Even if I fall into a ghost story, I still have to go to work
Chapter 77
I Guess I Still Have to Work Even After Falling Into a Horror Story 77
I Guess I Still Have to Work Even After Falling Into a Horror Story 077
I am currently walking up the stairs in a nightmare school with a Disaster Management Bureau Agent.
…While dragging said person along like a bound prisoner, that is.
For the record, I ambushed and bound him using an item he gave me.
“…….”
What a mess.
‘I can’t let it stay like this.’
I think I’ve crossed a line here.
By tomorrow, I’ll probably be on the Disaster Management Bureau’s blacklist, and if things go south, I might even be conscripted by the Scales of Evil.
The company would likely protect me, but I have no desire to deal with the insane situation of being indebted to Baekilmong Corporation…!
‘I have to rehabilitate my image somehow.’
The cold sweat on my back never seems to dry…
First, I spoke with a grave tone.
“If you swear not to scream, I’ll remove the gag. Just nod your head.”
The Agent’s eyes, which had been glaring as if they wanted to kill me, settled.
Then, very quietly, he gave a slight nod.
‘…He’s lying.’
If you’re going to deceive someone, at least try to be less obvious about it…!
Eventually, I sighed and spoke.
“I have no intention of harming you, nor do I intend to deceive you to leak Bureau information to report back to the company.”
“…….”
“And… as I made that statement just now, I felt no pain.”
“…!”
“I know the caramel you gave me is a torture-grade truth serum.”
The Agent’s pupils trembled.
“Of course, I don’t think you acted out of malice. It’s just….”
I looked into the air with a slightly melancholy gaze.
“Even though I didn’t explicitly mention I work for Baekilmong Corporation, I wanted to convey that I never intended to lie to you….”
Strictly speaking, that was a lie.
If things had turned sour, I was fully prepared to inject myself with painkillers from the Alien Shop’s rocket delivery and spout whatever lies I needed to survive.
Sure enough, a nauseating pain surged from within.
‘Ugh.’
A sensation like my stomach was being scraped raw, like a gastric ulcer.
But here, momentum was everything.
‘I can endure this much now without letting it show.’
The stronger the malice or intent behind the lie, the stronger the pain. Since what I just said was closer to an evasion, it probably wasn’t even Level 1.
Endure it.
‘Next is….’
Trust.
Simultaneously, I unfastened the small silver badge inside my pocket with one hand, slightly hiding my expression.
Then, I openly showed the item, the ‘Silver Heart,’ to the Agent.
“I am telling you this without relying on such effects.”
“…….”
“I’ll say it again. …If you swear not to scream, I’ll remove the gag. Just nod your head.”
An indescribable conflict swirled in the Agent’s eyes.
And by the time we stood on the landing.
He gave a very slight nod.
“…….”
Without a word, I removed the gag.
The Agent did not cause a scene, just as he had promised.
‘Hmm.’
Good. Next step.
I returned the Agent’s confiscated flashlight and pistol to his hands.
Then, I loosened the bindings on his arms.
“This is….”
“You’ll need to protect yourself in such a dire situation.”
‘Besides, that pistol is mostly useless against anything other than ghosts or supernatural phenomena anyway.’
They say it can work on evil people depending on the ammunition, but no matter how I looked at it, neither I nor Jang Heo-un seemed to fit the criteria for being that evil.
‘Mr. Jang Heo-un… there haven’t been any rumors of him doing anything crazy for the past three months.’
However, I didn’t completely undo the bindings, as I couldn’t have the Agent running away before I finished building rapport.
I attached a plausible excuse for that as well.
“It’s too dangerous for you to run off alone, so I’ll keep the bindings on only until your rational judgment returns.”
“…….”
It was just as we finished climbing the stairs, slowly keeping a lookout in all directions.
Suddenly, the Agent asked.
“Is ‘Roe Deer’ your codename?”
“…….”
“Don’t you people move in teams and call each other by nicknames taken from your masks?”
“…That’s correct.”
“Are you the Team Leader?”
“No. Just a new recruit. This person here… is my colleague.”
I gave a somewhat bitter smile as I took the half-mask from my pocket and held it to my face.
