Ne Job: The Intern from Hell — Chapter 143: "The Intern Who Refused to Kneel"
The smoke parted.
Ash drifted like pale snow across the shattered plaza of the Heavenly Plaza, where divine marble lay cracked in spiderwebs beneath Ne Job's feet. His breath came ragged, each inhale scraping like sand in his throat—but he remained standing.
Across from him, Lord Bureaucrat Xian—robes torn, hair unbound, divine sigils flickering erratically—finally steadied himself. His paper fan hung in tatters from his hand. Every step Xian took left a faint burn-mark of authority on the ground.
"Intern," Xian rasped, voice dipped in exhaustion but iron as ever. "Submit. You have neither rank nor right to oppose a Bureaucrat Supreme."
Ne Job wiped the blood from his lip with the back of his wrist. "Then maybe Heaven needs a new definition of 'Supreme.'"
A faint crackle ran up his arms—remnants of the Shard energy he'd been channeling since the confrontation began. It wasn't stable. It wasn't safe. But it kept him upright.
Behind them, the semi-conscious Elders watched from the ruins of the Council steps. Assistant Yue crouched beside one of them, torn between rushing to Ne Job's side and holding the line. Her eyes met his.
Don't die stupidly, she mouthed.
Ne Job grinned back.
No promises.
Xian inhaled deeply, recomposing himself. The air rearranged around him—papers swirling into formation, sigils reforming behind him like a halo of sharpened divine bureaucracy.
"You pushed far enough to amuse me," Xian said. "But this stops now."
He raised his hand.
A circle of golden script ignited beneath Ne Job's feet.
Yue's eyes widened. "NO—! JOB, MOVE!"
He tried, but the weight of divine authority pinned him in place. It was the Bureaucratic Binding—the same seal used to restrict divine beasts during audits. The air thickened, crushing his lungs.
Xian's voice echoed across the plaza.
"Form 77-B: Emergency Subjugation of Rogue Personnel."
The seal brightened.
Ne Job felt his knees buckle.
For a split second, he wondered if this was it. If everything—his internship, his rebellion, his stubborn refusal to be humiliated—would end on his knees before a man who had never listened.
Then—
A voice cracked like thunder through the plaza.
"INVALID FORM."
Every sigil froze.
The seal flickered.
Xian's eyes widened. "What—?"
A second voice followed, calm and cold enough to draw frost across stone:
"Filing Error. Please revise and resubmit."
The ground itself split open.
From between the cracks rose a familiar figure wrapped in drifting sheets of ancient parchment—tattered but glowing with stored divine grievances.
The Forgotten God of Paperwork.
But he wasn't forgotten anymore.
His form towered, swirling with the accumulated weight of abandoned forms and overlooked complaints. His eyes burned with the faint blue light of administrative vengeance.
He pointed his massive brush-staff toward Xian.
"Supreme or not… you cannot misuse authority in my presence."
Yue exhaled in relief. "Oh thank the audits—he's back."
Xian gritted his teeth. "You should not exist. You were erased—"
"And yet here I stand," the Forgotten God replied. "Because he—"
He pointed at Ne Job.
"—remembered me."
Ne Job blinked. "I… didn't do much."
"You acknowledged what others refused to see," the god replied. "That is enough."
With a sweep of his brush, he struck the binding seal.
It shattered like glass.
Ne Job stumbled free, gasping.
Xian looked from Ne Job to the resurrected deity, fury rising like volcanic heat.
"This is treason!"
"No," Yue said, stepping beside Ne Job. "This is correction."
More figures stirred behind them—Princess Ling, Dreivery Spirit Bao limping forward, even the Evil Manual Spirit flickering defiantly like a stubborn candle.
One by one, they took their place behind the intern who refused to kneel.
Xian's face darkened.
"You think your little rebellion—your pathetic cluster of misfits—can stand against Heaven's bureaucracy?"
Ne Job adjusted his cracked badge.
"It's not a rebellion," he said. "It's a team."
The sky split with a crack of thunder—paper storms gathering, power surging on each side, tension stretching taut like divine wire.
Xian raised his arm.
"All of you," he declared, "will be filed under 'Obstructive Anomalies.' Permanently."
Ne Job stepped forward.
"Then let's talk… about corrections."
The plaza trembled.
The final confrontation was no longer brewing—
It had begun.