Chapter 4: Not Even in My Dreams

There’s a phrase that says life is the C (Choice) between B (Birth) and D (Death).

And it’s true.

Because the choice I made when I entered this place was complete garbage.

“Ah, employee Jeong. Did everything go well in Human Resources?”

As soon as I left Human Resources, I immediately took the elevator.

When I returned to the office feeling as though all the energy had been drained from my body, Manager Myeon stared at me with his seven faces.

And there was only one answer I could give him.

“…Yes. I don’t think I’m going to quit.”

“Oh, did something happen?”

“It seems there was a mistake on the hospital’s part. They said it’s not such a serious condition after all.”

Maybe because it was the correct answer, Manager Myeon didn’t continue asking about the call.

Perhaps they were simply short on staff here.

“I see. What a relief, truly a relief. We just hired a new employee, and it would have been a shame if you quit on your very first day.”

It had just seemed to me like the fifth face licked its lips.

But surely that was just my imagination.

When I responded with an awkward smile, Manager Myeon approached and patted me on the shoulder.

“It must have been quite a shocking day for you, so for today, finish up here and go home. It seems the others will still take a while to return, so I’ll introduce you to the rest of the team tomorrow morning. And starting tomorrow afternoon, we’ll begin the real training.”

“Go home…?”

I carefully looked around while leaving the sentence unfinished.

Beyond the open office door, I could vaguely see the hallway I had passed through earlier.

“Don’t tell me there’s another problem?”

“N-no, it’s not that. Do I simply leave through there?”

Manager Myeon nodded.

He was definitely holding back laughter.

As though he were watching a completely lost rookie who didn’t know how work functioned.

I decided not to directly ask that thing how exactly “leaving work” functioned.

Even so, this was at least a place where something called an “exit” existed.

It truly was fortunate that I hadn’t said in front of the baby monster that I wanted to quit.

If I had spoken carelessly at that moment, that enormous red tongue would have tasted my flesh, and I never would have been able to leave this place.

— I’m Jeong Haeil, the new employee who just joined Extraction Team 1. I came to introduce myself. I hope we get along well.

It wasn’t a bad improvisation.

Being seen as an excessively polite employee was a hundred times better than losing my life.

The baby monster responded irritably that something like that could be confirmed from its own office, and I maintained my composure as best I could before escaping Human Resources unharmed.

It was a little clumsy, but even that baby monster didn’t eat a hardworking rookie just because his face looked a little pale.

As for Lee Jihyun…

‘Forget it. Don’t think about that and get out of here.’

I stood up from my seat, picked up my bag as naturally as possible, and headed toward the office door.

“Then, as you said, I’ll be leaving for today.”

Manager Myeon chose one of his kindest faces to smile at me.

“Very well. You worked hard today, employee Jeong.”

I bowed my head in farewell and headed toward the emergency exit at the end of the hallway.

For some reason, I didn’t want to use the elevator I had taken to go to Human Resources again.

It had been a day full of absurd situations.

But even so, I managed to endure an entire day.

First, let’s leave the company.

Let’s go home and rest.

Thinking only about that, I opened the door.

Click—

Cold air immediately rushed in.

And what appeared before me was unfortunately, my room.

A small, cramped but tidy studio apartment.

The clothes and bed were still perfectly arranged.

Aside from the deep darkness beyond the window, it was exactly the same room I had been in this morning.

Just in case, I carefully closed the door.

And opened it again.

My room again.

I closed it and opened it again.

My room.

My room.

My room again.

I stared at that scene for several seconds, as though it had been sewn into place with a needle.

On top of the shoe cabinet by the entrance sat the book I had left reading last night.

And the goldfish inside the aquarium opened and closed its mouth as always.

Well, they had said they would come pick me up when it was time to go to work.

I guess that made sense.

But.

Could I really call this “leaving work”?

— Can we leave? Really? No…!

I sensed malice and mockery organized at an institutional level.

Quit?

Leave work?

Was it even possible to leave this building from the beginning?

No.

