“Yellow police tape had been strung across the park entrance, and a few officers stood guard in front of it.
The back gate looked the same, though the officers there seemed just as puzzled about why they were doing this.
The person in charge, hands clasped behind her back, watched the entrance alongside a woman in a black suit.
One of the uniformed officers spoke.
“Never thought someone of your stature would come all the way here.”
“Is that so? I’ve been a bit tied up getting out to Sector 3. In any case, congratulations on your promotion, Superintendent Magnum. Or is it Chief Superintendent now?”
“It’s been three months since I pinned on the new badge—save your congratulations. May I ask why, if Pain made the call, Ms. Cozet was dispatched instead?”
It wasn’t courtesy but outright hostility—an attempt to browbeat a Foundation Union representative. Cozet swallowed a hollow laugh and replied tersely.
“Pain is someone we can’t afford to lose. If he filed a report, of course I had to come.”
“Since when have you and Pain been so close?”
“Oh, not long at all.”
Superintendent Magnum snapped her mouth shut. She clearly disliked Cozet.
Delester Magnum—talent of the Shelter Police’s Public Order Bureau—was well known within the force. Born in Sector 2 to a family of shelter officials, her mother retired from the security detail. She’d grown up surrounded by people who lived only to maintain the shelter.
No wonder Superintendent Magnum was a stickler for rules, a loyal lapdog of her superiors. Her promotion and transfer to the Public Order Bureau—a unit created just five years ago—had been a major event.
The Bureau was essentially a paper tiger. Despite its name, it rarely got to act. Publicly, it was billed as a rapid-response unit for shelter emergencies, but whispers called it a ghost department to punish those who’d fallen out of favor.
Underfunded, staffed by only five or six people in a nametag-decorated cubicle, it looked like a glorified cleanup detail for the high-and-mighty to dump unwanted personnel. In reality it served as a cover for cooperation with the Foundation Union—sealing off anomalies, blocking residents, providing CCTV footage, even erasing casualty records.
So Superintendent Magnum’s disdain for the Foundation Union could only burn hotter than the sun.
The Foundation Union subdued phenomena that shouldn’t exist, and the police served public order. Both were essential—one overt, one covert—but their aims diverged.
The Foundation Union sought ultimately to preserve humanity’s future, by any means necessary. Its massive lobbying, arms deals for munitions to secure phenomenal objects, land purchases for containment sites, recruitment of criminals for research staff, manipulation of incident records—none of it surprised anyone.
They greased palms across media, government, and even the royal family. Such necessary evils, to the Union, and borne by the civil authorities’ public image.
No matter how expertly they covered their tracks, questions always arose—and those questions were directed at the police, at the law. The angry residents demanded answers, but the police couldn’t reveal everything.
In the end, it fell to the public-facing forces—especially the police—to absorb the outrage. Naturally, the shelter police bore the brunt. Thus, the relationship between the Union and the police was anything but cordial.
The Union’s stance was: “Do you think we do this for fun? Can’t you cooperate?” The police grumbled back: “Why must we clean up after your messes?” Such complaints flew from both sides daily.
Yet personal feelings aside, when orders came down to cooperate, Superintendent Magnum could not refuse Pain’s request. She’d rallied all available personnel—and now Cozet, a full-time Union agent, had suddenly appeared. Magnum clenched her jaw and stared at the park entrance. When Pain emerged, she planned to demand cooperation by the book.
How long they waited, she could not say. Then they saw a shadow on the park path. It materialized and drew nearer, and only once it closed did they recognize its source.
Friedrich Pain supporting Raimund Geppert, stumbling toward them.
When they crossed the police line with difficulty, Cozet rushed forward, caught Raimund’s other arm, and slung it over her shoulder.
“What happened? Anomaly survey?”
“Completed.”
“I’ll call in the field team immediately. Transfer the data and start treatment—”
“No.”
Friedrich repeated evenly, “Completed. It’s over.”
Cozet stared at him for a moment, then her eyes widened as realization dawned.
“No… surely not. Could it really—?”
“Yes.”
He nodded, then indicated Raimund, unconscious. In Raimund’s right hand was the Justitia replica, and in his left a silver amulet wound with red thread.
“We’ve safely secured the Labyrinthos’s phenomenal object.”
His head throbbed. He felt as powerless as after three sleepless days. Battling the weightiest eyelids in the world, Raimund peered at the slightly stained but otherwise clean ceiling, groaned, and closed his eyes again.
Number 36 Post. He was back in the third-floor bedroom he’d claimed. Yet he had no memory of how he returned.
He staggered, trying to move off the bed, but felt nothing below his neck. What—was he injured? He forced his eyes downward and first saw the white sheet. Nothing else. Bewildered, then horrified, he panicked.
“My body! My body—aaaah! Waaah!”
His body was gone. Where his torso should have been, the sheet lay empty. Had he gone insane? Had erosion made him hallucinate?
His scream rattled the halls, then the door flew open. Cozet and Friedrich Pain entered.
“Ah, Mr. Geppert! You’ve lost so much weight—or rather, your face is completely gaunt. You’re awake already?”
“It’s not just my face! What happened to my body? All that’s left is my head—what the hell is going on!?”
“Whoa, calm down. There’s nothing to fear. I’ll explain everything.”
Cozet raised her hand to silence Raimund’s next scream, then pulled a chair beside his bed.
“I’m not on the medical support team, so I can’t go into details, but your erosion rate spiked to dangerous levels inside the anomaly. The artificial body the Union implanted twisted beyond repair.”
“Twisted?”
