Chapter 129

Kim Ji-an did not seem to be lying.

So the researchers first moved places and put Kim Ji-an in a protective suit.

“……You really want me to keep wearing this? I have to talk while wearing this?”

“Yeah.”

“Just in case.”

“It is hard to breathe in this…… It is too stuffy. Do I have to wear it?”

“It feels unpleasant.”

“For us.”

“No, no…… If you suspect something, please examine me. Is it over if you just make me wear this? Then what about me?”

“All right, all right.”

“We will measure your contamination level later.”

Kim Ji-an suddenly ended up left alone in a protective suit.

The researchers half-heartedly soothed that resigned employee.

The texture was a little different, but it seemed the Research Division also got along well, like the Field Division.

“I think it is a little embarrassing that I am the only one wearing this…….”

“It is all right. It does not look strange at all.”

“In any case, Ms. Kim Ji-an, you are saying you remember nothing? Tell Oh Tae-o to come here.”

The Head of the Research Division suddenly looked for Oh Tae-o.

The researcher beside them contacted him immediately, and meanwhile, Kim Ji-an groaned half air and half sound as she watched herself recorded on the Bureau’s CCTV.

“No, no…… What is this? Ah, I am so scared right now……!”

……The more I looked, the more she seemed like a different person.

The Kim Ji-an who had come to find me had felt restrained.

On the other hand, this Kim Ji-an seemed like someone who took honesty rather than restraint as a virtue.

“No, look, Senior. You know there is no way I would do this. If it were truly me, I would already have cried when Mr. Cha spoke like this…….”

“That is true.”

“So I thought you had come after steeling yourself firmly.”

It was while Kim Ji-an kept replaying the conference room CCTV footage of herself with Cha Si-eon and me.

Oh Tae-o appeared after being summoned by the Head of the Research Division.

“I told you it was not me…….”

And yet, the moment he arrived, he complained to the Head of the Research Division.

It seemed there was some story over there too.

Overall, everything was a tangled mess.

So the four of us, me, Cha Si-eon, Kim Ji-an, and Oh Tae-o, began a four-way meeting in that place.

First, Kim Ji-an spoke from inside the protective suit.

“I have not contacted Bureau employees at all recently. And that day, I left work exactly on time at my current job and went straight home. I was tired, so I lay down on the sofa for a moment before showering, and when I came to my senses, it was midnight. So I only thought I had dozed off.”

To Kim Ji-an, it seemed that day had simply been a tiring day.

But a few days later, an old superior had suddenly contacted her, and it seemed she had been questioned about an incident she did not even know about.

Startled by that, she had hurriedly appeared today.

Considering Kim Ji-an’s situation, I took over and continued speaking.

“That day, I met an acquaintance at a café in Mangwon-dong, Mapo-gu, and parted with them around 9 p.m. After that, I was waiting for Jae-gyeom to return, when Ms. Kim Ji-an came and spoke to me. Ms. Kim Ji-an told me Lee Sol’s current situation and the atmosphere among the Bureau higher-ups, that they were trying to dispose of Lee Sol.”

“There is no way I would know such things…….”

Kim Ji-an turned toward Cha Si-eon in bewilderment.

At that appeal from the protective suit, Cha Si-eon opened his mouth.

“I received a call from Kwak Jae-gyeom around 9:15 p.m. It was a report that Ms. Kim Ji-an had approached Mr. Seo Do-un, and I had both of them come in first. Since Mr. Seo Do-un was beside her, I could not ask Ms. Kim Ji-an about the detailed circumstances. Amid that, Acting Team Leader Oh Tae-o entered, so I had only assumed it was Acting Team Leader Oh’s doing.”

“No, I said it was not me…….”

When he was mentioned, Oh Tae-o again looked wronged.

“I only helped because Ji-an contacted me. I did not say anything first…….”

“Did you not find it strange that Ms. Kim Ji-an knew all our internal circumstances?”

“I thought she had just heard rumors from somewhere…… Like from Team Leader Jo Eun-bi…….”

“Oh Tae-o…….”

At Oh Tae-o’s lack of measures, the Head of the Research Division finally grew heated.

“Hey, you bastard. If you thought she heard rumors, you should have reported to me first! Why are you opening the quarantine area for her?!”

“Then should I leave Lee Sol to die……?”

“…….”

But Oh Tae-o was confident, as always.

Furthermore, he succeeded without much effort in making the Head of the Research Division into trash.

The Head of the Research Division was rendered completely speechless, and I used that gap to ask Oh Tae-o,

“Then Acting Team Leader Oh, was it not you who gave Ms. Kim Ji-an my going-out schedule?”

“No. In the first place, I learned that Agent Seo was going out through Ji-an…….”

“……When did you learn that?”

“The day before Agent Seo went out. Ji-an sent me an email. She said she would meet Agent Seo tomorrow and come in with him, so to show her Lee Sol.”

“No, I did not. I have never contacted you like that.”

“…….”

Oh Tae-o answered calmly, and Kim Ji-an denied it urgently.

Between them, my head went blank.

The day before I went out.

My going out this time had only been decided late the previous evening.

On top of that, I had shared my going-out schedule with the people around me the morning of that day.

“Acting Team Leader Oh, what time did you receive that email?”

“Hmm…… 9:03 p.m…….”

At Oh Tae-o’s answer, I felt a chill as if I had been hit with cold water.

