Chapter 1-3: Briefing

The whole class followed the two high graded Lobotomy Employees, the initial worry about the place having just slightly calmed down after learning that in some way, they couldn't die permanently in this place.

As it was proven by the Luckster of the group: Makoto Naegi… Who was being herded by some of his girl friends.

Sayaka was on his right, holding his arm with both hands to keep him close, Kirigiri was on his left, holding his hand with her gloved right one and Mukuro was behind him, one hand on his shoulder and so close behind him he could feel her front against his back.

"G-Guys…" Naegi started, feeling embarrassed as nearly everyone had their eyes on the small group, "I think you're exaggerating! I just-"

"Died once." Sayaka said monotonously.

"Before our eyes." Kirigiri added.

"Right after you said 'everything will be fine'." Mukuro finished.

"I… um… okay…" Naegi immediately gave up the idea to counter argue with them.

With his face red of embarrassment, he could hear some of his friends snicker behind him.

"It's been a while since we saw 'Naegi's Harem' shenanigans." Mondo said.

"Can't say I missed seeing such foolish behavior from them." Togami sighed.

"Y-Y-Yes… Get a room, y-y-you normies…" Fukawa followed with a stammer.

"Wait, so that's a normal thing?" Pauline asked as she saw the little show from the back of the group.

"After like, what? Four months in our first year? Yeah, that would be a pretty recurring scene. At least now the girls are working together instead of trying to one-up the other." Hiro explained but got death stares from the girls in question as he wasn't quiet about his statement.

"Anyone here got jealous?"

"Leon." Chihiro said.

"Hey! But I gave up, I'm sure Naegi's luck will bite him in the ass for that in the future, so I'm fine with it."

"Gee, thanks, Leon. What a great friend you are." Naegi said to his friend in a monotone voice.

"Hehe… I almost forgot what 'normal life' was, thanks for the reminder kids." Connor chuckled from the front of the group, "Hold on to those memories while you guys are here."

To that, no one knew what to say that wouldn't worry the others.

"We're almost there."

The group arrived at the main office of the 'Control Department. At first glance it wasn't strange in any particular way except for a strange painting on the far wall of some circles connected to each other. There were also many monitors displaying all rooms of the departments live. Two doors on the adjacent walls from the entrance, one leads to a closet while the other… no one knew.

Kirigiri and Togami quickly recognized what the painting was representing but decided not to comment on it… yet.

"Um… Where is the person we were meeting?" Taka asked out loud as he looked around.

"Ah sorry, sorry! I'm in the closet, taking out some files for you!" a female cheerful voice was heard coming from behind the door labeled 'closet'.

The door opened up and a young woman with short brown and yellow hair along with a red hairband carrying a file in her hands. She has brown eyes and her skin was as white as snow, just like everyone else in the Facility. She wasn't very tall and was wearing a normal Lobotomy Corp. suit and tie like all the Ultimates in the room.

"Hello, my name is Malkuth! I'm a Sephirah and the head of the Control Team at Lobotomy Corporation!" The woman, Malkuth, greeted with a bright smile, "It's nice to meet you, Ultimates of Hope's Peak Academy!"

Malkuth extended a hand towards Naegi, the Luckster smiled back and was about to extend his hand to shake it but Kirigiri raised hers to stop him.

"Enough with the disguises, what are you?" she asked, eyes narrowed, glaring at the woman in front of them with suspicion, confusing everyone.

"Wh-What do you mean?"

"There are many signs that show that you're not what you seem." Kirigiri started, "For starters: your footprints don't match your shoes at all."

At this, everyone looked down, whatever the Head of the Control Team was doing in the closet was dusty enough for her to leave footprints when she walked out of the room.

"Then, there's the weight of your steps, it sounds way heavier than what you look."

"H-Hey!" Malkuth exclaimed.

"And finally, there's that noise and smell coming from you that is nothing human."

"That's rude!"

"So tell us, what are you?" Kirigiri demanded, silencing the room.

At least until Pauline let out a small applause.

"Wow." she sighed.

"Impressive. She's good." Connor joined her in the applause.

"You must be the Ultimate Detective, aren't you?" Malkuth smiled awkwardly, "Alright, I'll lower the Cognition Filter."

As if everything was just a mirage, the human form of Malkuth faded from everyone's vision and instead stood a large brown cubic robot. Its body was a brown rectangular chassis with a single digital glowing yellow eye in the center of the body. Its name was displayed at the top of the body, and its chassis possessed a streak resembling a red hairband. Its also possessed mechanical limbs as well; a pair of arms and legs, in the arms it was holding the files taken from the closet.

"Let me present myself again, I'm Malkuth, a Sephirah and one of the nine heads of this Facility's Departments. Nice to meet you, young Ultimates." She repeated herself, this time her voice had a robotic tint.

She once again extended her hand, her real one.

"Wh-WHAAAAAAT?!" Yamada screeched as Hagakure hid behind him screaming something about black magic.

"A robot?"

"This is incredible!" Chihiro exclaimed as they nearly ran towards Malkuth, excitement in their eyes as they grabbed her robot hand, "Are you really an AI? Who on Earth programmed you?! You sound so human! Where were you constructed?!"

