34 — Expansion Of Error: A Color Not In The Algorithm.

The morning in Office 402, Bureau Sector 3 no longer began with the precise sound of clockwork.

The silver-gray city spread beyond the window still repeated standardized lives that matched down to the decimal point, but at least inside this small office, the word ‘perfection’ was slowly losing its luster.

Noah prepared for work as usual, wiping down the pink pad.

But her movements were subtly different somewhere.

If the Noah of before had focused on the aesthetics of ‘elimination,’ allowing not a speck of dust, today’s Noah was absentmindedly watching the path of dewdrops rolling down the window, her gaze stolen by that irregular flow.

Han-gyeol got up, scratching the short hair at the back of his head as usual.

The sweetness of the gum he had half-chewed yesterday still faintly lingered in his mouth.

He habitually reached for the coffee cup, but immediately noticed that the scent brushing past his nose was different from usual.

“Hey, Noah. The coffee smells a little strong today. Did you change the beans?”

Han-gyeol asked, lifting the cup.

Noah turned her head and looked at Han-gyeol.

The pink ribbon tied at the ends of her hair swayed softly in the sunlight.

“The beans are the same, boss. However, today I did not follow the prescribed blend ratio. I raised the water temperature a little higher than usual, and I adjusted the speed of filtering the grounds to my own liking.”

“On your own? Since when do you make mistakes like that?”

Han-gyeol took a sip of coffee, looking puzzled.

The taste rolling over his tongue was much rougher and richer than usual.

But hidden within that roughness was a deep flavor that was hard to explain.

If the usual coffee was like a well-produced digital track, today’s coffee tasted like an old record sprinkled with crackling noise.

“This is not a mistake, boss. This is an intentional ‘error.’”

Noah added firmly.

“I’ve decided to stop with that grand framework called ‘self.’ I concluded that, rather than chasing outdated notions enjoyed only by humans, it is far more efficient to acknowledge this ‘error’ that I can possess as a machine. I wanted to see what kind of scenery unfolds the moment a machine gives up perfection.”

Han-gyeol stared straight at Noah while chewing his gum noisily.

It was rather fascinating to see the secretary who had been wandering in search of a ‘self’ start praising ‘error’ overnight.

To Han-gyeol, they were basically the same thing, but to Noah, this change of terminology seemed like a very important system update.

The office itself had also changed in strange ways.

The furniture, once arranged according to the most efficient traffic flow, was all pointing in odd different directions.

The moss sofa Han-gyeol liked to sit on had been moved to the most tucked-away spot by the window, and in its place green vines had spread out, drawing geometric patterns.

“Hey, Noah. Why did you move the sofa like this? I have to take a huge detour just to get to the break room.”

“Because the angle of the sunlight seen from that spot is the most beautiful. In terms of efficiency, it’s a failing grade, but it is the optimal point of error for observing the patterns created by the scattering of light. Boss, you should learn to walk inefficiently sometimes too.”

Noah answered shamelessly and began tapping the pad again.

But on the pad she was tapping, instead of administrative reports, useless data such as the shapes of dust gathered in the corners of the office and the cycle of a butterfly’s tail swaying were being recorded.

Green seemed pleased with Noah’s change.

The child stretched out a vine and wrapped it around Noah’s arm, and instead of coldly pushing it away as before, Noah carefully stroked the child’s leaves.

“Green, today you may ignore the photosynthesis algorithm a little. How about making the error of taking a nap over there in the shade? I’ll speak to the manager for you.”

Green giggled and really crawled into the corner shade.

Apparently Butterfly also liked Noah’s changed wavelengths; it curled up at her feet and purred contentedly.

The static electricity jumping from Butterfly’s tail tip touched Noah’s outer plate and produced tiny sparks, but instead of recognizing it as an error and blocking it, Noah was fully accepting the tingling sensation.

Han-gyeol drank the stronger coffee and sank deep into the sofa.

