After the auction, a private meeting followed in the VIP room with the toad that had won me.
Despair.
I had no idea how that emotion could be delivered to him.
I simply did as the auctioneer told me and laid my hand on a small crystal set in front of the toad.
BEEP—
The crystal glowed blue, and a number appeared in its center. That was probably my despair, turned into data.
"Croak. Croak-croak."
"Pardon? Aha! I'll pass that along for now."
I was excited at the thought that the points would come in any moment, but the toad ghost seemed to have some complaint and said something to the auctioneer. To me it just sounded like a toad's croaking, so I couldn't tell what it was saying, but I had a bad feeling.
"Investor No. 3029. The Superior says there is too little emotion and wishes for it to be increased."
"You're saying my despair isn't enough."
What nonsense this was.
I knew perfectly well what I was feeling. And here in the market, despair that gave off a thick scent of revenge in particular definitely stimulated those creatures' sense of smell. I hadn't been sure before coming to the auction house, but after coming here and seeing the negative emotions being traded, I was sure. Sadness, depression, jealousy, anxiety, despair. If my emotions in particular whetted their appetite among all of them, I was ready to exploit that to the hilt.
"There is no problem with the quality. He would just like the quantity increased a little."
"...How?"
It took me a moment to understand. Piecing it together from context, I gathered it boiled down to this: that toad was a big eater and wanted to eat a lot. But I wondered whether a person could just increase that at will, so I asked again.
The auctioneer held out a pink candy. The big heart in the middle of the candy grated on my nerves in some strange way.
"What is this?"
"The market's pride and joy, the 'Heart-Exploding Candy'!"
With a name like that, unlike its cute shape, it seemed like something I should never eat. It was a market product, so maybe it really would make your heart explode.
"......."
I thought for a while about what the candy was for, but my head, which had been a normal person's until just recently, couldn't even guess.
"Don't worry. You just eat this and face the events of your despair on the screen, like watching a movie."
"Watch... what, now?"
It seemed they meant to drag that hellish memory out of me and show it to me again. Then again, here, it didn't seem impossible.
"I know~ I know~ You've already been through it, so there won't be much emotional upheaval. That's why the Superior here has decided to show you even things you don't know about. A kind of investment!"
"......."
"Do you accept?"
A hollow laugh escaped me. I was about to refuse, but at the words "the whole story of what I didn't know," my calmly settled eyes lit up. That I could hear it without having to shake down that bitch and bastard was, if anything, to my advantage.
However.
"Yes, but before that, I'd like to revise the winning bid."
If I meekly accepted the terms as they were here, I would never survive in this place. I had to think like them and act like them.
"All I originally meant to trade was my despair as it is now. If it's going to be increased, I'd like separate points paid for however much it's increased."
"Ah... Investor No. 3029. But the Superior is covering the cost of the candy and the screen...."
"Then I refuse."
At my razor-sharp answer, the auctioneer warily watched the toad's face, looking troubled.
The auctioneer didn't relay anything separately to the toad, who was already sitting there hearing everything. Time just kept passing like that in silence.
'This is starting to be a waste of time.'
The toad's mouth, covered in sticky slime, showed no sign of opening, so I got up from my seat and made a bold move on the toad.
"You'll never taste despair like this anywhere ever again."
Just as the sale was about to fall through, a boom like thunder spread out from the toad's mouth, and its closed mouth opened.
"He says he's impressed by your nerve, Investor, and will give you 300 points in total."
"Good."
After taking the candy from the auctioneer, I grabbed his hand and shook it. It was an expression of my joy that the trade had safely gone through.
***
At an auction house I had come to thinking I might earn 20 points or so, I ended up earning about as many points as I would have for taking part in an A-difficulty game. Satisfied that I had been paid a fitting price, whatever might happen after I ate this candy, I tossed it into my mouth.
The place I was moved to was a private room, just like a solitary cell.
In pitch darkness, without a single speck of light coming in from any side, only the screen in front of me gave off a bright light.
CLICK— WHIRRR.
I heard the sound of an old projector winding, and then everything around me wavered and dizziness rose.
-Hey. I heard the job you set up is finally getting underway?
-That's how it turned out. Sick of it. I don't know how I held out for 5 years.
Park Min-hwan and Kim Hyun-woo.
It felt as vivid as if they were right beside me.
-Still, one more sucker took the bait this time, so I think I can make another 200 to 300 million.
-How many? You've got to tell me so I can start the groundwork.
A stifling feeling rose up, like my chest was blocked solid. I had thought I could stand a conversation like this, but maybe because of the candy, the anger rising in me began to take over my brain to a sickening degree.
Their conversation kept going, and I wasn't the only victim; there were nearly 20 people.
On top of that, they had built up relationships with every one of them, for 2 years at the shortest and 5 at the longest. They had known from the start that I was a team leader at a big conglomerate and approached me according to plan.
'Son of a bitch. I'm the world's biggest idiot for trusting that trash heap.'
