Chapter 77: The Red Cloak….(2)

[5. Through the diary left behind by a survivor, it was possible to confirm the truth about the village. This was a fragmentary document with only some of its pages discovered, and...(omitted)....]

The three of them, including Su-myeon, quietly left the cabin, keeping their expressions as natural as possible.

As though they were merely looking around. They decided to blend naturally among the villagers and look around the town.

“...I think there are more people here than there were in White Night Land.”

Su-myeon agreed with Han-su.

Dozens of log houses could be seen below the hill.

“They weren’t here when I came.”

Hwi-yeon said with certainty as she looked at the town.

Su-myeon asked again to make sure.

“Is there any chance you simply didn’t see them?”

“......If you put it that way, I can’t say the possibility is zero. But dozens of us traveled together, and we still never found them.”

Back when Hwi-yeon had fallen into this ghost story.

There had been many humans involved here even then.

Hwi-yeon had traveled as part of a group as well, but in the end, she said only she and her younger brother had remained as the final survivors.

If that was the case, then there was a high probability that the village had appeared after Hwi-yeon escaped from this place.

'Just as White Night Land and Alice Hotel changed the way they operated after I escaped, maybe the Red Cloak changed its methods after Hwi-yeon left too.'

Instead of a terrifying forest, it gave humans a paradise they would not want to leave.

Perhaps what Peter Pan had failed to accomplish at Mujin High School was being done properly here.

However.

“Then what exactly does it mean that they were ‘offered’?”

Just as Han-su said, Su-myeon could not quite understand it either.

What did it mean to say someone had been offered to the wolves?

Did it simply mean they had pushed someone toward the wolves as a human sacrifice?

But that was strange too.

If that were the case, there would not have been time to leave something like that in the diary.

“For now, we should look around the village more. I’m sure they’re hiding something.”

Firmly packed dirt underfoot and fresh air. A bright atmosphere suited to the sunlight.

Amid all of it, a completely incongruous sense of hostility and wariness filled them.

As Su-myeon looked over the village, which seemed endlessly like a scene from a fairy tale, he stopped walking.

“....”

The place where Su-myeon stopped looked like a butcher shop.

However, perhaps because they lacked proper blades and tools, the sight was quite different from a neatly organized modern butcher shop.

Entrails and blood were strewn everywhere.

Chunks of flesh and bones that had barely been hacked apart and stripped.

It was enough to turn one’s stomach, but it was a butcher shop. It was not a sight that should have been particularly problematic.

But Su-myeon covered his mouth without realizing it.

“Come on, come on! Fresh wolf meat just came in! Wolf meat!”

Beside the butcher calling for customers, the monsters they called ‘wolves’ had been piled up and bound together in layers.

Looking closely made it even more horrifying.

More than ten wolf monsters had had their arms and legs cut off, leaving only their torsos tied together.

“Oh? Aren’t those our new faces?”

One of the residents who had come out to shop recognized them and greeted them familiarly.

He was one of the hunters who had lowered Su-myeon from the net when they first met.

“I knew it. Once you’ve tried it, you can’t forget the taste, can you? Unfortunately, though, that stuff isn’t free.”

“You need something worth trading for it.”

At the hunter’s playful and friendly words, Su-myeon froze.

Once I’ve tried it...?

'Does that mean I ate that?'

The moment the thought reached that point, he nearly gagged on reflex.

There were only a very limited number of things Su-myeon had eaten since coming here.

The unidentified meat soup the women at the campsite had given them.

The memory of that foul-smelling meat chewing between his teeth made his stomach twist.

So that was....

“You can only eat the arms and legs of wolf meat, you see. Even when we hunt them every time, there isn’t much meat.”

The hunter clicked his tongue as though it were a shame.

Han-su asked him in place of Su-myeon, whose face had gone deathly pale.

“......Why don’t you eat the body?”

“If we eat all of them or kill them, that person gets angry.”

