The first floor of the Management Bureau building was equipped with various convenience facilities.
Not only basic boarding and dining rooms, but also game rooms, lounges, cafes, mental health counseling centers, and more.
Various facilities for the mental health of Management Bureau employees had been established at the Bureau level. Naturally, due to the nature of the Bureau’s work, there were inevitably many people using them, and the inside of the facilities was always teeming with staff.
However, the people of the Response Division couldn’t make good use of the facilities. Most of them were frequently out on external assignments.
Even now, out of the Response Division’s total of six teams, as many as four teams were working in the field.
The Seoul metropolitan area branch was like this. If you added the other branches together, probably at least a dozen or so teams were traveling across the entire country to hunt down entities.
As the work was demanding, the pay was naturally substantial. They boasted wages higher than the Reconnaissance Division—their lives as fragile as flies within the Management Bureau—so financial compensation was certainly solid.
It was money that would ultimately revert to the Management Bureau if they died anyway, but that was that.
The sum sitting in the bank account of Gim Iseo, who belonged to Response Team 3, was large enough to elicit gasps in the hundreds of millions.
Of course, this was largely because she wasn’t the type to particularly enjoy luxury.
She wasn’t the type to purchase things through the Cartel like other agents, nor did she particularly like designer brands. The only places she spent money were ordering the most expensive drink at the cafe or buying food for her juniors.
Now was one such moments.
“Drink.”
On her day off.
At the cafe on the first floor of the Management Bureau, Gim Iseo ordered the most expensive menu items and dessert, then swiftly held them out to the junior sitting across from her. Her junior, who resembled a puppy, smiled awkwardly and received the drink politely.
“Th-thank you….”
A blue coffee with steam rising from it.
It was a fatigue-recovery drink made with the Management Bureau’s special recipe. It tasted similar to cola, but its effects were excellent. After drinking it, one could endure without sleeping for about two days.
It was the best drink for Negotiation Division staff who pulled all-nighters as if they were meals. Though it boasted an insane price of 30,000 won, many people sought it out because of its effects. Bak Mina was also one of the aficionados of this drink.
However, when the one buying it was a senior with five times more years of service than her, she couldn’t help but drink carefully. So she put the straw into her mouth, watching Gim Iseo’s expression, and took a sip.
Gim Iseo didn’t look at her, instead gazing out the window.
The Management Bureau building stood in the heart of the city. A barrier had been erected so that the interior couldn’t be seen from outside, nor could anyone enter, but from the inside, it was possible to look outside clearly.
“….”
It was lunchtime, so there were quite a few people on the streets. Office workers headed to restaurants in groups, while cars on the road drove according to the traffic lights.
It was a peaceful, everyday scene.
Gim Iseo had once been part of that daily life, but after her entire family was transferred into a cruel fairy tale, everything had collapsed.
She was the only one who escaped from the fairy tale. Her younger sibling had become soup in a witch’s furnace, and her parents had been dissected alive. She alone had survived.
In a single night, she had become an orphan. And after dropping out of school, she became a Management Bureau agent.
“…Hah.”
It was a common tragedy found everywhere in the Management Bureau. It was laughable to be sentimental about it now.
Gim Iseo shook off her thoughts and turned her head toward Bak Mina sitting across from her. She was chewing on pancakes hamster-like, her cheeks puffed out.
“Is it good?”
Gim Iseo asked with a faint smile. Bak Mina nodded awkwardly and gulped down the pancake.
“Y-yes. I think it’s even more delicious because you bought it for me, Senior…!”
“We’re not even from the same department, so you don’t need to butter me up that much. The Response Division and Negotiation Division hardly ever meet in the first place.”
“B-but still….”
“More importantly, that person. You said he’s not a mage?”
Gim Iseo asked with a serious face. Bak Mina gulped and answered.
“Yes… He was just someone with vaguely strong energy who happened to have an exorcist’s talisman. I couldn’t feel that unique aura mages have….”
“…An exorcist’s talisman. Did you check if he really got it from a shaman?”
“He didn’t seem to know the true form of the business card, so I didn’t check that far. After all, unless one has the personal conviction of having directly encountered the supernatural, it’s impossible to see through a business card, right?”
“…That’s true.”
If the man standing at the convenience store had directly faced the true form of the Eight-Foot Ghost, it would have been impossible for him to perceive the information written on the business card. Even a seasoned agent couldn’t figure out the false information on a business card—how could a civilian possibly notice it?
The same would be true if he were a mage. No, if he were a mage, he would have been even more hypersensitive.
For some reason, mages greatly disliked getting entangled with the Management Bureau. There were a few who cooperated, but they were an extreme minority. The rest all lived while hiding their identities.
Such a mage couldn’t possibly stay still upon seeing the words “Management Bureau.” They would have definitely moved in some way.
