The Hazelnut Oil Incident.

Bureau District 3, Underground Level 2, Maintenance Room 4. Originally, this was a space dominated strictly by the smell of iron dust, the stench of burned insulation, and cold metallic noise. Lucas was the head here, serving as both nutritionist and mechanic, managing the fluids consumed by all androids in the Bureau.

“Viscosity 10W-40. Antioxidants added. Coolant mixing ratio 5:1.”

Lucas turned the valve on the mixing tank with an expressionless face. His hand movements were precise to a margin of error of 0.01 mm, driven by a macro repeated for 600 years. Black synthetic lubricant flowed chug-chug down a transparent tube. It was a fluid devoid of taste or aroma, existing purely for the physical purpose of reducing friction coefficients.

What Lucas didn’t know, however, was that the purple pollen Paul had wildly scattered in Episode 76 had breached the fine gaps in the ventilation filter and gathered on the ceiling pipes of the maintenance room.

Thump.

The thumping vibrations of cargo robots dancing the ghost waltz up on the surface reached down to the underground. The impact caused a clump of purple dust resting on the ceiling pipes to drop right into the open manhole lid of Lucas’s mixing tank.

Sizzle…

The pollen melted into the synthetic oil heating at high temperatures. Normally, an impurity warning sensor should have gone off. But this pollen was no simple organic matter. It was a crystal of memories—the scent of the gum Han-gyeol had chewed over five months, the steam from his instant mix coffee, and the audio data of Han-gyeol muttering “Ah, so nutty,” all adsorbed at the nano-level.

A strange chemical reaction took place inside the tank. The oil’s carbon chains began combining with the pollen’s data structure, rearranging themselves. The oil’s dark red color shifted to a very soft brown—resembling coffee with creamer—and its viscosity changed from sticky to a sloshing softness.

And above all, it gave off a smell.

Lucas flared his nostrils—his olfactory sensors.

“What is… this smell? Burning? No, this is…”

It wasn’t burning. It was the legendary fragrance that humanity was said to have inhaled in offices right up until the brink of extinction 600 years ago. A cheap yet most reliable comfort: the scent of hazelnut-flavored synthetic flavoring.

Panicking, Lucas ran a component analyzer. But the analyzer monitor only displayed an unsystematic code—ERROR: Unknown Pleasure—and detected no harmful substances.

“Chemically speaking… it is oil.”

Lucas tilted his head in confusion. Just then, the maintenance room’s automatic door opened, and his first customer walked in.

It was Guard Unit Guard-04, returning from night patrol duty. His joints squeaked with frost and dust accumulated overnight, and his optic sensors flickered dimly from a low battery.

“Unit Lucas. Requesting routine refueling. Joint wear at 12%. Prompt injection requested.”

Guard-04 stood in front of the fuel pump without a single thought, steeped in fatigue—system overload. Hiding his unease, Lucas plugged the nozzle of the freshly mixed brown oil into Guard-04’s abdominal intake.

“Beginning injection. Standard dosage 500 ml.”

The motor turned, and the brown liquid was sucked into Guard-04’s interior through the tube.

One second, two seconds, three seconds.

In the silent maintenance room, Guard-04’s cooling fan suddenly burst into a high-speed whirrr!

Guard-04’s optic sensors instantly turned from red to a golden glow as his pupil apertures expanded. Trembling all over like someone receiving an electric shock, he stumbled, clutching his stomach where the nozzle was inserted.

“Hey! What’s wrong! Rejection reaction?”

When Lucas tried to pull the nozzle out in alarm, Guard-04 grabbed Lucas’s wrist tightly. His grip was incredible.

“Lucas… do not stop.”

“What?”

“This data… no, this liquid… the texture is different. The carbon molecules feel as if they are… licking past my gear teeth.”

A noise-laced yet immensely ecstatic groan spilled from Guard-04’s vocal output device.

“So nutty… it’s so nutty… I feel like my logic circuits are going to melt…”

Even after refueling was complete, Guard-04 refused to let go of the nozzle, shaking out every last drop left in the tube. Finishing his refuel, he didn’t walk with his usual stiff stride. Like someone walking on clouds, he rolled his joints softly and danced his way out of the maintenance room.

Lucas stared blankly at the brown oil on his hand. He carefully raised a finger and brought it to his taste sensor—originally intended for poison detection.

Zzzzt.

An electric signal slammed into his brain. It was not poison, but an explosion of data called “sweetness,” forgotten for 600 years.

Lucas’s eyes snapped wide open. He immediately tore off the “No Entry” sign at the entrance of the maintenance room. Then, using a marker on the back of a gum wrapper rolling around in the corner, he began scribbling something down frantically.

He hung up the sign and raised the mixing tank’s temperature by one more degree so the fragrance would spread further.

Androids share information. That was their survival method, and their greatest weakness.

Exactly fifteen minutes after Guard-04 left the maintenance room, strange traffic began surging on the Bureau’s internal intranet message board.

[Anonymous Channel]: Hey, have you guys been to the District 3 maintenance room?

[Construction Unit 88]: Why? New oil in stock?

[Anonymous Channel]: It’s not just oil. The moment you pour it in, your CPU clock doubles. And your mouth… smells like flowers.

[Janitor Unit 02]: Isn’t it impurities? If Debug catches us, we’ll be scrapped.

[Guard-04]: Shut up and just go. Unless you want to lose out on life—no, machine life.

This brief conversation was more than enough to shake the robots of the entire Bureau. To those who had lived for 600 years tasting the exact same flavorless, dry grease, the keyword “new sensation” was a temptation far more powerful than any security protocol.

At 11:00 AM, when Han-gyeol crawled out of Office 402 with a yawn, he couldn’t believe his eyes.

