Chapter 14
Throbbing Tea Time with Manager Batori (2)
It was hot.
No, it was cold.
No, more than that—it was unfamiliar.
A sticky sensation spread beyond my eardrums.
Somewhere I should never have been touched. That place had been reached.
“Ugh, ngh!”
I couldn’t open my mouth.
My tongue curled inward, and my lower jaw went numb.
My body lost control, moving completely against my will.
crack—
squelch—squish—
The tentacles weren’t just touching my nerves.
They were licking, scratching, rubbing inside my mind.
It felt like the pages of my brain’s diary were being turned—slowly, forcibly.
One page.
Then another.
It felt like pages were tearing.
Old wounds were being licked as something crawled over them.
Memories were pushed, crumpled, twisted, stuck together, and mixed.
A scene.
I was in middle school.
I had received milk from the school meal program and stepped into the hallway.
The entire corridor was covered in red slime.
An eyeball from a student in the next class rolled at my feet.
I tried to scream, but inside the classroom there were only Teacher Hand’s heads everywhere.
I was crying while holding the teacher’s desk, and I had become one of the faces of the homeroom department.
No… that… wasn’t right…
Next scene.
I was at a job interview.
Manager Batori was sitting at a grand piano, playing my application form.
She pressed piano keys made of human toes.
Smiling, she tore open my lips and pulled out my resume from inside.
“You are quite cute, Jeong Hae-il. Still wanting to give back what you received.”
“Thank you.”
Someone—not me—spoke.
Where does memory end, and where does dream begin? Where does she start?
“Ghh… ngh… aaah!”
My brain was melting.
No, it really was.
It felt like it was boiling.
Hot, sticky, slimy, painful, burning, frightening—again and again, frightening.
The center of the world flipped red.
Memory and dream mixed like thick, spoiled oil.
“Haa… ahh…”
My heart pounded wildly.
My body was still bound to her.
Something deep inside my brain clicked and fell.
A memory fragment was placed on an altar.
Something precious I didn’t even know I had.
And then—
The words broke apart in my mind, collapsing into nonsense.
At that moment, Batori’s voice echoed softly.
“Yes. That is fear. It is also the most delicious layer of you.”
Paaak!
Suddenly, with a sharp pain, something inside my brain was pulled out.
It sounded like something slipping out of my ear.
“Kh, huh?!”
I gasped for air.
Air rushed into my lungs as if I had just been born.
From inside my ear, blood—and something thicker than blood—flowed out.
I lowered my head and touched my ear with trembling fingers.
It was wet.
Blood, definitely blood.
And something else… strange.
Thick, warm, slightly trembling liquid.
Pus? slime? brain fluid?
“Haa… haah…”
I barely held myself upright in the chair, breathing hard.
My heart was still racing uncontrollably.
It felt like something was still moving inside my ear.
Like an intruder hadn’t fully left my memory.
“This is…”
Batori’s voice came again.
Lightly excited.
Satisfied.
Full, like someone who had just finished a meal.
I looked up at her.
She slowly raised her hand.
A tentacle.
The same one that had just been inside my mind.
At its tip was a strange liquid.
Red, white, cloudy, semi-transparent.
Like a mixture of blood and memory.
“Excellent cuisine.”
She gently touched it with her fingers and brought it to her lips.
And slowly licked it.
As if tasting a luxury dessert.
Every movement was disturbingly graceful.
Sluuup—
A soft sound escaped her pale lips.
“Director Gu will also like this. It is your first sincere offering.”
Director Gu.
I didn’t know who that was.
But just the title alone felt dangerous.
But more than that—
What did she see?
What did she dig out of my mind?
Fragments of memories resurfaced.
Too clear. Too sharp. Like shattered glass.
……
My chest tightened from my throat to my head.
Memories I had buried so deeply I could barely see them.
I had repeated to myself that they were just excuses from a pitiful life.
But clearly, they had ruined my life. Changed it. Made it irreversible.
