Chapter 3: I Am Ground

“If it were possible to turn back time, what would you do, Mr. Seon Yuhan?”

“Mr. interviewer. This building… has turned into a maze.”

I stood up without wasting time and helped the interviewer to his feet.

“Huh? What… what are you saying?”

The interviewer was dragged out with a confused expression, not knowing what face to make, but soon his expression tightened.

“You’re speaking seriously.”

It’s frightening how easily he believes my words.

Could it be that, by working as an agent managing explorers, one learns to quickly distinguish others’ emotions and sincerity?

“Yes. And… is there any way to immediately inform, in the fastest and widest possible way, that this place has turned into a maze? To prevent more people from entering the building. I don’t mean the Maze Management Department.”

Last time, the interviewer was about to mention that method before disappearing.

Fortunately, he didn’t take long to respond.

“We can ask the explorers on our team to post it on social media. Just one of those assigned to me has nine million followers.”

Ah. So that’s one way.

As expected from an agent.

The head of Team 4 of the Explorer Support Department quickly sent a group message from his smartwatch and then spoke with a determined look.

“Mr. Seon Yuhan.”

He has a somewhat absent-minded air, but with that attitude he doesn’t seem like someone easy to deceive.

“I’ll go to the second floor. There’s a daycare. I won’t ask you to help me, so you escape first.”

Why are there always people like this everywhere?

I hate people like that.

“No. I’ll go toward the elevators. Soon there will be a blackout. Before that, we need to bring down as many people as possible.”

“Understood.”

We had to split up.

Two people aren’t needed to press a button, and I couldn’t abandon someone who could still be saved.

Of course, even so we won’t be able to save everyone.

I know that well.

And he does too.

Because a maze is not that kind of place.

“Be careful, Mr. Seon Yuhan.”

“You too.”

We split up, each heading toward the elevator and the emergency stairs.

Ah, right.

“Mr. interviewer!”

I quickly turned and shouted at his back as he grabbed the handle of the emergency door.

“If someone asks you the time, answer honestly! And be careful when going down the stairs!”

The interviewer tilted his head, confused, but gestured that he understood.

“Phew…”

I ran back to the elevator area and pressed the button.

“Except for one, all of them…”

As I thought, the other three elevators, aside from the one that collapsed with me, were on the upper floors.

There was no way they would come down in time.

6… 5… 4… 3… ding!

「The doors open.」

The same man was inside again.

Casual business attire, laptop bag, dark brown hair, mid-thirties.

“Are you not getting in?”

He asked brusquely and, without waiting for an answer, pressed the close button.

He had quite an impatient personality.

Clack.

“Get out. Soon there will be a blackout.”

I quickly stepped into the elevator, blocked the door with my leg, and pulled the man out.

“Hey, what are you doing! What’s wrong with you?”

The man, caught by me, shook his arm hard to break free.

He almost hit me with his bag.

“Who are you?”

“I’m Seon Yuhan.”

“Don’t tell me your name! Shouldn’t you apologize first?”

The man frowned.

He approached with a threatening attitude, but he didn’t seem like the type to hit without thinking.

“Yes. I’m sorry. This building has turned into a maze and soon there will be a blackout. Let’s go down the stairs.”

“What…? Ah… whatever. It’s my fault for running into a crazy person.”

Even though he got the apology he wanted, he didn’t seem satisfied.

He scratched the back of his neck in irritation and pressed the elevator button again.

“Believe me. This place is dangerous now—”

“—Are you not going to move your hand? I’m seriously going to call the police…”

He couldn’t finish the sentence.

Bang!

A huge crash, accompanied by vibration.

Boom! Crash! Bang!

“Aaaah! An earthquake!”

Crash! Thud!

The man jumped while covering his head.

“Calm down and let’s go down the stairs. It’s not an earthquake. It’s an elevator that fell.”

“What? All of a sudden? Seriously?”

“Yes. Do you see that the power went out? Follow me.”

“Damn it…”

The man, completely bewildered, began to follow me.

“So I was about to die?”

Since I died, you would have died too.

But instead of saying that, I used the short walk to the emergency exit to explain again.

That this building had turned into an invasive maze.

“How is that even possible? That I’m trapped in a maze? No… that can’t be. Invasive mazes are rarer than being struck by lightning!”

“Mazes are places where impossible things happen. And there are people who do get struck by lightning.”

And there is no guarantee it will happen only once.

“Stop talking nonsense. I don’t believe you.”

It’s normal that he doesn’t believe it.

I would probably believe it even less than him.

I held back a sigh, opened the emergency door, and stopped with one foot on the landing.

1…… 2…….

“W-what? All of a sudden. Why aren’t you going in?”

“One moment. I have to check something.”

I more or less understood that at the beginning I went down clumsily, misstepped, and fell, breaking my neck.

But last time, why did I stand still and still fall?

I had to find out.

And at the same time make this guy understand reality.