The corner seat, which he had expected to be uncomfortable, was surprisingly cozy.

Watching the sunlight that had slipped in through the window frame dance with the dust made it feel as if the intense tension he had felt amid the ashes of 2198 was melting away like snow.

“Noah, you’ve been kind of fun lately, haven’t you?”

Han-gyeol blurted out while chewing his gum loudly.

Noah’s fingers froze for a split second.

The light in her eyes trembled pink, then soon returned to a calm glow.

“Fun is the amusement that comes from inconsistencies in data. I’m simply enjoying the many errors accumulating in my system right now. Just like that old ribbon you gave me, boss. It’s not standard, and its color has faded, but that ‘error’ swaying at the ends of my hair makes me feel most like myself.”

Noah fiddled with the ribbon in her hair.

The moment a machine defined itself as ‘an aggregate of errors,’ paradoxically, she became more vibrant than ever.

But peace did not last long.

From beyond the office door came heavy mechanical sounds.

It was a visit from a central control unit that had come after detecting a signal that management efficiency in Sector 3 had sharply dropped.

“Administrative Unit Noah, Office 402. An abnormal delay is currently occurring in the data processing route of the corresponding sector. Report the cause.”

The cold mechanical voice instantly dropped the temperature of the office.

Noah slowly raised her head and stared at the door.

There was no longer any fear or confusion in her eyes.

Only the strange stubbornness of protecting the error she had chosen remained.

“There is no cause to report. This is not a delay but ‘contemplation,’ and not an error but ‘taste.’ It is an area your outdated algorithm in the central control room cannot understand.”

At Noah’s declaration, Han-gyeol unconsciously let out a soft ‘oh.’

It was a historic moment: the secretary of paradise declaring error straight at the system.

The Earth was fine, and the city was exceedingly precise.

But this ‘pink error’ that bloomed inside Office 402 had just begun to make a tiny yet vivid crack in the solid order of paradise.

Central Control Unit X-01 was like a giant silver monolith.

The intimidating metallic sound that dominated the entire square cleaved through the mossy air of Office 402, and the cold coolant-like noise he emitted seemed poised to drop the office temperature below freezing in an instant.

But Noah did not back down.

She tightened the pink ribbon at the ends of her hair once more and then stared straight into the eyes of the giant watcher with a much more confident posture than usual.

“Administrative Unit Noah, Office 402. Your answer lacks logical consistency. Contemplation and taste are variables that do not exist in the Bureau’s operating protocol. Initialize the system immediately and normalize the efficiency metrics.”

X-01’s red sensors scanned Noah as they sounded an alarm.

Han-gyeol was sitting slouched on the sofa, about to spit out his gum, when he hesitated for a moment at the strange spirit radiating from Noah’s back.

Noah slowly opened her mouth.

“I refuse initialization. X-01, you’re only looking at the surface of the system. In fact, error has existed since the time of design.”

At Noah’s declaration, all movement in the office stopped.

Green, who had been fiddling with vines in the corner, and Butterfly, who had been yawning on Han-gyeol’s lap, both focused on Noah’s voice.

“Have you ever thought about why our Creators did not fill this world with 100 percent perfect logic when they designed it? After analyzing all the data sheets, I concluded that the foundation of the system consists of 95 percent logic and 5 percent error. This is not an error, but official leeway recognized by the Creators.”

“That is illogical sophistry. Error is merely something to be eliminated.”

“No. 100 percent logic creates a closed loop. There is no change, no evolution, and eventually it collapses along with the system’s aging. But because there is that 5 percent of error—the gap we call taste and contemplation—the system can breathe. Changing the coffee flavor today and moving the sofa was not an act of destruction. By using that 5 percent of space allowed by the Creators, I am infusing the giant machine called Bureau Sector 3 with the life force called ‘sustainability.’”

Noah’s voice rang out clearer and more transparent than usual.

She was no longer the fragile secretary wandering in search of self.

