Chapter 51
A strange buoyancy fills me. I had literally thrown myself through the window, so I braced for a tumble across the floor, but...
"Huh?"
Instead of rolling, I was somehow standing before I knew it.
To be exact, I came to while standing.
"What...?"
The world.
Is too bright.
After staying in the dark for so long, opening my eyes in a bright place felt like I'd been hit by a flashbang. But it was just an illusion, and soon everything started looking normal again.
Current location.
Inside the elevator.
What lies ahead.
A brightly lit corridor in the quarantine facility!
Did I survive?!
Did I really make it back!
"Ah!"
A surge of joy shot up inside me, and I nearly burst into tears.
This bright light...!
I don't know how badly I wanted to see this!
Yeah!
The window was the right answer after all!
The window I chose was the right one!
I was just going in circles because I didn't know that!
You pathetic bastard! You didn't know this, so you went off the rails over and over, bawling like a child demanding toys at the supermarket? Department Head Lee Do-hyung in hell would laugh at you! Mr. Gognija must have been so frustrated too!
"Grong? What's wrong?"
At the voice, I turned around.
A beauty with wavy purple bobbed hair.
It was Ms. Spangdal.
"Sniff! Senior Spangdal!"
Overcome with joy, I hugged Ms. Spangdal right there and then.
"U-uh? W-wait. Why... why are you...?"
It isn't some monster. I can feel human warmth. This softness and warmth are proof that she's a proper human being.
Ms. Spangdal is a little strange, but there's no way she's a monster. If she seemed monstrous, it was clearly because I was losing my mind over an abnormal situation like the lights-out Bureau.
"I-it's troublesome... At this rate... y-you should probably let go quickly..."
Even while saying that, Ms. Spangdal didn't pry me off. Instead, she rubbed my back and comforted me. As expected, Spangdal really loves her juniors. From now on, any attack on Spangdal will be considered an attack on me.
After wiping my tears a little, I pulled away.
"Mm..."
Ms. Spangdal scratched her cheek, looking troubled.
"Senior Spangdal. I suddenly got overwhelmed by fear, that's why. I was scared when I thought I was facing a monster."
"Sigh... Even so, suddenly hugging your senior like that. This could be a problem."
"But I was so scared...! Anyway, thank you! I'm feeling a little better now!"
"Then that's a relief..."
I'm back.
At last, I've returned to a normal world.
Maybe because of that thought, I feel so relieved. This bright place is the world I belong in. From now on, let's do even better.
Let's put uncovering the Bureau's secrets off for a little later... For now, I'll just do ordinary agent work. Since I've already come in here, I can't leave anyway.
Everything happened because I got caught up in the lights-out phenomenon. That's how it was from the start. Impossible hallucinations and contradictions kept happening one after another. It definitely isn't normal.
"All right then. Shall we go see to the quarantine team's work?"
"Yes! Senior Spangdal!"
But then, suddenly.
I had a thought.
What if... I had to do the work of tending the Tooth Tree again here? What would happen then?
Amid that series of horrific events.
I tended the Tooth Tree twice.
The first time was in the dark, and the second was after activating the Reality Reperception Device and seeing it light up again.
Wait a second.
The lights coming on... weren't they not complete either? After they came on, I was doing fine, then got hit by a vampire's hypnotic attack and woke up again. Tending the Tooth Tree would mean that process repeats...
"By the way, what kind of work are we going to see?"
I asked cautiously.
"Yeah, for now."
If here.
If Ms. Spangdal says she's going to tend the Tooth Tree...
I get the ominous feeling that everything really will repeat.
"Ah, that sounds good."
"What is it?"
"It's a fake Bureau agent."
"Pardon?"
"We captured it and locked it up. I think it'd be good if you saw it."
Wait.
A fake Bureau agent...?
"Senior Spangdal. This fake Bureau agent, what is it?"
"You'll know when you see it."
A meaningful smile.
Goosebumps rose all over my body.
The Tooth Tree.
It would've been better if she'd said we were going to tend the Tooth Tree.
"Ah."
Why.
Why.
Why.
If I really escaped.
Why.
Why isn't the success message appearing?
Let's
start
work
and
get
your
neck
ripped
off
by
Manager
Jo
Seong
chun
.
What opened wasn't the isolation room door.
ㅡcreak.
It was a window that had appeared at some point.
