Chapter 41
“Huff... huff... huff....”
I caught my breath as quietly as possible. If it got too loud, the sound might give me away.
Clang, clang, clang.
I was hiding in an alley after fleeing the Red Mask, who had suddenly twisted her expression and charged at me.
“You dared to make me feel ashamed! I’ll tear that disgusting mouth of yours to shreds!”
Not long after we encountered each other, she suddenly shouted something completely out of nowhere, took off her mask to reveal her torn mouth, and charged at me.
I didn’t know how deep a grudge she held, but anyone would have run from someone carrying a massive pair of solid-steel scissors that looked capable of causing tetanus.
Worried that she might have pinpointed my location, I crouched as small as possible and hid in the corner.
“Come out right noooooooooow!”
Fortunately, it seemed the other party was just as unable to see even an inch ahead through the dense fog.
“I’ll kill you! I’ll find you and tear you apart with these scissors, starting with your mouth and working over your whole body!”
Clang, clang, clang....
The cries and snipping sounds that had been drawing closer gradually began to recede, then soon fell silent.
“Haa....”
I curled up where I was.
Even though the unchanging silence continued to embrace the fog-covered streets.
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As time passed, my mind cleared enough for me to regain some composure.
The first thing my restarting brain questioned was the current situation.
How had I gone from inside the Bureau to this place?
Staying only in the hospital and the Bureau was driving me stir-crazy.
When I tried to go outside, the old geezer tried to stop me, but I couldn’t bring myself to say anything rude to an old man, so I said I’d handle it myself and came out.
A portion of a post written under my name.
Even the biggest idiot should know this wasn’t the time to bring up hacking or anything.
I didn’t want to believe it, but that had to be something I wrote.
The mental contamination the counseling room had failed to catch must have been progressing.
But even so, it didn’t make sense.
If I’d been capable of writing posts like that unconsciously, there was no way I wouldn’t have been caught by my teammates.
It was obvious that something—anything—must have happened during the time I wasn’t aware of.
Then why had my seniors left me like this?
The questions that came to me as my mind cleared kept leading to more questions.
I wanted to say we should get out first and think about it afterward, if possible.
But the fact that my teammates were involved kept me from easily cutting off those distracting thoughts.
Vrrrrrr-!
My terminal began to vibrate violently.
I couldn’t help being startled by the sudden vibration.
For good reason: that wasn’t my usual gallery notification, but....
[Team Leader Imina: Did another team grab you when you went to the bathroom?]
It was the messenger’s vibration pattern, which had never gone off even once inside an entity.
[Me: When I came to my senses, I had landed in a strange neighborhood.]
[Team Leader Imina: Are you okay?]
[Me: I was attacked once, but I’m okay.]
[Team Leader Imina: I sent this because Yuna and Chaeyoung said you weren’t replying to their messages. Haven’t you received anything from them?]
There was no way I had. The two Messenger contacts hadn’t updated since last night.
[Me: I can’t see any messages from them.]
[Team Leader Imina: Then I suppose it’s somewhere I’ve been before. Tell me about your current situation and its features.]
I looked around briefly, then sent Imina a summary of what I could see and what I’d experienced moments ago.
After a short while, Imina sent me an entity report.
[Team Leader Imina: Toy Box.txt]
[Team Leader Imina: You’ll probably feel that something about your situation is off. I recommend turning on the recorder app and checking it later.]
[Team Leader Imina: My messages will probably stop coming soon too, so read the report carefully and stay hidden. I’ll somehow make it there if you can hold out for just one hour.]
[Team Leader Imina: But the hospital and the school are off-limits. Absolutely.]
After receiving the last message, I immediately sent one asking why those two places were forbidden, but all I got back was a notice saying I was outside the service area.
Everything was a mystery. It was common sense that entities couldn’t attack inside the Bureau.
So the teammates who knew something must have let me go to the bathroom, then contacted me because I’d been gone too long.
But why had I left the Bureau, and why had I been caught up in an entity the instant I went outside?
Before organizing my thoughts, I opened the entity report.
Then I spotted one all-too-familiar word.
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[Entity Report]
Toy Box (37)
Rank: Level 2 (1–4)
Classification: Composite Type (Entity-Type & Location-Type)
※ Sentences displayed in bold in the report are presumed to be messages left by Scientist Madnificent.
No cases of information contamination or mental contamination caused by these sentences have been confirmed to date.
In addition, a phenomenon has been confirmed in which related phrases are discovered each time new information about the inside of the Toy Box is recorded,
but it was judged not to have a meaningful impact on entity analysis, so they have been omitted from the report.
Once you’re done playing with your toys, you have to clean them up properly!
