Chapter 5
Hwaae High School (1)
Could Team Leader Yong not be trusted?
I still couldn’t tell. It hadn’t been long since we met. Besides, this was his own team.
“When your name is called, please come forward, collect your ID card and uniform, and then leave!”
But was there any point in worrying about it? This wasn’t a matter of preference. We were being assigned.
The whiteboard on the platform vanished, revealing a circular stone slab.
An animal had been carved in relief upon it, its mouth gaping wide open.
“Mr. Park Min-il!”
The man whose name had been called stepped forward and reached into the stone creature’s mouth. He pulled out a uniform marked with a red stripe, with an ID card resting on top.
“You’re on the Exploration Team. Congratulations!”
“Wow, that’s the team with the high salary, right? I’m jealous.”
The new employees exchanged congratulations among themselves.
Team Leader Yong remained perfectly still, his chin propped on one hand as he stared straight ahead.
“What does the Exploration Team do?”
“Well... it isn’t a team I’d recommend.”
Unlike earlier, his voice was noticeably subdued. He didn’t even make a joke of it.
Instead of pressing him further, I decided to watch how things unfolded.
Dismantling Team, Exploration Team, Exploration Team.
Most were assigned to the Exploration Team, though a few went to the Dismantling Team. Those assigned to Dismantling were conspicuously composed amid the excited atmosphere.
The distinction between the two groups was strangely clear.
What was the difference?
“Mr. Kim Hanmu!”
At last, Myeong Haebin called my name.
Staring at the stone jaws that looked ready to snap shut at any moment, I couldn’t help admiring the courage of everyone who had stuck a hand inside.
“You were here? I was going to visit your room after this, Senior!”
A chill ran through me when Myeong Haebin called me “Senior,” but there was no trace of yesterday’s cold, inhuman demeanor in her bright eyes and cheerful voice.
“Team Leader Yong brought me here. I missed the lecture.”
“Oh, that mister? It’s fine. I’ll explain everything to you separately later.”
“Team Leader Yong is also a mister, so why am I ‘Senior’?”
“What am I supposed to do when I’ve already gotten used to calling you that? Team Leader Yong told me to call him ‘Mister.’”
She pouted as though she couldn’t see what the problem was. She looked exactly like the Myeong Haebin I knew.
Maybe I misjudged what I saw yesterday. I was completely overwhelmed at the time....
Thinking that made me feel better.
“Well... fine. Call me whatever you like. But what determines which team we’re assigned to?”
“I’m not sure. Whichever team suits you best, perhaps? I only announce the assignments.”
The team that suited me best.
Would I be better off on the Exploration Team, which was filled with lively new recruits, or Team Leader Yong’s Dismantling Team?
Tense, I felt around inside the cold stone mouth. My fingers touched a flat piece of plastic resting atop a soft uniform.
But the uniform I pulled out looked strange.
Why is mine black?
Everyone else’s had either a blue stripe or a red one. Why didn’t mine have anything?
“Haebin, is this perhaps defective—”
My words died as my gaze landed on the ID card.
[Await Heaven’s Will]
Name: Kim Hanmu
Affiliation: Cleaning Team
“Hey, did you win some kind of special prize? The Cleaning Team?”
Some of the people who had lingered to watch the remaining assignments peered over my shoulder at my ID card and began murmuring.
“What’s the Cleaning Team?”
“I thought there were only two possible teams. Did they explain this earlier?”
“I didn’t hear anything. Did they hire a janitor instead of an employee?”
I was more bewildered than anyone.
From the dormitory to the plaza, I hadn’t seen a single person wearing a plain black uniform without a colored stripe.
Except for one.
“Haebin, could there have been some mistake—”
“Of course not. You really are assigned to the Cleaning Team, Senior.”
Myeong Haebin’s expression didn’t waver in the slightest, which only confused me more.
“The assignments are over, so everyone should get going! You don’t want to be late on your first day of work, do you?”
A few people repeatedly glanced back at me, but it was ultimately none of their business, and they left one after another.
“Come with me. You’re on the Exploration Team too, right?”
“The name written on mine is a little different... but sure.”
Once all the new employees had gone, the seminar room felt empty.
Only three of us remained: Myeong Haebin, Team Leader Yong, and me.
“Phew. Now that everyone’s gone, I can finally tell you.”
“You knew?”
I looked at Myeong Haebin, the only person I had seen wearing a plain black uniform without any colored stripes.
