Ah, I’m going to lose it.
Gong Isu snipes as he springs up toward the ceiling.
“What are you going to do about that? Even I can’t handle Yang Seoho. There’s some unresolved bad blood too.”
Gong Isu was once captured by Yang Seoho.
How do you “capture” Gong Isu, who can destroy all matter—who can even slip past the walls of time and space?
I looked at Yang Seoho snarling in the living room for a moment, then said:
“Well, nothing changes from before.”
“Nothing changes?”
“Right. It’s actually better. I’m ending it this run.”
“Junior. Are you out of your—”
“No! My head’s fine, don’t worry. Maybe we needed a variable like this.”
Gong Isu looked like he had more to say—but we can’t wait.
It’ll be 6:33 any second now.
“Okay—thirteenth attempt!”
“Haa...”
I left Gong Isu sighing behind me and stepped outside.
Yang Seoho was definitely different from the guests so far.
“It’s 6:33. Your pasta will be ready soon. For that, there are rules you must follow.”
“Hey, mask freak. What is this? Huh? Why is the head of Ilshin Hotel tied up?”
“You know me?”
A middle-aged man in a suit, Mun Gyeongha, asks Yang Seoho with a delighted face.
“How could anyone not know someone as famous as—”
“What? You’re a famous man?”
Hwang Incheol speaks to Mun Gyeongha in a tone of bafflement.
“...There we go.”
“At last, a person who acts like a person. Please protect me. I’ll make sure Yeonam Group rewards you handsomely!”
Mun Gyeongha lights up.
Of course, not everyone failed to recognize him.
No one expected a CEO who runs a major hotel under Yeonam Group—a third-generation chaebol—to be rolling around in a place like this.
“I plan to protect not only you but everyone here.”
“Hm—”
Normally I’d toss a joke to throw him off—but I can’t do that now.
I have rules to keep too.
“Rule one: wait for the pasta. Once you eat the pasta—then not only can you leave this pension at any time, every problem that arose here will also be resolved.”
“Hey.”
“You’ll even leave with a small commemorative gift. If we can manage that—today might even become a pleasant memory.”
“You got yourself a new ID issued, right?”
“Rule two. Listen to our introduction and explanation. It’s an important procedure, so interruptions won’t be allowed. Even if you already know it, please bear with it.”
“If you can’t prove your identity, I’ll arrest the mask and the body separately.”
“Our menu is Genovese pasta! And I’m the Genovese Pasta Manager here to serve you exactly that. Please call me Manager! And now our Chef will begin! Chef, start!”
“Understood.”
Heo Sanghyun’s voice comes from the kitchen.
“And that employee tucked under your arm is Korean! He’ll help you as staff—but I dragged him in, he knows nothing! Check his pockets and you’ll find a driver’s license! Let him go! Introduction over!”
“Which pocket?”
“Chest! Chest! No, let me take it out! Don’t touch my chest!”
Jang Hyundeok’s desperate scream.
“Hold still. I’m not doing this to grope you. Kid, trust your nuna a little.”
Maybe annoyed—or maybe she misjudged her strength—Jang Hyundeok’s jacket tore apart like an explosion.
“Aaagh!”
“Hm. Right. Confirmed.”
After confirming Jang Hyundeok’s ID, Yang Seoho freed him and slid the driver’s license back into his pants pocket.
“Hey, are you crying? Quit it.”
“I’m not crying...”
“You, over there.”
Yang Seoho pointed to a corner of the living room.
“From now on, from that corner to the drawers—treat that area as the gathering point for key witnesses.”
Meaning she’ll park the suspicious ones there.
And... really, she’s absurdly brute-force. She ignores all the surreal rites and anomalies and just does whatever she wants.
“Rule three. Do not enter the kitchen under any circumstances.”
“Kim Sinhwa.”
“Rule four. Do not say names. Starting now. From this moment on, calling someone by name is dangerous. This isn’t a trick to deceive you. Absolutely do not!”
“What are you babbling about? You got a death wish?”
“Rule five. Do not ask us questions. You can ask each other, but even if you ask me anything, I won’t ans— ugh!”
No matter what rules someone else puts up, Yang Seoho has rules of her own.
If you can’t prove your identity, kneel.
If you can’t prove your identity, you’re under arrest.
What are you babbling about? You got a death wish?
By her rules, she gives three warnings.
And in her rules, there is no such thing as a [Fourth Warning].
[vwooom]
She blasted straight at me, and since I was using most of my mana to maintain this space—I had no way to dodge that atta...ck?
No, I do!
I raised the pocket watch I borrowed from Gong Isu and discharged mana.
[Manager Privilege: Space Reconfiguration]
zzzzzzzt!
I split the space itself—shifting my position 130 cm to the left. It wasn’t so much that my body moved as the floor I stood on slid under me.
[BOOOOM!]
Sent flying off-angle, Yang Seoho smashed the wall behind me.
[crumble]
“Hm.”
Great. The outer wall.
Yang Seoho frowned for a beat and looked through the hole she’d punched.
Beyond it lay an empty void with neither light nor darkness.
Again: this is not [Hungry Mansion]. It’s a space beyond the veil, constructed by the power of [One Who Tears the Veil].
A kind of subspace.
“You’re up to something.”
Information floods in at once.
The rules have changed.
“Rule six. When you move, do not step with your left foot first! Start with your right! And you saw outside, right? This is a pocket dimension created by an abyssal being. The way out—just like I said earlier—is to eat the Genovese pasta we’re preparing.”
“Pocket what? That Pika—whatever thing?”
Totally off the mark. And a question, at that.
