Chapter 35 - The Taxpayer II

4

"Oh! You're Undertaker! I've been hearing about you everywhere. I'm sorry I didn't recognize you."

Once we exchanged names, Lee Juho's wariness melted away like snow in the blazing spring sun.

This was why you should do plenty of good deeds and spread your reputation far and wide. Why wouldn't you build a good name when it automatically gave you a +20% affection buff even with people you'd never met?

"Oh, there's nothing to apologize for. My reputation is all hot air. I'm grateful you think so highly of me."

"Hahaha. Our guild is pretty small, so we were on the second string during the Tenlegs raid—no, more like the third. All I ever did was see you from a distance. Ah, if it wouldn't be too much trouble, could you sign this for me...?"

"Oh, goodness. I'm not a celebrity. This is embarrassing."

Even as I said that, I obligingly pulled a brush pen from inside my clothes and popped off its cap. I didn't get as many requests for autographs as Dang Seorin, but I got enough to keep a brush pen on me.

Undertaker. I dashed off the three Chinese characters for my name in regular script.

Those strokes held the accumulated skill of a regressor's lifetime. I could feel Lee Juho's eyes widen the moment he saw my signature.

"Uh, wow. Your handwriting... You're an incredible calligrapher."

"Thank you. I practiced calligraphy like my life depended on it just for the pleasure of seeing that reaction."

"Pardon? Oh. Hahaha."

An experienced regressor learns specialized icebreakers for every type of person and personality.

In fact, there weren't many people on the Korean Peninsula I couldn't befriend if I put my mind to it. (Human garbage like Noh Doha, who approached the world with distrust, hatred, malice, and contempt, was admittedly an exception.)

In less than five minutes, Lee Juho and I had established a rapport.

"Oh, then... you came all this way specifically because you saw my post on SG Net?"

"That's right."

"Wow, this is so embarrassing..."

Sure enough, the anonymous member who had posted that firsthand account was Lee Juho.

Back when Sim Aryeon insulted his father—in run fifty, that is—he had used the handle JoinedToday on SG Net.

His very first post back then had included this:

-I used to post anonymously, but I signed up to write this.

In other words, in runs where Sim Aryeon didn't insult his father, Lee Juho continued posting anonymously.

"What's there to be embarrassed about? You're on your way to uncover the nature of a newly appeared anomaly. If you don't mind, I'd like to help you out."

"Of course I don't mind! Having you help would be like having an entire army at my back!"

Our friendly atmosphere lasted only until we reached the uphill road where the Pocheon Tax Office building stood tall.

"Hmm."

"Uh..."

I was the one who let out the dissatisfied "hmm," while Lee Juho supplied the bewildered "uh."

Let me say that again. The tax office building stood tall.

Yes. Spotless, as though the apocalypse had never happened.

[Thank You for Paying Your Taxes Faithfully - Pocheon Tax Office]

[May Is the Period for Finalizing and Filing Comprehensive Income Tax Returns. Filing and Payment Period: May 1–May 31]

[Faithful Tax Payment, Fair Taxation! A Tax-Filled Future Together]

The other buildings around it were practically ruins. The tax office alone had pristine gray exterior walls, with spotless banners fluttering at length above and below.

"Mr. Lee, was that building intact before?"

"Huh? No, it wasn't. There, uh, was a huge fire here not long ago. All the buildings collapsed then."

Lee Juho looked up at the building uneasily.

"Hah. I'm sure they did..."

"Then the building itself must be a void."

Perception alteration and forced changes to the surrounding environment. This was a fairly high-level void.

Was it because it had rained last night? The building's wet surface gleamed slickly like an insect's shell.

And then it happened.

"Uaaaargh!"

Someone tumbled out of the building.

Lee Juho and I instinctively drew our weapons, but the person didn't seem to have any attention to spare for the fact that we were armed.

"My foot! Aaaaagh! My foot! H-help me!"

Because he was missing his right leg.

Blood splattered everywhere as the man flopped down at the entrance.

Lee Juho frowned.

"Park Sanghyeon?"

"Someone you know, Juho?"

"Uh. Yes, well... He's not awakened, but he goes around this neighborhood like a thug, threatening the older residents. You don't need to remember him."

The very tone of Lee Juho's voice radiated his dislike for that sort of person.

"I'm surprised someone like that is still alive."

"He's the son of our former deputy guild leader, a man I looked up to who's passed away now. So our guild can't exactly pretend he doesn't exist..."

A father and son, huh.

"L-Lee Juho! Mr. Lee!"

The man must have noticed us, because he waved urgently. Hmm. Shanks had lost an arm, so this fellow was Lower-Body Shanks.

"Please save me!"

"Hah. What happened?"

"Th-the building appeared out of nowhere, so I went inside... This place is insane! Ugh, no, just save me first! I'm so dizzy right now..."

CLANK

A strange noise came from the building's entrance. The man called Park Sanghyeon flinched, his entire body stiffening.

