Chapter 4

Chapter 4. Staff-Only Passage (2)

[4. At midnight, the lights will be turned off for approximately one minute for inspection of the lighting system. During the blackout, please stop moving and remain quiet to prevent unexpected accidents.]

“Did I tell you to do anything so great? I just told you to check whether the walkie-talkie works.”

A man was confronting San-hyeok, trembling in front of him as San-hyeok clicked his tongue.

The man, who had an extremely faint presence, was an ordinary office worker named Kim Cheol-su, and he did not have any particular set role.

However, if he survived, San-hyeok would bully him like that and constantly start trouble with him. There was even a tip saying to kill him off early unless you wanted to raise the difficulty on your own.

“Is it you again?”

There it was. The first line that began the confrontation between San-hyeok and the protagonist.

Since the righteous protagonist had tried to treat him without prejudice at first, it should have been a line he said much later, but it seemed to have been moved forward because of the earlier incident.

“Again? What’s that supposed to mean, pig?”

It was an isolated space full of strangers meeting for the first time.

San-hyeok seemed to have already finished grasping the people around him and began acting out openly.

Discord within the group was never a good sign, so it was only troublesome for Su-myeon.

‘I can’t see well….’

Besides, with more than ten people there, he could barely see the heads of the men talking.

Su-myeon gave up on staying in the middle, turned his body slightly, and stepped one pace farther forward.

Between the people facing off, he could see one open drawer and one walkie-talkie inside it.

“Th-that person earlier also… disappeared after breaking a rule! I don’t want to touch that thing!”

After shouting that, Cheol-su suddenly ran out of nowhere and hid behind Su-myeon, who had just stepped forward.

No, I wasn’t planning to shield anyone….

“You again?”

This time, San-hyeok spat out a line that gave Su-myeon déjà vu.

Please set up that rivalry only with the protagonist and do not waste it on an extra like me, who is outside the discussion.

Su-myeon simply felt a little wronged, but before he could respond, Ju-hee shouted sharply.

“If you’re so curious, why don’t you touch it yourself?! Why are you doing this to someone who said he doesn’t want to?”

“What is this tiny little thing saying… Ha, do you even know who I am…?”

San-hyeok kept letting out hollow laughs and making sounds like ha, huh, and wow. But frankly, who he was did not matter very much right now.

Everyone was in the same situation, trapped in an unknown space without a single coin to their names.

San-hyeok swept his gaze over the group members who were throwing hostile looks at him, as though he still wanted to play king among them, and stepped forward.

“Fuck, fine. If you don’t want to, then don’t. You cowardly bastards.”

After saying that, San-hyeok abruptly tried to grab the walkie-talkie inside the drawer.

It seemed San-hyeok wanted to put on a bluff like this and seize the momentum.

If that kind of troublemaker died on his own, Su-myeon would be thankful, but the problem was that this was not an action that placed only San-hyeok in danger.

‘If anyone touches it, the crazy clown will chase us!’

Wanting to maintain a peaceful time as much as possible, Su-myeon kicked the drawer shut with his foot.

The drawer closed right before San-hyeok could grab the walkie-talkie inside, and San-hyeok glared at him with a vicious expression.

However, Su-myeon could not immediately say the words that had risen in his mind.

How was he supposed to explain this naturally?

“Um….”

“Mr. Su-myeon is right. Even if it is your own life, I will stop dangerous behavior.”

While Su-myeon hesitated, Han-su stepped forward first and stood in front of him as if protecting him.

But… Mr. Protagonist. I haven’t said anything yet.

“You people are putting on a show.”

San-hyeok looked at Han-su and Su-myeon, twisted his lips, and answered coldly.

“You think you’re somehow different from me? You there, and you! You!”

He began pointing wildly at the other group members who had been watching the whole situation.

“You were all curious too, and you thought it’d be good if the walkie-talkie really worked and connected to the outside, so you just watched this whole thing, didn’t you?”

