Dispatches from the Graduate School of Ghost Stories - Chapter 33

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Urban Legends and Graduate School Presents (33)
Resignation Vlog (2)
According to the guidebook, during overtime hours, security guards circulate through the interior to monitor the staff.
Which meant the outside of the building was safe!
He ran in a circle around the building, pouring Commercial Soybean Oil in a continuous line. So Hui-yeong had prepared a full fifteen bottles, so there was no danger of running out. He could only marvel at his senior’s foresight.
At this point, Yu Jong-hwa had begun to doubt his own sanity. Even if the company burned to the ground today, the intern ghost would never quit. Once he escaped, DNA Logistics would revert to its original state as an Urban Legend Phenomenon. Still, if the ghost felt happiness right now and let him go, Yu Jong-hwa could be happy too.
He ignited the oil with a Flame Thrower and asked.
“Still not satisfied?”
He rotated the Selfie Stick so that his Smartphone faced him.
The expression of the man visible on the screen seemed off somehow. He was clearly growing tired of Yu Jong-hwa—exactly what Yu Jong-hwa wanted to see.
At his part-time job, at work—he’d never been particularly good at anything.
But his sister once told him that people were kinder than you’d think; as long as they could see that you were giving your all, they’d generally let things slide. Whether out of pity, or because they thought you were a hopeless case.
It was unfair, but his sister was usually right. Yu Jong-hwa had gotten through every aspect of social life by doing his absolute best and muddling through well enough.
[…, …….]
“I’m really doing my best. You can see that, can’t you? Park Min-gu, if you keep getting angry and chasing me like this, it’s going to be a problem. I’m struggling to survive too. Everyone in Korea is struggling, you know?”
The ghost in the drawing didn’t answer, but Yu Jong-hwa sensed that it wouldn’t linger much longer before being persuaded.
“Just a moment. It’ll take some time for the fire to reach the upper floors.”
Fortunately, the windows on the third floor were open.
Yu Jong-hwa pulled several bottles of Ritual Rice Wine from his backpack, uncapped them, and poured the liquid onto the floor.
Watching the alcohol pour away, he wrestled with the thought. This stuff wasn’t cheap.
Yu Jong-hwa recalled Kim Jong-mal’s advice once more.
Survival is about momentum!
Since he was going to cause trouble anyway, he might as well show what a truly awful person he was. Make sure this intern couldn’t even be presented to the Chairman as a successor!
Instead of pouring the expensive liquor onto the floor, he poured it into his own stomach.
“Actually, I’ve never made a Molotov Cocktail before. If you asked my seniors, they’d know, but we don’t have cell reception here? Let me just try making a bunch of them!”
The man drawn in the graffiti, whose face had been pressed large against the screen, now seemed somehow more distant. Was he running away?
Yu Jong-hwa examined the drawing through eyes growing faintly dizzy with alcohol.
The dead intern ghost was slowly closing the office door in the picture.
“Park Min-gu. Don’t worry—I’ll make sure to destroy the company for you.”
He tore open packages of Sterile Gauze frantically.
The bottles of ritual alcohol were bigger than soju bottles and looked better. He stuffed the cloth into a bottle, filled it with oil, and set it alight.
Crude as it was, the flames burned beautifully. Today was definitely his lucky day.
He called out the ghost’s name affectionately and hurled the completed Molotov Cocktail through the window on the third floor.
<>
His Smartphone had now gone completely silent, but instead, a loud announcement echoing from somewhere was calling out his false name.
Yu Jong-hwa thought: Where was the Chairman’s Office?
No one had bothered to explain the company structure to him!
“Where is it located?! I don’t know! I’m not going! I’m quitting today!!”
Matching the volume of the announcement, he bellowed at the top of his lungs before hurling Molotov Cocktails through every open window.
The office that had made him feel isolated all day long was burning brightly, collapsing in on itself.
“See? Want me to do more? Do you like fireworks?”
Yu Jong-hwa swept the Selfie Stick, filming the building blackening as it burned.
His hand was already gripping a set of Fireworks Sticks. When he’d rummaged around looking for alcohol, he’d pulled out a handful of the Fireworks Sticks So Hui-yeong had tucked away.
Fireworks were beautiful—the ghost would surely appreciate them.
