DPGR 122

A notification sound rang out from the phone. With an apologetic expression, Geonwoo spoke as if making an excuse.

“Oh. It’s the chatroom with the fellow guides. It was basically dead, but something must’ve happened…”

Geonwoo’s murmuring abruptly cut off. His expression hardened, as though he had just seen something shocking.

At the same time, Sena, who had also been looking at her phone, glanced around and said, “Huh?”

Judging by how pale her face had gone, she must have seen the same news as Geonwoo.

Before Jiho could ask what was going on, Sena reached for the remote and turned on the TV in the Captain’s office.

“—Now for the next news. Singular dungeons are being discovered one after another around the world. The Director-General of the World Esper Organization has begun an emergency briefing regarding the singular dungeons.”

The screen quickly changed. A large foreign man stood at a podium, beginning a speech with a grave expression.

As Jiho was busy reading the subtitles at the bottom of the screen, Sena’s phone was suddenly thrust in front of his face.

“L-look at this!”

Her phone was playing a breaking live news stream on YouTube.

“—Following the unusual surge in dungeons in Korea, a large number of singular dungeons are being discovered. Currently, known singular dungeons include a C-rank small dungeon in Cheorwon, a D-rank small dungeon in Yeoju, a C-rank small dungeon in Suncheon…”

The anchor rattled off the names of regions and dungeon information in a slightly shaky voice. The locations she listed alone totaled five.

She then warned that the number could still increase, as several sites had yet to be investigated.

“What… is this…”

It was the moment Jiho’s anxiety collided with reality.

It wasn’t enough that dungeons had begun erupting everywhere like a storm, now news of singular dungeons was cropping up like mushrooms after rain.

Thanks to that, the Center was in complete chaos.

“Director! Reporters are calling—”

“Tell them I’m in a meeting! Say I’ll call back when it’s over!”

“Y-yes, sir!”

The Esper Director quickly summoned the Guide Director and the Center’s board of directors for an emergency meeting.

Everyone gathered in the main conference room was already aware of Dojin’s regression and the Final Dungeon.

Bang!

A few of the board members slammed the table and raised their voices.

“What in the world is going on! You said we still had time!”

“This is what happens when we blindly trust Esper Baek Dojin and do nothing!”

“Director! How do you plan to take responsibility for this!”

“Who’s to say Esper Baek Dojin didn’t intentionally trigger this entire situation?”

Those adding fuel to the fire were all people who had never looked kindly upon the Esper Director.

Watching them pounce on the situation as if this was their chance, the Esper Director felt nothing but disgust. This meeting wasn’t called to lay blame.

“I told you already, time has been reversed, and all incidents have accelerated!”

Bang!

When even curses about Dojin began to fly, the Esper Directors finally lost his temper and slammed his fist on the table.

Unlike the civilian board members, he was an Esper. The thick wooden table split with a crack.

“……”

Silenced by the display, the board members shut their mouths. Even so, the Esper Director, fuming with rage, roared at them.

“Esper Baek Dojin triggered this on purpose? What could he possibly gain from this, huh?”

“N-no, I just meant maybe it was a possibility or something…”

“Watch what you say. And is this really the time to argue over blame?”

The usual friendly glint in the Esper Director’s eyes was now laced with menace.

The Guide Director standing beside him also spoke in agreement.

“Let’s all calm down. What we need to discuss now is how to respond from here on.”

“Ahem. Ahem.”

“Mm-hmm…”

Thanks to his calm words, the board members settled somewhat. A few who had raised their voices awkwardly cleared their throats and avoided eye contact.

The Esper Captain gave the Guide Director a grateful look.

The position had long been vacant after the previous Guide Director had been imprisoned for corruption. This one had been appointed precisely for being modest and quiet, and that choice was paying off now.

“Well then. Let’s begin with the matter of dual dungeons.”

The Esper Director, withdrawing his killing intent, raised the most pressing issue.

Originally, the plan had been to keep information about double dungeons secret for a while. Releasing too much at once was bound to cause backlash.

But with so many dual dungeons appearing worldwide, the embargo had already been broken.

The leak had started in the United States.

As a result, the Center was now swamped with phone calls asking for explanations and official statements about the singular dungeons.

“How about holding a press conference?”

Just then, a board member who had remained neutral finally voiced his opinion.

He believed staying silent during all this would only make the public even more anxious.

“The Director-General of the World Esper Organization has already made a statement about the double dungeons, but I think it would help if we made an announcement as well. What do you think?”

