Chapter 65

A hologram of a black booklet settled over Supervisor Park Minseong’s head.

It clung like tar and oozed down as he writhed, clawing at the floor.

Behind his struggling figure, the cheerful voice spoke from the TV again.

[Now we’ll announce the new teachers who failed to participate actively in Hangman.]

Soon, similar scenes were playing out all around me.

The problem—the problem was...

[New Teacher Park Minseong, you didn’t guess a single letter correctly!]

One penalty already on his record.

One for stepping onto the platform.

And...

One for failing to guess a letter.

Which made...

[3 accumulated penalties]

The TV pronounced its sentence.

[New Teacher Park Minseong has been selected for remedial instruction.]

[You will receive instruction at the kindergarten forever, preparing for its opening until you become a perfect teacher of ■■ Affiliated Kindergarten.]

Of all the black booklet holograms covering the faces of those who had failed to guess a letter, only Supervisor Park Minseong’s turned bloodred.

Then it enveloped his entire body.

“■!!”

His screams were eaten away into strange shapes.

“N■, ■me, ■■■■...!”

A human being rolled and twisted on the floor in a horrifying spectacle.

Incomprehensible passages from the teaching manual spilled out in recitation, interspersed with sobs.

Yet no one around him cared.

They merely glanced over, moved far away as if to avoid any involvement, and waited for the next step described in the manual.

Namely...

[Thank you for your hard work in today’s practice game! Goodbye, new teachers!]

Clear confirmed.

“...”

“Ah, f*cking finally!”

“Move!”

The instant they realized the game was over, everyone was free to swear and run again. They poured out of the Activity Room.

Soon, even the employees who had finished their ten-minute remedial instruction vomited up the tarlike holograms and got to their feet, clutching their foreheads. They staggered, then broke into limping runs.

One bumped into me on the way.

“Huh?”

“...”

“Wh-what are you doing?”

“...”

“The doors only stay open for thirty minutes! If you don’t leave now, they’ll count you as a volunteer too! Damn it!”

Then they ran past me.

“...”

And so I was left alone.

With the ‘contaminated’ Supervisor Park Minseong, writhing on the floor.

-Good heavens! To think someone would mistake my friend for a volunteer at this musty old place! Let’s leave at once, Mr. Roe Deer!

“... No.”

-Mr. Roe Deer?

The game was over.

Which meant...

The rules of this ghost story were over too.

‘Worst-case scenario, ten minutes is plenty of time for me to run out on my own.’

So...

“I have to at least try... to take him with me.”

I could hold out.

I had to try as far as I could.

It had worked earlier, hadn’t it?

‘I don’t want to give up right away.’

After exploiting the slimmest of loopholes to save the person chosen as hangman, I couldn’t accept an ending where one of the people who tried to save her disappeared into the ghost story instead.

I didn’t want to leave some footnote on the wiki saying, ‘A very Hungry Hangman sort of expedition outcome.’

‘... I can do this.’

I raised my head.

Then immediately thrust my hand into the tattoo on my wrist.

: Benefactor :

The things I had stored came out of the heated tattoo. A candle-making kit, apple juice, the Blood-Drinking Knife, stickers, dozens of bundles of five-hundred-won coins...

-Oh, what entertaining item do you intend to use this time, my friend?

“I’m not using any of them.”

-Hmm? Then what are you...?

I packed everything I had taken out into my briefcase. Without the Blood Bathtub, it all fit, if barely.

Anything likely to poke out, such as the Blood-Drinking Knife, I set aside and slipped into my back pocket.

‘... There.’

The packed briefcase was heavy, but not so heavy I couldn’t run with it.

And what remained was...

The empty space inside my wrist.

-You were making room?

Exactly.

I slipped my hand a little way into the space connected through my wrist tattoo, then drew it out.

“You said its volume was the same as a cube sixty centimeters on each side, right?”

-Correct.

“But its shape isn’t fixed, is it?”

-...! That is also...

Interest and amusement entered Braun’s voice.

-Correct.

Good.

‘It’s all or nothing anyway.’