The cheap sparklers ignited, and bright colored sparks shot up into the sky.
“…….”
He looked at the screen.
By now his Smartphone display had changed to an ordinary wallpaper. Even the trace of those bizarre messages had been completely erased.
His efforts had satisfied the intern, who seemed to have achieved Attainment of Buddhahood. He felt a small sense of pride.
“Find somewhere good for your next job.”
Tap, tap……. The Urban Legend Phenomenon, which had held onto cool autumn air, was now spending a warm night bathed in raging flames.
Yu Jong-hwa separated his Smartphone from the Selfie Stick, carefully organized it and the oil bottles he was holding into a small Backpack.
<>
What was coming? The moment he heard the announcement, the righteous fury and courage that had been boiling over moments before drained completely away.
The strongest person in this Urban Legend Phenomenon would come directly. Nothing compared to the monster that had been in the Warehouse.
He felt a piercing gaze and looked up.
The collapsing company building was packed with people.
Without fearing the devouring flames, they crowded against the windows to witness the final reckoning of the human who had destroyed their precious workplace.
Until now, they must have been monitoring and evaluating every move the new employee made.
<>
Smoke engulfed the sky as the building began to crumble, collapsing from the ceiling downward.
The speaker emitted a piercing dissonance, as though suffering a mechanical malfunction.
Yu Jong-hwa spun around and ran.
‘Grab the goods and get out. Easy as that.’
‘Keep track of the last train time. Get out fast. Understood?’
The faces of his seniors kept echoing in his mind—all the warnings they’d given him before he entered this place.
Ju Ho in particular had looked unusually worried, and it occurred to him that perhaps she too had once attempted a physical solution and paid the price for her mistake.
Though surely her mistake had never reached the scale of his own.
Wheeeee—
He heard the shrill wail of a whistle splitting the air.
Beams from bright flashlights swept across him. At least five security guards were closing in behind him.
Eight. For you researchers newly hired at DNA Logistics, corporate associates, or uninvited guests—your objective is the theft of parcels, yes?
The journey from company entry varies for everyone, so I’ll assume you’ve managed adequately along the way~.
The escape route is the same for all, so if you follow carefully from here, you’ll be home stretching your legs in bed!
First, we must board the subway at Tonggo Station. And only the Line 6 can take you home.
Did you find it strange that Line 6 of the subway runs through Gangwon Province?
Tonggo Station actually has as many as ten lines running through it! But only Line 6 heads to Seoul—take any other train and where you’ll end up… well, I haven’t the faintest idea! I lack such curiosity!
Ah, but you see, DNA Logistics isn’t exactly located in a well-connected area, is it? So I do hope you’ll steal your goods early and make it back before the last train departs~.
The distance from DNA Logistics to Tonggo Station was considerable.
According to his seniors’ experience, based on a person’s running pace, it would take roughly an hour.
And the person they’d used as their baseline was Ju Ho.
Current time: 20:30.
Last departure of the Seoul-bound Line 6 from Tonggo Station: 22:02.
Even in an Urban Legend Phenomenon, quitting one’s job proved difficult.
He threw off his damp outer garment and began to sprint. Within moments, he realized his accumulated injuries left him in worse condition than he’d hoped. Under normal circumstances, he’d have made it easily, but now he wasn’t certain he could even reach Tonggo Station. And he still had to shake the security guards chasing him.
On top of everything else, he had guards bearing down on him with terrifying speed.
At this rate, there was a very real possibility that Yu Jong-hwa would be documented at the top of the DNA Logistics exploration report as a textbook example of “what never to do.”
“Isn’t this manageable?! Surely we’ve exerted ourselves sufficiently!”
Yu Jong-hwa gasped, demanding whether he hadn’t earned his wage from the workers, his breathing ragged.
No answer came in return—only the relentless pounding of pursuit.
Yu Jong-hwa pulled salt from his backpack and flung it at the guards, but nothing happened. They simply swung their flashlights back and forth, maintaining their steady pace without exerting full effort.
This calm unsettled him far more.
They were clearly creatures beyond human limitation, yet they didn’t push themselves—instead maintaining a razor-thin distance, as though waiting for their prey to exhaust itself entirely.
The creature in the warehouse too had clearly refrained from delivering a fatal blow until he’d burned it. Could the Chairman have ordered him brought back alive?
