Chapter 133: Rumors (1)

“Hey, did you guys hear about that?”

Class 3 of the second year at Mujin High School.

When one student who loved gossip dramatically opened the conversation, everyone nearby turned their attention toward him.

“Apparently, some YouTuber disappeared recently in the middle of a stream. He was one of those YouTubers who explored abandoned houses and haunted places....”

“Oh, I heard about that too. The Tagger app? I got curious and tried looking it up, but it’s completely gone now.”

“I heard there were even people who got searched just because they had the app.”

“Someone said a person followed the instructions and ended up finding a corpse.”

“Whoa, what... seriously? That happened here?”

“I can’t find any articles about it, though. And there’s no app like that either....”

“No, it was definitely around until a few days ago, but apparently everything vanished.”

“There’s also a rumor that the government deleted it because it was dangerous.”

“Wait, is that actually true?”

“...Dunno. That’s what people are saying.”

Rumors were spreading with truth and lies mixed together.

Recently, stories about ghost stories like these had begun flooding the internet, creating a huge craze.

It was the sweltering middle of summer, so this was certainly the season when horror specials became popular.

“And apparently some kids disappeared from our school not long ago.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Ghost stories are all anyone talks about these days. They say some students went into the school at night and disappeared.”

“There’s also a story about hundreds of skeletons suddenly appearing right in the middle of Seoul.”

The rumors they were suddenly hearing had always been stories with unclear origins.

But Ha-min, who knew some of the hidden truth behind them, kept his mouth firmly shut at school.

I-an wore much the same expression and quietly moved away from where the conversation was taking place.

If they got involved for no reason, they felt like they might react awkwardly.

“Why is all this suddenly spreading everywhere? Has Su-myeon said anything?”

At I-an’s question, Ha-min bit his lip even harder.

Ever since the day he had gone after Jae-min on his own, Su-myeon had neither particularly scolded him nor contacted him again.

Ha-min almost thought it would have been better if he had been scolded instead.

‘No, what is going on?!’

‘What? Is this not precisely what thou wished for? I grant thee what thou wanted, and still thou complainest. Truly, young people these days....’

Ha-min remembered Ryang’s answer when he had gone to see Geon-su again yesterday and let out a deep sigh.

He had definitely asked Ryang.

‘What should I do if I want Su-myeon to stop leaving me out and stop caring about whatever I do?’

He had asked exactly that.

But he had never expected Su-myeon to become this indifferent, as though telling him to do whatever he wanted....

“Everyone, sit down!”

Just then, their homeroom teacher entered for the end-of-day homeroom, and Ha-min and I-an returned to their seats.

Thinking back on it now, Ha-min found himself wondering why he had done something so reckless this time.

Almost as though something had bewitched him.

At the time, he had felt that he absolutely had to follow them.

“All right. There have been a lot of strange rumors going around lately.”

Apparently aware of the recent rumors circulating through the school as well, the teacher brought them up directly.

“You guys know better than anyone that there aren’t any missing students at our school right now.”

At the homeroom teacher’s words, the shoulders of Ha-min and the others who had experienced a ghost story jerked sharply.

Well, there were no missing students now, technically.

Though maybe it would be more accurate to say there had been....

“Don’t pay attention to nonsense rumors, and stop spreading stories like that around!”

Various reactions rose at the teacher’s emphatic voice.

Disappointed complaints from students who enjoyed scary stories, jeers asking who would believe something like that anyway, and curious questions asking whether the teacher really believed none of it at all.

Among them, those who knew real ghost stories remained quietly silent.

“That’s all. Don’t wander off anywhere. Go straight home.”

School ended amid the strange atmosphere.

After hesitating for a moment, Ha-min cautiously picked up his phone and contacted Su-myeon again.

It had been three days since the incident involving Jae-min.

***

The Governance was also aware of the stories beginning to spread through the internet and by word of mouth.

In truth, they had already expected something like this to happen eventually.

“With this many survivors, it’s honestly impressive that the secret lasted even a few days.”

“I thought it would hold a little longer, though....”

“People’s mouths are a lot looser than you’d think.”

Listening to Ju-hee, Hwi-yeon, and Mi-ae talk, Su-myeon let out a sigh.

Either way, just because rumors were spreading did not mean the Governance itself had to do anything directly.

Director Jang Bok-eum usually handled external matters like that on his own.

“About Mr. Song Jae-min... you haven’t heard anything else, Chief Han?”

Du-pal still seemed unable to see Jae-min’s situation as something completely unrelated to himself.

Su-myeon shook his head at the question.

Ever since that day, when Director Jang had forcibly taken Jae-min away.

They had received no further news about him.

Su-myeon had eventually grown tired of waiting for Director Jang to tell him on his own and had asked directly.

But—

―Do you not have enough work to do?

Director Jang had made it quite clear that he had neither the intention nor the obligation to answer.

In any case, something about this incident seemed to have seriously angered him, though Su-myeon had no idea why.

If he had to guess, Director Jang had always been obsessively focused on bringing ghost stories to an end.

Perhaps the possibility of doing the exact opposite—creating an entirely new ghost story—had infuriated him.

‘......Even setting that aside, something about this still feels strange.’

Su-myeon sighed, still feeling as though some tangled thread remained unresolved.

