Chapter 44: UTG (3)

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The group stood gathered around the coffee machine, their expressions grave.

"All right, if anyone's been pranking us, this is your last chance to confess."

Ju-hee pointedly turned her gaze toward Du-pal as she asked again, but he only protested his innocence.

This was, after all, a building that housed the entrance to Baekya Land.

A machine sitting directly above that entrance was behaving in a way that defied reason, and everyone was taking the matter seriously.

"You've all been drinking coffee from this machine this whole time?"

Hwi-yeon asked once more, just to make sure.

Ha-min, who had been watching the situation unfold, quietly picked up the cup that had already been dispensed.

A spotless white paper cup, filled with dark brown liquid.

The pleasantly bittersweet aroma rising from it was just... ordinary coffee.

"It seems like regular coffee...."

Su-myeon nodded at Ha-min's assessment.

Ever since they had claimed this place as a makeshift office and spent days buried in research on ghost stories, the main coffee drinkers had been Su-myeon, Han-su, and Du-pal.

The reason they had unwittingly overlooked the oddity all this time was simple: both the taste and aroma were completely ordinary.

Nor had anything unusual happened after they drank it — no strange symptoms, no inexplicable phenomena.

"Do you know anything about this?"

The information Su-myeon possessed — the Heartphone Script and everything he already knew from the game — was vast and varied, so Han-su directed the question at him.

"No. I've never heard of or seen an infinite coffee machine."

Wasn't that a little too trivial? Too petty?

Ghost stories loved tampering with food, but nothing quite like this had ever appeared before.

Ju-hee, watching Su-myeon's perplexed expression, flipped through the Heartphone Script she had already read several times.

She had copied and studied it so thoroughly that her version was covered in handwritten notes.

"There's nothing in the script about a coffee machine or endlessly spawning food."

The office was still a chaotic mess, nowhere near resembling a government agency, or even a small company.

The hastily assembled group only sank deeper into confusion.

They couldn't even tell whether this ridiculous little phenomenon constituted a crisis, much less determine what had caused it.

One thing, however, was becoming increasingly clear.

Unnatural threats were real. They occasionally bled into reality, and some kind of response was necessary.

"We should at least try to figure out what this is."

Hwi-yeon needed some kind of conclusion if she was going to report back to her superiors.

Meanwhile, entirely of its own accord, the coffee machine had dispensed a latte.

The fragrant smell of coffee only made the situation feel even stranger.

As the group's questions continued to pile up, Ha-min spoke.

"Do you think maybe the, um... the doll might know?"

"Cheshire?"

Su-myeon answered reflexively.

There was exactly one phenomenon outside a ghost story that they could actually consult.

The moving doll Su-myeon had brought back from inside one.

Of course, it only functioned through Su-myeon's home computer, but still.

Maybe Cheshire knew something.

"I'll go check."

It was more than worth investigating, so Su-myeon headed straight home.

His life had been overturned so suddenly and completely that everything still felt unfamiliar, but of all the changes, his own apartment felt the strangest.

The unimaginable status he had acquired, the absurd occupation he now held — harder to grow accustomed to than either of those was....

"......"

The hollow emptiness of his home, where nothing but silence waited for him.

The subtle absence of his mother's warmth and care, something he had felt every single day — that was what he found hardest to endure.

And now, in that empty space, a strange doll rolled around, providing a presence that wasn't quite a presence.

"Oh~ You're home early~"

Cheshire was perched atop Su-myeon's computer tower, nibbling on chocolate.

Worse, he was wiping the slightly melted chocolate from his cloth fingertips onto the computer case.

"Hey, don't wipe that on there!"

"Why... you're the one who left it for me?"

Well, yes.

He had left it there before going out.

Faced with the shameless doll's attitude, Su-myeon simply grabbed a wet wipe and cleaned both the computer and Cheshire's hands.

Inside the doll's boneless, cotton-stuffed hands, he could feel some kind of inexplicable resistance.

The sensation — neither living nor inanimate — was faintly unsettling.

