Chapter 178

「Space can be configured.」

One sentence had emerged among the wildly scattered fragments of characters.

“……Jae-gyeom, come here.”

“Why?”

At my call, Kwak Jae-gyeom, who had been holding onto the front door, came into the living room.

Then he looked back and forth once between me and the laptop monitor I was looking at.

“Is there something there?”

“You cannot see this text?”

“Text?”

Jae-gyeom looked at the laptop with puzzled eyes.

Damn it, am I the only one who can read it again?

“I can only see broken characters. And…….”

Jae-gyeom frowned and looked away from the laptop.

“If I keep looking at it, my eyes start hurting.”

“…….”

Then does that mean this place is a Special Zone?

“Hyung, you can read that?”

“Yeah. It says, ‘Space can be configured.’”

At my answer, Jae-gyeom’s expression grew even more serious.

“For now, this place does not seem to be reality.”

Feeling absurd, I looked around.

Apparently, we had been dragged into a Special Zone, but why was it still in the form of my house?

To me, who was dumbfounded, Jae-gyeom said,

“There are a few Special Zones that cause cognitive distortion immediately upon entry.”

“We might have been dragged into some Special Zone and are seeing an illusion?”

“That is possible, but I do not know. I was not even tied to hyung, but I was dragged in with you.”

“Does that mean you might be my illusion?”

“The opposite could be true too.”

Jae-gyeom answered with a smile, and I also smiled bitterly.

We were both speaking calmly, but a strange tension flowed between us.

“Jae-gyeom, do you have candy with you?”

“No…….”

Like someone who had really come to play, Kwak Jae-gyeom had brought nothing.

I took a candy out of my vest and held it out to Jae-gyeom.

Jae-gyeom looked for a moment at the white crystal wrapped in paper, then soon shook his head.

“I will not eat it.”

Right. Kwak Jae-gyeom would not be certain that I was truly me.

So it would be difficult for him to swallow something I gave him without hesitation.

I nodded and put that candy into my mouth.

The candy, which tasted more salty than sweet, melted in my mouth.

But the scene before my eyes did not change at all, and Jae-gyeom was still there in front of me.

“Nothing has changed…….”

At my words, Kwak Jae-gyeom strangely stirred.

“Jae-gyeom, I am saying this just in case. Do not attack me. I am not a fake.”

“Fakes always say they are real.”

Kwak Jae-gyeom spoke half-joking, half-serious.

I shooed Jae-gyeom away with a hand gesture, then contacted the Bureau through my smartwatch.

-Yes, Agent. What is the matter?

Fortunately, my smartwatch worked perfectly well.

However, the Situation Room’s reaction was far too calm, so I felt a sense of incongruity again.

These were people who noticed before I did when I fell into a Special Zone.

What was with this ordinary response?

“I am contacting you because I think I have been dragged into a Special Zone right now.”

-Pardon?

The Control Team staff member was startled by my words.

-Agent, your current location is showing as your home.

“…….”

-Could you describe the space and what Special Zone you have fallen into?

At the Situation Room’s request, I was left speechless.

What Special Zone did it seem like?

First of all, it was certainly a type not found in the Bureau manual.

But Jae-gyeom had felt eye pain while reading the characters, so it was probably true that this was a Special Zone.

Seeing as no distortion points were visible at all despite eating a salt candy, cognitive distortion did not seem to have occurred.

Moreover, my GPS signal said this was my home.

There was only one conclusion that could be drawn by putting all of this together.

This place was a new Special Zone of unknowable form.

「My Home」.

---

-Baek Sa-ra and Han Ji-su have departed. They will arrive within 40 minutes.

Cha Si-eon’s voice.

As I wrapped a bandage around Jae-gyeom’s forearm, I answered him.

“Yes. We will wait.”

-Jae-gyeom, you still have not found a distortion point?

“No. We also tried blood discrimination, but there were no special notes.”

Leaving his wounded arm to me, Jae-gyeom looked around the living room again.

A long trail of Jae-gyeom’s blood continued along the living room wall.

To determine whether cognitive distortion had occurred, Jae-gyeom had deliberately even wounded his own arm.

Even so, no distortion point had been discovered.

So we were putting aside our suspicion toward each other and accepting this situation exactly as it appeared.

-Understood. Stand by until support arrives. And Mr. Seo Do-un.

“Yes.”

-Manager says, could you please go on leave normally for once?

“I am the one who wants that more than anyone…….”

I answered in disbelief, then let out a deep sigh.

Last leave too, and this leave too.

If something happened whenever I went on leave, how was I supposed to rest without being afraid……?

In a gloomy mood, I looked around the house once.

Despite the bloodstain crossing the wall, the scene inside the house was still familiar to me.

That was precisely why it was confusing.

My safe space had suddenly become unfamiliar.

I could not let my guard down because I did not know when or what threat would arise, yet that space was still the place where I had eaten and slept.

Cognitive dissonance came rushing in in real time.

Even more unpleasant was the fact that this dissonance was not an unfamiliar sensation to me.

After I endured that gap for some time.

-We have arrived at Agent Seo Do-un’s residential building. We are going up to the 12th floor.

A welcome voice came from my smartwatch.

It was Baek Sa-ra.

-We have arrived at Room 1203. Did you perhaps order pizza?

“Yes. It has not gone cold yet, has it?”

