Ch.27027 – There’s Space Behind the Pillar 4

# 027 – There’s Space Behind the Pillar # 4

We held our breath like mice hiding from a snake.

We kept our mouths tightly shut to prevent even the slightest sound from escaping.

About five minutes passed like that.

Clatter, clack-. Click, click, click.

The sound of unnaturally bending joints and high heels disappeared around that dark corner.

But no one dared to move much or speak easily.

“I think it’s gone.”

I spoke to clear the atmosphere and help everyone regain their senses. Jeongseok also carefully exhaled his held breath and parted his lips.

“What was that just now? It was too dark to see clearly. Wasn’t something whitish moving? What would have happened if we hadn’t hidden in this trash can?”

“I don’t know. Nothing good, I’m sure.”

I tried to appear calm while peering through the slightly open lid of the trash can to survey our surroundings.

It was too dark to see much.

At times like this, my bag comes in handy.

I unzipped the backpack I was wearing.

But it was so dark inside the trash can that finding anything was troublesome since I couldn’t see a thing.

“Yang Juhui. You have a lighter, right?”

Delinquents, regardless of gender, typically carry lighters.

And as far as I knew, Yang Juhui was a smoker.

“I do.”

“Light it up, please.”

Click, whoosh-.

Yang Juhui’s Zippo lighter illuminated the cramped trash can. How comforting a flame can be to the human heart.

Of course, everyone’s faces in the lighter’s glow were stiff with tension.

“Yeongwon, look at this talisman.”

Swish-.

While Yang Juhui and Jeongseok’s attention was focused on the talisman, I took advantage of the lighter’s glow to pull a flashlight from my bag.

“Having a light will help us move around.”

Ever since opening the corridor and fighting various ghosts, I always kept a flashlight in my bag. It was for situations like this.

Click, click-.

As I was checking if the flashlight worked properly, someone grabbed my arm firmly.

“Are you suggesting we leave? Wouldn’t it be better to stay hidden and observe the situation? Whatever that ghost-like thing was, it didn’t seem to notice us hiding here, maybe because of these talismans.”

Jeongseok proposed staying hidden in this safe trash can.

It was an entirely sensible and typical Jeongseok-like plan.

But if my thoughts and predictions were correct… we probably wouldn’t be able to hide in this trash can for long.

And as if to prove my hypothesis, something unexpected happened.

“Ugh! What’s that smell? Did someone shit themselves?”

Yang Juhui was in obvious distress.

Soon Jeongseok also started gagging, “Ugh. Ugh.” A terribly foul odor had filled the trash can.

The stench was so awful that even while holding our breath, it made our eyes water.

It seemed almost malicious, as if trying to force us out of the trash can.

“Let’s get out. Let’s get out. Out! I can’t stand it! Uweek!”

Jeongseok, who had suggested we stay hidden in the trash can, was ironically the first to escape.

Perhaps being raised as a young master, he had the least tolerance for foul odors.

Yang Juhui was the second to bolt out with a “Padaaat-” sound.

“Ugh. Uuugh.”

Yang Juhui was on the verge of vomiting.

I was relatively composed because I had anticipated something like this and was mentally prepared.

Plus, I had the “Holding Breath” trait.

This trait allowed me to hold my breath 1.5 times longer than normal, a skill that wasn’t particularly useful in everyday life…

“…”

But in this situation, it was a relatively useful ability.

If I could just endure the stinging in my eyes, I might be able to withstand the stench in this safe zone a bit longer.

“Puhaa!”

Of course, my lung capacity had its limits, and I too had to rush out of the trash can.

Jeongseok, who was surveying the surroundings from the dark corner, asked me:

“What’s going on? Ha Yeongwon. Do you know what this is? I’m asking because you seem relatively calm. If you know something, explain it all.”

Jeongseok’s reasoning was sharp even in this situation.

I could be considered somewhat experienced in this dark space.

But not knowing how much time we had, I decided to explain briefly.

“We need to find an exit and get out of here. But there are monsters or ghosts like the one that just passed by, so wandering around carelessly won’t be easy.”

Even as I spoke, I remained alert to our surroundings. I didn’t know when ghosts and monsters might come this way.

What concerned me was the ghost that had just passed by. It was somewhat different from the ghosts I’d seen in the “Nightmare Corridor.”

“…It had no face.”

Yang Juhui said in a small voice.

“That ghost just now. It had no face. It had no head. It was wearing red high heels. Its skin was extremely white. So vivid you could see it clearly even in the darkness.”

To observe a ghost’s face in such an anxious moment—Yang Juhui’s courage was truly remarkable.

A faceless ghost, huh.

Jeongseok soon chimed in.

“A headless ghost? Ha Yeongwon. Is this a ghost you’ve seen before?”

“No. It’s my first time seeing it too. Anyway! What I want to say is that ghosts roam places like this. But there are hiding spots like this trash can scattered around. We can’t stay long, though.”