But the two people who had visited his house were perfectly fine and had returned having obtained information. There were no signs of… brainwashing.
That meant it was practically proven that the man was truly a civilian who knew nothing.
Just a civilian with vaguely strong energy who didn’t even know the true nature of the entity, or even that he had gotten caught up in the supernatural.
There was no need to perform memory erasure or extend a recruitment offer to such a person. You couldn’t forcibly drag someone who hadn’t realized the hidden side of the world into it.
“For now… got it. Thanks for letting me know.”
“Ah, it’s nothing. This much is easy.”
Gim Iseo didn’t consider the possibility that Ian was a mage who had even seen through the business card.
If that were possible, it would mean his level was extraordinarily high, and such a mage wouldn’t have let the Eight-Foot Ghost slip away at that scene.
Furthermore, a mage of that caliber would have already had their face and name known to the Management Bureau. But his face wasn’t stored in the Management Bureau’s mage database.
Therefore, that man was definitely a pure civilian. Having organized her thoughts as such, Gim Iseo stood up.
“Ah, are you leaving?”
“Yeah. It’s my day off today. I rested at the dormitory, and now I have to return to work.”
She answered, pulling her hood down low. Then she turned back to Bak Mina at a sudden thought.
“Once our operation in a few days is over, you guys will probably have to move busily too. It’s an incident that’ll likely produce a lot of survivors.”
“…Huh, did a large-scale contamination incident occur somewhere…?”
“No.”
Gim Iseo smiled bitterly and pulled a small ticket from her pocket.
It was a ticket with a red design featuring a picture of two clowns playing trumpets. Bak Mina checked the contents written on the ticket and scrunched her brow tightly.
[Fun Theme Park! For children and adults alike! An amusement park for everyone’s happiness!]
[Come to our magical paradise, Magic Eden, abundant with things to enjoy!]
[Admission is free with this ticket. Please visit without worry!]
*
“…What the hell is this?”
The day after the vampire rampage ended.
On his way back from buying a simple lunch at the convenience store, Ian discovered a red ticket lying by itself in front of his house and frowned.
When he picked it up and checked, it was an amusement park promotional ticket. He couldn’t understand why they had bothered to make it red, but anyway, it wasn’t anything problematic. Ian tucked the ticket away, roughly tossed it onto the table, and put a pre-made lunch box in the microwave.
Whirrr. The microwave turned on with a humming sound. Ian sat on the bed while waiting for the timer and opened his banking app.
“8.5 million won, huh….”
Adding the request reward to the money he originally had came out to roughly that amount. Ian smiled and lay back.
He had gained quite a bit of leeway in the blink of an eye. It wasn’t enough to gain financial freedom, but it was true that a large sum had come in.
He probably wouldn’t need to live scrounging for at least a few months. Even after paying rent and buying various necessities, he would easily have several hundred thousand left over.
But he couldn’t just spend the remaining money carelessly.
Ian's immediate goal was to acquire a workshop anyway. He should only buy what was necessary and save the rest, then rent a room once the money accumulated.
While he was thinking, the lunch box finished cooking. Ian took the lunch box out of the microwave, set it out, and looked at a new icon on his phone.
[Cartel]
It was an unidentified app that had been newly installed right after he completed their request.
Ian had been wary of it at first, but let his guard down after hearing Albert and Benjamin’s words.
“That’s something like a verification mark that the Cartel side implants only in people they can trust. With that, there’s no need to meet their contact or communicate by phone. You can use all of the Cartel’s services with just that one thing.”
“So basically it means it’s a delivery app? You don’t need to call the store, you can order everything with just the app?”
“…For a mage, that’s an incredibly stupid analogy, but it’s correct. So there’s no need to be suspicious. Everyone who has worked with the Cartel more than once has this installed. I do, and so does Benjamin.”
Since the two said that, Ian could also take it lightly. So he had run the app once in front of the two of them and confirmed there were no major issues.
Thanks to that, today he could open the app with a relatively comfortable mind.
He took a spoonful of rice and accessed the Cartel’s main page.
[Welcome to the Cartel. Please enjoy the service you desire.]
[Current Top 3 Recommended Services with the Highest Popularity]
[1. Request Brokerage]
[2. Shop]
[3. Compendium]
Ian looked at the three recommended items that appeared, contemplated for a moment, then clicked on the Shop.
The shop sold an incredibly diverse array of items.
Starting from basic bladed weapons and firearms to materials for alchemy, ingredients for magic, and grotesque tools and weapons made from all sorts of entities. The items were divided into a wide variety of categories depending on the user’s occupation.
But every single one had outrageous prices. Bladed weapons or firearms could be bought for a few hundred thousand won at least, but items related to the supernatural basically exceeded the one-million mark.
Even the chunk of entity flesh Ian had personally obtained cost over 1.5 million won for the cheapest one.