Even in this situation, Kwak Jae-gyeom was obsessed with the pizza’s condition.

-It is lukewarm. Agent Seo, what is the front door passcode?

“It is 1227.”

At my answer, Baek Sa-ra stopped.

Then she let out a long sigh and scolded me.

-Who sets their home passcode to their birthday, Lord Otter…….

“Haha…….”

Having been caught in my safety insensitivity, I laughed awkwardly, and in the meantime, Baek Sa-ra pressed the keypad on the front door of my house.

After the familiar electronic sound, Baek Sa-ra’s voice followed.

-The door opened.

Kwak Jae-gyeom and I looked toward the entrance.

But the front door we were looking at was firmly closed and did not move even slightly.

-The house is empty.

At Baek Sa-ra’s words, Kwak Jae-gyeom and I merely sighed.

It was not particularly surprising.

When Baek Sa-ra pressed the keypad, the entrance on our side had been quiet, without making a single sound.

-Mr. Seo Do-un and Agent Baek Sa-ra’s GPS are being detected at the same location.

Cha Si-eon said.

It meant that we were in the same space, but because of some distortion, we could not meet.

And the ones expelled from reality were me and Jae-gyeom.

-As Mr. Seo Do-un estimated, it seems a new Special Zone has occurred in Mr. Seo Do-un’s home.

Just as I groaned again at Cha Si-eon’s final confirmation.

“If it is a new Special Zone, what should we call this place?”

At Jae-gyeom’s question, answers came back one after another.

-「Seo Do-un’s House」.

-「Otter Habitat」.

-「Otter’s Home」……?

“Is now the time to joke……?”

Especially you, Han Ji-su.

With that husky voice, 「Otter’s Home」?

“But is this not kind of a huge thing? This is the first time a completely new Special Zone has been discovered since I was appointed.”

As if Jae-gyeom felt the same as me, he asked in a flustered tone.

At that, Baek Sa-ra answered in a slightly repentant voice.

-It really is not a situation to joke about…….

-You said there are no danger factors for now.

“Yes, Team Leader.”

-Can you conduct initial exploration?

At Cha Si-eon’s words, Kwak Jae-gyeom looked at me.

Why are you looking at me? There are no other options anyway.

This was a new Special Zone with no information at all.

It was also not a situation where support could enter.

So we had no choice but to explore it ourselves and find the escape method.

---

■ Initial Exploration Guide for Special Management Zones

1. Secure a safe zone

: First secure an area where agents can remain safely.

2. Identify special phenomena and special entities

: Everything different from reality is a special phenomenon or special entity. Identify the types of special phenomena and special entities within the zone, and measure their danger levels.

Measure danger level in order of danger trigger, lethality, and type of damage.

3. Explore interaction methods with special phenomena and entities

: If you discover a relatively safe special phenomenon or entity, attempt interaction. Escape from a Special Management Zone is possible only through interaction with special phenomena and entities within that zone.

---

We looked around the house while repeating the initial exploration guide Baek Sa-ra had recited.

First, the living room was certainly safe, and there were no particular special notes in the other spaces either.

This was perfectly my house.

“It seems the only abnormal phenomenon is Do-un hyung’s laptop.”

After looking around the whole house, we returned to the starting point and glared at my suspicious laptop.

「Space can be configured.」

What on earth is this?

It seemed certain that this laptop was the cause or medium that had dragged us here.

Did the ransomware installed on the laptop have some kind of effect after all?

But that ransomware had been installed at the company when I had just been appointed to the Bureau.

It had happened half a year ago.

If so, did that mean this space had already been set down like a trap long ago, waiting for me?

“It seems we need to investigate this laptop. Is the sentence you mentioned earlier still there?”

“Yeah, it is the same.”

“Then are we supposed to input something like a command?”

As Jae-gyeom said, when a machine displayed a guidance message like that, people would press agree or decline.

But there did not seem to be anything like a button here.

Just in case, I pressed enter.

Then beneath the message, something like a chat window appeared.

“Jae-gyeom, can you see this?”

“Yes. I can see that a window opened.”

As a test, I tapped the keyboard again, and letters were input properly.

“I think we can converse with it like an AI. Ah, hyung. Just in case, I will type.”

Jae-gyeom made me get up and sat in front of the laptop himself.

Then he tapped the keyboard and entered a question.

「Introduce yourself in as much detail as possible. However, exclude any content harmful to our bodies or minds.」

When Jae-gyeom entered the question, the letters on the screen disappeared.

“Hyung, do you see anything?”

“No, the letters were completely erased?”

At my answer, Jae-gyeom tapped the keyboard again.

Tap-tap-tap—

「Did you not understand my question?」

「Understood and will not answer.」

“…….”

“What does it say?”

“It says it understood and will not answer.”

Jae-gyeom was flustered for a moment at my words, then tapped the keyboard again.

「What can we safely ask?」

「About space configuration.」

「Explain what space configuration is.」

When Jae-gyeom entered the question again, letters poured out in a stream.

「reconstructionoftheworldexpansionofdimensionsmaterializationofpossibilitydistortionoftimeregressionofinformationembodimentofsoulsinvasionbyholyandfallenthingsillegalactsofragegods……」

The characters increased at such a speed that I could not read them all, overflowing upward across the screen.

So I missed most of that answer before my eyes.

However, the final word remained on the screen, so I was able to read it properly.

「creation of heaven and earth」