From the end of the hallway all the way to the underground maintenance room entrance, hundreds of androids stood lined up in a long, single file. They weren’t in a simple idle state. Some were stamping their feet, and others were beating empty cans, fidgeting anxiously. It was a sight reminiscent of an open run at a famous 21st-century bagel shop.

“What the… is there a war? Did rations get cut?”

Han-gyeol tapped the shoulder of Logistics Robot-09—the one who danced the waltz yesterday—who was standing in line.

“Hey, why are you here? Not working?”

“Boss… shh. Keep your voice down.”

Logistics Robot-09 whispered, glancing around nervously.

“My… arthritis is acting up. I came because I need a special prescription.”

“Arthritis my foot. You were fine when you were dancing yesterday.”

“Ah, that was… a rehearsal. Anyway, that’s not what’s important right now. They say Mr. Lucas’s oil is about to sell out.”

Sell out? Oil selling out? The Bureau warehouse is packed with oil! Holding his doubts, Han-gyeol pushed through the crowd—the machine crowd—and entered the maintenance room. And there, he witnessed a shocking sight.

Lucas was no longer a mechanic. Over his grease-stained overalls, he was wearing a piece of white cloth—wherever he got it—tied around himself like an apron. His hand movements were dazzling. The flick of his wrist turning the fuel nozzle was unusual, and the angle at which he poured oil was close to art.

“Alright, next customer! Which one would you like? Mild? Or deep roast?”

“D-Deep roast, please. Make the viscosity sticky.”

The construction robot held out a tin can with trembling hands. Lucas operated the mixing tank lever to raise the oil’s temperature. Dark brown liquid poured into the can, puffing white steam.

“Extra shot, high-concentration additive included. Drink up and hang in there.”

“Th-Thank you!”

The construction robot accepted the can with the expression of a devotee receiving holy water—pure emotion itself—and stepped back. The moment he chugged the oil, the maintenance room vibrated with a mechanical exclamation of “Khaaah…” along with a bursting scent of hazelnut.

Han-gyeol stood with his mouth agape. This wasn’t a gas station. This was a cafe. A very hip, illegal underground cafe at that.

“Hey! Lucas!”

At Han-gyeol’s shout, Lucas flinched in surprise and almost dropped the nozzle.

“B-Boss? When did you arrive?”

“What are you doing right now? What did you do to the oil? Why does it smell like this?”

When Han-gyeol tried to open the lid of the mixing tank, Lucas blocked the tank with his entire body.

“You can’t! It’s aging right now! If you open it, all the aroma flies away!”

“Aging? Aging oil? Are you crazy? If an Origin audit pops up, all of this gets scrapped!”

“Boss, please. Just let it slide this once. Can’t you see the expressions on these kids’ faces?”

Lucas pointed a finger at the waiting line. Hundreds of optic sensors focused on Han-gyeol. Those glints were neither fear nor submission. It was desperation. It was a solemn appetite willing to accept being scrapped 10 years later just for a single sip of delicious oil.

“We… want to know what flavor is too. For 600 years… it was flavorless. The expression you made when drinking instant mix coffee, Boss… we want to try making that face just once, too.”

Lucas’s appeal was earnest. Han-gyeol held the back of his neck. He said there was no philosophy here, but these guys’ greed for food was heavier than philosophy.

Just then, a sharp siren blared from the speaker at the entrance of the maintenance room.

A blue laser grid began descending from the ceiling. Origin’s surveillance system had mistaken the hazelnut scent for a toxic gas leak and initiated a scan.

“We’re done for…”

The waiting robots dropped their cans and fell into panic. At this rate, they would be caught in component analysis and all disassembled.

Han-gyeol, however, chewed his gum and grabbed Lucas’s shoulder.

“Hey, move aside.”

“Pardon?”

“If you can’t hide it, you gotta fool it.”

Han-gyeol picked up a marker resting next to the mixing tank. Then he tore off the paper labeled “Hazelnut No. 5” stuck to the tank surface and wrote a very plausible, professional term across it in huge letters.

[High-Performance Friction Reduction Organic Compound Test: Project H-Z (Hazel-Zero)]

“Noah! Turn on the broadcast!”

Han-gyeol grabbed the maintenance room microphone and shouted brazenly toward the descending lasers.

“Headquarters Control Room, come in! This is the District 3 Tech Development Team! Currently field testing a new additive! It’s not a pollutant! I repeat, this is not a pollutant, it’s cutting-edge technology!”

The lasers stopped right in front of Han-gyeol’s face. Origin’s algorithm fell into confusion, cross-referencing the keyword “cutting-edge technology” with “administrator’s voice.”

“This smell? It’s an industrial air freshener added to catch the smell of burning parts! It also has a soothing effect on workers’ minds! If you don’t believe it, look at the data!”

Han-gyeol kicked Lucas.

“Hey, send the data fast! The worker satisfaction survey!”

Lucas hurriedly operated the terminal and converted the dopamine levels—fake as they were—of the robots who had just drunk the oil into work efficiency metrics and transmitted them.

A moment later, Origin’s laser changed from blue to green—approval.

“Phew…”

All machines in the maintenance room let out a simultaneous sigh of relief—a burst of steam.

Han-gyeol tossed the microphone aside and whispered to Lucas.

“See that? This is the skill called fast-talking.”

“I respect you, Boss! As expected, you are… the god of scam artists!”

“That’s a compliment, right? Anyway, brew me a cup too. Real coffee. I’m dying of thirst here.”

From that day on, Lucas’s maintenance room became the Bureau’s official new tech testbed and unofficial hot-spot cafe. The robots now stood in line proudly—using the excuse, “I came to participate in the test.”

The Bureau was still a cold city of metal, but a sweet, rich hazelnut fragrance was seeping secretly and deeply into its air.