My phone grip.
It was the final button component of the Dream Cultivator.
The main button corresponding to the wish-voucher.
“.......”
I stared at it, dazed.
The lit button glowed faintly, as if tempting me.
Without thinking, I reached my hand toward it—
“Agent Podo!!”
“...!!”
I jerked my hand back.
Beside me, Agent Choi grabbed my arm, then killed power to the device with the other hand and yanked the cord.
“You said it yourself. If anything goes wrong, pull it immediately.”
“......Thank you.”
“What was that just now.”
I looked at the now-dark button and muttered like my soul had left me.
“I don’t know.”
But—
“It seems I’ve been carrying the most important component of this machine.”
“.......”
Agent Choi’s pupils dilated as they examined the button I’d completed.
“Memorial phone grip.”
“.......”
“But the color is....”
I hesitated, then said,
“It isn’t a Memorial phone grip.”
“What?”
“The shape and function were clearly a Memorial phone grip, so I thought it was the same, but... I was told it wasn’t.”
“By who.”
“The elder.”
“...!”
—This one is an even rarer artifact. It seems someone imitated our workshop’s item.
“...I was told that something more precious had been made to imitate a Memorial phone grip.”
And that the original function of this grip had been the wish-voucher button of YuKwae Research Laboratory.
Still staring at the grip now seated there as a button, I lifted my head by reflex.
It wasn’t visible now, but when activated, the notepad that used to appear and hover by my head—
The trace of the Darkness Exploration Record popup store.
[Darkness Exploration Record Real-Goods Box]
—Permission to use a new good unlocked!
The phone grip had been one of the first-prize items I’d won at the popup store.
An item inside the Real-Goods Box.
Then why... is that the button of YuKwae’s Dream Cultivator?
My head rang.
So to organize myself, I first explained what the elder had said when repairing the broken phone grip.
Including how they’d viewed it with undiluted wonder, not aversion.
“.......”
Agent Choi’s eyes deepened, as if sinking into thought.
“So you’re saying it isn’t a profane object.... That’s the claim you want to make?”
“Not a claim—just telling you exactly what I experienced.”
“...Right.”
Agent Choi sat on the floor with the power cord in hand. They brushed ash from the front of their trousers, then patted the spot.
“We’ve got a lot to talk about, it seems.”
.......
“Podo. So where did you get that.”
“You won’t believe me.”
“Really? I’ll hear it anyway. I’m good at listening, too. That’s a virtue of an ace agent.”
Looking at the slight smile on Agent Choi’s face, I finally sat across from them.
And I spoke on impulse.
“I came from another world.”
They held their breath.
***
...At some point, I had imagined laying everything out honestly to someone.
But I couldn’t say it—sure I’d be treated like a lunatic, or like I belonged in a ghost-story setting.
So it felt strange.
That I was saying this with my own mouth.
...Relieving and strange.
But it wasn’t a thoughtless decision.
“.......”
I looked at Agent Choi.
...Knowing this person’s disposition, there were surely things they hadn’t told me—more hidden information and circumstances.
To obtain those, I have to state my own premises.
If I just kept hiding, I’d look even more suspicious than I already did. We’d only doubt each other and never lay down cards.
That wouldn’t do anymore.
Because a new clue has appeared.
Right now, we needed any information and inference we could get. I wanted to talk to someone and hear their view.
So if I wanted information, I had to put mine out as well.
...In the way most likely to earn Agent Choi’s trust.
“...Do you remember the supernatural disaster ‘Shimmering Dragon Palace,’ where the children’s identities couldn’t be verified?”
“...I remember.”
Children who named countries that don’t exist on Earth, or had slightly different physical traits, or gave addresses that didn’t exist in reality.
“Those children weren’t ‘citizens’ of this place.”
“.......”
“I’m similar.”
A missing person swept up in a ghost story.
“I came from a reality other than this one. ...From Seoul Special City that’s almost the same, but with slight differences.”
I did not say I came from a world without ghost stories.
Because I remembered Agent Choi’s cult-smelling reaction. It would only undercut the credibility of the conversation.
But ghost stories about parallel worlds were already well populated in the Darkness Exploration Record.
So this much should be an acceptable explanation.
And then I poured it out.
That when I opened my eyes, it was Daydream Inc.’s new-hire orientation, and several pieces of equipment had been issued to me.
“.......”
