Chapter 82: A room you can’t enter if you don’t clear the game

After sufficiently carving the humanoid variant model.

Jina, taking a short breather, began adjusting the sound and lighting effects to enhance the game’s atmosphere.

The setting is a hospital corridor turned to ruin.

A drone sound exuding an ominous atmosphere lays low over the gloomy background.

On top of this, she layered the sound of a door creaking, the faint sound of dripping water, and an eerie sound like wind seeping in as white noise.

Jina appropriately raised the speaker volume and pressed the play button.

Kkiiik.

Tok, tok-

Hwiii…

The gloomy sounds sinking into the silence made even the workshop air feel heavier.

Using the bizarre noise as background music for work, Mad Artist Jina continued her task.

She broke some of the corridor’s fluorescent lights and set others to flicker in time with the noise.

Darkness and faint, dim light intersect.

The corridor on the screen.

Slowly, gradually…

Becomes tinged with an eerie atmosphere.

Jina slowly looked around the screen from the player’s perspective, retouching unsatisfactory parts.

“Suddenly pop out hwak! when they’re not thinking about it at all…”

With a few mouse clicks, a humanoid variant was faintly placed at the end of the dark corridor.

Utilizing an eye tracker, she added a script to make the object move slightly when the player looks away.

It was a演出 (direction/staging) where the variant gradually approached the player.

The direction of the variant attacking the player from their blind spot was vivid and eerie, making Jina wear a satisfied expression.

To design the space more delicately, Jina drew the hospital interior in greater detail.

“VR TRPG is definitely convenient.”

It’s sudden, but Jina isn’t a ‘golden hand’ (exceptionally skilled artist).

Of course, she became able to draw quite well for an ordinary person.

But for the Mama of Han Ari and Seasons, there were some shortcomings.

Understandably so, as Jina’s identity was more that of a researcher than an artist.

In that respect, VR TRPG was practically Jina’s exclusive weapon.

Extracting drafts of game components based on AI, and improving them to high quality.

This is the work Jina does best.

Combining key keywords and inputting prompts instantly created a shabby hospital room.

Under Jina’s touch, the plain hospital room gradually became eerie.

The wallpaper faded and grew moldy.

The floor tiles cracked and fell away.

Broken beds, malfunctioning wheelchairs, and objects like oxygen tanks or IV stands were scattered disorderly in the corridor.

Adding seemingly insignificant yet extremely delicate effects like dust and cobwebs on top.

A background perfectly suited for the horror genre was completed.

The reason why numerous clients and communities revere Jina as a god-tier 3D model designer.

Lies precisely in this meticulous pursuit of reality.

“Still, since it’s a game, it’d be good to add some gimmick elements, right?”

Jina also added simple puzzle elements that the player must solve as they progress through the game.

She briefly considered adding weapons like steel pipes or guns but immediately gave up.

Giving Spring a gun would complete a very funny picture.

But giving Winter a gun…

“Then it would become too easy.”

Preventing the game’s genre from changing from horror to shooting action was paramount.

The puzzle difficulty itself was also set not too hard.

She devised simple mechanisms that could maintain tension.

Finding keys needed to move from room to room, or solving combination lock puzzles, that’s all.

Of course, if terrified, they wouldn’t be easy to find.

Jina nodded with satisfaction and finally added a few more directional touches.

Emergency room doors closing by themselves, or the sudden sound of a newborn baby’s laughter.

Besides that, various other things.

After the game prototype was completed, Jina put on the VR headset for testing.

Instantly, her vision was dyed in darkness, and the scene of the ruined hospital lobby she just created unfolded before her eyes.

“Summer wasn’t overly immersed for no reason.”

Jina, having lightly finished the test play, ended the game with a pleased expression.

Even she, who knew all the game’s gimmicks, felt creeped out several times.

What if Spring and Winter, who know nothing, play this game?

“The broadcast will be fun.”

While adding faint graffiti to the corridor walls and adding sound effects to reinforce the details.

[Winter: Um… I heard Jina is personally making the horror game Spring and I will play…]

[Winter: By any chance… will it be very scary…?]

[Winter: (Cat shivering cone)]

A few messages arrived from Winter.

Jina grinned and typed a message.

[Jina: I put a lot of effort into making it.]

[Jina: You can look forward to it.]

[Winter: (Cat turning white and screaming cone)]

---

The day of the horror game collab arrived.

