episode_0019

They were handcuffed and dragged into a black sedan. I felt like if I resisted, I would be knocked out, so I just followed along.

“No, what did I do-”

“Be quiet you little shit!”

Bam!

Fucking hit the back of the head. Maybe it’s because I’m used to the police stations of the world, but I can’t predict what these guys will do.

When we arrived at the gloomy building, we were taken out of the car and dragged somewhere. Is this the secret police station? It was scary enough to make me laugh.

As I entered the building and walked along the crazy-looking interior, which was all gray, I was soon seated in a chair.

“Come on, you’re going to be flustered if you’re suddenly dragged in. Right? You don’t know where this is, so you’re going to be scared, right?”

Heek heek heek

A grim-looking old man sits across the table. He speaks softly, but the orange lamp flickers slightly, filling the otherwise gray space with color and creating a strangely gloomy atmosphere.

“But if that’s the case, you shouldn’t have made something like that, Lee Seo. It’s so big that it even appeared on TV?”

What the hell did I do? Is making a rhythm game worth getting dragged into this?

“How can you already be expressing Soviet music and architecture when it’s only been a short time since the collapse of the Soviet Union? I really don’t understand. They keep on broadcasting propaganda about arresting the Chongryonghyup guys, but you’re ignoring that and trying to praise communism again? ”

Oh shit, it was because of Tetris.

“Can I defend you?”

“Will it work? Just listen, man.”

Oh, I’m really frustrated. I’m going to lose my mind.

“I can understand it. Parents are dead, there are no relatives, it’s easy to go astray. But why is it an anti-government movement? No matter how much the communists are said to spontaneously emerge from the fields, this is not right.”

No, I’ve never done anything like that.

“Is it okay to drive people out like this without any evidence?”

“Evidence? Oh, wait.”

Then the man started to rummage through the files next to him and took out the papers one by one.

“This is the information I received as a request for cooperation from KUST. I created a temporary club, and two of its members have already been arrested. One of them even wrote a statement with me.”

When I get out of here, I’m going to ask the school to fix the 10-person limit. The problem is that I brought along people I didn’t know well and who didn’t even go to school.

“And… as a special note, he disappears every vacation… I’ve confirmed that he doesn’t even use PC communication, but his internet and electricity bills are continuously overcharged… Why don’t you just say outright that he’s communicating with North Korea?”

No, I’m just a hikikomori. The fees are there because I have to do a lot of things like server communication, email, checking Sound Live, Digital Inside, etc.

“No, if you want to communicate with North Korea, why don’t you use shortwave radio instead of the Internet? Our country’s Internet is relayed by Korea Telecom, but does Korea Telecom also relay communications with North Korea? Then isn’t Korea Telecom a spy den that has colluded with North Korea?”

“This is what was written in the data requested from Korea Telecom. Random numbers of a certain length that cannot be decrypted are sent intermittently.”

Ah. I’m talking about the encrypted data when you log in. That data. It can’t be decrypted because it uses a hash.

“Please ask Korea Telecom again. Where is the destination of the packet containing the random number? It is probably KIN Computer Cafe. It is the building right next to the arcade that was the subject of the TV debate I went to last time. I have never talked to North Korea or any communist group.”

But I couldn’t just sit there and do nothing, so I explained as best I could. I also continued to say that if I made a request to Korea Telecom, it would be confirmed.

“… Manager Park. Just make the request.”

Eventually, the detective got tired of my story and gave up. As expected, there’s nothing better than repeating the same story over and over again to make people feel worse.

“It’s way past mealtime. Stay. I’ll make you some rice.”

As we talked for a long time, I didn’t even realize how much time had passed. Then, food arrived…

“Seollongtang?”

“You don’t want to eat it? Then take it back.”

“Oh, no. That’s not it… Are you sure that while you’re eating, he suddenly grabs the back of your head and makes you poke his nose? ”

“How old is this kid that he’s talking about years ago?”

That’s what happened. As expected, Korungtang was the information ‘creation’ technology of the National Intelligence Service, which boasts a long history.

The food was quite delicious. I was hungry because I came in the morning and skipped lunch, so it couldn’t have been bad.

In the end, the investigation continued through the night. The investigator suspected that I had undergone spy training, seeing as I stayed up all night just drinking a cup of coffee.

Actually, I couldn’t understand this either, so I couldn’t help but say I didn’t know.

