Mother's Echo
Roll, roll, roll—. “Yeong-won. Even if you hear this voice, don’t ever follow it. This is the exit. Mom’s already gone out—.”
“Shit….”
The status window had once advised me that every event has its cause and effect. If there’s a body without a head, then naturally there must also be a ‘head’ without a body.
When my eyes met those pale pupils, it felt as if all the blood in my body had turned to ice, and every hair on my head stood on end toward the ceiling.
“This fucking—guys, run!”
I had to run. The moment that thought crossed my mind, disaster struck.
“Agh!”
Jeong Seok tripped and fell, his legs giving out from the tension. The head tumbled and rolled straight toward him.
“Agh! Agh! Agh! Agh! Agh! Agh! Agh! Agh! Agh! This is the exit. Mom’s already gone out—.”
In that life-or-death moment, Yang Ju-hui shouted.
“You stupid bastard! How could you fall there! Damn it!”
Click—. Yang Ju-hui pulled the box cutter from her pocket. Before I could even process what she intended to do with it, she sprinted between the rolling head and Jeong Seok, then slammed the blade down onto the ghost’s head with all her strength.
“Die!!!”
Shunk, splatter!
“━Yeong-won━──!!”
The head ghost let out a piercing scream. The fact that it screamed my name while doing so felt especially unlucky, like a snake had coiled around my neck.
Roll, roll—. The ghost’s broken eyes darted between Yang Ju-hui and Jeong Seok, glaring at them. It was horrifying. I wanted to shake my entire body to fling off this cursed luck, but there were more important things right now.
“Hey! Get up! Get up, let’s go!”
I hauled Jeong Seok to his feet from where he’d collapsed on the floor. Even he, who had been sitting there dazed while watching the scene unfold, snapped back to his senses and stood.
“Yeong-won!!! How could you fall there!!! Shit!!! We’re going to the exit!!! Mom is!!!”
“Shut the hell up!!!”
We ran as if trying to shake off the voices chasing us from behind. We kept running until our lungs burned and our heads spun.
# # #
I don’t know how long we ran. But the moment the beam of our flashlight caught the office door labeled 「Principal’s Office」, we slipped inside without exchanging a single word.
“Haa, haa, haa—.”
“Ugh, I’m dying….”
“Hey, what kind of men can’t even run properly?”
We gasped for breath as if paying back all the interest we’d owed. The only one who still looked relatively fine was Yang Ju-hui, who was used to running. Anyway, we were alive. Once the adrenaline that had surged to the top of my head began to fade, fear finally crept in. My legs trembled at the realization that we had truly almost died.
Drip, drip, drip—. Only now did I notice Yang Ju-hui’s hand was bleeding.
“Hey, what’s that? Are you hurt?”
“Ah, shit. I must’ve cut myself when I stabbed that head. Lost the cutter too. Got anything that could work as a weapon?”
She must have injured her hand while driving the box cutter into the ghost’s skull. Our only weapon was gone as well.
I suddenly remembered Yang Ju-hui’s player sheet.
An unstable and secretive delinquent girl. Bold, adventurous, and proactive by nature. In this dark and sinister journey, she will generally prove to be a reliable companion.
《Tool User》: Can enter the corridor carrying up to three tools. Tool durability increases by 1.5 times.
Possession: Yeong-won’s Box Cutter — Can stun a monster for a short time with one stab. Disappears after use.
The way she kept searching for anything that could serve as a weapon might have been because of that trait, 《Tool User》. Or perhaps the habit of looking for weapons and tools had given rise to the trait itself. Just as quirks manifest according to a person’s constitution, disposition, and temperament, traits might also manifest according to one’s nature and inclinations.
Click. Thud. Click. Unable to simply watch Yang Ju-hui rummage through the drawers of the principal’s office with her bloodied hands, I joined her in searching for items.
This time, Jeong Seok found something.
“There’s a first-aid kit here.”
Swish—. He pulled the kit from a lower drawer. Inside were bandages and antiseptic.
“The medicine has an expiration date. The antiseptic… was it one year? I’m not sure if we should use it.”
Glug, glug, glug—. Ignoring Jeong Seok’s hesitant explanation, Yang Ju-hui poured the antiseptic liberally over her wound. Then she wrapped the bandage with practiced ease. If Guan Yu or Zhang Fei had been standing before me, this must have been how it felt.
After treating her right hand, Yang Ju-hui flopped down onto the principal’s chair. Only then could Jeong Seok and I sink to the floor as well.
“Ah, shit, we’re alive.”
“Guys, sorry. My legs gave out in a situation I never expected…. I thought the phone would warn us if a ghost came, but I guess not. Or maybe the head ghost is an exception….”
Jeong Seok apologized for freezing up the moment he saw the head ghost. It was lucky Yang Ju-hui had stabbed it with the cutter. If she hadn’t…
Looking at her bandaged right hand, Yang Ju-hui spoke up.
“So what do we do now? Go back there and follow the arrows again? Does anyone know the way back to the elevator we came on?”
I shook my head. Even Jeong Seok, whom I’d been counting on, shook his head as well. We’d been so focused on running that we hadn’t had time to memorize the path.
A thoroughly screwed situation. Just as the mood was about to turn gloomy, Jeong Seok—the one who had caused this mess—spoke up as if trying to make up for his mistake.
“Still, we got some information. That head ghost earlier. From what I heard, it was repeating what we said in random order. It mimics what it hears.”
“Really?”