“Who is that person?”

At Han-su’s flat question, the hunter looked at him once.

“Ah~ well, that’s....”

The hunter hesitated for a moment, then casually waved his hand.

“You boys don’t need to worry about that! Besides, look. The wolves’ torsos are all skin and bones anyway, so there isn’t much worth eating besides the arms and legs.”

The hunter joked that butchering the torso would only dull the blades for no reason and walked away.

Even with nothing but their torsos remaining, the wolf monsters were still whimpering among themselves.

The sight of them continuing to writhe in pain without dying was enough to evoke pity even though they were monsters.

But apparently the people of this sunny, beautiful village did not feel that way at all.

They were going wild over the wolf meat that had come in after a long absence, eagerly bartering for it.

After watching crops they had grown, sewing materials, alcohol, furniture, and all kinds of trade goods changing hands, the group eventually turned away.

There was no reason to keep watching that scene.

Just as they tried to move somewhere else as though fleeing from it, a familiar old woman appeared in front of them.

“Do you feel sorry for those things?”

The oldest person in the village, who lived in the fairy-tale-like cabin.

Su-myeon could not easily answer the old woman’s question.

Watching him, the old woman nodded, planted her cane on the ground, and stepped closer to Su-myeon.

“I... have lived here for more than twenty years.”

The old woman continued slowly.

“Those things are monsters that harm people. And what’s more infuriating.... they imitate the shape of humans.”

If they did not kill those things, they themselves would die.

The old woman continued defending the villagers, saying that the people here had no choice.

But the more Su-myeon listened, the harder it became to accept.

For something they supposedly had no choice but to do in order to survive, the people were enjoying it far too much.

“I like you.”

The old woman suddenly said something completely out of nowhere as she watched Su-myeon’s troubled expression.

What did she like?

He wanted to ask, but the old woman was smiling broadly.

Her smile raised the corners of her mouth so excessively that it was chilling for an instant.

While the group missed the chance to ask what she meant, the old woman turned and left.

***

Su-myeon woke from sleep.

With the bright sunlight, their second night inside the ghost story had passed.

The previous night had gone by so quietly that it was almost strangely peaceful.

They had heard wolves howling from very far away, but the distance had been too great to be concerning.

“....”

He nearly jumped when he saw Han-su sitting right beside him like some kind of stone statue, but nothing had actually happened.

The cabin had two rooms, but the three of them had been too uneasy to sleep separately and had all slept together in one room.

Hwi-yeon seemed to have gotten up first as well, and naturally greeted Su-myeon.

“Did you sleep well?”

“Looks like you got up before me.”

He had been the last one.

Feeling slightly awkward, he found his glasses and put them on.

He had been a little worried about removing the Cyclops Contact Lens, so he had gone to sleep with it still in.

It was only possible because, befitting an item, it caused no discomfort or stuffiness in his eyes despite his concerns.

'Dr. Young-cheol would probably have something to say if he knew....'

It couldn’t be helped.

Su-myeon got to his feet and roughly straightened his appearance.

Knock knock knock-

At the perfect timing, someone knocked on the door.

Wasn’t it almost as though someone had been listening and waiting for them to wake up?

Being in such a suspicious place was starting to make him feel paranoid for no reason.

Could something here be exerting some kind of mental control too?

Su-myeon hid his complicated thoughts, forced himself to manage his expression, and headed toward the front door.

“Yes. Who.... Ah! Hello.”

Barely managing to act pleased, Su-myeon opened the door wide.

Pretending not to be wary, he found the old woman, the hunter, and Seung-min standing beyond the open door.

The chilling impression from yesterday had vanished, and the old woman he saw today looked like the very image of a kindly grandmother from the countryside.

Pretending to rub his forehead, Su-myeon checked them once again with the Eye of Truth.

“Oh my, you’re all awake already? Such diligent youngsters~”

A peaceful, affectionate tone, bodies entirely covered in something like lumps of pitch-black tar.

