Chapter 142

Director Go’s face had a long wound running across the space between his brows.

It was a wound made when the glasses crushed under 「Alpha」’s foot scratched his face.

Director Go, who had acquired a pirate-like scar in that brief moment, asked back in half-disbelief.

“A monster in the shape of one of our agents killed me…….”

“That is correct.”

“And the Deputy Director was badly wounded, so he left first…….”

“Yes.”

“Then did you two come back to look for me……?”

“…….”

“…….”

Director Go’s two eyes grew strangely moist.

A middle-aged man lost in emotion was more burdensome than I had imagined.

All the more so when it was a superior who had been difficult to get along with because of his extremely sensitive temperament.

Perhaps Kwon Mu-seop also felt some kind of aversion, because he suddenly pushed my back and said,

“Agent Seo Do-un was the one who first said we absolutely had to bring you back, Director.”

So this is how you’re going to play it……?

Go Hong-sang’s watery eyes turned toward me.

So I took half a step back again and added,

“No. Manager Kwon Mu-seop was deeply worried about you, Director, and I merely went along with him.”

Director Go’s gaze shifted back toward Kwon Mu-seop.

Then Kwon Mu-seop smiled with difficulty and countered my words.

“It was Agent Seo Do-un’s decision. Please praise Agent Seo Do-un.”

“Manager Kwon Mu-seop would have gone looking for you even if he had been alone.”

“Agent Seo Do-un never turns away from someone in trouble.”

“I merely followed Manager Kwon Mu-seop’s guidance.”

“Hah, you people…….”

As we fiercely passed the credit back and forth, Director Go covered the corners of his eyes with his hand and sighed.

Then he made an ominous and uncomfortable sniffling sound.

“I did not even treat you well…….”

Director Go began a grand self-reflection all on his own.

Director Go, who had already suffered abandonment anxiety, seemed extremely moved by the fact that we had come to look for him.

It was from that moment on.

That Director Go’s gaze toward us became unnecessarily affectionate.

It was truly a burdensome matter.

---

After safely reuniting with Director Go, we took some time to readjust our condition.

I wiped the blood off various parts of my body, found my wounds, and treated them.

While I was disinfecting the nail marks on my neck, Kwon Mu-seop came beside me to get an adhesive bandage and said furtively,

“The Director might join S.O.C.H. too.”

“…….”

See this? I’m not suspecting them for no reason.

S.O.C.H. was clearly propaganda for the managers to control the Bureau, and now they were even trying to co-opt the Director.

I glanced toward Director Go, thinking, surely not.

As if he had been waiting, Director Go smiled benevolently.

Director, so you were the type whose arm bends fiercely inward toward your own people…….

“He seems to be looking at you more warmly than me, Manager.”

“No way. He probably still has a lot of complaints about me.”

“My image is also the worst.”

“That might make you even more charming.”

“…….”

A character who threatens to abandon you, then comes to save you at the moment of real crisis.

There was certainly demand for that.

Unable to deny this fact, I pressed my mouth shut and smiled.

Director Go had become extremely cordial, as if he had already forgotten what had happened before.

It was clear that his heart had opened wide toward us.

It was a good thing.

In this situation, he probably would not clash with us over every single thing as before.

The only minor problem was that Director Go, like most of S.O.C.H., was currently mistaking me for a good person.

Director Go seemed to be misunderstanding that I had come back for warm reasons such as sympathy, pity, and conscience.

So it seemed he wanted to give me warm and toasty feelings in return, like gratitude, affection, and solidarity…….

I was sorry, but I had no desire to have that kind of emotional exchange with Director Go.

To be more honest, I did not particularly want to have that with most other people either.

In the first place, my action had been for myself, not for Go Hong-sang or Kwon Mu-seop.

Because it had happened immediately after I spoke about “sympathy, pity, and conscience.”

Because betraying the words I had said only a few hours earlier, without any trigger or incident, felt extremely uncomfortable.

I generally liked both good characters and evil characters in novels, but I could not feel well-disposed toward a convenience-driven character the author wrote carelessly, making them go this way and that.

When I saw a character that clearly showed the author was lost, I even felt a faint disgust. If it was a book already published, I would close it immediately, and if it was a manuscript I was proofreading, I would number every passage involving that character and demand consistency from the author.

A character whose words and actions jumped wildly from page to page was as painful as a sentence whose subject and predicate did not agree.

I had a kind of obsession with consistency, and I could not stand it when a contradiction like that appeared in myself.

Of course, reality overflowed with inconsistent people.

There was no need to look far.

Director Go’s enemy was Director Go, and Director Go could be refuted with Director Go.

Even so, I had no desire to criticize him for that.

For some people, that inconsistency itself was consistency.

When I saw such people, honestly, I wanted to congratulate them.

In some sense, you must be able to live comfortably in this world.

On the other hand, some people felt inconsistency and contradiction like physical pain, and if they did not correct them, they suffered as if they had left an incorrect sentence alone.

And it seemed I belonged to the latter group.

Of course, the range of my cognition and perception was not perfect, so there might be contradictions I did not know about.

But at least within the range I recognized, things had to be handled consistently.

If they could not be, I suffered.

So this was a means for me to avoid pain.

