Page 400 of Light Leech

I followed her but stood a foot behind.

“Barrier, please,” the face said.

The guard left and the veil returned to its vibrant violet.

“Hihow.” Ralia snapped her fingers.

“Come,” the man said as he stepped out from the opposite side of the table and waved her forward.

She glanced at me. We obeyed.

“I’m sorry, what is this?” a disgruntled bald man said.

“Do not question Dear Leader Kim.” An aged woman said. I recalled that she was one of the few who did not act bothered by our entry.

“Mister Kim, I have a dig team waiting for me and don’t have time for your guests to–”

Mister-Dear-Leader Kim glared through the prism at the man who had spoken. “The archeological branch can wait for this. Nothing is more important.”

“Sir, the Southern Republic’s Yucatan temple anomaly is close to breaching. I find it hard to believe that anything can be more important than that right now.”

“The return of the Dokkaebi,” Mister Kim said.

Half of the table gasped or expressed some form of audible awe. Ralia stopped a foot before Mister Kim. Despite his aged face, his build was that of an Olympian with large stature and flushed-out musculature. Violet light lines ran down from small circles on his temples, down his neck, then met in the middle to run down the center of his chest at the point of his buttoned collar.

“Are you serious, sir?” a woman asked.

“But you are already here,” that same disgruntled man said.

Mister Kim faced him again through the prism. “Did you ever think that it might be possible that you are not all knowing?”

“What?”

“That all might not be revealed unto you?”

“The Constitution of Pure Knowledge contradicts that.”

Mister Kim grinned. “Who composed that document?”

“You did, sir. Or at least the part of you that is–”

“What would happen, Don, if everyone here was granted all knowledge?”

“Isn’t that the purpose of the Correction?”

“The Correction is knowledge,“ the older woman said. “Not the people.”

“Exactly, Miss Kholleo.”

“So you’ve been lying to us?” Don asked.

“Is the omission of a part of the truth a lie?” Mister Kim asked. “Ask yourself this, why would we conceal part of the truth for you?”

“No idea. Everything we do and think is monitored so any deviance results in death, right?”

Mister Kim nodded. “Why would we conceal a part of the truth?”

“Because that might affect us.”