Chapter 249: Ch 249: RECOMMENDED PERSONNEL
Roughly ten days after an unprecedented incident in which, out of the blue,
two members of Black-Tortoise Team 1, two Daydream employees, and one
unidentified supernatural disaster all appeared unconscious at the Disaster
Management Bureau headquarters.
The principals of the incident gathered at a barbecue joint.
The slightly shabby place seemed like a long-beloved spot in an office-
district, buzzing with diners, but at the corner table where they sat a weary
hush prevailed...
They had only just regained a fragile calm.
"..."
"..."
Sizzle.
Meat hit the grill and began to cook. Three haggard faces traded polite
encouragements.
"Please, eat up."
"Yesyes, thank you."
Agent Choi briskly grabbed a piece off the grill and popped it into his
mouth.
You wouldn’t think of him as someone who had spent a full week surviving
only on water and liquid foods just to barely recover because he couldn’t
swallow anything.
It was a similar case with Assistant Manager Eun Haje as she cracked open
a soju bottle.
"Can’t even let you quit drinking, this job."
"Eh-hey, no matter what, a government agency can’t be the one to serve
alcohol. But at least the treatment was free, right?"
"If I start in on taxes here I turn into a real nuisance, yeah?"
"You do know your stuff, huh?"
Back when she was a newbie, she’d had her personal info exposed by an
agent she ran into inside a ghost story, so thanks to that, even in a grandma
getup she’d been identified as a Daydream employee.
After several days of interrogation and treatment, she’d been granted leave
on condition she accompany the agents.
Her gear had been confiscated by the bureau, but she’d been humanely
issued replacement equipment to fill her empty hands. Wearing gloves so
there wouldn’t be any electrical shocks, she picked up the tongs and flipped
the meat.
"Come on, Sir Highborn Geezer, you too."
"..."
Of the group, the one who looked the least worn-out was Agent Bronze, or
rather Ryu Jaekwan. He accepted the hanwoo with a complicated
expression.
He probably wasn’t just calculating whether the bill would skate under the
anti-graft law’s threshold. More likely, he was at a loss for how in the world
to handle this situation.
Indeed.
Every one of them had died. They were noosed and hanged at Sekwang
Station, and then woken up, and only just recovered from brutal aftereffects
to the point of being barely functional.
But they were still tormented by nightmares and eerie auditory
hallucinations, and only now were they properly taking stock of what on
earth had happened.
Because even inside the bureau it was difficult to talk openly about
Sekwang Special Metropolitan City.
"...It’s damn hard to collect intel on ’that area’. You agents turn up
anything?"
"You dig into that the wrong way and your memories will literally get
blown away~ You could say the way things are now is, for the moment, the
best-case scenario."
"By ’the way things are now’ you mean..."
"The bureau has classified our state as contamination. ...Since we went
through a well that hadn’t had safety checks in ages, we’ve been officially
judged to have been contaminated by an unidentifiable supernatural
phenomenon," Agent Bronze explained.
In other words, a vaguely stable condition.
Basically, they seemed to think Agent Choi had once again pulled some
reckless stunt and they’d ended up in an ’anyway, we escaped’ state...
Even for Daydream employees, the fact they weren’t being thrown straight
into the Glass Prison but allowed to live in this awkward, lax limbo
probably owed something to that view.
They were seen as having been dragged into it.
"We benefited a bit from the problem-child reputation on your side."
"Eyy~ sometimes things happen when you’re trying to save civilians.
’Challenging’ is such a nicer word. No need to be so harsh."
"Right, right. Please, have plenty of beef."
Then Assistant Manager Eun Haje flicked a glance to one side.
Not just her. Everyone’s eyes drifted the same way.
To the one presence at the table who couldn’t eat beef.
"...Next time, let’s make sure you get some."
Conditional acceptance
That would be me.
A being in the shape of a supernatural disaster, going by the codename
130666.