And when I reached the night—and the morning after—
I clenched the chair in anger.
My fingers went white.
Batori quietly watched me.
A faint smile at the corner of her mouth.
As if saying:
It’s already too late.
I slowly steadied my breath and sat properly again.
My heart was still pounding, but the tentacles were gone.
Her abdomen was neatly closed again,
with not even a trace of blood.
Batori picked up her tumbler again.
Then, as if this were truly just a tea time, she began humming.
“Ra, laa~ lu, lulu~”
Her humming spread across the quiet room like ripples.
I didn’t even know why I was angry, but I forced myself to endure it.
I leaned slightly forward and placed my hands neatly on my knees.
Like a student sitting in the front row during punishment.
“Have you calmed down?”
“Hehe, I am always cheerful. However—”
She rotated her tumbler filled with blood.
Under her silver hair, her red eyes tilted slightly.
“Experiencing such a pitiful human in this vast star is rare. Most only think they are pitiful.”
“I see.”
“After tasting such delicacies, I always want to talk more. Now forget what happened earlier.”
“Yes, as you wish.”
I only answered.
The conversation was entirely under her control.
“Hehe, since I gave you a good memory, accept it as payment. In this place, hiding things is not always the best choice. Now, what shall we talk about next?”
She tapped the edge of the tumbler with her pinky finger.
“Let us talk about our company. It is a place where you can achieve your desire to become something complete and special.”
Her eyes still sparkled with strange amusement, but her tone was surprisingly serious.
Without waiting for my answer, she continued.
“Good. Then I will explain the company you belong to. After hearing it, you will feel motivated.”
Batori drew something in the air with her finger.
On the invisible space, blood droplets floated and formed a red organizational chart.
“First, this company is not simply a place that produces and sells things. It is closer to a place that makes what is desired come into existence.”
“Create existence…?”
I looked up slightly.
She did not miss my reaction.
“The company’s products are not simple objects. They are meaning, will, and even words.”
“…Words?”
“Hehe, I went too far. Let me simplify it.”
She flicked her finger.
“You, Jeong Hae-il, work in the Production Division. Extraction Team, Refining Team, Fusion Team—all belong here. The Director Gu I mentioned earlier is the head of this division.”
“Yes, understood.”
“And production begins with extraction.”
Crack—
At her words, I thought I heard something like bones breaking.
“Are you getting used to dimensional entities?”
“Yes… I see them almost every day.”
“Then it will be easy to understand. From those beings, we extract higher-dimensional concepts and energy that do not exist in this world. That is the Extraction Team’s job.”
Her red eyes narrowed like crescents.
“Team 2 handles internal extraction work. Team 3 handles fieldwork in dimensional distortion zones. But our Extraction Team 1 is an exception. We are elite among elites. Be proud.”
“This company structure… I’m hearing it for the first time.”
“It is because you did not need to know.”
She smirked.
I almost got angry, but I held it in.
“Extracted materials cannot be used as they are.”
“Why not?”
“They are unstable. Just touching them can destroy the body, break the mind, and distort time.”
She smiled.
“Therefore, the Refining Department takes over next.”
I nodded.
I had heard of this sequence in passing at the office.
“Refining Team 1 handles A-class dimensional energy. The classification means little—A-class entities leave behind consciousness and corrupted structures. Refining is a process that burns both mind and body.”
“Then Teams 2 and 3 are similar to us?”
“Slightly less destructive. But even there, mistakes can cost you limbs or eyes.”
I bit my lip.
The Refining Department was also far more dangerous than I expected.
“And after that is the Fusion Department. They reconstruct refined energy into final products.”
“Sounds like reality manipulation.”
“Correct. It is connected to your desire.”
Batori narrowed her eyes.
“What they create is not simple objects. Capsules that erase time, bottles that seal emotions, boxes that store entire worlds—and more grotesque things.”
She exhaled slowly.
Her tone was calm and precise, but I could tell—
She was enjoying explaining this.
