At the very front row, there was a teacher, but they were just a chaperone.
From here on, company staff would be giving the facility tour.
The students were chattering, and the teacher stood up and told them to quiet down.
The teacher wasn’t the one from my homeroom class.
The students on this bus weren’t all from the same class, but rather a mix of students selected from the same grade.
That teacher was probably just unlucky to be here.
In fact, his voice had no energy.
Ah, was that the case with other teachers too?
After a brief wait, a man entered.
He was a very nice-looking middle-aged man.
His impression was good, but not striking, so I thought I wouldn’t remember his face after a week of hearing his explanation.
He looked like one of those nameless models in corporate promotional posters.
He wore a gray work jacket that workers often wear, but underneath it was a white shirt and tie.
“Hello everyone, nice to meet you.”
Though his impression was faint, his voice was really pleasant.
It sounded like the kind of voice that would make you fall asleep if you heard it in class.
The man introduced himself, but I didn’t really pay attention to what he said.
“I’ll be guiding you for the next two days, so please enjoy your time here.
The dorms will be company dorms, and while you’re in the building, you’ll be treated the same as Noir Corporation employees.”
At the man’s words, someone raised their hand.
“Do you have any questions?”
“Yes.”
A child with a lively appearance stood up awkwardly to ask.
“Is there a curfew?”
I could hear giggles from around the child.
“There’s none for employees.”
At those words, cheers erupted from the group.
“However, you can’t leave the building.”
Though the teacher said that, the view outside the building was really bleak.
Even if there was a convenience store, it was inside the complex, not outside.
Hmm.
The lack of a curfew at night made it easier for me to move around.
I suppressed a sigh that was about to escape.
In times like this, having fewer friends is helpful.
I can’t really say I’m relieved, though.
Walking around the complex was more interesting than I expected.
Some parts of the massive rectangular building were still under construction, some were factories that built spacecraft, and there were places that manufactured semiconductors for internal use.
Seeing it this way, I could understand just how big Noir Corporation was.
They did construction on the outside, and even owned subsidiaries like media companies and entertainment firms.
I wondered if this was the kind of mega-corporation that you’d see in cyberpunk stories—corporations making everything from toothpicks to missiles.
It made sense why countries might want to align themselves with such galactic-scale corporations, considering that such companies were not just in Korea, but all over the world.
“Alright, that’s it for today.”
At 4:30 PM, after assigning the dorms and explaining the rules, the man said.
The students seemed to think the day had ended earlier than expected.
They were excited.
There was a big supermarket nearby, and it seemed like everyone was planning to go there and buy a lot of food.
I, however, had other things to do.
I realized they had intentionally selected an odd number of students, and I was the only one assigned a dorm room on my own.
The other students looked at me with mixed pity, but I actually found it more comfortable this way.
I’d be moving around at night too, after all.
Once I entered the dorm and finally had some privacy, I took a deep breath and looked under the bed.
As expected, there was a case.
I opened it, checked the contents, and then put it back.
“Good.”
I had heard there were a lot of soldiers in this complex.
I was assigned to be the one to face off against magical girls directly.
I wasn’t an executive, but my role was pretty close to one.
Hmm, was James really being serious?
I thought back to what James had said, but I couldn’t figure out an answer, so I decided not to think about it further.
Still, I had a job to do.
Even if I was someone who went with the flow, I didn’t want to just lose without doing anything.
Even if I failed in the end, I at least wanted to land one good hit.
When you’re getting beaten up unilaterally, thoughts like that inevitably start to form.
The tablet that came with my suitcase had a 3D map of the building’s interior with detailed descriptions.
It was too large to memorize everything, but I focused on memorizing the part that mentioned the researchers.
There was no concrete proof of it, but maybe they were hiding this information in another place on purpose.
If they were trying to create confusion in the magical girls’ intelligence rooms, it seemed plausible.
“…Is the attack coming from there?”
I wasn’t sure where they got the information from, but seeing all this, it seemed clear that there was a strong possibility.
I scratched my head and turned off the tablet.
Then, I stood up and lazily walked toward the area marked as the research facility.
The teacher wasn’t particularly patrolling.
I passed a few of our school’s students in the hallway, but since they were from a different class, I just ignored them.
“Ah, I see.”
The tablet had said “research lab,” but the area now was just a place surrounded by walls.
It was the deepest part of the complex.
The lowest floor of a pillar-like structure that seemed to support the building was labeled ‘secret research facility.’
I had no idea how to get in.
Maybe they were hiding it with some alien technology, or perhaps they had painted the door to obscure it in preparation for this event.
Or maybe they had just pointed out one of the pillars to mislead us.
What I had to do was guard this “research facility.”
I shrugged to myself, turned around—
poke
I felt a finger jab into my cheek.
“…Did you see this in a drama too?”
I turned my face away to escape from the finger and asked.
“You’re not surprised?”
“Of course not, I figured you’d be here.”
It was Jiguppa.
Jiguppa handed me a can of drink without warning.
“Not coffee today?”
“No, even I don’t get drunk before work.”
Jiguppa handed me a can of soda.
I accepted it and walked to the nearby convenience store.
After entering the ‘complex,’ I realized why it was called a “complex.”
It wasn’t just like a giant shopping mall but more like a small town inside a huge square dome.
It was a “complex” built to let people live and work there long-term.
Though there were several floors, the upper floors weren’t that big because the middle was open.
Inside the open area, there were several buildings of different heights.
The closest thing I could compare it to was the famous indoor amusement park in Jamsil.
The structure was similar, though this one was much larger, and it wasn’t a dome, but a square building.
The buildings were supported by thick, strong pillars, and one of those pillars seemed to be designed for ‘camouflage.’
Jiguppa sat beside me and started talking about this and that.
At least he was sensible enough to avoid talking about work.
Most of the conversation was about random topics like dramas, movies, and comics.
Some of the topics were interesting enough that I made a mental note to remember a few of the titles.
And then night came.
The magical girls, who could not directly attack, were expected to infiltrate, according to the company’s predictions.
Instead of attacking flamboyantly, they would likely use their abilities to quietly take out key people.
That meant I also had to move secretly.
While keeping a close watch on places, I would stay hidden and monitor.
The black suit was useful for that.
Even the helmet I had just received was matte-coated.
Maybe they had predicted this to some extent.
Until about 8 PM, I moved around in civilian clothes, casually checking on things.
After 9 PM, I changed into my suit and hid in places where no one would see me.
Not on the street, but inside buildings that only employees could enter, watching the outside.
The fact that many buildings were designed so that you couldn’t see inside from the outside was convenient.
The magical girls didn’t show up until almost past midnight.
My eyes were getting tired.
If I had known it would take this long, I would have tried to rest a bit earlier.
“…Ah.”
I muttered.
A white dot appeared.
It was light, emerging in mid-air right after the patrol guards passed by.
The light, dimmed to a minimum, slowly started to grow, almost as if it was trying to hide from the surroundings.
It’s definitely a scam.
I thought as I watched the magical girl’s power—or rather, the technology from the Galactic Federation.