Amorphous flesh inside a gas mask, unable to put even a perfectly grilled
bite of hanwoo in its mouth...
For the record, the only reason I could even be here was because Black-
Tortoise Team 1’s team leader, the Elder, was using a dokkaebi trick to
distort the other diners’ line of sight in this restaurant.
The human body I’d gotten back in Sekwang Special City was nowhere to
be seen.
Because it had been a dream to begin with.
’Ha...’
So how am I still thinking like a person, you ask?
’They worked me to death to bring me back in line...’
Luck helped, too.
Thanks to the relief I now felt, even missing out on premium beef didn’t
feel bitter enough to make me cry.
’So... they said it was about three days after everyone woke up.’
Agent Bronze said that’s when he first heard about my condition.
About me, returned in a state of having completely lost my humanity.
– Did the visits go well?
"...Yes."
Ryu Jaekwan sat in the hospital ward and looked at his superior.
Showing the fastest recovery of anyone, he’d barely gotten approval for
visitation after a few days and was going around seeing people.
Thanks to that, he’d just come from visiting Falcon—the person he now
learned was named Eun Haje—fresh out of emergency treatment.
And he learned she could polish off an LA galbi lunchbox one-handed.
For someone sweating cold and complaining of a constant strangling ache
in the neck, it was an impressive attitude.
His superior in front of him, Agent Choi, was the same.
"Same statements all around. It seems what we went through... is best
treated as a ’dream’."
– OK haha
His superior was exhibiting contamination symptoms beyond PTSD, to the
point that he couldn’t even hold a spoken conversation. His neck was
covered with cloth so no one could look at it at all.
And yet, even lying in bed under a strict bed-rest order, his eyes flashed so
sharply it was as if you could hear his brain whirring, forever scheming.
Thanks to that, the moment the two of them realized they had experienced
the incident as a dream, they even managed to track down a certain ghost
story.
Who would have thought that one would be a ghost story connected to an
even larger, annihilation-sanctioned ghost story.
’And the mechanism was the same.’
Entry was only possible through a dream.
Of course, from the start the two agents had had a chilly hunch that the
Daydream employees Kim Soleum and Eun Haje were telling the truth
about Sekwang City.
But they had kept up a healthy suspicion that it might be false. But seeing
how things stood now, it seemed all too likely to be true... which was the
problem.
Sekwang Special Metropolitan City, recognition of which—erased. The
existence of that sealed, annihilation-sanctioned disaster zone.
...A place you enter in a dream, and yet the contamination you suffer on
’death’ in that place is off the charts.
’Huu...’
– Jaekwan-ie do you remember sekwang technical high school?
Worse, the superior before him wasn’t even the worst off among them.
Even setting aside those still unconscious.
...Just now, uncharacteristically hesitating a moment, the superior had
asked in writing.
– How’s grapes
"..."
Ryu Jaekwan’s expression dimmed slightly.
As if the intact human form they’d seen in Sekwang City had been a lie,
Kim Soleum...
...was formally classified as a full-fledged supernatural disaster.
Attempts at communication by Disaster Management Bureau personnel
were going nowhere. The entity simply kept repeating requests to be
returned to Daydream Inc.
It had not yet shown aggression, but if the return request continued to be
delayed, there was no telling what might happen. That was the bureau’s
present assessment.
– You did try purification on the basis that he was originally human right?
– It appears that entity will have to be transferred elsewhere.
"...Yes."
Ryu Jaekwan’s voice dropped.
"They say only some anxiety symptoms improved. Otherwise, there’s been
no progress."
"..."
None of the contamination-removal methods the bureau runs at
headquarters worked to strip the supernatural influence from Kim Soleum
and restore him to human.
...For three days, truly nothing.
Leaving Agent Choi’s room and stepping into the corridor, Ryu Jaekwan’s
thoughts sank, taut with anxiety.
’If so...’
...Maybe it was time he really said it.