"I-it's coming! Hey! Hurry! Hurry up and save me!"

The noise was metallic. If I had to put it into words, it was something like clanking and clicking.

The clank came from deep inside the tax office, from its duodenum beyond the opening of its mouth. It began drawing closer and closer.

"Wh-what are you doing? I said save me! Hey! Lee Juho! You think Mr. Donguk will let you get away with it if I die?!"

I glanced at Lee Juho.

"Are you sure you don't need to save him?"

"... He was a scumbag people in the guild complained about from time to time anyway. If an anomaly eats him, our guild won't lose face."

At last, the clanking reached the spot right behind Park Sanghyeon. Screaming, he crawled along on his belly as best he could.

But he hadn't gotten far when something caught his ankle.

"Aaaaaagh! Agh! No, I don't want to! Save me! Aaaaah, a—"

Park Sanghyeon's body slid straight back into the building's maw. It happened in an instant.

His screams carried down the corridor for a while, but not for long. Had about a minute passed? Everything fell silent.

"Do you still want to go in there?"

"Hmm..."

Lee Juho looked increasingly troubled.

But there was no need to agonize over it for long.

Shortly after the screams stopped, someone walked out of the tax office.

-Hello. Are you here to file your taxes?

"..."

"..."

There were several reasons we couldn't immediately answer that question.

First, anything that emerged from an obviously abnormal void building couldn't possibly be normal.

Second, the vaguely human-looking entity wore a neat suit like a civil servant at a reception desk, but for some reason was completely violating the hair regulations.

I'm not exaggerating: its disheveled hair hung down to its pelvis in front and back, hiding not just its face but its entire upper body. Its voice drifted sluggishly out from between those strands.

I couldn't simply write that off as a personal hairstyle preference. The Confucian old fogey inside me, a native of the Land of Courtesy in the East, shouted, "Insolence!"

Worse, it kept shaking its head from side to side, making that enormous mess of hair sway back and forth like a seesaw. Apparently civil servants these days listened to heavy metal during working hours.

Third—and this was the most important reason—this something-that-looked-like-a-civil-servant held a thirty-centimeter pair of scissors in its right hand.

CLANK CLANK CLANK

Those scissors were the source of the strange noise we'd been hearing. Sticky blood splattered whenever their blades moved.

It was undeniably a shocking sight.

Even if the "civil servant" standing before us enjoyed gardening in its spare time, I doubted bringing scissors to work was permissible under civil service regulations. Article 8-2 (Attire and Uniforms, etc.) of the Republic of Korea's Regulations on the Service of State Public Officials clearly stated: "① Public officials shall wear neat attire that maintains their dignity while on duty."

-Taxes.

The civil servant tilted its head. Its hair slid softly, releasing an unbearable reek of gasoline with every movement.

-Are you here to file them?

"Uh, um..."

"Yes."

I stepped in for the bewildered Lee Juho.

"We received a text about comprehensive income tax. It told us to go to Pocheon Tax Office, so we came. Is this the right place?"

-Yes. It is.

The civil servant's head snapped around to face me.

-This month is the filing period. May I see your resident registration card to verify your identity, taxpayer?

What should I do?

Drawing my sword and lopping off this anomaly's head would be simpler than wringing Tenlegs' neck. But "Anomaly Response Manual: Just Beat It Up First" only worked for awakened on my level.

Even I couldn't deal with every anomaly in the world at once.

A "strategy" only had real value if, as far as possible, everyone could use it for reference—even awakened far weaker than me. Especially for anomalies that appeared nationwide, like this comprehensive income tax anomaly.

"Juho, I think we should play along for now."

"... Oh. Yes. Here you are."

Lee Juho took his resident registration card out of a battered, worn-out Hermès leather wallet. He didn't seem like someone who favored luxury brands, so it was probably a keepsake from a deceased family member.

-Thank you. I'll take a moment to check your resident registration card.

The civil servant accepted the card and brought it into the gap in its hair.

A coarse grinding noise came from behind the hair, which hung shut like a curtain. Would nibbling a resident registration card with your front teeth make that sound?

"... Wait, my registration card..."

-Verification complete. Age twenty-six. Mr. Lee Juho. You're one of our Pocheon residents. Your income is very low. The taxes you must pay today, including body tax and slave tax, come to a grand total of one hundred grams.

"What? One hundred grams?"

Ah.

So it was this type of anomaly.

-We can process your tax payment for you. Would you like us to do that, Mr. Lee Juho?

"Well. Uh, I'm not sure what's going on, but..."

"Hold on. Wait."

I caught Lee Juho by the shoulder.

"Yes?"

"When anomalies offer you a deal, you can't just obediently nod along. You saw what happened to that Park Sanghyeon fellow, didn't you?"

"Huh? Oh, yes."

"That was probably tax collection."

"...?"

"It just said you owe one hundred grams in taxes. What do you think would happen if it were fifty kilograms?"

"...!"

Lee Juho's eyes widened.