The disgusting aura was still there.

“Yes. We are, but.... I don’t think any of us are feeling very well.”

None of the three of us are particularly good at acting.

Once Su-myeon laid the groundwork like that, the others could at least follow along.

“...I had nightmares all night.”

“I... don’t remember them very well either, but I’ve had bad dreams both nights.”

When Han-su and Hwi-yeon said that with expressionless faces and somewhat pale complexions, the others looked worried.

“Of course, of course. That’s only natural. Warm your bellies with this and get some rest.”

Were they planning to serve them that monster meat again?

Absolutely not.

“I’m sorry.... It’s just. I feel like anything I eat right now will come right back up.”

When Su-myeon said that, the old woman stared at him for a moment.

Her slightly cloudy eyes, faded with the peculiar dullness of old age, stared at him without even blinking.

The gaze felt as though it were looking right through him, nearly sending another chill down his spine.

Whether or not he noticed the exchange of looks, the hunter let out a hearty laugh and patted Su-myeon on the shoulder.

“You’re a young man, but you’ve got a weak stomach!”

“We brought this so you could eat something and get your strength back, so at least have a few bites. I’m telling you, my old lady’s cooking is incredible.”

Even Seung-min actively urged them to eat.

He even explained that she was the only person capable of cooking with the rare spices they had.

The food they presented as they said this was, incredibly, spicy stir-fried pork and rice.

“The land isn’t exactly good for growing rice, but this is still something, isn’t it?”

After hearing them explain that it was such a rare meal, they could not simply slam the door in their faces.

Reluctantly, Su-myeon let them inside.

“I’m sorry. None of us are feeling very well.... Then please, everyone, eat with us.”

Though reluctant, he allowed them into the cabin.

The warm aroma of food filled the room appetizingly, but Su-myeon’s stomach gradually began to feel genuinely uncomfortable.

“It’s sad that we can’t go home, but it’s still not bad here.”

Seung-min spoke brightly as he unpacked the food they had brought.

He said it had been ten years since he had come here with the woman named Hye-won.

As though trying to help them relax, he began telling them his own story.

“What would I even do if I got out now?”

In their late twenties, the two of them had been living ordinary lives that were slowly falling behind.

They had been wasting away their days preparing endlessly for civil service exams with no idea when it would ever end.

They had entered Mimi Lodge to blow off some stress, and this was what had happened.

While living here, Seung-min had started a family and become an indispensable member of this small society.

“There are dangerous things like the wolves, but it isn’t bad, is it? This much, at least.”

Even if he returned to the mercilessly competitive society of reality, there was nothing he could do there.

That was why they no longer wanted to escape.

Because this place was better than reality, they no longer wanted to leave.

Seung-min gave a self-deprecating smile and shrugged.

For some reason, Su-myeon thought of Geon-su, whom he had left behind at Mujin High School.

While the group picked at nothing but the rice, unable to bring themselves to touch the meat, the hunter explained the rules of the village.

“You saw how people traded at the market yesterday, right?”

Their society provided rations sufficient to maintain a basic diet.

Things like meat and clothing were obtained by exchanging them for something one had personally produced or accomplished.

Su-myeon suddenly thought, This is it, and set down his utensils before asking with a serious expression.

“Then, there’s something I’d like to ask. Please give us work too.”

If they blended in among the villagers, opportunities to ask about Mu-yeon would naturally arise.

They might also find a chance to uncover the problems in this society and rescue everyone who had adapted to this contradictory ghost story.

Now that Su-myeon had experienced terminating a ghost story once, his ultimate goal remained, above all else, the termination of the ghost story itself.

But the answer he received was different from what he had expected.

“Then starting tomorrow, why don’t the three of you keep my old lady company?”

At the hunter’s words, Su-myeon flinched.

The oldest grandmother in the village. Keeping her company.

It was exactly the same process written in the diary.