Chapter 85: Double Down!
"N-No! Kyaaaaah!" Eunji screamed as she watched the number for slot 3 hit zero before her own slot, number 1, could do the same. Number 3 was the one number that absolutely could not hit zero first, yet of all things, it had. This was an absolute disaster.
And Eunji wasn't the only one who thought so. From Jia and Jiseon's perspectives, number 3 hitting zero was the worst-case scenario. But no matter how much the three of them denied it, the number that had ticked down from ten all the way to zero was indeed number 3. Watching this unfold from the side, Dohyung's clone burst into a hearty laugh, perfectly mirroring the thoughts of the original.
"Puhahaha! This is a masterpiece! Of all numbers, number 3 hits zero first? Hahaha!" Of course, since Dohyung's clone shared a mental link with the original Dohyung, he knew exactly what circumstances had caused number 3 to reach zero first. He was simply ecstatic at the prospect of watching the three girls suffer. He was especially pleased that this outcome would bring the most torment to Eunji.
Eunji was absolutely furious. She had been so close to escaping punishment, only for her number to stall at one instead of hitting zero. There were just too many bizarre things about this game. In fact, she had harbored doubts ever since Dohyung first explained this "Countdown" game.
Until now, the flow of the games had always been dictated by the three of them. Even if the process was agonizing and filled with things they desperately wanted to avoid, the outcome of victory or defeat had ultimately depended on their own efforts to escape punishment. But this game progressed completely independently of anything they did. It was a game where they simply had to pray that their chosen number on the display board would hit zero first.
To think I have to pray over a stupid game of pure luck to decide whether I get punished or not... How is this fair?! If she had struggled with all her might to avoid punishment and lost anyway, she would at least feel less cheated. But being subjected to a penalty because of some arbitrary numbers she didn't even understand was utterly unacceptable.
She desperately wanted to demand answers from Dohyung right this second. What was the basis for these numbers? Why had her chosen number stopped right at one? Because Dohyung hadn't explained a single thing about the numbers when the game started, the three of them had been suffocating in suspense. Now that the result dictated that all of them would be punished, their frustration and irritation boiled over.
"Hehehe... It looks like none of you want to accept the fact that you're all getting punished."
"T-That's..." Eunji couldn't find the words to reply to Dohyung's clone. She truly, deeply did not want to accept it.
"In that case, how about we do this?" Dohyung's clone stood up slowly and walked over to the display board. He pulled a remote-like device with buttons from his pocket and pressed it. The screen showing the current game status went dark, and a new feed flickered to life.
"Master... what is this?"
"Oh... oh my god..."
"Ah..."
Sujin and Dongeun lie unconscious, their foreheads severely burned and dripping with fresh blood.
Hyemin and Ara hover before the heated iron plate, trembling with fear and hesitation.
"H-Huh? Those girls..." Jiseon squinted at the screen, her expression shifting as recognition dawned on her. Following Jiseon, Jia and Eunji also began to study the familiar faces, gradually realizing exactly who the girls on the screen were.
Dohyung's clone was actually a bit surprised by Jia and Jiseon's reactions. He had assumed the four newly captured girls were only connected to Eunji; he hadn't realized they had any overlap with Jia and Jiseon. Driven by a burning desire for vengeance on Minah's behalf, he had hunted down the perpetrators who bullied her. He had started his proxy revenge by targeting the four ringleaders, knowing Eunji was linked to them. However, since no connection to Jia and Jiseon had appeared in the memories of those four, he had assumed the two had absolutely nothing to do with Minah's tormentors.
Deciding to keep quiet about that for now, Dohyung's clone began to explain the girls on the screen. "I'm sure you're all dying to know how those numbers were ticking down. Well... ah, actually, you can just watch right now." Dohyung's clone cut his explanation short as he saw Ara on the screen. Driven to her absolute limit by thirst and starvation, she swallowed hard and prepared to prostrate herself in front of the iron plate.
"Just watch the screen, and you'll see exactly how this game works." The three girls stared at the monitor in silence. Then... they gasped in horror as Ara pressed her forehead against the iron plate, letting out a bloodcurdling shriek. They hadn't understood why Sujin and Dongeun's foreheads were in such a gruesome state, but watching Ara now, it all clicked.
