Episode 165. Mind Control (1)
How long had my eyes been closed?
In a fleeting moment where I couldn’t tell if I had dozed off, a familiar voice emerged from the darkness.
“Anyway, young people these days have weak mentals. Their minds have gone completely rotten, I tell you. How do you plan to live life being that weak?”
A rough, coarse, emotional tone.
It was Chief Nam’s catchphrase.
Without looking, the air of the office was vivid before my eyes. The image of Chief Nam grumbling to himself while reading an internet article, and everyone pretending not to hear while only doing their own work.
Someone whispered right beside me. It was Deputy Chief An’s voice.
“An employee at a nearby office died. He’s like that because he heard about it.”
Deputy Chief An swallowed a sigh.
“That crap about young people, I’m sick of it. He talks about people like they’re losers. Everyone is struggling so hard just to live diligently, aren’t they?”
It was around the time when Deputy Chief An’s team members were resigning one after another.
And Deputy Chief An was one of the few who didn’t hurl curses at departing employees.
“They say it’s like that these days. People think something terrible will happen if they quit, so they have extreme thoughts instead. They’re driven into a corner. No matter how much those around them tell them to rest, would they hear it? When your heart is heavy, your judgment dulls….”
Deputy Chief An spoke calmly, deeply, and darkly.
“The world is still wide. This isn’t the only company. So.”
That day.
The day I returned to work for the first time after sending my noona off.
The last thing Deputy Chief An said while comforting me came to mind.
“Assistant Manager Gim, don’t do that.”
Cold seeped into the soles of my feet.
Very faintly, I heard the sound of water.
When I opened my eyes, a glittering nightscape was visible in the distance.
A few skyscrapers that hadn’t yet gone completely dark were splendid.
‘Hannam Bridge?’
Thanks to passing by often, it was easy to know where I was.
However, there were differences from usual. Not a single car could be seen on the bridge that was usually jam-packed during rush hour.
The road was empty, and the streetlights flickered, laden with the humid dawn air.
The night sky was pitch black.
‘Just what time is it…….’
When I fumbled in my pocket, my phone came into my hand.
4:10 AM. It was a time when even the first buses weren’t running.
Walking on the sidewalk, my forearms felt chilly. Running my hand down my arm, I felt the rustling texture of my shirt.
Suddenly, I turned around and checked the direction I had been walking from. Buildings with almost all their lights off were visible. About an hour down that road was Hanpyeong Industries.
The moment I turned my body back toward the original direction.
My whole body was cold. My chest felt tight, as if being squeezed.
The wind was blowing, yet I couldn’t breathe.
Beyond the narrow railing, a wide, black sky was visible.
Connected as one in such darkness that one couldn’t tell where the river was and where the sky was.
My stomach churned. The hand covering my lips trembled. My steps faltered helplessly in the wind, so I had to grip the railing tightly. I felt like I was going to collapse.
Without realizing it, unconscious words spilled from my mouth.
“Noona.”
My other hand also reached for the railing. Black river water flowed calmly.
The scenery seen by twenty-eight-year-old me unfolded before my eyes.
An “erased emotion” of mine that I had forgotten lodged in my chest.
“Do I have to keep living like this?”
Back then, I had asked myself at the riverbank that offered no answer.
I couldn’t pride myself on working hard, but I hadn’t lived lazily.
Even without dreams, it wasn’t that I had no hope.
I just thought I was living moderately well.
Life twisted in an instant. After experiencing an unexpected accident, I had lived by inertia.
When the alarm rang, I opened my eyes; when it was time, I went to work; even when cursed at, I felt nothing.
A life of returning home alone and falling asleep when the time came.
Everyone said they would live a changed tomorrow, but only I remained like a stone stuck in place.
Perhaps because that appearance was unsightly, people picked fights with me everywhere. Hating that, I kept hiding underground. I rooted myself only in barren places and didn’t move.
I have no motivation, nothing I want to do. No thoughts come to mind.
Someone wedged themselves into the spot where my defenses had vanished. Even when that person dug into my wounds, I didn’t resist.
I gave up thinking. I had no confidence that I could live a better future.
Because the more I realized it, the more I felt the empty space.
Because even the future had disappeared for noona.
Because it was painful.
Only noona had told me to live well. Now there is no one to give me courage.
Because it’s suffocating.
I exhaled the breath that had been blocked. A rough sound rose from my throat. My breathing was rapid.
I hung my head for a long while.
Even though my hair blew about enough to cover my face in the wind, I didn’t fix it. I didn’t straighten my back either.
As if trying to see the unseen bottom of the river, I cast my gaze only downward, downward.
Then a small vibration rang from my pocket.
A familiar saved name, a familiar tone. And…….
Chief
[I’ll stop by a client tomorrow before coming to work]
[Do the onboarding for the new hire, Assistant Manager Gim]
[Come in early and set things up]
……Treatment that felt like what I’d receive for the rest of my life.
The nightscape was so far away, yet the phone light was so close. As if it would blind my eyes.
I took one step back from the railing.
The feeling that the heart which had been supporting me had died.
At twenty-eight, having burned everything away and left with only an empty shell, I gave up on Gim Iwol’s human life.
Gim Iwol stared at the message that had arrived around 4:30 AM for a long time.
Then smiled with a sad face.
Gim Iwol muttered.
“Life is too hard, noona……”
Gim Iwol moved his feet. It was a staggering yet heavy step, without will or purpose.
