The hospital continued to move at the same pace. As Doyoon walked toward the exit, he tried not to register that pace. Floor markings, wall signs, and indicators above the doors were unchanged. There was no reason for them to be different.
People passed through the corridors sporadically. Their walking speeds varied, but the places where they slowed were similar. Some stayed close to the wall. Others avoided the center. In hospitals, those choices aligned without effort.
He passed several doors on the way out. Doors that opened automatically and closed automatically. The timing of opening differed slightly, but the way they closed did not. Doors always closed behind him.
The air near the exit felt lighter than inside. When the automatic doors opened, outside sounds entered. Passing cars, a distant horn, a continuous low noise mixed with the hospital's order without overwhelming it.
He did not treat that mixture as a problem. Inside and outside were always connected this way. The boundary was clear, but it was not a break.
He paused for a step, then moved again. The pause was brief and without reason. Leaving a hospital had never required judgment. Departure usually sat close to an ending.
He tried to forget the pause as soon as it happened. The moment a pause was acknowledged, meaning could attach itself. Meaning was unnecessary here.
Movement continued near the reception area. Someone shifted a step at the counter and turned toward a sign. The motion was natural and unremarkable. Doyoon neither avoided nor followed the flow.
Scenes like this repeated in hospitals. Repetition did not create questions. The absence of questions was one of the hospital's advantages.
An elevator arrived. The doors opened and several people stepped out. One paused briefly, then crossed the corridor. Papers were held. Hands adjusted. The moment was short. Too short to carry meaning.
Doyoon did not keep his gaze there. In hospitals, brief looks felt natural. Longer ones usually came from necessity. There was no necessity now.
He thought the necessary judgments here had already been completed. Before entering, and immediately after. The chance of that judgment being wrong felt low.
He turned toward the stairs. His steps stayed even on the way down. He did not touch the handrail. The wall's texture entered his view and passed as much as it needed to. No more.
A notice was posted at the landing. Emergency procedures. Contact numbers. Routes. The text was clear, the letters large. He already knew the content without reading it.
The lower-floor corridor was not much different from above. Notices spoke in the same tone. Arrows kept the same angle. The hospital explained itself the same way everywhere.
He tried to accept that explanation as sufficient. It should not have taken time. Before, it had not.
As he neared the exit, outside light grew stronger. Someone stood beyond the doors, then passed through and changed direction. A face did not appear. It did not need to.
Doyoon followed after. The distance between them was appropriate. They did not overlap. He was not late. The ground outside differed in material from inside. The difference was clear.
He did not try to confirm that he had left the hospital. Confirmation tended to slow judgment. The hospital remained behind him. That fact should have been enough.
It was not.
He walked a few more steps and stopped. From there, the hospital had already become part of the background. The doors continued to open and close. The order inside did not spill out.
People entered and exited, each with reasons that did not show. The hospital did not ask for them.
Nothing happened.
The sentence followed him after he left. This time, it followed faster than before.
Doyoon did not measure that speed. The choice not to measure it remained, once again.