"Hey! What are you doing suddenly going in through the window? My neck got stretched, so my body won't fit in properly!"
Manager Jo Seong-chun crawls out from inside the window.
.
.
.
[You died after having your neck yanked until your face turned white.]
[Death count: 13 -> 14]
.
.
.
[Restarting.]
* * *
Inside the elevator.
The lit corridor.
"..."
I couldn't escape.
Regression doesn't reset my mental state. Just a moment ago I thought I'd escaped, but even that was a lie. The pain of my neck stretching out is still vivid.
"Ha, hahahaha! Hwahahaha!"
Before despair and fear could swallow me, I burst out laughing. The laughter keeps coming. I don't know why.
Only one thing is certain.
The only thing I can trust is the status window's message box.
If I'd gotten out, the message box should have appeared...!
"Grong?"
I ran immediately without turning around.
"I won't fall for it!"
The corridor is brightly lit.
But even this is a trick.
"I'll survive, no matter what!"
The stinging on the back of my head actually seems to be clearing my mind.
Senior Spangdal... I trusted you. I trusted the sight of you hugging me so gently in that bright place. But it was a lie.
I don't blame Ms. Spangdal for this.
The only one I have to blame is myself.
To survive, I have to do anything. If I sink into despair and fear, all that will happen is the death count will increase meaninglessly.
I'm not sure why, but I have a feeling that if I give up here and die endlessly, endlessly increasing the death count, something even more terrifying than that itself will arrive.
So run!
Run!
"Aaaagh!"
I let the pent-up resentment inside me burst out all at once. A mixture of fear and rage is boiling over. Saliva spills from my mouth along with my screams, and tears stream down my face. Ugly as it is, even snot is coming out.
So what!
Think!
What I need to do right now!
"Ah...!"
Come to think of it, wasn't this my first regression after activating the Reality Reperception Device?
If so, there's something to test.
The window!
Even if I don't know the details, if I 'regressed,' that means the timeline went backward. Then what I need to do now is find the 'window,' which may still be intact, and go through it.
So much has gotten tangled up that it's hard to think deeply. But what I do know for sure is that I just died and regressed for the first time since activating the Reality Reperception Device, and I've returned to the point when the underground facility's lights were on.
If I keep going as is, I get the feeling I'll run into the vampire and the same thing will repeat.
Then what if I find the window and leave right now?
Maybe I can solve this!
"Where is it...!"
I found the window.
At the very beginning.
I need to find the window Ms. Spangdal told me about. I don't know when that window suddenly appeared. I found it suspicious and didn't go in. I should have gone in then. I'm paying the price for that now.
"Ah!"
A window appeared as I ran.
It's that window from before.
A window whose ability to function is doubtful, a window that's literally decorative in form.
Yes! I need to go in there!
"Hup!"
I hurled my body toward the window. Its shape itself is decorative. I might just collide with the wall.
But.
I didn't collide with the wall.
My body is going through the window!
Is this an escape...!
* * *
ㅡFwoosh!
When I opened my eyes again, I was inside the elevator.
A brightly lit corridor was in front of me.
"Damn it...!"
Message!
Isn't the message going to pop up?!
Then is this not an escape either?
I thought it would work, so I tried immediately.
And yet the message still didn't appear.
"Grong?"
"Yes."
Ms. Spangdal's perfectly normal face.
"..."
Success?
Or failure?
Maybe in this phenomenon, the message doesn't appear because of some rule or condition?
The corridor is bright, and Ms. Spangdal is human. If I've really escaped, then the hypothesis that the message doesn't appear here would be correct. But if it's the opposite?
If I haven't escaped... then a series of events, whether it's a hallucination or a dream, leading up to the vampire would keep playing out, and I'd keep waking up and repeating it.
At this point, I thought.
Let's say everything is an illusion.
Then what if I don't wake up?
I woke up because I encountered the vampire.
So if I keep avoiding the vampire?
Wouldn't I just be able to live while trapped in a realistic illusion, without needing to experience this extreme fear and chase?
The option of giving up.
This came to me far too temptingly.
"..."
However, after dying more than ten times up to today, there is something I've thought. If I settle into the illusion, something even more horrific might happen.
And.
The vampire!
Hatred for the vampire!
Could this whole series of events be the vampire's plot to make me give up chasing it?!
