Chapter 15: Uncle Brandon (5)

I failed.

When I first started the strategy, the atmosphere wasn’t bad.

Perhaps because I arrived earlier than last time, the convenience store wasn’t filled with the suffocating stench of blood or the groans of students like before.

Naturally, Uncle Brandon’s condition was also not yet enhanced.

So, was time the key variable after all?

“That’s the serial killer…!”

“What a horrifying sight…”

The teachers and soldiers who saw Uncle Brandon’s grotesque appearance all let out faint gasps and sighs.

However, unlike last time, the convenience store wasn’t in a gruesome state, so the teachers didn’t panic, and the suppression attempt went smoothly.

“P-p-please have a red cookie…”

“You insane serial killer! Stop resisting and submit quietly!”

Since even in the previous attempt, subduing the urban legend wasn’t difficult with just a few teachers, there was no way we— now with double the numbers and armed soldiers— could lose.

Uncle Brandon resisted fiercely again, but in the end, he was subdued even more pitifully than the first attempt.

We didn’t even need to shed blood to successfully restrain him.

But then, another anomaly occurred.

Squirm, squirm

Uncle Brandon began to writhe again, and the moment I saw it, I abandoned everyone else and ran.

Even so, the only difference was that my death came last.

Ah.

At least it wasn’t a complete waste.

Since I survived until the end, I was able to observe the enhanced state of Uncle Brandon that Elaine had mentioned.

[Name: Uncle Brandon]

[Classification: Urban Legend]

[Gift: ── ]

[Characteristics: A famous urban legend rooted in Everlight Academy. He kills everyone. His domain is the bakery. Everything he kills turns into cookies and candy.]

Uncle Brandon, now far larger than Elaine’s description, had the space around him warping as if to prove the description in the status window true— transforming into a space made of colorful bread and desserts.

And the same went for the corpses of those he killed.

The bodies he trampled and crushed instantly turned into cookies or candy.

“Ugh…”

The convenience store, filled with the stench of blood and groans, had been disgusting enough, but the sight created by the rampaging Uncle Brandon was on a whole other level.

Nausea rose in my throat.

And what was even more revolting was that, at some point, even the vomit threatening to surge up in my mouth began to taste sweet.

What kind of nonsensical existence was this?

This had already completely surpassed the category of an urban legend like Uncle Brandon.

Had I misunderstood something?

Was violence the key to his enhancement?

“Kyaaah!! Everyone, run!!”

“Where!? Where to!?”

The moment I, like the other students, desperately tried to flee, I realized my body wouldn’t move as I wanted.

Was I paralyzed by fear?

No.

It was because my body was slowly turning into cookies from the extremities.

Fortunately, I didn’t have to endure the terror of becoming a cookie until the very end.

I was trampled to death by Uncle Brandon before that could happen.

Crunch!

.

.

.

And once again, in a quiet corner of the academy.

Having already repeated the events once, the shock wasn’t as great.

Returning to the morning, I once again held a strategy meeting with Elaine.

“What was the reason for this failure?”

“I don’t know.”

Honestly, I don’t even have a clue.

We had prepared much more thoroughly this time, and we had even started the operation several hours earlier than the first attempt.

Yet, contrary to my expectation that time might be the trigger for his strengthening, Uncle Brandon transformed much faster and more powerfully than in the first attempt.

“Elaine. By any chance, in the rumors about Uncle Brandon, is there anything about him awakening hidden powers when he’s about to die, turning into a ‘Super Uncle Brandon’…?”

“No.”

Elaine answered coldly before I could even finish the question.

Yeah. Even I knew it was a ridiculous question.

If that were part of the rumor, it wouldn’t be an urban legend— it would just make him a villain from a superhero battle story.

It only made my head spin more.

But amid the confusion, one thing became clear.

“If we don’t figure out why Uncle Brandon keeps getting stronger, it’s better not to brute-force our way through like we did in the first two attempts.”

We’ve already failed twice in a row with slight variations of the same approach.

I’m not foolish enough to fall for the same trick a third time.

The number of times I can turn back time is limited.

So far, the regression has been working without issue, but if the energy required to reverse time runs out at some point, there would be no worse outcome than that.

“Let’s organize our thoughts. Initially, during the first attempt, I thought Uncle Brandon’s sudden strengthening was due to time. I assumed the Uncle Brandon urban legend had some kind of time limit, so in the second attempt, I gathered people earlier, before lunchtime, to try and defeat him again.”

“But there was nothing in the Uncle Brandon rumor about him getting progressively stronger over time, right?”

“Yeah. Exactly. So my first assumption was wrong. My second thought was the presence of violence. The common factor between the first and second attempts was that I gathered a bunch of people to subdue Uncle Brandon. Naturally, some level of violence was unavoidable in the process, and I wondered if that violence might be the reason Uncle Brandon grew stronger— like unlocking hidden power in a crisis.”

