Chapter 135

Inside Commander Ha Yeri’s private residence, which was built in the style of a traditional Hanok.

In the rear of the mansion, a place where visitors rarely venture, a peculiar set of marks remains. At the base of one of the pillars supporting the guest room, deep horizontal grooves are carved into the wood. These sharp, distinct lines—etched as if by a blade over several years—were none other than the records Ha Yeri had made of her own height, without missing a single day.

They say a person’s height increases by an average of 1 cm in the morning. Based on that scientific theory, it was her daily routine to measure herself against the pillar every morning before work. Until now, there had been absolutely no change in that stature; the marks were carved so deep in the same spot that the pillar would have needed structural maintenance in another year.

But today, a brand-new line was drawn a staggering 3 cm above the rest. And for me, that signaled the end of the world.

“Heh.”

It was an unsettling laugh. It escaped the lips of Commander Ha Yeri as she stood beside me, chin tilted up, confirming her growth with her own two eyes. Usually, she was so cold and emotionless that rumors swirled her facial nerves had died, but now, her mouth was curled into a look of uncontrollable bliss. Her heels bounced up and down as if she were about to leap into the sky.

“Heh—I knew it. My efforts, never skipping my height-increasing calisthenics every morning, have finally borne fruit.”

“No, doesn’t this look suspicious to anyone? A whole 3 cm? Logically, a person can’t grow that much in a single day.”

“If you look at research cases from the Seoul Child Development Medical Institute, there’s a record of a 12-year-old girl showing extreme growth velocity within a 24-hour period. It’s not an entirely impossible story.”

Where do you even find those things?

Ha Yeri raised her hand and busily began tapping away at her smartwatch. When I checked to see what she was doing, I saw her accessing the server with her administrator account to edit her own profile. Since the promotion evaluation had just ended, she technically should have waited until next year to change it, but she was brazenly exercising her executive powers.

“I’ll need to buy new clothes. I have 300 sites bookmarked just for this occasion, so I’ll have to visit them one by one… Oh, right. I need to show the credit card company what’s what. I tried to do a video call for a card replacement recently, and they told me to bring my mother.”

“Calm down, Commander Ha Yeri! This isn’t the time to be leisurely picking out clothes!”

And why are you getting revenge on the credit card company?

I checked the posts popping up on the Special Unit Bamboo Forest. The change wasn’t just happening to her. Reports from agents witnessing supernatural phenomena were flooding in: monsters inside Gates suddenly turning into tentacles, or patients at hair loss clinics suddenly sprouting full heads of hair.

Even the Bamboo Forest computer system seemed broken; agents could now leave peer reviews for colleagues they had never even gone on a mission with. My profile was already being terrorized.

Peer Evaluation: 3.9 points
★☆☆☆☆ : F
★☆☆☆☆ : F
★☆☆☆☆ : F-f-f-f not…?

“…….”

The snowball caused by Mala-nim running away had grown this large. It might look like a joke, but no one knew how serious these nonsensical changes would become. The only organizations capable of sensing and responding to this were the Bureau and the Special Unit.

“Something sinister is happening due to an unknown entity! The world might turn into hell!”

“A world where I have to wander through the children’s clothing section at my age is already hell to me.”

“If you give up that easily, what happens to the justice you were trying to achieve even while sacrificing your height!?”

“I never linked my sense of justice to my height. My stature was just small.”

“Is that true?”

“Yes. There was no reason for it; there was only the malice of God.”

“…….”

The moment I ran out of words to persuade her, an alarm blared from her smartwatch.

“Yes, Commander-in-Chief. What is the—”

What do we do, Yeri? It’s a disaster! Yeon-hwa… Yeon-hwa is…!

The urgent voice of Commander-in-Chief Seona. It was a signal that a chaos akin to the seeds of calamity was descending upon everyone.

We rushed to Seona’s office. When we arrived, No Yeon-hwa had already transformed into a state too disastrous for words. My first mission partner, who was always so dependable, was no longer even able to stand on her own. Because she was being cradled in Seona’s arms.

As usual…

“Th-thell!” (Hell!)

“Yeon-hwa?”

“Wut is dith! Why am I…!”

“Isn’t she just the cutest? She suddenly turned into this tiny child while giving her mission report. I was so startled I just had to put her in these adorable baby clothes!”

“…….”

Only a few days ago, we were eating together at a restaurant. Now, she needed a booster seat just to sit in a chair. Looking at Nh Yeon-hwa, who had instantly become “Nong” Yeon-hwa,¹ I was speechless. Having clearly been tormented by Seona, she teared up the moment our eyes met and approached me.

“Was it impossible to grow back with Word-Spirit?”

“D-do you think I didn’t twy!? Th-thell, but it’th not working! Nothing’th coming out at all!”

“You mean you can’t use your ability at all?”

“I told you! And I keep, hic! just cwying…!”

“My, my. Come here.”

An Upper-rank Awakened had become an ordinary person overnight.

Everyone in the office realized this was a truly grave matter. I looked silently at Ha Yeri while holding the shrunken No Yeon-hwa.

“…I’ll summon a general meeting.”

She closed the websites where she had been picking out clothes on her smartwatch and immediately drafted the announcement.

