Breakdown III
I was, after all, a storyteller, refining my experiences into tales for you all, a so-called peddler of stories.
Thus, unless my brain completely lost it and I mistook myself for an omnipotent god, my stories inevitably adhered to the first-person narrative.
However, even I sometimes envied the wholesale storytellers—those third-person narrators or the first-person-rewrite method.
Imagine it. How delightful it would be to slander and defame Noh Do-hwa from an omniscient perspective!
Unfortunately, I lacked the skills like [Evolve into a God in the Final Chapter of the Story] or [Possession], so describing events from a third-person perspective or immersing in another's first-person view was impossible for me.
But… what if the targets felt no guilt no matter what I did?
For instance, wouldn't it be possible to ‘distort history’ about anomalies as much as I wanted?
So, I tried it.
-The guard is coming! The guard is coming!
The anomalies trembled in fear (of course, such conversations probably never happened) and shouted from the shadows.
-How shameful for an anomaly to feel fear towards a mere human!
-Stop! Don't go! Those who rushed in couldn’t return!
-Long live the anomaly! For the glory of the Infinite Void!
-The ghost of Agrippa from the art room, defeated! Lost! No signs of life detected!
-Foolish one. Made of marble without any physical immunity, what was he thinking?
-This can’t be. The ghost of Beethoven’s portrait in the music room isn't responding. The words [Symphony Only] were written on Beethoven’s portrait when it died! Blood is flowing from Beethoven’s mouth!
-The ghost of the anatomical model in the biology room was also found with all its internal organs shredded! The heart had [Arrhythmia], the kidney [Diabetes], and the tongue… [Noh Do-hwa]? Unidentified characters were written like curses!
-No! This makes no sense! We are the strongest tutorial dungeon, School Ghost Stories, on the Korean Peninsula! But our ace members are being annihilated without resistance?
-Enemy shadow, approaching! It's coming this way! Ah! The flashlight! That light! Our eyes!
-Stop it! Hold the line at any cost!
-The guard is coming! The guard is coming!
-Aaaaah! Iyaa! Iyaa!
That was a fun session of historical distortion.
But no matter how much I distorted history, the truth didn't disappear.
Here, the truth was that I had cleaned out almost all the ghosts from the 1st to the 3rd floors of the school building.
On the second day of exploration,
After exorcising the ‘student left alone in the classroom after school’ ghost on the 3rd floor, I set up a notice board on the stair landing for easy identification.
[Patrol Completed]
Thus, the lower floors of the school building all turned into safe zones. In the void of ‘School Ghost Stories,’ it had reverted back to the reality of ‘Baekhwa Girls' High School.’
“The truly important place is... the 4th floor.”
I murmured. When traversing the void alone, constantly talking to oneself like this was quite useful.
“It’s a way to check one's self-awareness.”
If a murmur I didn’t intend slipped out or felt like ‘my words,’ it was a sign that a mind-control-type anomaly had appeared nearby.
Of course, there were drawbacks to talking to oneself.
“Heading to the 4th floor is very dangerous, but it’s probably where the most captured survivors are.”
“Yes. I expected you to show up.”
Crack!
I immediately infused aura into my cane sword ‘Do-hwa’ and struck my shadow.
-Aaaaaargh!
Just like now, excessive self-talk could attract doppelgänger-type anomalies.
But if you had pre-arranged countermeasures, you could intentionally keep murmuring to bait the doppelgängers.
The shadow pinned to my cane writhed and squirmed.
-How? How? How?
“It’s thanks to modern conveniences, anomaly.”
Swoosh, I removed the earphone from my left ear. A small microphone was attached to the collar of the guard uniform.
I had been eavesdropping on my own murmurs in real time through the earphones. The microphone and earphones were connected to a smartphone, and I deliberately reproduced my voice at a low quality.
If ‘a completely different voice, recorded at a different distance or quality, played back through the earphones’? It would be proof that a mental-control-type anomaly had appeared nearby.
