The Regressor Is Brave? (5)
The protagonist awakens in an unknown space. Knowing deep down that something is ominous, he has no choice but to move to escape. Before long, he comes face to face with a terrifying monster and is brutally murdered...
But in the next moment, he opens his eyes at the very starting point. Was that just a nightmare? Or did it actually happen? Wiping the sweat-soaked back of his neck, he moves again.
'Aaaaargh!'
And again, he is brutally murdered. Then again, he awakens. At the place where it all began.
Only then does he realize. This place is a vast, inescapable sand hell...
That's a story often used in horror fiction. The protagonist, trapped in an unwakeable nightmare, struggles and struggles until they make a dramatic escape, or they think they've escaped only to find it's still a dream.
Oh, for the record, I only watch horror games or movies through YouTube highlight compilations. Playing them myself is too scary, but they're fun to watch.
Anyway, back to the point.
"A nightmare."
If this floor's design is similar to the fiction I know... then there's a strong chance this space is a dreamscape. I've seen many endings where you smash through all the trials, finally escape, and then return to reality. Should I call it the positive version of 'ah, it was all a dream'?
So, what must you do to wake from a dream? The first thing that comes to mind, naturally.
"...Suicide?"
Suicide.
Lots of stories portray dying in a dream as the way to return to reality. I've never actually committed suicide in a lucid dream, so I'm not sure, but they say the shock of dying wakes you up. So the first solution that comes to mind is suicide.
But the problem with just going for suicide is that there's also the 'I killed myself and could never come back' type of ending. That kind of ending where if a person dies in the nightmare, their mind dies for real, and they become a vegetable in reality forever.
If I killed myself here and my mind actually died, and that didn't trigger a regression? Then I'd be checkmated. Even though I possess that absolutely broken ability called regression, my journey would end right here.
I don't know if suicide is the real answer or a trap. But when I compare the risks, I know for sure that clearing Floor 24 through the conventional method is the right call.
Suicide: instant clear or eternal death.
Conventional method: takes a long time but can be cleared eventually.
If I had to choose one, anyone would pick the latter. Trying to get there thirty minutes earlier can make you thirty years late to the grave.
"Direction's set."
The next thing to experiment with is the corridor.
I closed my eyes and sank deep, deep inside. Deep enough to reach past consciousness, past the unconscious, all the way to my soul.
Standing still as if meditating, I soon felt the contours of my soul. When the fog tightened around me on Floor 23, the situation was too urgent to use this, but given enough time like now, it's a useful trick I can employ.
But if this is a dream, why can I feel my soul? As I thought, it must be something between dream and reality. Good thing I didn't go with suicide.
"Right foot... left foot..."
While maintaining that soul-conscious state, I stuck half my body out into the corridor. Still no sensation, so I pushed a little more. Then, the moment my entire body was exposed to the corridor—
"...!!!"
An energy filled with the emotion called 'fear' rushed in from all directions...! I had no chance to resist or do anything—I scurried right back into the hospital room.
"Wow."
Was it Floor 17? On that floor where they test mana, it felt like a very thin thread was connected to my soul. You just had to focus and gently snap the thread.
But that corridor... the sensation was like throwing your body into a swimming pool. It was like stepping into a place full of energy that directly affects the soul. Slashing wildly in a swimming pool with a single sword changes nothing—it's the same principle.
"...Definitely."
It wasn't an illusion. It's definite. The moment I step out of this room, my breadth of thought shrinks dramatically. More precisely, I forget the very fact that 'I can resist.' This floor is designed that way.
Fear comes from the inability to defy. From the inability to cope. The instant you see it, you must feel 'I have to run.' That is fear.
But if a player goes out there swinging weapons around, mowing everything down? That's not fear. That's action-adventure. So the moment you leave this hospital room, you lose the driving force behind your ability to resist.
"I'm getting the picture."
It's the same in horror games. You run around aimlessly, and at some point the ghost stops chasing you. You've entered a safe zone, and that's when the player can sigh in relief. Sometimes the ghost disappears the moment you finish a specific sequence deep inside the map. You win by running away, not by fighting.
The Dancing Ghost? Probably somewhere in one of the hospital rooms connected to the corridor... there'll be an item that lets you escape from her. The number of rooms isn't small, but that's just a matter of grinding them out.
