Chapter 12
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 12
Chapter Title: Backside World
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“Is this for real?”
Unlike the past, when I just thought I had to wander aimlessly...
Now I had a clear goal.
I had no idea how many more strange tales I'd have to clear from here on out.
But this meant I finally had a way to escape too.
“Kiiiiiiiiiyaaahoooooo!!!!!!”
I couldn't help but burst out laughing.
I'm happy. So damn happy.
Was this the reward that girl gave me?
This feeling, like years of pent-up rewards crashing down all at once.
It hit with an impact words couldn't capture.
Escape. Escape.
The dream I'd longed for so desperately, the process, the future, the desire etched into every cell of my being—a wish that had to come true.
“Um, are you okay over there?”
“Sniff... huuuh... I've been through so much hell. Finally getting my due makes me so freaking happy.”
“Don't tell me you're switching places with me to escape alone...?”
“No, nothing like that. It just said I can escape once I gather 999 points.”
“Whaaaat!?”
After linking up with Yu-na midway and busting out some tap-dancing together.
I calmed my excitement and checked out the other items.
Besides the stuff I'd seen in [School Strange Tale], there were all sorts of things available. The one that screamed "must-buy" was none other than.
【Lodge Creation Lv.1】
【Price: 5P】
- Creates a two-room lodge within the space.
- Also summons random food up to three times a day probabilistically.
- Capacity: 2 people
A house.
A house I could generate right here in this empty space.
And it even provided three meals a day?
“Gotta buy it, right?”
“Obviously.”
“Then let's snag it right now.”
We clicked the [Purchase] button in perfect sync.
Kuuuung—!
A house about 30 pyeong sprang up from the bare ground like bamboo shoots.
Peeking inside with eager eyes.
“Ra, raaamen...!?”
Inside the room sat two steaming servings of ramen, fresh as if just made.
Even factoring in the kimchi and pickled radish sides, it was a top-tier meal.
Slurrrp—!
Sluuuurp—!
One who'd eaten nothing for three years and one who'd subsisted on mystery grub for over ten inhaled the ramen without a word, plopping right down.
My face started to melt into bliss.
Yu-na's did too.
The two Koreans found an unspoken bond in that universal word: 'ramen'.
By the time we'd licked the bowls clean.
“No need to say it.”
“We get each other.”
“You know Korean?”
“Yes, I do.”
We'd become a solid duo.
A pair with the ruthless edge to ditch anyone else for our escape.
Right up until we'd arrived here, I'd thought of her as a lifelong friend forged in gallery camaraderie.
But.
“Betrayal? More like every man for himself. They didn't get kidnapped here to save us in the first place. Take what's given, ditch what's not—that's how it works.”
“Plus, the gallery's full of trash anyway. They're just lurking right now, but plenty would sell out other gallery folks' locations to save their own skins.”
We'd been united by ramen for a while now.
Speaking of which.
Selling out allies' positions to survive?
What the hell was that about?
I asked Yu-na, who'd been a restless spirit here for ten years, out of curiosity.
“You didn't know? It's old news that came out ages ago... Oh, right, you're a newbie who hasn't been in long. You act like a rotten veteran who's been around for a century, though...”
“Fair enough. Yeah.”
“Anyway, just like we have our 'gallery' to communicate. Turns out the strange tales have their own ways too. Not real-time like ours, but... I think it was the [Ghost Phone Number] strange tale?”
“Ghost phone number? What's that strange tale about...?”
“Beats me. It sounds like something that could exist in reality, but rumors say another strange tale got eaten up and turned it into their private network or something.”
“Network...? Strange tales have a network...? What is this, some wuxia novel where I'm demanding carbonara?”
Shocking news.
If the strange tales had a network, did that mean they'd heard about me too?
'No, probably not. They wouldn't even know I can revive, so my info hasn't leaked yet.'
Every game has methods.
Even an invincible-seeming ability like 'revival' has its.
That's why the meta is to farm as much as possible before that spreads.
Infighting among humans is one thing, but traitors too?
“Makes me wanna shove a steel chopstick up their asses for real...”
At least the betrayal went down 30 years ago, so any traitor would be a 30-year vet by now.