I felt my delusions swelling larger and larger, spiraling toward madness.
I have to decide.
1. Accept this as reality and live while avoiding the vampire.
2. This is fake after all. Solve it before things get even more fucked.
"Grong? That's a little strange. You don't look well. Are you getting scared?"
"Yes, Senior Spangdal. I'm scared. I'm really, really scared."
"Mm-hmm, that's understandable. It's your first time. But let me give you one piece of advice: it's better to be a coward than to be brave."
"Because brave people die early?"
"You catch on quickly."
Honestly, I was finding talking to Ms. Spangdal to be a kind of healing.
She was human now.
For now.
Even this conversation and her reactions were all human.
Until she turns into a monster, she's my reliable senior. Even if she were to turn into a monster in exactly ten seconds... being able to exchange a few words like this right now is truly precious.
Maybe because I thought that.
Ms. Spangdal feels quite precious to me.
"But, Senior Spangdal. I guess I don't want to be a coward after all."
"Did you get a little courage?"
"Yes."
I drew up my courage.
"Take this!"
I shouted with all my might.
"You thorny monster bitch!"
"Huh... Eek?!"
The instant I swung with all my strength at Ms. Spangdal's shin.
ㅡflash.
I suddenly felt the world go dark.
Since when had the lights been out?
I'm sure I thought they were on at first.
"
Gr
ong
ah
what
are
you
doing
."
Ms. Spangdal's body was cast in shadow. Her body turned a pure black, and several eyes appeared all over it as thorns began to sprout.
It was fake after all!
I got a very clear clue, one that didn't even need to be doubted!
1. Simply going out through the window is not the answer!
I kept regretting it. I might have solved this if, after activating the Reality Reperception Device, I'd gone straight out through the window Ms. Spangdal told me about.
Now that it's been confirmed that wasn't it, I feel completely relieved!
It feels like getting hit with -50%, completely cutting off hope for a stock I'd held for three years and finally cutting my losses.
To escape, I need something more.
I'll set aside the possibility that 'there is no way to escape.' If I'd thought that, I would have given up long ago.
I think as I run.
For now, there is a route I devised.
Join up with Manager Jo Seong-chun.
Go to the lab.
And I figured out what ghost story mainly kills me. Come to think of it, while I died twice here, wasn't it the neck-pulling ghost both times that killed me?
One possibility.
Perhaps the root of this phenomenon is...
"That little peeper?"
Could the neck-pulling ghost be the main one?
I keep thinking.
The message window?
The neck-pulling ghost.
That appeared in the message window.
In this underground quarantine facility.
The ghost that appeared in the message showed up repeatedly and killed me twice. There's definitely meaning in that.
The first time, I was simply caught by it.
The second time, Manager Jo Seong-chun had his neck yanked, turned into a ghost, and kept chasing me, pulling my neck and killing me.
The neck-pulling ghost is, at least for now, the main one. It didn't really speak. But Manager Jo Seong-chun, maybe because he fell victim to the ghost story, became a ghost after death and kept talking to me nonstop.
Maybe there's a hint here.
The moment I thought that...
ㅡpeek.
A pure white face appeared right ahead!
"You fucking bitch!"
By now, anger was ahead of fear...!
That damn giraffe bitch might be the source of this mess!
It's impossible to bring it down head-on. Even Manager Jo Seong-chun got taken out in one hit. Unlike the vampire, defeating it is impossible.
For now, I have no choice but to avoid it.
ㅡpeek.
ㅡpeek.
ㅡpeek.
"Aaaagh!"
No matter which way I turn, it appears from the corner!
And.
ㅡswish.
Maybe because Spangdal was getting closer, windows began appearing in the corridor walls.
A pure white hand shoots out from that window... Ah!
It was like lightning struck my head.
"A pure white hand!"
This fucking pure white hand!
It's just as snow-white as the neck-pulling ghost's hand!
"This is it! This!"
The odds that the culprit behind this whole situation is that neck-pulling ghost keep getting higher and higher...!
Clues are appearing, clues!
Clues keep coming up!
ㅡpeek.
In front of my trembling eyes, a pure white face slid closer.
"You motherfucking bastard!"
Next time, I'll definitely solve this!
.
.
.
[You died after having your neck yanked until your face turned white.]
[Death count: 14 -> 15]
.
.
.
[Restarting.]