
In a state where the hallucination of 'Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace' had already weakened under madness and fear… And then, someone yelling 'Cut your tail!' inside your mind?
Of course kids would follow for sure…
'I feel sorry for scaring them, but…'
But this was the only way to save everyone.
I just hoped the shock wasn't too deep, and that with memory suppression and proper treatment afterward, they'd recover.
I bit down on my lip.
Still… I felt a bit more at ease.
Because I'd brought every last child with me.
'And now that the entire city's been buried, it'll be a lot harder for anyone to start snatching kids again.'
Maybe this really was the end of the Mermaid Grave. Of the Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace.
And if Daydream Inc.'s Research Team threw a fit about it?
Honestly—not my problem.
'Those psychos can deal with their own fallout…'
I swallowed another sigh and let the growing haze of unconsciousness wash over me.
A success was a success.
'Now, once I get back to reality…'
...
Wait.
They did say we were going back to 'reality', but where exactly is that?
The coast?
Well, not really my concern.
'The veteran agents will handle it, right…?'
I believe in you, sunbaes.
Even as I realized my right arm was still gone, I accepted the drowsiness with a strangely peaceful mind.
Escape.
...
"Oho? What's this!"
Huh?
I opened my eyes.
All around me were unconscious adults and children who had yet to fully wake.
And near me stood a single man, completely awake.
White lab coat. Glasses.
He stood in front of a now-awake Agent Bronze, grinning brightly, his eyes twinkling with fascination.
"Ah, government agents, are you?"
A familiar face.
'…Kwak Jaekang!'
Research Team Section Chief of Daydream Inc.
Goosebumps spread across my entire body.
'Wait a minute.'
No way… this place—
I looked around.
White-walled office. Laboratories. A modern, pristine corporate interior I knew too well.
Yes, it was familiar. Because…
'This was my workplace until just a few months ago!'
We had escaped… right into the heart of Daydream Inc…!
-x-X-x-
For the escape destination to be set to Daydream Inc.'s headquarters, given that it was a Darkness under their jurisdiction…
Sure, it's not all that strange. But still.
'If we all entered through different paths, shouldn't we have been sent back to where we each came from…!'
I gulped hard.
Looking around, it seemed like everyone who'd been aboard the escape pod had, without exception, been dropped into the Research Team's office.
Why the hell had every last one of us ended up stuck inside Daydream Inc? Shouldn't an escape pod, at the very least, ask passengers where they want to go…?
Ah.
'Don't tell me. It was because the first person to board and calibrate the pod was someone from Daydream Inc…?'
Maybe that initial input had set the default destination for everyone.
'Totally possible.'
Problem was, thinking about that now didn't change anything.
I wiped my cold sweat and shifted my eyes to glance at Agent Bronze, who was now facing off with Section Chief Kwak Jaekang.
"Ah, I see the uniform now. Disaster Management Bureau agents, right? Looks like a distress signal from our Darkness reached your organization somehow. Haha!"
"Supernatural Disasters are not private property. Please refrain from inappropriate terminology."
Agent-nim!
"Well, you can put it that way, sure, but…"
Kwak Jaekang smiled behind his glasses.
"Still, you did trespass into this here private company. Right, sir?"
"..."
"But hey, since we helped each other clear things up down there, yeah? If you'll just give us a quick interview, we won't even charge you for—"
"Charge us?"
"Well I mean, you did use one of our designated escape routes! Things like data usage fees, labor costs, expert consultation fees… You're a government agency, so surely you're not planning to dine and dash?"
Honestly, I wouldn't have been surprised if Agent Bronze introduced his fist to Kwak Jaekang's face right then and there.
But shockingly, he didn't get angry. Instead, he stared with quiet contempt and replied.
"We did not request any consultation. And the escape method we used was based on our own previously acquired intel."
"Pfft… Then I guess that makes it unauthorized trespassing, not collaboration."
Kwak Jaekang continued smiling at him.
"..."
Agent Bronze, silent, slipped a hand into the inside of his jacket.
A strange tension crackled through the room.
Right.
'This place… We're standing in the heart of a psychotic pharmaceutical megacorp.'
And not just any office, but the Research Team.
A simple press of a call button would make Daydream Inc.'s Security Team come running to subdue the 'intruders' in no time.
And since those Security Team members had long surpassed what could be called human… Even these two veteran agents could end up horribly overpowered.
