Chapter 167
The appearance of the woman who saved me was quite eerie. She wore a mask with huge eyes painted on it and held a ritual knife dripping with blood.
This woman suddenly fell silent mid-sentence.
"You..."
I wondered what it could be and felt a chill run down my spine. I need to get out of here quickly.
"I'll be going now. Thank you for saving me."
Grab—
But this woman grabbed my collar and wouldn't let go.
"...Give it to me."
"What! What! Please don't do this!"
"Give it to me! It's here! Something that smells strongly of blood! Something hard!"
The woman started frantically searching my waistband.
"Stop it! I'll hit you!"
"I can hear the sound of blood! Don't try to hide it! I can hear the blood!"
What sound is she talking about?
She was completely insane.
As I felt dizzy, not knowing what she wanted from me, something thick fell from my waistband with a thud.
It was the nameplate. What? Why do I have that?
"Here it is! It's here! You're lucky! So lucky!"
The woman quickly picked up the nameplate. Then, she shouted at me.
"This is mine!"
Choke!
The woman reached out with her cold hand and gripped my throat.
"Gack!"
"Die! Hahahaha!"
Is this a woman's strength? Is this human strength?
I'm really going to die.
As I thought this, something lunged at the woman.
"Young-won!"
Thwack!
The woman fell as if hit by a car.
"Ow!"
When I came to my senses, Dahee was pinning the woman down. Dahee was holding the nameplate and repeatedly hitting the woman's head.
Thwack thwack thwack!
It happened so quickly that I didn't have time to stop her.
After being hit multiple times, the woman writhed like a stepped-on worm and then went limp.
Crack—
The wooden mask she was wearing split in half, revealing her face.
I thought she was a middle-aged shaman, but she turned out to be a young woman, maybe around Ms. Hong Mi-ri's age.
She's dead.
"Young-won, are you okay?"
Dahee, her face covered in blood, asked me.
I was glad to see Dahee, but I couldn't adjust to the sudden turn of events.
"I'm fine, but..."
Drip, drip drip—
Blood dripped from the nameplate in Dahee's hand. The red blood seeped into the engraved letters, making them glow red.
"Pastor Cheon Aesu"
The red letters looked particularly ominous and creepy. The blood drops on Dahee's pale face were also terrifying.
"I'm okay."
I tried to calm my racing heart.
If Dahee hadn't helped me, I would have died. There's no time to dwell on this. I need to find Yang Juhee.
Juhee is residually staying somewhere here.
"Have you tried calling out to Juhee?"
Dahee had the 《Whisper》 trait. It meant she could speak to others telepathically, even from a distance.
Wiping the blood off her face with her sleeve, Dahee said.
"I tried, but it doesn't seem to work. She must be on a different floor."
Let's go to the basement and get the talisman first. With that thought, we headed to the basement.
When we got there, Gu Hyena was trembling.
"Hey, Hyena. Why are you so scared?"
"...There are so many shamans on the first floor. They're trying to catch me!"
Hyena said she had been attacked by shamans who were after her.
Having just been attacked by a woman who went crazy over the nameplate, I could understand her feelings well.
Even that scary high school girl ghost is now treated like a Pokémon to be caught by these crazy shaman women.
I felt sorry for her.
"I'll take the talisman. Don't go up to the first floor and just hide here in the basement."
"Okay. You guys be careful too. There are so many people on the first floor. The school itself seems to have gotten bigger. The width of the first floor is strange. Unknown spaces have appeared too. People are even killing each other."
"Unknown spaces have appeared?"
"Like a maze."
Hyena said that the Nightmare Corridor had been changing recently. There were paths where there should be dead ends, and strange classrooms had appeared.
She said unfamiliar humans and ghosts were wandering around too. Everything's in chaos since we opened the third floor.
"Alright Dahee, let's go up."
I went up to the first floor with Dahee. Finding the first floor talisman wasn't too difficult. Dahee had her paper crane.
"I'll fly the paper crane. Whoosh—"
The paper crane, carried by the wind, floated up and flew around the first floor corridor. The problem was, as Hyena said, there were many unfamiliar people on the first floor.
"Youngbok, is there nothing in that staff room?"
"Nothing. Nothing. It's a bust. Someone's already cleaned it out."
"Ah, shit. We're screwed."
It was a group of men holding broken chair legs like clubs. There were three of them.
Judging by their rough language, they didn't seem like friendly people.
"Should we go up?"
"Are you crazy? We'll all go mad if we go there."
"I saw a shaman woman with a bell wandering around earlier. Let's kill her and take everything."
"Is she pretty?"
"You idiot, is that important in this situation? She was wearing a mask, so I couldn't see her face. But she seemed like a young woman. Looked inexperienced."
"Hehe, we're going to kill her anyway, so she won't remember. Should we have some fun first? Let's see her face before that."
They looked like robbers or thieves at first glance.
If we were caught by these people...
It wouldn't be strange if they went crazy like the shaman who lost it over the nameplate.
Tip-toe—
We moved through the corridor with extreme caution.
Thanks to my 《Owl Eyes》, I could see well in the darkness without any light, which was fortunate.
***
The first floor talisman was in the girls' bathroom.
As soon as we acquired it, a loud rumble shook the school as if it might collapse.
"Where is Yang Juhee?"