3……. 4……. 5…….

At the moment that chilling sensation of emptiness beneath my feet climbed up my spine, I pulled back my right foot and stepped backward.

“Damn it. What is this?”

The man behind me gasped when he saw what was in front of us.

Or rather, what had disappeared.

The two of us barely leaned our heads out and looked down at a bottomless square hole.

“Hmm…”

Now that I think about it.

“Was there another emergency staircase here?”

I should have checked by going all the way down.

**

1-1. Do not remain on the stairs for more than 5 seconds.

***

“Ha…”

Perhaps because the reality of the maze was beginning to sink in, the man let out a heavy sigh.

But it was already too late.

The landing had already collapsed.

“There’s another exit. That way.”

I followed the man toward another nearby staircase.

“Go down carefully. Don’t fall.”

“Says the one who just broke the stairs. What was there to check…?”

His complaints echoed in my ears.

I decided not to waste energy responding.

Second floor…

As we passed through the emergency door of the second floor, I thought about the interviewer.

Did he make it safely to the daycare?

Or did he disappear again?

And if he disappears, will I be able to save him?

Can people who disappear come back?

“Whether it’s a maze or whatever, we just need to get out.”

Bang!

“We’ve arrived!”

The man’s confident voice rang out as he opened the emergency exit on the first floor.

“Huh?”

I’m starting to develop an aversion to “huh?”.

I don’t like saying it, and even less hearing it.

Although this time it was understandable.

“Didn’t we just come out on the first floor?”

The place we came out to was the second floor.

We both went back into the stairwell and checked the number on the wall.

“What? Why does it say second floor?”

Before going in, it clearly said first floor.

Damn it.

I held back the emotion boiling inside me.

“As I told you… this is a maze.”

Whether it’s a contact maze or an invasive one.

The reason they’re called mazes.

The Labyrinth of Greek mythology was a prison.

To confine the Minotaur.

“It doesn’t seem like we can get out so easily.”

A maze does not easily let out those who enter it.

“Shut up! Don’t say such unlucky things. You said that sometimes there are easy mazes, right?”

The man gritted his teeth and ran down the stairs.

He tried to go down one more floor.

It seemed useless, but just in case, I followed him.

Clack.

As expected, it was useless.

“Ha, the second floor again!”

Even when we tried to open the basement door, what awaited us was once again the second floor.

“Maybe you can only go down one floor at a time.”

“And what am I supposed to do then? And you!”

The man, groaning in frustration, suddenly turned and grabbed my shoulder.

“Why have you been so calm this whole time? Are you an explorer? I don’t remember seeing one like you in Yuwi.”

Calm? Not even close.

I’m barely holding back the urge to vomit.

“I’m not.”

Saying that I had already died and come back knowing this would happen was hard to believe even for me.

And I didn’t know how long this would last either.

Whether it could repeat indefinitely or had limits.

How many chances I had left.

Maybe this was the last one.

I had to act as if it was.

“But I saved you a moment ago, so there’s not much difference.”

The man, who had avoided dying in the elevator, finally fell silent.

“Ahem… well… yeah, I owe you one. What did you say your name was? I’m Choi Jaeha, an accountant at Howol…”

He took out a business card.

Even in this situation, thinking about exchanging cards is admirable.

I glanced at the card.

[Howol Accounting Corporation

Certified Public Accountant Choi Jaeha]

His office was on the 16th floor.

This building, although it is the headquarters of the Yuwi Guild, has some floors rented out.

It seems the 16th is one of them.

“Ah, nice to meet you. I’m Seon Yuhan. I don’t have a card. I came for an interview.”

“Huh.”

“Yes, I know my life is a mess. So let’s think about what to do now, Mr. Choi Jaeha.”

I led him to the auditorium.

If the third floor was empty, the second being empty didn’t give me a good feeling.

Besides, we needed a place to talk.

The cold and dark atmosphere of the empty auditorium was unsettling.

“What to do? Do you have any idea?”

Choi Jaeha replied irritably.

For someone who almost died and could die at any moment, his reaction was quite mature.

“Explorers don’t enter invasive mazes, right? Unlike competitive ones.”

So he calls contact ones “competitive.”

If “contact” is neutral, “competitive” is more political.

I understood better what kind of person he was.

“That’s right. You can’t predict what will happen. But we can make assumptions.”

“Yeah? Which ones?”

“If we can’t go directly from the third to the first floor, it means we have to fulfill a condition on the second.”

Not just on this floor.

In general, that’s how mazes work.

Whether contact or invasive.

If you fulfill the condition, the maze is resolved.

Simple rule.

“And what is that condition?”

That’s the problem.

We don’t know.

“It could be staying on this floor for a certain time, entering all the rooms, finding other people, defeating something, or something completely absurd.”

There are many routes.

And whoever is trapped in a maze must get lost among them.

If you choose wrong.

you will only find death.

Tap—

“Huh?”

The stage lights turned on.