“The three departments—Extraction, Refining, Fusion—are the heart of the Production Division and the company itself.”
She laughed softly.
“Among them, Extraction Team 1 is the most exceptional. Be honored that you are part of my bloodline.”
I nodded mechanically, but something kept bothering me.
Why am I not being killed?
What am I compared to the people in the Emotional Management Department?
If the company can achieve desires through products, then this was about survival.
“…Manager.”
“Hmm?”
At my voice, she lowered her tumbler slightly.
The red liquid rippled.
Her gaze slowly turned toward me.
The sensation of the tentacle still lingered at the back of my neck.
“That day… the people in suits. Those people… were they employees?”
“Oh, that incident.”
“Yes. Were they also employees?”
She lifted the corner of her lips and nodded.
For a brief moment, her eyes gleamed strangely.
“They were from the Emotional Management Department.”
Emotional Management.
A department I had only seen in records until that day.
“…A department made of humans like me?”
“Yes. A department composed only of humans.”
“Why only humans?”
“Because it is necessary.”
Her tone was firm.
Elegant, but solid like an iron teacup.
“None of us possess human emotions. Not having them is more efficient. But sometimes, emotions are needed. Some products cannot be completed without human emotion.”
She tapped the table.
It felt like a heartbeat.
“Deep rage, overwhelming fear, loss carved into the bones, blind love… such emotions determine the shape of energy.”
“Then human employees are…”
“Tools used to stamp those emotions.”
Tools.
Stamps.
That is how people are called here.
“A kind of emotional injector. Fear, hatred, sympathy, despair. To embed such emotions into products, high-quality human emotion is required.”
It was too calm. That made it more terrifying.
I looked at her quietly.
“So Emotional Management humans… die like that.”
“Yes. Afterward, they are processed. Sometimes used as material in Fusion. Sometimes sent to Refining for extra work.”
Batori rested her chin on her hand.
With delicate fingers and pale nails, faint red veins showed through.
“That is why Emotional Management does not last long. Usually two weeks, at most a month.”
I couldn’t speak.
That dead employee from earlier probably joined just two weeks ago.
My own start date was likely the same.
“Do they know they are going to die?”
“Yes. Even without explicit notice, most realize it. But humans are hopeful creatures. So they foolishly think, ‘It won’t be me.’”
That sentence felt like it was directed at me too.
“Then… did they press the release button out of despair when their time came?”
“Hehe, who knows. We only received reports that they were becoming increasingly unstable.”
Her red eyes deepened, as if foreseeing something.
If Emotional Management lasts two weeks, how long can I last?
If I am in the Extraction Team, do I get a few more weeks?
Batori, noticing my fading expression, paused for a moment.
Then she spoke again.
“Of course, Jeong Hae-il, you are special as you wished. Some long-surviving humans are recognized and moved to other departments, or even receive company products or leave. It would not do for you to lose your light so soon.”
My heart skipped.
“What…?”
A faint emotion that had been buried somewhere slowly rose.
Someone I had never seen before.
A person who survived this hellish company.
Moving through the gray corridors of Emotional Management, the red-lit extraction rooms, the damp workshops of Fusion—still breathing quietly.
If such a person really exists…
How did they survive?
How did they endure all those screams and still remain here?
A single sentence dragged my thoughts far away.
Maybe I could too.
The moment I thought that, I realized how desperately I wanted it.
The desire to live.
The faint hope that I might survive.
I slowly raised my head.
Batori was still smiling at me.
Her red eyes were those of a predator, but behind them was something like curiosity—like she was testing me.
“Is there really… such a person?”
My voice trembled like old paper.
Batori tilted her head slightly and answered in a classical tone.
“If there is something you wish to believe in, then you may believe it.”
She smiled quietly.
It looked warm like velvet stained with old blood, but would turn cold like ice the moment you touched it.
I did not respond anymore.
But hope had already taken root inside me.
