Distorted World: Studio Apartment (3)
The nickname was Error.
The ID was ERROR.
A viewer who'd been flooding the chat with a katakana character shaped uncannily like a laughing "k."
Who the hell is supposed to be spamming?
I scanned the viewer list three times. There's nobody named Error.
The rest of the chat was unanimous.
Nobody was spamming.
There was no nickname called Error.
"Come on, everyone. Stop messing with me. It's not funny."
We're not kidding tho~
You're the one messing around -_-
There's really no chat like that, ffs
"No, another message just came through. You really can't see it?"
"I'm not joking. Nobody can see it? Not a single person?"
Cut it out.
I can't see it, for one.
Doesn't seem like anyone can see it.
Not a single viewer claimed they could see it. It didn't seem like they were lying. There was no way this many people would all team up to mess with me without a single exception. It wasn't like they had a group chat or anything — how would they even coordinate that perfectly?
I'd already checked the viewer list, of course.
Right at the very top, Error (ERROR) sat there as plain as day.
"It's right there? At the top of the list."
Bullshit, nah
The one at the top is LovesThiccBabes tho~? Kinda a nasty username though.
A donation alert popped up out of nowhere. At the same time, the message played out loud as a voiceover.
So the platform had that feature, at least. The voice was stiff and unnatural, but it worked.
"No. I've never touched any settings related to the viewer list. Why do you ask all of a sudden?"
The moment I answered, Ppang-ayeon's regular chat came through.
"...Is that so? Then what I'm looking at doesn't make any sense by any normal logic... Wait. Hold on."
Didn't make sense by any normal logic?
Which meant this, too, was a Distortion Phenomenon.
"Living things, or beings with a sense of self — those are called Distortion Entities, right? Then couldn't this viewer named Error be a Distortion Entity too?"
Huh?
Holy shit. That could actually be it.
If the streamer isn't lying, then that's definitely it.
If we can't see it and only Yeoul-yeoul can, that's a lock.
Fake.
Are there Distortion Entities with no physical form?
You said it infiltrated the stream and is typing in chat. Then it's got a sense of self, so yeah, Distortion Entity.
Whoa. Like a digital ghost or something.
It seemed that way. The viewer called Error was some kind of Distortion Entity.
There was no other way to explain its existence.
"...If it's a Distortion Entity, there's nothing I can really do about it, so I guess I'll just have to ignore it for now."
Can't you just ban them?
If it's bugging you, ban 'em, go go go
Would a ban even work? It's a Distortion Entity.
You should at least try.
Why bother? Just leave it.
Doesn't seem like there's anything to gain by pissing it off.
The moment the viewers brought up a ban, Error posted something different from before.
A question mark that looked somehow... off.
"Banning them... I'd rather not. A Distortion Entity might hold a grudge and come after me."
That so?
Yeah, that's the right call. Poke it wrong and it might mess with you.
I decided against the ban. It was unsettling, sure, but given that it had just been sitting there this whole time, it didn't seem interested in hurting me directly.
It just laughed in that unpleasant way. That was all.
Not a harmful Distortion Entity, then.
Either Error couldn't physically hurt me — or it could, but it had a gentle enough nature that it was simply keeping quiet. One of the two, from the look of it.
Guys. Doesn't it seem like Yeoul-yeoul is searching more and more half-assedly?
Maybe she's just tired tho~
She's flopping around like everything's too much of a hassle. Could've sworn she was a squid.
Tired already? lmao
It's not a stamina thing. She's probably mentally exhausted. You'd be the same if you got dropped into a Distorted World.
I think she's just the type who finds everything annoying.
More importantly, when is the exit gonna show up...
Praying for a safe escape.
Whoa. The streamer here is hot as hell. What's she even doing right now?
hii newbie~
Think if she searches everywhere she might find like an escape hint or something?
Yeah right.
Hints my ass. You think this is some escape room game?
I heard finding the exit is purely luck-based.
I wrapped up the search of this studio apartment just as quickly as the last. No exit. I did find two passages leading to other studios, though — the bathroom door, and the refrigerator door.
"I'll go through the fridge this time."
Yeah, you'd have to be insane to go into the bathroom studio.
Fr lmao, it's not like she's trying to die. Who'd go in there. It looks hella dangerous even at a glance.
The reason I didn't pick the bathroom door? Because on the other side, a thick green liquid was dripping from the entire ceiling of the studio beyond. I had no idea what the stuff was, but some instinct told me that touching it would be a very bad idea.
The studio past the refrigerator, on the other hand, looked ordinary enough from the outside. Nothing unusual jumped out.
Can she even fit through that tiny space though.
She'll probably just barely make it?
Yeoul-yeoul, you got this!
Move carefully tho~
Is that really a Distorted World? How is there a whole studio apartment inside that tiny fridge?
o/ newbie
Viewers keep going up.
I squeezed through the refrigerator and came out into another studio apartment.
Error was still there. Moving to a different studio hadn't made it vanish from the stream.
Thinking back, Error had joined the broadcast right after I'd moved into the previous studio, so I'd assumed it was a Distortion Entity that only existed in that one room. Apparently not. Maybe it was a Distortion Entity that could watch the entire Distorted World, and it had simply joined the stream late — the timing just happening to coincide with my move into the last apartment.
Or maybe it had followed me here.
...I had no idea.
I really needed to stop paying attention to it. I kept getting hung up on it without even meaning to.
"Stop laughing."
?
owo?
Error cracked up again.
What Error?
Isn't it dangerous to just open everything like that? What if a Distortion Entity jumps out.
It's not like she can just not open them. She's gotta find the exit.
Didn't a Distortion Entity called Error already show up? Can there be multiple Distortion Entities in one Distorted World?
Yeah, apparently there can.
One thing I learned after coming through: this studio had three refrigerators. One on either side of the fridge I'd just crawled out of.
The one on the left was completely empty.
The one on the right, however, had food in it.
Leftover bread. From yesterday.
There's a piece of bread in the fridge lol
Not a whole one. It's half.
She's not gonna eat that bread, right?
She's making a face like she wants to though.
The streamer's probably hungry right now? She was originally gonna go to the convenience store and buy a lunchbox.
But is it even safe to eat that.
Wouldn't that be dangerous tho~
I was staring at the bread when Ppang-ayeon sent another donation.
A regular chat followed right after.
I hadn't been planning to eat it in the first place. The thought that it might be dangerous had already crossed my mind.
"Really? Got it. Thanks for the info."
I thanked them anyway. They were digging up information for my sake and going out of their way to pass it along.
I gave a small nod, then went back to searching the room from top to bottom.
Unfortunately, this studio didn't have an exit either. Same as before, there were two passages to other apartments: the bathroom door, and the front door.
"Hmm. Neither of them looks particularly dangerous."
I looked back and forth between the studio beyond the bathroom and the one beyond the front door. I'd left both doors wide open.
"Finding the exit is all luck anyway, so overthinking it would just be a waste of time, right? Then I guess I'll just go through the front door again..."
I said it offhandedly, my eyes settling on the studio past the front door — and that was when it happened.
For a split second, every other viewer's chat vanished.
And then Error's messages began filling the window. Korean, this time — in sentences that were, relatively speaking, actually intact.