The last I heard of Kang Ihak was back when he went out to collect the “Man on the Screen” urban legend.
That was the news of his disappearance.
I’d heard he’d been taken in by the Disaster Management Bureau, but since he was a senior staffer, I figured he’d be released without much trouble....
...So why, here?
In the silence of the filthy corridor stood the effigy of a dazzling woman.
The sound came from inside the pottery.
“~!!”
A stifled scream, like one being suffocated to death, like a man buried alive.
—Yeah.... On that floor... some staff went missing too....
...So the missing staff member was Kang Ihak?
But there was no time to dwell on that thought.
The effigy in the corridor had doubled.
“......”
Around the corner appeared a shape smaller than the womanly figure before me. Similar, but not the same—like the inner doll of a matryoshka.
And in its shrunken form, its true identity was plain.
A canopic jar.
That instant—
Tip, tilt.
...!
The pottery-woman tottered forward toward me, swaying back and forth. Jewelry dropped, glinting in the dim firelight of the corridor.
Inside the effigy, there was the sound of flesh, jewels, and liquid colliding....
I watched it without moving.
“Good.... Don’t touch... it....”
......
“It’s doing that on purpose....”
Tension froze the air.
From behind me came Deputy Eunhaje’s low murmur, confirming the situation.
“This is insane. That’s a honey jar bastard.”
Right. I’d realized too.
One of the twilight-class darknesses Baekilmong used to harvest gold.
To be precise—
An urban legend, sustained with just the right level of danger, maintained under strict manuals for twilight-class threats.
Darkness Exploration Records / Urban Legend
[Golden Canopic Jar of Canopus]
: An urban legend appearing in the Darkness Exploration Records, Baekilmong Corporation identification code Qterw-E-195.
A distorted version of the ancient Egyptian jars used to hold organs during mummification.
This jar, having failed to preserve organs, seeks new ones in the afterlife, luring victims with jewelry in order to steal organs for a mummy to use.
Truly....
This explains why Kang Ihak ended up trapped in there....
I let out a sigh.
Right now, that thing was like a giant Venus flytrap, grown fat on Kang Ihak.
No wonder suppression was difficult.
Even if one tried to destroy or subdue it, the effigy would scatter jewelry. And—
Strange behavior observed: the darkness proliferates via jewelry attached to its exterior.
Jewelry dropped by the jar is found in random sealed spaces nearby, leading discoverers in a linear route back toward the Golden Canopic Jar.
If left uncollected, the jewelry gradually accumulates glaze and clay, forming into a small jar within three days.
Each such jar is identified as a new Golden Canopic entity.
If all the jewelry scattered and vanished wasn’t collected, each piece could become another effigy.
And draw in more victims.
What’s worse—
“...That honey jar bastard just ate someone, didn’t it?”
“Yes.”
Deputy Eunhaje cursed under his breath.
“Why? Why’s that bad?”
“They say once it eats someone, it digests them and rips out the organs, and until then, it rages even harder....”
And then he trailed off.
He noticed it too.
The reason access to Annex B2F had been locked down so long.
The security team was deliberately waiting for the people inside that jar to die.
More precisely, they’d been ordered to.
Just hold out until then.
Once the person inside was reduced to nothing but entrails, the Golden Canopic Jar would have fulfilled its purpose and calm down.
And besides—
Yet, the proliferation of this darkness does not align with any canopic jar tradition.
Nor were there ever canopic jars in ancient Egypt shaped like women, nor anthropomorphic pottery jars resembling the human body.
Hence, there is a chilling hypothesis that this is not a relic at all, but something unknown imitating one.
An unknown horror.
With no precedent to rely on, no one dared to provoke it further.
Until it returned to its twilight “calm” state.
Kang Ihak... they never even planned to rescue him.
Since he was a low-year staffer who’d already been detained once by the Bureau, the company would just write him off as sunk cost and mark him missing.
But the bigger problem—
“...That thing, that thing!”
I looked at the earring in my hand.
“This came from it? This....”
The ornament I’d retrieved from the broken Toy Maker seemed to have fallen from that effigy....
Damn.
So I’d been lured.
“If it’s not in containment, it’ll keep chasing down anyone who picked up its jewelry, until the human inside is reduced to organs.”
Even within containment, the company made sure to melt down the jewelry entirely, erasing its shape to prevent paranormal phenomena, using only the gold.
But being pursued like this—could I slip out without being caught by the security team?
Especially as someone conspicuous from a special division.
The others’ faces shifted.
...If we break it, the security team will notice.
And with fragments and jewelry scattering everywhere, containment failure would last even longer, and other darknesses on this floor could be affected too....
Like what had just happened with the Toy Maker breaking down!
We can’t do anything flashy.
Even with Director Ho backing me, if this blew up into an incident too big to cover, I’d be in real trouble.
“Hoo.”
Plink, clatter.
Meanwhile, the effigy kept dropping jewelry at my feet.
As if urging me to pick it up.
