Chapter 74
Chapter 74
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 74
Chapter Title: 25-Hour Convenience Store Horror - Rules (6)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
To achieve my goal, it was impossible with just one coin in my current state.
To last until midnight, I needed to map out the optimal route.
Not relying simply on "luck" or "endurance," but advancing step by step with certainty.
In other words, "management" calculated through numbers and patterns.
Think.
The number of people entering the convenience store each hour is generally fixed.
It varies only slightly, but the basic pattern repeats.
The moment I read that repetition, the probability of my survival would change dramatically.
In the end, what made the difference was how I handled the "moments of combat."
Combat is an explosion in an instant, but the time in between is a kind of resource.
Tension is sharp like a blade, but holding it too long cuts your hand.
The human body isn't a machine.
It's tough at times, but it crumbles from a single minor mistake.
So, I needed time to maintain my body, calm my mind, and prepare for the next one.
The key was "sustainability."
That meant the goal wasn't a single victory, but flexibly enduring the entire time.
The good news was that even though the horrors' appearances changed, their behavior patterns were fixed.
There were three core types.
Punch-type, ranged-type, scream-type.
They all gave a signal right before attacking.
With sound, body language, or screams.
That signal itself was the "attack warning," followed by indiscriminate violence.
Almost like "hit anyone and kill them" attacks.
The power was threatening, but if you spotted the signal and dodged, there was no harm.
In short, just cycle through observation → prediction → evasion properly.
Oh, and one more additional rule.
I checked if freeloading was possible, but no.
I couldn't close the convenience store door or deliberately leave my post.
Attempts to block customers' entry were also out.
If I closed the door in any way or blocked entry itself, all the lights inside the convenience store would go out.
Up to now, I'd explained a lot, but excluding additional rules, I still had everything memorized.
Whether the calculations were truly accurate—
I'd have to confirm in actual combat.
I put it into action right away.
Looping back.
18th loop.
I thought I'd distributed it well, but the tips of my fingers holding the Great Mop began to tremble slightly.
My body knew first.
That this loop wouldn't last much longer.
The longest I'd survived without combat so far was [21:00:00].
But after switching to a combat focus, it was [16:00:00].
A difference of about five hours.
Time had decreased, but I didn't think the method was wrong.
The direction was right.
I slowly raised my head and looked at the ceiling.
The radiant beam of light hovering above.
Below it, eight lights illuminated the convenience store.
I saw the potential.
In the next horror that entered, my muscles loosened during the fight, ending it.
Strength drained away, muscles slackened.
In that brief breath, I thought.
Next time…
It would be a little better than now.
21st loop.
The hand gripping the Great Mop didn't shake.
The calculations had seeped into my body to some extent.
I kicked the horror on the left, pinning it against the wall.
Then bashed its head.
I used the recoil from my body.
The Great Mop swung toward the one standing on the right in my peripheral vision.
It smashed into its temple, destroying the balance organ.
The thing twisted and collapsed.
Without watching it fall to the end.
I hurled the Great Mop with all my strength at the horror behind me.
Bang!!
The straight metal rod sliced through the air.
As it raised its arm, the Great Mop stabbed into the horror's mouth, twisting its arm sideways.
That arm then pierced the torso of the horror preparing to attack right beside me.
Breaths mixed in ragged gasps.
—Behind you! Behind you, Agent!
Before my body could turn, wind sliced from behind.
Bang!!
"Ah.."
0.1 seconds.
Just that much.
My reaction was late.
31st loop.
For the first time, my body couldn't keep up with my head.
Crisis.
My mind had calculated perfectly.
Each horror's entry time, distance, attack warning motion, and counter timing.
But my body's durability couldn't keep up with the calculations.
The moment I tried to move, my leg cramped, and my shoulder twisted like it would snap.
What I hadn't factored into the calculations.
Fatigue. Physical stress.
And finally, physical wear.
The signal spread slowly in my head.
Thought arose, but action lagged a beat.
I didn't dodge the attack. It was already too late to dodge.
Instead of dodging, I raised the Great Mop to alter its trajectory.
At that moment, something hit the back of my head.
When I came to.
My vision tilted, the floor's fluorescent lights upside down.
Hoo—
I forcibly flipped my body to look at the ceiling.
Fatigue was gnawing at the connection between my head and body.
I needed to understand the body's reaction speed due to fatigue.
So I thought.
Then think and move one step faster.
42nd loop.
My body started to remember.
When a horror raised its arm, my body judged and reacted before my head.
The Great Mop moved on its own.
Shoulder direction, gaze focus, foot angle—
All of them angles taught by the "deaths" of previous loops.
This time, I barely thought.
I just moved.
Even so, my body began distributing the optimal route and stamina.
Grabbed one horror's arm and twisted it.
Smashed another's jaw.
Stepped on the twisted joint and snapped it.
Even after dealing with the horrors, stamina consumption and emotional disturbance were minimal.
