Chapter 4
“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck….”
A full day had passed since I'd been banned from the forum.
Click, click, click
The good news was that I had enough room to swear.
The bad news was that time, which was already crawling, seemed even slower.
Five days and ten hours.
There was still that much time to endure in that damned Backrooms, and yet I couldn't use the forum that helped me survive the most.
What an utterly lamentable thing.
“Son of a bitch….”
But from the head mod's point of view, it was understandable.
[Let's learn about the human-rights-forfeiture track.araboja]
Are there actually people who come in through the human-rights-forfeiture track?
So we treated human trash like a newbie?
If you work at the Bureau and this is your first time seeing the human-rights-forfeiture track, lol.
How is a newbie who just arrived after years the human-rights-forfeiture track?
So they're basically Class N personnel?
In just one day, there were already five pages of best posts that were all about me.
Before I got hired, my limit was five pages of best posts even after dumping a hundred disgusting images with 108 anonymous accounts.
Click, click, click
But as I looked through the best posts, there were more than a few strange things.
[Let's learn about the human-rights-forfeiture track.araboja]
Author: PostingForCash
Forum bros, today's slacking off time is~!
Today we're gonna look into the super-hot human-rights-forfeiture track, y'know~!
There are several kinds of hires to get into the Bureau.
Usually you'd come in through the regular track, after surviving an encounter with an entity or an anomaly.
If you have an entity or an ability, it's the field scout track.
If your office skills are insane, it's the office scout track.
If you defect from another organization, it's the defector track, and so on!
You've probably heard of most of these at least once, but a lot of forum bros have probably only heard the term “human-rights-forfeiture track.”
This is for people who can't live a normal life in society, and with their consent they're brought in and put to use!
Then what's the difference from Class N personnel? You might ask.
The difference is simple, simple~
They haven't committed murder!
And there can't be anyone who died because of the fallout of what they did, aside from the person they personally killed!
So basically, the newbie hadn't done enough to get someone else killed!
They weren't things like jeonse fraud, voice phishing, drug trafficking, or organ trafficking; they had just ruined their own lives.
The human-rights-forfeiture track is when the Bureau solves those people's problems in exchange for them becoming something between staff and Class N.
If you get that, stop slandering the newbie just because he showed up after a long time.
[댓글]
Hound: It's your fucking speech pattern, asshole.
WhiteHacker: This bastard only ever spews crap posts, so why is this suddenly useful?
AutoSaveIsMandatory: If you're below staff and above Class N, aren't you basically just a salaried Class N….
ㄴ(Author) PostingForCash: Do you know how big the paycheck is, y'know!
ㄴComeAtMe: That cute speech sounds pretty natural. Were you maybe a girl?
ㄴ(Author) PostingForCash: As if, idiot.
[How can a newbie who came after several years be the human-rights-forfeiture track]
Author: DadIsAMartialArtist
I was always seeing the same regulars, and then a new face showed up for the first time in ages—how'd it end up being the human-rights-forfeiture track?
There was a newbie who came to our department and got marked as having quit after just three days, and I wondered what that was, but later I found out it was this.
But is there really any reason to keep it separate from Class N?
They're already working the newbie to the bone, aren't they?
[댓글]
HauntingSpiritNo.1: Explaining that would take a gold-tier post, so no can do.
ManageTheManagement: ^^
ㄴEntityFucker: Everyone take your hands off the keyboard!
ㄴOrphanCrusher: Never talk about HR.
ㄴLoreTweaker: Bureau-kyaaaaaagh!
A newbie who finally showed up in a forum you can enter the moment you're hired, after years of waiting.
In reality there were plenty of peers, but the human-rights-forfeiture track is treated like a minority.
Should I say it makes me question whether the Bureau they're talking about is the same Bureau as mine?
Click, click, click
“You can think about that after you get out of here.”
After checking the Smiler caught in the photo, I unplugged the charger.
I would run all day, then charge my phone while resting for an hour or two.
A routine made possible by the slow pace.
Thanks to that, even while being chased, I was still eating and resting properly.
Of course, napping here and there didn't make the fatigue go away completely.
For the Backrooms, isn't this an incredible luxury?
Please, let this last for just a week.
And I really wish the forum ban would be lifted soon.
[Unban the newbie, head mod]
Author: TrappedAtHome
We've reached our limit too, just unban him already.
Stop blaming the bait, stop blaming the newbie, stop blaming management.
We gave the newbie enough time already.
You and I were too busy surviving and grinding away in the Bureau to know how important newbies were.
