GSGW c231

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Chapter 231

The silence settling inside the elevator weighs down heavily as the space descends.

Downward.

Into a distant abyss.

Toward Basement Floor 96.

“…You really pressed it?”

I did.

Without warning, I chose the option that leads into the farthest depths of this urban legend—into a layer so deep it can’t even be measured.

…It would be a lie to say I didn’t hesitate.

I still don’t have the confidence to face the dream incubator I came out of and keep my sanity.

But…

'Put another way, there’s nothing else I’m afraid of.'

Right now, I’m incapable of feeling fear.

If Braun is right, and my emotions will gradually recover along with my reason, then someday I’ll probably tremble in fear every time I explore the Cheerful Research Institute beneath the main building.

'Maybe it’s better to figure out what I can before that happens.'

Like a kind of preventive vaccine.

[Ah, the method of eliminating fear through repetition. A classic and well-proven learning technique…]

[Though there appears to be an entirely unexpected variable beside you.]

Ho Yuwon.

[That too may be part of the charm of a live broadcast, but if he’s inconvenient, why not simply abandon him? If you require the host’s assistance, I can lend a hand.]

……

No. For now, I’ll take him with me.

[Oh?]

'That employee ID badge is bothering me.'

The Cheerful Research Institute employee badge hanging from Ho Yuwon’s neck.

I glanced at it again.

Surprisingly, I had already seen an item with this exact design before.

In the Dream Cultivation Room underground—the place where the prototype incubator was. The card key carried by the dead employee there.

Researcher Yu Dwae

■■■

The parts that said “Cheerful” and the name had been crudely scratched out with a pen. I used it to activate the incubator.

It’s probably still stuck in that machine even now… unless someone else removed it.

'…Though I don’t know if I’d even be able to retrieve it.'

Still, it might be worth observing exactly what effect wearing that employee badge has inside this Cheerful Research Institute urban legend.

Ho Yuwon met my gaze. The brief surprise he’d shown when I pressed the button without hesitation was gone, replaced by another smile.

His face was still completely battered.

“I was really startled. Roe Deer, you’re quite brave.”

……

“With courage like that, I’m sure you’ll be a great explorer. I’ll do my best to follow along.”

What an incredibly irritating bastard.

I ignored him.

The elevator numbers—plunging downward at an unsettling speed—finally reached their destination.

Basement Floor 96.

Ding-dong. With the same cheerful notification chime as before, the doors opened.

And—

A peaceful corridor appeared.

"....."

From the offices came occasional sounds of laughter or cheerful keyboard typing… but that was all.

 It looked completely normal. Almost as if we had returned to Basement Level 2.

Which made it even stranger.

This shouldn’t be possible.

“Roe Deer?”

……

“Roe Deer, aren’t you getting off? It’s just a normal office corridor… Don’t tell me you’re scared? If you’re really scared, you can cover your eyes. I’ll give you a little push—”

Warning 1

Reason: Interfering with work (intentional)

Total Warnings: 1 / 2 until disciplinary action

“Huh? I was only trying to help… that’s really sad.”

Sigh.

“And I’m not sure you’ll actually be able to carry out disciplinary action properly. Earlier you failed, didn’t—”

Proof of successful disciplinary action:

: Check your own left face

/tn. I cackled so hard

Only then did he fall silent.

'Please just shut up…'

How could someone still act like that when half their face had been smashed in?

Anyways. Watching for dust on the floor and signs of movement near the office doors, I stepped forward.

Out of the elevator.

Step. Step.

I kept my footsteps as quiet as possible. I may not feel fear, but I still have caution.

Thick smoke wrapped around me.

'There’s definitely something here.'

Slowly, I walked to the end of the corridor.

…..

But in the peaceful corridor of the Cheerful Research Institute, bathed in sunset-colored light… There was nothing unusual at all.

Just a quiet office hallway.

“That’s really strange… don’t you think?”

I grabbed the handle of the office door that showed the least sign of activity.

“Oh. Shall we try going into that office? Though inside there might be—”

You hear the sound of a music box.