The Toy Box is one of the inventions created by Scientist Madnificent.
Strictly speaking, it qualifies as a tool-type entity, but considering its unusual nature—an independent space and multiple entities existing inside it—the Bureau classifies it as a composite type.
The Toy Box is presumed to have been created to isolate multiple entities in a separate dimension.
Following an interview with ■■■, it was confirmed that an entity must consent to exist inside the “Toy Box.”
Each Toy Box is assigned a unique number, and the internal environment and entities contained within differ according to that number.
Based on investigations to date, only entities up to Level 3 have been confirmed in Toy Boxes numbered from 1 through the 50s.
※ In the case of Level 3 entities, only location-type entities that are safe unless entered have been confirmed.
The Bureau has completed investigations of 140 Toy Boxes to date, and estimates that the total number is around 150.
Analysis of cases involving the Toy Box showed that Bureau employees accounted for an overwhelmingly higher proportion than civilians.
The victims all shared one thing: they had experience coming into contact with entities created by Scientist Madnificent.
It was also confirmed that the greater the number and frequency of their contact, the more likely they were to enter Toy Boxes with higher numbers.
Among these, Toy Box No. 37 is one of the numbered Toy Boxes most frequently encountered by Bureau employees.
Toy Box No. 37 consists of a small urban environment shrouded in dense fog.
To date, a total of 28 types of entities have been confirmed, including “Red Mask,” “Yeondoo High School,” and “Eternal Life General Hospital.”
Most entities other than Red Mask have their own areas of activity and tend not to attack first unless someone enters their respective territory (inside a building).
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The prime suspect behind my abduction: Scientist Madnificent.
What on earth was that thing, that its name kept appearing in the entity reports for “The Town Where Time Stopped” and “The Forest of the Faceless”?
I didn’t have enough time to play twenty questions alone. Even now, Red Mask was probably searching for me with the intent of chopping me into pieces.
The surroundings were quiet, but I kept thinking I could hear the clatter of scissors.
I hurriedly scrolled down the screen and searched for a way to escape the Toy Box.
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What’s the point of putting toys in a box if they break each other apart!
Three methods of escaping “Toy Box No. 37” have been confirmed to date.
Enter “Eternal Life General Hospital,” then leave through the normal discharge procedure.
Enter “Yeondoo High School,” score at least 85 points on the open-book exam, and exit through the school gate.
Survive for at least five hours inside “Toy Box No. 37.”
Both “Eternal Life General Hospital” and “Yeondoo High School,” mentioned above, are Level 3 location-type entities.
Therefore, if survival in Toy Box No. 37 is the top priority, surviving for five hours without entering either location is judged to be the safest method of escape.
The following is a list of the entities included in Toy Box No. 37 and their characteristics.
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It was sheer fucking insanity. This was a place with 28 entities that might do God knew what to me if they caught me.
To make matters worse, two of the three escape methods weren’t even options.
If I happened to run into the director of Eternal Life General Hospital, who apparently wanted to dote on me, I’d become a test subject on the spot.
As for Yeondoo High School, if even Team Leader Imina told me not to go there, I couldn’t imagine what might be inside.
The exam couldn’t possibly be normal, either.
At least, unlike in some AV plot, it wasn’t as if every entity was chasing me... but....
That didn’t make the woman with the torn mouth chasing me with rusty steel scissors any less dangerous.
In the end, the best I could do was find somewhere to hide or keep moving around while avoiding Red Mask.
For now, as Team Leader had said, I turned on the recorder app on my terminal.
I had to check it from time to time to figure out what was happening to me.
All right. Deep breaths. If I just stay hidden and keep moving carefully from now on, I can get out without any problems.
Especially since Team Leader said they’d be here in an hour.
If I could just meet Team Leader, I should be able to get out without incident.
“Phew....”
I covered my face with both hands and rubbed it with my dry palms.
Stay strong. Stay strong and just avoid Red Mask.
It was just as I thought that and removed my palms from my face.
“I’m gonna kill youuuuuuu!!!!!!!!!!”
My field of vision suddenly changed.
Without warning, what entered my view was not the foggy outdoors from moments ago, but the inside of a fairly old school.
Against a backdrop of the hallway, Red Mask was shouting while clacking the rusty steel scissors in both hands.
My body stiffened at the sudden change.
“It was nice when you could say weird things and run away, huh? What should I do? Now it’s my turn to have some fun.”
Clamp!
“...!”
As Red Mask shrieked and took a stance to charge, someone clamped a hand over my mouth from behind.
Clang! Crunch!
At the same time, a crisp metallic clang rang out, followed by the sound of something shattering.