Agent Choi stared quietly at the ashen floor for a long time.
Soon, thankfully, a calm voice sounded.
“So you think you got pulled into a supernatural disaster and dropped here. The world changed on you, and you had gear in hand.”
“...Yes.”
“So,”
An intake of breath.
“So. Going home was your wish.”
“.......”
I forced a smile and answered.
“But I couldn’t.”
“.......”
“As the Bronze Agent said, the wish-voucher wouldn’t do it.”
“Podo.”
“But I didn’t expect to find another hint in this machine. ...A hint I can use to conjecture why I was summoned here.”
I looked again at the powered-down machine.
More precisely, at the wish-voucher button completed by my phone grip.
“.......”
The adhesive base left lonely on my smartphone could no longer serve as a “Memorial phone grip.”
To read the Darkness Exploration Record Wiki, I’d need the component that is the Dream Cultivator’s button.
...So someone removed the Dream Cultivator’s button, processed it into a Memorial phone grip, and... that was given out as the popup store’s first-prize?
From the world that made the Darkness Exploration Record, for the person who’d be summoned into the Darkness Exploration Record.
...Or, from the world without ghost stories made by the Dream Cultivator, for the person to be called back out.
Which is it.
What hint are they trying to give?
What do they want from me?
Something’s taking shape, but it isn’t clear yet. Only....
“I can’t shake the thought that YuKwae Research Laboratory set something in motion.”
“That this lab brought you here?”
“From the circumstances, that’s my inference.”
In truth, I’m almost certain.
Because I woke up from this cultivator.
“So I want to know more about this Dream Cultivator. Not only to rescue people from Se-gwang Special City... but also, frankly, because I think it’s tied to me.”
“.......”
“That’s all.”
Agent Choi sat in silence.
Their eyes alternated between the Dream Cultivator and me; the fingers on the ceremonial blade’s handle moved as if in thought....
Then they spoke.
“Podo.”
I looked at them, tense.
“After you disappeared, I turned that underground lab over once, properly.”
“.......”
“...And I found something.”
What?
“What kind of—”
“But I want you to swear one thing.”
Agent Choi’s blue gaze met mine.
“Don’t hand this information to Daydream Inc., that company. Got it?”
“......Agent.”
I wrestled with it, then finally sighed and spoke.
“I’m under an employment contract with Daydream. Permanently. Forever.”
“...!”
Agent Choi would be recalling it too—
130666 in the Security Team uniform.
It had been a choice I couldn’t avoid to survive, but the outcome wasn’t pleasant.
“As 130666, if Daydream demands it for company interest, I likely won’t be able to refuse. So... I might not be able to keep that promise.”
“.......”
“But even so, I want to hear it.”
Agent Choi stared at me like they’d taken a hit, then answered.
“Fine.”
And gave a wry smile.
“...Did you really expect me to make allowances and just hand it over because you were honest?”
“To some extent, yes.”
“Impressive. Truly.”
Agent Choi produced something from their coat.
“......It’s the right answer.”
Folded paper.
“I transcribed and restored parts of a document labeled ‘Experiment Log.’ It was caked with fluid, so there aren’t many pages.”
“......!”
“This must be it. It was in the place you found, after all. Here.”
Adding, “I grabbed it when we grabbed the cultivator,” Agent Choi passed it to me.
I took it.
[Oh, like the adage that there’s sunshine behind every cloud, friend, the crisis of getting caught by the civil servant when you snuck into that dusty lab wasn’t all bad, was it.]
[Look how it brought you back here!]
Brown’s clapping rang in my head like tinnitus.
With trembling hands, I opened the document.
It was....
That contract!!
An accusation against Daydream Inc.
No—words etched like distilled wrath.
It wasn’t signing the contract the pharmaceutical exec thrust at us. Because of those ■■ our research slipped through our fingers.
They spirited away the ■■ of the Dream Cultivator. Their promise to become a supply line for ■-solution was smoothed over with a cheap word trick that they’d fill the Dream Cultivator with solution.
So....
Daydream first approached YuKwae claiming they’d supply dream-solution, then only stole the potion-making Dream Cultivator and knifed them in the back?
Textbook Daydream.
After more lines that seemed to be laced with curses for Daydream, the tone settled.
We left the lab’s main building and set up a separate lab. Here we will find the pharmaceutical company’s weak spot.
