Two workers who died in a shopping mall explosion that followed a powerful earthquake in Japan last week were asked by a boss to re-enter the building to secure cash.

Their employer, general goods store Habita, has apologised for the “loss of two precious lives”.

The two were among 38 people who died in the magnitude 6.8 earthquake in Kumamoto prefecture on 28 July. Seven of the fatalities were from Aeon Mall.

“The instructions given at the time were inappropriate, and I truly regret them,” Habita sales director Goji Yuse said, NHK reported.

One of two workers has been named as 22-year-old Kurumi Otake. The identity of the other deceased employee has not been made public.

Otake’s family told local media that she ran into a relative outside the Aeon Mall after the earthquake.

She told the relative that she had to go back in because her company had asked her to move money from the cash register into a safe.

This was confirmed by two company representatives, who attended Otake’a wake on Sunday and apologised to her family.

He added that the company was considering how to proceed with the matter, NHK reported.

“Looking back now, it was not worth a life,” Yuse told reporters at the wake, Kyodo reported.

Otake’s relative described her as someone with a “strong sense of justice”. She had supported her mother after her father died three years ago, Asahi Shimbun reported.

“If she hadn’t gone back inside the store at that time, Kurumi would still be with her family today,” the relative said.

While most people in Aeon mall had evacuated shortly after the earthquake, some employees were still in the building about an hour later, when an explosion ripped through the mall.

“My daughter is not coming back,” local media reported her mother as saying.

Habita, founded in 1976 and operates more than ten stores across several prefectures.