Cosmo Live headquarters’ spacious studio.

The place where Fall had also conducted her VR fitness broadcast.

Today, Spring and Winter were scheduled to conduct a horror game joint broadcast here.

“Hwaaang… I wished today wouldn’t come…!”

Spring muttered in a gloomy voice, shoulders slumped in a corner of the waiting room.

“Haaa… Right…”

Winter, with a stiff posture, didn’t move an inch, as if frozen.

Her tense gaze flowing beneath her tightly tied hair, unlike her usual cold demeanor, trembled with worry and fear.

Spring and Winter trudged towards the studio at a snail’s pace.

In front of the firmly closed door, a notice written in crooked handwriting caught their eye.

[Room You Can’t Leave Unless You Clear the Horror Game]

It was a handmade work by Daon, strongly asserting that geniuses have bad handwriting.

“Hwaaang… I really hate this…”

Spring squeezed her eyes shut and made a crying sound.

“Winter unnie, are we even going home today…?”

While Spring whined, unable to take her eyes off the notice.

“…”

Winter beside her just kept letting out long sighs silently.

“Winter unnie, are you perhaps nervous?”

“…No, not at all.”

Unlike her words denying it, her voice trembled slightly.

“Just a little… ha, just a little bit annoyed, that’s all.”

Just then, someone staggered towards them from afar.

A sallow face and hollow eyes.

A living zombie, no less.

“Ah… You’ve arrived? Spring-nim, and Winter-nim.”

His identity was Cosmo Live’s general manager, Youngjun.

“…Manager, didn’t you sleep?”

‘Don’t tell me you were keyboard warring on the community forums until dawn again,’ Winter thought, glaring.

Then Youngjun weakly shook his head.

“No, that’s not it… Actually, I tested Jina’s handmade horror game that Spring-nim and Winter-nim will be playing today beforehand. But…”

Youngjun’s lips trembled as he continued.

“I thought I was immune to horror games… but I couldn’t keep my composure. Haha, ha…”

‘Seriously doubting the mental state of Jina who made this,’ Youngjun just let out hollow laughter.

“…”

“…”

Spring and Winter stared blankly at each other with stunned faces.

Their pale faces were dyed with fear.

“It wasn’t just me either, Summer-nim came in midway saying she was curious…”

“…Came in, and?”

“It was the first time I saw Summer give up midway saying she absolutely couldn’t clear this.”

“Yes? S-Summer unnie?!”

Spring’s face was filled with shock.

“Just how scary is it…?”

Youngjun looked quietly at the two who were scared even before starting, then smiled faintly with his hollow face and patted their shoulders tuk tuk.

“Then, you two… good luck. Today’s broadcast will be managed by other managers.”

Saying he needed to take some sleeping pills and get some shut-eye, Youngjun quickly turned and disappeared from the studio as if fleeing.

The two, left alone in the empty corridor, looked at each other and let out another long sigh.

“Still, since there are two of us… if we trust and rely on each other, won’t it work out somehow, unnie…?”

For a brief moment, the image of Spring throwing a grenade at the wall flashed through Winter’s mind.

The bad thought that maybe being alone would be better briefly crossed her mind.

But well, it’s not a shooting game.

“Shall we… go in?”

At Winter’s words, Spring clenched her teeth and nodded heavily.

Kkiiik- Kung.

The sound of the door closing was unusually ominous.

---

Exactly one hour after Spring and Winter entered the studio.

“Kyaaaaak-!”

“Hwaaaaak!!”

Spring and Winter’s screams shook the studio.

As expected of peers, the harmony their screams created was superb.

Following the screams, an eerie sound echoed.

Simultaneously, the corridor’s fluorescent lights flickered rapidly, confusing the two’s vision.

“U-unnie… There’s something over there… It just moved… It moved!! Kyaaaaaak!!”

“IsawittooButthat’snotwhatweshouldbelookingatrightnowRunquicklyQuickly!”

Winter poured out words urgently without taking a breath.

But Spring’s legs, paralyzed by fear, wouldn’t move as if frozen.

The humanoid variant, faintly visible between the flickering lights.

Slowly, very slowly.

Approached the two.

At some point, the fluorescent lights completely went out.

Blood-red pupils shone hwaak- in the darkness.

“…Kyaaaaaaaaaak-!!”