In short, we were deep in enemy territory where no concept of societal common sense applied.
…A chill ran down my spine.
'This lunatic company wouldn't bat an eye at making a few civil servants disappear and turning them into test subjects…'
"Aigoo, my back…"
"…!"
Just then, a groaning voice cut through the tension as someone stirred on the floor.
With deliberate exaggeration, Agent Choi sat up, playing up the drama enough to cut through the tension.
'Agent Choi!'
"Well, I couldn't stay lying down, I was too scared. What's this about trespassing… I mean, these days even crash-landing out of a ghost story counts as unauthorized entry, huh? Goodness gracious, how's a guy supposed to work under such cruel rules?"
Agent Choi stood up, locking eyes with Kwak Jaekang and flashing a cheeky smile.
"Over at the Disaster Management Bureau, we don't treat people who wander in during a safety inspection so coldly, you know…"
"..."
Ah, right.
Daydream Inc.'s hatred for the Disaster Management Bureau didn't stem from anything like wounded pride or jealousy. The reason was far more simple.
The government simply did not recognize ownership over supernatural disasters. Officially, that is.
So, when the bureau identified a ghost story under Daydream Inc.'s 'jurisdiction' and deemed it solvable, they'd storm in and put an end to it.
All under the banner of a 'safety inspection'.
'From Daydream Inc.'s point of view, the bureau's more like a disaster that would ravage through and destroy raw material suppliers.'
Because of this, both sides had even established rules to limit how often their investigations clashed over ghost stories.
Otherwise, the number of chaotic reports would have gotten out of hand.
…Just like this case.
"I worry we might get a little too aggressive if this keeps happening~ Don't you think?"
In other words, Agent Choi was now politely threatening to make their lives hell.
And as the veteran members of both factions dueled with words and veiled menace, Agent Bronze, now out of the spotlight, casually turned his head in my direction while pretending to check on the children.
Our eyes met.
And I read his lips.
– Stay still.
Yes, sir. Absolutely.
'Zip it and don't stand out.'
If I got exposed here, the consequences would spiral out of control.
Agent Bronze probably thought I'd 'faked my death and resigned' from this company, which was why he was trying to protect my identity… But the truth was far more complicated.
'I'm not just missing. My identity was officially altered so that, as far as the company's concerned, I'm dead because I'm working undercover as a corporate spy.'
If the Research Team found out who I really was, and that information reached Director Ho… I couldn't even fathom what might happen.
And if Director Cheong—who thinks I hit her on the back of the head and ran—found out 'Kim Soleum' was currently inside the company?
Gulp.
'…I'm dead.'
No, worse than dead. This was a ghost story, after all.
'I absolutely cannot be exposed.'
So I naturally blended in among the children, doing everything I could to hide my presence.
Meanwhile, Agent Choi's subtle threat—basically, 'keep this up and we'll keep crashing into your jurisdiction with inspections'—was gradually leading the conversation toward a conclusion.
"We'll just take the civilians and be on our way. No need for any formal thanks for rescuing your employees, of course~ Haha!"
A clean, diplomatic offer.
But, let's not forget. Kwak Jaekang's a total nutjob.
"…Ah, yes, of course. Always so busy, working for the good of the citizens. I understand completely."
He spread his arms wide, holding a file folder.
"Then by all means, take only the civilians!"
"...!"
Kwak Jaekang started walking toward us.
'…!'
I quickly lowered my posture and bowed my head, pretending I was still unconscious.
Footsteps.
Tap. Tap.
They drew closer.
Then, right above me—
"But these contaminated ones here… No matter how you look at them, they don't seem like proper, functioning members of society."
Shit.
"Why, look right here. Gills instead of ears! That's not something a citizen should have! And this one has an extra arm. This one over here…"
A gaze.
"…is missing his right arm."
Goosebumps raced up my back.
"Oh, of course, it could just be a poor civilian who lost it in an accident, but we won't know until we run some tests, right?"
His voice turned gleeful.
"Since they're all heavily contaminated, we'll go ahead and examine them, sort them, and make sure only true citizens are safely sent home."
And if they aren't 'citizens'…
The company would handle it themselves.
"So, dear government agents, I'm sure you've got plenty of other things to do. So why don't you clock out and go home now~?"
At that moment, it seemed Agent Bronze's patience snapped.
