Being A Full-Time Employee C68

Chapter 68

Wonu kept his eyes closed, arms crossed, perfectly silent. Meditation or sleep—I couldn’t tell. He hadn’t touched his lunch. He looked pale and tense, and I didn’t dare wake him. He’d been that way ever since hearing we were going to City Hall Station for secondary reinforcement.

I studied his face for a while before pulling out a glucose candy—the last one—and pressed it gently between his dry lips. Startled by the sudden sweetness, he opened his eyes.

“You lose focus when you’re hungry,” I said.

He flicked his tongue to check the candy’s position before tucking it back in. Watching him quietly suck on it made him look so harmless. Harmless—but still the most dangerous person here.

That contradiction—that gap—was unbearable, addictive. After finally admitting how deeply I felt, I couldn’t stop falling. The truck with broken brakes wasn’t Wonu—it was me.

Meanwhile, he had become calmer by the day, unreadable inside. I wanted to think it was just maturity, but it was hard to believe a mere change of year could make someone grow so much.

Still sucking the candy, he slowly slid down into his seat, hands in pockets, slouched low enough to make any orthopedist sweat. Then he mumbled something.

“…ayo.”

“What?”

But an explosion from the team of barrier specialists drowned him out. Screams followed, and soldiers assisting on site began ushering civilians away. Bright specks—glinting like falling glitter—filled the air. The dungeon had opened.

“A1 team, ready for entry.”

The commanding voice resounded across the area. Hunters and guides groaned—complaining about not brushing their teeth or finishing their food—but obeyed all the same.

Hunters rose, pulling on gas masks—to shield themselves from the smoke that affected only hunters, dulling reason the longer it was inhaled. Out of caution, guides wore them, too.

Wonu was usually aggressive in raids, the kind who took the lead without hesitation. Given his overwhelming power, it made sense. So I expected us to be at the front.

But as I moved to stand, he stayed seated, gas mask resting loosely atop his head like a mask from a play, and tugged my sleeve.

“What’s wrong?”

He didn’t answer. Others were lining up.

This was just cleanup—the monsters inside barely registered on scanners. It wasn’t expected to be difficult, so even rear-assault teams had been brought in for a combined sweep. They glanced at us and moved ahead confidently. The easier the job, the cockier they got.

I felt that cockiness too—partially because of him. The stronger Wonu became, the more faith I placed in him, and with that faith came recklessness. A foolish certainty that we wouldn’t die.

“Come on, the sooner we’re at the front, the sooner we’re done.”

“I don’t want to go in.”

“…What?”

I froze. It was the first time he’d ever said something like that. He clutched my sleeve like a child.

“I don’t want to go in, Hyung.”

“What are you doing there! Get moving!”

The rear-team leader’s voice cut through the noise, sharp and irritated. Not his unit, not his problem—and yet he couldn’t resist snapping. Grimacing, I pulled Wonu to his feet and leaned close.

“Why, does it feel wrong?”

“….”

“Talk to me.”

Even if he told me, we both knew there wasn’t much we could do. Raids weren’t elective—you didn’t get to refuse.

He was a Bureau asset, a one-man army worth ten others. Everyone here knew it. The rear-team leader especially must’ve been annoyed seeing such a key hunter hesitate. We were moving toward the rift now, but his pace lagged noticeably.

“…My value—my usefulness—my entire reason for existing is based on how much I contribute to dungeon raids, isn’t it?” he said quietly.

That wasn’t unique to him. Every Bureau lesson began the same: We protect the nation from dungeons and monsters so that citizens can live normal lives. That pride defines us.

“If you’re a hunter… then yeah, I suppose,” I said carefully.

His lips pressed tight, his eyes lifted, and something settled behind them—resolve, cold and final. I reached for his chilled hand, wishing I could tell him you don’t have to if you don’t want to, but couldn’t.

“What are you two waiting for?!” shouted the team leader.

He was already glaring daggers—our division’s usual arrogance had offended him on the ride here.

“Let’s go.”

