Chapter 291

“Damn it.”

Rachel’s husband, Garrett, had died four years ago, struck by a truck whose driver had failed to look ahead while he was crossing the road.

Anna folded her arms and tilted her head. Was it really a coincidence that the break-in happened during the same period when Rachel could barely function after her husband’s death? What if the thief had not been after the expensive car, but had come specifically to steal the drainage tunnel blueprints her uncle possessed?

But that seemed like too much of a leap. Her uncle had only had a copy. He certainly wasn’t the only one who had kept the schematics while working on-site. Even so, Anna could not dismiss the suspicion.

“Is there any way to get another copy of the blueprints? Maybe your uncle’s coworkers still have one stored somewhere.”

“It’ll be hard to get the same version. I heard the schematics were revised halfway through. And since the Deep Drainage Tunnel is infrastructure, the documents are classified under federal rules, so they aren’t provided to regular workers. The copy my uncle had was something he secretly duplicated behind his supervisor’s back.”

It was discouraging, but not reason enough to give up. Even without blueprints, they could push through physically. If they opened a manhole and descended through a stormwater pipe, the enormous underground drainage system running beneath the city would eventually appear.

A sudden fear struck Anna, like being swallowed into the belly of some colossal creature. Saying it was easy; she couldn’t imagine actually going down there. She asked, just in case:

“Did your uncle ever say anything to you about the schematics?”

“Garrett? To me?”

“Yes.”

“I told you before, I think. He said the city didn’t finish construction in the southern districts because of budget issues. It’s cheaper to deal with flood damage than to build the system. That’s why the lower neighborhoods flood every time the river rises.”

“So what you’re saying is, the plans exist, but some parts were never actually built?”

“I guess so. But that happens all the time, doesn’t it?”

Rachel muttered endlessly about selfish rich people. Anna, who herself benefited from the drainage system, pretended to listen while picturing the underground spaces. Dozens of meters beneath the Nathan River—an enormous hollow space like the stomach of a creature.

What if secret construction had taken place in the sections that existed only on paper? What if Rachel’s husband had seen something he wasn’t supposed to see? What if he had been silenced because of it? Once the suspicion surfaced, everything felt unnatural.

“The section that exists only in the schematics seems suspicious.”

“Why? Do you think Hybris is hiding there?”

Hearing the word Hybris from Rachel’s mouth made Anna shiver. She felt she would not have been more shocked if Rachel had confessed love to her in Elvish. In that moment, she realized that she had still been treating the tragedy Hybris had brought into her life as though it were some unreal scenario.

It wasn’t a scenario. People were disappearing. It was merciless reality.

Anna answered with a face free of doubt.

“The evidence is weak, but my intuition is telling me so.”

“Yes, yes! Intuition! That matters so much.”

Rachel nodded vigorously, sincerely agreeing with what should have sounded absurd. Her earnest agreement embarrassed Anna; it rekindled a small flame of courage within her. Irritated at that, Anna muttered:

“So what. We still don’t have the blueprints.”

“Huh? So what? We just go look at them.”

Anna’s face twisted.

“Are you joking? You said we can’t get them.”

“There are public agencies. Who knows? Maybe there’s something useful there.”

It was a surprisingly plausible suggestion. When Anna picked up her car keys from the table, Rachel jumped up and ran to the kitchen.

“Just need to grab this! Start the car!”

Anna started the engine and waited at the curb. Soon Rachel locked the door and hurried out, carrying a square ceramic baking dish with a lid. Once inside, she carefully set it on the dashboard and fastened her seat belt.

“I wasn’t working today, so since you were coming, I baked a pie.”

Anna stared.

“Rachel, we’re not going on a picnic.”

“I didn’t eat breakfast. And you need something sweet when you’re thinking. We’ll eat in the car later.”

“You seem really excited.”

“What? No! I’m not.”

Rachel, flustered, hid her smile and tied her frizzy red curls back.

“Let’s go to Baggers City Hall first. We can submit a viewing request at the Public Works Department.”

No matter how she tried to hide it, excitement crackled beneath her expression like popping candy. Anna suddenly realized that a woman obsessed with mysteries would never pass up a moment like this. She looked like someone who had spent her whole life waiting for the moment she would become the witness and solver of a special case.

Anna glanced at Rachel’s profile and compared their lives. At least Anna was an outsider by choice. Rachel was someone who wanted to belong but never did. They were not the same.

Anna was grateful for Rachel’s help, but her enthusiasm made Anna feel as though she were indulging a lonely person.

Ugh, at this rate we’re going to end up forming a real friendship.

Anna grumbled inwardly and shifted gears. Sunlight flared across the windshield, white and blinding. She sighed and pulled the car onto the road.

“Damn it. I don’t even know anymore.”

October in Helso remained hot, summer heat lingering. Palm shadows stretched across the Baggers University campus, students moving with books and tablets in hand.

Baekgyeong paused. He had never visited a university before. He had passed both middle and high school through equivalency exams. This bright, bustling campus felt like a world he had never lived in—a different planet. If not for the dead twin in his mind, this might have been his life.

Like Baek Sang—he flinched, realizing how long he had avoided thinking of his brother—if he had been born healthy, he would have graduated and joined the Vile Group. With his temperament, he would have been an incompetent, selfish bastard who stole credit from subordinates and lived a dull, comfortable life while draining others dry.

But Baekgyeong did not regret the life he had not lived. He had become a ruthless killer by accident, dragged to the brink of death again and again, but not once had he resented it. Because it brought him to Yoon Siron.

Whatever happens, I will find him.

He walked toward the Institute for Large Mammal Conservation.

Baggers University was a state-established research university. As he moved south toward the industry-cooperation district, the number of older researchers and graduate students increased.

The Institute for Large Mammal Conservation stood out among red-brick buildings. Smooth white concrete walls. Tinted windows reflecting the southern sun like mirrors.

He stepped through the automatic doors into the lobby. A refrigerated chill enveloped him. A wide screen showed endangered megafauna—elephants, giraffes, hippos, marine mammals. Then the image changed to a woolly mammoth covered in coarse brown hair.

“Aren’t mammoths extinct?”

Before the question could linger, the image changed to a rhinoceros.

There was no receptionist. Entry required a pass, but a touchscreen kiosk allowed department calls. He called the Elephant Conservation Lab.

After some waiting, the glass door opened, and a woman in her mid-forties of East Asian descent stepped out, hesitant.

“Are you Andy LeClair?”

She barely reached his shoulder and looked up at him with suspicion.

Baekgyeong thought of the pitiful Prisoner 3547 trapped in Stone Creek and nodded.

“Yes.”

“You’re really a science journalist from The New York Times, correct?”

“Yes. I’m Andy LeClair, journalist with The New York Times.”

She looked him over—black cap, horn-rimmed glasses, black hoodie—and her face tightened with unease.

“Are you really LeClair?”

Baekgyeong raised his chin slightly, casual and dismissive.

“Yes. If the surname is why you’re asking... I’m adopted.”

The woman’s face flushed with embarrassment.

“Oh—I didn’t mean to imply anything. This way.”

She led him from the glass-walled lobby into the interior corridor of the institute.