"I-I think it's way too soon for me and the others to tell you our backstory." Malkuth said in an embarrassed tone.

"OTHERS?! A-Ah! I-I mean, sorry…" Chihiro blushed, embarrassed too as they walked back towards their friends, Mondo welcomed them by ruffling their hair with a big grin.

"A-Anyway, I'm going to explain to you what exactly you will be doing while you're in Lobotomy Corporation." Malkuth clapped her hands to get everyone's attention, "As you might already know thanks to Naegi-san's internship with us, we produce energy by 'taking care' of creatures known as Abnormalities."

To that statement, pretty much all the Ultimate students nodded, remembering Naegi's stories from a year prior.

"Well we're doing pretty much the same as before with slight changes. Naegi, do you remember the types of work an employee could do?"

"Hmm… There was 'Cleaning', 'Feeding', 'Playing', 'Repression' and 'Consensus', right?"

"That's correct. But now we have changed that. There's now only four types of work: 'Instinct', 'Insight', 'Attachment' and 'Repression'. But don't worry about that, it's pretty much the same as before with Feeding and Playing fused into 'instinct'. And also, now everyone can do all types of work, so that all Abnormality workers can grow at the same time." The robot woman explained.

She then added.

"Our goal here is to complete a 50 day cycle of working, where every five days a department of the facility opens up until we reach the bottom. So to do tha-"

"Wait a minute. A fifty day cycle? We've been informed that 'this' has been going since the beginning of the Tragedy. How on earth did you not accomplish the cycle yet?" Togami interrupted.

"Well, it's not so easy you know! We had to retry many times from Day 1! The choice belongs to the Manager if we must restart…" Malkuth said in a dejected tone.

"Do you happen to know the criteria needed for restarting a cycle?" the Heir asked.

To this the robot shook her 'head' (which was actually her whole body).

"We already did thousands and thousands of cycles and-" Pauline started with a sigh but was very quickly interrupted by many students.

"Wh-What do you mean 'thousands'?! The Tragedy has been going on for only a bit more than one year! Even with restarts from day 1 that wouldn't be possible." Taka exclaimed.

"Oh yeah… Time wrapping stuff. Too complicated to explain." Connor sighed, "Well to make it short, time is 'faster' here. It's been almost 10 years that we've been here."

"T-TEN YEARS?!"

"What the hell!?"

"WHAT THE FUUCK?!"

"E-Everyone please calm down, we're not done talking here!" Malkuth tried to control the situation.

Thankfully it didn't take long for everyone to be quiet thanks to the more level headed Ultimates, thus allowing the Sephirah to keep talking.

"Alright. So now that you know our objective so you must also understand that all of you will become Abnormality Workers. We're drastically missing people on that aspect. Having sixteen more will help a ton for the cycles!" Malkuth explained.

"But wait! Doesn't that mean that we-we-we'll have to fight any breaching Abnormality?!" Hina asked, not even trying to hide her worry.

Upon hearing that fact, many if not all the students started to panic once more until Naegi said something that shut everyone up.

"I'm fine with that."

"Naegi? What are you saying, you just died yesterday from one of those monsters!" Leon exclaimed,

"Let me add that while it's clear that some of you aren't suited for fighting, I know for a fact that many will be very good for the tasks." Malkuth added, "Like Hifumi Yamada!"

When hearing the unexpected name, everyone turned towards the fanfic creator with wide eyes, but no one had them wider than Hifumi himself.

"Wh-WHAAAT?! ME?! NONONONO! If the monsters in this place are as scary as the one we encountered until now, a-a-an otaku like me could never survive!"

"Oh don't worry, we've seen some of your work here and I'm sure the Queen of Hatred will love talking to you." Connor said with a grin.

"Yeah, true… That magical girl loves to talk about herself, if someone starts writing about her, her mood will definitely stay positive for a long time"

With the words 'Magical girl' pronounced, all the new workers had once again their eyes turned towards the Fanfic creator who was uncharacteristically silent. Yamada had his head lowered, not saying a word until he suddenly raised it, readjusted his glasses on his nose and said in a serious tone:

"Where do I sign?"

That reaction made many students laugh, others rolled their eyes and one gambler stared dagger at him. Connor, Pauline and even Malkuth joined the students with a chuckle.

"Alright alright, please everyone calm down." the robot leader said, "So as I said, some of you will be better at working with them while others will be better at suppressing them like Mukuro Ikusaba and Sakura Oogami. I've read the report on how you managed to push away the Forsaken Murderer with your bare hands back at the Tokyo Facility, miss Oogami! It's very impressive!"

"But even if some of you will excel in one type of work or the other, everyone must work." Connor reminded the newcomers.

"And everyone better give it their all." a new voice joined the conversation.

Everyone turned towards the source of the voice, it was coming from the person who was standing in front of the other door in the room, it was a woman with blue hair tied into a side ponytail, her eyes were closed and never once opened as she had yet a serious expression on her rather beautiful face. She was wearing a long lab coat over a black suit and red tie with a skirt and brown leggings while wearing red shoes.