Ho Yuwon and I turned our heads at the same time.

But no one was there. Instead—

A wide-open door near the elevator caught our attention.

The emergency exit.

Under the emergency light, beyond the dark stairwell with no windows, something was coming out into the corridor.

Fire.

Flames were pouring from the emergency staircase into the office floor.

“..!!"

A loud alarm began blaring through the corridor.

And every office door opened.

“Ah.”

I immediately pressed myself against the wall. Beyond Ho Yuwon doing the same—standing tight against the corner—

Countless presences poured out from the offices.

The residents of the Cheerful Research Institute, invisible to explorers.

[Oh dear. In a fire, the basic safety rule is to escape using the stairs. However…]

[This time, that place is the path to death!]

That’s right.

The vibration of their footsteps—unable to reach the emergency exit—shook the corridor. Confusion, fear, panic…

Someone desperately tried to open a window—the frame creaked loudly. Someone else bravely ran into the bathroom, turning on the taps as if trying to bring water to fight the fire.

But most followed instinct.

[Oh! They’re running toward the elevator!]

Ding-dong.

The elevator doors opened. A brutal sound of bodies colliding inside echoed through the hall.

Then the elevator announcement sounded along with a warning tone.

—Capacity exceeded. Capacity exceeded…

Where would that elevator even go?

No—looking at it like this, it’s doubtful it could even depart safely.

The doors cannot close.

Even without seeing it, I can imagine it.

Researchers from the Cheerful Research Institute rushing toward the elevator, cramming themselves into the doorway, the warning alarm blaring as the weight limit is exceeded.

Slowly suffocating in front of it. Burning to death.

And then…

Soon I realized I didn’t need to imagine it at all.

Thud.

It began with a single body.

But as time passed, the number increased exponentially. Two, five, eight, fifteen…

Dead researchers from the Cheerful Research Institute.

They began appearing, filling both the elevator and the corridor.

'The dead…'

Because they are judged as objects.

And the corpses of the “entities of the Cheerful Research Institute”—those things once recorded in exploration logs as unknown beings that caused disappearances through mere contact, beings associated with terror and fear—

…now simply looked like ordinary people.

Broken fingernails scratching at the elevator doors, disheveled hair, two people collapsing in the corridor together after trying to block smoke from someone’s airway with a lab coat. Burning.

Until the very last one.

Until death.

“Roe Deer.”

……

“You can see them, can’t you? So you can see them after all.”

Ho Yuwon frowned slightly, smiling with what looked like sympathy.

“That’s really unfortunate, isn’t it?”

……

“But congratulations. You chose a good floor. Moving around the 96th floor will be much easier now.”

I realized I had regained another emotion.

Repulsion.

With a body no longer affected by poisonous gas or intense heat, I stood still and endured that feeling.

Together with the counselor from the Fox Counseling Room, who was likewise completely unharmed.

Hissssss.

The sprinklers finally activated.

Strangely enough, black water poured down.

It carried the metallic scent of fresh blood.

The flames in the corridor weakened slightly as the black water drenched them, and the charred office doors collapsed into the hallway.

The smoke thinned a little.

“Cough.”

A cough came from Ho Yuwon.

It sounded almost deliberate. Yet if you turned to look, not a single strand of his hair had been burned.

He looked completely unharmed for someone who had supposedly inhaled toxic gas and stood inside a fire.

So I asked the urban legend.

Question: The sounds made by the people evacuating

“Well… I’m sorry, but my hearing isn’t very good. And it seems they’re already all dead.”

……

Warning 2

Reason: Non-cooperation

Total Warnings: 2 / 1 until disciplinary action

“That’s really harsh…”

Do whatever you want.

I pushed myself off the wall and stepped into the scene of the Cheerful Research Institute’s disaster.

Squish.

…Something crunched beneath the sludge on the corridor floor.

[Sigh… To think my friend’s feet must touch such a filthy floor.]

It doesn’t matter. I’m not afraid.

Where should I start?

I looked out across the burning Cheerful Research Institute—windows shattered, walls scorched away, the insides of offices exposed.

