Chapter 132

“Do-un, step on me and go toward the door!”

“Yes……!”

As Kwon Mu-seop said, I used his body as a foothold and headed toward the entrance.

But even standing with my foot planted on Kwon Mu-seop’s shoulder, there was still more than 1 meter left to the door.

After hesitating, I threw my body toward the bathroom beside it.

Then I hooked my upper body over the bathroom wall and barely crawled up.

“Manager!”

I stretched out my arm and pulled Manager Kwon Mu-seop up into the bathroom too.

Using the bathroom wall as the floor and looking below, I saw that Director Go Hong-sang and Deputy Director Kim Seon-ung were barely hanging on to the TV on the wall.

A wall-mounted TV.

It was a structure nowhere near enough to support the weight of 2 people.

“This is…….”

Kwon Mu-seop, who had become urgent, climbed up the entrance shoe cabinet like he was rock climbing.

The bathroom and entrance were almost attached, so it took no time to reach the front of the door.

Clack— clack—!

But the door did not open.

Kwon Mu-seop pushed the door upward with one hand, then, seeming to decide this would not work, called me.

“Do-un, come up and open the door!”

I clasped the hand Kwon Mu-seop held out.

Kwon Mu-seop pulled me up in one smooth motion and seated me on his back.

Then he spread his arms and legs wide against the outer wall and supported me.

While riding on Kwon Mu-seop’s back, I pushed the door with my shoulder.

Mocking my hope that it would open, the door was absurdly heavy.

Rattle— rattle—!

The door only shook and would not lift easily.

On top of that, what I was standing on was Kwon Mu-seop’s back, so I could not properly apply strength.

“It is all right, so push with everything you have!”

Perhaps noticing my hesitation, Kwon Mu-seop shouted.

Damn it, yes. Dragging this out will only waste stamina!

I ignored the strange feeling under my feet and pushed the door with all my strength.

“Uuugh……!”

Flung open—!

The door gradually gave way, then suddenly opened.

CRASH—!

“Ugh…….”

I tumbled onto the corridor floor as I was.

What is this? Did gravity come back?

I awkwardly stayed on my knees on the floor for a moment, then looked back toward the guest room.

Manager Kwon Mu-seop was still holding on by pushing against the wall and shoe cabinet with both legs.

“Hah……!”

I hurriedly came to my senses and first flung the door completely open.

Thak—!

Meanwhile, Kwon Mu-seop got out of the guest room on his own.

Then he immediately shouted to me.

“Do-un, wire!”

I passed the wire to Kwon Mu-seop, and Kwon Mu-seop unspooled it while shouting toward the guest room.

“Deputy Director!”

The Director and Deputy Director were still holding on around the middle of the guest room.

I was standing upright, while people were falling sideways before my eyes.

My sense of direction became tangled.

On top of that, a considerable amount of the space had already been sucked in, and about half the guest room had lost its form and only the colors remained, slowly swirling.

When the wire came down from above, the Deputy Director shouted to the Director.

“Director, climb up first!”

“How am I supposed to do this barehanded……!”

“If you only hang on, we will pull you up!”

When the Director was at a loss, Kwon Mu-seop shouted.

Then, while taking off his outerwear, he spoke to me too.

“Do-un, help pull from behind.”

Kwon Mu-seop, who had been in full dress uniform, also untied his necktie and wrapped it around his hand.

Then he sat in front of the door and braced both feet on either side of the doorway.

With his posture fixed like that, he began pulling up the Director, who was hanging from the wire.

But what is this?

The Director was far heavier than expected.

Director Go Hong-sang was a gaunt man who looked like he might barely weigh 60 kilograms.

But even with Kwon Mu-seop pulling from the front and me adding strength from behind, he was not easily drawn up.

As if something were pulling from the opposite side.

Meanwhile, once his body became lighter, Kim Seon-ung began climbing the wall in large strides.

