Chapter 119: CHAPTER 6. Night Self-Study (1)

It was dark. Everything in front of him was black, and it was difficult to make out their surroundings.

“What the....”

“Why is it so dark?”

“.......”

He could hear Young-cheol, Ha-min, and even Han-su making restless noises as they looked around, sensing that something was strange.

In the end, almost at the same time, everyone pulled out their phones and turned on their flashlights.

“.......”

They had definitely entered the Infinite School Grounds.

The four phones swept their lights around the area.

They barely managed to come down the stairs and stand in the hallway, but there was nothing around them.

Only a school corridor blanketed in pitch-black darkness stretched ahead.

It was yet another scene completely different from what they had seen before.

Outside the windows, it looked like total darkness without even any moonlight.

“......There is a moon, at least.”

When Su-myeon moved a little closer to the window, he saw a crescent moon like a fingernail hanging overhead.

Its light was so faint that rather than illuminating the surroundings, it seemed to make them look even darker.

He could not even imagine trying to go back to Hook’s gymnasium they had seen before.

TICK- TICK-

On top of that, the clear ticking of clocks coming from outside the window made Su-myeon move away from it.

It had brought back an unpleasant memory.

After moving farther into the hallway, where he would not fall even if someone shoved him, Su-myeon looked at the others again.

“The time changed to eight.”

At Han-su’s words, Su-myeon looked at his phone again.

The time displayed on the phone, which had already become a Heartphone, was 9:00 p.m.

“Looks like a lot has changed here too. We’ll need to be even more careful.”

After Peter Pan, the master of the ghost story, had fallen, the place had been taken over by Wendy, who had once been nothing more than a child dragged here.

For now, that was about as much as they could guess regarding the reason for the changes.

“Maybe it’s because it’s been a while, but I really am a little nervous.”

With his hands trembling, Young-cheol broke one of the tranquilizers he had brought in half and shared it with Ha-min.

Then he began putting the medications filling his backpack into the Heartphone inventory.

They distributed spares among themselves just in case and checked over their respective equipment.

This was the first time Su-myeon had seen Young-cheol in his student form, but his overall impression was almost exactly the same.

He merely looked a little younger. If anything, perhaps Young-cheol had looked a little old for his age even when he was a student.

“Come to think of it, Mr. Du-pal should look younger too, right?”

Ha-min said while staring at Young-cheol.

That was probably true, but Su-myeon did not think Du-pal would become impossible to recognize.

At most, he would probably have changed only enough to still be recognizable, just like Young-cheol.

While organizing the inventory, Su-myeon poured in all the Rose Coins Ryang had given him, and a welcome message appeared for the first time in a while.

[Preparing stock....]

They had already brought two ghost stories to an end since then.

The number of coins they had gathered had reached four hundred, so perhaps another rose could bloom now.

Thinking that, Su-myeon manipulated the Heartphone again.

“For now, let’s try contacting Mr. Park first.”

Since they were already inside, one by one, the group sent messages to Du-pal through their Heartphones.

It was a strategy of overwhelming him with messages, with each person sending something of their own.

Normally, Su-myeon limited entry to three people.

If Du-pal realized that four people had come in to rescue him, surely he would react somehow.

While Su-myeon was writing Du-pal a long message explaining in detail that escaping would only become more difficult if he did not quickly tell them where he was.

“Huh? Su-myeon, you’re not showing up on my Heartphone.”

Ha-min spoke.

“Huh? I can’t even add you as a new friend. Wasn’t your code #####? Five # signs.”

At Ha-min’s words, Han-su and Young-cheol checked their own friends lists.

Su-myeon’s account had disappeared from all of them.

His code had been so unusual that everyone had been able to remember it.

“Huh?”

Su-myeon also sensed that something was strange and began searching through the messaging app.

All of their existing chatrooms had disappeared.

“It says the old account does not exist.”

Startled by Han-su’s words, Su-myeon checked his personal information in the messaging app.

When he looked at the information, a codename he had never seen before had appeared.

[#REST]

What did this mean now?

Could these codes suddenly change?

“......My code changed.”

He had no idea why, but Su-myeon finished sending the message he had been writing to Du-pal first.

Then, just in case, he added one final line.

[This is Han Su-myeon. I thought you might not know who I am because my code changed.]

They could not simply sit around waiting indefinitely for a reply.

After each of them sent Du-pal a message, the group once again looked down the empty hallway.

Even now, they still could not sense the presence of anyone at all.

“...Let’s start searching.”

At Su-myeon’s words, everyone began walking slowly down the hallway while suppressing their footsteps.

***

Du-pal and Geon-su were together inside the Infinite School Grounds.

Already familiar with the place, Geon-su guided Du-pal around with practiced ease, and Du-pal was enjoying the time he was spending with his son after so long.

No matter where this place was. As long as they could be together.

Perhaps that alone might be enough.

“Anyway, it’s not bad here.”

The cafeteria looked exactly like the cafeteria of an ordinary high school.

Whatever the ingredients were, warm and delicious food was always freshly prepared there.

It had not been like that from the very beginning. It seemed that now that night had fallen, dinner time had been taken into consideration as well.

The dining hall was dark with the lights turned off, but the father and son had already become somewhat accustomed to the darkness and continued eating as naturally as though they could see perfectly well.

Watching Geon-su stuff his mouth full of the freshly served spicy stir-fried pork, Du-pal smiled faintly.

'Is it really okay to leave things like this?'

That doubt would suddenly torment Du-pal at every moment.