Death floor.

I thought it would be good to establish clear objectives for us wandering in this strange space.

“We need to find an exit from here. And we also need to find my mom. Let’s focus on these two things. But our top priority is to survive.”

The “Nightmare Corridor” is a dream.

Even if you die, you get one more chance.

But this bizarre space wasn’t a dream.

If you die, it’s all over.

At least, that’s what I was convinced of.

Swish-.

Just then, Jeongseok picked up the phone he had left on the floor.

“What are you doing? Why that?”

When I asked, Jeongseok replied:

“Earlier, there was definitely a terrible sound, but now it’s quiet. And that high-heeled ghost we met earlier. It didn’t seem interested in the sound this phone was making. Maybe because it has no head, it can’t hear?”

Crackle, crackle-.

Just then, the phone Jeongseok had picked up started making that unpleasant noise again.

Click. Click.

And from around that corner, the sound of high heels hitting the floor could be heard again.

“Let’s hide! We need to hide!”

I led Jeongseok and Yang Juhui, who seemed dazed, and ran away.

# # #

Thanks to my experience navigating the “Nightmare Corridor,” or perhaps because I had a flashlight, I was able to find a room marked “A-1” more easily than expected.

“Let’s go inside for now!”

I didn’t know what kind of room it was, but it seemed much better than wandering the corridor aimlessly.

“Let’s hide in here! Jeongseok! What are you doing? Let’s hide quickly!”

“Wait-. It’s okay. All done! I’m trying to leave the phone in this corridor!”

Slide-.

As we opened the sliding door and entered, we found ourselves in what looked like a laboratory covered in dust.

Beakers and flasks were filled with red liquid, and gray water dripped from a rusty sink.

The broken desks and chairs were chaotic, but they seemed like they would make good cover for hiding.

Crackle, crackleeeee-.

Aaaaaaagh-.

…Mom, mom…. Mom….

Unpleasant noises continuously came from the corridor.

It was the noise emitted by the phone Jeongseok had left there.

Crack, clatter, crack-.

When the phone’s noise reached its peak of unpleasantness, a strange shadow began to pass by the glass window of the sliding door.

Click, click, click.

We kept our mouths shut and held our breath, just like when we were hiding in the trash can.

Please.

Please!

Just as I was desperately wishing in my heart-.

Slide-.

The sound of the sliding door opening was heard.

“…!”

“…!”

“…!”

I was greatly surprised.

When I hid in “Class 1-4” or the “Faculty Office” in the Nightmare Corridor, ghosts couldn’t open those doors. But this wasn’t the corridor, and this place wasn’t a faculty office or classroom.

This meant ghosts might be able to open doors and come in.

What should I do?

What should I do if we come face to face with a ghost like this?

As my brain was working overtime, feeling like my blood vessels might burst, Yang Juhui pulled her hand out of her inner pocket and gripped a box cutter. I wasn’t sure why she carried such a thing, but the blade that slid out with a “srrk-” sound looked quite menacing.

I wasn’t sure what Yang Juhui intended to do with it, but I found myself praying that such a situation wouldn’t arise.

Perhaps my prayer was effective?

Slide, thud-.

The sound of the “A-1” laboratory door closing was heard.

Click. Click. Click.

The strange presence also disappeared into the distance, and the eerie, chilling noise from the phone in the corridor became as quiet as a dead mouse.

“According to my guess…”

Jeongseok’s voice pushed away the silence.

“According to my guess, the phone makes noise when those ghosts approach. I think it might be reacting to some kind of wavelength or magnetic field that the ghosts possess.”

“What do you mean?”

“Haven’t you heard of an EMF meter? There’s a hypothesis that ghosts leave behind an unspecified electromagnetic field when they appear, and it’s like a device that measures that.”

I wasn’t sure what he was talking about.

But I could understand the core of what Jeongseok wanted to say.

The phone alerts us to a ghost’s approach!

Swish-.

Yang Juhui, who had put the box cutter back in her inner pocket, asked:

“But what if the ghosts hear the sound coming from that phone? They might follow us because of the phone’s noise.”

“That’s why I want to experiment a bit… Honestly, I’m not sure.”

Jeongseok looked a bit troubled.

It would be stranger to maintain composure in a situation like this.

Yang Juhui also seemed to have trouble calming down.

Slide, thud-.

She was opening and closing drawers in this laboratory, seemingly looking for something.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m checking if there’s any useful weapon or something. Having something to hold onto would be reassuring, don’t you think?”

I see.

Now that I heard it, it made sense.

But contrary to our wishes, there didn’t seem to be anything in the laboratory that could be used as a weapon.

If Jeong Sojin with her “Attentiveness” trait were here, would she have been helpful in this situation?

…No.

…If she were here, she’d probably push me aside to save herself when a ghost appeared.

I decided to focus on what I could do right now rather than hypothesizing about things that hadn’t happened.

