There Are No Humans in the Monster Company

“Is there any limit to the number of uses?”

As I asked that, I touched the bone fragment shaped like a pen that was faintly pulsing inside my pocket.

Supervisor Hong Na-gyeom, who had been heading toward the door, stopped and slightly turned her head to look at me.

“There is no established usage limit. As long as you have sufficient capital and blood, you can theoretically perform an infinite number of refinements. However, if it determines that the value of the inserted materials falls below a certain level, it will not activate. It also does not accept as material products that it has created itself.”

As I listened to her words, I examined the Universal Employee Benefits Machine once more.

Beneath the blinking red lens, I saw the slot through which it had devoured the banknotes.

But upon closer inspection, its shape was strange.

For a simple opening meant for inserting paper currency, it was excessively wide, and its entrance opened in an unsettling way.

As if it could easily swallow something other than money.

‘What would happen if I put in something that isn’t money?’

That unsettling thought had just crossed my mind.

Scrraaatch! Scrraaatch, scrraaatch!

From behind the heavy lead door of the containment chamber came the sound of something sharp scratching against a metal plate.

“Huff… huff…”

A familiar wet breathing filtered through the crack beneath the door.

It was that White and Chubby Furball.

Without either of us noticing, he had made his way there and was protesting to be let inside.

“…A dimensional entity?”

Hong Na-gyeom’s eyes widened.

Without hesitation, she pulled a dagger from her clothes.

The black blade was coated in a viscous and unpleasant substance.

Anyone could see that it was a weapon designed to kill.

“W-Wait, wait a moment!”

Just as she was about to open the door and brandish the dagger, I hurriedly stepped in front of her.

The tip of the blade stopped less than a foot from my chest.

“Move aside! According to regulations, any unauthorized dimensional entity that leaves its containment chamber must be neutralized immediately. Otherwise…”

Her shoulders trembled slightly.

She looked like someone with an almost pathological fear of breaking the rules.

“No, Supervisor Hong. It’s a D-rank dimensional entity that arrived while you were away. Besides, it poses almost no danger. Extraction Team 1 has already given him permission to wander outside.”

Upon hearing my explanation, her eyes wavered again.

She alternated her gaze between the door behind me and myself before muttering in disbelief.

“You’re telling me that a D-rank dimensional entity left his containment chamber, made it all the way to a C-rank extraction room, wandered around the hallways, and yet nobody did anything? Have you already suffered mental contamination?”

“It’s not that… It’s just that this thing is a little special.”

Hong Na-gyeom’s brows twitched.

Without sheathing the dagger, she listened carefully to the idiotic breathing coming from the other side of the door.

Completely ignoring the killing intent directed at him, the furball squeezed through the gap and approached me with his usual goofy expression.

It was unclear whether he was incapable of understanding the situation or simply possessed too much courage.

He awkwardly rose onto his hind legs and placed a front paw on my shoulder.

“Hey, hey! Now’s not the time for this…!”

I was trying to push him away when it happened.

“Ptooey!”

He spat something directly at my face.

What landed in my palm along with a generous amount of saliva was a cold, heavy metallic object.

“…A gold coin?”

It was a golden coin engraved with strange symbols.

I had no idea where he had gotten it.

One side bore an elaborate eye-shaped design.

And, strangely enough, it was warm to the touch.

The furball wagged his tail while grinning brightly.

It was obvious that he was expecting praise.

As if he were saying.

“Did I do well?”

But the killing intent behind me did not lessen.

Hong Na-gyeom tightened her grip on the dagger while staring at the creature.

“Whine… whine…”

Only then did the furball seem to notice the predator standing before him.

He lowered his ears and hid between my legs while whining pitifully.

Hong Na-gyeom let out a long sigh, as if she no longer knew what to do.

Finally, she sheathed the dagger.

“…Fine. I’ll personally escort this dimensional entity back to the D-rank containment chamber. For now, I’ll postpone filing a report with the Security Team.”

She roughly grabbed the creature by the scruff of the neck and shot me a cold look.

“Do whatever you want with that coin of unknown origin. It doesn’t look very hygienic. Throw it in the trash or…”

Her gaze briefly settled on the enormous opening of the Universal Employee Benefits Machine.