But each time, the same thought suppressed the conflict.

His son liked it here, so for now, perhaps that was enough.

BUZZ-

BUZZ-

Suddenly, Du-pal’s phone vibrated.

Startled, Du-pal reflexively lifted it and checked.

There should have been no way for a phone to get a signal here in the first place....

“For a phone to work here....”

Geon-su spoke without thinking, then realized something.

He too had seen someone’s phone work properly exactly once.

It had been when Han Su-myeon was involved.

“.......”

Geon-su and Du-pal looked at each other in surprise.

Neither of them had imagined Su-myeon would come all the way here.

Faced with this unexpected development, neither could easily speak.

***

“Looks like this guy is going to leave us on read.”

Ha-min said while continuing to check his phone as he moved with Su-myeon.

Even though the 1 beside the chat had disappeared, Du-pal had not replied [N O V E L I G H T] at all.

[Mister?]

[Mister!]

[I told you I came too!]

[You’re really going to do this?!]

Even though Ha-min immediately began pressing him, Du-pal did not respond easily.

In the meantime, the four of them checked the bathroom where they had met Geon-su before, as well as Class 3-3.

But there was not a single familiar face among them, including Geon-su.

Neither Peter Pan nor Wendy was anywhere to be seen, and the students in every classroom sat with their heads lowered, studying on their own.

They did not bother looking closely enough to see what exactly the students were so diligently writing on the paper.

“......Isn’t it strangely quiet?”

They had not encountered a single teacher or guard walking through the hallways either.

The current time inside the ghost story was 9:30.

Thirty minutes had already passed since they entered.

“When does night self-study usually end?”

“...Was it ten?”

Unfortunately, even Ha-min, being an athlete, did not seem to know.

Su-myeon had graduated several years ago as well, so he could not remember clearly.

Was it nine? Ten?

“Do schools still force students to do night self-study these days?”

“...I don’t know?”

It was not an easy question even for Ha-min to answer precisely.

Wasn’t he supposed to be helping them with things adults would not know because he was a student?

When Su-myeon gave Ha-min a slight glare, Ha-min avoided his gaze and hid behind Young-cheol.

In any case, the moments when they truly needed Ha-min were not for trivial information like this.

“But maybe this night is just repeating over and over right now? The first time too, the time only went up to fifty-nine minutes before going back to the original time.”

Ha-min cautiously offered his guess.

Su-myeon had been thinking something similar.

Considering the rules and the fundamental nature of the ghost story, that was probably right.

Time within a single day might pass in this school, but it would never be able to reach tomorrow.

“For now, I guess we have no choice but to search the whole place.”

Since Du-pal was not answering, all they knew was that he was somewhere inside.

The first thing they saw was the music room at the end of the hallway.

That classroom was relatively safe as long as they followed its rules properly.

Du-pal and Geon-su probably knew the rules well too.

There was a good chance they might be hiding in a safe classroom like that.

CREEEAK-

The group cautiously opened the heavy, soundproofed door to the music room.

Once they stepped inside, they found the room empty, fitting for night self-study hours.

But in the center, as though someone had brought in a clock crocodile and strung it up for display.

Instead of a metronome, a crocodile clock with its belly split wide open was ticking away.

The crocodile’s corpse, its ribs spread open like a flower as though for decoration, looked thoroughly unpleasant.

“Aagh!”

On top of that, when they passed beside it, the crocodile suddenly began thrashing around as though it were still alive despite its abdomen being completely opened.

At the sight of its organs spilling out from its open belly, Ha-min screamed and stumbled backward.

Young-cheol jumped in surprise as well, and the two of them nearly ended up clinging to each other.

Su-myeon had been startled too, but Ha-min and Young-cheol had reacted so loudly that he was able to pretend he had not been.

“Doesn’t look particularly pleasant here either.”

Su-myeon said while the other two trembled in each other’s arms.

The various instruments inside the music room were also warped forms of things he did not even want to imagine.

White skeletal structures resembling spines formed their frames, with various tendons and blood vessels connected along them....

“Close your eyes.”

Han-su advised Ha-min, but hearing that only made Ha-min calm down more.

“......I’m not that much of a kid.”

Still, this was a safe space as long as they did not touch the instruments.

They had thought Du-pal and Geon-su might be hiding here.

But since neither of them was present, the group immediately left the music room again.

“For now, let’s keep looking.”

Keeping well away from the instruments, the group stepped back outside and cautiously examined the hallway.

It was still quiet.

If anything, the surroundings were even quieter than before, to an almost unsettling degree.

Only the students inside the classrooms remained completely absorbed in their self-study.

There was no sign of anyone else nearby.

“Can’t we just release something like anesthetic gas throughout the entire school?”

Ha-min asked cautiously.

At first glance, it sounded like the easiest and fastest method, but to Su-myeon, it was not particularly realistic.

“Want to try it if you can carry every single one of them on your back and get them out through the rooftop?”

But what if a shadow or a guard appeared while they were doing that?

A student they had anesthetized might die because they failed to react at the moment they needed to.

Failing to save someone was one thing, but Su-myeon had little desire to experience someone dying because of them.

Of course, it would be fortunate if all of their causality simply disappeared and they were expelled back into reality.

“.......”

The countless crocodiles outside the window, ticking so rapidly that it was impossible even to count the numbers.

And Hook, who might still be somewhere inside the gymnasium.

Considering all of that, anesthetizing everyone here was impossible.

“Next, let’s try going in there.”

Saying that, Su-myeon pointed toward another room this time.

What they saw next was the school library.