Go Yeongeun was one of my more level-headed colleagues.
That much was certain. Even when we woke up on that deranged subway during the company’s entrance test, and later when we escaped the psychotic art exhibit that involved plucking out visitors’ eyes, she never lost her composure.
But right now, seeing Go Yeongeun at the stairs leading to the ‘fourth floor’, the source of so many disappearance stories in this bizarre supermarket…
“Sh-She’s a real human being, right…?”
She was too calm.
Despite the high schooler’s startled cries, her pale face didn’t flinch.
No words.
No expression.
She just stood on the stairs, looking down at us…
‘…She’s standing on the landing?’
Wait, that’s—
Didn’t the door to the third floor vanish the moment someone started going up the stairs, making it impossible to get back?
Then…
‘How long has she been there…?’
No, more importantly.
‘Why… is she here?’
Sure, Go Yeongeun could be one of the two agents who entered earlier. The mention of ‘two missing’ was a clue already. The Bureau typically sent out agents either individually or in pairs, so two usually means a senior-newcomer pair.
But here she was, a new recruit, on the stairs to the fourth floor. Alone, with no senior agent in sight.
And presumably for at least a week…
“……”
A foreboding sense of dread prickled up my spine.
“Agent?”
No reply.
“Miss… Goral?”
Go Yeongeun’s lips parted.
“Welcome to Looky Mart!”
I immediately shoved the high schooler behind me and reached for the door.
“Agent.”
“We appreciate your business, dear customer!”
Expressionless, the figure stumbled down the stairs.
It was Go Yeongeun.
Or rather, something that looked like Go Yeongeun… acting like an employee.
‘Shit…!’
I was about to fling the door open and drag the high schooler out, when I realized something odd.
‘The sound.’
There was no squeaking.
…And she wasn’t dressed in a uniform—still wearing her Bureau attire.
So…
‘Contaminated…?’
I looked again.
The shape of Go Yeongeun—a clearly human figure—was descending the stairs.
“Hold the door handle.”
“Huh, what?!”
I lunged forward, pinning Go Yeongeun as she stepped onto the landing.
“…!!”
“Welcome… to Looky Mart…”
Okay.
She still had a human body.
Which meant…!
Holding her shoulder down with one hand, I reached into the tattoo on my wrist with the other, pulling out the last of my Blue Soda Churros.
Then I shoved it into Go Yeongeun’s open mouth as best I could.
“!”
She didn’t even resist. She just kept trying to walk and recite the same line. In the process, her teeth moved naturally, crushing part of the churro, at least enough for it to go down her throat.
Sweating all over, I watched…
And, moments later.
“Gueeeeh!”
Go Yeongeun retched violently, spewing a deluge of water.
I patted her back. The stair landing was soon slick with inky-black fluid.
It wasn’t quite enough to drown in like my month on Braun’s talk show… but it was nonetheless bizarre enough to make the high schooler recoil in horror.
Finally, she vomited a bluish liquid, slumped, and I caught her.
“Hurrk, huhk, huuu…”
“Agent.”
I called out to my colleague.
“……!”
Her eyes, now aware, shifted to me.
They dilated. She started trembling uncontrollably.
“…Mr. R-Roe Deer.”
She’d come back to her senses.
She responded to being called ‘Agent’, and she was alert enough now to the fact that we were inside a ghost story, so she addressed me by my alias instead.
‘Thank goodness…’
“U-Urgh!!”
“…?!”
She suddenly tried to crawl back up the stairs again, and I grabbed her in a panic.
“Huhuh—Ugh, damn this supermarket! Even the hallucinations look real! Ack!”
“……”
“I-I won’t be fooled! Mr. Roe Deer’s dead…”
Ah.
Right.
“Hey, I’m not dead. Agent.”
“…?!”
“I got assigned to the same job as you.”
“?!”
It took another few dozen minutes to convince Go Yeongeun—who believed I’d died during my month-long disappearance—that I was very much alive, and had re-entered as a spy…
“Th-Thank you… Thanks to you, I survived…”
“No, don’t mention it.”
Fortunately, once Go Yeongeun regained her composure, she cross-checked a few details with me and accepted the situation.
Though trying to explain everything without giving the high schooler weird intel was… a different level of difficulty.
Looking at the now-empty churros wrapper, I felt a strange mix of emotions.
‘The churros… They’re really something else.’
I hadn’t paid it much attention before, because everything in Braun’s Late-Night Talk Show happened so crazily fast. But if it could clear contamination in a single go like that, it was an unbelievably powerful item.
‘In the context of Dark Exploration Records… it’s almost too good to be true.’
Anyway, the priority right now was escaping this deranged supermarket. Still, I felt a bit more confident now that another person had joined, especially because it was a colleague I could actually rely on.
So, first, I needed to confirm something.
I stepped aside and clearly showed Go Yeongeun the door leading back to the third floor of the supermarket.
“Can you see the entrance?”
“……”
Go Yeongeun nodded.
“Yes.”
Phew.
“Rather, I can’t see the door itself, but I do see light coming through a gap. …If someone opens it for me, I think I could get out.”
“That’s good enough.”
The moment I let out a little sigh of relief, Go Yeongeun lifted a hand to cover her face.
“But… I can’t leave the supermarket anyway.”
“Huh?”
“…I damaged merchandise.”
“…! That’s okay. We’re outside the supermarket here, so unless you were seen eating something in there—”
“No, I broke stuff in the supermarket and got caught.”