I had clearly heard him say that being contaminated, unable even to die and trapped in this ghost story forever, was more horrifying than death.

‘Let’s try it.’

I gritted my teeth and waited.

For Supervisor Park Minseong’s third penalty to end.

‘Grabbing him and trying something right now would be stupid.’

If I touched someone serving a penalty, that holographic teaching manual would kindly become ‘visible’ to me too.

Then I would be out of action for ten minutes myself, reciting the teaching manual.

‘That would be the end.’

Suppressing my anxiety, I waited calmly.

‘Time left until the penalty ends... seven minutes.’

Six minutes.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One...

Zero.

“...”

The sticky red tar vanished from around Supervisor Park Minseong’s body on the floor.

Then he slowly stood.

Looking like a perfectly neat kindergarten teacher.

The body that had worn a black suit was now dressed in soft beige trousers, a white T-shirt, and a light green apron.

In one hand he held a brown folder with a title in red.

<Teaching Manual for ■■ Affiliated Kindergarten>

And on his bare face, the mask now melted away completely...

A brand on his forehead.

Sprout Class

A gentle smile spread over his fully exposed face.

“Teacher Soleum!”

F*ck.

“You waited for me while I read the teaching manual? Thank you so much.”

“... Of course I waited.”

Don’t panic. If I let it show, I was f*cked.

“Are you feeling all right?”

“Absolutely. Couldn’t be better!”

Supervisor Park Minseong nodded with a gentle smile.

“... I’m glad. Shall we go, then?”

“Go? Oh... home?”

“Yes. Let’s go together.”

“Oh, I don’t have a clock-out time! I’m not a new teacher anymore. I’ve read the entire teaching manual!”

“But leaving work...”

“I told you, I don’t.”

“...”

“Hmm. It’s time for me to go to Sprout Class and help prepare for the opening...”

Then he exclaimed brightly.

“Oh, that’s right! Would you like to come too, Teacher Soleum?”

Goose bumps swept over me.

“You don’t know which class you’ll be assigned to yet, do you? You haven’t read the teaching manual yet. Once you read it, you’ll know. Your class!”

He extended his hand.

“Which one will it be? I hope you’re in Sprout Class too. We were on the same team, after all.”

Damn it.

Damn it!

I took a natural step back, as though considering his offer.

The teacher’s outstretched hand passed through empty air.

“Oh...”

“Thank you for the offer... but I think I’ll need to toss this outside the entrance first.”

I lifted my briefcase.

“I have some borrowed things I need to return on time.”

“Teacher Soleum, I was wondering how you had so many fascinating items. You borrowed them?”

“Yes.”

Please don’t let him catch on.

‘Please.’

The thing that had once been... Supervisor Park Minseong answered with kindness and warmth, as though it were a professional requirement.

“Then shall I ask the teachers to help carry it?”

“It’s only a briefcase. If you don’t mind, I’d just appreciate you showing me to the entrance. ... You, Supervisor Badger.”

Supervisor Park Minseong froze.

“...”

Could it be?

“... Supervisor Badger?”

...

His mouth opened.

“Y...”

...!

But the next moment...

“Yes! Let’s go to the entrance together.”

The gentle teacher’s voice emerged again.

“...”

“Teacher Soleum?”

“Yes, please just accompany me to the entrance. I’ll walk quietly so I don’t disturb anyone.”

“Great!”

I turned toward the exit of the Activity Room.

With Supervisor Park Minseong, fully contaminated into a ‘teacher,’ right behind me.

‘Ha.’

Slowly, I began walking.

TAP. TAP.

Right behind me, I could hear him following close on my heels.

Not the sound of dress shoes, but soft slip-on slippers.

TAP. TAP.

“Oh, let me help you carry that briefcase.”

“It’s fi—”

Before I could finish saying it was fine, the teacher’s hand took hold of half the briefcase I was carrying.

And the cover of the perfect teacher’s manual, held in that same hand, tapped against mine.

TAP. TAP.

“...”

It was fine.

No sudden sound stabbed into my mind. No maddening terror or fear came flooding in.

‘I can get out.’