“......”
Once it realized I wasn’t taking the bait, it would try “somehow” to make contact with my body....
Even if it’s not a person, just entrails are enough for it, huh.
Uneasy, I heard—
“Mm... should I just... swallow it...?”
...What?
“If I ate it whole... left no fragments... maybe that’d do it...?”
The Guard Captain’s head twisted into a grotesque shape, swelling into a black, massive form....
Not recommended
Reason: Survivor inside jar
“...Mm.”
And in an instant, the Guard Captain was back to his usual slack, drooping self.
Phew.
...Was that the effect of seeing Red Riding Hood?
He felt more aggressive than usual.... I’d need to be careful.
[Ah, what a shame! It would’ve made for a spectacle—devouring prey pottery and all! Filthy and disgusting, yet with that primal entertainment value!]
Wait.
Devour?
Even if the Guard Captain was more aggressive, he still retained his usual precise judgment.
So he’d chosen that method because it left behind no shards or scattered jewelry. And—
That’s something I can do too, isn’t it?
......
I spread black smoke, wrapping the effigy before me.
“...!”
“Roe Deer?”
Standby request
And I thought:
I nearly forgot.
Coming back into this annex made me remember the old days too much.
But I wasn’t a field exploration team staffer anymore. Which meant—
I could do things like this.
I tore the effigy’s head off.
“...!”
Crunch.
...I’d done similar things to people, but this was even easier.
Since there’s no risk of contamination here.
With the sound of hard ceramic splitting, the gilt-sealed pottery cracked.
But the jewelry didn’t fall. I swallowed every piece into my smoke.
Yes.
If the aggro is already on me—
Then so long as every trinket was judged as “picked up by me,” that was enough.
Snap, grind.
I clutched the effigy’s head and jewelry in the smoke, then pulled out only my wrist and shoved it into the inventory tattoo.
“Eek.”
And with that same hand, I plunged it into the Golden Canopic Jar.
Through the swarm of yellow eyes glaring at me, my gloved hand rummaged inside the bizarre legend’s gut.
Damp digestive juices, clinking jewelry—but none of it could harm me....
And then.
“...Mister Cat?”
Got it.
Whip.
I yanked a body out and tossed it outside.
“...!”
A staffer whose flesh and bone had partly transformed into jewelry crashed to the corridor floor—caught just in time by Manager Lee Jaheon.
Kang Ihak, gasping for breath.
And—
“...One left.”
Chomp.
A giant wolf’s jaws swallowed the remaining effigy whole.
Crunch, crunch.... A short burst of rending noise, then gulp, swallowed down.
“......”
All went quiet.
“Hoo.”
Even the small jar that had appeared around the corner was devoured in a blink as the Guard Captain’s shadow stretched and snapped it up.
And all eyes turned to Kang Ihak.
“......”
“......”
“...We all saw you shut your eyes just now. What are you waiting for.”
“Huha!”
At Baek Saheon’s words, Kang Ihak leapt upright, the parts of his body warped into jewelry clinking.
“Ah, thank you! Really, how lucky for me—you all were just passing through trouble and happened to help me! Next time, if possible, let me treat you to a meal. Well then....”
“...He saw us.”
“......”
“...He saw us.”
“Haha, I don’t know what you mean....”
“If the company asks how this guy came back alive, it’s going to cause us serious trouble.”
If Kang Ihak testified about us, our whole little annex heist plan would fall apart....
And Kang Ihak was the type who’d sell us out for a single coin’s worth of gold.
“In that case, we’ll transport him sealed.”
“Yes, sir.”
“W-wait, huh??”
Deputy Ho would handle it.
And so, Kang Ihak was strapped into a wheelchair and became Manager Lee Jaheon’s luggage.
“Wait, hold on! Is Mister Cat with you? Wasn’t it Mister Cat who saved me—”
Hm.
I formed text for the others to see.
Recommendation: Escape first
130666: Will join later
“...!”
Anyway, Deputy Iseonghae got the equipment he needed.
Only I was left, so it’d be safer for me to move alone.
The Golden Canopics would follow me alone.
And if I ran into the security team, it’d be easier to explain.
As just a special division staffer moving independently.
Reason: Escape stability
Recommendation: Take Assistant Jo-rangmal
“Understood.”
“If I recover from contamination, could I maybe keep some of this jewelry separately—”
Thunk.
Deputy Iseonghae knocked Kang Ihak out swiftly and efficiently, and the group departed in perfect order....
“I remember the route to the emergency stairs, no need to guide us.”
“...Okay.”
Only Baek Saheon remained.
Because I’d grabbed his shoulder.
“...?!”
Reason: Surveillance
“Fine.”
“Hey.”
Of course, not just that—at our next destination, we might need someone classified as “human.”
Deputy Eunhaje seemed to realize this too, since she left without protest, moving quickly....
“Tch....”
Baek Saheon wore a complicated expression, but since he hadn’t gotten any items, maybe he still felt it wasn’t worth resisting.