Deputy Director Kim Seon-ung climbed up with the momentum of a wild animal.

But the moment Kim Seon-ung grabbed the pillar on the wall.

CRACK—!

The pillar crumbled apart.

Damn it, it was not my imagination.

That sucking force really was growing stronger.

Whrrrrrr—!

On top of that, now it had even begun making a sound like wheels rolling.

Kim Seon-ung slid down along the wall, then stopped his fall with grip strength.

Then he leapt again and finally hung on to the doorframe.

“Do-un, help Deputy Director!”

I let go of the wire and pulled the Deputy Director in.

CRASH—!

Kim Seon-ung finally came out into the corridor and fell to the floor.

But there was no room to catch our breath.

While I helped the Deputy Director, Kwon Mu-seop was holding the wire alone in a state where the blood vessels in his head looked like they might burst.

We all hung on to the wire together.

Whrrrrrr—!

The Director, still inside the guest room, had his hair and clothes whipping wildly.

“Director!”

When the Director was pulled up to the entrance, the Deputy Director stretched out his arm.

The Director also reached out his hand, and the Deputy Director succeeded in grabbing the Director’s hand.

The Deputy Director pulled that hand out of the guest room in one smooth motion.

We all fell backward together, and the guest room, which had been eaten all the way to the entrance, had its door close by itself.

BANG—!

“Huff, huff…….”

I stared at the closed door while gasping for breath.

Fortunately, the phenomenon sucking in the space seemed not to cross that threshold.

“Whew…….”

I barely caught my breath and looked toward Manager Kwon Mu-seop.

But the atmosphere was strange.

Kwon Mu-seop and Kim Seon-ung stood frozen, saying nothing.

Director Go Hong-sang was nowhere to be seen.

On top of that, this smell of blood…….

“……?”

Wondering what had happened, I approached Kwon Mu-seop.

Then I froze in place with them.

The Deputy Director was holding an arm that had lost its owner.

Go Hong-sang’s arm, cut as if it had been trimmed with scissors.

“Huh…….”

Looking at that arm and the blood dripping from it, I went pale.

But the Deputy Director did not treat that severed thing carelessly and asked Kwon Mu-seop,

“Manager Kwon, what time is it right now?”

“Go Hong-sang’s time of disappearance is 14:08.”

Kim Seon-ung nodded and took off his outerwear.

Then he wrapped the Director’s arm in it.

“Director Go…… I cannot say it was good, but to think you would go like this…….”

Deputy Director Kim Seon-ung murmured with complicated feelings.

Kwon Mu-seop and I also could not continue speaking amid the shock.

It was then.

Flung open—!

The door to the guest room next door opened, and a man ran out.

“……!”

Startled, we looked back in that direction.

But…….

“Huff, huff……!”

The one who ran out from the guest room next door was none other than the Director.

It was Director Go Hong-sang, who had left behind only one arm with the Deputy Director and departed.

“……?”

We all stared at the new Go Hong-sang while frozen.

Go Hong-sang, breathing hard with a pale face, looked exactly the same as he had just before.

Even his arm was intact.

The Deputy Director looked back and forth once between the arm he was holding and the newly appeared Director.

Then he said without addition or subtraction,

“Mu-seop, grab that.”

“Yes!”

Kwon Mu-seop charged in as he was and seized Go Hong-sang.

“What are you doing?”

Go Hong-sang protested with a stern face, but Kwon Mu-seop paid it no mind and twisted his arm behind his back.

“Urgh……!”

After that, he took off his glasses and looked into his pupils, then even checked inside his mouth.

“……!”

Go Hong-sang was appalled by the humiliation of having his mouth forced open.

“There do not seem to be any unusual points.”

At Kwon Mu-seop’s report, Kim Seon-ung nodded.

Then he asked Go Hong-sang directly.

“Director, what is your vehicle number?”

“Deputy Director, I will not let this matter pass.”

“Director, you need to answer properly right now.”