As if rewarding my efforts, I found a strange object in one of the laboratory drawers.

“Oh…”

It was a rolled-up drawing paper. More precisely, it was a torn page from a sketchbook.

When I unfolded it, a drawing made with clumsy strokes appeared.

It looked like it was drawn by a preschool child, and the content… seemed to depict a treasure chest.

“This box. Could it be this one?”

Yang Juhui pointed to a box placed in the corner of the laboratory.

It looked like a fairly heavy cabinet.

It had a padlock that required a password.

Jeongseok said:

“The number of possible combinations for a 4-digit password is 10 to the 4th power, so about ten thousand.”

Is this for real?

Do we have to fiddle with the lock ten thousand times here?

I wondered if it was worth the effort.

If Kim Geonho with his “Destroyer” trait were here… would such effort be unnecessary?

While thinking that, I looked closely at the drawing paper depicting this strange box.

There didn’t seem to be anything unusual.

On a hunch, I checked the back and found numbers written there.

“Hey. Jeongseok. Try entering 1126 into the padlock.”

“One-one-two-six. One-one-two-six.”

Jeongseok entered the numbers.

Click-.

The padlock opened.

We were able to open the box and found an item inside.

“Crayons and a sketchbook?”

I felt like I now knew where that torn page had come from.

Yang Juhui reacted:

“Oh, this is the Princess Sketchbook. I really wanted it when I was young. But I never got to buy it. It’s a sketchbook that was discontinued 10 years ago, and I really wanted it…”

“Princess Sketchbook.”

The cover of the sketchbook had a princess character that young girls would likely love, and there was a dark red stain on it.

Below that stain, there was writing that seemed to have been written with a marker.

“A-1 ───”

It looked like someone had written a name, but the stain made it illegible. Not thinking much of it, I opened the sketchbook and turned the pages.

I saw a drawing of a tall building and many people gathered for a fireworks display.

There was also a description:

“Title: Fireworks”

“It was sooo fun!”

“This looks like the completion ceremony for the Oseong Electronics building. That was when I was 6 years old. 10 years ago. When my dad was… still a prosecutor.”

Jeongseok seemed to recognize the event depicted in the drawing.

A sketchbook discontinued 10 years ago.

A drawing of an event from 10 years ago.

This sketchbook must have been used about 10 years ago.

With that thought, I casually turned the page.

“…What is this?”

Like drawings that reflect the emotions of a child under extreme stress, the later drawings were grotesque.

Some were filled with bright red eyes, some had entire pages covered in black, and some had incomprehensible writing scribbled all over.

However, the drawings became more organized towards the end.

The last five pages were all drawings of a single object.

It was a drawing of an elevator seen from the outside.

“Title: Door”

“Let me out I wanna get out I wanna see mommy mommy”

…The elevator is a door? An exit door?

Suddenly reaching a certain thought, I recalled the advice from my status window.

“Advice from ‘The Broken Clock’: Where there is an entrance, there is also an exit.”

Where there’s an entrance, there’s also an exit.

But… sometimes they’re not different but the same, right?

There’s also the term “entrance-exit” after all.

“Guys. Let’s head back to the elevator we came in on. On the way, we should also retrieve our phone.”

We left “A-1” and returned to the elevator we had come from.

“This is the door?”

Jeongseok frowned.

Soon, Yang Juhui pointed at something as if she had discovered it.

“Look at this. Doesn’t it look like someone marked this with crayon? On the elevator door.”

Where Yang Juhui was pointing, there was an “X” mark.

It was in such a low place that one had to bend at the waist and knees and lower their head to see it.

“Ha Yeongwon. Yang Juhui. Look at this. There’s another mark here. It’s an arrow.”

Now that I looked, there were black crayon markings on the low walls of this corridor.

When we first came out of the elevator, we didn’t have a flashlight out, so we couldn’t have noticed.

Jeongseok said:

“An X generally signifies rejection or negation. Maybe they wanted to indicate that this elevator is not the way? How about we follow the arrow for now?”

Just as I was comprehending Jeongseok’s deduction, a voice that pierced my ears came from far away.

“Ha Yeongwon. Over here.”

“…Mom?”

I could tell this was my mother’s voice. A son can distinguish his mother’s voice even among ten people speaking simultaneously.

“Is it really Mom?”

I wondered if my mother was beyond that dark corner.

The phone, which was supposed to react when a ghost approached, wasn’t making any noise.

“Ha Yeongwon. Over here. Here.”

My heart filled with relief and longing at the sound of my mother’s voice, which I had so desperately wanted to hear.

What broke this feeling was Yang Juhui’s curse.

“Shit, what is that!”

“Over here. Here. Exit. Mom is going to leave through this exit. Even if you hear Mom’s voice, it’s not Mom. Mom has already left, so even if you hear this voice, never follow it—”

Roll, roll, roll-.

Something that perfectly mimicked my mother’s voice was rolling towards us.