“Senior! Please! If only you’d packed a bicycle!”
Yu Jong-hwa prayed fervently while desperately rummaging through his backpack.
A backpack this size could certainly hold a bicycle, yet lacking any emergency transport seemed absurd.
Though he hadn’t known So Hui-yeong long, he trusted her preparedness.
“There it is!”
His hand closed around something weighty. Yu Jong-hwa widened the backpack’s mouth to examine it.
The electric kickboards causing so much trouble lately—or rather, something easier to store and transport: a single-wheel electric skateboard.
Though his experience riding one amounted to a single attempt, it was infinitely better than nothing.
To retrieve his ride, Yu Jong-hwa cut a sharp turn and threw himself down a side path.
Banana, thumbtack, hammer, saw, sack of salt.
Scattering every obstacle he could find to buy himself time, he finally extracted the electric skateboard from his backpack, set it on the ground, and powered it on.
“Is it illegal without a helmet?”
Survive first, worry later. He’d already committed arson—a traffic violation was the least of his concerns.
Having temporarily shed his mask of model citizen, Yu Jong-hwa barely maintained balance as he rode the single-wheel skateboard forward.
Though his ride was wobbly and ungainly, it was far faster than running.
His necktie fluttered in the cool autumn night breeze.
Yu Jong-hwa had finally found freedom.
The guards’ voices had faded from earshot. In the distance, a brightly lit building came into view. He’d reached the subway station!
With escape within reach, he pushed his speed higher and drove straight toward his nearly-achieved destination.
His phone rang incessantly in his pocket, but he wouldn’t answer now.
His seniors? His family? Within an Urban Legend Phenomenon, calls wouldn’t connect anyway. Once he left this place, he’d call them at once to say how much he’d missed them.
Yu Jong-hwa kept his eyes fixed only on the subway station as he rode hard.
And then he arrived at an old iron door.
“Wh—?”
The skateboard slowed to a stop.
Beyond the door lay the same ordinary corporate landscape as on his first day—the words “DNA Logistics Gangwon Headquarters” glowed clearly on the office building.
The vast Warehouse, too, showed no trace of the Flame Thrower’s work.
His phone was still ringing in his pocket.
Though he’d never saved the number, his Smartphone displayed the caller’s name on the screen.

He pressed the power button hard, trying desperately to shut the device down, but it was no use.
Yu Jong-hwa’s trembling hands, slick with cold sweat, brought the phone to his ear.
“Intern Kim Jong-mal. Come up to the Chairman’s Office.”
“I—I was going to resign—”
“You know well enough that our company is busy.”
Beep-beep.
The ringing sound that had echoed through the Office all afternoon continued to ring in his skull throughout the call.
The voice hanging up with a sigh carried a reproach that made it sound as though everything was his fault.
He was Kim Jong-mal, an Intern who had joined DNA Logistics.
And Kim Jong-mal thought to himself:
Just as the Chairman had said, all the damage that occurred today was his doing.
His head throbbed. What time was it now? There wouldn’t be any chance to leave work? What had he been thinking?
Kim Jong-mal understood the Chairman’s anger. Wasn’t it a fact everyone in the transport industry knew well? He, too, was unmistakably part of the company, and he felt its workload keenly in his bones.
The fact that the Chairman had politely suggested he visit the Office, despite the serious damage he’d caused to company operations, only proved she was a good person!
His mind cleared as if he’d been splashed with cold water.
He straightened his disheveled clothes and stepped into the office building.
Even if he was an Intern coming for the first time today, he was an employee of DNA Logistics. He knew the company structure well enough.
Kim Jong-mal slowly found the elevator near the entrance and pressed the button for the fifth floor.
The fifth floor held only the Chairman’s Office.
The Chairman was so busy that she rarely visited the company, but she handled important work and needed an independent space.
To summon a junior Intern to this place—just how much damage had he caused?
He was more afraid of having become the company’s problem than of meeting the Chairman herself.
Knock, knock.
He rapped timidly on the heavy wooden door to announce his arrival.
“Come in.”
A crisp voice granted him entry, and Kim Jong-mal stepped into the spacious Office.
A woman in a white formal suit with a Black Coat draped over it sat in a large chair, fixing him with an expressionless stare.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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