And how in the world did the doll digest food inside a belly stuffed with cotton? For that matter, how did it even put food into a mouth that was nothing more than thread stitched into fabric?

He decided not to think about it any further.

"There's something I want to ask you."

Without bothering with any preamble, Su-myeon went straight to the point.

As he explained what had happened at the office, the lounging Cheshire gradually sat upright.

By the time Su-myeon finished, the doll was giggling with delight.

"I see, I see. So that's how all of you reacted~?"

"......Do you know what it is?"

"No? Why would you think I'd know?"

Ghost stories were, for the most part, disconnected from one another.

Baekya Land and Sadang Station Exit 4 had been unusual exceptions; normally, separate ghost stories rarely crossed paths.

But Cheshire moved between different stories.

Even into reality.

"Belle built all kinds of inventions too, but she can't move around on her own."

And although Su-myeon had seen the Trump Cards in Baekya Land, the Red Queen had only said that she was looking for them.

There seemed to be severe restrictions on what they could do.

If the Red Queen had been free to enter Baekya Land herself, the fact that she hadn't done so was strange in itself.

That left only one conclusion.

Even monsters within ghost stories couldn't freely cross into other worlds.

"Isn't that some kind of rule too?"

At Su-myeon's deduction, Cheshire clapped his cotton fists together in delight, almost as though applauding him.

"Then try applying that."

Su-myeon frowned slightly at Cheshire's words.

Apply it?

"All the things that have changed. Why do you think they changed~?"

Cheshire asked again, his voice brimming with curiosity.

"Well...."

Why had they changed?

Su-myeon sank into thought.

If he traced all the changes back to where they had begun....

It was the moment he started experiencing the events of the game in reality.

"Even after Belle prepared so much~ she couldn't do a thing~"

And the moment Belle began to act coincided with that same point.

The catalyst had been Su-myeon himself.

Su-myeon's existence becoming known within the ghost stories.

That was where every change had begun.

'And Cheshire. The phone, the computer....'

Then it struck him.

The things in reality that had changed in impossible ways.

His computer.

His phone.

And now, the newest addition — the coffee machine in the office of the first workplace he'd ever had.

He had always needed more sleep than most people. Even the slightest drowsiness was difficult for him to fight off.

Now that people's lives depended on how quickly he acted, he had begun drinking coffee like an addict — nearly a cup every hour — just to keep himself awake.

"...So all of this is because of me?"

Cheshire didn't answer Su-myeon's question.

The stitched mouth on the doll's face merely curved as though smiling.

It wasn't a definitive answer, but now that Su-myeon had found a clear common thread, he could make another deduction.

These anomalies had appeared because of his involvement.

And every single one of them had manifested in a way that helped him.

"Then at least it's not something that'll hurt me."

At the very least, none of the strange phenomena that had occurred around him so far had resulted in anything harmful.

When something repeated this consistently, it was reasonable to treat it as one of the rules.

Su-myeon expected Cheshire to remain silent again.

Instead, a voice drifted from the doll.

"Right."

A rare, completely unambiguous answer.

Su-myeon still couldn't understand why such a rule had manifested around him, but at least he now understood how it seemed to work.

"But, you know~?"

Cheshire called out to Su-myeon as he sat deep in thought, his voice stretching in that familiar way.

"I'm out of snacks~"

You don't even need to eat, do you?

Su-myeon desperately wanted to ask, but swallowed the words and went to rummage through the snacks packed into the pantry.

He had never been much of a snacker himself, yet the apartment had always been stocked with simple treats like these.

Having a snack with her morning coffee had been one of his mother's little pleasures.

His father used to keep the pantry stocked with small treats just for her.

Now the reason for all of it was gone.

Only the things themselves remained.

"Here. And I'd appreciate it if you dropped the crumbs on this tissue."

There was no one else left to eat them, after all.

With a strange feeling in his chest, Su-myeon handed Cheshire a biscuit.

***

The next day, Su-myeon woke with the vague feeling that he had been dreaming.

He had slept in.

As he shuffled into the living room, he heard someone moving around.

His mother's familiar back was there, washing dishes just as she always had.

