Survivor Paradox (2)
The flickering fluorescent lights, tapping against the glass as if heralding the horrors yet to come, finally fell still, and a pale glow painted the classroom into existence.
What that weakly trembling light revealed, filling my vision completely, were the enormous lockers looming right in front of me.
...I think the Survivor's Record said you could just pick any locker and climb inside.
Large and small lockers stretched and broke apart in every direction, while desks and chairs lay scattered and stacked high, forming a landscape that looked like an endless, chaotic maze.
I pressed a hand to my forehead for a moment against the dizzying sight.
What I had learned the hard way today, dying over and over, was that I could never let my guard down.
I scanned the surroundings carefully, checking for any differences from what I had found written in the Survivor's Record.
No one stood nearby, yet scraps of clothing and the tops of heads flickered past through the narrow gaps between lockers or over the tops of the lower ones. Distant footsteps, impossible to place, drifted from somewhere far off. From those signs alone I understood that the students who had entered the classroom were scattered all throughout this place.
.
.
...Is this really going to be okay?
The doubt had barely risen when, as if it had been waiting for that exact thought, a panicked shout tore through the silence that had blanketed the classroom.
"What the fuck!"
"Ji-hyeok? Stop fucking around and come out!"
Cries of pure, reflexive panic, with no understanding of the situation, rang in my ears.
...Figures.
I had hoped it would be simple, yet some part of me had always known it never would be. When the situation twisted in a direction I had never imagined, my heart felt like it was dropping straight through my chest.
Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee
Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee
Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee
THUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUD!
Short screams and bone-chilling laughter erupted from every corner of the classroom, mixed with the frantic slam of locker doors. Above all of it came the sound of wood being hammered from overhead, a relentless pounding that filled the air.
The noise, as if something were being smashed to pieces, surged close one moment and receded the next, tightening around my entire body like a noose.
My mind raced.
For survival.
The moment arrived when I had to thrash and claw just to stay alive, exactly as I had in 666 Village, and my thoughts spun wildly.
I could not remember everything, yet the knowledge I had gained from the records stored inside the Rulebook guided me the way reading a forbidden text once had guided my companions. Even as death closed in from every side, I began gathering and analyzing every scrap of information, moving solely to survive.
I dropped low and pressed myself against a nearby locker.
The cold metal of the door leached a chill into my skin, but I ignored it, eyes darting in every direction as my thoughts kept racing.
I no longer possessed the unnatural vision or the forcibly injected unnatural wisdom of before, and the side effect left my head throbbing as if it might split open. Still, with every clue I had gathered so far, I finally pieced the truth together.
Why is the situation different this time?
Why has the escape method changed?
Is it adjusting itself to the survivors?
Ah—two of them!
Yes, two!
If there are two survivors—
then there must be two escape methods!
I did not even need to summon the Rulebook and look at the Survivor's Record inside it. The inspiration struck on its own.
So the current situation is both Confinement and Necromancy!
The instant the realization hit, the hammering sound closed in, accompanied by a strange creaking right above my head.
I did not hesitate. The moment I heard it I lunged forward.
CRASH!
Something shattered behind me and my body flinched, but I never stopped. I swung around a large locker in front of me and dove into another branching path of the maze.
Under the pale fluorescent light that flickered with an ominous hum, as if it might die at any second, I ran and twisted through the repeating lockers and the desks and chairs tangled like spiderwebs, sprinting in a blind frenzy.
In the middle of that desperate flight I spotted, at the very bottom of the maze walls packed tight with lockers, a desk sitting low to the ground. Without a second of hesitation I kicked off the floor, rolled, and scrambled underneath it.
THUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUDTHUD
Even when my back slammed hard against the iron crossbar bracing the desk legs, I swallowed the scream that tried to burst free and forced my body into the tightest possible crouch inside the narrow space.
The sound that had been racing after me, echoing around every corner from far away, was suddenly right in front of my nose.
Yet within the sliver of vision that showed only the floor beyond the desk legs, the source of the noise was nowhere to be seen.
...
...
...
...
Silence. Then, as if pondering, a light tapping of wood came now and then from overhead. Soon the bizarre hammering resumed, and the unknown ghost gradually moved away.
Even after the sound vanished, even though every second counted if I wanted to escape the classroom, I did not move rashly.
Only when a scream rang out from somewhere distant did I finally drag my aching body out from under the desk, rolling free like something discarded.
The aftereffects of all the deaths I had already suffered—the splitting headache, the stiff neck, the burning eyes—combined with a mind pushed to its absolute limit left my body fraying at the edges. Still I kept analyzing the situation without pause.
It doesn't seem the type to toy with its prey. More like pure animal instinct, maybe?
I stayed low and began walking the maze again, every sense on high alert.
I called it a maze, yet the walls of large and small lockers, desks, and chairs stacked so precariously were riddled with gaps. Through countless openings I could see pieces of the classroom that had swollen to an unimaginable size.
I turned my head toward the direction of the earlier scream. Through the tangled gaps, thankfully, I could make out a student.
The view was fractured by multiple layers of openings, so the full figure never appeared, yet the upper body was faintly visible.
The upper body that had been running while screaming now flickered in broken frames, like a strip of film, each desperate moment flashing through the gaps one still at a time.
A student running while screaming.
.
A student running while screaming.
.
A student running while screaming.
.
A student running while screaming.
.
A student running while screaming.
.
A headless student running.
.
The body lurches forward as if about to fall.
.
The student vanishes.
The terrified running figure appeared in the next gap as a headless torso, accompanied by a single short scream. Then, with a wet slap, the body kept its forward momentum, tilted, and collapsed.
A clattering roar followed as chairs and desks tangled with the headless student's arms and legs and went flying.
CRASH! BANG! CLATTER!
The sound echoed like a rolling wave, and chilling laughter erupted from every direction. I kept my mind turning.
Only the head of the student's upper body had vanished.
The noise the "ghost" brought with it always came from overhead.
And when I had stayed low, I had managed to avoid danger once.
.
.
.
That "ghost" is moving across the top of the maze?
It could be crawling along the ceiling, but judging by the sound of wood being hammered, the far more likely possibility was that it was stomping across the tops of the lockers.
If I could just get a look at its form or shape, it would help me pin down its traits...
But standing up and wandering around was far too reckless. My life mattered more. I needed another way.
I placed a hand against the locker wall and began moving my feet carefully yet quickly.
The Necromancy scenario never mentioned the classroom expanding like this, so this must be a phenomenon from Confinement.
In this situation, can I really escape through a locker?
The sudden doubt made me rest my hand on a large locker, but after long hesitation I pulled away without opening it.
Instead my hand slid to a smaller locker beside it.
I positioned myself so that even if I opened the door while leaning against the wall, nothing inside could expose me, then pulled it open.
Click.
The small locker opened with a quiet sound and spat out no anomaly. I waited a moment longer before carefully peering inside.
Inside, old notebooks writhed, completely swarmed by white, wriggling insects.
I slammed the door shut at once and turned my head, yet I could not stop the reflexive gag that rose in my throat.
I retched as quietly as I could at the horrific sight, eyes still sweeping the surroundings. Fortunately the "ghost" did not seem to have come this way.
With trembling hands I skipped several lockers and opened another small one.
Creeeak.