“Try putting it into that machine. I’m curious to see how far your luck goes.”

After throwing out another jab, she dragged White and Chubby Furball out of the room.

As he was hauled away, White and Chubby Furball gave me a sad look, as if he wanted to say.

“See you later!”

But my attention was already completely focused on the coin in my hand.

‘She said it could swallow anything as long as it had value, even if it wasn’t money.’

I thought about it for a few seconds.

Would this strange coin be worth more than a fifty-thousand-won bill?

Or was it nothing more than junk that White and Chubby Furball had picked up somewhere?

Ah, whatever.

I shoved the coin, still covered in saliva, directly into the grotesque open mouth of the Universal Employee Benefits Machine.

CRUNCH!

The machine emitted a grinding noise far more violent than when it devoured banknotes.

CRUNCH! RUMBLEEE!

It began vibrating abnormally, as though it were struggling to endure the value contained within the coin.

The sound of gears meshing together echoed like an agonized scream.

Black smoke poured from the insertion slot, accompanied by the smell of burning metal.

‘It’s not going to explode, is it?’

I instinctively stepped back.

The machine’s red lens began blinking frantically.

Finally, with a loud—

Ding!

The output hatch burst open as if something had been forcibly expelled from it.

And what came rolling out was a single object.

“…A collar?”

I picked up the collar that had fallen to the floor.

The blackened leather strap was strangely warm, and the pendant had a grotesque texture, as if someone had compressed human entrails until they were tiny and embedded them inside.

The moment I held it in my hand, I felt a strangely pleasant warmth emanating from the pendant.

As if hypnotized, I hung the collar around my neck.

“…!”

At that instant, my vision changed.

Vivid lines of color began to trace themselves across the black-and-white landscape of the containment area.

The presences of the dimensional entities beyond the glass walls emerged like reddish mirages.

Even behind Hong Na-gyeom, who was walking down the hallway in the distance, a faint yellow energy floated.

“…My God.”

The intense red color undulating within the containment chambers conveyed an aggression capable of tearing my throat out with a single bite at any moment.

On the other hand, the blue color emanating from White and Chubby Furball, who was being dragged along by Supervisor Hong Na-gyeom, conveyed harmless vitality.

There was no need for names or numbers.

Just by seeing the colors, my brain issued instinctive warnings.

Blue meant safety.

Yellow meant caution.

And red meant danger.

‘Later, I’ll have to bring him a ton of treats.’

I tucked the collar inside my shirt.

I felt a steady weight near my collarbone, right where the pendant rested.

At the very least, Hong Na-gyeom’s claim that the machine provided objects truly necessary for the user did not seem to be a lie.

***

An hour later.

With the new collar carefully hidden beneath my shirt, I was reporting the current state of Zone D to Hong Na-gyeom while walking half a step behind her.

The area where the collar touched my collarbone carried a reassuring sense of weight, and I could comfortably avoid the small yellow mirages lurking throughout the hallway.

“…That’s why the replacement cycle for D-103, The Record Gentleman’s bronze needle is currently every ten hours instead of every twelve. The irregularity of the waves had worsened, so we took that measure. Fortunately, energy extraction efficiency increased by approximately five percent.”

As she listened to my report, Hong Na-gyeom lightly tapped the screen of her tablet.

Her gaze remained fixed ahead, but it was obvious that she was analyzing every word I said as though it were data.

“Reducing the needle replacement cycle, huh? Was that approved by Manager Myeon?”

“Yes. Manager Myeon said that if a song goes on for too long, it eventually becomes boring, so he recommended cutting it off at the appropriate moment.”

“A very Manager Myeon-like decision.”

Hong Na-gyeom responded in her usual mechanical tone and gave a slight nod.

The yellow energy surrounding her seemed somewhat fainter than before.

At the very least, it appeared that the way I had managed the work during her absence had received a satisfactory evaluation.

We passed one containment chamber after another while reviewing their security status.

As I explained in detail all the unusual events that had occurred during the month she had been absent, she occasionally asked sharp questions, though for the most part she seemed satisfied with my answers.