Deputy Director Kim Seon-ung spoke in a calm voice.

As if having read a strange nuance inside it, Go Hong-sang reluctantly answered.

“……12 Ga 9XX9.”

“When did you take office at the Special Management Bureau, Director?”

“January 9, the year before last.”

“Where were you before that?”

“I was at the Government Performance Evaluation Office of the Office for Government Policy Coordination.”

Kim Seon-ung asked several more questions, then soon nodded to Kwon Mu-seop.

“It seems you may let him go for now.”

Kwon Mu-seop released the wrist he had been holding behind Go Hong-sang’s back.

Go Hong-sang glared fiercely at Kwon Mu-seop and rotated his wrist, where pale hand marks remained.

Kim Seon-ung asked that Go Hong-sang again.

“Director, why did you open that door and come out just now?”

“What do you mean, why? You people pulled me up, did you not?”

“Could you explain what happened before you opened that door and came out, in chronological order?”

“Deputy Director, if you are perhaps trying to use the current situation to pressure me…….”

Go Hong-sang murmured as if he would no longer be played with.

Director Go Hong-sang also seemed to be by no means an easy person.

However, Director Go was currently greatly misunderstanding the situation.

Instead of explaining this with words, Kim Seon-ung unwrapped the clothes he was holding.

When a blood-soaked human arm suddenly appeared, Go Hong-sang recoiled in horror.

“What is that……?”

“It is your arm, Director.”

“……What did you say?”

“The Director we tried to pull out of the guest room disappeared, leaving only this arm behind. We do not know where the body went.”

“Hah!”

Go Hong-sang snorted as if asking what nonsense that was.

Then he faintly frowned.

He was looking at the watch on the severed arm.

A watch exactly the same as the one he was wearing.

“You may check whether it is your hand.”

“Get that away!”

When Kim Seon-ung tried to show him the arm, Go Hong-sang recoiled sharply.

When Go Hong-sang strongly avoided it, Kim Seon-ung covered the arm with the clothes again and asked back.

“You know that the 4 of us were dragged into a Special Zone, correct?”

“……Yes, I know.”

“And that we were in a hotel guest room, and objects there began being sucked into one point?”

“I was the one who first discovered that.”

“I would like you to explain the situation after that.”

At Kim Seon-ung’s suggestion, Go Hong-sang sighed and opened his mouth.

“The phenomenon worsened, and people began being dragged in too. But Manager Kwon and that friend escaped first. They lowered a line for me, so I grabbed the line, and Deputy Director, you climbed out along the wall by yourself.”

“And after that?”

“I had nearly reached the door too, but the surroundings suddenly turned dark. So I opened that door and came out…….”

“Do you remember me grabbing your hand?”

“Grabbing my hand?”

At the words that his hand had been grabbed, Go Hong-sang reacted as if he were hearing it for the first time.

Kim Seon-ung also narrowed his brow and murmured.

“Only the final memory is absent……?”

Director Go, who evaporated before us, leaving only an arm behind.

And Director Go, who appeared intact with only a few seconds of memory erased.

What kind of phenomenon is this?

Is it the danger factor of this Special Zone?

A person returning alive is the danger factor?

I thought deeply, then suddenly remembered something.

“Deputy Director, may I look at the watch on that arm?”

At my request, Kim Seon-ung took the arm out again.

After hesitating briefly, I removed only the watch and took it.

“Director, could you show me your watch too?”

Go Hong-sang held out the wrist wearing his watch.

On it was the same luxury watch as the one I had just removed.

I placed the 2 watches side by side and compared them.

“There is a time difference.”

“A time difference?”

“Yes, the Director’s current watch is 13 seconds slower than the watch on that arm.”

At my words, everyone gathered and checked the 2 watches.

The second hands inside those watches were moving from different positions, just as I had said.

“It seems the current Director is ‘the Director from 13 seconds before his arm was cut off.’”