Immediately, the familiar texture, like bark with sprouting horns, covered my skin.
The Agent looked at me with a shocked expression.
Then, I heard Jang Heo-un’s dejected voice.
“…I’m sorry, Mr. Roe Deer. You were trying to help me…….”
“No, don’t be. You must have been very flustered.”
Compared to Baek Sa-heon, who was constantly trying to screw me over, I’d been prepared for this kind of situation since the moment I started pretending to be a temporary Agent….
Furthermore, Jang Heo-un even stepped up to make excuses for me to the Agent.
“Um, Mr. Roe Deer is a truly kind and good person. Even when we first met, he risked his life to save me from the darkness…….”
“It—it wasn’t that much.”
Nice shot!
“We just… helped each other. To survive the darkness together.”
“Mr. Roe Deer…….”
“…….”
The Agent fell silent with an even more complicated expression.
But I took it as a win that he didn’t try to bash my head in with the grip of his small pistol.
“…Entering the 4th floor.”
And so, we reached the top of the stairs.
[4F]
“…….”
We made it, but….
‘I’m nervous.’
In this horror story, things start to get more distorted from the 4th floor.
First, no announcements are made even if a student dies….
And it is extremely dark.
Bzzt…
Most of the lights were already broken or burnt out, and the few remaining ones were all flickering, save for a select few.
And the bigger problem was….
“…!!”
Gasp,
Dozens of students were standing in clusters in the hallway.
And they were already staring intently in this direction.
‘Ha.’
Those students, lined up on both sides of the dark school hallway like mannequins.
The student entities on the 4th floor are all 3rd-years, and in every exploration round that reached this floor, more than 100 individuals have been confirmed.
Hearing just that much makes it seem like the floor is designed for you to just die.
However.
“……It’s alright.”
The Agent provided information, albeit in a stiff voice.
“They cannot leave those spots.”
Right.
The 4th floor is truly bizarre. To begin with, we can’t actually witness those ‘students’ moving, but we still see them changing positions, right?
But the 4th-floor students can’t move.
It’s like their feet are glued to the classroom floors.
—From the 9th Exploration Record Recording
Since they stand still instead of lunging, you just have to avoid entering the radius of a student’s territory.
If you happen to need to approach one, you just have to keep staring at them to keep their movement completely frozen.
‘The problem is that it’s easy to lose sight of them because it’s so dark.’
And they were very… very cunning.
They often tried to catch you off guard with psychological warfare.
‘……Hmm.’
So that’s how it is.
After confirming that Jang Heo-un was wearing the Name Tag he’d obtained from a student of this school on his blazer, I spoke gravely.
“Then let’s investigate the 4th floor slowly and very carefully.”
There were no objections.
We stepped into the midst of the students.
‘Phew.’
Jang Heo-un swallowed hard.
The sensation was truly strange.
Trembling as he passed right next to the ‘student’ entities, so close that their uniform sleeves almost brushed against him.
But he gritted his teeth.
‘I have to be of help.’
It felt as though he had ruined this exploration for his grateful colleague, Kim Sol-eum.
What had Kim Sol-eum been trying to do by accompanying the Agent?
‘He was probably aiming for a… high-score clear, right?’
According to the manual, the longer you survive and the more Name Tags you collect, the higher the concentration of the liquid in the Dream Collector tends to be, but…….
Perhaps because it was too dangerous, Kim Sol-eum didn’t even glance at the Name Tags attached to the 4th-floor students.
‘…I don’t know.’
Jang Heo-un decided not to judge.
Relying on his own intellect had never been a good habit.
He simply focused intently on the students they were approaching.
In particular, when entering areas where the lights were all broken or flickering, he obsessively shone his flashlight.
Thump, thump.
“Mr. Bison, please watch the rear.”
“Yes.”
His voice trembled thinly.
Jang Heo-un walked backward, watching their six.
In the space they had just passed, he saw dozens of students turning their heads toward them, reaching out their hands….
“I see the music room over there. Let’s hang in there until we reach it.”
They moved their feet.
Soon, they entered a section with no lights at all.
‘Phew.’