So when we're on the forum, we promised to give newbies preferential treatment.
(중략)
But what is this? A three-day ban? Does that even make sense?
Are you going to take responsibility if the newbie dies and stops posting?
Just unban him. Don't blame the bait, and handle it yourself. We've all had enough. Unban him right now.
[댓글]
DadIsAMartialArtist: What kind of template is this now?
ㄴHauntingSpiritNo.1: It's been posted so often you'd have to be living under a rock not to know it. Please actually spend some time on the forum.
LoreTweaker: The fire's cooled off a bit anyway, so we should at least hear the newbie out.
There isn't even a ban-by-status rule in the notice.
ㄴWhiteHacker: For real, for real.
ㄴAutoSaveIsMandatory: Anyone know the incident where someone got permanently banned for messing with the forum rules? G-
ManageTheManagement: =ㅅ=….
Thankfully, the people who needed dopamine also wanted my ban lifted.
The head mod wasn't a complete brick wall, so if this kept up….
[Notification: The ban has been lifted]
“Oh.”
Looks like he couldn't stand the forum users' pressure and lifted the ban.
“As expected, when it's not streamer or VTuber stuff, bait suppression is all about going this far.”
The moment I was about to enter the forum and write a post, dopamine surging through me.
Crunch.
“Huh?”
Something made a crunching sound from my left shoulder.
My shoulder felt oddly cool.
When I turned my head, I saw that a chunk of flesh had been torn off my left shoulder, leaving a bite mark like someone had taken a bite out of an apple.
Crunch, crunch.
In midair, a lump of flesh was chewing away while blood dripped from it.
Blood was gushing from the torn-open shoulder. What that thing was greedily chewing on was me.
“Aaaagh!”
The pain of raw flesh being torn apart came rushing in only afterward.
A pain I'd never felt in my life started spreading through my whole body, centered on my shoulder.
“Hii…hiiiii!”
The urge to collapse onto the floor and writhe around was taking over my mind.
Dudududududak!
But my body rejected that command from my brain and started running at full speed on pure instinct.
Thud!
“Hrk!”
Even if I stumbled while running in that half-baked posture and my shoulder hit the ground, the hellish pain would engulf my whole body.
I let out a weird groan, got up on all fours like an animal, and forced myself to run again somehow.
How long had I been running?
By the time I came to and looked back, the blood trail from my shoulder stretched out in a long, crooked line.
Click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click
Starting from behind, then above, left, right, and even the floor, I obsessively snapped photos.
And in the photo I took behind me.
Two Smilers were grinning at the end of the long trail of blood.
One of them had teeth caked with blood and flesh.
“It definitely hadn't been in the picture.”
I had been snapping pictures of my surroundings constantly, so when the hell had they gotten that close?
Was there missing information in WhiteHacker's explanation?
Dizziness rose from the sheer absurdity of absurdity being dumped on top of an already absurd place.
Or was it because I'd lost too much blood?
Click-click-click-click-click-click
Without stopping, I pulled spare clothes out of my bag, tore them up, and wrapped my shoulder.
“Uuuuuugh!”
It was better than before, but the pain was still so hard to get used to that I almost blacked out for a moment. Somehow, though, I managed first aid.
Of course, that didn't suddenly make me okay or improve the situation.
My head was spinning. Nausea was rising in my stomach.
If I'd been unlucky enough to get bitten in the leg instead of the shoulder….
The pain from the torn-open shoulder surged up my spine once more.
“Haa… haa….”
The urge to swallow the euthanasia pills in my bag was swelling at an insane rate.
But that would have been too unfair.
If I was going to swallow them, I'd have done it a long time ago.
Slap!
After slapping both cheeks with my palms, I barely managed to steady my mind.
At times like this, being shameless is what keeps you alive.
They say even if a tiger drags you off, you can survive if you keep your head.
Though if a hunter got bitten by a Smiler, he'd die for sure.
I fought down the urge to let my mind twist and wrote a post on the forum.
[Thanks for unbanning me]
Author: ForumingIsEasy
[A meme of a blood-soaked inspector saying, “Nothing happened!”]
[Photo of a shoulder wrapped in clothes soaked through with blood]
[Photo of two Smilers]
I'm okay. Doing great.
But time was moving way too slowly.
I was going around taking a photo every three minutes and checking safe zones, you know?
Suddenly one popped up from nowhere and started munching on my shoulder.
There definitely wasn't a gimmick like that in what I'd read.
Still alive, so let's have a drink.