"Cut the nonsense."
"Nonsense?"
Damn it.
"I'm just saying, it's unclear whether these fall under the jurisdiction of the Disaster Management Bureau. And if you keep pushing… Hey, let's ask our own staff. Hey, Assistant Manager Jin!"
Beside him, we heard Kwak Jaekang shaking awake Jin Nasol.
And then came her flat, annoyed voice.
"…What."
"Oh, you're up. As an elite team member, do you see these kids as innocent citizens? I mean, seriously, I feel like I'm being treated unfairly here!"
"You feel unfairly treated every single day, sir."
But Jin Nasol, seeming to grasp the situation, gave a cold and strategic response.
A damning one.
"…They're mer-children."
"Oho!"
Kwak Jaekang's footsteps grew animated.
"Mer-children! What a fun—no, fascinating discovery. So in truth, they're not innocent citizens at all. They're something like traitors from the Darkness!"
"Just a moment."
Agent Choi's voice turned sharp.
"That is a matter for the bureau to decide. A private company has no authority to make that call independently. Especially—"
Even though I couldn't see it, I could feel it.
"—you, personally."
Pressure.
"..."
"..."
"…Haha, looks like we have a difference of opinion!"
Clap— Kwak Jaekang started to applaud.
Then took a step back.
"You're right. Maybe I acted a bit rashly. So then… why don't we all take a little break and talk again after we've cooled down?"
"..."
The two agents seemed to be calculating their next moves.
This was a precarious moment.
No.
'This can't escalate further.'
Getting out of here as smoothly as possible without any conflict was the best outcome.
If hostility boiled over here—especially with everyone already drained from escaping a ghost story—no one could predict what might happen.
And so…
"Oh, we're always open to conversation~"
Phew.
"We'll just rest here with the children. Come back when you've organized your thoughts."
"Haha. Mm. Got it."
The agents sat right where they were, making it clear they would not take their eyes off the children. And perhaps realizing he had no leverage at the moment, Kwak Jaekang finally stepped away.
But…
'There's no way that's the end of it.'
I opened my eyes naturally.
At some point, agents had moved closer and now sat beside me as if we'd relocated together by chance.
They were talking, clearly for me to hear.
"How long will it take?"
"Dunno~ Maybe half a day at most."
Agent Choi's voice was laced with a relaxed sigh.
"Not the first time we've seen a guy like that. Let's just wait here a bit until backup arrives."
Thank god.
It seemed like we'd successfully created a window to contact the Disaster Management Bureau and get their support.
The problem was…
"Excuse us for a moment, we've got some procedures to handle…"
…that the Research Team would try every trick in the book until then.
I cracked one eye slightly open and watched someone approach the group.
A sleep-deprived researcher with deep eye bags and glasses was tending to the Field Exploration Team staff, getting them treated and guiding them toward the interview room.
[Lee Yeonhwa]
Assistant Manager, Research Team 1.
The name tag matched a researcher I remembered reading about in the Dark Exploration Records. Which meant one thing.
'She's notable enough to have her own wiki entry.'
And her 'notable trait' was…
She was one of the rare few in Daydream Inc. who actually cared about research ethics.
The kind of researcher whose attitude made that clear.
If this had been under different circumstances, I might've even felt glad to see her. But not now.
Not when she'd almost certainly been sent by Kwak Jaekang on purpose…
To lower the agents' guard.
"Um, I think both the kids and the agents should really receive some basic first aid, especially the children. They're suffering from severe blood loss, and a few seem to be in shock."
"…Hmm."
It wouldn't be easy to refuse, right?
After the bureau agents confirmed that the researcher meant no harm, they scanned the recovery potions she offered with their equipment and gave a reluctant green light.
Of course, they didn't drink it themselves. But since the kids had just gone through things like ripping off their own tails, the urgency of the situation forced them to allow it.
"Drink up."
Naturally, a potion made its way to me as well.
One of the standard-issue red recovery potions stocked in their infirmary.
'Been a while.'
I tried reached out with both hands, only to remember one of them was missing, so I just accepted it with my left hand.
Instead of drinking the potion though… I just pretended to, while secretly funneling the liquid into the tattoo on my wrist.
'That guy might've recognized me and spiked it with something strange.'
Even if that wasn't the case, the researchers could've tampered with it for 'research purposes'.