“It imitated Yeong-won’s mom’s voice. And that voice clearly said it was escaping through the exit. It also told us not to follow even if we heard the voice, because it wasn’t really her. If that story is true….”
Clap—. Yang Ju-hui gave a small round of applause.
“That means Yeong-won’s mom really escaped! Ow, shit, that hurt. Shouldn’t have clapped.”
Reminding myself to take her to the hospital once this was over, I recalled the voice I’d heard earlier. It had definitely been Mom’s voice. She had used the ghost to leave me a message, as if she’d known I would come.
“Mom must have known I’d come into this weird corridor. She sent that message about being trapped in the elevator, so she probably figured I’d come looking for it.”
And I had. Mom really did know her son well. We’d gotten hurt and lost things because of the head ghost, but we’d gained something valuable.
“Mom escaped from here. So our goal just got simpler. Now all we have to do is survive and get out of this place. Let’s all make it out alive.”
“By the way, Yeong-won, what’s that in your hand?”
Yang Ju-hui, who had been rubbing her own hand, looked at me curiously. She must have spotted the paper I was holding.
“Oh, this.”
Swish—. I showed it to everyone. I’d found it while searching the principal’s office for anything that could serve as a weapon.
“It’s a photo. A picture of some kids.”
As Jeong Seok said, it was a photograph of a group of small children. On the back was written 「A-1」.
Maybe it was a photo of Class A-1?
“If there are kids’ photos here, does that mean this used to be a kindergarten?”
Yang Ju-hui looked around. It seemed absurd that such a sinister kindergarten could exist, yet it made a strange kind of sense. The sketchbook we’d found labeled 「A-1」 must have been drawn by one of the children in this photo. What had happened to that kid…?
Before worrying about that, maybe we should rest for five minutes.
# # #
“Guys, look at this.”
Jeong Seok, who had been rummaging through the principal’s office, called us over as if he’d found something. I thought he might have found another photo, but he hadn’t.
“There are two more passages besides the entrance in the principal’s office. One leads left, the other right. And both have arrows drawn on them in crayon.”
Maybe he felt guilty that Yang Ju-hui had gotten hurt because of him? Jeong Seok had searched the office with great enthusiasm and finally found results.
“A left-right fork. Which way do you think we should go?”
Jeong Seok asked for my opinion. In a situation like this, where the path split in two, he seemed to want to hear from the team’s so-called leader.
Yang Ju-hui spoke up.
“How about we check both?”
That was one option. But ever since learning that Mom had escaped, one idea had been dominating my thoughts. It seemed worth testing now that things had come to this.
“Status window.”
I called up the status window and opened the shop. I had 363 points. Enough to gamble.
“Guys, pray this works.”
I spent another 90 points. 273P left.
Rattle. A gacha machine-like interface appeared before my eyes, and round capsules began to clatter inside.
Rattle. Rattle, clack. Rattle.
Just as I was wondering what would happen—
The item has been placed in front of the exit.
2,250 steps east.
“…Did it work? I think it worked!”
Even in a hellish environment, people find strength when there’s hope. I was experiencing that firsthand.
“Guys, we can get out! Let’s head east! The gacha seems to be telling us which way to go!”
When I first tried the gacha, I’d found the notification system that told me items were placed at the exit fascinating. I’d wondered if there was any way to make use of it—and now was that moment. My gamble looked like it had almost succeeded.
“Guys, let’s go.”
We left the principal’s office with a bright candle of hope in our hearts. The capsule I’d bought for 90 points—whatever was inside—would be our lifeline.
“The arrows keep going. But why are they drawn so low on the wall?”
Yang Ju-hui grumbled as she looked at the crayon marks. I thought I knew why they were so low.
“A little kid drew them. That’s why they had to be low. Seok, how’s the phone? Still no sound?”
“Not yet, but… if we run into a ghost here, there won’t be anywhere to hide.”
The corridor we were walking through was a straight line. An endless straight line. We must have walked at least a hundred meters when Jeong Seok spoke.
“I’ve been thinking since we were in the elevator. This might be some kind of parallel world. Another place existing in the same space.”
“So what does that mean?”
“…It just means that.”
Even Jeong Seok could say nonsense sometimes. He probably just wanted to say anything to shake off the fear. This eerie chill and darkness never got easier to handle.
“A parallel world, huh….”
The Nightmare Corridor. And this strange passage. They were very similar. The appearance of the head ghost was similar too. Was there some meaning or reason behind it…? They said every event has its cause and effect….
“Yeong-won. It’s Mom. The exit. Here. No. Not Mom.”
At that moment, we heard something heavy rolling toward us from behind. The problem was that a crackling sound was also starting to blare from the phone.
Click. Click. Click.
The sound of high heels approaching from the front, where we were headed. And the sound of the head ghost from behind.
“…Shit, we can’t run this time.”
We were completely trapped. The one silver lining was a box nearby.
Creak—. When we opened it, the inside was large enough for two people to fit. The problem was… there were three of us.
“Two people won’t fit in here, let alone three.”
Crackle—. Waaah—. Mom… Mom….
“What do we do? Ha Yeong-won! What do we do?”
Jeong Seok held the wailing phone, at a complete loss. A straight corridor. Three people. A box for two. Ghosts in front and behind. I made my decision.
“Hey. You two get in. Hurry!”
I decided to put Jeong Seok and Yang Ju-hui, who had followed me all the way into this hell, into the box. Both of them looked startled, but there was no time to explain.
“Hurry! I have a plan!”