Chapter 30: Baekya Land - Attraction (1)

[1. Receive a wristband at the gate before entering!]

All visitors are required to wear a wristband.

Please note that visitors are classified by color as follows.

Yellow — Free Pass

Red — ■■ Arrivals

Blue — Permanent Pass

***

"There are rules popping up again."

Ju-hee read through the message and spoke with a grave expression.

Baekya Land wasn't an outdoor amusement park, but an indoor one.

The entire park was enclosed by walls on every side beneath a massive domed ceiling.

Suspended from that ceiling was an enormous artificial light made to resemble the sun, perfectly befitting the name "Baekya"—the land of the midnight sun.

"Then we do what it says."

As people continued filing in from the direction of Exit 4, staff members appeared at the entrance.

Every one of them was a mascot employee dressed in a character suit.

Small bears with black eyes—one pink, one mint green.

The concept itself might have been cute.

The problem was that both colors had been combined into a single mascot.

It looked as though someone had sliced two bear plushies cleanly from head to toe, taken one half of each, and stitched them together.

One side pink, the other mint green.

There was a face on both sides of the head, making it impossible to tell which side was supposed to be the front.

And the seam holding the two halves together consisted of nothing more than crude, uneven stitches.

"......"

Normally, a mascot costume had a person inside it, moving the way any ordinary human would.

But these mascots twisted and contorted their bodies as they attended to visitors on either side, with no meaningful distinction between front and back.

Meanwhile, everyone arriving from Sadang Station was being fitted with a blue wristband.

Ju-hee scanned the crowd for Hyeon-seok, but there wasn't a single familiar face among them.

"So we hand our tickets to those things and get wristbands, right......?"

Du-pal asked, his voice taut with tension.

They couldn't avoid it forever, so Su-myeon sent Han-su ahead first.

"Yes. Everyone needs a yellow one. If they try to give you a different color, politely ask them to exchange it."

The group was visibly nervous as they followed Su-myeon's instructions, but one by one, they all received yellow wristbands without incident.

Just as everyone began to relax—

"W-wait...!"

Su-myeon, the last in line, was offered a red wristband.

He immediately waved both hands in alarm.

"I'd like a yellow free pass too, please."

At his request, the mascot froze as though confused.

Then—

CRACK. CRACK.

With a series of bone-like pops, it violently twisted its head around until the mint-green face on the back was facing him.

And it was staring at Su-myeon too.

That wasn't all.

The mascot called over every other bear that had been fitting wristbands onto the people coming from Exit 4.

Before Su-myeon knew it, five enormous bear mascots had surrounded him.

Cold sweat trickled down his back.

"......Please."

He had absolutely no idea what was happening.

He tried his best not to provoke them, but the mascots simply stood there.

Silent.

Staring.

Pressuring him without saying a word.

Su-myeon had just about decided that he needed to try something else when—

"Just do it~"

Cheshire, who had been quietly watching the entire scene, suddenly spoke.

Only then did the mascots look at one another.

After exchanging glances, they finally fastened a yellow wristband around Su-myeon's wrist.

Somehow, the situation had been resolved.

But Su-myeon felt as though several years had been shaved off his lifespan.

"Are you alright?"

"What happened?"

He had barely managed to calm his racing heart by the time he stepped inside, where Han-su and Ju-hee immediately approached with worried expressions.

Su-myeon waved a hand to show that he was fine, then lifted Cheshire off his shoulder.

"What was that just now? Why do they listen to Cheshire?"

"Mm......"

As always, Cheshire merely tilted his head slowly at Su-myeon's question.

Whenever he did that, the answer was inevitably the same.

"Too lazy to explain."

Su-myeon had neither the courage nor the time to press him any further, so there was nothing more he could do.

For now, simply being grateful that they had all made it inside safely would have to be enough.

"So now we just have to find him somewhere in here?"

Once Su-myeon seemed to have settled down, Du-pal brought the conversation back to their objective.

With their free passes, they could return to the real world whenever they wanted.

All they had to do was head back out.

Which meant it was time to focus on finding the person they had come for and getting him out.

"How about we make a missing-person announcement?"

At Su-myeon's suggestion, everyone turned to look at him.

It sounded like a joke.

But Su-myeon's expression was completely serious.

***

By and large, it was an ordinary horror game.

Its main content involved exploring Baekya Land alongside a player character who had come to experience an urban-legend attraction as a test of courage.

There were multiple endings, but two stood out above the rest.

The Normal Ending, in which the player rode every attraction in Baekya Land, received a blue pass, and became a permanent resident.

And the True Ending, in which the player uncovered the truth behind the park and escaped before falling under its spell.

'I had no idea all the visitors here were people funneled in through Exit 4, though......'

Since Su-myeon knew both endings, he could at least avoid the worst possible outcome.

He looked out over the hundreds of visitors filling the amusement park and felt a chill creep down his spine.

Most of them wandered around Baekya Land with the same awkward, unnatural gait.

Others had stopped moving altogether.

Frozen mid-pose like mannequins, preserved forever in the image of visitors enjoying the park.

"......They look like wax figures."

That was Han-su's conclusion after reaching out and touching the hand of a person standing motionless nearby, smiling brightly while clutching a helium balloon.

Most likely, everyone still wandering around the park would eventually meet the same fate.

Wax figures perfectly suited to an amusement park.

Freed at last from the exhausting, painful grind of real life.

Granted freedom in the name of death.

"I want to shut off that goddamn flute first."

Du-pal muttered irritably, rubbing at his ear as the grating sound rattled inside his skull.

Su-myeon couldn't have agreed more.