[D-105: White and Chubby Furball]

The moment we arrived at the entrance to the containment chamber, I heard something different from the usual panting.

It was a pitiful whimper.

When I looked inside, my jaw dropped.

“…Supervisor Hong?”

In the center of the room, the furball was rolling around on the floor completely wrapped in special security restraint ropes.

He was tied so tightly that he looked like a giant ball of yarn.

Only his eyes, nose, and mouth were visible.

The moment he saw me, his eyes lit up as though he had found his savior.

However, because of the restraints, he could barely move and could only writhe desperately.

“It’s a disciplinary measure. He needs to receive this level of stimulation in order to learn that escaping does not contribute to improving extraction efficiency.”

Hong Na-gyeom looked at the furball with a completely professional expression.

The moment he felt her gaze, the creature became dejected again and lowered his head.

All the confidence he had shown earlier had vanished.

Now he was nothing more than an unjustly bound cotton candy puff.

“…Even so, I think you tied him up too tightly.”

“Don’t worry. Given that dimensional entity’s elasticity, there is no risk of suffocation. In fact, it might even help strengthen his bone density.”

That was complete nonsense.

But her expression was so serious that all I could do was look at the furball with silent apology.

The creature tried to roll toward my shoes while pouting resentfully.

I fiddled with the pen in my pocket and thought.

After all, both humans and monsters were completely insane in this company.

“That will be enough for today.”

Hong Na-gyeom turned off the tablet and spoke with a voice that carried a faint trace of sadness.

Was she the type of person who hated leaving work?

After giving one last glance to the furball, who was still rolling around the floor tied up like a package, she turned toward the end of the hallway.

“You managed Zone D properly during my absence. I don’t know how long it will be, but I hope to continue working with you from now on.”

She seemed to be the kind of person who always added one extra sentence.

When she finished speaking, her orange eyes briefly swept across my chest, precisely where I was hiding the newly acquired collar.

“Let’s return to the office. Good work today.”

“I learned a lot thanks to you. Thank you.”

She didn’t respond.

Only the rhythmic sound of her heels echoed through the extraction corridor.

In a normal office, this would probably be where a conversation like, “Would you like to grab dinner sometime?” might arise.

But the atmosphere of this place allowed no such everyday warmth.

Still, perhaps because of the strangely comforting sensation of the collar beneath my shirt, I ended up sticking my nose where it didn’t belong.

“…Supervisor, have you been working here for a long time?”

At that instant, the regular sound of her heels stopped.

Her head slowly turned toward me, as if a carefully designed circuit had just activated.

Her orange eyes fixed directly on me.

There was no emotion or warmth in that gaze.

It was a dryness similar to looking into an empty containment chamber.

She watched me for a long time, as though calculating the weight of the question I had just asked.

Then she spoke.

“Mr. Jeong Haeil.”

Her voice was calm, but unmistakable.

“Curiosity is the least necessary thing in this place.”

Her tone did not convey a warning.

It conveyed an absolute truth.

“The only way to accumulate years of experience here is by never trying to find anything out.”

Then she turned her gaze forward again and continued walking.

I closed my mouth.

I said nothing.

The skin beneath my shirt, where the collar rested, began to feel strangely cold.

At the end of the hallway, the elevator doors opened and monochrome light flooded the area.

Just as that light swallowed Hong Na-gyeom’s silhouette, the warm yellow mirage surrounding her back suddenly flared into an intense red.

But the moment the elevator doors fully closed, the vision vanished as though it had never existed.

I remained alone in the hallway, thinking.

Perhaps working in this place for that long meant completely tearing out every trace of one’s humanity.

‘Audit Team Director Go Gyeol and Security Team Director Moon Ara were also humans who had lost some of their sanity.’

Perhaps I would end up the same way.

Would that be better than dying miserably out there?

I pushed those thoughts aside and slowly raised my index finger to my lips while looking at the furball, who was still staring at me with eyes full of injustice and letting out tiny whimpers.

“I’ll let you out later. Hang in there a little longer.”

As if he had read my thoughts, the creature scrunched up his snout and finally calmed down.

In this company, silence was always safer than questions.