Only once the others had rounded the corner did the Guard Captain raise his head.
“Before more come out... let’s go....”
“...Yes.”
And again, there was that faint sound of lips smacking, as though still hungry....
...Best not to provoke him.
I walked on with the Guard Captain.
This time, going deeper.
“Now... this is security team’s zone... might run into them. If I stop, you stop right away....”
Acknowledged
Our footsteps echoed quietly down the corridor.
The iron doors lined up on either side, numbers shifting as we passed, until we reached three digits.
The Guard Captain stopped.
“...Here....”
E-404
We’d arrived.
The third and final urban legend for equipment production.
Offering Sacrifices
Also known as: Tainted Wish.
“......”
We opened the iron door and stepped inside.
The smell of burned ash, olives, and something indescribably strange hung still in the air.
The narrow square room’s floor was covered with fine dirt. By the entrance, in a corner, were piled brittle dry olive branches.
And in the center—
A tiny altar, like something children might make in play.
Uneven natural stones.
And traces of ashes left from burnt branches.
Darkness Exploration Records / Urban Legend
[Offering Sacrifices]
: An urban legend appearing in the Darkness Exploration Records, Baekilmong Corporation identification code Qterw-E-404.
A miniature altar for burnt offerings. Built of plaster and olive branches. For fast use, it is recommended to always have olive branches prepared.
The user burns salt, grain, and oil on the altar, states the desired object three times, then checks the pattern of the remaining ash for success or failure.
If successful, the requested item is discovered buried beneath the altar.
Success rate observed at roughly 30%.
At first glance, it looked like it could be incredibly useful.
But—
However, many cases observed where the discovered item was contaminated by unknown high-grade darkness.
Though the ritual can be repeated until success, the more attempts, the more severely contaminated the discovered item tends to be.
It was also discovered that one can designate living beings as the “desired object,” but in such cases, they appear dead.
The randomness was high, and malicious outcomes frequent—so it couldn’t be used lightly.
That’s why this one was mostly used by the security team.
They could handle contact with contaminated objects without always dying or suffering irreparable fates.
Since they were already too contaminated to ever return to field exploration duty.
And as for me....
...I’m the same.
As 130666, my state was similar....
“......”
[Burning offerings! A ritual of sacrifice, found in many cultures. Brown is somewhat familiar with this. Though this one is child’s play in scale... let’s see what it gives Roe Deer.]
I stepped up to the altar. The room already had salt, rice, and olive oil prepared.
I set them atop the olive branches.
And lit them.
With a whoosh, the flames leapt unnaturally high, shadows dancing across the plaster stones....
And I wished.
The exact item I wanted, three times.
“......”
“......”
The fire died down, leaving ash atop the stones....
A clear, circular pattern.
[Ah, how simple! But as direct an expression as it gets, friend.]
It was a success.
I dug carefully beneath the altar. From the shallow earth, the outline of an object emerged, lifted by my gloved hand....
Revealing a familiar line of text—
Warm times,
Magic Candy!
Nostalgia Candy.
Of course. This was one of the main supply sources for the Nostalgia Series used by the security team.
“......”
I stared quietly at the candy packet in my hand.
It wasn’t dirty, didn’t trigger hallucinations, didn’t feel strange.
No trace of contamination.
A success.
And this was enough.
If I took this in Se-gwang Special City, it would surely restore me to the days when I had legs.
“...Ah.”
I held the candy still, feeling its name’s odd nostalgia.
Then—
Hand.
“S-hand??”
A gift.
I placed three or four pieces of Nostalgia Candy into Baek Saheon’s palm.
Not like he’d have much use for them.
But they’d help in an escape, if need be. And at least this way, he couldn’t run off, tempted by spoils.
And since it was Nostalgia Series—
I should give some to the Guard Captain too.
I was about to share when—
“Hold... a moment.”
The Guard Captain raised his hand.
Then rummaged in his coat and pulled something out.
A radio.
Faintly vibrating, glowing. He slowly lifted it and pressed receive.
A voice came through—
[Finally got through!]
It was Manager Kwak Jegang.
[Good grief, answering this late? A security man should be quicker on his feet.]
The Guard Captain gave no reply.
I too stifled a sigh, thinking Kwak Jegang was just needling him as usual....
But then—
[More to the point....]
[Employee, you’re there too, aren’t you?]
......
...!
I stared at the radio.
The voice carried a tinge of excitement.
[I know you infiltrated the annex under Director Ho’s orders. How do I know? Hahaha....]
[Director Cheong noticed.]
...!!
[I just wanted to warn you—it’d be better to get out fast. Director Cheong even brought along your assigned security team, you see!]
...What?
[And as you know, Director Cheong isn’t the type to value staff lives....]
[No telling what might happen. Ha, hahaha. Oops.]
Click. The line cut.
And then—
Knock, knock, knock.
“......”
“......”
Our gazes all turned to the iron door.
From beyond it, a voice called....