And the method to exterminate doppelgängers was simple.
“Say the Saintess's name.”
-......? ......?
“You can’t answer. You are not me.”
Bubbling, bubbling, bubbling-
The shadow boiled up and then popped! The bubbles burst, and my shadow returned to normal.
After hearing the Saintess's true name in the 36th cycle, I never exchanged names with her again. A doppelgänger living only in this cycle had no way of knowing the Saintess's true name.
Thus, ‘you’ and ‘I’ were different. Denying identity. The anomaly, whose weak point was exploited, couldn't maintain its existence and collapsed.
“What a dull fellow. If you want to brainwash me, bring someone like Go Yuri.”
But it wasn’t over yet.
I reattached the earphone and microphone. Then, I took out a walkie-talkie from my pocket.
“Alright. This is Guard Undertaker. I am heading to the 4th floor after covering the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd floors. No abnormalities. Continuing the night patrol.”
-Roger......
“Gotcha.”
Confirming the presence of the anomaly through the walkie-talkie, which couldn’t return my response.
Immediately, I played the recorded phrase, ‘No abnormalities. Continuing the night patrol,’ on my phone in an infinite loop.
But I increased the speed, tenfold.
Of course, the walkie-talkie, which had to respond to my words, also became urgent.
-Roger, roger, roger, roger.
“Oh, it’s holding up well?”
I increased the speed to twentyfold.
-Roger, roger, roger-roger, ra-ra-ra, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la.
Boom!
The walkie-talkie exploded on its own before 60 seconds passed.
A ‘walkie-talkie unable to return a proper response’ had no reason to exist.
“This is Guard Undertaker. I am heading to the 4th floor. No abnormalities on the stairs. Continuing the night patrol.”
-......
There was no response from anywhere. Just to be sure, I glanced at the school speakers on the wall, but they were silent too.
Extermination complete.
This meant most mind-control-type anomalies had been cleared.
“Hmmm.”
From the silent stair landing, I glanced upstairs.
The 4th floor.
The 4th (死) floor.
In a void with stairs or elevators, it was the most dangerous zone along with the ‘13th floor’ and ‘basement 4th floor.’
Scoffing at the idea that it's just a pun on the pronunciation of ‘four’ (사) meaning ‘death’ (死) could lead to having your brain dribble out of your nose like an Egyptian mummy.
‘Wordplay in this world’. This linguistic act is the essence of being human.
Wordplay using homophones forms the basis of comedy and poetry. For the human race, which tries to dominate the world with language, it’s a stepping stone for magic.
Astute readers may have already realized.
Yes. This is why I insist on calling myself the Undertaker and never mention the Saintess’s true name.
Simply revealing a true name carries the risk of being used for curses.
For figures like Noh Do-hwa or Dang Seo-rin, who operate openly, it might not matter. But for beings like the Saintess and me, who are truly free only when our identities are hidden, we must conceal even our names under aliases.
“Now then.”
I opened the trunk bag and took out 'money.'
There were two main types of money.
One pouch was filled with gold and silver coins. The other was bundles of various countries’ banknotes, two hundred each.
I laid the coins and banknotes neatly on the stairs leading to the 4th floor, using them as an altar. I also bit down on a silver coin.
Then, I quietly closed my eyes and joined my hands in prayer.
“......”
Whoosh.
A chilly breeze brushed my cheek. When I opened my eyes, all the money on the stairs was gone.
“Ptooey—”
The silver coin in my mouth, however, remained intact. I spat out the coin and stuffed it back into the trunk bag.
“Well, the ferryman sure took a hefty toll.”
To enter the realm of death, the 4th (死) floor, the 'afterlife,' without incident, I had to show my sincerity.
That was the toll.
The type and amount of toll varied greatly depending on ‘what kind of anomaly’ ruled the realm of death.
The money I placed on the altar included not only banknotes but also coins from various countries, including Greek silver coins and Venetian gold coins.
