[This is the Eleventh Basent Floor.]
An external shock briefly interrupted his panic.
Another stop.
[The doors are opening.]
“I shall now proceed with the extraction of optic nerves.”
“I will now be connecting the mouth to the navel.”
“Would be great to have no feet, too!”
On Basent Floor 11, an employee in a doctor’s coat was conducting a cheerful consultation for surgery in room 910.
Whoosh.
Once again, the one in the gas mask looked out with its thirty-seven eyes and sent forth smoke.
Soon, the strange being in the doctor’s coat beca a bloodless corpse with its limbs stitched together in the wrong places.
“Aaagh!”
Again, screams. Escape.
The people who had been holding their consultation as if hypnotized fled room 910 and boarded another elevator, and this elevator’s doors naturally closed as well.
[The doors are closing.]
“……”
The new employee looked down at his feet.
He couldn’t see the floor of the elevator.
Because the Security Team mber’s lted lower half was covering it.
Ba-thump.
He heard a heartbeat-like sound from the wall.
Because the upper left part of the Security Team mber’s torso was spread wide, stuck to the wall.
“……”
And so it continued.
[This is the Tenth Basent Floor.]
[This is the Ninth Basent Floor.]
[This is the Eighth Basent Floor.]
With every floor the doors opened and closed, with every strange event the smoke caused, the figure inside the elevator grew stranger.
It got bigger and more distorted.
[This is the Sixth Basent Floor.]
[This is the Fifth Basent Floor.]
The shape of the thing riding the elevator is getting more and more grotesque. It’s so bizarre and impossible to even look at. It’s a strange ■■■■■■■■■■ it’s just strange strange stra
[This is the Fourth Basent Floor.]
[This is the Third Basent Floor.]
[This basent is an endless basent.]
At last, he realized what was strange. Now the entire elevator was made of sticky smoke and yellow lights and a crown of thorns and bone-grave curves of ■■.That’sit!ThisisBasentFloor13!He’sbeingsuckedbacktoBasentFloor13andnow
Ding.
……
……
[This is the First Floor.]
[The doors are opening.]
Light pours in.
“Haaahhh…”
The mont the familiar ground-floor lobby cos into view, the new employee collapses.
Soone rushes over and pats him on the back.
“Slowly, slowly… just breathe out.”
The fellow new hire nad Jang Heowoon or whatever his na is?Him?
That fellow new hire JangHeowoonorwhateverhisnawas?Him?orsooneelse?grabshisarm,andhebreathesinandoutinandoutinandoutinandoutinandoutdyingandthesmoketellsusaboutour■■-nim…
■■-nim?
“…Excuse .”
Soone speaks.
He unconsciously turned his head.
At so point, the figure of ■■-nim?theSecurityTeam staff had returned to normal.
A man with a horned gas mask, radiating an odd sense of authority. Jang Heowoon was speaking to him…
“Did you… just help us?”
No.
The smoke moves.
“Eek!”
But instead of covering over his head, the smoke forms letters.
Duty of an employee
“……”
After a long silence, Jang Heowoon finally managed to speak.
“Yes. Thank you…”
His voice was hoarse, almost as if he was choking up.
Then he turned and began to help another teammate, who was trembling in the corner of the elevator.
Maybe he’d lost his mind from the terror.
‘Crazy bastard.’
He needs to get out of here now. The new employee snapped back to his senses.
He hurriedly got off the elevator, desperately avoiding his coworker.
In a situation this insane, trying to help soone else recklessly was a sure way to die. Self-preservation—self-preservation was the only way to survive… He barely pulled himself together, still shivering in fear and panic.
“W-What’s that?”
“Uuuhh…”
Fortunately or unfortunately, the chaos and all the various survivors who had returned ant the lobby was full of noise and distraction, so not many people actually saw the Security Team mber inside the elevator.
The yellow lantern-like eyes briefly turned to the lobby as ‘Jang Heowoon’ helped his coworker out of the elevator, then suddenly stared straight at him.
And then…
Be grateful for your luck
“……!”
[The doors are closing.]
The elevator started moving again.
To Basent Floor 13.
[13BF]
The new employee stared blankly at the floor indicator, then collapsed onto the lobby floor.
He was drenched in cold sweat.
* * *
The elevator doors closed.
I am alone again.
“……”
Smoke rises, and I can feel my body, which had been warped and distorted, slowly returning to its proper shape within the frawork of the Security Team uniform…
……
Sothing stirs.
I brought my hand to my chest, but felt no heartbeat. My insides were so completely destroyed that I couldn’t even tell if I existed, or where I was.
But the strange pulsing sensation lingered for a mont.
And I savored it.
Like a bottle of nostalgia.
Ding.
The doors opened on Basent Floor 13.
A silence flowed through the basent. In the dark hallway, I saw gloomy iron doors, flickering with red and blue lights.
But there was sothing else, too.
– Target confird.
Guard Teams.
Employees in familiar uniforms erged from the hallway, facing .
It seed soone must have reported that I’d acted out of protocol.
It was a misunderstanding. I had never once set foot on another floor, or aboveground. I had properly carried out the security of my assigned area.
Question
But instead of paying attention to the letters I had made, the Guard Team each drew their own special restraint devices, mutating into contaminated forms…
“Aigoo, everyone’s so tense!”
A white hand suddenly shot out from behind.
“It’s fine. Please, give us a little space…”
A bright, inappropriately cheerful voice rang out, and a Research Team employee walked out from the center of the security team.
I still couldn’t make out his face, which looked like a lting mosaic, but I could tell from his outfit and employee badge who he was.
His identity.
“Hello.”
Kwak Jekang.
“It’s been a while since I’ve t you in person… No, it’s the first ti, isn’t it? Hahaha!”
His face, behind glasses, wore what seed to be a calm smile, but his voice betrayed a barely contained excitent.
“I’m the manager in charge of our Security Team’s new Special Division employee! And today I’m also in charge of the annex experint.”
He didn’t seem at all afraid of the stares from the Guard Team, and as he took out docunts from his jacket, he grinned at .
“I’d like to start with a few simple questions… Haha, goodness . Why don’t we begin by introducing today’s visitors of Basent Floor 13? Seems these folks forgot to introduce themselves. Let’s see. Lee Jeongin, age 28. Park Yonghae, age 25. And…”
His voice paused, as if to build suspense, then emphasized:
“Jang Heowoon, age 26.”
……
……
Just now.
“Hmm? Do any of these nas sound familiar? Hahaha.”
What did he just say?
goblin notes:
A bit stupid to realize this 200 chapters in, but… The spelling of Kwak Jaekang’s na is more accurate with ‘e’ instead of ‘ae’, so I’ll be using ‘Jekang’ from now on.
I’ll try to edit all past chapters (alongside the font changes) little by little… once I have extra ti on my hands…… ;-;
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