So why the fuck are you only making a fuss at me?

At San-hyeok’s words, which he muttered while chewing on curses, none of them could answer recklessly, and they merely watched one another’s reactions.

While Cheol-su and San-hyeok had been arguing over the walkie-talkie, the fact that everyone had merely watched probably had not been an act of outright malice.

But, as was true of most modern people, it was not their problem.

It would be troublesome if they stepped forward for no reason and got caught in the sparks.

So they had simply thought someone else would help.

‘I’m one of those people too….’

If this had been any ordinary situation, Su-myeon might not have stepped forward either.

He was only stopping San-hyeok because he knew in advance that his actions could place Su-myeon himself in danger too.

“Let us move together instead of wasting our strength pointlessly. If you make any more trouble, I will not stand by.”

Han-su spoke with a displeased expression at San-hyeok’s attitude.

The problem was that the more he did that, the more excited San-hyeok became.

“What are you going to do if you don’t stand by?! What are you going to do?!”

In the meantime, more time than expected had been delayed.

Leaving San-hyeok and Han-su bickering behind him, Su-myeon took out his phone.

[AM 11:59]

This damn….

No one had noticed amid the commotion, but just in time, a new safety rule about the noon blackout had appeared.

He had needed to watch the timing and convey it naturally, but because of that bastard, everything had gone completely wrong.

“Ah, a Korean police officer is going to hit someone. Huh? He’s going to hit me! Huh! Go on, hit me! I said hit me!”

Unable to keep watching San-hyeok as he finally started an immature fight, Su-myeon’s foot moved first.

It was something like the harmful aftereffect of taekwondo, which his mother had sent him to as a child to fix his laziness.

“Guhk….”

Kicked by the sudden attack, San-hyeok fell over and rolled across the floor.

There had been hundreds of moments while playing the game when Su-myeon had wanted to hit him once, but before he even had time to feel refreshed, he shouted.

“Shut your mouth for a second! Everyone, when the lights go out, don’t move and don’t say a single….”

He tried to quickly bring the situation under control, but time was too short.

Before Su-myeon could even finish speaking, pitch-black darkness filled the surroundings.

“…….”

Su-myeon immediately shut his mouth.

Perhaps most of them had taken his warning seriously, or perhaps they had been swept along by the atmosphere, but fortunately, the surroundings were quiet, and only the sound of breathing continued.

At least everyone was able to find some stability thanks to Su-myeon’s action of holding up his phone at the very end.

[PM 12:00]

Together with the screen displaying the time, a faint light shone in the darkness.

Because there was at least some light rather than seeing nothing at all, everyone was able to feel much more at ease.

“Sniff….”

A very faint sound came from someone, as if they were sobbing.

Su-myeon was so tense that he could not even swallow dryly, and before he knew it, he was holding his breath.

49 seconds, 50 seconds, 51 seconds….

Even if it was not exact, Su-myeon kept counting the time inwardly.

The one minute felt several times longer, like an eternity.

[PM 12:01]

As the time on the phone screen changed, the fluorescent lights began flickering on all at once with a humming sound.

It worked. They had gotten through it. Unfortunately, that sense of relief was immediately shattered.

“U-uwahhh!”

“Kyaaaah!”

As soon as the lights came on, screams poured out from every direction.

The startled people looked around, and several more screams followed.

Bloodstains and torn pieces of flesh were strewn everywhere.

Clearly, he had only barely heard a small sobbing sound, so who in the world had moved?

Su-myeon, who was trying to identify the missing person, checked Ju-hee first.

“H-how did… this…….”

Ju-hee was unharmed, covering her mouth with a shocked face.

The person who was inevitably supposed to die on this floor had survived.

For now, that meant the game’s development could change depending on Su-myeon’s actions.

Then if it was not her, who on earth….