But I need time. Fine, grab the thread and keep her talking.
“You know that?”
“There was a kid on the team with a Pika-whatever pencil case.”
“Ah... there was.”
“He’s dead.”
Come on. I’m trying to stall here—don’t leave me nothing to say.
“He got dragged into some freak ritual run by a cultist trash just like you.”
“Hm—there’s a misunderstanding here, I didn’t intend to drag you in. And if we just eat the pasta, we can get out. Also, it’s really delicious.”
“Me?”
“No, the pasta.”
“Well, we’re pretty close now, aren’t we? How about some friendly physical contact?”
“Ah, wait! Ma’am! What we need is time and distance!”
[Manager Privilege: Space Reconfiguration]
[BOOOOM!]
“Hey. Don’t dodge. It’ll hurt more if you do.”
“Is there really no option where you just don’t hit me?”
“No.”
I can still avoid her, though.
Yang Seoho isn’t at max output right now.
This place is too cramped for her to move freely. The moment she goes all out—the hostages—no, the people clustered to one side will weigh on her mind.
[rumble]
[bzzzt]
“Hug me!” “Hug me!” “Hug me!”
Anomalies erupt all at once.
“What’s that now?”
“I told you earlier not to ask questions, right? Everyone! Do not look at electronic devices! Do not look at the ceiling! Do not hug the dolls! The faucet—ah, the faucet’s no longer an issue. Oh, and the doll just got smashed.”
[bang! bang! KWHANG!]
That’s not supposed to break just because you hit it.
Yang Seoho destroyed every [Non-Korean Object] interfering with her objective, then said to me:
“Whatever clown show you think you’re running, if you want to be taken alive, cut it out.”
“As I’ve kept saying, everything I’m doing is to keep you all safe.”
“The pasta?”
“Yes. The pasta! Aren’t you looking forward to it? Today our chef—who has experience in a hotel kitchen—is preparing Genovese pasta in the Neapolitan style.”
“Mm... pasta, pasta...”
For a moment, Yang Seoho repeats the word pasta with a vague look. A bit late, but it seems the mental contamination effect this space induces just kicked in.
Not good, exactly—but it buys time.
In the meantime I’ll lay out the new rules they need to—
[BOOOOM!]
A tremendous blast goes off at Yang Seoho’s head.
“W-what did you just do!?”
That one’s my question.
If I’ve got it right, Yang Seoho pulled a mana stone from her jacket and slammed it into her own forehead.
The mana stone collided with her brow under massive pressure and detonated with a magical force strong enough to kick off the mental contamination—and as a result—huh?
“No need for pasta.”
“With a meat-headed trick like that!”
Or, looked at another way, is it like my electric zapping? What even is that?
“Junior!”
Gong Isu’s shout bursts from the ceiling.
“This space is starting to overload!”
“What? Gong Isu? You discharged?”
“Ugh. Long time no see. And because of the shock from your attacks and that—what the Manager brat keeps doing by repeatedly reconfiguring the structure of this space—the entire space is destabilizing. Please stop attacking. If this continues, everyone here will become lost in time and space.”
Having heard Gong Isu’s calm persuasion, Yang Seoho falls silent, thinks for a moment, then answers.
“Gong Isu. You remember our deal, right? Are you on the same side as Kim Sinhwa right now?”
A deal?
“Mm... no.”
Huh?
Hey! Gong Isu!
“Then you go over there. By the employee.”
It’s the key-witness gathering point where Jang Hyundeok is standing.
Then a clown with a chainsaw popped out—
“Oh, what’s this now?”
[crack crunch snap]
In an instant, the clown becomes what used to be a clown.
“Gong Isu? You staying in the ceiling? Or are you going to follow my instructions?”
“I’ll move to the gathering point.”
“Senior! You’re supposed to help me!”
“What exactly am I supposed to do in this mess!”
“I’ll turn myself in! I surrender! That clock-headed geezer put me up to it! He egged me on to invite an abyssal being to descend!”
“Gong Isu, anything to say about his testimony?”
“No. I don’t know anything about it.”
“Even so, please cooperate as a key witness.”
“I’ll cooperate faithfully.”
“Thank you. You hear that, Kim Sinhwa? You’re the only one here with unconfirmed identity.”
“Wow, me!”
He says that, but Gong Isu wiggles into an exquisitely inconvenient spot—
Which splits Yang Seoho’s attention.
And while she talks with Gong Isu, I’m able to siphon a little mana.
[Grip of the Dead]
Wooooooo—
Wraiths surge up around Yang Seoho.
As a melee bruiser, necromancy is exactly the sort of magic she’s bad at dealing—
“Get out (disperse)!”
[jingle-jangle-jingle!]
Amina, a shaman, intones and the bell chimes trail after her command.
“Hey!”
[tsss]
Amina lights a pipe, pushes up her sunglasses, and grins wide.
“Better to trust a visible public servant than pasta that may or may not show up.”
“Team lead! I’ll assist!”
Im Huiyeong, wearing fingerless gloves, takes a judo stance and fixes me in her sights.
“Hm~ the bounty went up since last time, didn’t it?”
Hwang Incheol sidles in.
But Yang Seoho steps between them and me and says:
“It’s dangerous for everyone. Fall back.”
“...”
No matter how you look at it, it’s the moving scene of righteous public servant Yang Seoho protecting people from the evil cultist Kim Sinhwa.
“Junior, she’s a hard-working public official. Cooperate. Cooperate.”
“Easy for you to say!”
“Gong Isu, if you don’t step back further, I can’t guarantee your safety.”
“Yes. I’ll retreat.”
Ah, I’m really going to lose it.