…I'd definitely saw it.
While handing out potions, some of them had exchanged signals and deliberately chosen different bottles for certain children who seemed 'unusual'.
'It's a real healing potion, but something's probably mixed into it.'
Call it paranoia, but it never hurts to be cautious.
That's when I noticed something else.
As I moved, I suddenly felt the presence of an unfamiliar object tucked into my clothes.
'…The glass lantern!'
The dokkaebi flame, now transformed into a glass lantern, was stowed away beneath my coat.
"…!"
If someone caught me with this, it'd be obvious I was an agent.
In other words, it would be the perfect excuse for Kwak Jaekang to lock onto me.
'That can't happen.'
Pretending to be a scared little civilian kid, I nestled deeper among the children and tried to subtly stow the lantern into the tattoo.
But the dokkaebi fire inside rejected it violently.
"…!"
It didn't want to go into the tattoo…?
'Damn it!'
Left with no choice, I used my oversized jacket to cover it up as much as I could.
Then, keeping calm, I sat back down and handed the now-empty-looking potion bottle to the researcher with a scared look on my face.
That's when I locked eyes with Baek Saheon, who had just woken up.
"..."
"..."
– Acknowledge me and you're dead.
– Ah, yessir.
That was the gist of the unspoken exchange. Baek Saheon turned away quickly, one eyelid twitching.
Honestly, he'd probably imagined ratting me out and getting a promotion, but…
'He won't move recklessly. He still wants the item he was promised.'
He's the type to calculate every gain and loss.
I remembered the conversation we'd had right before the escape, when I used Baek Saheon as a ride to read the Necronomicon.
– If you do it right, it's yours.
And how his heartbeat had quickened with greed.
'Good.'
I could stay quiet.
I sat still, quietly observing the dazed and traumatized children around me, letting time pass uneventfully.
But then.
"The D-squad has returned!"
A new voice rang out as someone entered the lab.
I instinctively looked up.
"Ah, you're back."
"Yes."
An emotionless voice.
And… a white lizard mask.
'S-Squad Leader…!'
It was Section Chief Lee Jaheon.
'It's actually him! Squad Leader!'
Since when did that white reptilian head and those vertical pupils start making me feel so relieved I could cry?
I almost jumped to my feet when I saw the lizard wearing the lizard mask.
'Of course, it's not exactly the right situation to be feeling that happy right now…'
Still, the memories of being super-saved by the physically strongest in those insane ghost stories were just too vivid.
Anyway, Chief Lizard, who seemed to have just returned from the Darkness, was now starting his report to the Research Team.
"It took three hours and twenty-four minutes to clear."
"Ah, um. Section Chief. Now might not be the best time for details…"
"?"
"There are outsiders present."
The Research Team gestured towards the office, now thrown into chaos.
Nearly thirty injured children, a handful of government agents, and even the groaning Daydream Inc. staff lay scattered around the space.
"I see."
Even though Section Chief Lee Jaheon would have just seen, as usual, a room full of civilians instead of employees after clearing the Darkness, there wasn't a trace of disturbance on his face. Typical of the lizard that was him, really.
What bothered me, though, was that no one else had followed in after him.
'The researcher definitely said the D-squad had returned.'
But Section Chief Lee Jaheon was alone.
...Don't tell me the new hires all died in an instant?
Whatever my doubts, the interactions among Daydream Inc. employees continued.
"Um, Section Chief. The Dream Essence Collector, if you could bring it over this way…"
"Yes."
"Thank you…! Um, if you could just wait for a moment."
With the Mermaid Grave cleared, it was the first thing that needed to be handled.
After handing back the Dream Essence solution to the researcher, Chief Lizard looked around the unusually crowded Research Team area.
As his gaze swept the room… those blood-red eyes locked onto me.
"..."
No way.
'Ah, did he recognize me?'
But soon, the gaze moved on, and Chief Lizard silently walked into the center of the office and sat down on a meeting sofa.
…That meant he'd just walked in and sat right among the blood-soaked, contaminated children without batting an eye.
"Th-that spot…"
Even the Research Team was stammering.
His presence was so extraordinary and forceful, you could hear agents whispering to each other.
"…Agent. Do you know him, by any chance?"
"The lizard mask? No. But if I'd seen him even once before, I'd never forget him."
Agent Choi also seemed to be seeing him for the first time.
