What's going on? What's going on, what's going on?!
The current situation had completely spiraled beyond all expectations.
The pounding on the door grew more and more violent with each strike, accompanied by the emotionless, repetitive shouts of 'Open the door,' the earthquake-like shaking of the entire hallway, and the dizzy spell that involuntarily spread from the depths of his mind. All of it mingled and resonated together, like a chaotic symphony.
Gao Hai knew very well that panicking in the face of an emergency was pointless.
Flailing about wouldn't make the enemy pity you and slow down, nor could it delay the urgent danger. Reality had no pause button. The faster he calmed down, the more likely he was to think of a solution and escape the current predicament.
But what could he do?
The best experience from his past life was standing up for a bullied classmate, fighting five delinquents with a shit-stained mop, and earning the nickname 'Shit-Stick Sage' or something. No one had taught him how to deal with horror stories that defied common sense, especially not when the rules sheet in his hand was two years out of date with no way to verify its contents, and he had no cheats like clairvoyance or invincibility. Even having two beautiful girls as teammates couldn't magically conjure up the intel they needed.
Seriously, the rules said not to respond, but who the hell knew this damn thing could communicate with your inner thoughts and form a dialogue?! Did the person who wrote these damn rules have a screw loose and deliberately hide a key detail, or were the rules in this godforsaken place really changing every single day, undergoing some kind of super-evolution?
"Why... are they knocking on the living room door?"
At that moment, Maki had completely lost her composure, looking behind her in disbelief at the cracked and rickety-looking door to the living room.
She couldn't understand.
Just a second ago, those things were outside the front door in the hallway. How had they gotten into the living room the next second and started banging on the door between it and the hallway?
All her knowledge and experience could not explain what was happening, nor could they help her find a course of action.
It wasn't until this moment that the young woman truly began to understand what a 'horror story' really was.
Crack!
A hole split open in the wooden living room door.
Blood began to flow from the hole.
A foul, metallic stench spread through the air.
It was as if the living room, which the three of them had just searched, had now turned into a slaughterhouse piled high with bloody, dismembered limbs.
[Open the door!]
The shouts of the three people seemed to ring directly in their ears.
It was as if three invisible people were standing right beside them, roaring at them.
Amidst the distorted voices, their vision seemed to blur.
It was as if they could see three mangled figures crowded behind the door, wailing ceaselessly, letting out sharp cries of pain.
Boom!
The wooden door was now completely warped and on the verge of being smashed to pieces.
The hallway itself took on a bizarre state, twisting out of shape like a reflection in a funhouse mirror.
And they themselves, the three of them who had collapsed to the floor, seemed to twist along with it. Every cell in their bodies, their skin, flesh, and bones, all seemed to be slowly warping into grotesque shapes.
"What... is..."
Kaguya Shinomiya struggled to prop herself up, but after several attempts, she still couldn't get to her feet.
From the moment the things outside the door began to mutate, the three of them in the hallway had started to lose control of their own bodies.
The world twisted more and more like a hallucination, their limbs growing weaker and weaker.
The cacophony of sounds amplified in their minds, howling as if countless figures surrounded them on all sides.
It was as if the hallway was packed with innumerable people, crowding them so tightly they couldn't move.
One after another...
The unseen, the unheard, the unfelt...
Always... always lingering here... souls who could never find peace...
"Ugh..."
Kaguya Shinomiya, whose hearing was the most acute of the three, collapsed onto the floor with a painful whimper.
After all, the 17-year-old girl had never faced such a terrifying and bizarre situation. Furthermore, she had been listening to the knocking alone in the hallway for a while before Gao Hai and Maki Shijo came out, so she was the most affected and had almost no strength left to support her body.
But even so, she instinctively clutched the wall clock in her hands—the only clock in Room 208, which she had taken from the end of the hallway—and refused to let it go.
"Ka... Kaguya..."
A muffled voice sounded by her ear.
Amidst the countless anguished howls, it was as if someone's voice was whispering right next to her.
The next moment, a hand shot out from the side and snatched the clock from her grasp.
Kaguya whipped her head around and saw Gao Hai's face splitting down the middle.
It was a sight that should not have been possible in the real world.
Kaguya could clearly see a seam crack open down the center of Gao Hai's face, his cheeks opening to the sides like a book.
Blood still flowed through the vessels beneath his skin, the white matter of his brain seemed to pulse gently, and his bisected tongue was still writhing. Even the muscles at the cross-section trembled so vividly that she could even see saliva being secreted from it.
Is this... a hallucination?
Looking down, the skin on the fingers gripping the clock seemed to be peeling away bit by bit, already revealing the raw, red flesh beneath.
She couldn't seem to feel any pain.
But then... the pain seemed to sharpen, bit by bit.
After she felt it, after she noticed it, after she became aware of it, the agony began to spread, consuming her entire body.
"..."
No sound came out.
In the silent, soundless hallway.
The young woman couldn't make a single sound.
She thought she could see her body turning transparent.
She saw every part of her body begin to tear, to break apart, saw herself gradually shattering into large and small fragments.
The pain grew sharper.
Yet her thoughts grew increasingly sluggish.
She couldn't utter a sound, only numbly watch it all happen.
Watching herself, just like this, gradually walk towards death.
Is this... what happens in the hallway outside...
Click—
But she could still hear something.
A sound coming from beside her, from extremely close.
She laboriously moved her gaze downwards.
What she saw was a severed hand.
A hand almost completely torn off, connected by just a shred of skin to a shattered, ruined skeleton.
She saw two fingers.
Two fingers that gently closed over the hour hand of the wall clock.
Click—
A clear sound echoed by her ear.
The hour hand of the clock was moved.
It moved backward by a small fraction of a space.
"Wha—!"
The next moment, Kaguya's eyes flew open as she bolted upright on the filthy, broken bed.
She turned her head and saw Gao Hai lying beside her, panting heavily, his forehead covered in beads of sweat.
There were no eerie knocking or voices.
No dismembered bodies or dulled senses.
Everything felt like an unreal nightmare, except that upon waking, she seemed to be right back at the starting point.
"Just now, what did you do..."
Kaguya, who already had an idea of what happened but still found it hard to believe, couldn't help but ask in a low voice.
"The clocks in every room are perfectly accurate, aren't they?"
Gao Hai, however, struggled to sit up. He glanced at the rules sheet on the nightstand beside him and at the kitchen entrance where the door had been removed. Then he stood, reaching out a shaky hand to brace himself against the nearby wall until he finally found his footing.
He had turned time back to the very beginning.
Back to when he and Kaguya had just woken up in this room, just when they heard that strange voice.
The two of them were now back in Room 204.
Now, everything that had just happened had not yet occurred.
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