3. Calamity-Class Creepypasta

The phone clutched in one ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠hand.

A plain black T-shirt.

A man absorbing every single gaze in the room.

He stood with both arms raised high, wearing the expression of a man gravely wronged.

"Identify yourself. What kind of creepypasta are you?"

One of the agents stepped forward and demanded. It was the same agent who had been badmouthing Seoyoon outside just moments ago.

"I'm a human being."

"I thought we told you—no lying."

"……"

While the man glared at the agent with resentful eyes, the agent looked him up and down.

Two eyes. One nose. One mouth. His hair isn't some animal pelt, and there are no spikes or tentacles on his body.

Undoubtedly the appearance of a human being. If you stretched to find anything off, it would only be that his face was abnormally handsome.

Which was precisely what made him suspect. The anomalous always sought to lure in and deceive humans.

……This was absolutely not inferiority complex making him push things.

"Why are you staring at me like that?"

Just as the agent was scanning the man's appearance, the man scratched the back of his head and asked.

"……Like you'd believe anything I said."

"You noticed I'm not a creepypasta, right? That's why I keep telling you—I'm human."

A pleasant, honeyed voice. Far too human to belong to an anomaly.

Appearance: normal. Voice: normal. Capable of conversation, and showing no hostility.

Every sign pointed away from him being an anomaly, but the agent's suspicion had its own twisted logic behind it.

"No. You're a creepypasta. No ordinary person could have gotten in here."

"I'm sorry, what?"

This place was inside a creepypasta—a newly discovered one, no less, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that the Management Bureau had successfully secured the moment it appeared.

The Bureau had naturally cordoned off the surrounding area, and the entrance had been sealed for ages.

There was no conceivable way a civilian could have walked in.

"I just opened my eyes and I was here."

"You're saying a creepypasta swallowed you?"

"Probably."

"……That still doesn't add up. The very fact that you're alive is a contradiction."

Fine—let's say he somehow got in. It wasn't unheard of for a creepypasta itself to abduct people.

But if that were the case, the man's survival made no sense at all.

"This is a Disaster-class creepypasta. Thirteen elite exploration agents lost their lives here. This is not a place where a civilian survives."

"Well, I survived."

"Which is exactly why you're an anomaly."

— Clack!

Perhaps that was enough chitchat. The agent racked his rifle and leveled it at the man's head.

"By protocol, any anomaly we can kill, we kill on sight."

"Huh?"

"Don't worry. I'll make it painless."

The agent gave a crooked smile and closed one eye.

His finger was a hair's breadth from the trigger.

— Tap.

"……Team Leader?"

Someone had placed a hand on the agent's shoulder to stop him. It was the Exploration Team Leader.

"Assistant Manager Seo. Killing him seems a bit hasty, don't you think?"

The team leader waved his hand—calm down, lower the weapon, for now. Assistant Manager Seo didn't understand, but he shouldered his rifle and stepped back anyway.

"……Why did you stop me? Protocol says kill any anomaly we're able to kill."

"Correct. An anomaly we're able to kill, that is."

The team leader whispered, low enough that only the agents could hear.

"Doesn't something feel off? An anomaly just lounging around in a Disaster-class creepypasta like that?"

"Yes, which is why I tried to kill him."

"And the advance team that arrived first—what do you think they were thinking?"

"……!"

A short, choked breath escaped from inside Assistant Manager Seo's helmet. Seoyoon answered in his place, cutting off his stammer.

"They obviously would have tried to kill that man. He shows no will to fight and no apparent abilities."

"And yet the advance team?"

"……Dead, sir. All twelve of them."

The moment Seoyoon's words landed, cold sweat broke out down every spine in the room.

If the team leader hadn't stopped him—if that rifle had fired at the man—what happened next was horrifyingly easy to imagine.

"Hoo… we nearly caused a catastrophe."

"We owe the Team Leader our lives……"

"Assistant Manager Seo, you'll be writing an incident report when we get back."

"Ugh……!!"

Each agent breathed out their relief in their own way.

Assistant Manager Seo watched them all, biting down on his lip.

"Um, so—we're not killing him, then?"

There it was: his chance to earn recognition and a career-making achievement by slaying an anomaly, tossed away right before his eyes.

Because of one humanoid creepypasta. What could possibly be dangerous about that flimsy, parasite-looking loser? Assistant Manager Seo simply could not accept it.

"Ahem—of course, sir! A brief error on our part, clearly."

"Is that so."

The team leader bowed deeply toward the man in apology.

"We're terribly sorry. If there's anything you'd like as compensation, please—name it."

Pathetic. A team leader, groveling at the feet of a damn monster.

Tsk. Assistant Manager Seo clicked his tongue inwardly.

Still, he pretended indifference while straining his ears. The situation was already wrecked anyway—he might as well hear what the man would ask for.

"Compensation, huh……"

The man stroked his chin, considering.