It wasn’t.

I closed the door and pressed my hand against my forehead.

My forehead was warm.

But my hands were freezing cold.

Was I really going insane?

“Employee Jeong.”

I flinched and violently turned my head.

I didn’t know when he had followed me, but Manager Myeon was standing several steps behind me.

His seven faces wore expressions of satisfaction, as though they had finally seen my true feelings.

One laughed.

Another frowned.

Another yawned.

And then one of them, the one with the most innocent expression of all, spoke kindly.

“Since you are a valuable talent, I made a special arrangement to improve your work efficiency. So you no longer have to worry about coming to or leaving work.”

Manager Myeon brought his kind face closer and smiled at me once again before elegantly turning around and heading back toward the office.

As a working adult, I no longer had any choice but to accept it.

I had already arrived home.

In a way I could not escape from.

***

It’s a new morning.

A quiet awakening, without sunlight or alarms.

I pushed aside the blanket and lowered my feet to the floor.

Leaving the warmth of the bed is never easy, but this time it was difficult for a different reason.

Even so, I forced myself to get up, open the cabinet, and take out the bag of cereal I had left there two days ago.

The milk seemed so old that I couldn’t even remember when I bought it, but at least the smell was still normal.

“…Haaap.”

I scooped up a spoonful of cereal and brought it to my mouth.

Crunch, crunch.

Normal sensations.

Sweet, crunchy, and slightly rough as it went down my throat.

The kinds of sounds that belong in a place where a person lives.

Like remnants of a routine that still hasn’t collapsed.

I hadn’t collapsed either.

I got up normally, I was eating cereal, and soon I would go to work.

Somehow, I would survive inside that organization and get something out of it.

Ding.

A notification appeared on the black phone screen.

The first was a deposit of three million won from Citizens Bank, labeled as a welcome bonus and work support.

The second was a notification indicating that points had been added to an internal company store application that I didn’t remember ever installing.

But.

Where exactly was I supposed to use money or points like those?

“Well, I’d better take a shower.”

I forced my voice while imitating Manager Myeon just to make myself speak.

From experience, I knew that if I didn’t mutter something even while alone, I would eventually lose my mind.

I opened the bathroom door, washed my face, brushed my teeth, and quickly rinsed my body with water.

The face reflected in the mirror looked paler than yesterday.

The dark circles under my eyes also seemed deeper.

“I’m fine.”

Even while saying it, my voice trembled slightly.

I finished drying my face with the towel and put on my pants and shirt.
Then, absentmindedly, I opened the curtains.

It felt as though icy water filled my lungs.

‘I forgot.’

Outside the window, there was still nothing but empty darkness.

No light.

No sound.

No outlines.

It wasn’t night.

It wasn’t even darkness.

It was something nonexistent.

A void where everything seemed to have come undone.

Slowly, with extreme care, I closed the curtains again.

Since no one was watching me, my fingers trembled freely.

Today’s mental escape had failed.

The fact that my room was behind the company’s door and that nothing existed outside the window.

This entire world seemed to be screaming at me that I had no choice.

Then I saw something beneath the window, on top of the desk.

Beside my work clothes, the employee ID badge had been carefully placed there, as though someone had deliberately left it.

Had I left it there myself?

Employee Jeong Haeil

Limited Company Where the Dead End Up with Ghosts | Extraction Team 1

I slowly picked up the ID badge.

My name and department were engraved with an almost funerary clarity, like an epitaph.

“Limited Company… Where the Dead End Up with Ghosts.”

With my lips closed, I murmured those words to myself, as though trying to hypnotize myself.

I took one step toward the entrance.

If there truly was nowhere to escape to and no time to do so then I had no choice but to enter.

I silently turned the doorknob.

Click.

When I opened the door, the company’s fluorescent lights enveloped my face.

The faint smell of dust, the scent of detergent spreading through the hallway, and the cold air of a perfectly organized office space.

Just as I expected, beyond the door I had closed after leaving work last night, the same company hallway still stretched out.

I took exactly one step.