For a moment, Wonu’s expression seemed to waver, then lock into place again. Calm, almost detached. He pulled me along. But there was something off about the calm—it felt like a wall.

“Wonu.”

He didn’t turn.

“Should we run away?”

I didn’t know why I said it. It just slipped out, impulsive and impossible.

Run where, exactly? Cash withdrawals left records. Cameras everywhere. A single phone call—or even just powering it on—would give us away.

With one foot already past the forced-open dungeon gate, Wonu looked back.

“Hyung, do you want to run?”

His tone sounded like he’d let me—send me away if that’s what I wanted. But the word “together” was absent. I didn’t answer.

The team leader shoved me from behind before I could think. I stumbled through the gate, barely bracing as Wonu pulled the mask down over my face, then his own. The air inside stung, electric.

“Jesus…”

This should have been a dungeon spawned from City Hall Station—a concrete maze underground. But what spread before us looked like a paradise reborn. A dazzling, tranquil forest stretched in every direction, full of soft light and fruit-bearing trees—apples, pears, bananas—and sluggish creatures crawling gently among them. Mist hung in the air like haze after dawn.

“No one take off your masks!”

The barked command nearly startled the mask off my face. I’d been seconds away from tugging it off myself, disbelieving what I saw.

“This can’t be real,” I muttered—only realizing much later that it was my own voice I’d heard.

“It’s either a dream or I’ve gone insane.”

My head spun—not from the air, but from the surreal beauty. For a fleeting moment, I even thought of those street preachers shouting in plazas that dungeons were gateways to salvation, proof of a paradise beyond the end.

Turning back, I could see those maintaining the gate’s perimeter. Beyond them was the damp, grey subway platform I knew. The people outside couldn’t see the forest within, only looking in confusion at the same blank stone gash.

“Look,” someone said. “The monsters aren’t attacking.”

All around, the handlers murmured in awe. But I didn’t like how perfect it looked. It felt like honey disguising a carnivorous plant.

“Don’t touch anything,” Wonu murmured, echoing my unease. We clasped hands. We’d once lost each other in a dungeon; caution was everything now.

“They’re kind of cute up close,” someone said, approaching one of the fuzzy, puffball-like creatures.

Idiots. Pure, reckless idiots. Across the mask, I couldn’t see who it was, but every nerve screamed to stop him. Even the team leader—who should have—just stared blankly, hypnotized.

“Hey—!” I shouted, too late. His fingertips brushed the creature’s fur.

My heart stopped.

Nothing happened. The monster only flinched and shuffled sideways, seemingly timid.

“Well, look at that,” the man said, intrigued. Maybe stubbornness, maybe thrill-seeking. He reached again, this time spreading his whole palm.

Miracles might happen once—not twice. I expected Wonu to lash out, to knock the man’s hand away with water—but he only gripped me tighter.

When the palm was inches from the thing, I stepped forward anyway.

“Maybe don’t,” I warned.

The man looked up—no, not at me. At our joined hands.

“Why are you two holding hands? Scared?”

“It’s called being careful,” I said evenly.

“You’ve been in here before, right? We’re rear-team; we wouldn’t know. They said you struggled last time, huh? Maybe what this dungeon needs is a gentler touch than your kind of brute force.”

He stooped, picked up a stone. It crumbled in his grip, breaking into pebbles, as if it had always been made of them. He tossed them up, caught them, and in that instant, Wonu’s fingers clenched around mine like iron.

The pebbles turned granular—coarse sand—and as he brushed his palms, they became dust, streaming between his fingers.

So that was his ability: fracturing matter into smaller and smaller particles. Unusual. Powerful, maybe dangerous.

“Violence isn’t the answer,” he said. “Breaking things open all the time doesn’t make you strong.” His gaze flicked toward Wonu. “Your ability’s water, right? Like a balloon bursting? There’s an item like that in Kart Rider—ever heard of it?”

“…Let’s go,” Wonu said flatly, pulling my hand.

Normally, he’d have met taunts like that with icy sarcasm. But now his eyes were unreadable, distant. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking at all.