Sending affectionate looks toward someone like me was not particularly appropriate.

But that did not mean I could go to Director Go or S.O.C.H. first and explain myself.

If someone questioned my actions and my character first, I was willing to answer honestly.

On the other hand, going to people who were not thinking much and explaining, “Actually, I am a selfish bastard who only cares about the consistency of my own personhood and has no real interest in other people,” would simply make me an utter madman.

So today too, leaving the misunderstanding alone, I faced it by myself.

My own inadequacy that others did not know.

THUMP—!

At that moment, a white pillow fell heavily onto my lap.

“……?”

Startled, I lifted my head and saw Manager Kwon Mu-seop standing before me.

“Tired?”

“No, I am still all right.”

It seemed that me thinking alone had looked like I was spacing out.

I shook my head, but Kwon Mu-seop did not listen and spread a blanket beside me.

“Lie down for a while. Let us get some sleep before we move.”

Where did he suddenly get this from?

I looked around in confusion and found a linen cart not far away.

It seemed he had taken out whatever he could see from there.

On top of that, Director Go was already lying in cozy bedding.

“Are we allowed to use this?”

“Yes, it is fine. It is not a liquid; it is cotton fabric.”

Kwon Mu-seop answered my question calmly.

“In the past, everyone wanted to explore 「Hotel」 because of this. If you were tired, you could go into a guest room and sleep in a bed.”

“What?”

“Why, it is much better than sleeping on a bare floor or camping outside. During the moon-exploration days, the stay times were long too. So when people got assigned to explore 「Hotel」, they used to be happy, saying they were going on a hotel staycation…….”

Are these people truly insane……?

Compared to these people’s madness, my compulsion probably did not even qualify as an illness.

“Manager, have you come here often too?”

“Yes. In the past, I came in and out often.”

“Then could we possibly meet the old Kwon Mu-seop team here?”

“……There is a possibility, I suppose?”

For some reason, Kwon Mu-seop muttered as if troubled by my words.

“Probably with the odds of finding a needle in a desert. Besides, would it not be dangerous if we did run into them? They might misunderstand us as an abnormal phenomenon and attack, or realize that they themselves are fake and lose it again.”

True, that made sense.

While I silently accepted it, Kwon Mu-seop muttered low beside me.

“Still, I would be glad to see them if I did.”

---

We decided to rest for exactly 2 hours.

After sleeping first for an hour, I woke and sat with my back against the wall beside the sleeping Kwon Mu-seop.

Then I slowly looked back and forth between both ends of the corridor.

After sleeping even briefly and waking up, my body felt considerably lighter.

Once the rest ended, we would have to find the fitness center again and turn the revolving door.

It was a situation somewhat similar to when I had been isolated on 「Island」 with Team Leader Cha.

Still, here, we only had to open and close a door without needing to break through a zone, so it was much easier.

The problem was that bastard 「Alpha」, who might have completely run away or might be hiding and targeting us…….

Even so, we could not give up the escape route of “escape through 「Hanged Shadow」” because of that bastard.

Among all 「Hotel」 Special Zones so far, there had never been an escape route as low-risk and stable as this one.

Furthermore, 「Hotel Where Shadows Grow」 had lasted for no less than 3 years and 8 months.

Compared to other Special Zones, which lasted 2 years at most and half a year at the shortest, it took up a fairly high proportion of time.

That meant the probability of it appearing was also high.

So we had no choice but to keep cycling through the fitness center while being careful of 「Alpha」.

I looked to the right side of the corridor, then back to the left.

No abnormalities.

The fully lit hotel corridor was quiet.

I turned my head from the left back to the right.

Likewise, no abnormalities.

The empty corridor of a high-end hotel called forth a sense of stillness.

My gaze moved from the right back to the left.

Something was standing at the end of the corridor.

“……!”

I flinched and raised myself.

What is that?

A person? A man.

A man stood there with his shoulders drooping.

Moreover, that man was wearing the Bureau’s dark gray combat uniform.

It was not 「Alpha」.

The difference in physique immediately distinguished them.

Then what is that? No, who is that?

I lowered my gaze to its feet.

It was not standing with its feet planted on the ground.

With only the tips of its toes lightly touching the floor, it was floating in midair.

Damn it……!

I hurriedly shook Manager Kwon Mu-seop.

When I shook his shoulder and woke him, Kwon Mu-seop opened his eyes immediately.

Before raising himself, Kwon Mu-seop looked at me once, then followed my gaze and turned his head toward the far side of the corridor.

Then he slowly sat up.

“Its toes are floating.”

I whispered low to Kwon Mu-seop.

A human with floating toes.

They were dangerous entities of the kind that burst at the slightest touch.

“It is only standing still and not approaching us.”

But for some reason, that thing was not moving.

The one we met in the lobby had actively driven us back.

“Ha…….”

Kwon Mu-seop, who had been quietly listening to me, suddenly let out a sigh.

Had he recognized who it was?

I took my eyes off that entity and looked back at Kwon Mu-seop.

But Kwon Mu-seop’s expression was strange.

Kwon Mu-seop stared endlessly at that thing like a man who had seen a ghost, then groaned as if he had forgotten the rules.

“Lee Seop…….”