That this bizarre entity had originally been Agent Grapes.
It wasn’t merely a matter of bad timing that he hadn’t reported it until now,
it was more that he’d considered Kim Soleum’s complicated position.
Daydream Inc. had turned a former employee, whom they had ordered to
infiltrate the bureau as an agent, into a supernatural being and was still
using him as staff.
The moment he reported that, word would inevitably travel up the chain.
’And then... who knows how Agent Grapes’ treatment would change.’
The bureau had grown used to choosing the lesser evil.
Like sifting out the wicked.
"..."
But as things stood, even that might be necessary...
They needed far more intensive, specialized purification.
’Maybe I should’ve said something from the start.’
It might have been the right thing even for the bureau’s greater good. As
Ryu Jaekwan’s thoughts tangled and mixed with the noose’s phantom
whispers...
"Oh, Ryu Jaekwan-ie. Visiting?"
"...!"
A tall middle-aged woman walking down the hall waved.
Ryu Jaekwan’s eyes widened.
"Agent Haegeum."
Team leader of Black-Tortoise Team 3.
The agent wearing the Four-Tiger Evil-Slaying Sword looked tired, as if
just back from a deployment, but still flashed a vigorous grin.
"I heard about it anyway. Tried to use the well and it blew up on you, huh?"
"..."
"There’s always a ton of trouble whenever Choi-ssi’s involved. With you,
too."
This case was a little different, but he couldn’t bring himself to deny it...
"I also heard Daydream employees were involved. That right?"
"...Yes, ma’am."
"Hm."
She tossed off her next words.
"Among them was a face I know."
"Pardon?"
"Well, maybe ’know the face’ isn’t quite right... since he’s wearing a gas
mask."
"...!!"
"Yeah. The one with horns and smoke seeping from the gas mask. He’s
security staff on their side. Looks like Daydream finally figured out how to
handle a supernatural disaster."
But how does she know that.
Just as Ryu Jaekwan’s thoughts began to cloud again.
Agent Haegeum rolled her shoulder.
"I should go see him."
"Why..."
"Because I’ve got something to give him."
And from that point, astonishing things began to happen.
Agent Haegeum’s visit.
Regarding the identity of the entity in question, she testified that it
was the being inside the supernatural disaster dubbed ’Cheerful
Theme Park’, a.k.a. the ’Flower Golden Mascot’.
She stated she’d encountered the entity in the field, and proposed an
item that might improve its condition.
Authorization has been granted to bring in a ’jade bell’.
But the attempt failed miserably.
Jade bell, destroyed.
A total of five jade bells decayed to the point of losing their shape, at
average intervals of 182 minutes; no improvement was observed in
the subject’s condition.
This repeats over two days.
As ’Failure’, ’Failure’, ’Failure’ keeps coming up, Agent Haegeum’s claim
that the very act of breakage is meaningful proves persuasive, leading to the
use of stronger equipment of the same type.
Authorization to use the Great Jade Bell of Divine Transcendence.
Treatment is carried out by leaning the subject against the resonant
panel and having them listen to the striking tones of a great bell rung
at the proper hour.
No doubt the aim was also to prevent indiscriminate consumption of the
smaller bells.
By this point, it was almost certain that if even this didn’t work, some other
measure would be taken.
But, surprisingly...
A change occurs.
The subject asks after the wellbeing of the others who used the well.
"...!"
Rational communication has become possible.
The entity’s mode of communication (letters formed in black smoke)
is the same, but personal exchange proceeds smoothly.
Afterward, bells are prescribed to maintain this state.
Ryu Jaekwan ends up going to Agent Haegeum to ask directly.
And she said nothing more.
...After that, word came that the bureau had reclassified the supernatural
disaster in question as a phenomenon and was exploring the possibility of
designating it a cooperating entity.
On that basis, Ryu Jaekwan completes a certain frightening inference.
Namely...
