Chapter 102: Trap (2)

[An unquantifiable singularity has occurred. The full document for ‘The Mountain of the Red Cloak’ is scheduled to be revised. Anyone currently carrying the previous rules is advised to dispose of the entire document.]

Thirty minutes before Han-su and Su-myeon reunited.

'Goddamn it!'

Su-myeon was wringing out his soaked clothes while grinding out curses in his head that he could not bring himself to say aloud.

After looking around, he had no idea how this had happened, but there was no doubt that this was The Mountain of the Red Cloak.

The fire-scorched trees and the strangely alien-looking ridgeline were far too familiar.

First they had nearly burned to death because there was no water.

Had the place cunningly drawn in the water from the Dragon Palace and released it onto the mountain behind it?

What was even harder to understand was that parts of White Night Land seemed to have been mixed into this place as well.

It was difficult to make sense of so many ghost stories becoming tangled together like this.

At least, nothing in Su-myeon’s knowledge suggested that such a thing should happen.

“W-where are we now? What in the world is going on...?”

Jae-hak, who had finally begun to hope that they might escape, now looked almost completely despairing.

Anyone could tell that this still was not reality.

“The way out is farther than I expected.”

“...What?”

Jae-hak looked somewhat confused by Su-myeon’s words, which held more frustration than fear or discouragement.

Was this not actually a dangerous situation?

While Jae-hak struggled to understand, Su-myeon sighed and took out his Heartphone.

“......Still works.”

Fortunately, getting a little wet had not broken it.

Leaving Ju-hee and Cheshire behind as they busied themselves trying to sort out their drenched clothes and hair, he activated Dokkaebi AI.

Questions that went beyond the limits of his own understanding were usually clearer when asked through this.

[Can ghost stories mix together? I thought they were normally separated from one another.]

When Su-myeon asked Dokkaebi AI, it fortunately gave him an answer almost immediately.

A most exquisite question!

Though shaped through wicked means, what hath been born is nevertheless born.

That which exists still exists, and in one form or another, it is bound to remain.

Even that which someone casts away doth not simply vanish. At the very least, rubbish remaineth.

What the hell is that supposed to mean?

As though it had read Su-myeon’s thoughts, a simpler sentence was added.

Use thy head, mortal.

Something that someone cast away was absorbed into a ghost story.

Put that way, one possibility immediately came to mind.

Su-myeon turned to Cheshire, who was shaking his head in disgust like a cat that hated water.

“...Cheshire. Can you still use that ability you had to move between spaces?”

At Su-myeon’s question, Cheshire, who had been picking up Rose Coins scattered around them, faintly furrowed his brow.

He handed Su-myeon a fistful of coins before answering.

“......Obviously not? If I could, I would’ve gotten us out ages ago...? I’m human now, remember....”

You certainly have strength that doesn’t seem very human.

Setting that minor detail aside.

In the end, it meant that the power Cheshire had once possessed to move between different spaces, which he had later discarded, had been absorbed into the ghost story itself.

And because of that, different ghost stories had begun to mix together.

Groaning quietly, Su-myeon wiped his glasses and organized his thoughts before calling the group together once everyone had finished straightening out their clothes.

“One thing is certain. Part of this place is White Night Land.”

As far as he knew, it was the only ghost story set in an amusement park.

The Ferris wheel, though somewhat run-down, was still operating well enough to make it obvious that this was an amusement park.

“Let’s get out of here quickly. If this is White Night Land, that actually makes things easier. We just need to find the entrance.”

With that conclusion, the group headed straight toward the Ferris wheel.

There was no real fence separating the areas.

At some point, paved blocks began appearing sporadically along the mountain trail, followed by amusement rides standing where they had no business being.

And then came that very familiar, miserable sound of a flute.

“But... is it really okay for us to enter like this without admission tickets?”

Around then, Ju-hee raised a very reasonable point.

Su-myeon slapped the back of Jae-hak’s hand as the man had started violently scratching at his own ears, then answered.

“No. It isn’t.”

As for a countermeasure, they had one if you wanted to call it that.

When Su-myeon explained the only solution that came to mind, Cheshire burst out laughing while Ju-hee calmly nodded.

“Of course. That kind of plan.”

“I’m not exactly a welcome guest here anyway.”

Even as Su-myeon spoke indifferently, he too was beginning to notice the problems with White Night Land.

'So much for the Ferris wheel operating normally.'

It was turning so precariously that he half expected it to collapse at any moment.

On top of that, the employees occasionally wandering nearby looked completely different from how they had before.

At the sight of them dragging what appeared to be corpses strapped to their backs, Ju-hee’s face went pale.

She had probably imagined what might have happened to her younger brother if they had failed to find him that day.

“Guest, could I perhaps see your admission ticket?”

At that moment, an employee who had been lying in the undergrowth suddenly grabbed Su-myeon by the ankle and spoke in a flat voice.

They had been so focused on watching for enemies at eye level that they had failed to notice it.

But—

Crack-

Ju-hee raised the crowbar that had become completely familiar in her hands and brought it straight down on the monster’s head.

Thud-

The employee in green overalls collapsed limply after Ju-hee’s blow shattered its skull.

That was Su-myeon’s solution to entering without permission.

If there was a problem, beat every employee down and run.

“Haa....”

Fortunately, this time they had been caught by an employee that was already half-dead and crawling along the ground, so dealing with it had been easy.

While Ju-hee let out a breath, Cheshire carefully hid the corpse in the bushes.

Whatever story the person who had once been a missing victim might have had, there was no longer any way to know it.

“May you rest in peace now.”

With Ju-hee’s quiet murmur, spoken perhaps to ease what little guilt remained in her heart, they moved farther inside once again, bringing the trembling Jae-hak with them.