And at that instant, as though the entire world had been waiting for me, the fluorescent lights began turning on one by one.

Chk, chk, chk—

The electric buzzing accompanied the gradual lighting of the hallway, like a kind welcome preparing my place.

Was I already adapting to this grotesque office?

Or perhaps I was degrading?

Or maybe, in order to say that someone has “adapted” to a company like this, every difference between the two first has to disappear?

I continued walking straight toward the Extraction Team 1 office.

The doorknob was warm, as though someone had just touched it.

When the door softly opened, the exact same office space as yesterday appeared.

Manager Myeon was already sitting down writing something.

One of his seven faces slowly turned toward me and lifted the corners of its lips.

“Very good morning, Mr. Haeil.”

I also put on the mask more naturally than yesterday before responding.

“Good morning, Manager Myeon.”

I bowed my head and walked toward my desk.

It had begun.

A routine I never chose.

A working life where no alternatives remained.

Maybe, if I tried hard enough, I could survive one more day.

“Assistant Manager Son just went to the break room. It seems he was excited because a new employee joined, so wait a moment. I’ll introduce him to you when he returns.”

“Yes. Understood.”

As I set my bag on the desk and slowly regained my breathing, the sound of someone coming out of the break room was heard.

Thud.

The first step was heavy and long.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

After those slow footsteps, the office door opened.

Naturally, I lifted my head.

And I saw him.

He was a large-built man.

He wore a simple black suit and an immaculate red tie.

The creases in his pants were sharply pressed, his shoes slightly shiny, and he carried a mug in his hand.

The image of a completely ordinary office worker.

Except for one single thing.

The head on his shoulders.

“Assistant Manager Son, this is employee Jeong Haeil. Introduce yourselves.”

Assistant Manager Son.

A word was missing.

Because in reality, it was “Assistant Manager Hand.”

His head was literally a hand.

More precisely, an enormous fist.

A gigantic pale-skinned hand was attached directly to his shoulders without a neck, clenched like the sturdy fist of a boxer.

It had no ears, eyes, or nose.

Only five bent fingers rising like a deformed crown.

And that hand slowly began to move.

The thumb and index finger gently separated before coming together again.

Then the middle finger opened before closing once more.

It looked like a greeting.

A handshake.

Or perhaps the motion right before strangling someone.

“Ah, so you’re the rookie?”

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.

The voice came from his head.

No rather, it was embedded directly into my mind.

That voice didn’t enter through my ears.

It was as though it crushed and burst something between my eardrums and brain before being forced inside me.

Every time he pronounced a syllable, the fingers of that fist twisted in place of lips.

“Wow, a new employee finally joined. Call me Assistant Manager Son. I hope we get along well.”

As he approached, the fist on top of his head slowly began to open.

As though politely offering a handshake.

He wasn’t extending a hand.

That entire enormous head was what pointed toward me.

“How about a handshake?”

Erasing the bewildered expression from my face, I extended my right hand.

Because I felt that the hand embedded in his head could clench into a fist and smash into my face at any moment.

“Yes, nice to meet you. I’m Jeong Haeil.”

The instant our palms touched, a chill ran through my body because of the abnormal warmth of that hand.

And then came an absolutely inhuman pressure.

Creeeak—

A pain as though steel pincers were crushing my entire hand.

The strength he applied simply by shaking hands was in a completely different category from mine.

“You’ve got a tougher hand than I expected. Looks like you trained something, huh?”

Without noticing my condition, Assistant Manager Son let out a loud laugh and lightly smacked my back.

Tap!

For him, it was probably just a friendly pat.

But for me, it was enough of an impact to force all the air out of my lungs at once.

“Guhk…!”

Something cracked inside my body.

Maybe no bones were broken.

But my brain was already slowly pulling down the emergency shutters in order to survive.

Thinking I could endure an entire day here had been pure arrogance.

‘…Damn monsters.’

The last image I saw before collapsing was Assistant Manager Son’s enormous fist-shaped head tilting from side to side.