He could buy them if he wanted, but they were indeed a burden for Ian as he was now.
What caught his interest the most was the gun.
A firearm capable of supplementing the lacking firepower of his magic.
This wasn’t a huge burden to purchase. Including bullets, magazines, a holster, and such, it would exceed one million won, but once bought, it could be used continuously, so it wasn’t a big problem. It was far more efficient than disposable materials.
*I just wonder how the delivery will come. It’s the Cartel’s business, so I’m sure they’ll handle it well, but….*
Perhaps it was because he had grown up in a country where firearm possession was illegal his whole life. Just thinking about buying a gun made him somewhat anxious for no reason.
Still, a gun was essential to continue living in this world of the extraordinary. At least until he became accustomed to magic and learned offensive magic, it didn’t seem like a bad idea to make good use of a gun.
“I should just think of it as an investment and pull the trigger.”
Ian muttered to himself like that and put the necessary items in his shopping cart.
A silencer with performance straight out of a movie, which he checked just in case, naturally cost several million won. Ian cleanly gave up on it, ordered only what he needed, and completed the payment.
Since Deer had said that purchases from the Cartel shop wouldn’t be traced, he didn’t hesitate with the payment.
Ding.
[Purchase confirmed for one revolver, 70 rounds of ammunition, a gun maintenance kit, and a holster. Total 1.45 million won.]
[Thank you for your purchase.]
The reason he bought a revolver was to minimize costs as much as possible. It didn’t need a separate magazine, and while the number of bullets loaded into the cylinder was small, the firepower was strong.
It was the optimal item for temporary use.
[Delivery is expected to be completed within approximately 12 hours of payment.]
[By default, the delivery destination is the location of the customer’s mobile phone.]
[Error confirmed. Intervention by Lemegeton has been detected. Destination cannot be set.]
[If you enter your desired delivery address directly, we will deliver it there.]
Lemegeton’s intervention.
‘It must be because of the Godmother’s magic.’
It seemed the magic bestowed on him to avoid the Bureau’s tracking had been applied to the Cartel as well.
But an address, huh…….
Even if it was the Cartel, was it really all right to send them his home address so carelessly?
[Please send us your residential address.]
The moment he thought that, a notification rang from his phone.
[In order to prevent the leakage of customer information, our company continuously administers a day’s worth of memory-erasing agents to our delivery personnel. Please rest assured.]
[In addition, the delivery destination set by the customer is not registered in our company database.]
[Our company desires a happy relationship with our customers. Trust is the foundation of trade. We ask that you please believe in us and continue using our services.]
It was a notification that seemed to be explaining things. Ian hesitated for a moment, then entered his home address as the notification instructed.
If some problem arose, he could somehow meet an employee from the Cartel side and interrogate them.
The Cartel employee he had met in person had seemed more sincere about business than expected.
That strange attitude, as if nothing mattered besides that. If anything, it inspired trust.
If they used such mechanical talent even for a simple transportation service employee, the credibility of the Cartel itself could be rated quite highly.
Above all, it was a place Lee Seo-ah had recommended, so he decided to trust them for now.
[Destination confirmed.]
[Some of these messages are delivered only to customers using our shop for the first time.]
[If all of these messages are displayed even though this is not your first time using our service, please stop the transaction immediately and contact customer service.]
[Out for delivery]
The lengthy guide messages ended, and an image of what looked like a moving truck appeared.
The delivery had begun. Ian cleaned up what he had eaten, sat on the bed, and this time entered the request brokerage section.
‘I bought the revolver because I needed it, but since I spent money, I have to replenish it.’
He wasn’t planning to start a request right away. For now, he intended to rest for a few days and accept a request when his condition was decent.
Right now, this was a preliminary survey.
“Hmm.”
Among the countless requests, he listed those stamped with the Cartel’s certification mark and posted at their level.
He clicked on the post at the very top.
[Anomalous Phenomenon. Retrieve the Administrator’s Heart from the theme park, Magic Eden]
(An image of a Magic Eden ticket)
[This request is limited to those who possess the corresponding ticket. It is a ticket distributed randomly by Magic Eden, and if you do not possess one, we offer our regrets.]
[Warning: If you discover the ticket and do not visit the theme park for more than a week, you will be forcibly transferred. This is a fact we learned through our employees. Therefore, if you possess a ticket, please complete this request and receive the reward before you are transferred.]
[Reward: 15,000,000 won.]
A request with a reward exceeding eight figures.
But what actually captured his gaze was something else.
“……This.”
A single ticket was planted squarely in the center of the request notice.
He stared at the image for a moment, then looked back at the red ticket he had tossed onto the table.
Then he let out a hollow laugh.
“It’s the same.”
There was no room for doubt.
It seemed the next request he would handle had been decided.