“Ha… hahahaha! Haha! Serves him right~”

At San-hyeok’s words as he burst into delighted laughter, Su-myeon turned his head too, and had no choice but to bite his lip hard to keep himself from screaming.

Horror maniacs worth their salt would pride themselves on being immune to all kinds of brutal sights.

Su-myeon was also like that, but anything artificially made failed to express even a quarter of the overwhelming presence of the real thing.

Already, this was the second time today.

Faced with the brutal sight, Su-myeon clenched his fist hard to pull himself together.

“Is… is he dead…?”

“What do we do!”

“Ugh….”

The trembling voices of people everywhere and the sound of someone retching mixed together dizzyingly.

On the wall in the direction everyone was looking, Cheol-su was hanging.

Literally, Cheol-su’s body was fixed to the wall like the stuffed carcass of a beast.

Through the torn gap in his belly skin, as though a red flower had bloomed there, the things that had pushed their way out exposed their raw crimson flesh.

“Ugh… uuuugh….!”

While everyone froze in shock, a groaning moan flowed from Cheol-su.

Even though the things that should have been inside his stomach were dangling out, human vitality was tenacious, and his breath had not yet stopped.

“S-save….”

Cheol-su’s voice, as though it might cut off at any moment, continued desperately.

“He’s alive!”

At someone’s shout after hearing that sound, the fainthearted people collapsed where they stood, and a few braver ones approached the wall where Cheol-su was hanging.

“Hurry, help him!”

Ju-hee was at the very front, but because she had a small build, she could not even reach the feet of Cheol-su, who was hanging high on the wall.

Drop, drop. Heavy drops of blood, like a thick mucus mixed with something rather than plain blood, fell and dirtied her clothes.

“W-wait!”

At Ju-hee’s actions, Han-su and several others stepped forward and began thinking of a solution.

Don’t tell me they’re going to bring that down? Su-myeon stepped forward and stopped them from doing something that could not possibly help.

Everyone had missed it because his torn belly looked like the greatest injury, but Su-myeon alone had seen it.

In Cheol-su’s bloodstained hand, he was holding a foreign object that had been sewn there with a large wire.

“See? You were going to end up holding it anyway, so why did you do that?”

San-hyeok seemed to have noticed the same thing, and he opened the drawer beside him again.

The walkie-talkie that had clearly been inside it was now sewn to Cheol-su’s hand.

“…Quickly, we don’t have time. We need to leave this place right now!”

After grasping the situation, Su-myeon raised his head again and looked at Cheol-su.

As though he had just exhaled his final breath along with that groan, Cheol-su’s body was now hanging limply without any strength.

Even the pool of blood already gathered beneath his feet was enough for him to have died from excessive blood loss.

However, Han-su seemed unable to give up and reached out, grabbing his leg.

“Wait….”

“Mr. Kang Han-su! That man is dead now! Don’t you understand?!”

This kind of role is the worst. The worst.

After shouting that, Su-myeon left the place first and began running.

They had to quickly give up on the dead and save the living first.

If they wasted time pointlessly trying to bring down a corpse, they would only end up the same way.

THUD! THUD THUD THUD THUD!

As soon as Su-myeon began running, the sound of something enormous charging toward them could be heard.

Soon, the remaining group members, who had grasped the situation, also left Cheol-su behind and began running after Su-myeon.

The number of people was now fourteen, but that was not a small number.

Su-myeon had clearly been the first to start running, but before he knew it, the people began overtaking him one after another.

“Huff… huff!”

Was a lifetime of laziness coming back as karma like this?

Su-myeon could only try not to fall behind last.

“Th-there’s a fork!”

Before he knew it, Ju-hee’s clear voice, even while she ran at the very front in high heels, carried all the way to the back.

At those words, Su-myeon lifted his head.

[ <-Arcade ] [ Back Office-> ]

At the fork, a sign was kindly written there.

That was it. The marker he had been looking for! Seeing it, Su-myeon shouted.

“Left!”