In the suffocating darkness, the students stood still, yet continued to peer at them with eerie intensity.
It was the moment they were pushing through the gaps, illuminating the way with their flashlights.
Flicker.
A light flickered somewhere. It felt like a power outage had occurr….
‘Eh?’
Wait a minute.
Something was wrong.
‘How did a light flicker when there are no lamps here?’
And Jang Heo-un realized a moment too late.
It wasn’t a power outage.
What flickered was….
The flashlight of someone walking ahead.
Just now, someone had lost their field of vision.
“…!”
Jang Heo-un almost turned around. But a calm voice struck his back first.
“Don’t look back.”
“You…!”
“Just… keep walking.”
Kim Sol-eum’s voice was laced with panting.
And….
The smell of iron.
Drip, drip….
In the vision of Jang Heo-un, who was walking backward, he noticed red liquid dripping onto the floor from a certain point.
He couldn’t see clearly because he was watching the students, but the soles of his shoes were slippery.
And,
Jang Heo-un also saw the hand of a student reaching out into the center of the hallway, far enough to bump into his waist.
It was stained red, blood dripping from it.
Jang Heo-un suppressed the urge to gag.
“M-Mr. Roe Deer…!”
When they finally broke through the cluster of students and he turned around.
Kim Sol-eum was clutching his stomach, his face pale as a ghost.
And the flashlight in his hand flickered once more.
He smiled with a pallid face.
“……The battery,”
—Effective Lighting Time: 60 minutes
That was it.
Emergency flashlights didn’t have such a long usage time.
‘Ah…!’
The two of them, who had brought their own supplies and kept the emergency flashlights as spares for true emergencies, had failed to consider the remaining time on the flashlight the other was holding…!
“J-just a moment… ugh.”
“D-don’t speak!”
Jang Heo-un tried his best to support Kim Sol-eum while fighting back his nausea. The Agent reflexively joined in.
Thus, the Baekilmong Corporation employee and the Disaster Management Bureau official hurriedly supported the man into a classroom.
A few students were peering in there as well, so they laboriously set the man down in an area where the students couldn’t reach.
And Kim Sol-eum, while seated and pressing down on his wound, spoke.
“You two.”
“…….”
“Leave me and go.”
Wearing the horned mask, he clutched his wound and forced a strained smile.
“Ah, wait a moment.”
Kim Sol-eum reached out with the hand that wasn’t holding his stomach and completely undid the Disaster Management Bureau Agent’s bindings.
“I forgot. You can go now….”
The Agent didn’t even listen; he rummaged through his pockets, pulled out a spare Name Tag, and stuffed it into Kim Sol-eum’s pocket.
But….
“You don’t have to give it to me. Didn’t you have a place to use it?”
“…….”
“Please go. There must be others from your side on this floor. If you join up with them, ugh, you’ll be fine.”
Kim Sol-eum’s brow furrowed slightly before smoothing out.
“Actually, even if I die like this, it won’t be a big problem for my employment. The company will be satisfied with this much….”
“That damn company!”
The Agent clenched his fists.
“Why on earth do you people believe in such a ridiculous, disgusting organization?!”
It was as if a sore spot had been touched.
“Do you really think a company that treats human life so cheaply will actually grant your wishes?”
“…!”
Jang Heo-un looked at the Agent in surprise.
The Agent spoke through gritted teeth.
“I know all about you working for the Wishrights. Do you really believe in that absurd illusion? That a magic potion will grant any wish?”
Kim Sol-eum looked up at the Agent blankly.
“It does.”
“…….”
“If the Wishright were a lie, this structure couldn’t be maintained. Once you actually get one, it grants whatever wish you have.”
“……Phew.”
The official let out a sigh as if he was going crazy with frustration, then repeated a logic he seemed to have built up over a long time.
“Think about it. Suppose someone wishes for world peace and someone else wishes for the extinction of humanity. How can both of those contradictory wishes be granted?”
Jang Heo-un, wearing the bison mask, flinched.
But Kim Sol-eum remained composed.
“From the perspective of the person making the wish, yes. It is granted.”