Jade bells are not intended for cleansing a human of contamination.
The same goes for the Great Jade Bell.
Of course it has some efficacy for purification, but its primary effect is
simply to steady the mind so one can reclaim one’s own identity.
– How did you do it??
– Let’s just say your basic premise was wrong.
Which means...
Did Agent Haegeum, from the outset, premise the treatment on the subject
being a nonhuman entity?
And the fact it worked means...
"..."
Ryu Jaekwan quietly swallowed that conjecture.
It was just idle speculation.
’Be grateful that Agent Grapes has come to his senses.’
He suppressed the urge to report his conjecture to Agent Choi.
And a few more days passed. Those who had experienced the well steadily
recovered from their condition and received a safety assessment from the
bureau...
Thus, a conditional get-together at a worn, weary salaryman’s barbecue
joint became possible.
* * *
I avoided Agent Bronze’s gaze, which felt like it kept darting between the
meat and me.
Please don’t misunderstand. I just can’t physically eat it...
"...Have you been supplied with enough bells?"
Affirmative :
7 units in total
"Understood."
Thankfully, the staring eased after that, not only from Agent Bronze but
from the others as well.
They made sure to include me in the conversation while eating well. I’m
jeal... No, that’s good.
It’s human nature for the mood to soften once food and drink are in play.
The same was happening here.
In the nearly closing-time lull of the barbeque place, as people recovered a
bit of energy, we arrived at the truly important main topic.
Namely...
Topic : Dolphin’s whereabouts
The biggest problem in the present situation.
"Right. Why exactly... hasn’t Assistant Manager Lee Seonghae woken up?"
"..."
"It’s been half a month already."
That’s right.
Assistant Manager Lee Seonghae was currently still asleep in the bureau’s
protection ward, in a coma.
I did explain what I’d done, but...
"That only makes it stranger. She should’ve cleared by escaping and woke
up, and yet she hasn’t."
...
My hand clenched.
’I shouldn’t have done that.’
At the thought that, without properly grasping the situation, I’d put
Assistant Manager Lee Seonghae in a bind, my mouth went dry.
Even though I don’t have a mouth.
In fact, even if she’d died of dehydration, by now she should have already
come out of the dream. The only reason she wouldn’t is if the train wasn’t
the way out.
Concern : Possibility of survival at location site
Method : Complete contamination state
"..."
Exactly that.
The worry is that she became fully contaminated and turned into a resident
of the ghost story.
And if rescue is delayed in that state... there’s a calamity that can happen
specifically because this is Daydream.
Potential risk : Resetting Employee Dolphin’s Points
"...!!"
"What exactly does a ’point reset’ mean?"
"For us, if someone’s been missing about a month, we assume they’re dead
and process them as resigned. For your side’s terms, I guess it’s like
’voluntary resignation’."
Assistant Manager Eun Haje gestured as she spoke.
"And then all the points they busted their ass to hoard to cash in a Wish
Ticket? Reset."
"...!!"
"Back to square one. All for nothing."
Huu...
"Well, I’ve heard you agents don’t believe in Wish Tickets... but from our
standpoint, it’s a truly horrific scenario."
"..."
Agent Choi didn’t agree outright.
But he did declare this much.
"In any case, rescue is needed. That’s our specialty."
However.
"Sir Highborn Civil Servant. No matter how much prep we do, we don’t
know how it’ll go. Don’t be so categorical."
...
That was true too.
We didn’t know how to break the nooses, and most of our gear was
rendered useless in that space.
’It’s difficult.’
Unless the person themselves were strong enough to survive even being
noosed and hanged...
Wait.
’Then what if we could physically rip it apart?’
And I knew of one lineup that could physically smash nooses and trees
alike.
A physical exorcist agent from the Dark Exploration Records.
Recommended personnel
"Oh?"
Recommended personnel :
Section Chief Lizard, D-squad, Field Exploration Team
"...?!"