This was the largest-scale emergency since the appearance of the 13th House of the Void on the Korean Peninsula. Minor schedules like the general cleaning were tossed aside, and reports began at the urgently convened meeting.

Yoo Se-byeol sat proudly in the Division 3 Commander’s chair, which had always been vacant. She had bandages wrapped around her arm as if she had sustained an injury, but fortunately, she seemed physically fine otherwise.

“Currently, there are 17 reported cases of damage within the Special Unit alone, and over 300 throughout Seoul, excluding Busan.”

“The guilds and Magic Towers have launched investigations to grasp the situation, but the exact cause hasn’t been identified yet.”

“Exactly what kind of cases are being reported?”

“They are so diverse they’re hard to define, but fundamentally, it seems ‘Mana Corruption’ is the cause.”

“Mana Corruption…”

Mana within the body becomes corrupted, causing sudden abnormalities in the body and mind. The type of supernatural ability might change, or one might lose the ability to use it entirely. Generally, Awakened individuals are the ones affected, but in spaces with high mana density—like Mt. Cheonsan or inside Gates—phenomena where the laws of physics warp have also been reported.

After hearing Park Mu-cheol’s report, Ha Yeri asked, “Is there a way to normalize this Mana Corruption?”

“It hasn’t been clearly identified yet.”

“Is it unknown when things will return to normal?”

“Yes, for now……”

“Sniff!”

“Oh, it’s okay, it’s okay. You’ll return to normal safely, Yeon-hwa, so don’t worry.”

I continued listening to the discussion while comforting No Yeon-hwa, who was sitting on my lap. I didn’t forget to take photos of her chubby cheeks as she tried to put her fingers in her mouth. I’ll sell these to Seo Chae-rin later.

“However, we have managed to identify the epicenter of the phenomenon.”

“Where is it?”

“Right here.”

The location that appeared on the monitor was a place all too familiar to me. A “charming hometown” where not a blade of grass grew, where broken glass shards and iron pipes with nails in them were driven into the streets instead of trees, and where everyone’s faces were full of smiles.

“Is it Ground Zero?”

“To be precise, it’s deep inside.”

But Park Mu-cheol wasn’t talking about Ground Zero itself. Something rising high toward the sky was visible above the walls surrounding the area. A purple tower with ominous dark clouds swirling around it. It was a bizarre structure that twitched occasionally as if it were alive.

“That is…”

“It appears to be one of the makeshift magic towers erected to disperse the demon forces during the Great Invasion… but the Bureau never installed such a facility inside Ground Zero.”

“Then another faction built it by taking advantage of the chaos.”

“Yes. Multiple reports have been filed centering on this tower, dubbed the ‘Purple Magic Tower’ due to its external color. We have confirmed that the closer one gets to the tower, the more severe the Mana Corruption becomes.”

Hearing those words, I finally realized where Mala-nim was. She was definitely holed up at the top of the tower built by the Cult of the Void during the Great Invasion. The troublesome part was that the tower was inside Ground Zero. It was already a Seed of Calamity that was burdensome even to approach, yet we had to climb the tower while resisting Mana Corruption.

Could a small elite force break through? That was the tricky part.

“Generally, Mana Corruption is known to cause greater side effects the higher one’s rank is. According to rare cases reported in academia…”

“Deputy Commander Park Mu-cheol. There will be individual differences.”

“Pardon?”

“My mana was corrupted, but I didn’t turn into a child or lose my abilities like No Yeon-hwa-yang. My height simply increased a little.”

“…….”

A long silence swept through the meeting room at Ha Yeri’s words. Everyone was clearly thinking the same thing: that Commander Ha Yeri growing a full 2 cm was a feat more difficult than an Upper-rank Awakened’s powers vanishing or their body reverting to childhood.

However, no one dared to voice that thought in front of her as she stood in the meeting room without a footstool. Park Mu-cheol also looked like he had a lot to say, but he maintained a professional posture to the end. To not laugh in this situation—he truly was the Deputy Commander of Division 2.

“Ahem! A-anyway, it seems desirable to organize an assault team focused on mages rather than general Awakened who aren’t used to mana manipulation.”

“Do you have a lineup in mind?”

“Yes, I will call the names now.”

The names Park Mu-cheol called were mostly mages from Division 4. Among them were those who had just reached Middle-rank or were still Lower-rank. This was to minimize the side effects of Mana Corruption that increase with higher ranks. Fortunately, I fit the criteria, so I could participate in the assault without difficulty.

“For now, it seems best to assault the Purple Magic Tower centering on these individuals.”

“Isn’t it too dangerous regardless?”

“But they said the Commanders would escort us until we enter Ground Zero.”

“So what? We don’t even know what’s inside there.”

Agitation spread among the agents as the lineup was announced. Seeing this, Park Mu-cheol raised his voice.

“I must tell you, this is not the final list. Because there may be high-ranking Awakened who, like Commander Ha Yeri… are unaffected by the side effects of Mana Corruption.”

“Who is that?”

“Hmm, that would be…”

He looked like he was debating whether to say it here and now. Is there really such a person? Just as doubt was growing, Park Mu-cheol, deciding it was better to announce it for the sake of morale, cleared his throat and revealed the agent’s identity.

“The Saint of Salvation, Moon Ah-rin.”