I wanted to get out of this bizarre corridor quickly.
With so many people and evil spirits wandering around, the corridor had become like a dungeon in a game. People were actually killing others and looting their possessions as if farming a dungeon.
"Hey, Youngbok, look at this woman. She's got a talisman in her pocket."
"Is it an escape talisman?"
"No, just some useless talisman. Better than nothing, I guess. Let's strip her completely. There might be more. But... who killed her?"
As we were trying to go up to the second floor, we saw those men from earlier stripping the body of the shaman we had killed. It was an act without any respect for the dead.
'Of all places, they're blocking the stairs to the second floor.'
This place wasn't reality. A nightmare without law or morality.
Everyone seemed to have no qualms about killing others and taking their belongings.
In fact, we were no different.
Even though I almost died, we had taken down the shaman and stolen her ritual knife. The bell Dahee was holding was the same.
I suddenly remembered Wang Ja-hyun's words about how they were protecting this corridor. He said they were the milder ones.
If that was true?
It made me think deeply about many things.
"Oh, who's there?"
Just then, someone shone a flashlight at us. Damn, we must have been watching the men for too long.
'It’s dangerous. We've been spotted.'
Not knowing what those men might do to us, or what Dahee might do to them, I made a decision.
"Dahee, when I give the signal, run up to the second floor. Now! Now!"
"Okay!"
Dash—
Dahee started running towards the second floor. The bell in her hand jingled as she ran.
Soon, the men shouted.
"It's the bell sound! A shaman's bell! Catch her! Catch that girl!"
"Get her!"
"Don't let her escape!"
"F-fuck off! I'll kill whoever comes at me first!"
I shouted like an angry lion. I didn't forget to swing the ritual knife around.
The men flinched at the sharpness of the knife. Then, they burst into laughter.
"Hey, kid. That ritual knife is blunt. It's for catching ghosts, not humans."
"Even if you hit someone with that, it'll just leave a bruise."
Really? I didn't know.
The important thing was that Dahee had already run up to the second floor. I had stalled enough time, so I should go to the second floor too.
But the men were blocking the stairs to the second floor.
"Come here."
"Are you a Yeongji High student? I heard Yeongji High students have been getting caught up in this for a long time."
"Come here. Uncle will help you and that girl from earlier get out of this school."
The men chuckled.
Their offer to help us get out clearly meant they were going to kill us. Do I look stupid to them?
What should I do?
As I was pondering—
Kyaaaa!
A piercing scream rang out.
Suddenly, the high school girl ghost Gu Hyena appeared and pounced on the men.
"Aah!"
"What is this! Youngbok! Help me! Help!"
"Eek!"
Why is Hyena, who was hiding in the basement, here? Did she come to save me?
I never thought I'd be touched by a ghost.
"Hyena, thank you!"
I seized the opportunity and ran towards the second floor with all my might.
The men seemed afraid of the second floor when they were talking earlier, and it seemed true as they hesitated to follow up the stairs.
"Damn! We lost them!"
"Shit!"
"Idiots!"
I hurled insults at the men and fully entered the second floor.
It was too early to breathe a sigh of relief. In some ways, the second floor was even more treacherous than the first.
"There must be evil spirits on the second floor."
Seeing Dahee not hiding her worry, I fell into thought for a moment.
We had two talismans, enough for Dahee and me to escape.
"I think Juhee is on the third floor. I've been thinking about why Juhee ended up in residual stay. I think it might be like this."
Those who enter the third floor each take on a 'quirk'.
That day, Juhee and Jung Sojin must have been right at the entrance of the third floor. Unlike Sojin who died for some reason, Juhee must have entered the third floor.
"When you enter the third floor, you get a quirk, right?"
Juhee with one quirk.
For Juhee without a talisman, 'death' was the only way out. But for Juhee who already had one quirk, death would have meant a terrible transformation like Kwon Suho.
So, didn't Juhee choose to stay on the third floor rather than die? Even if I didn't know exactly how, this was the best guess I could make.
"Let's chase after them!"
"To get out of here, we either have to die or get a talisman!"
"Let's go! Go!"
Just then, we heard the men rallying on the first floor.
Are they planning to come up to the second floor?
Flustered, I thought we should quickly break through the second floor and go to the third.
"Tick-tock, tick-tock—"
The problem was that the Rhythm Ghost was waiting for me on the way to the third floor.
"Let's go up! Let's catch those kids and take everything!"
"Young-won, are you here? Teacher knows your smell. You're here, aren't you? Young-won, shall we have a little counseling session?"
Murderous men behind me and the Rhythm Ghost in front.
I was truly caught between a rock and a hard place, pondering what to do, when suddenly Dahee's chest started swelling.
Puff puff—
"Oh shit! Dahee, what's that!"
"I don't know! My chest is getting bigger! What's happening?!"
Puff puff—
I'm not lying, Dahee's chest was swelling like a balloon.
A high school girl's growth spurt? No, it was far beyond that level.
As I was staring in confusion at Dahee's school vest that looked ready to burst—
Pop!
Something jumped out from inside Dahee's school vest.
Boom-boom-pow—
"Th-this sound?"
Giganoto! Giganoto was with Dahee!
Soon, Giganoto, running quickly on four legs, lunged at the Rhythm Ghost!