The next attack route simply appeared in my vision.
And for the first time, I surpassed the previous loop's record.
[21:00:00]—
Not a single light had gone out.
63rd loop.
The moment I ducked, an arm whistled over my head.
I lightly tapped the passing arm with the Great Mop.
The attack trajectory changed.
Soon, the heads of the two charging at me collided in each other's attack paths and exploded.
The biggest progress here was.
Not closing my eyes.
That was it.
It took quite a while to internalize this.
It wasn't as easy as I thought.
Mastering that simple sentence with my "body."
My head knew I wouldn't die, but my body still instinctively tried to dodge.
Controlling that reflex was agony itself.
In exchange, the reward was huge.
By staring straight at the opponent's attack to the end.
I could see the start and end, the trajectory and gaps.
At first, I focused on defense.
Then on attack.
And now I knew.
The best defense, the ultimate attack—
Came from using the opponent's force.
After understanding that, stamina allocation efficiency skyrocketed.
I grabbed the scream horror with the hole in its face and spun it as a shield.
The approaching ones froze momentarily from the scream.
In that gap, I crushed one with my foot.
The rest I handled with the Great Mop now fully in my grasp.
For incoming attacks, I just tapped with the Great Mop to redirect only the arm's trajectory.
Finally, what remained was the scream horror, already reduced to a rag by the other horrors' attacks.
I released the hand holding it.
It slid down and collapsed on the floor.
Thud.
The quieted convenience store.
I looked up at the ceiling.
All ten lights were still on.
[23:53:53]
—Agent! Y-you won!?
My vision blurred from spilled blood.
The blood-soaked dress shirt.
The revolting smell emanating from my body.
Liquid trickled down following my hair.
Even so.
All preparations were now complete.
***
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[Moving to the last save point.]
[The most recent save point is AUTO SAVE 5.]
[25-Hour Convenience Store Horror]
[Death Type]: Exsanguination.
[Tip]: Leaving your post during work hours is not proper conduct.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
I slowly opened my eyes, which had been closed.
The faint stabbing light grew stronger.
The convenience store interior.
Under the familiar shelves and fluorescent lights, the receiver rang in my ear.
After dozens of deaths, I had a premonition that this was truly the last.
'I'll end it completely this loop.'
I had the same conversation with her as in previous loops.
—Um, this is the convenience store, right?
—By any chance... are you here for the part-time job?
I fetched the uniform from the storage room, put it on, and returned to the counter.
As I stood at the counter and pressed the red button.
Beep—
The electronic clock's second hand ticked, echoing in the silent convenience store.
And the store lit up brightly again.
I'd had countless conversations with her.
Over the past dozens of loops.
With nothing to do after combat, most of the remaining time was spent satisfying her curiosity.
And she, in place of my poor conversational skills, shared stories about herself.
Her daily life before getting caught in the horror.
—Agent, I really just came here to work part-time. I had no money, flunked college entrance... just, you know.
"It's fine. Everyone goes through that once. College isn't everything in life."
—Hehe, thanks for the comfort! But it's true. I didn't have any big dreams.
—I just wanted to hang out with friends, drink coffee, post on Insta. Live like everyone else.
—I know people say I'm kinda dumb. Always smiling and stuff. But what's wrong with that? I like it. If there's nothing to smile about, I make it!
She said that and smiled like an ordinary girl her age.
In that moment, it felt like returning to everyday life.
—Oh, right. Do you like coffee, Agent?
—I love convenience store lattes! They're cheap and above all... tasty! Plus, the character drawn on them is cute. One of those gets me through the day. For real!
Instead of answering, I nodded.
She'd get excited and open up even over trivial talk.
The old convenience store's fluorescent lights flickered once in a while.
As if the afterimages of past loops illuminated this space now.
And I recalled the stories shared with the gallery users.
Each time I returned to the loop's starting point, the conversation partner changed slightly.
But what they said was always similar.
[파천황]: Horrors prefer "good people" over villains.
[파천황]: The reason is simple.
[파천황]: Good people can't ignore others' misfortune.
[Flounder]: From the horror's perspective,
[Flounder]: They're like "batteries full of endlessly despairing life force."
[Crazy Woman]: Good people helping?
[Crazy Woman]: It's subtle.
[Crazy Woman]: They do genuinely help. Enough to break the horror.
[Crazy Woman]: But that very goodwill makes the horror stronger.
[Not Human]: Human kindness, sacrifice, regret. The purest negative energy comes when those crumble.
[Not Human]: Paradoxical, right?
[Not Human]: Thanks to that "helping heart," the horror gets stronger.
As if snapping me from those thoughts.
A voice flowed from the receiver.
—Checkout is an act of exchange, right?
—They prove their existence here through the act of "payment."
—The moment you "acknowledge" them.
—That's it.
—Hehe. I mean, that's just what I think. I don't know the details either.
For now, it was time to focus on the present.