[댓글]
EntityFucker: Are you okay? Did you disinfect it properly?
WhiteHacker: Ah, shit, I mentioned the new video because of the bait and it got buried. I'll repost the summary.
LoreTweaker: That's why we don't send staff into places with brats involved.
HauntingSpiritNo.1: Looking at the fact he's still posting pics in the middle of all this, that guy's a real forum goblin.
ㄴGayWeirdGayYa: Looks like he spent the whole ban just hoarding pics from the forum.
Hound: The one on the right must be the new guy. Brush your teeth, man.
Click-click-click-click-click-click
I was obsessively scanning my surroundings and checking the comments when WhiteHacker's post went up.
[Why the Newbie's Shoulder Got Torn Off]
Author: WhiteHacker
[Video encoding in progress]
When the newbie got banned and the human-rights-forfeiture bait was circulating, a new video went up on that channel.
The video said that if you survive a day in Backrooms Level 0, a second Smiler appears.
The problem is that this one doesn't appear from far away; it shows up ridiculously close.
In the video, the protagonist is taking pictures with a camera, and because it appears at point-blank range, he almost gets bitten and runs away.
But the newbie didn't know that and ended up like that.
The bait was hot and the post got buried, but even if he'd known, he probably wouldn't have been able to respond.
The video's protagonist uses two really good cameras, and that's what saved him.
[댓글]
Why the hell does this goddamn liminal space get real-time live patches?
That's Field Management Department-level shit lol.
The problem was putting him in there in the first place when he was basically a pseudo-employee anyway.
If we're going to get screwed every time a video goes up or a wiki gets edited, can we even handle that?
Of all days, a new video had to go up today on a channel that can affect this Backrooms.
There was no worse bullshit than this.
“Three days ago, the first video. And today, a new one. At this rate, three days from now….”
Cold sweat broke out.
If this kept up, there'd be impossible, rigged bullshit on the last day that I couldn't prepare for.
Click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click
You want me to keep an eye on uploads while also keeping the two Smilers off me?
Impossible.
No matter how much I cut sleep and just stared at the forum, there was no way to prepare for absurdity that changes in real time.
Then what the hell am I supposed to do?
The only way was for someone to somehow beat the view count of the channel uploading the video right now.
There was no way something like that could suddenly become possible….
“It can.”
Click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click-click
The moment that brilliant idea flashed through my head, I started writing a post on the forum.
***
After school, at an elementary school somewhere in Seoul.
“Hey, hey, Park Yuchan, seen this?”
“What is it?”
Yoon Heesang called out to Park Yuchan, who had the mission of getting home quickly and play Blocklox.
“A new Backrooms video came out!”
“Oh, the American one? We watched that together.”
“Not that one! I mean the one that went up last night.”
“No?”
Hearing that indifferent answer, Yoon Heesang walked over to him with his smartphone in hand.
“This one, this one! Hurry up and watch it and leave a comment!”
“Why?”
“Watch it and you'll see. Hurry, put it at 3x speed!”
“Okay.”
The video began by showing Level 0 of the Backrooms.
A background he'd seen so many times it was practically boring by now.
But Yuchan's thoughts changed to surprise the moment he heard the voice in the video.
“I've been trapped in the Backrooms for a day.”
Instead of the incomprehensible English that is standard in Backrooms videos, what came through was Korean.
Instead, the subtitles attached to the video were in English.
Soon the screen shifted from the Backrooms scenery to a bloodied shoulder.
“Damn it, they said Level 0 would have nothing.”
“I'm recording this in real time to document the situation.”
“But I know the people watching this won't be able to believe it.”
“So if anyone can, please share this video and leave a comment. I'll answer every question I know.”
“Oh no. They're coming. I'll check the comments tomorrow morning. See you later!”
The short video ended there.
The description explained how to verify that you'd shared the video and said he'd answer 50 questions in the next video.
“You left a comment?”
“Of course.”
“Shared it too?”
“Yeah.”
After hearing his best friend's story, Yuchan immediately pulled out his smartphone and shared the link everywhere as instructed in the video.
Then he took a screenshot of it, sent it, and left a comment.
(Do you really die if you don't drink Almond Water?)
He didn't forget to like his own comment either.
That would raise the odds of getting selected.
He had to get home fast.
Because he'd have to use the home computer to ask all the questions with his mom's, dad's, and older brother's NewTube IDs.
“Park Yuchan!”
“What?”
Yoon Heesang called out to him as he hurried home.
His expression was unusually serious, as if he'd made a big decision.
“Like my comment too.”