The view was so open it was almost like a single space.

Which is why my eyes immediately caught it. There. Beyond the collapsed wall on the right, past a door that had once been locked—a transparent cylindrical device.

A dream incubator.

There’s a dream incubator here.

I, I, I-I-I, I had to check it. I think I had to. But it’s difficult. Because my body was inside the incubator—

“Roe Deer.”

Roe Deer?

“That doesn’t look like the incubator you were cultivated in.”

……

Ah.

“It’s broken.”

I staggered upright.

At some point, I had nearly collapsed to the floor.

Beside me, Ho Yuwon brushed ash from his hair while tidying his clothes, then politely bowed and extended a hand.

“You sank down. You must have a lot on your mind.”

I stood up without taking his hand.

Ho Yuwon looked disappointed, though I already knew he wasn’t actually feeling that emotion.

Instead, watching the remaining flames slowly begin to spread again through the corridor, he asks:

“Ah. Were you perhaps worried that the fire might spread through the elevator to other floors?”

……

Negative

No.

I never worried about that.

To begin with, the floors aren’t connected. Because…

Reason: Separate timelines

“...!"

Right.

Do you remember? Every floor of the Cheerful Research Institute has exactly the same layout.

To an absurd degree—even some of the marks on the walls match.

This was something the security chief mentioned before. And he had made a guess back then as well.

—The same offices… The layout and even the wallpaper are identical, so it has to be the same place… but… it feels like… the time period is slightly different.

“Oh. So you knew that much already?”

No.

Actually, I didn’t stop there.

Based on that testimony, I formed a hypothesis before entering.

[Indeed!]

If all the underground floors are projections of different time periods of the same space—

And if that space is part of the Cheerful Research Institute—

Then descending further underground wouldn’t simply make the scenery stranger.

'The deeper you go… the more important moments of the Cheerful Research Institute might appear.'

[Oh?]

Because a pattern is visible.

First, the lower floors.

'The institute there has very few people, or it’s some odd time outside normal working hours.'

Lunch breaks, vacation season, after work.

'But the deeper you go, the more work-related themes appear.'

Once you reach the middle layers, the tone becomes obvious. Celebration, debate, and the number of people increase.

So what would the deepest layers show?

Looking at the pattern, the answer is obvious.

'Moments more closely tied to work. More intense moments.'

The core events of the Cheerful Research Institute’s operations.

If that’s the case, then this situation can be interpreted the same way.

[This fire is an extremely important incident tied to that toy shop’s work…]

[Is that what you’re saying, my friend?]

Exactly.

And we already know very well what kind of work the Cheerful Research Institute does.

'Developing recreational urban-legend products.'

For a place like that to end up like this because of a normal fire would be strange.

So perhaps this fire isn’t natural at all. Perhaps it was caused by an urban legend itself.

A catastrophic event that determined the fate of the Cheerful Research Institute.

And when I recall the experimental log that summoned me…

This will probably be the final research of the Cheerful Research Institute.

Which means the probability that it’s connected to why they summoned me is high.

'Remember this.'

After taking a mental deep breath, I slowly walked toward the broken dream incubator.

Then I reached out to the place I remembered.

The card key registration slot on the incubator.

Click.

The card key slid out of the slot, revealing an intact employee badge.

Cheerful Researcher

Lee Heoun

……

What?

“Oh? That name… it’s the same as the employee sent to the Supernatural Disaster Management Bureau, isn’t it? Jang Heoun, right?”

I turned my head.

“And it’s also the same name as this year’s new recruit, isn’t it? Kim Heoun, I think.”

Ho Yuwon was smiling.

…And I realized.

The person who knows the whereabouts of the spy dispatched to the Supernatural Disaster Management Bureau better than anyone—and can contact them.

Someone who also has access to all the profiles of this year’s Field Exploration Team recruits.

And someone who wouldn’t have to worry about that information reaching Director Cheong.

“Quite an interesting phenomenon… isn’t it? Is there something you’d like to ask me, Roe Deer?"

The route to finding out about Jang Heoun was standing right in front of me.

 

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