“Hmm, everyone want to take a look at this?”

By now, whenever Mi-ae asked them to look at something together, it was almost frightening.

Everyone turned toward her screen with faintly apprehensive expressions.

Mi-ae, whose eyes were nearly falling out from searching the internet for ghost stories, put in artificial tears as she spoke.

“So this finally leaked.”

[Guide to Returning to Reality]

1. It is normal if the people around you do not remember your absence.

2. Never make eye contact with your reflection in a mirror.

3. If you see an old missing-person flyer on the street, do not look at it. Ignore it completely.

4. If there is someone who remembers your absence, immediately report them to OOO. Under no circumstances should you tell them your real name.

It was a Guide to Returning to Reality that someone had posted online.

Since copies had been distributed to hundreds of survivors of the Infinite School Grounds, they had thought it might leak somewhere eventually.

“But why is this... not even the original? Why did it get changed into something weird...?”

Just as Du-pal {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} muttered.

It was quite different from the original Guide to Returning to Reality.

At this rate, the guide distributed by the Governance itself was going to spread like one of those rules-based horror stories instead.

“We could find the original uploader if we really wanted to.”

At Mi-ae’s words, Su-myeon’s head began to hurt even more.

Now that it had already spread this far, trying to take action might only draw even more attention to it.

“Let’s leave it alone for now.”

At the moment, no matter what it said, people would simply treat it as another ghost story.

No one would actually believe it was real.

They would assume someone had simply made up a convincing story.

“.......”

No.

Maybe, instead.

Couldn’t they use this?

“It might actually be better if we distribute the original ourselves.”

The agents’ eyes turned toward Su-myeon.

“But let’s change the last item a little.”

If they could not avoid it, the best option was to use it.

[Guide to Returning to Reality]

1. The people around you will not remember your absence.

2. Do not remind them that something is different. Simply return to your daily life.

3. We remember what happened to you. If you need counseling, come find us.

4. If you have any information regarding unnatural phenomena, please contact the UTG. Your report may greatly assist future rescue operations.

UTG Counseling Center: 02―000―0000

The guide that the Governance began distributing itself quickly spread as the trend gained momentum.

***

Time passed with almost cruel speed.

Before they knew it, the day they had promised to enter Alice Hotel again was nearly upon them.

Five days from now, at night.

Once they fell asleep, they would return there.

“Whew....”

Su-myeon let out a sigh as he lay in the underground garden created by the dokkaebi, taking a nap.

Being underground made it pleasantly cool, and despite being an enclosed interior, the place had a strange freshness to it that made it perfect for napping.

And yet Ryang, who had actually created the place, hardly ever stayed there.

He had asked why she never spent time here when she was constantly darting between the infirmary and the office at all hours.

‘? What nonsense dost thou speak? Am I not already here?’

Judging by that answer, perhaps because she was not human, her definition of what it meant to “be somewhere” was considerably broader.

Maybe she considered everything built on the same piece of land to be part of the same domain....

Anyway.

While he cleared his complicated thoughts and enjoyed some time alone.

He heard someone coming down the stairs.

“Here. Your glasses.”

The person who came underground was Ju-hee.

She handed Su-myeon the new glasses she had gotten made for him.

Even getting a single new pair of glasses had been an absurd amount of trouble.

Why had it been so difficult in Korea, where you could normally get new glasses in a single day?

Because of Su-myeon’s condition, which made it difficult for him to casually show his eyes to outsiders.

“......Ah. Much better.”

After putting on the new glasses, Su-myeon finally felt like he could breathe again now that his vision was properly clear.

One eye had nearly 1.6 vision and did not need glasses at all, while the other had negative visual acuity.

The difference was so extreme that most optical shops became excessively curious about it, which had made everything difficult.

Only after Young-cheol provided proper vision test records from a doctor had they finally managed to get suitable glasses made.

On top of that, making them specially reinforced so they would not break under ordinary impacts had taken even longer.

“Nothing uncomfortable?”

“No, they’re fine.”

He was already used to having corrected vision in only one eye.

Ju-hee handed him three additional pairs as spares.

“Anyway, thanks for taking care of this for me.”

If Su-myeon had gone to an optical shop himself, there was no way anyone would have failed to show interest in his gray iris.

When he thanked Ju-hee for running the errand in his place, she briefly looked around.

The underground space was empty except for the two of them.

Ju-hee stepped a little closer to Su-myeon.

“Um, but... Chief Han.”

At Ju-hee’s words, Su-myeon also glanced around.

With no one else around, Su-myeon did not particularly want to hear someone older than him calling him by such an awkward title.

He gestured for her to speak comfortably, and Ju-hee understood what he meant and switched back to a casual tone.

“Hey, Su-myeon.”

Something about the way she said it suggested she was about to bring up something serious, and Su-myeon straightened slightly.

He could not think of much she would need this kind of atmosphere to say.

Maybe that she was quitting?

Had she misunderstood something because he had excluded her from the upcoming Alice Hotel expedition?

It would be troublesome if she quit. Ju-hee was quite useful manpower.

As all sorts of thoughts tangled through Su-myeon’s mind.

Ju-hee said something he had not expected.

“Don’t you think we... probably shouldn’t just leave the dokkaebi—Ryang—the way she is?”