— Sweep.

A moment later, he pointed directly at Assistant Manager Seo and said:

"Then please remove that man from my sight. He's the one who pointed a gun at me. He makes me uncomfortable."

"……What?"

Assistant Manager Seo wished he could melt out of every gaze in the room.

He's talking about me? Right now? A monster, giving orders to a human……?

It was absurd. Infuriating. The sheer arrogance of it—he should have been groveling in gratitude for being spared, and instead he dared issue commands.

Assistant Manager Seo drew his rifle from his back again. He was marching toward the man, one final piece of his mind locked and loaded—

"Hey, who the hell do you think you're—"

— KRA-KOOM!!!

A pillar came crashing down from the ceiling and flattened Assistant Manager Seo in an instant.

"……"

Voice cut off mid-sentence. Blood and flesh sprayed in every direction. Shards of reinforced combat armor rattling across the floor.

Everyone who had just absorbed all of it with their five senses slowly turned their heads toward one side of the room.

"……Why is everyone looking at me?"

Toward someone whose composure was disturbingly intact.

Silence filled the yellow room, broken only by the endless buzz of the fluorescent lights.

Countless eyes stared at me from behind helmets.

Flustered—no, terrified, maybe.

"Everyone's got the wrong idea here. I didn't do that."

"……"

"No, seriously."

The moment I stepped forward to defend myself, the agents flinched and stumbled backward.

One step from me, one step back from them. Their posture made it unmistakably clear: they saw me as a threat.

Just as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a strange standoff settled between the two camps—

— Clank.

One of the retreating agents stepped on something. A blood-soaked shard of reinforced armor.

"Kh—hup…!"

The agent hunched over, desperately strangling a scream.

The others weren't any better—they only hid it. Every one of them stood rigid, unable to tear their eyes away from that shard of armor.

— Tap, tap-tap.

Then, footsteps scattering in every direction.

"A-aaaaaah……!!"

"Run! Stand anywhere near that thing and you're dead!!"

Taking that as their signal, the agents shrieked and bolted every which way.

Running from whom?

Me, obviously.

"Um, I really didn't do anything, though……"

"All units! Full exploration team, return to base right now!!"

"No, just listen to what I'm—"

"E-everyone calm down and regroup at the Team Leader……!!"

My words fell on completely deaf ears. The panic-stricken agents scrambled backward on trembling legs and huddled together in one spot.

I was standing there, smacking my forehead in bewilderment, when the man they called Team Leader pulled something from his pocket.

A red button stamped with the words 'Return to Reality.'

"Hey—wait, me too!"

Before I could get a word in, the team leader slammed the button down—

— Vwoooong.

—leaving nothing behind but a wisp of blue mist. And of course, every last agent vanished with him.

"……At least take me with you."

"There we go. Explosive reaction, just as expected."

I lay on the floor, watching the anomalies' reactions roll in.

The comment section had erupted exactly as I'd predicted. My phone was still buzzing itself hoarse with notification after notification.

— Halt.

My thumb, scrolling endlessly downward, stopped dead on one word: Management Bureau.

"……I still can't get over it. Who do they think they are, waltzing in and out whenever they please?"

The people just now had been Management Bureau employees, most likely. The anomalies in the comments said as much, so that had to be it.

Truthfully, I'd clocked it the moment I saw them, too.

Rifles that looked like they could fell an elephant in one shot, and seriously badass tactical suits. They practically showed up announcing, Hello, we are Management Bureau agents.

So naturally, I assumed they'd come to rescue me, having fallen into the Backrooms like I did.

"Never dreamed the Management Bureau itself would mistake ME for the creepypasta."

And then they pointed a gun at my head.

If the team leader hadn't intervened, I'd probably be in heaven right about now. Thinking about it sent a little chill down my spine.

— Thump, thump!

"You shouldn't have done that. Treat me nicely, and I wouldn't have said a word."

For no particular reason, I smacked the back of my hand against the pillar—the very pillar that had crushed the agent who tried to shoot me.

Honestly, this was the part I understood least of all.

The instant I asked for that man to be moved, the agent ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was pounded into paste. In other words, something had responded to my words.

Not some outside force—the Backrooms itself.

"Well, it is a creepypasta in the end. Having a mind of its own wouldn't be strange."

Maybe the Backrooms simply hadn't liked that guy either.

Creepypastas hunt humans—that's just common sense. Its meal had gotten a little too mouthy for its own good, and it couldn't stand the sight.

And me? Relief washed over me long before fear did. Strange, really—any normal person would have collapsed on the floor trembling.

"Thanks for the help and all, but isn't that going a bit far……?"

On the off chance, I spoke into the empty air.

But only silence answered. The Backrooms gave no reaction whatsoever.

"Yeah, figured as much. Since when does the Backrooms have a personality?"

Just as I decided I'd been overthinking it—

"…I'm sorry?"

Words had surfaced on the wall.