Chapter 44

“Get up, quickly!”

The skeleton masks threatened us, banging the walls and chairs.

The threatened people reluctantly stood.

There were 8 in that teddy bear gang.

There were only 5 people inside the theater.

Numbers were one thing, but it was too much for people who had suddenly been dragged here to resist an organized group.

In the end, the people were shoved by the skeletons toward the exit.

I also mixed in around the middle and moved with them.

CLANK—!

But the moment we came outside, we were trapped in some kind of iron cage.

Its width was so narrow that barely one person could stand in it.

Instead, the cage extended forward like a passage.

So the people who came out of the performance hall stood in a single line inside that cage.

Like cattle entering a slaughterhouse.

As the people fell into confusion, the man standing beside me shouted angrily.

“What are you doing right now? Who are you people, and where on earth is this?”

The man, who looked around 40, was wearing a suit.

But he did not look dressed up. He was only reasonably neat and quite worn down.

He seemed like a white-collar worker used to overwork.

At that man’s question, the teddy bear said arrogantly,

“Ah, wait a bit. I’ll tell you everything. First of all, this is a real situation. So listen properly, and first, everyone look this way!”

The people, including me, had no choice but to follow the instruction.

The teddy bear and skeletons began slowly examining the people trapped in the iron cage.

“Oh, found one.”

Soon, the teddy bear pointed to a woman.

The skeletons opened the middle door of the cage and dragged that woman out.

“Eek!”

“What are you doing?!”

At the woman’s scream, the man beside me flared up and shook the cage.

Then the teddy bear dragged the woman over and shoved her abruptly in front of the man.

“Ah, this mister is really noisy. Shut up and look.”

“Look at what…….”

“Don’t you see something weird? The eyes, see?”

At the teddy bear’s explanation, the man furrowed his brow.

A moment later, the man was startled violently and stepped back.

“See? What did I tell you?”

The teddy bear showed the woman’s face to me, who was beside him, as if boasting.

An ordinary frightened expression.

But the woman’s eyes were utterly black.

They were not simply black. There was no iris or pupil.

So it looked as if black Go stones had been embedded there instead of eyes.

That strangeness made chills run down my spine too.

As if satisfied with our reactions, the teddy bear pulled the woman back and said,

“If you’re wearing lenses, say so now.”

“Why are you doing this? Please let me go…….”

The woman twisted the shoulder he had grabbed and kept pleading.

Just looking at that sight, she was completely an ordinary person, so I felt even stranger.

The man beside me also seemed confused, because he grabbed the cage again.

Was our state pathetic to look at?

The teddy bear took a jackknife out of his pocket.

Then, with no hesitation, he brought it down on the woman’s head.

“Take this.”

THWACK—!

It made the sound of a watermelon splitting.

The jackknife sank in far too easily, and only the handle was left sticking out from the side of the woman’s head.

“You crazy bastard……!”

The man shouted in fury.

But that lasted only a moment.

At an impossible-to-ignore sense of wrongness, the man froze again.

The woman did not collapse.

A single line of blood flowed down, then stopped.

With the knife still lodged in her head, the woman whispered in the same pitiful voice as before.

“Please send me home…….”

The man beside me finally screamed.

---

■ Precautions within 「National Theater That Roots Out the Fake」

[After Viewing the Performance]

1. Find the 「Fake Human」 before leaving the performance hall.

There will be several more citizens in the performance hall who were dragged here like you.

However, there is no guarantee that they are all human.

In this place, 「Fake Humans」 that imitate humans exist.

Their outward appearance is almost the same as humans, but if you examine them closely, you can identify prominent defects.

You must root them out within the performance hall.

If you leave the performance hall together with them, a very dangerous situation may occur.

■ Major Characteristics by Which 「Fake Humans」 Can Be Identified

① Fingernails that are too hard

② Hair with a texture like nylon thread

③ Eyes made of a single material, with no iris or pupil

④ Skin through which blood vessels or tendons do not show

⑤ An empty skull

※ The degree of precision differs by 「Fake Human」 entity. Entities that have corrected all of the above defects also appear from time to time, so please exercise caution until the final verification.

---

This too was something the Bureau had already identified.

But the brochure I saw earlier did not have this part.

Instead, there were only traces that part of the brochure had been cut out sharply.

Judging by the reaction of the man beside me, it seemed this person knew nothing about 「Fake Humans」 either.

Damn it, why?

If this teddy bear gang had deliberately cut out part of the Survival Rules, the problem became complicated.

CLACK—!

The skeletons put handcuffs on the 「Fake Human」 in the form of a woman.

“You saw that, right? There are monsters pretending to be people here, you know? We’ll find them for you, so everyone listen well. Got it?”

The teddy bear spoke like a class president and examined the people inside the cage again.

He made them move their fingers, touched their hair, and even looked inside their mouths.

“Wow, why do you have so many teeth?”

Another one among us, no, another entity, was rooted out.

Behind a neat row of front teeth, it had 32 canine teeth.

That one was dragged out too, and now there were 3 left, including me.

Me, that man, and an old man.

Perhaps because he could no longer find them by outward appearance alone, the teddy bear pointed to the man beside me and said,

“In order, name, age, where you live, and what you do now. You first, mister.”

The man, who had been stiff, confessed obediently, as if exhausted by the situation before his eyes.

“Choi Sang-eun. 41 years old. Gangdong-gu, Seoul. Reporter.”

“Reporter?! Wow, guys, he says he’s a reporter!”