And the next morning, several documents arrived in front of the investigator.

“Requested data from Korea Telecom… It’s already here.”

The investigator was kind enough to read it out loud.

“The most common one is K… What do you read this? Anyway, it’s an internet cafe… The second most common one is a house in Seoul… What is this? Is this the house of Kim that I left the day before yesterday? What’s your relationship with this guy?”

It’s Kim Moo-sik at a glance. I thought I hadn’t seen him lately, but he was here. By the way, he didn’t look like someone who would be active in the student movement.

“… What happened to that person?”

“I got out safely due to lack of calling. Oops, I shouldn’t say that.”

The investigator must be mentally unstable due to the aftereffects of staying up all night.

“I’ll be going out to listen soon anyway, so let’s hurry up and count it down. Please keep reading.”

“Are you saying it as if leaving is a certainty?”

Well, that’s confirmed.

“The third is the British National Research Institute… The fourth is Curst. The rest are all Korean. Hmm…”

“Look at that. I didn’t do anything weird.”

Eventually, the investigation was concluded due to lack of evidence and he was released. He was forced to sign a confidentiality agreement, so he can’t say anything openly about it.

It hasn’t even been 24 hours since I was arrested, but I feel like I’ve been locked in solitary confinement for a week. Is it because my stamina has been declining lately?

In order to leave, you need someone else’s stamp or signature on your new recruit ID, but luckily Eun-ji, who was working at home, answered the phone and signed it for you.

When I went out, Eunji and all the members were there to greet me.

“Oh my gosh, his face is half gone!”

“This is the first time I’ve seen her with such dark circles under her eyes.”

… It’s not that hard. I’ve always had dark circles.

More than those things, I feel like the tension is being released without a trace. To be honest, I was so nervous that I thought I might actually drink water through my nose if I did something wrong, so I kept my body tense all day.

“Let’s go back first. I want to go home and take a nap.”

“Oh my, these guys from the National Intelligence Service have finally ruined this book! There’s no way that this book would say it wants to sleep!”

“These days, the NIS spies are even using a soldering iron. Oh my.”

…Is this also my karma?

***

After that, I came home to a noisy atmosphere that I thought had nothing to do with me, and I took a nap, accepting that my lifestyle was ruined. In fact, my lifestyle was already ruined as much as it could be.

Let’s wake up. It’s 7pm. For some reason, Eunji is lying next to me. And she’s half naked.

“What? Did I have an accident?”

Unable to accept the sudden change in circumstances, a thousand thoughts passed through my mind.

After a while, I finally realized the situation and felt relieved. Then I had dinner with Eun-ji using the rice and side dishes from the refrigerator and went to work at the arcade.

The work was the same as usual: coding rhythm games, surfing the internet, writing private articles.

By the way, even though the air conditioner is on, the heat doesn’t go away. When will this crazy heat wave end? This is the first time in my life that I’ve prayed for a typhoon.

The topic of this column will be global warming. The conclusion will be that we should not pass the burden on to future generations.

Because it is so hot, the number of people coming to the arcade has decreased significantly. Even though the arcade was originally crowded and the air conditioner was turned on, it was still hot due to the radiant heat from human bodies, so how much worse must it be now.

I didn’t want to spend my vacation this miserable. There’s only a month left. Oh my god, this is happening.

There were a few days when I went to work at a PC room, but eventually I had to give in to the heat and stay home.

Of course, Yoo Ji-young and Kim Jeong-ah would often come to visit. Watching me draw or petting my stuffed animal became a great source of energy in my boring life. Eun-ji would look at me with a strange look every time.

During the vacation, Yu Ji-young’s drawing skills improved by leaps and bounds, to the point where she could produce illustrations that looked pretty good to my eyes, as long as the computer could handle it.

Of course not for me. The blue whale is still far away. Yoo Ji-young!

Since I had nothing to do, I started drawing graphs in Excel while reading the newspaper delivered every morning. I felt a strange sense of pleasure as the chart gradually became aligned. It’s not as fun as playing a game, though.

“Are you finally back?”

Eunji and other people treated me like I was crazy whenever they heard this.

“If you try it, it’s better than you think? Churaichurai”

Of course, it didn’t work. I didn’t think it would work in the first place. Even from my perspective, it was a bit strange.

The season when the Maillard reaction occurs in the brain.

It was summer.