I thought that if I looked in the mirror now, I would see a very dazed face.
That was only natural.
I was tensely investigating the unidentified presence, but… it turned out to be a fan.
It was a scene that could only leave one deflated.
Even if this was the object known as the Singularity.
But it’s just a fan, right?
Truly, what could be the identity of the thing lingering here in this abandoned place, creating such eerie phenomena?
Could there possibly be another Singularity here?
With that thought in mind, a fan appeared.
It’s not just me—anyone would have been deflated seeing that.
…Our friends, who had never seen a fan before, seemed fascinated by the one spinning all by itself and slowly approached to tentatively prod it.
Even so, it didn’t feel right to be so casually touching something assumed to be the Singularity.
Even though I was quite deflated.
I pulled Daesik and Jungsik, who were poking at the fan, back.
Not out of anger, but for their safety.
Of course.
Even while thinking that, my mind was wandering with the thought that what could a fan possibly do?
As I felt absurd, gazing at the fan spinning on its second speed setting, a story I had once heard vaguely resurfaced.
‘Koreans believe a superstition that leaving a fan on in a closed room overnight can be fatal, so if you’re sharing a room with a KATUSA soldier, be especially considerate and mindful.’
Apparently, this was written in the manual for US troops deployed to Korea.
Looking it up later, I found that such a manual really did exist.
Of course, it was labeled as a superstition… so it was more like a kind, considerate measure.
I also clearly remembered hearing such tales from an elder in the past.
It seemed that if you close the door and leave the fan on, the air disappears, and you can’t breathe, eventually dying.
I knew it was a baseless tale.
After all, before I became a jelly, the number of times I had slept with the door closed and the fan on was countless, if I had to count.
Had I really died, I wouldn’t have become this jelly now, would I?
But…
What if the fan in front of me actually manifested this superstition?
It’s truly an absurd tale, but after seeing my own existence, the flying whales, the rampant proliferation of canned goods, and more… Disbelieving these would be foolish…
…It would be stupid, wouldn’t it?
And since I’m smart, I naturally believe.
So is this fan something that eliminates air in spaces it perceives as sealed…?
To be honest, I could make some vague guesses, but I’m honestly not sure exactly what’s going on here.
…Isn’t that Han Seori’s job, figuring this out?
Anyway.
Other than that, it seemed like there was no other function, so without hesitation, I pressed the button.
The stop button.
To think that this facility was abandoned just because pressing one button would suffice.
Hmm… Since there are buttons in the world that launch nuclear missiles, this might indeed be trivial compared to that.
As I pressed the button, I heard a ‘click,’ and…
Whirring… the fan, which had been spinning, blew its last gust of wind and…
With a faint ‘pik’ sound…
It stopped.
It was quite an anticlimactic finale.
In any case…
Why doesn’t this thing have a cord?
If this could generate wind-powered electricity, wouldn’t it produce infinite power?
Though it probably wouldn’t be sufficient.
While idly thinking such thoughts, I picked up the now stationary fan.
Thinking that it must be over, I returned to where I had entered.
Having placed the stationary fan there, I collapsed on the floor, waiting for the door to open.
But the door did not open this time either.
Isn’t it too soon?
As I tilted my head in confusion, I remembered how the knowledge pouch had been twitching about earlier.
…Could it be?
Was there more than one fan?
Being accustomed to the building’s strange occurrences by now made it difficult to determine if they had indeed ceased.
Upon reflection, my body was still bouncing around, so it seemed the abnormal phenomena hadn’t ended yet.
Yeah… It wouldn’t be that simple.
The wobbly jelly that was me glanced around and approached Sosik.
I placed him beside the fan, pointed at my eyes and then toward the fan.
Meaning that he should always keep watch on it.
Seeing my gesture, Sosik halfheartedly nodded and flopped down right next to the fan.
…Hey, you were supposed to watch it, not fall asleep!
Oh.
If lying down helps him observe it as well as I would…
Still, watching him sprawled out like that gave me a strange sense of unease.
As if I were seeing a fresh recruit who had just been assigned to sentinel duty, already nodding off at the post.
…Not that I had any easy way to discipline him, so I just let it go.
I didn’t feel like wasting energy on something so trivial.
Shaking my head, I left Sosik and the fan behind to search for the next fan.
With the cheat key that was the vent, a locked door posed no obstacle to me.
The fan’s location was indicated by the knowledge pouch, so the job proceeded relatively smoothly.
Whenever I encountered a closed door, I simply entered via the vent.
Each time, as if by fate, there was an emergency opening device, so the number of opened doors gradually increased, and…
…proportionally, the number of fans also grew.
The facility I entered was wider than expected, so despite the smooth progress, it still took quite a while.
Its vastness was partly due to my small size.
How many fans had I moved by now?
I eventually placed fans at the entrance.
They gathered in such numbers that I could kick one with every step.
Looking at them all like this, I feel as if I’ve walked into a secondhand shop.
Their appearances were all over the place, making it feel like I’d stumbled into a bazaaar.
About that time, a slight unease began to creep in.
What if I gather all these only for the door to open, and all the fans suddenly turn on at once?
Although my body had bubbled after the door closed, so perhaps it wouldn’t matter much…
…But you never know, right?
If the people who trusted me and came down here—Han Seori and Kim Cheon-soo—had to go through the same ordeal I initially experienced…
Urgh.
That didn’t sit right with me.
I didn’t like that.
As I felt uneasy, I quickly thought of a solution, proving that I was probably a bit smarter.
If the problem was that they were working…
Then all I had to do was stop them from working, right?
Since it seemed that these fans, which were running on their own contrary to everywhere else having power, had to be stopped…
…There was only one way.
I called Daesik and Sosik.
Daesik toddled over and Sosik lingered at my gestures.
Sitting down the two jellies, I demonstrated how to dismantle a fan right in front of them.
I removed the front part, twisted the assembly to detach the blades, and showed how to take them apart.
If you reassemble the front cover…
…you’ll end up with a fan body that can’t spin anymore and only the blades remain.
After showing them this, I pointed at the fans in front of the two and waited.
Daesik enthusiastically extended his stuffed animal fists forward, eager to help, while Sosik predictably showed his distaste.
What a picky one, that Sosik.
Jin can’t help even if he wants to because he’s a whale.
Will you ever understand the sorrow of wanting to work but not being able to?
…Anyway.
With decisive gestures indicating the necessity of dismantling the fans, Sosik reluctantly shuffled over and began dismantling the fans.
Though he used his tentacles instead of hands, he was still doing the work, so I let it slide.
The two jellies must be as smart as me—they dismantled the fans quite well after seeing it done once.
Feeling satisfied, leaving behind my fan disassembly factory, I floated along with Jung-sik to gather the remaining fans.
By now, I had the building’s structure memorized.
I started to consider that I might soon be done collecting these fans.
Although the feeling of adventure was long gone, I still found it somewhat satisfying.
After all, the sensation of solving something bizarre remained.
Even though the answers were practically handed to me in this treasure hunt.
…Thinking about the time wasted finding these fans made me feel a little disturbed.
If I were just a little taller, perhaps the size of an average woman, it would have been easier, but this facility was overwhelmingly large for me in my tiny, smart form.
In the midst of coming and going between the entrance and the inside…
Finally, a fan that gave off a very last fan vibe appeared.
It was stuck deeply inside, so this had to be the last one.
If this isn’t…
…Forget it.
Why don’t we use someplace else next time?
While grumbling under my breath where no one could hear, I switched off the whirring fan.
With a ‘tick’ sound, as the fan stopped running…
Clang! Crunch! Screech!
Strange noises began to echo throughout the building.