However, the 'afterlife' in this 'School Ghost Stories' void took all the toll without asking for nationality or origin.
It was a sign of an anomaly drenched in greed.
But this wasn’t bad news.
On the contrary, it was very, very welcome news.
“Then let's see the value of the toll you’ve taken.”
It was a simple transaction.
The more toll the anomaly took, the more 'benefits' it had to give in return.
Charon, the ferryman of the underworld, standardized the fare to one silver coin per person to avoid protests calling for his resignation over fairness issues.
But the 'anomaly of the afterlife' here had taken a toll worth over a hundred million won, even excluding the historical value of the gold and silver coins. From a living person who wasn’t even dead yet.
This was a bribe and embezzlement scandal of a scale that would get them fired in any religious or mythological system.
As a citizen of a staunchly democratic society, I couldn’t help but smile broadly. I confidently walked towards the most dangerous area in the 'School Ghost Stories.'
Step.
Step.
The moment I reached the 4th floor, as expected of the worst area, red fleshy tendrils immediately squirmed and rushed towards me――
-......
――but couldn’t reach me. The red tendrils stopped abruptly right in front of me.
As if an invisible shield surrounded me.
Click, click, click...
A gold coin rolled from the dark hallway, clinking as it hit my foot.
I smiled broadly.
“Not accepting it.”
-......
“No refunds.”
-......
Click, click, click, click, click.
Gold and silver coins rolled in one after another from the corridor. Over time, countless coins piled up at my feet, but I paid them no mind.
“I said I won’t accept money. You probably demanded limbs or lives from humans who couldn’t pay, right?”
-......
“The interest rates are steep these days. Let’s see how high the usury gets later.”
Step. Ignoring the refund request, I walked on, and the illusion of red fleshy tendrils around me disappeared.
It was just an ordinary school corridor.
The ‘afterlife’ hadn’t been completely exorcised yet. The red-stained windows and blood-stained handprints scattered around were proof.
But for a while, I would be protected from the ‘afterlife’s curse.
Maybe that’s why.
Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap—
The wooden hallway echoed. Lively footsteps, yet grounded with a sense of weight. The breath of the body and the muscles of the flesh in a rhythm unique to living organisms.
Footsteps of a human, not an anomaly.
“Hyahaaa—!”
The rhythm of that living being was confirmed by the voice. A human in a white school uniform dashed down the wooden hallway and jumped, aiming a right kick at me.
Excellent jump. Splendid kick.
I lowered my head and caught the opponent’s shoe. A black-red Air Jordan basketball shoe halted.
The kick carried the full weight of Cheon Yo-hwa’s charging body, but I skillfully handled it with the aura in my palm.
“Haaah?”
The opponent was surprised. Orange ponytail swayed in the air.
For a moment, our eyes met.
“――A, human? Ah? An adult?!”
Instead of slamming the opponent into the floor, I gently landed them so their back wouldn’t bend.
“Ugh! Ugh! Ack!”
The opponent stumbled and eventually fell in the hallway, but seemed uninjured since I had absorbed all the impact.
“Ow, ow, ow... Wait. An adult? Really an adult? Uh, so... sir, you're human, right?”
“Hm.”
I nodded.
“Yes, I am human.”
“Aaaah...! Finally! You've come to rescue us!”
A hopeful expression appeared on their face.
Although the impression was quite different from when we first met, the name tag attached to the front pocket confirmed that the person before me was indeed the one I was looking for.
An awakener who would later grow into the strongest necromancer on the Korean Peninsula.
A former runner-up in the last national high school basketball championship. Main position: point guard.
The 113th student council president of Baekhwa Girls' High School. The only witness connected to the Outer Gods’ ‘Infinite Void.’
Cheon Yo-hwa (天寥化).
Heaven (天), Lonely (寥), To become (化). A child with solitude hidden in her name.
Finally, I had encountered my target in the worst tutorial dungeon.
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