I had assumed it was because she was an instructor or perhaps a member of Human Resources.
“Yes! I was transferred with you for your sake, Senior.”
Myeong Haebin held up her ID card.
[Await Heaven’s Will]
Name: Myeong Haebin
Affiliation: Cleaning Team
It was true. Her affiliation was listed as the Cleaning Team.
What team had she originally belonged to? Was it because I hadn’t looked carefully? I couldn’t remember.
Team Leader Yong, who had remained seated even while everyone else left, ambled over to us.
“What’s all the commotion about? Let me see.”
When I showed him the ID card, he turned it over several times, looking intrigued.
“Never seen this before. Is it a new team?”
“Our senior is very special! Mister, I’m telling you, he completely eradicated an urban legend!”
“I did?”
I pointed at myself in bewilderment, and Myeong Haebin smiled brightly.
“Yes! Normally, once an urban legend manifests somewhere, it always returns no matter how thoroughly it’s dismantled. But you cleaned it up without leaving a trace and eradicated it so completely that it can never reappear!”
I hadn’t been aware of doing anything special. I had merely cleaned the same way I always did.
Did I possess some power even I didn’t know about?
If I was going to have a special gift, couldn’t it have been a brain capable of getting me into Seoul National University or a face handsome enough to make me a celebrity? Why did it have to be cleaning urban legends?
“Oh... Is that so?”
Team Leader Yong rubbed his chin with interest. Then he abruptly seized my wrist.
“Haebin, does the Cleaning Team have any work?”
“Not yet. It was only just created. I also need to give Senior another orientation....”
“Nothing beats hands-on experience. Once you try it yourself, it’ll stick in your head.”
“What?!”
Rather than meekly allowing Team Leader Yong to drag me away, I planted my feet.
Feeling the heavy resistance, he looked back as though wondering what the problem was.
“What?”
“Where are we going right now?”
“To an urban legend, of course. Haven’t you heard that seeing once is better than hearing a hundred times?”
“Why do I have to go?”
Team Leader Yong paused, apparently not expecting that response, but soon burst out laughing.
“Are you afraid you’ll die? Haebin, which Dismantling Team has the highest survival rate?”
“Am I supposed to say it’s your team, Mister?”
“See? How reassuring is that?”
Suspicious.
After a moment’s thought, Myeong Haebin rose onto her toes and whispered into my ear.
“It might not be a bad idea. The Cleaning Team currently consists of only you and me, so wouldn’t it be safer to accompany a veteran?”
I knew next to nothing about urban legends.
Since I had even missed the orientation, this might be a little dangerous, but perhaps it would prove more useful for my future.
Bzzzt—
At that moment, my phone vibrated with a notification.
[Completion Condition: Clean up an urban legend with “Team Leader Yong.”]
It really must have been desperate for me to clean up urban legends. It never let an opportunity slip by.
Fine. I’ll go.
“Understood. If that’s all right with you....”
“Then I’ll go get our equipment! You two go on ahead!”
Myeong Haebin darted out the door, leaving Team Leader Yong and me alone in the seminar room.
“Don’t chicken out. It’s only a school urban legend.”
Team Leader Yong smirked and pulled a wooden plaque from inside his coat, then inserted it into the door Myeong Haebin had just used.
When he turned the handle and opened it, an entirely different place appeared beyond it.
A sunlit school corridor lay on the other side. It was an ordinary school filled with the everyday sounds of children chattering and running around.
Aside from the considerable amount of blood everywhere.
A brown-haired man with glasses was crouching there in a Daecheonmyeong uniform.
“You’re already here. I told you to wait for me.”
“You told me to come ahead because you were going to hook a new recruit and bring him along.”
“Hoho. Did I say that?”
Their casual conversation didn’t register at all.
A corpse lay brazenly in the middle of the main entrance hall, its neck stitched to its shirt collar and its wrists sewn to its sleeves.
He said it was only a school urban legend.
Haebin said this might not be a bad idea.
“Ugh....”
“You must be the new recruit. Are you all right?”
I wanted to say that I wasn’t all right in the slightest, but I was too busy covering my mouth to keep myself from vomiting.
“You don’t look all right. Understandable.”
“Hey, you were like this at first too.”
I raised a trembling hand and pointed at the corpse.
“Did you... do that?”
“Of course not. It’s difficult to see, but there’s a uniform underneath.”
The brown-haired man calmly took his hand off my back, walked over to the corpse, and pulled open its school shirt.