"Uh, th-then... me too?"

"Yes. The taxes this comprehensive income tax anomaly talks about probably have to be paid with parts of the human body. A hundred grams might not sound like much, but which part those hundred grams come from makes a world of difference. What if it takes your eyeballs?"

"Gasp..."

"Believe it or not, I'm an anomaly expert. Leave this to me."

I took out a plastic bag and gathered aura around my fingers.

"And I should ask first... Juho, you don't particularly care about your hairstyle, do you?"

"... Sorry?"

A little later.

Lee Juho's already short hair had evolved into a barren mountain. The white plastic bag held the blackened evidence of that tragedy.

He despaired.

"Aaaaaah..."

"Hmm. This is still quite a bit short of a hundred grams. Take this and go pee in it for a moment."

"... So this is the kind of person you are, Undertaker."

Why? What? What use was embarrassment or anything like it when dealing with anomalies?

Anyway, Lee Juho put his heart and soul into completing a plastic bag containing one hundred grams.

The civil servant took the bag from him.

-Tax payment confirmed.

"..."

-We earnestly ask that you continue to pay your taxes faithfully. Thank you.

The civil servant bowed and went back into the tax office.

Lee Juho looked at me with an expression that said, That actually worked?

I gave him a warm smile.

'Actually, if urine or spit hadn't worked, I was going to cut off a few fingers from his non-dominant hand...'

Well, it worked, so wasn't that a happy ending?

5

There is an epilogue.

-Anonymous: This comprehensive income tax anomaly is a total fucking pushover lol

By the time I returned to Seoul, Lee Juho had already posted a sequel to his firsthand account on SG Net.

-Anonymous: Say you're there to file comprehensive income tax and some ghost with long-ass hair comes out and tells you to hand over your resident registration card. Just give it to the ghost and it'll calculate your taxes for you. No idea what happens if you've lost your card, though, yeah...

-Anonymous: Mine came out to 100 grams, so I shaved off all my hair on the spot, pissed in a plastic bag, and handed it over. Then this stupid ghost went away all happy lol

-Anonymous: The way I see it, don't ignore the comprehensive income tax notification. Just run to the tax office right now and ask how much you owe. If it's around 100 grams like mine, pay it right there. If it says something like 50 kg, keep collecting your piss in a big trash can until May 31. Should be an easy way to get past the anomaly, yeah...

-Anonymous: Anyway, don't chicken out. Everyone pay your taxes faithfully lol

"Hmm."

As I'd requested, his posts included a solid strategy for defeating the comprehensive income tax anomaly.

The other members couldn't contain their astonishment.

-Anonymous: Wait, you actually came back from this in one piece...?

After that, SG Net was flooded with firsthand accounts from people who'd paid their taxes at their own local tax offices and returned.

-Goryeojang: Got hit with 300 kg in taxes. Holy shit. Anyone get more than me?

-BookishGirl: 10 kg is average for SG Net, right?

-Anonymous: Fuck, it wants 500 kg in taxes. What do I do?

-[Contentment]CookingQueen: I got a tax refund this time. The civil servant gave me a box as a gift. What do you think is inside?

People even started a little competition over whose taxes weighed the most, calling it the Tax Challenge.

It could be considered an extremely rare case of an anomaly being reduced to a plaything.

In the end, we never discovered what criteria the comprehensive income tax anomaly used to assess taxes. And while it was rather absurd that we were now paying taxes to an anomaly instead of a human government...

'I suppose this is the way the times are changing.'

I, too, headed to the tax office with a much lighter heart.

When the massive void first erupted in Seoul, every building south of the Han River had vanished. Yet every year, in May alone, tax office buildings suddenly appeared, only to vanish again in June.

Marveling at this determination to squeeze the people's hard-earned money out of them no matter what, I visited Banpo Tax Office. A wild-haired scissors ghost identical to the one at Pocheon Tax Office walked out.

-Hello. May I see your resident registration card to verify your identity, taxpayer?

"Yes, here you are."

-Thank you. I'll take a moment to check your resident registration card. Age twenty...

It froze.

The anomaly, which had taken my registration card and was nibbling it with its teeth, suddenly stopped functioning.

Then its entire body began trembling violently.

"...?"

-Twenty, ten, twenty-six, twenty-seven, eight, nine, sixteen, twenty-four, ten thousand, one hundred, two hundred, thirsh-three, seven-seven-seven-seven, seven-seven-seven, four hundred, five hundred twenty-seven.

SPLAAASH!

The anomaly's body rapidly swelled, then burst, spraying pitch-black bodily fluid everywhere. It had literally exploded like a balloon.

"..."

I picked up my resident registration card, which lay forlornly on the ground, and put it back in my wallet.

When I straightened after bending down, Banpo Tax Office had vanished like a mirage. I stood alone in an empty field.

"Hmm."

... It seemed the day when I, Undertaker, would pay taxes wasn't coming anytime soon.

- The Taxpayer. End.