"Ah! The number over there..." Jia pointed at the screen and cried out as she noticed the number 10 beginning to tick down the moment Ara's head made contact with the iron plate. At Jia's exclamation, Jiseon and Eunji also focused on the rapidly decreasing digits.
The number, which had started at ten, steadily decreased until it finally hit zero. The moment it did, Ara, who had been screaming with her forehead pinned to the hot metal, collapsed sideways, losing consciousness. Seeing this, Dohyung's clone pressed another button on the remote, switching the display back to the original scoreboard. There, the three girls saw that the number 10 under slot 4 had changed to 0.
Having finally pieced together the true nature of the game, the three girls stood frozen in sheer shock. They had been completely in the dark about what governed the countdown, but now they understood perfectly: the numbers on their board decreased in real-time as the girls in the other room endured the agony of pressing their foreheads against a searing hot iron plate.
Yet, a sense of injustice still lingered. Even though they now knew how the game worked, the fact remained that the outcome was entirely out of their hands. And that was exactly what Dohyung had intended.
"Now then... let me make you an offer. It would be a shame for all of you to get punished right now when you feel so cheated, wouldn't it?" The three girls locked their eyes on Dohyung's clone. It was only natural, as it sounded like he was about to throw them a lifeline.
"The difficulty of this game was 2 stars. How about we double down and play one more game? What do you say?"
"One... more?"
"Yes. We double the stakes from 2 stars to a 4-star game. But this time, you'll be directly participating in the game yourselves. And since it's an individual match, I can promise you that all three of you won't end up getting punished."
The three girls fell into deep thought at the clone's words. The choice boiled down to this: should they all take a 2-star punishment together, or raise the stakes to a 4-star punishment that would be concentrated entirely on a single loser? Since they had never experienced a 2-star punishment before, they couldn't quite gauge how painful it would be. However, remembering the horrors of the 1-star and 4-star punishments they had seen, they knew for a fact they wanted to avoid it at all costs. Thus, rather than all of them suffering a 2-star penalty, it seemed far better to gamble on a 4-star game and dump the entire burden onto one person. After all, as long as it wasn't them, they didn't care who took the fall.
"I-I agree with Master's proposal!"
"Me too!"
"I also feel... too cheated to just accept the punishment like this."
Dohyung's clone smiled warmly at their responses. "Very well... then it's settled. As you wish, we will carry over the punishment from this game and add it to the next." The three girls let out a collective sigh of relief, glad to have escaped immediate punishment. However, a creeping anxiety about what the next game would entail began to settle in.
"Master... how will the next game be played?"
"Ah, that? I'll explain it tomorrow. Let's call it a day." Feeling a lingering unease at how easily Dohyung had let them off the hook, the three girls bowed and bid farewell to Dohyung's clone as he exited the Basement.
"Aaaaargh!" Once Hyemin—the last one to press her forehead against the iron plate and bring her countdown to zero—finally passed, Dohyung dispelled the clone he had sent to Jia, Jiseon, and Eunji's basement room. He then picked up Hyemin, whose forehead was severely charred and bleeding, and carried her to the room where the other three unconscious girls lay.
Dohyung cast a spell on Hyemin's forehead to treat her wound. However, it wasn't a complete healing; it merely stopped the bleeding, leaving behind a hideous, puckered burn scar. While his magic was fully capable of restoring her skin without a trace of a scar, Dohyung chose not to.
"If you did that to Minah, it's only fair that you carry the exact same scars, isn't it?" Dohyung smiled with deep satisfaction at the sight of the four girls, each now bearing a beautifully matching burn scar. His immediate instinct was to show off this glorious sight to Minah. However, he quickly dismissed the thought.
Minah was, after all, an ordinary person. Dohyung knew all too well that what he was doing down here was not something a normal person could easily stomach. If Minah saw this, she might be so traumatized that she would collapse. Dohyung fell into deep contemplation, torn between keeping his revenge a complete secret or finding a way to hint at it to her indirectly.