"You're up? Come eat brunch."

It was such an ordinary scene.

So why did the sight of it feel so painfully welcome?

Scratching his stomach, Su-myeon lazily sat down at the table and looked up as his mother turned around.

Then he froze.

"What's wrong?"

Her voice was gentle and calm, exactly as it had always been.

But in grotesque contrast, clumps of blood clung to the ragged flesh where the skin of her face had been torn away. Her lidless eyes, with nothing left to hold them in place, rolled forward and slipped from their sock—

"Gah...!"

Su-myeon jolted awake in a panic.

A dream.

It had been a dream.

"What the... fuck...."

What kind of nightmare was that to start the morning with?

Su-myeon cursed under his breath and forced his heavy body upright.

The reality around him still didn't feel real, and a sigh escaped him.

After refilling Cheshire's snacks, he dragged himself back to the office.

"Morning."

"Not... a great one, I'd say."

Ju-hee and Hwi-yeon greeted him, but Su-myeon responded only perfunctorily.

He stopped in front of the coffee machine, which, just as always, immediately dispensed a cup the moment someone approached.

"I ran some tests on it yesterday."

Han-su came over and gave Su-myeon his report.

Apparently, after Su-myeon had gone home, the rest of the team had conducted a variety of tests.

There was exactly one condition required for the machine to dispense coffee.

Someone who liked coffee had to walk past it.

People who didn't normally drink coffee received nothing, no matter how many times they passed by.

"I sent a sample out for analysis too, and — it's genuinely just ordinary coffee. Brewed from the arabica beans we put in at the start... just coffee."

Hwi-yeon had even gone so far as to have its composition analyzed.

Su-myeon hesitated for a moment, then picked up the freshly dispensed cup and took a sip.

He had no idea what Hwi-yeon was talking about with arabica beans and all that, but at any rate, it was good coffee.

"I talked to Cheshire about it yesterday."

The important points were simple.

The coffee itself was harmless.

And, most likely, Su-myeon was at the center of the anomaly.

When he summarized what he had learned and explained it to the others, their reactions were much the same as his own had been.

They understood the basic idea.

Actually accepting that this was now part of their reality, however, would take a little longer.

"I think there's one more thing they all have in common."

Han-su, who had been thinking quietly, spoke up.

"Every one of these things helps Su-myeon solve problems inside ghost stories."

Su-myeon had reached the same conclusion himself, but hearing Han-su say it aloud gave the thought a subtly different weight.

Almost as though someone were arranging all of this specifically for him.

But that implication seemed to trouble only Su-myeon.

Everyone else mostly appeared relieved that the coffee machine was no longer a cause for concern.

Ju-hee, in particular, printed out a sheet of paper and taped it to the wall beside the machine.

[If the coffee machine dispenses coffee automatically, feel free to drink it. It is harmless.]

Su-myeon wasn't entirely convinced that was the right way to handle things, but in a sense, it became the office's very first rule.

"I'll compile a report based on what we know and send it up."

Su-myeon nodded at Hwi-yeon's words.

Up the chain.

To whoever within the government had created this absurd special department almost overnight and set the whole thing in motion.

Someone who had quietly watched over and supported Hwi-yeon during her special arc, and who had now extended that support to Su-myeon.

"......"

Su-myeon glanced through the window blinds and noticed a black sedan parked in front of the building.

He was curious about whoever was behind all of this.

But for now, it was a question whose answer didn't matter.

The people he still needed to rescue from the ghost stories mattered more.

***

Over the following days, Su-myeon spent nearly every waking hour organizing every piece of information he possessed, with almost no distinction between day and night.

Information from the game, elements he already knew, and the contents of the Heartphone Script.

He had also grown quite accustomed to the coffee produced by the mysterious infinite coffee machine.

Bzz—

The moment Su-myeon felt his phone vibrate in his pocket, he pulled it out.

The caller was Ha-min.

He should be in class at school right now. What's going on?

"Hey, what's up so early in the—"

"Su-myeon!"

A frantic voice burst from the other end.

"Something terrible happened!"