Run, find the countermeasure, then push forward again. It's fine if the ghost catches and kills you. The information remains. If I repeat this process, I'll be able to escape. Definitely. This is the intention behind Floor 24. Now that I've grasped the direction, investing enough time will let me clear it.
Yeah. A guaranteed clear. The only escape route found by keeping a cool head, holding onto hope that I can beat this, without being swept away by fear. This is correct. This is... correct, but.
"..."
So why was a sneaky, dark desire slithering up from a corner of my heart?
Must I really clear it this way? Is this truly the only method?
This isn't reality, so my limits are released. I can use far more power than usual, without the risk of regression. The dancing woman is scary as hell, but I feel like I'd win if we threw down? And that crazy doctor from earlier, couldn't I just slice him up with my sword? Do I really have to go the long way around?
If I step outside into the corridor, I lose my will to fight. But staying in the safe hospital room changes nothing. Even if I break through the walls, only identical hospital rooms repeat. Isn't there some new option between these two choices?
Not black nor white, something in between... a new... third path...
In between...
"In between?"
Suddenly.
An idea came to mind.
**
Dingy walls. A warped door. I opened the door and poked just my head out into the corridor, looking around. Roughly sketched out, it looked like this.
"Then from here..."
The left side was a dead end, a blocked wall. In my opinion, touching that wall would bring nothing good. Even if there's a hidden piece there, the possibility that something equally terrifying is sleeping there is high.
Then what about the right? The corridor stretched on and then turned right again at the end. A route I've already taken, terrain I know. It's a familiar corridor. If you follow that path, you meet the dancing woman.
Also, the corridor has not just hospital rooms but plenty of other rooms too, and if you search them, an item to escape from the 'Dancing Ghost' will probably appear. It's just a guess.
But here... what if I demolish the right wall of my hospital room?
-Crash!
Just like before, an identical hospital room appeared. The key here is the 'corridor.'
If you exit this duplicated hospital room, it connects to the starting point of the corridor. Even though I clearly moved one space to the right from the original room, it's inexplicably linked to the corridor's starting point. The exact same thing happened whenever I broke down a wall to travel, whether I moved up or down. It's truly a distortion of space, a supernatural phenomenon.
But what if I create an environment where this 'inexplicable phenomenon' can't possibly occur? In other words... completely demolish the wall connected to the corridor.
Without any regard for the strain on my body, I poured out mana and destroyed the wall. Not just the part connected to the corridor, but even the part where the duplicated hospital room and the corridor were linked.
"...Oho."
The result was astonishing.
In the spot where the 'duplicated hospital room' should have been, there was some bizarre laboratory. A large human anatomy model stood there too. It looked like the kind of place where something would jump out, but that spot was now taken over by the duplicated hospital room.
When I completely tore out the wall to create a situation where a 'distortion of space' was impossible, the duplicated room simply took over that spot. I wasn't sure if it would work, but fortunately, it did.
What's more, since this space was treated as the 'starting-point hospital room,' I didn't feel any mental pressure. I could use mana just fine, and I still had the will to fight. I could even draw my sword.
If you've followed along this far, you know what I'm about to do.
I'll keep linking duplicated hospital rooms, linking and linking, continuously tearing out the walls connected to the corridor...
"Just you wait."
I'm going all the way.
**
In the distance, the silhouette of a woman with disheveled hair came into view. In a corridor without a single window, under flickering fluorescent lights, the sight of a woman dancing with a grin twisted wide open sent chills racing down my spine just by looking at her.
The moment I took my eyes off her, that woman would vanish and start tailing me. Then, when I turned around? She'd probably scuttle along the ceiling—tap-tap-tap-tap—and twist my neck around in circles.
"Hey."
But this time, my situation was different. I was holding a weapon, and my mana could flow normally. That was because I was still judged to be within the 'starting point.'
All the right-side walls of the corridor I passed through were torn down. The duplicated hospital rooms repeated in a pattern, and I reached this far by tunneling through them like a mole.
While mechanically breaking walls with mana, I didn't take my eyes off the woman. I blinked my right eye and left eye alternately to maintain my vision. The Dancing Ghost kept dancing, perhaps bound by a condition like 'disappearing from sight' to be able to sneak up on you.
Little by little, I edged closer to the ghost. Using mana this violently wouldn't trigger a regression.
"Just you wait."
Let's see who wins in a fight.