The teddy bear fussed excitedly, like a child.

“Do reporters make a lot of mone…… y?”

But that fuss ended as a question.

The teddy bear looked Choi Sang-eun up and down.

Choi Sang-eun looked extremely tired and was wearing a badly wrinkled suit.

“Mm, well, still, I guess you make as much as an ordinary person. But Choi Sang-eun? Your name kind of feels unpleasant. Whatever, next?”

The teddy bear pointed at me.

I hesitated briefly, then spoke in a reluctant tone.

“Park Hyeon-jin. 28 years old. Seocho-gu, Seoul. Preparing for employment.”

The contaminated person who had seized this place must mean this teddy bear.

So I gave a suitable false name and job.

I did not know what level these bastards’ information-gathering ability was, but saying my name exactly as it was, when it had already entered the Bureau organization chart, was dangerous.

Fortunately, the teddy bear moved on without much suspicion or verification.

“Good, good. Next.”

“Im Jong-hak, I’m 70, and I live in Nowon-gu……. I retired, and I just do small work to pass the time…….”

“Hmm, you all seem human, so shall we go straight to the closed-room test?”

Closed-room test?

I flinched at the teddy bear’s words.

But there was no way to resist.

Acting like I knew anything here would be the same as advertising that I belonged to the Bureau.

“All right, move as you are!”

At the teddy bear’s words, the skeletons pushed the cage trapping us.

When the bottomless cage moved, we had no choice but to be pushed along and walk.

Before long, we passed the theater lobby and arrived at an area with offices.

The skeletons opened an office door and also opened the entrance to the cage.

Then they aligned the two entrances and made a passage.

What is this? I am like a chicken being moved in a chicken coop.

“Enter.”

The teddy bear spoke cheerfully in a historical-drama style, but we did not move easily.

I knew that office was empty.

But the others did not.

Moreover, since they had just come out after a horrific experience in the performance hall, their wariness of unfamiliar spaces had reached its peak.

“What is inside there……?”

Im Jong-hak asked in the slow tone particular to old people.

One might expect him to be a little polite to an elder, but the teddy bear was only defiant.

“Nothing. You just go in and come out.”

“Then why are you telling us to go in…….”

“Aaah, grandpa, seriously! Just do it when I tell you to!”

When the teddy bear grew irritated, the skeletons behind us pushed the cage.

As the folding cage folded, the space gradually vanished, and we were eventually shoved into the office.

Inside was truly an ordinary office.

Work desks stood in rows, and partitions divided the space.

The problem was not this office, but the “closed-room test” mentioned earlier.

Pretending to examine the space, I put as much distance as possible between myself and the others.

Toward us, the teddy bear shouted through the gap in the door.

“Well then, good luck!”

Click—

The door closed.

“…….”

“…….”

“…….”

An awkward silence continued.

Had about 3 minutes passed like that?

The door opened again, and the teddy bear poked his head in.

“Oh, you aren’t fighting? Reporter mister! You come out.”

The teddy bear singled out the reporter, Choi Sang-eun.

Choi Sang-eun glanced at me and Im Jong-hak, then went outside the office.

The door closed, and the office became a closed room again.

Now the only ones trapped here were me and Im Jong-hak.

“Excuse me, I have something to say…….”

Im Jong-hak suddenly spoke with a serious face and took a step.

So I said firmly,

“Don’t come this way. Say it from there.”

“I’m worried they might hear outside…….”

Despite my refusal, Im Jong-hak slowly approached.

The old man’s anxious expression did make me pity him, but I warned him again.

“Stop first.”

“It’s a really important story.”

“No, still, don’t come closer.”

But Im Jong-hak did not stop.

Now he did not even answer, only walked unsteadily.

At the ominous feeling, I raised my voice.

“Don’t come!”

At my shout, Im Jong-hak abruptly stopped.

Did he understand me?

Had what he just did been because he was simply confused?

The instant I thought that.

Im Jong-hak, who had been standing stock-still, lunged at me like a beast.

His pupils had vanished, and both his eyes were full of only the whites.

“……!”

---

■ Major Habits of 「Fake Humans」

① Cultivated in the Performance Hall

「Fake Humans」 are created in the performance hall together with new performances.

Therefore, they do not reveal their true nature inside the performance hall.

So be sure to root them out and subdue them within the performance hall.

② Human Predation

「Fake Humans」 eat humans.

To do so, they use hunting methods almost identical to humans, including acting, lies, seduction, setting traps, and coordinated activity among their own kind.

Human predation is their reason for existence, and the more humans they eat, the more precise humans they become.

Sometimes, they imitate the victims they have preyed upon, or people remembered by those victims.

③ Hunting Instinct

「Fake Humans」 do their best to hide their identity.

However, when their number is equal to or greater than the number of real people, they cannot suppress their true nature and set out to hunt.

---

I dodged the charging Im Jong-hak and ran toward the door.

RATTLE RATTLE RATTLE RATTLE—!

But damn it! The door was locked!

BANGBANGBANG—!

“Open the door!”

Just as I shouted desperately.

GRAB—!

The 「Fake Human」 that had been Im Jong-hak covered my back.

“Krgh……!”

It wrapped around my neck with unbelievable grip strength.

Then a cold, damp breath brushed the nape of my neck.

I strained with all my might to push it away, but it was no use.

“U-aaaagh……!”

Just when I thought I was about to be bitten like this.

CRASH—!

Without realizing it, I slammed it into the floor.

……Oh my?