[10]
“Agh, seriously!”
With the cat starting yet another countdown, Baek Saheon glanced about.
‘Not wearing the target for this…’
Thankfully Kang Yihak crouched first and began writing.
– How much will you pay us if we tell? haha
Another lunatic…
– We’re completely broke ㅠㅠ You rich guys suck it up! Don’t want Kitty to pop your head, right~
“Eyy.”
In the end, under the pressure of the countdown, Baek Saheon wrote the answer himself in place of his money-crazed colleague, using his best judgment.
– You already know, right… The tail’s an entry pass for the escape run.
– But we never brutally cut the tails off of the mer-children. We only took the minimal amount from already fully infected general entities. We need to survive too…
‘Telling them we butchered a kid would make them flip!’
Even so, Agent Choi didn’t blink.
– How is it used? Fuel? Ticket? Sacrifice?
Was it safe to spill this much?
[6]
Damn it.
– An admission ticket.
As he wrote, Baek Saheon instinctively glanced toward where the cat had been. After squeezing him with that killer countdown—are you satisfied now, you psycho bastard?
But the cat was gone.
“…!”
It was now standing in front of the window.
Standing… on two legs.
[This way]
The cat’s posture was uncanny.
As if something else were forcing it to move, it stood eerily upright on two legs near the window and lifted its left front paw, pointing sharply westward.
That direction was…
…The escape vessel!
And with that, it dropped below the window.
“…!!”
People rushed to the window and looked down, but below—there was nothing.
The cat had vanished.
“……Hah.”
The air suddenly felt lighter.
As a few people caught their breath and began thinking rapidly—
“The escape vessel… the escape vessel!”
Baek Saheon tore at his hair.
“That’s it! The cat meant for us to board the escape vessel and get out!”
“What?”
“I-It said, ‘Prepare for death’! I thought that meant something else, but now it seems it was a warning! If we don’t all escape by boat, it’ll kill us…!”
“…!”
“We have to get out of here—”
But the Daydream Inc. employees didn’t forget the danger so quickly. The Disaster Management agents were still here. And…
The memory of what the cat had just done.
“……”
At that moment, Agent Choi fell into thought.
The cat had forced them to sever the mer‑child’s tail, then used the conch shell to heal it.
Any adult would have recognized that as a friendly act toward children…
“Hmm.”
Thinking of that, Choi calmly wrote on the ground.
– The cat showed us where the conch shells were and even demonstrated the cure. Clearly it wants us to use them to save as many kids as possible…
– Unless you’d rather risk being slaughtered by a monster for your greed?
‘Damn it.’
But Choi didn’t stop there.
– Otherwise, will you cooperate only until we’re all safely out?
“…!”
– Make sure you escort every child out safely, using the conch shells on the escape vessel.
“……”
Jin Nasol shoved Baek Saheon aside and strode forward without hesitation. She barely blinked as she wrote.
– Any foolish moves and you’re shot.
“Okay~”
Thus, a strange temporary alliance was born.
It was a team capable of utilizing both the sensory perception of the Mermaid Grave and the Twinkle-Twinkle Dragon Palace, with enough personnel to both handle the biological disaster and protect multiple children at once.
‘…Was it leading us into this?’
Ryu Jaekwan’s eyes twitched slightly.
Just what kind of supernatural phenomenon was that rumor in the form of a cat, to lead to something like this…? No, what mattered for now was getting out of here safely and completing the mission.
Wait!
Yes, and he wasn’t even alone anymore. They had a rookie now, too…
“Grapes!”
Ryu Jaekwan spun to face his superior grimly. Their rookie must still be searching for survivors among the children…
“We have to find him at once. If someone’s left behind…”
“Hold on, hold on! Calm down. We’re meeting this evening anyway. We’ll pass by and pick him up on the way out.”
That was the problem…!
‘We can’t take these maniacs with us…!’
“I’ll… threaten them a bit first.”
Agent Choi, instead of keeping the conch shell with Baek Saheon, demanded the tail tissue of the general infected creatures as collateral, and verified that the employees weren’t lying about the location of the escape vessel.
He even pretended to wrestle over the conch shell to discreetly attach a tracking device to it, completing the precautions.
“All set.”
Finally, they firmly agreed to meet in front of the building near the escape vessel.
“Now let’s gather the kids.”
“…Yes.”
In any case, the encounter between that lunatic pseudo-pharmaceutical company and Agent Grapes was now inevitable.
Ryu Jaekwan felt a chill in his chest, but resolved that he should spot the rookie first and make him cover his face with a hood or something.
If he said he wanted to protect the rookie’s identity from the cult-like pharmaceutical staff, his superior would probably understand.
“By the fountain!”
“Yes.”
But the moment they met Agent Grapes at the central fountain of the city—
“Agent!”
Ryu Jaegwan realized his plan had been meaningless.
Through the suncatcher he had been holding up reflexively—just in case—he saw it clearly.
The rookie agent, who turned back after noticing them…
“I’ve been gathering and organizing the children by age group!”
Half of his face was covered in ulcers.
“……”
Ryu Jaegwan came to a halt.
Cold sweat ran down his back as his trembling eyes scanned the childlike figure of the rookie agent…
Below the torso, long umbilical cord-like masses of cellular tissue dangled.
From his waist, thick chunks of flesh extended outward, with ulcers hanging from him like a tail.
It was grotesque and horrific. But because of the setting in an underwater city, and because the form resembled a tail…
This biological disaster was referred to as the merfolk.
“But playing together is so much fun…”
The mer-child, who had once been an agent, smiled and waved.
“Can’t we stay just one more day?”
Upon seeing the rookie fully infected by the biological disaster, the two agents stopped in place, their faces completely drained of color.