“What… does that,”
“It means the Wishright isn’t a tool meant to change the world; it’s an object that omnipotently fulfills an individual’s wish.”
Whatever did that mean?
It sounded like some cult-like salvation theory.
However, Kim Sol-eum’s attitude wasn’t one of religious fanaticism, but rather the resignation of someone who had inductively verified the situation multiple times….
The Agent looked at him with a confused mind, but Kim Sol-eum merely shrugged.
“Anyway, I think this is it for me.”
“…!”
From beneath the hand pressing on his stomach, blood gushed out.
The bleeding wasn’t being controlled at all.
Kim Sol-eum handed the Name Tag back into the Bronze Agent’s hand.
There was blood on the Name Tag.
The Agent gritted his teeth.
“Even if you’re dragged here every dark moon and keep giving up your Name Tags, that company will never help you.”
“Perhaps so.”
Kim Sol-eum shrugged again, wincing slightly from the pain, yet he still smiled.
“But the Disaster Management Bureau will one day be able to end this darkness… I mean, this disaster. Then I’ll be completely free, too.”
“……!!”
The Agent looked at Kim Sol-eum as if he’d been struck.
“Please go, you two. It could be dangerous if you keep looking back like this.”
Kim Sol-eum looked up and shone his still-functioning emergency flashlight outside the classroom.
“While you’re going, I’ll keep watch ahead as much as I can.”
“…….”
“And, since Mr. Bison is a rookie and hasn’t really done anything wrong, I’d appreciate it if you could stay together safely for a while.”
“Mr. Roe Deer….”
The Agent was conflicted.
But eventually, he gritted his teeth, turned around, and walked away with his flashlight.
“Follow me.”
“Ah….”
Jang Heo-un hesitated, but finally made up his mind.
‘There’s nothing I can do for him even if I stay….’
It might be easier for Kim Sol-eum if he just disappeared quickly.
But he couldn’t just leave, so he secretly slipped something into Kim Sol-eum’s arms.
“Mr. Roe Deer, this… this is my spare Name Tag.”
“…!”
“I lived longer because of you… and I don’t have anyone else to save. It’s not much, but even just one… thank you.”
And before he could even hear an answer, he left to follow the Agent.
Unable to bring himself to look back.
“…….”
As promised, Kim Sol-eum watched the Agent and Jang Heo-un leave for a moment.
And then….
‘It worked!’
The moment they turned the corner and disappeared, he hurriedly pulled out the item he had prepared from his pocket.
A single Googly Eye Candy, individually wrapped in plastic.
From those warm days,
The magic candy!
The red, yellow, and white old-fashioned Googly Eye Candy sat large inside its nostalgic wrapper.
[Nostalgia Can-dy]
The emergency recovery medicine Kim Sol-eum had purchased.
He unwrapped it with bloody hands, popped a piece into his mouth, and started rolling it around.
Then, a change began to occur.
“…!”
The wounds on his body began to close.
The spilled blood was reabsorbed, and broken bones naturally reconnected into their original forms.
As if time were being rewound.
As the candy rolls in your mouth
Old memories come back to life!
While the Googly Eye Candy is melting in your mouth, it fixes the consumer’s state to their healthiest physical and mental peak from the past 10 years.
‘Since this is a dream anyway, a temporary fix like this is enough.’
His condition improved drastically, and his mind became sharp.
His brain was firing on all cylinders.
‘I succeeded…!’
Kim Sol-eum let out a sigh of relief.
His calculated move had worked perfectly.
The most effective method to use in this kind of situation.
‘As expected, nothing beats a death-induced retirement.’
He had narrowly seized the opportunity to simultaneously gain freedom for his exploration and rehabilitate his image.
‘I was so nervous I’d miss the timing of the emergency flashlight dying.’
He brushed himself off and stood up, letting out another long sigh of relief.
His heart was racing.
A mix of liberation and fear.
‘…Alright.’
Now I know what to do.
Kim Sol-eum stood up, checked the tattoo that had reappeared, and pulled a spare high-powered flashlight from within it to grip in his hand.
After taking a deep breath, he stepped out of the classroom and took a single step alone into the dark 4th-floor hallway.