The company Kim Hyun-woo worked for was a paper company, and the building Park Min-hwan owned had been mortgaged and headed for auction from the start. There wasn't a single thing I had known for sure. They were a bottom-of-the-barrel ring of con men whose entire lives were nothing but lies.
TRICKLE.
Something damp ran down under my chin.
"Damn it...."
I had thought I was keeping my face blank, but at some point tears had started running down my cheeks. On top of that, my tightly pressed lips had been crushed, and blood had beaded on them.
'No. I'm way past getting hurt by words like that.'
The only reason my emotions were jumping around like this now was that the memories I had with Kim Hyun-woo, that trash heap, were still lodged in my frontal lobe. I should have erased them long ago. If I had known that everything he had done for me, everything he had said, every word of comfort, had only been possible because he saw me as a wallet, I would never have come this far.
TICK— WHIRRR.
Just as my breathing grew ragged and my vision went hazy, I heard the projector winding again, and the screen began to change rapidly.
-Sob, sob. It's so hard for me. Honestly, I've wanted to break up with him for years....
-A-ran, you mustn't mistake gratitude for love.
This time it was my longtime lover.
Go A-ran and Lee Tae-hyun appeared.
The moment I saw A-ran, my heart began to tighten as if I had forgotten how to breathe altogether.
"Gah! Huff, huff...."
I hurriedly clutched my chest and forced strength into my shaking legs to get up. My pride wouldn't let me collapse.
-To be honest, I never loved him from the start. He was just like a close older-brother type, but he was so good to me that I thought he'd do as a man to marry.
-A-ran... What can you do. You've found true love now.
Plague-ridden bastards.
At the conversation that followed, I finally crumbled. With one knee on the floor, I burned low and quiet at their words.
BA-DUMP BA-DUMP.
I could feel my heart pounding so hard I could have traced its shape.
'I only sat down because my heart hurts.'
7 years. We were together for 7 years, and as long as I was human, I couldn't wipe out those feelings in an instant as if they had never existed.
I took a deep breath, calmed my chest, and got back up. It was a relationship that was over.
Having seen this much, I was confident I could stand tall no matter what else came next. But I was wrong.
Moans like something out of a porno rang out, and a scene of Go A-ran and Lee Tae-hyun having sex played in graphic detail. On top of that, every remark comparing him and me in bed came through, not a word missing.
"Goddamn toad bastard."
Those market bastards were insane. They were treating me as a machine for extracting emotions. They made no secret that they had chosen this footage to fatten up my emotions so they could eat more. Thanks to that, keeping my emotions under control was getting to be too much, so much so that both my hands were bleeding.
-Ah. Fuck. That bastard is so damn clingy.
-Why? Is the new guy you hooked no good? I heard you dumped that sucker bastard and switched over?
-No, he's fine with everything, but he acts so fucking full of himself in bed. Doesn't he realize he's just average? Heh.
Lies within lies. And the truth inside them.
My heart had gone past aching; now I couldn't even feel the pain.
At a conversation even more shocking than the sex scene, I froze as if I had turned to stone.
'This is what the Go A-ran I knew really was?'
The true face of the woman who had been so angelic and ditzy, who was always making mistakes yet still packed my lunch for me with her own hands.
I denied it. At this point, I even began to suspect that the footage I had seen earlier had all been false information shown to me to pump up my emotions.
TICK! WHIRRRR!
I heard the sound of the projector turning a third time, and when I opened my eyes, I was back in that room.
I had come out while the conversation was still going, so I hadn't gotten my bearings, and I groped at the wall to get back in.
"Investor No. 3029! More emotion was extracted than expected!"
"......."
The auctioneer's voice droned in my cochlea. Even his voice sounded mushy.
"A lot of other emotions were extracted too, but as per the contract, all of it belongs to the Superior."
"I have a question."
My ears were still muffled, everything in front of me shimmered, and my vision was blurry, but I turned toward the auctioneer with everything I had.
"That footage. Is it a lie? Or the truth?"
Now that they had extracted all my emotions, the auctioneer had no reason to lie to me. I had to hear the answer to that question before he disappeared.
"You may not want to believe it, but it's the truth!"
"I see. Now just put the points in."
CLAP!
With the sound of a clap, my jumbled head cleared, and my heart, which had been thrashing as if it would leap out of my chest, went back to normal. And then.
[Trade complete. The winning bid of 300 points is delivered to Investor No. 3029.]
Once the points were filled in, I was back to my usual self. The state I had been in before watching the footage, that is. But every scene crammed into my head had been stored, not a single one erased.
"Oh. I just extracted your emotions, and they refill this fast."
Of course they did. After seeing something like that, there was no way it wouldn't be burned into me. And this feeling of having emotions drained.... I couldn't possibly have experienced it before, yet it felt somehow familiar.
"...I'll be going."
"See you again soon. Next time, I hope you'll trade the desire that was born this time, too."
The auctioneer waved cheerfully as I walked out of the auction house. Behind the auctioneer, beyond the screen, the words [This Month's Highest Winning Bid: No. 3029] were visible, but I turned my eyes away from the electronic board.