This made no sense.

The time I had spoken with Author Na Bit on the phone was around 8:40 p.m.

My going out had been decided spontaneously then.

But only 20 minutes later, my going-out schedule had been shared through Oh Tae-o’s email.

This was not something Kim Ji-an could do.

Because at that point, the only people who knew I was going out were me and Author Na Bit.

But I had never sent Oh Tae-o an email, and there was no way Author Na Bit had done that either.

Then who remains now?

「Crow」, which watches my every move.

Other than that, I could think of nothing.

“Acting Team Leader Oh, why did you send me Lee Sol’s quarantine records?”

“Because Agent Seo asked me to send them…….”

“I did?”

“Ji-an said so. That Agent Seo needed them.”

“No, no……! It was not me…….”

Once again, responsibility floated into the air.

Kim Ji-an had not known anything about Lee Sol’s situation, so there had been no reason for her to step forward like that last week.

But Oh Tae-o opening Lee Sol’s quarantine area and sending Lee Sol’s quarantine records to me had all been Kim Ji-an’s demands.

“Haa…….”

I felt dry laughter pooling in my mouth.

It seemed that the fact Kim Ji-an’s pupils had looked especially black had not been my imagination after all.

The feeling that those black eyes resembled 「Crow」’s seemed not to have been merely my delusion either.

---

We gathered in one place and compared our stories, but we could not reach any particular conclusion.

We barely remembered that Kim Ji-an had once experienced a blackout similar to this while she had been at the Bureau.

But there was no further progress beyond that, and for now, the Research Division decided to measure Kim Ji-an’s contamination level.

They also decided to examine further where and how the emails said to have been exchanged between Oh Tae-o and Kim Ji-an had been sent, then contact us.

I conveyed the vague inference that the one who had controlled Kim Ji-an might be 「Crow」, as well as the color of Kim Ji-an’s eyes and the temperature of her hands while she had been controlled.

Afterward, as we left the research building, I asked Cha Si-eon,

“What kind of person was Ms. Kim Ji-an originally?”

“Exactly as you saw today. She was the sort to handle her assigned work properly, but somewhat…….”

“I will take it into account if you speak honestly.”

“She had a tendency to make a fuss. She did not converse efficiently, and when asked for the main point, she would become rapidly flustered, causing inconvenience in communication. And she was generally afraid of Field Division employees.”

……Taking that into account, perhaps Kim Ji-an was not inefficient in conversation, but ordinarily social.

So she had probably tried to make ordinary conversation with Cha Si-eon too, only to become flustered when Cha Si-eon asked only for the main point.

“But considering she was afraid, the way she addressed you sounded familiar.”

Mr. Cha.

It seemed like an address she had shortened because she had to call him often.

“That is because of Lee Sol.”

“Lee Sol?”

“When Lee Sol’s father was still at the Bureau, there was an incident where Lee Sol’s house burned down completely. At that time, Lee Sol’s family lived at the Bureau for a while for safety reasons.”

Lee Sol, just what kind of life have you lived…….

“At that time, the Research Division employees often played with Lee Sol, and because of that, there were also frequent occasions when she came face-to-face with me.”

So this is that thing where if there is a child, the adults become close too.

“Team Leader, when you saw Ms. Kim Ji-an last time, did you not feel anything strange?”

“I did not feel any particular sense of incongruity. There were not many words exchanged, and given the matter at hand, it was not that strange for her atmosphere to be different from before.”

“…….”

That was true.

The black-eyed Kim Ji-an had hardly spoken in front of Cha Si-eon.

The same had been true when we moved in the Bureau vehicle that had a dashcam.

When she was alone with me at the café, she had spoken a considerable amount.

If even that had been a deliberate action…….

“You said the one who controlled Researcher Kim Ji-an might be 「Crow」.”

“Yes. Though there is no basis yet.”

There was no basis, but my intuition was telling me so.

The moment I thought that, my spine turned cold again.

Thinking that 「Crow」 was watching even now kept making goosebumps rise on the back of my neck.

The behavior of Kim Ji-an, whom I suspected to be 「Crow」, was truly cunning.

To think it had informed me of Lee Sol’s situation and sent me the materials so that I would eventually jump into that problem.

I had felt this before, but 「Crow」 grasped my thoughts and actions far too well.

As if predicting my own future, which even I did not know.

If that was really the case, what was 「Crow」’s purpose in arranging this incident?

While I was struggling to digest the confusion, Cha Si-eon said beside me,

“If so, we may look forward to the 「Railway Station」 operation.”

At those words, I burst into laughter, even forgetting the seriousness.

If my inference was correct, an entity of a Special Zone had controlled a person in reality.

It had also infiltrated all the way inside the Bureau and disturbed people through that method.

It was an extremely serious matter, but he did not care about any of that. In any case, he was saying the 「Railway Station」 operation would go well.

His obsession toward his objective was remarkable.

It seemed this gentleman also had a firmly knotted unresolved grief.

Yes, let us think of it positively for now.

This operation had received 「Crow」’s approval.

Moreover, until now, there had been no instance of failure in anything 「Crow」 intervened in or intended.

So surely this time would be the same.

I ran my hope circuit like that and settled the confusion.

But the optimism I had painstakingly dragged together shattered before we even began anything.

The upper level denied permission for the 「Railway Station」 special operation.

And a few days later, an audit came down to the Special Management Bureau.