After all, as long as there were no witnesses, it was fine.

“Let’s try to reduce the causality cost as much as possible while we search.”

Because the entire structure had changed, they had no idea where the exit was anymore.

Attractions that should have been located on opposite sides of the park were now right next to each other, while other things that should have been there were missing entirely.

Jae-hak had already spent too long inside a ghost story, and his mental resilience had weakened considerably.

He would not last much longer here.

Even if they had to act recklessly, the key was to avoid wasting time and force their way through as quickly as possible.

“But... why are these things like this now? What in the world happened here...?”

Ju-hee gestured toward the wax figures that had completely melted into the ground here and there.

Perhaps because her own brother had once suffered the same fate.

The figures, with parts of their bodies melted away until they no longer held a proper shape, were clearly different from the ones in the White Night Land she remembered.

Unable to control their stiff bodies, they were all facing toward something....

'Toward something?'

As Su-myeon examined them, he suddenly realized that every single one was looking in the same direction.

The flute sounded almost ecstatic now, stirring an urge inside him to tear open his own eardrums so he could hear it even more closely.

“.......”

He pushed aside the implanted thought.

Then turned his attention back to the wax figures’ suspicious behavior.

If they were ignoring Su-myeon’s group and acting strangely for some other reason....

“......There’s a chance the other field team that entered White Night Land still hasn’t returned, right?”

At Su-myeon’s words, Ju-hee covered her mouth again.

That made sense.

If White Night Land had changed this much, there was a strong possibility that Han-su’s group was still wandering somewhere nearby.

“Oh, then I guess we’d better hurry even more...?”

Cheshire reacted indifferently while stating the obvious.

Even then, he was using brute strength to hold Jae-hak’s arm almost as though restraining him, because Jae-hak had been scratching at his ear until it bled.

“Can’t we just tie him up?”

At Cheshire’s annoyed suggestion, Su-myeon handed him a length of rope he had been keeping in his inventory.

It would not look pleasant.

But in a situation like this, it was better for someone physically strong to carry a mentally compromised person.

Preventing him from having any chance to do something unpredictable was safer for everyone.

“Guest, could I perhaps see your admis—”

Wham!

Cheshire’s knuckles slammed directly into the employee’s face.

Su-myeon took over the task of dragging the fallen employee away and hiding the body.

They hurried toward the place where the wax figures were gathering, and soon found Han-su’s group surrounded by them.

“There they are...!”

The moment Ju-hee spoke with a mixture of relief and anxiety at seeing that the others were safe.

Su-myeon saw one of the wax figures, which was openly targeting them, reach toward Hwi-yeon.

Han-su appeared to be focused on what was in front of him and failed to notice the hand reaching up from below.

There was no time to explain the situation and then react.

“Damn it.”

Su-myeon quickly raised his gun and fired.

Bang-! Bang-!

There was some distance between them, so he thought he had aimed fairly conservatively.

Yet one shot landed perfectly in the wax figure’s head, causing the thing that had been reaching for Hwi-yeon to collapse onto the ground.

“Why are you still wandering around in here?!”

With Su-myeon’s urgent shout, the groups finally reunited.

They quickly exchanged information, and Han-su gave Jae-hak the earplugs he had been carrying for himself.

“...I’ll untie your wrists now.”

Only then did Jae-hak finally regain the use of his bound hands, though he still looked unstable.

Once Jae-hak was freed from the sound of the flute, they also gave him one of the calming pills and a painkiller they had brought.

Naturally, all of this was done while they continued moving.

By the time they had barely finished summarizing the situation for one another, they were already pressing onward with Hwi-yeon at the front, since she could perfectly remember any route she had traveled once.

Walking ahead as she listened to the explanation, Hwi-yeon spoke.

“Then that’s strange. If that mountain and White Night Land have merged....”

Wouldn’t that mean the survivors from the city inside the mountain were somewhere around here too?

“Why haven’t we seen any of those people or the wolves?”

“Who knows. Maybe that Ferris wheel isn’t visible from the city on the mountain.”

Ju-hee offered a somewhat hopeful theory in response to Hwi-yeon’s question.

Both The Mountain of the Red Cloak and White Night Land were ghost stories with enormous internal spaces.

Considering the nature of a mountain, Ju-hee’s idea was certainly possible.

Perhaps because their numbers had increased, everyone seemed to feel a little safer, and a subtle sense of relief settled over the group.

“.......”

Su-myeon alone found the situation increasingly ominous.

'This is bad.'

More than six people with considerable influence were now inside the same ghost story.

Considering that the amount of causality differed from person to person, the total causality held by the group right now had to be quite substantial.

For the moment, they could rely on one another.

But in return, they had also increased the scale of the ghost story capable of absorbing that causality.

As they hurried onward, a long howl made the ominous feeling concrete, cutting through the sound of the flute.

Awoooo-!

A wolf’s howl.

One howl was followed by another, and then another, until a long chorus of howling spread through the area.

There were so many that it sounded as though the entire amusement park had been surrounded.

The flute itself was drowned out, and every light throughout the amusement park flickered and trembled in response.

“.......”

Everyone watching the scene understood instinctively.

This was not a good sign.

Jae-hak was still half out of his mind, but Han-su was the first to hoist him onto his back like a piece of luggage.

“Run!”

Ju-hee shouted at the same moment, and everyone broke into a sprint with Hwi-yeon leading the way.

After the wolves began howling, even the flute stopped completely.

But instead of chasing the group, the wax figures began hiding themselves in the bushes as though fleeing from something.

Meanwhile, a familiar sound of wolves growling steadily drew closer.

Only then did Su-myeon fully understand what was happening.

The two ghost stories had not merged by cooperating with one another!