“Hmm. A good suggestion. But a press conference…”

“I’m sure the reporters are already waiting to hear from us. Judging by the noise outside, quite a few of them are already here. We should invite them in and call for more, and hold at least a short briefing.”

On that point, both the Esper Director and the Guide Director agreed. Aside from a few disgruntled members, the proposal was nearly unanimously approved.

The Esper Director decided to hold a press conference in the Esper wing for now.

“Please contact the press immediately. Let them know there will be a briefing.”

“Yes, Director.”

The Esper Director gave orders to the secretary standing beside him. The others in the room also began combing through their contacts to notify anyone who might be of help.

Everyone in the meeting room looked ashen, like people who had already received notice of their impending deaths.

***

Jiho, Sena, and Geonwoo continued monitoring the news from the Captain’s office.

There hadn’t been any updates, the same reports kept looping over and over.

Jiho, watching the screen with blurry eyes, anxiously bit his lip.

He was worried that something might go wrong with the dungeon Dojin had entered. He’d had a bad feeling ever since earlier.

Just then, an announcement echoed from the building’s speaker system.

–May we have your attention. The Guide Seminar scheduled for today at 2:00 PM has been postponed indefinitely. A press conference regarding dual dungeons will be held shortly in Main Auditorium 1 of the Esper wing. All employees are asked to watch the live news broadcast.

The three of them stared blankly at the announcement that played again.

Postponing the seminar and holding a press conference all of a sudden?

“Let’s watch it this way.”

Sena suggested they watch the YouTube livestream instead, and connected her phone to the TV.

She casually pulled up the official channel’s livestream.

Soon, the Esper Director appeared on screen with a grim expression and gave a formal greeting.

Jiho, Sena, and Geonwoo all held their breath, fixated on the screen.

The Esper Director’s briefing was simple.

It wasn’t much different from the speech given by the head of the World Esper Organization.

He named the phenomenon a “dual dungeon” and explained the definition and dangers of such dungeons.

There was no mention of a final dungeon, perhaps to avoid mass panic or rioting.

Still, the announcement of dual dungeons alone caused a stir at the venue.

Though the content matched the earlier global speech, reporters bombarded the director with questions.

“What do you think causes dual dungeons?”

“Is there no way to identify a dual dungeon before entering?”

“What’s your take on the current surge of simultaneous dual dungeons?”

“No official casualties from dual dungeons have been disclosed yet! There are rumors the Korean Center is suppressing the information, what’s your response to that?”

The reporters’ questions tangled together chaotically. The Esper Director calmed the crowd and answered each question sincerely.

He began by saying the cause of dual dungeons remained unknown, that there was no method yet to detect them beforehand, shared his brief thoughts on the current situation, and promised to release damage reports as soon as possible.

“…Jiho, you said you had memories from your past life, right?”

Geonwoo spoke up while watching. Sena followed with a question.

“Did this kind of thing happen before too? All these double dungeons bursting out at once? Even if events are happening earlier this time, this feels way too sudden.”

“N-no. This didn’t happen before.”

Jiho shook his head. He was just as confused.

In fact, Jiho had no memory of events after the Jeju dungeon that Dojin entered.

Thanks to the nightmares caused by the dream demon, he’d regained a few major memories, but even those were fragmented, and he couldn’t remember anything in detail.

Even if his memory had been perfectly intact, Jiho had lost his guiding ability at the time and was living outside the Center, so he wouldn’t have known the specifics anyway.

He was about to open his mouth to explain when—

Vmmmm—

A deep rumble suddenly echoed.

At first, they thought it was a phone vibrating and checked their devices.

But it wasn’t anyone’s phone. The floor was vibrating continuously.

Ripples formed on the surface of the water in a cup sitting on the table.

That’s when the three of them realized, the building itself was shaking.

“What the-? An earthquake? Now of all times?”

Sena grimaced and rose unsteadily from her seat.

At that moment, a deafening boom hit the air.

BOOM—!

An explosion roared from outside, and the windows shattered. A wave of hot air surged into the room.

“Jiho! Sena!”

Geonwoo, who had been sitting relatively close to the windows, grabbed Jiho and shielded him in his arms, then threw himself over Sena, who had fallen to the floor.

Several more explosions followed, then silence.

BEEEEEEP—

A high-pitched ringing filled their ears.

Once the world around him went quiet, Geonwoo finally released Jiho and Sena.

“Are you okay? Are you both all right?”

“Ugh… yeah…”

“Ahh, my head…”

He checked their condition, then approached the window.

Through the haze of smoke and black dust, he saw that the bridge connecting the Esper Wing and the Guide Wing had been destroyed.