A glimpse of a red-striped uniform could be seen underneath.
It belonged to the Exploration Team.
“And don’t call me ‘you.’ I’m Jeong Dohyeon. It’s nice to meet you.”
Introducing himself as Jeong Dohyeon, the man shifted slightly to block the corpse from my sight and held out his hand.
“...I’m Kim Hanmu.”
Perhaps because I could no longer see the corpse, I felt much better.
Right. Get a grip. If I let my guard down just because this was supposedly a school urban legend, I could end up like that.
I wiped my mouth, proud that I had somehow managed not to vomit, and straightened my back.
“Mr. Dohyeon, what exactly do the Exploration and Dismantling Teams do?”
“The Exploration Team is the first team sent into an urban legend. Their job is to discover an escape method for the Dismantling Team. In exchange, they receive the highest hazard pay.”
There had been an unusually large number of people assigned to the Exploration Team earlier.
There was a saying that departments with excellent employment prospects often had so many openings because people left—or died—so quickly.
Was that why they recruited so many?
“Then what does the Dismantling Team do?”
“They’re the company’s top operatives. They dismantle urban legends using the bare minimum of information discovered by the Exploration Team. Unlike the other teams, they’re divided into Tigers, Dogs, and Rats.”
Tigers, Dogs, and Rats?
That was an unusual classification. Why divide people into animals at all?
“There’s also a Support Team, but they handle office work, so you’ll hardly ever interact with them.”
“Then which group are you in?”
“Dog. We rank far below the Tigers, but—you still shouldn’t underestimate us.”
Team Leader Yong, who had been examining the body behind us, sauntered over and rested an elbow on Jeong Dohyeon’s shoulder with a grin.
Jeong Dohyeon’s shoulder sagged beneath his weight as he pointed at me.
“I’ve been wondering for a while. Isn’t he joining our team?”
“No. Believe it or not, he’s on the newly created Cleaning Team.”
“Ah....”
After Team Leader Yong briefly explained my situation, Jeong Dohyeon tilted his head to one side.
“I didn’t witness what happened, so I don’t know how you do it... but I look forward to working with you. Since this is your first time, don’t push yourself too hard. Let’s all make it out alive.”
Then he gave me a gentle smile.
He had blocked the corpse from my view earlier too. He seemed like a decent person.
“All right, Haebin isn’t here yet, but let’s start by figuring out how to enter.”
“Can’t we simply go inside?”
Team Leader Yong dropped a rolled-up sheet of paper into my hand.
I unrolled the paper, which was stained with blood and some unidentified liquid. Words resembling typewritten text appeared upon it.
[Improper attire upon arriving at school.]
“What... is this?”
“This person’s cause of death.”
It was merely a string of words that hardly seemed like a cause of death.
“Newbie, ghost stories have rules. Our job is to dismantle them. Look here.”
He tapped the noticeboard hanging on the wall of the central corridor.
Through the stains mottling the glass, I could barely make out the words underneath.
<Hwaae High School Rules>
All students must be diligent and sincere.Students must be neatly dressed.Students may not remain on school grounds after the official dismissal time.
“Things like this. You have to question everything inside a ghost story and examine it thoroughly.”
So this person had ended up like that because he had violated the second rule?
Click.
Just then, I heard the door open behind me.
“I’m here! I’m not late, am I?”
Myeong Haebin entered with flushed cheeks, carrying a bag stuffed with cleaning supplies and a mop.
“Perfect timing. Haebin, give me some glass cleaner.”
“Oh, I brought some!”
Myeong Haebin set down the bag and sat in the entrance hall. After rummaging eagerly through it, she handed me a spray bottle of cleaner and a window-cleaning tool.
“What are you going to do with that?”
“You told me to question everything and examine it thoroughly.”
I sprayed on the cleaner, then used the sponge side of the window cleaner to wipe the glass from top to bottom. I finished by using the squeegee on the other side to remove the moisture.
As I swept away the last trickle of soapy water, someone let out a quiet gasp.
“I don’t know much about dismantling or exploration, but cleaning is one thing I’m confident about.”
What we had seen earlier wasn’t everything written on the noticeboard.
<Hwaae High School Rules>
All students must be diligent and sincere and must faithfully carry out the prescribed daily routine.Students must be neatly dressed and must prioritize compliance with the regulations.Students may not remain on school grounds after the official dismissal time.
3-1. Third-year students are exempt from Rule 3. (Evening Self-Study)