Chapter 12
Chapter 12
The staff member in black knew he was already meat on the chopping block.
He had no leverage with which to bargain with Su Chen.
He might as well leave a good impression.
Perhaps Su Chen would honor their agreement instead of going back on his word.
After agreeing, the man picked up the Employee Handbook and handed it to Su Chen.
Su Chen saw how readily the man cooperated.
He was fairly satisfied.
He accepted the handbook, smiled at the man in black, then lowered his head and began reading carefully.
Employee Handbook
This zoo provides outstanding employee benefits, including tenfold overtime pay, generous annual leave, and insurance for every employee. We hope you will work diligently while keeping the Employee Rules firmly in mind and ensuring your own safety. You have only one precious life. For the sake of your family, protect yourself and obey the following rules.
1. If you discover an escaped rabbit, do not attempt to catch it directly and do not approach it. Lure it to the Lion Enclosure and leave the rest to the white lions.
2. The Primate Enclosure has only one street. If visitors report that two streets have appeared, lead any visitors already inside the enclosure to the street on the left and close the entrance. Once all visitors have left, keep the Primate Enclosure sealed for at least ten minutes.
3. If, while inspecting the Elephant Enclosure, you notice that the elephants you observe differ drastically from the elephants depicted on the sign, stop observing them. Repeatedly tell yourself that the real elephants are the creatures shown on the sign, not what you see before you.
4. If you work in the beverage shop, inspect the shelves once every hour. If “rabbit blood” appears out of nowhere, remove it immediately and store it securely.
5. Trim the shrubs in the Rabbit Enclosure once a month. Do your best to prevent shaded areas from forming inside the enclosure.
6. This zoo has no Aquarium. If a colleague mentions the Aquarium and insists that it exists, end the conversation immediately. This colleague is no longer the person you knew.
7. If you see the Aquarium, do not enter it. Tell yourself that it does not exist and leave immediately.
8. Rabbits are fed once every seven days. Do not feed them any snacks other than the prescribed food.
9. If you hear laughter from a direction in the Rabbit Enclosure where there are clearly no visitors, tear the final page of the Employee Handbook along the dotted line and hold it in your hand. Then proceed to the Elephant Enclosure and throw the page onto the grass inside. The other staff will understand what happened and will not reprimand you for littering.
10. If a visitor asks for help and claims to have violated the Visitor Rules, take that visitor to the Lion Enclosure immediately. During the journey, colleagues in black uniforms may attempt to take part in your work. Refuse and ignore them. They are not your colleagues.
11. There are only four white lions in the Lion Enclosure. If the number of white lions suddenly increases beyond four, take out the “rabbit blood,” show it to them, and splash it on the first white lion that immediately runs toward you. Leave at once after doing so. Do not keep watching the extra white lions during this process.
12. If you see someone wearing rabbit-ear accessories enter the Elephant Enclosure, disperse all nearby visitors at once and guard the entrance until you hear a child scream from inside.
13. Experiencing tinnitus, tightness in the chest, a migraine, or red and swollen eyes for up to five minutes is normal and no cause for concern. If any symptom lasts longer than five minutes, stop working immediately and proceed to the Lion Enclosure as quickly as possible, by any means necessary and to the best of your ability.
14. Treat the white lions kindly. When there are exactly four white lions, you need not guard against them in any way. They have been trained from a young age to be friendly toward humans.
(This passage had been crossed out.) If you are unfortunate enough to be attacked by a white lion in its normal state but do not die on the spot, Rules Six and Seven are void. Do not rush to the hospital. You will not die. After leaving the Lion Enclosure, proceed to the Aquarium. You will find it very quickly. You will put on a black uniform.
Su Chen was somewhat surprised after reading the rules.
There was no blue text anywhere in the Employee Handbook.
That suggested two possibilities.
The first was that the staff had a way to prevent “It” from distorting employee rules.
The second was far more terrifying.
“It” did not care.
It did not care what the employees did.
Perhaps “It” had already found a loophole in the rules.
Of the two possibilities, Su Chen favored the first.
The consequences of the second were simply too terrifying.
If “It” no longer cared about the Employee Rules at all, wouldn’t that make this Horror World an impossible scenario?
That would be absurd.
Su Chen drew his thoughts back.
No amount of further speculation would produce a definite answer.
He would be better off studying the employee rules carefully for now. If the opportunity arose later, he could test whether the staff truly possessed a method of resisting “It.”
He began analyzing the rules one by one.
He studied the handbook from beginning to end.
Most of its rules contained little worth noting.
They merely confirmed once more that the blue rules were traps.
The crossed-out passage at the end, however, gave him much more to chew on.