“I saw the photos. Did you know grass was growing in your digestive tract?”
“Grass grows in the digestive tract?”
“The soft tissues—cartilage, organs—were fibrosing. They would have been ruined, so we began replacement surgery.”
“Leaving only my head?”
“Your head is the crucial part, Mr. Geppert. In any crisis, you protect the head before the heart.”
What was she saying? Grass had been cultivated inside his body? Raimund had no clue where to begin.
“So what about my new body?”
“The medical team will bring it. They said the anesthesia was sufficient—but I didn’t expect you to wake so soon.”
“Isn’t this medical malpractice? I’ll sue.”
“I told you I’m not the medical team. I can’t re-anesthetize you, but I have good news to distract you.”
“Go ahead.”
“There’s a rumor: you’re our first super-rookie! Everyone’s dying to know who this new contractor is—Yonan pushed your contract through.”
What on earth?
“Me? Why?”
“You completed your first anomaly mission and secured its phenomenal object. That’s huge.”
“Really?”
“Of course! I even puffed up a bit myself. Because your success made waves, the Union sent the medical team immediately. You should feel proud.”
Cozet gave a thumbs-up. But Raimund, in no mood to smile, glanced instead at Friedrich leaning in the doorway.
“How much time passed since we left the anomaly?”
Cozet answered, “About three days. It took time to separate your head and preserve it.”
“I don’t remember how I got back.”
“Hm. Friedrich was on site—he can fill you in. We were just getting his testimony for the report.”
Cozet ostentatiously opened her suit jacket to reveal a small recorder blinking a red light. It was capturing their conversation.
Under Cozet’s urging, Friedrich began mechanically, “I’ve described the internal structure of the anomaly dubbed ‘Labyrinthos.’ Its maze-like design inevitably leads toward the center. Considering the hostile entity inside—Labyrinthos-1—it qualifies as a Level 4 Pesa.”
“Not rare, but you don’t see that grade often these days.”
“As Mr. Geppert’s erosion rate rose, he attempted escape but then, acting unpredictably, entered the center. The central area was a small hidden garden. The phenomenal object appeared as a thread-covered cocoon at its heart, connected to the foliage. Movement was observed inside, but its nature remains unknown. The cocoon measured about twelve feet.”
“Any further threats?”
“No additional hostile entities, but there was a defensive response—Labyrinthos-1 approached it directly.”
“You engaged Labyrinthos-1?”
“It was dangerous, so I drew it off. Mr. Geppert then struck the phenomenal object with the Justitia replica provided by the Foundation Union. The anomaly collapsed and the incident concluded.”
“Very good. Number 36 Post, field testimony complete.”
A silky purr. Raimund noticed Cozet’s unusual satisfaction. She switched off the recorder and turned to him.
“So, how do you feel?”
“What about?”
“How it felt to wield the Justitia—what it’s like to be an external contractor who secured a Level 4 phenomenal object, that sort of thing?”
“I don’t feel anything.”
He only worried when his new body would arrive and how long he could stay conscious. Cozet’s excitement faded, and she pouted.
“Seems you don’t grasp your achievement. Friedrich, would you explain it?”
“Why must I keep talking…sigh.”
Friedrich set down his teacup irritably. He looked at Raimund as if he were a professor teaching algebra to a child just learning letters.
“You know anomalies have classifications.”
“That I know—after Safe comes Level 5. Above that is—”
“Level 4, Pesa. Then Level 3, Hubris—that’s the grade we most often encounter. These levels reflect threat potential.”
Raimund nodded, having heard that once. Friedrich continued, and Raimund’s jaw dropped.
“Level 5 anomalies threaten unarmed personnel—that is, civilians. Level 4 can endanger two to ten armed individuals.”
“Level 3?”
“Fifty or more armed personnel.”
A complete disaster—a single anomaly could kill fifty armed officers at once. Despite Raimund’s shudder, neither Friedrich nor Cozet batted an eyelash.
“So the two of us escaped an anomaly capable of killing two to ten armed personnel.”
“That’s…impressive.”
“And you even used the Justitia replica to deactivate its phenomenal object.”
“Phenomenal object?”
Cozet produced something she’d been hiding behind her back: a silver amulet wrapped in red thread, encased in pale blue silk. The pristine silver was dented at one corner.
“This is the phenomenal object Mr. Geppert secured.”
“Isn’t it dangerous to hold that out? Put it back!”
“It’s been deactivated by the Justitia replica, so it’s safe. Once the Union takes it for containment, it’ll be quite a spectacle—a labyrinth covered in red threads.”
Whatever that meant, Raimund never wanted to see it again. He threw the silk-wrapped amulet into the air and caught it, eyeing Cozet with suspicion. Then he asked, curious.
“But how does the Justitia deactivate the phenomenal object?”
“Huh?”
“I’m curious about the mechanism. Mr. Yonan said we still don’t know how anomalies draw energy. How did they secure the original Justitia and how does its replica sever the object’s connection to the anomaly—”
At once the air grew awkward. Cozet feigned distraction, and Friedrich raised an eyebrow.
Raimund’s eyes twitched.
“…Surely you don’t know?”
“Hm. Not that no one knows—just that no one here knows.”
“What’s the difference!?”
“More than you’d think.”
“But someone must know about the Justitia—like the researcher who made the replica. Let me meet them.”
“Ummmm.”
Cozet rolled her eyes, then grinned. Friedrich, silent until now, spoke flatly.
“That won’t be possible. Many have received a Justitia replica, but no one has ever mastered its use—until you.”