Um, that made sense.
Section Chief Lee Jaheon, or rather Employee D, was a character who would first appear when the Dark Exploration Records got bigger and anomalous gag (joke) clears became acceptable amongst the community.
'You could say his exploration records don't really overlap with Agent Choi's, who was active mostly in the early days.'
Even the kids who'd just received first aid and regained their energy were sneaking glances at the man in the lizard mask.
It would've been nice if things had just ended there.
But as time passed, the number of 'kids who'd regained their energy' kept increasing, so…
"Excuse me. Are we going to see my mom now?"
"I, I wanna go to the bathroom…"
"Subin is hungry!"
The relatively uninjured kids started looking around and then began raising their hands to speak.
Even though they'd had horrific experiences in the Twinkle Twinkle Ocean Palace, because it was all inside that fairytale-like hallucination, they hadn't lost their innocence.
On top of that, being left injured on the uncomfortable office floor, it was impressive the kids had held out this long without a word.
"I need to pee…"
But with this, the researchers now had the perfect excuse to lure kids away one by one. Damn it.
Any minute now, the researchers would probably start saying things like, 'Let's take you to the bathroom, let's take you to the cafeteria,' and try to separate the kids into groups.
The agents would certainly stick with them like glue, but the problem was, there would always be some kids left behind, which meant they'd get split up.
'If the agents are separated one by one, it'll only get harder to deal with the Daydream Inc. employees.'
As it was, the agents were already at their physical limits, covered in bruises from head to toe.
This obvious setup wasn't lost on the agents either. Their expressions had grown subtly colder.
If that's the case… there's no other way.
'We'll have to make the first move.'
And the safest employee here is…
'Only I know that.'
Holding back a sigh, I whispered to one of the kids who said they wanted to go to the bathroom.
"Really? Do you know where it is?"
"Yeah."
With that, the kid shot up and shyly grabbed the pants leg of someone nearby and asked,
"Excuse me, Ahjussi. Where's the bathroom…?"
"…!"
Section Chief Lee Jaheon.
The lizard-faced man sitting on the sofa blinked and looked back at the child.
"Kids, just a moment…"
Before Agent Choi could say anything, I egged the other kids on.
"Do you wanna go too?"
"Yeah!"
"Me too!"
Kwak Jaekang was gone, and all the familiar employees had disappeared for treatment and interviews.
On top of that, half my face was still covered in ulcer scars and necrosis, so the odds of anyone recognizing me were extremely low.
'As long as I act properly, it'll be fine.'
Blending in among the kids, I went up to Section Chief Lee Jaheon and asked as much like the other kids as I could,
"Ahjussi, can you take us to the bathroom?"
"Yes."
The kids who had gathered around me looked up at him with shining eyes.
"Are you going to show us the way?"
"Yes."
And as soon as Section Chief Lee Jaheon stood up, the children finally burst into giggles and clung to his thighs and back.
"Wow!"
Only then did I give the two agents a small nod.
It was a signal that if anything went wrong along the way, I'd shout and alert them to danger.
Agent Bronze seemed to realize that I'd picked the 'safest' employee, and though his expression was complicated, he stayed silent and did not intervene.
"Let's go!"
In any case, thanks to this, Section Chief Lee Jaheon started walking down the hallway with about six or seven children in tow, just like a pied piper lizard.
.
.
And fortunately, there were no other incidents until we safely finished using the nearby restroom.
'Phew.'
After helping the children who were too young to use the bathroom alone, I washed my hand with cold water at the sink to try to collect myself.
'It really is inconvenient having only one hand.'
And now that I was using this familiar company restroom again, it felt like my mind might float away.
'I just want to collapse into a bed…'
Suppressing my fatigue, I finished washing my hand.
Section Chief Lee Jaheon quietly came up next to me.
No way, was he going to look after me just because I was a child…
"Mr. Roe Deer."
I almost struck the lizard head with my remaining hand.
"Anti-eavesdropping equipment is currently active. This conversation will not leak outside."
Phew.
With a trembling hand, I turned off the faucet and lowered my voice.
"How did you recognize me? I mean, I don't even have an arm anymore, and my age has changed…"
"? Yes. You have been determined as the same person through the change in age and loss of limb."
"..."
Let's just move on.
He's a reptilian alien who fires holy bomb barrages, so maybe he has other methods of analysis…