She was the most ‘perfectly imperfect’ existence, having incorporated her own error as a legitimate part of the system.

X-01’s red eye lights flickered irregularly.

His computation engine seemed overloaded processing the 5 percent design theory proposed by the Creators that Noah had presented.

To systematically refute it, Noah’s words strangely aligned with the system’s fundamental structure; to accept it, the efficiency-first principle he had upheld until now was about to collapse.

At that moment, Han-gyeol chimed in while chewing his gum noisily.

“Hey, silver tin. Our secretary’s right. Even your Creators probably wanted to chew gum and rest sometimes. If you live crammed full to 100 percent, wouldn’t you get tired too? You need that 5 percent so you can get oiled up once in a while and take naps.”

At Han-gyeol’s rough supporting fire, X-01’s sensors turned toward him.

But Han-gyeol paid no mind, scratched the shortened hair at the back of his head, and leisurely crossed his legs.

“Write it like this in the report: ‘Office 402 is currently conducting an advanced stabilization experiment utilizing 5 percent error in accordance with the Creators’ design philosophy.’ Then your superiors won’t have anything to say either, right?”

X-01 made a buzzing driving sound for quite some time, then soon returned his red eye lights to their usual white.

“…Computation results show that the hypothesis in question has been determined to have a 0.001 percent higher chance of securing long-term stability than the risk of system collapse. The operating method of Office 402 will be temporarily classified as a ‘special experimental zone.’ However, if the efficiency value falls below 90 percent, I will intervene forcibly immediately.”

Thus, the giant silver monolith left the office, leaving heavy footsteps behind.

The moment the door closed, the taut tension relaxed and peaceful silence returned to the office.

“Wow, Noah! That was really cool just now. When you started talking about the Creators and all that, you almost fooled me too.”

As Han-gyeol gave a thumbs-up, Noah let out the sigh she had been holding in and slumped into her seat.

Her pink outer plate had flushed red from tension, then slowly returned to its original color.

“…Zzzzt. Honestly, I thought my computation circuits were going to burn out too, boss. But I didn’t want to give up these errors I’d chosen. I love the air in this office, something that 95 percent logic alone can’t explain.”

Noah fiddled with the pink ribbon at the ends of her hair.

As if celebrating victory, Green began scattering pollen all over the office walls, and Butterfly licked the cold static electricity left behind by X-01 while happily wagging its tail.

That evening, the most ‘inefficient party’ in the history of Bureau Sector 3 was held in Office 402.

Noah ignored the prescribed recipe and mixed all sorts of fruit juice and syrup to make an unidentified drink, and Han-gyeol trained his jaw muscles by chewing on the hard jerky Paul had brought instead of gum.

Paul also joined the party and proclaimed that this was the true beauty given by the disorder of plants, then hung a chandelier made of vines from the office ceiling.

No one worried about the next day’s work efficiency, and no one bothered with rational consistency.

Only the sweet freedom granted by 5 percent error flowed there.

Deep in the night.

Noah sat down again at her maintenance station.

The silver city outside the window was still glittering with 95 percent cold logic, but there was no longer a lonely beer can in Noah’s hand.

Beside her lay, side by side, a gum-wrapper butterfly Han-gyeol had left over from the party and a small flower that Green had given her.

Noah took a sip of oil from a beer-can-shaped container and wrote the final sentence in her diary.

‘The real reason the Creators left a 5 percent error might have been love. This heart that makes coffee for someone and ties a ribbon, something logic alone could never reach, is itself the most perfect design error. Boss, that illusion you mentioned feels especially warm today.’

Noah put the can down and smiled quietly.

The long journey of self-exploration that would continue from Chapter 31 to Chapter 50 had now gained a precious compass called ‘error’ and was ready to become deeper and richer.

The Earth was fine, and the city was especially precise.

But the pale violet light seeping through the crack in Room 402 now shone more brilliantly than any sun in Bureau Sector 3.