Next came a summary of how, based on Daydream’s potions, they’d reduced the Dream Cultivator to a simple potion-production device.
Much was illegible or blanked out, as if too damaged to read.
And among what I could still make out, something caught my eye—
Among the potions produced by the pharmaceutical company, confirmation of a look-alike of Children’s Para■ Syrup.
Name: Wi■ Voucher.
“...!”
Censored, but legible.
Wish-voucher.
Children’s Paradise Syrup was, indeed, the original.
Cultivator’s cultivation function deleted, and solution concentration required for production arbitrarily lowered, presumed degraded version.
Degradation cases:
Requirement for linguistic sentence expression.
■ of world-line ■■ worsened.
Compromise wish-fulfillment, not the ■■ of Paradise.
That was all of the readable information.
“.......”
“How is it.”
I lifted my head.
Agent Choi looked at the paper in my hands and, half-joking, said,
“Total expose of big-corp’s dark side, right? If the Disaster Management Bureau weren’t the Environment Ministry I’d have just... hey, Podo?”
I yanked the power cord out of Agent Choi’s hand.
Then reconnected it.
“You...!”
“Just a moment!”
I looked again at the Dream Cultivator’s buttons lighting up.
My head pounded with the thud of my heart.
I’ve got it.
I still remember.
No—I can’t forget.
That day I drank the wish-voucher, how I read the text on the bottle.
The instructions for using the wish-voucher.
Lift the bottle with both hands.
After expressing your earnest wish in a single sentence...
With your eyes closed, drink the liquid in one go.
Any wish will come true.
One sentence.
The method was to make your wish into a precise single sentence and pray.
But—
According to this document....
Degradation cases:
Requirement for linguistic sentence expression.
That means it was a side effect of Daydream’s manufactured version.
In that case—
In the original YuKwae version of the “wish-voucher”... the condition to “pray a one-sentence wish” didn’t exist.
Even without language, a wish from the depths of one’s heart would come true?
Then—
In that case.......
“Podo.”
I can go back.
If I wish to go home, I can go back.
No need to labor over a sentence. If all I have to do is wish, if I wish to go back home....
YuKwae’s wish-voucher, “Children’s Paradise Syrup,” will send me home.
To a world without ghost stories.
To where I originally belonged.
...In my original body!
I looked at my hands. They looked human. Something I couldn’t see if I returned to reality. Not that melted, amorphous odd form or the lizard body I’d been issued as a replacement, but my original body, going home.
Relief crackled through my brain at the mere thought.
Nothing else mattered. Whatever the truth of the world, whatever the reason I was here, it didn’t—
“Calm down.”
“...!”
I blinked.
Agent Choi had me by the shoulders, pinned to the floor.
“Inhale, then exhale. Now!”
I did as told.
Deep breaths....
.......
“Agent Choi.”
“.......”
“I’m calm.”
Agent Choi stayed tense, watching for any sudden move.
But I turned my eyes back to the Dream Cultivator and checked.
The solution display, first.
DE 00000000
When this tank was filled with dream-solution, the number increased.
With A-grade concentration solution, about 150,000 points.
And the other emoji buttons consumed around ten to twenty thousand points.
If that’s C-grade, then the value for the EX-grade potion corresponding to the wish-voucher....
Hold on.
I sprang up and pressed the wish-voucher button that was lit.
“...!”
“It’s fine. There isn’t any solution anyway, so nothing will hap—”
Right.
But something else would display.
The amount of solution short.
It would show in red at the bottom. It was—
DE 05000000
...Five million points?
My head went blank white.
A-grade solution was 150,000 points.
By what means am I supposed to fill five million—
No!
It can be filled. Why couldn’t it? If I clear A-grade thirty or forty times, that should do it, shouldn’t it? It’s doable. I can do it.
Right, among the Se-gwang Special City subway stations—Hanbit Library alone, cleared and exited, has come out close to A-grade before.
So calmly, take the time and......
.......
Or else.
If not that...
There is a way to fill it at once.
Outside the very station I just thought of.
An enormous ghost story.
Say... an annihilation-grade supernatural disaster that swallowed an entire city.
And I know this:
When you don’t simply escape a ghost story but truly crack it, a higher-grade dream-solution is extracted.
“.......”
Therefore—
If I bring the Se-gwang Special City ghost story to a conclusion,
I can go home.