And I woke from the dream.
There was only ink-black darkness, like water.
“Ah……”
I shouldn’t have remembered at all.
I should have lived forgetting.
I wish I had lived my whole life not knowing about times when I didn’t want to do anything.
“Aah, ah……”
My emotions surged.
I bit my lip hard and pressed my palms against my eyes, struggling to quell the surging feelings.
But nothing changed. Neither the painful heart nor the deep depression.
I rummaged through my carrier like crazy. And took out hidden headache medicine.
I didn’t even have time to get water, so I swallowed it with saliva. Then I fell asleep as if escaping from reality.
* * *
Morning came.
I wanted to quit everything. My shoulders were heavy.
While sitting quietly on the bed, I Cheonghyeon came down the stairs and greeted me.
“Good morning!”
Noona was reflected over that face.
“Hey, you’re here early?”
On the first day of the regression, it had been a face that was completely blurry. Just because I opened one lousy memory data file, the face had become much clearer.
That made it more painful. The hand hidden under the blanket trembled.
Contrary to my heart, the smile engraved on my face rose reflexively.
I’m a fucking retard bastard.
“Yeah, good morning.”
Top-class idiot. Imbecile. Moron.
Whether I feel good or bad, I only try to put on a smiling face in front of others, unable to say what I like or dislike, just burying it all.
A stupid bastard who’ll die doing only what others tell him without a mind of his own.
* * *
“Hyung, did you finish it all?”
Gang Giyeon asked, looking at my salad container. About half the salad, without dressing, remained.
“Yeah.”
“……Are you sick?”
Even Bak Juu, who ate little himself, gave me a look.
“It’s because I’m sick of eating only salad, that’s why.”
“That’s true.”
I Cheonghyeon agreed. Choe Jeho…… seemed to be completely unable to empathize with my words, seeing as he was emptying his third container of salad alone.
“But hyung, you didn’t eat anything this morning either.”
“You guys been observing me?”
“We’re eating at the same table, so isn’t it weirder not to know?”
Gang Giyeon narrowed his eyes and chided me.
If I had baked the bread, I could have lied that I ate one while baking. Unfortunately, permission to bake bread hasn’t been granted to me yet.
“Still, you should eat something to get better. You have to take your medicine too, hyung.”
Jeong Seongbin tried to persuade me with a kind tone that made it impossible to ignore.
“Thanks to your loving nagging, I feel like I’d get better even without medicine.”
“So you’re saying you’re not taking your medicine now?”
“I’m someone who takes his own medicine properly.”
You know how much I hate headaches. Ever since I experienced a migraine once in the past, I learned the value of clear brain activity.
Even though my head has recovered now, I’m in the middle of taking all eight weeks’ worth.
“Ah, slowly……”
In the middle of playing along with their pointless jokes, bile rose inside me.
Saying I’d get up first, I took my salad container and trash and rose from my seat.
I went outside the practice room, sorted the trash for recycling, then went straight to the bathroom.
And entered the last stall, locking the door.
“Urk.”
Nausea surged. The salad I had just eaten came back up as is.
This is why I can’t eat anything. Even if I eat it, I’ll just throw it all up, so what’s the point of eating?
If only I didn’t have to eat with those Spark guys, I would have chosen to starve instead.
“Huegh……”
My stomach had been in this state for days. The moment I put food in, I couldn’t last a few minutes before getting nauseous. It was nothing but a waste of precious food through vomiting.
Around age twenty-eight, this happened often. It felt like not just the memories in my head but also my body’s memories had returned.
“At least I have the know-how, so that’s a relief.”
On the first day, I momentarily forgot the past and ate with oriental dressing, then vomited wrong and almost ruined my nose. After that, I’ve been forcibly on the Gang Giyeon-style diet.
After pounding my chest with my fist a few times, the urge to vomit subsided somewhat.
This too was starting to take its toll. Perhaps because I hadn’t eaten but my energy consumption remained the same, my head was spinning more and more.
“But if I let on that I’m not okay while working…….”
I felt river water rising at my feet. As if I’d see a straight road leading to Hanpyeong Industries if I turned around.
“Huegh!”
Both hands went to the toilet again. Only after dry-heaving until I was dizzy could I barely lift my head.
The system was floating above the bathroom wall.
+
[SYSTEM] Correction effects based on performance are being applied.
▷ ‘Attendance Management’ recognized as top-tier, receiving a high evaluation.
+
It was a phrase I had seen before. When Attendance Management was at 18, something similar had activated for the first time.
It seemed my diligence had been recognized and I benefited during the monthly evaluation.
When I opened my resume, the numbers had changed slightly.
+
Performance Evaluation (100)
─ Vocal Proficiency: 11/20
─ Dance Proficiency: 9/20
─ Self PR: 17/20
─ Attendance Management: 20(▲)/20
─ Organizational Adaptability: 15/20
─ Cumulative Fatigue: 15%
+
The cumulative fatigue that I had gone to the trouble of reducing to 0% had risen again in that short time. It seemed to be because I had moved around without eating.
The problematic Attendance Management was at a perfect score.
“If they gave a one-time benefit for excellent attendance, what effect do they give for top-tier attendance?”
As I stared blankly into the air, a new phrase was added at the bottom of the system.
+
▷ To ensure smooth work performance, negative emotion recognition rate is lowered to the maximum limit.
+
The system really did seem to want to help me.
Seeing as it gave me a function I needed so precisely.