If possible, it would be nice to take care of that while they were here...

KNOCK KNOCK.

"Excuse me."

Su-myeon entered the Customer Service Center and knocked on the office door.

The door swung open.

"Yes! How can I help you?"

The staff member who greeted them with a bright smile was a woman in a cute pink dress.

"......"

No.

No, she wasn't.

Su-myeon had known what to expect from the game, but the rest of the group instinctively averted their eyes.

Just like the mascots, the staff members inside the office had the same bizarre front-and-back structure, as though two people had been fused together.

It looked as if a woman and a man had been forced back-to-back and stitched into a single body, their fronts and backs functioning independently of one another.

A woman in a pink dress.

A man in mint-green overalls.

The place where their backs had been joined looked nothing like the body of conjoined twins.

It appeared as though they had been wired together by force.

The seam running down their fused backs was swollen and puckered, crusted with dark red scabs that gave off the stench of rot.

"I've...... lost someone from my group. I'd like to file a missing-person report."

Seeing the thing in person was far more horrifying than seeing it in a game, and Su-myeon's voice trembled despite himself.

At his words, the woman's face lit up with a smile.

"Oh my! What a shame."

The man's face on the other side brightened as well and immediately chimed in.

"You must be so worried! Just one moment, please!"

Having both sides fuss over him at once was deeply disorienting, but Su-myeon managed to nod.

"Just fill in the person's description and details, and we'll make an announcement for you!"

CRACK.

With the sound of joints twisting, the staff member rotated at the waist, and the man in mint-green overalls held out a form.

Unlike the mascots, the human staff members were joined only along their backs, meaning each side had its own arms and legs.

Four arms.

Four legs.

Su-myeon took the form from the spider-like figure and handed it to Ju-hee.

"Let's start by letting him know we're looking for him."

There was a deliberate reason he had chosen to make an announcement.

This was their first objective.

A signal to Shin Hyeon-seok that someone had come to find him.

Even if he had no physical freedom left, if his sense of self remained, then the announcement might give him time to prepare.

Ju-hee began filling in his information, her expression tense.

While she did, Su-myeon examined the interior of the Customer Service Center.

Like the scenery outside, every piece of equipment looked dated enough to belong in the 1990s.

"Um, will this...... be enough......?"

Ju-hee carefully held out the completed form, her hand trembling slightly as she offered it to the staff member.

The spider-human hurried toward her on all four legs, its footsteps pattering rapidly across the floor.

Its body looked as though it should have been horribly cumbersome, yet it moved with surprising ease, as though it had long since grown accustomed to its unnatural shape.

"Yes! We'll make the announcement right away!"

The smiling woman passed the form to the man's hand on the opposite side.

Another flurry of rapid four-legged steps carried the staff member over to the broadcasting equipment at the far end of the room.

CLICK.

First, the music that had been endlessly looping through the park was switched off.

At last, the maddening flute woven into the theme music—the same sound that had been giving all of them headaches—fell silent.

"The tape."

Han-su pointed toward the cassette inside the machine.

True to the park's antiquated setup, the background music was being played from an actual tape.

If they got rid of that, then there would be no way to play that bizarre sound anymore.

"A brief announcement from Baekya Land, where the sun never sets."

Meanwhile, the staff member's cheerful voice began echoing through the park.

But as the man spoke into the microphone, the woman fused to his back continued watching the group with a broad smile.

If Su-myeon wanted to steal the tape without being seen—

'There's only one way.'

Su-myeon walked right up beside the spider-human staff member in the middle of the announcement.

The instant both sets of eyes turned toward him—

"Oh, please! Find him quickly! Hurry!"

Du-pal suddenly bellowed at the top of his lungs.

The man holding the microphone flinched in surprise and immediately clutched it close, blocking the sound from carrying over the broadcast.

At the same time, the woman on his back snapped her attention toward Du-pal and began gesturing frantically.

"Sir......! Please don't worry so much......!"

"Ah, uh...... Ahem. We are currently searching for a missing person......!"

The male half stammered in confusion before resuming the announcement.

While both sides of the staff member were distracted, Su-myeon quietly pressed the eject button on the tape player.

"We are looking for Shin Hyeon-seok, age 30, wearing a suit. If anyone has this person in their care, please come to the Customer Service Center immediately."

"Oh, I'm worried sick...!"

"S-sir......!"

The male half read the description from the form while the female half desperately tried to calm the loudly distraught Du-pal.

Grotesque appearance aside, it was a painfully accurate portrayal of the hardships of customer service work.

Offering a silent moment of respect to the spider-human—two people, yet somehow one—Su-myeon slipped a small pebble into the tape deck and closed it.

'If they try to play it like this, the machine should break.'

Even if they had spare tapes, at the very least no one would have to listen to that warped sound again.

Han-su and Ju-hee, both of whom had been prepared to create a distraction of their own if necessary, quietly let out sighs of relief.

"We'll keep searching outside and come back."

"If he ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) shows up, could you make another announcement for us?"

They did their best to act naturally.

Like ordinary visitors in an ordinary amusement park.

The spider-human staff member responded warmly to their calm behavior.

"Of course!"

"We're terribly sorry you're going through this, but please try to enjoy Baekya Land!"

After thanking the relentlessly smiling spider-human one last time, the group carefully left the Customer Service Center.

As inconspicuously as possible.

Their cautious steps gradually quickened the farther they got from the building.

By the time their careful walk had turned into a run, the cheerful theme-park music started playing again behind them.

FWEE— EE.

But almost immediately, the sound began to skip.

To stutter.

SCREEEEEE.

Then, with an ear-splitting shriek, it cut out completely.