The entrance wasn’t far now.

All I had to do was walk.

But at the same time, a thought occurred to me.

Was sneaking out through the entrance like this really the right thing to do?

F*ck.

Just look at me, swearing like that.

Was it because I had never recited the teaching manual? It was a little embarrassing...

Perhaps it wasn’t really a punishment at all, but an opportunity for education offered under the name of punishment?

This was insane.

Wait. This deserved serious consideration, not dismissal as contamination.

This was a wonderful workplace. Preparing for a perfect opening alongside well-mannered, obedient people would be an unparalleled joy.

I had the aptitude to become a perfect teacher.

■■ Affiliated Kindergarten had told me so!

No.

What did I mean, no?

I mocked myself. Didn’t I know getting caught lying earned a penalty too? Let’s be efficient and simply give up on the entrance.

That was right.

I should voluntarily recite the teaching manual here. I could ask Teacher Park Minseong to let me read along.

No.

If I borrowed the teaching manual

No.

Let’s not think about anything else.

Because the more deeply I thought about it, the more I would acknowledge that this was quite a good idea—

No, I wouldn’t!

Focus on moving my feet. One step after another brought the entrance closer.

TAP. TAP.

“...”

I was there.

The entrance!

Instead of the filthy entrance I had first come through, it was spotless, so much so that I didn’t want to leave shut up.

“Now you’re going to throw this bag, right?”

I pulled the briefcase toward me. In the process, the teaching manual touching my hand regrettably lost contact.

“Shall we throw it together?”

Please.

“That sounds good.”

Work.

“Please hold it here...”

Only then did I turn my head.

Supervisor Park Minseong filled my vision, smiling with the face of a ‘teacher.’

Leaning forward and reaching out to take the briefcase, just as I’d asked.

‘Now.’

I seized his head.

“...!!”

And brutally shoved it into my forearm.

‘He’s going in.’

The space attached to my tattoo had the volume of a cube sixty centimeters on each side.

But it wasn’t actually cube-shaped. It was an irregular space with no fixed shape.

Which meant, in terms of what that volume could hold...

‘There’s more than enough room for one adult man.’

I kept my gaze fixed upward.

CRUNCH. CRUNCH.

The humanoid body resisting as it was forced into the tattoo on my wrist felt as though its joints were breaking...!

‘I deliberately tried to put his face in first.’

If we talked, I was sure it would affect me and intensify the contamination.

I kept pushing with one hand. The space inside the tattoo continued swallowing it without difficulty... Ah! The teaching manual touched me! I should keep this separately absolutely not.

Once I had crammed in even the last foot, all that remained was...

GRAB!

“...!”

Something shot out and seized my left forearm.

Every knuckle white with the force of its grip.

Supervisor Park Minseong’s right hand.

“Ugh!”

Damn it!

I tried prying the fingers off one by one, but they wouldn’t budge.

‘I can’t injure the teacher.’

I had no idea how this Darkness would react.

‘Quietly...!’

Barely breathing, I drew the Blood-Drinking Knife and plunged it into my own arm.

“...!”

As I tore the fingers free, a chunk of flesh tore away from my forearm with them. The pain should have made me scream like mad, but tension and adrenaline blocked it.

At the same instant I pushed the last finger into the tattoo, I hastily stepped through the entrance.

TAP.

The final step.

“...”

I raised my head.

A blue daytime sky.

Behind me now stood nothing but a decrepit, shuttered private kindergarten.

Sparkling sunlight shone on the weeds across the open outskirts of Seoul.

“...”

I had cleared it.

I lowered my head.

Deputy Eun Haje lay on the ground, her hand missing at the wrist.

The other employees were nowhere to be seen. They seemed to have gone back already...

I took my smartphone out of my pocket.

Then pressed the buttons as planned.

As if proving this was reality, the call rang, and someone answered...

“Is this... the Security Team Loan Warehouse?”

Even the words I had prepared barely made it out of my dry mouth.

“I need equipment to contain contamination...”

Because...

“I’ve rescued a contaminated employee.”

...

...

Done.

I fainted on the spot.