I wanted to hunt them down and drag them to reality right that second.
But baseless speculation equals instant loss.
If we'd traded info that many times, the traitor would be gunning to kill me or hand me off to another strange tale.
“Just to check, the gallery folks stuck in vases...”
“They should be fine, probably. I didn't see them often because of night shifts, but they didn't seem suspicious.”
“Okay, let's keep them as candidates for now.”
Urgent fires out.
Now just divvy up the earnings fairly.
By the way, I had no clue, but could Yu-na revive like me in other strange tales?
Asking her got me.
“No idea?”
“Nothing clicks with a 'snap'?”
“Nope?”
“Goddamn it.”
Just an endless, pointless loop.
To test it, I'd have to die on purpose...
As I was banging my head over it.
【Hint - 3P】
- Provides clues fitting the situation.
The [Hint] I'd figured I'd never use popped up.
Whether it was a hint about strange tales or something else, it seemed useful right now.
'Spending 3 points elsewhere isn't bad, but losing a party member in a game is the worst of the worst options.'
Points deducted.
Poof!
A scroll dropped right in front of me.
“This the hint?”
“Yeah, never used it before, so no clue. But probably has the answer we're after inside.”
“Open it already!”
Unrolling it at her urging revealed.
Sub-characters get two chances, unlike main characters.
If those two are exceeded, the character permanently vanishes.
The only ways to revive them are ■■■ and ■■■ ■■.
Not exactly friendly.
But clear info.
The blacked-out parts were probably over the info limit or not yet allowed.
Two chances total, huh...
“No charging in blind like me, then. I'll handle the reckless rushes. You focus on flexible escapes or finding outs.”
“Yeah, seems designed that way. Giving someone like me as many chances as you would be straight-up cheating.”
“Oh, you game much?”
“Steam horror total playtime's over 1,000 hours, thank you very much.”
“Explains why you got nabbed.”
“……”
Like the cliché 'regression' in webnovels.
Most gallery folks had some tie to horror, big or small.
She was probably one too.
“But why me? Never been that into this stuff, never played related games either.”
“Hmm... yeah, you're an odd one. Being able to enter other strange tales while having a unique ability like yours isn't common.”
“So this space is a 'strange tale' too? Maybe it'll have a solution eventually, like the others...”
“Nah, doubt it. If it qualified as a strange tale phenomenon, the Management Bureau would've figured out a fix by now.”
“Management Bureau?”
“You don't know the Management Bureau?”
“Nope?”
“??????????????”
Shin Yu-na hesitated at first, baffled that I genuinely didn't know.
Then she pulled herself together and explained.
“Taking Earth—where we lived—as base. 'Earth-1' is the normal human world. 'Earth-2' mirrors it but with anomalies influencing humans.”
“Like parallel worlds?”
“Similar but... more like a backside world or playground based on the original? Hard to pin down, but anomalies and strange tales dominate over humans.”
“Most cases of normals vanishing one day, losing memories, then returning? Management Bureau wipes their Earth-2 memories before sending them back.”
“Whoa... for real? My Earth had an agency like that?”
“Yep. They scout normals with 'inspiration' sensitivity, research anomalies, rescue trapped folks from other Earths—that's the Management Bureau.”
Huge shock.
I'd half-expected some shadowy org existed.
But spanning parallel worlds? Wild.
She went on.
The [Management Bureau] was humanity's shield: exterminating anomalies and strange tales while exploiting their quirks.
“Know Santa Claus?”
“Yeah. Cried my eyes out learning my parents were really him.”
“One of the anomalies. Back in the early 18th century, he gave useful gifts. But in our tale-overrun 21st century, he turned harmful—now a Stage 3 (Containment) entity.”
“Stages too?”
“Per a bureau gallery vet... [Stage 1 (Warning) - Stage 2 (Crisis) - Stage 3 (Containment) - Stage 4 (Infiltration) - Stage 5 (Extinction) - Stage 6 (Apocalypse)].”
“……But your [School Strange Tale] was Stage 1, right?”
“...Keep that secret from the gallery. I bluffed it as 2-3.”
“Got it.”
I milked her for every scrap of unknown knowledge after that.
And grasped the hidden underside of the world.