“…That does sound plausible. Like a wounded beast becoming fiercer?”

“But after regressing, I thought about it again and realized there was a contradiction in that hypothesis. If that were the case, he should have strengthened more in the first attempt, where we took more damage, than in the second attempt, where we subdued him with relatively little harm. But in reality, he strengthened more in the second attempt, not the first.”

“That’s not true. You died in the first attempt, so you didn’t see it, but he actually strengthened to a similar degree back then too.”

“You’re telling me this now…? That’s some really helpful information.”

Summarizing everything, we’ve witnessed three versions of Uncle Brandon.

The first was the ‘ordinary’ Uncle Brandon, exactly as described in the urban legend.

The second was the first-stage enhanced version— the giant Uncle Brandon that appeared when I brought a few teachers to subdue him.

And the third was the second-stage enhanced version— the winged Uncle Brandon that appeared after I died in the first attempt and when I brought dozens of teachers and security guards in the second attempt.

Why does he sometimes enter a first-stage rampage and other times a second-stage rampage?

No, more fundamentally, why is he even strengthening at all?

The original Uncle Brandon urban legend doesn’t mention anything about enhancement.

Especially in the second attempt, Uncle Brandon’s form seemed to transcend the urban legend itself.

I only heard about the Uncle Brandon urban legend yesterday— or today, if counting all the regression time as part of today— but that was definitely not part of the original legend’s characteristics.

“…”

I closed my eyes.

I began to deduce.

Perhaps the lack of information was just my misconception.

I’ve already died twice.

“Perhaps I simply don’t understand yet— maybe all the puzzle pieces have already been gathered.

I assemble the information I’ve collected so far and logically deduce the nature of the urban legend known as ‘Uncle Brandon.’

I seek to comprehend it, dismantle its structure, fully grasp the phenomenon, and find a clue to resolve it.

I view the very existence of an urban legend as a kind of product.

If I substitute the act of purchasing a product, it becomes the act of word-of-mouth transmission between people— defining the spread itself as the ‘sale’ of the urban legend as a product.

Then, for an urban legend to ‘sell’ through word-of-mouth, what must it do?

What is the sales point of an urban legend?

It’s the product’s uniqueness— its appeal.

Only when Uncle Brandon possesses a distinct personality and charm that sets it apart from other run-of-the-mill urban legends does it gain the qualification to spread by word of mouth.

The key appeal of the Uncle Brandon legend lies in the narrative surrounding the character himself and the irrational choices that inevitably lead to death, no matter what is chosen.

If the narrative of Uncle Brandon as a person is the packaging— the exterior that piques interest— then the core content is the dilemma of those unreasonable choices.

Faced with a dilemma where every path leads to a bad ending, anyone who encounters the legend will inevitably try to think of a way to circumvent it, and in that process, the legend gains depth.

Only then does the ‘product’ called Uncle Brandon begin to ‘sell’ through word of mouth.

But what about Uncle Brandon’s strengthening?

It maintains the packaging of Uncle Brandon, but the core— the irrational choices and dilemmas— has disappeared, hasn’t it?

That is an act that directly contradicts its own identity.

If so, then the nature of this strengthening does not originate from the entity ‘Uncle Brandon.’

If it’s not the entity’s trait, then is it a trait shared by all urban legends as a category?

Just as all food products inevitably have an expiration date.

Do all urban legends have a trigger that activates their strengthened state?

An inevitable characteristic of being an urban legend.

Why, then, are they called urban legends?

Not ‘grotesque beings’ or ‘monsters’—why ‘urban legends’?

“…”

“Mr. Allen?”

“Shh. I’m thinking.”

“Eek.”

A strange sensation.

A bizarre certainty washed over me— that my reasoning, my analysis, was leading me toward the correct answer.

Then, what is the trigger?

Time? Threats?

Those are wrong.

Does it gain strength by devouring victims?

That’s not it either.

Let me recall— the situation when Uncle Brandon entered his second-stage strengthening.

Humans dying too easily.

The screams of students.

And the crowded chaos where escape was impossible.

…!!

No way?

At the absurd thought that suddenly struck me, my eyes widened.

And as if confirming my suspicion, a semi-transparent message window appeared before me.

[Observation successful.]

[Through logical reasoning and in-depth analysis, your understanding of urban legends has increased.]

[All urban legends───────────────.]

A hollow laugh escaped me.

“Ha…! This is ridiculous.”

“Did you figure something out!?”

“Yeah. I just realized we’ve been wasting our time in the worst possible way.”

“Wasting time?”

“And in the most utterly pointless manner, at that.”

Having said that, I stood up.

“Ah, Mr. Allen? Where are you going all of a sudden!?”

“Come on, let’s go. We’re ending this mess.”

This world is truly, mercilessly cruel.