She looked very human, and yet, everyone immediately felt that something was very wrong when they saw her.

"Ah, Angela! Why did you come here?" Malkuth asked the woman whose name was 'Angela'.

"Let me guess. Another robot? Can you please show us your real form?" Togami cut, already tired with all this nonsense that's been going on for the past hour.

"... I am Angela, an AI. I am the Manager's assistant and this is my body. I don't use a Cognition Filter."

Mondo quickly grabbed onto Chihiro who was about to ask many excited questions, but his instincts told him that they shouldn't mess with the blue haired AI.

"I came to apologize for yesterday's mishap on behalf of the Manager." She slightly bowed to the group.

"Mishap?" Kirigiri asked.

"You were supposed to wake up tomorrow in your rooms. Then you'll be having the briefing you're having right now. Unfortunately, something went wrong with the files and the Manager executed an order to send you directly in the middle of the day to work. I assure you, it was a simple mistake."

"I-I see. It's quite alright-" Naegi started but was interrupted by his classmates' glares that said more than any words could.

"Anyway, about what we were talking, you all will be working and all must be efficient."

This was clearly not a suggestion or advice. It was a threat… And it went completely over the bush of hair that belongs to Hagakure as he asked.

"What if we aren't?"

"Well, you know what happens when you die in this Facility. We can always just keep your X-Key in a corner of a drawer for whenever we'll need your services again… if we'll need it." Angela said with a sweet smile.

The Clairvoyant was about to ask more questions for clarifications but when he noticed everyone shaking their head, he understood he should just stay quiet.

"Alright then. Do you all agree with those conditions?"

Work, die and relive or just die for what might be for good?

At least the choice was simple, if it even counted as a choice.

"Hm… W-W-What do we do about the 'o-o-other me'? S-S-Should I let her out a-a-and explain to her the situation again?" Toko timidly asked.

"Oh you mean the Murderous one?" Malkuth said, "Do not worry, we took care of it. We'll explain to you later." she said in an amused tone at seeing the dramatically confused expression of the writer.

"Any other questions?" Angela asked.

"Just one." Togami spoke up.

The blue haired robot nodded for him to continue.

"When we reach the end of this… Will we be able to leave?"

Silence was what he got for an answer, Malkuth and the two high level employees looked away, clearly unable to answer this question. Angela had one eye slightly opened and everyone could see her yellow, cold and emotionless eye staring at the blond heir who for the first time in a while felt uneasy and dare he say, intimidated by her stare.

"Everything will fall into place, and everything will be alright once we reach the end of the line. Our project will clear the world from Despair." Angela said.

This last detail was not what anyone expected as they stared back at the blue haired assistant with wide eyes.

"I-I…" Togami wanted to have more answers but was lost for words.

Surprisingly enough, Kirigiri wasn't asking anything despite clearly having lots of questions in her mind.

"Anyway, we're about to end today's quota of energy." Malkuth said to change the subject.

"Wait already?" Leon asked, confused.

"We're Sunday." Pauline answered, sounding uninterested out of nowhere.

"So the afternoon is for the calmer type of abnormalities to have some free time." Connor added.

"So you guys have the rest of the day to rest. I've been notified that we're going to restart a cycle starting tomorrow. You'll have a tour of the Employee's side of the facility and every one who is new to the work here can have Training classes with Hod until they are called to join the work, meanwhile Naegi can have the first shift of the first day!" Malkuth planned for the Ultimates, "How does that sound?"

The ex-students didn't know what to say.

It wasn't like they had a choice in the matter. It really was work or die.

"I'll work with Lobotomy Corporation again." Naegi said suddenly with determined eyes, "If the goal of this cycle is to end the Tragedy and the Despair in the outside world, I'm ready to risk it here. No matter what it takes." he then turned to Angela and walked towards her.

The human-like AI smiled faintly, "Alright then, Naegi Makoto. I remember that you've done a rather impressive work during your internship, hopefully, this time you'll do as well or better." she extended a hand to him.

"I will- No, we all will. right guys?"

"Hell yeah, let's get this done and go home!" Mondo exclaimed, tapping his biceps.

"To bring an end to the Tragedy…"

"I'm with you Makoto, and I'll protect you better this time!"

Most of the Ultimates exclaimed in their manner how they were on board with this and were ready to work at Lobotomy Corp.

"Alright, Miss Angela-san."

"Angela or Miss Angela is fine."

"Miss Angela, I'm ready to join Lobotomy Corporation officially!" Naegi smiled as he grabbed her hand and shook it.

And with that, the ex-students of class 78 of Hope's Peak Academy officially joined the ranks of Lobotomy Corporation…

And this until the end.

Baka's notes: Alright! And that's a chapter wrapped up!
To be honest, I kiinda know what type of chapters I wanna do but I have no idea if it's a good idea and how it will work out to tell the story.
But I can say with confidence that this story will be at very least 20 chapters long

Anyway, I hope you're excited for this story. Meawhile, I'll be working on the first chapter of something new.

See you soon!