After work ended.
"Your mental state today was… quite poor."
On the way back to the Manager's private bedroom, Angela's voice sounded unusually clear in the quiet corridor.
"I told you already. You should rest more in your room, rather than arriving so early merely to write your diary."
She tilted her head slightly, her gaze seeming to sweep past X's tired face.
"Relax, relax… People say women have 'that time of the month.' Men have something similar too."
X tried to dispel her suspicion with a clumsy joke, forcing a light laugh.
"It's just that women's is physical. For men, it's more like… a psychological low tide that comes in cycles."
He looked at Angela's puzzled face as she turned toward him and kept spinning the excuse.
"Something like… every month there are a few days when nothing's really wrong, but you still feel restless."
"…There is no physiological or psychological basis for what you just said."
Angela's brows knit for the briefest moment, then relaxed again.
"However, human psychology is extremely complex, and individual variation is immense… so perhaps your unusual sensation truly is a fact—for you personally."
"Alright, alright. I'm really fine. Don't worry."
X waved again, playing it off.
"If you insist…"
Angela gave a slight nod. She stopped at the bedroom door, returning to her standard secretary posture.
"Then I won't disturb your rest. Good night, X."
"Good night, Angela."
Click.
The door closed.
The heavy metal door slid shut with a soft sound, sealing off everything outside.
The day's work finally ended for good. Dragging himself, X practically threw his body onto the soft bed.
But he couldn't sleep. He stared at the ceiling, thoughts tangled.
Something was wrong with him.
It had only been that short, eerie communication this morning—a "B" who spoke without showing their face—yet it was like a boulder thrown into a calm lake.
The ripples hadn't stopped, leaving him distracted all day.
Not only Angela—several Control Team employees who had only known him for a few days had noticed something was off.
At dinner after work, they had even gathered around him, concern carefully restrained, asking if he had run into trouble.
How had he brushed them off again? With a smile and "I didn't rest well," he thought… "I'm sleepy," something like that.
"The 'inside' Lobotomy Corporation…? What is it, exactly…"
X closed his eyes and thought for a long time, but nothing came.
At last, exhaustion washed over him like a tide, loosening his strained nerves.
"Fine… forget it."
X let out a long breath and gave up the futile thinking.
He shifted, pulled the blanket up, and adjusted into a more comfortable position.
"No point thinking. Tomorrow I need to open a new department…"
"If B still wants to say something, they'll contact me again… I'll just wait until they tell me."
He consciously redirected his thoughts, recalling lighter, even amusing moments from work to overwrite the heavy unease.
Today's work… Punishing Bird escaping a few times… the Welch's soda the employees shared with him… the pulsing Heart of Aspiration…
And finally, his thoughts drifted to that Abnormality that was always so quiet—so gentle compared to the others that caused endless trouble—
One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds.
Strange. Why did his mind keep sliding toward the Abnormalities?
X suddenly sensed something off.
It wasn't external. It came from his own consciousness—something subtle, a shift, like weightlessness.
As if he were slowly sinking into bottomless water, everything around him turning vague and unreal.
Just as he wondered whether he should open his eyes and sit up to shake off the sensation, he found that he had already opened his eyes.
And in that instant, a scene both familiar and utterly strange flooded his vision.
Familiar because the room's layout and furniture were almost identical to the Control Team main break room he had watched through countless surveillance feeds in the Manager's office.
Strange because everything before him was no longer an image filtered through a screen and "cognitive dampening"—that slightly cartoonish, data-like footage.
It was real.
The texture of paint on the walls. Dust floating in the air. Shadows cast by furniture under emergency lighting…
This "realistic" style—stripped of all mediation—felt so wrong it made X doubt his senses.
What the hell…? He'd only gone to sleep. How had he ended up here?
Panic rose.
Was it because he had contacted that mysterious B, the first step toward learning what he wasn't supposed to—and now he'd been brought into the sealed company to be silenced?
Was it upper management? Or B themselves?
"No… no. Calm down…"
X forced himself to breathe deeply.
B had clearly said they would reveal three secrets.
If they wanted him dead, there would be no need for this… B could be ruled out.
Could it be Angela? Did she have the ability to move him here without him noticing?
But why? What motive?
It didn't fit. She had always acted like a dutiful secretary. Sometimes distant, yes, but never malicious.
Even if he did feel a strange fear of her…
After ruling out every conspiracy theory that sounded plausible, an explanation that sounded the most absurd—but fit the situation best—surfaced in his mind:
Was he having an unusually lucid dream?
A "lucid dream"?
The thought eased him a little. The environment was still terrifyingly real, but at least he could face it with a calmer mindset.
"If this really is a dream—or somewhere like a dream… then based on what I've seen on the cameras…"
X tried to recall the Control Team layout.
"If I'm not mistaken, that door… yes, down that corridor, at the end… should be the containment unit for One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds…"
A thought he couldn't suppress: should he go take a look?
But then he hesitated.
Reason told him that in this unknown, eerie situation, staying put and doing nothing—waiting to wake up—was safest.
Moving around recklessly, especially in a place that looked like the inside of Lobotomy Corporation… who knew what he'd run into?
But deep down, the curiosity he was born with—mixed with an indescribable urge to probe—began to coil around his heart like thin vines, tightening.
Add fear of his current situation, and a desperate need for answers…
In the end, driven by fear and curiosity together, the impulse to find out outweighed caution.
X took a deep breath, stood, and stepped through the door that slid open to either side, entering the familiar corridor.
Cold metal sheen lined the walls; the overhead lights were a harsh white.
At the far end of the corridor, the containment door was shut tight.
He reached out. His fingers touched the cold handle. He hesitated, then couldn't hold back.
Click.
X opened the door.
The door swung wide, and light flared—
-------
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