Students gathered in the schoolyard and pointed to a person standing on the rooftop.
“Look over there! Look!”
“W-what should we do? Should I go get one of the teachers?”
“What is he trying to do?”
“I don’t know. I think he’s going to jump!”
“The hell? Someone call a teacher!”
“Over there! He’s over there!”
All of the students stopped what they were doing and gathered to watch. Whether they were playing soccer, strolling, or returning home a little late, everyone now had their eyes on the person on the roof. They instinctively felt that something that they could not handle was about to happen.
Unlike the others, Raviel chose to act instead of simply standing around.
“This isn’t good! Gong-Ja! Call 119[1]. Give them the school name and tell them a student is about to jump from the roof. Hurry! I’ll go up to the rooftop and try to persuade them not to jump!”
Raviel didn’t send anyone to call one of the teachers and take over the responsibility. Instead, she quickly dealt with the situation at hand herself. Without waiting for my answer, she hurriedly ran to the main school building.
While watching her, I could feel my frozen body thawing. I wasn’t sure what was happening, but there was no time to hesitate. I quickly dialed the emergency hotline on my cell phone. One... One...
Just before I could press the number nine, something fell in the schoolyard. I initially thought the student had jumped, but the crash wasn’t loud enough for it to be a human. The student on the rooftop had simply thrown his cell phone away.
With my finger on number nine, I looked back up at the rooftop. Our eyes met. It was the student I had seen in the classroom—the one quietly sitting and studying alone in the back row by the window. For the first time, I could clearly see his face.
His eyes were black, and his cheeks were pale. The corners of his mouth rose into a sneer. His lips moved slowly. He was way too far away for me to hear him, but I could read his lips enough to make out what he was saying.
His short, rake-like fingers around the rooftop fence loosened, so the wind... he...
The students screamed, and the world exploded with noise.
Someone was yelling hysterically.
Another student trembled, digging his fingernails into someone else’s sleeves.
In just one second, the world turned upside down. The school disappeared. Its yard was replaced with a barren desert, and the main building was reduced to nothing more than an ugly prison. The classrooms turned to either slaughterhouses or breeding farms with animals that were always hungry for food.
In this world where people were slaughtered and bred, humans were only meant to become red corpses.
With the student lying dead on the ground, I blankly looked around the campus. The bricks were getting redder by the second. Afraid that the color would get on their toes, the students took a step back. Some took out their phones.
The sound of flashes going off made me approach the students.
“Don’t take pictures. What do you think you’re doing? Don’t take pictures! Stop!”
The students flinched in response, but more and more gathered. They left their soccer balls in the desert, the flowers on their trail walks, or the road that led to their homes.
“Don’t take pictures!”
When I stopped one student, another took out her phone.
“I told you to stop! Don’t fucking take pictures!”
Emotions I couldn’t name flowed back up my throat and made me feel like crying. I soon realized that they were anger, contempt, and disgust.
In the school’s main building, from the first floor to the fifth floor, students stuck their heads out and looked down. Countless eyes were watching the commotion.
“Goddamn it. Don’t take pictures! Stop already!”
The people by the windows seemed expressionless. The Black Witch looked down from the first floor. The Inquisitor peeked out from the third floor. The Paladin, the Countess, and the Heavenly Demon Cult followers were in the schoolyard, while the children of the Infernal Mansion surrounded me.
They moved their fingers and took pictures.
—You’re the ones who killed me. Don’t forget that you did this to me.
I looked up at the rooftop, finding Raviel looking down at me.
“You killed him, Gong-Ja.”
The world collapsed. When the student fell, he drenched the ground, the sky, and the people in crimson.
“As you already know, a tragedy happened at our school,” Principal Sword Star said in the auditorium. “But I believe in my Shinseo Middle and High School students...”
“Did you see the text message he sent? Isn’t that really crazy?”
Students who looked like the Countess and the Paladin whispered among themselves in the classroom.
“Yeah. Now that I think about it, he was always a bit strange.”
My father drank whiskey at home. He looked and laughed like the Guardian. “I heard a lot of people are making a fuss about what happened, but don’t pay any attention to them. They don’t have the courage to say it to your face, so they’re just messing with you on the internet. Gosh, those guys should have all their fingers cut off.”
“Yeah, man. In life, you sometimes end up hurting people or worse. Why would he go kill himself over something like that? What an attention whore. Call the Four Heavenly Kings! Let’s go play a game together!” my brother, the Fire Emperor, said cheerfully, slinging an arm over my shoulder.
“Yes, I’m very sad too. It’s so tragic,” Homeroom Teacher Viper said from the lecture podium. “This is a crucial time for you. When you become a senior, time will fly by, so you have to pretty much already decide on your university in your sophomore year. Think about what is important and keep your chins up.”
“Yes, Teacher,” the students answered in unison.
Only Class President Black Witch lowered her head in silence. A white flower was placed on the student’s desk. One day, two days, three days passed... In less than a week, the desk disappeared. I couldn’t tell who moved it. No student asked either. No new desk was brought to the window in the last row.
The wind blew, swaying the curtain. There was no one to be concealed by the curtain anymore.
[Repeating the trauma penalty.]
[The penalty's intensity level is high.]
[The penalty's theme is the TiryagyoniRealm.]
Ding, ding, ding, ding.
A dreary, electronic noise rang out, disguised as a melody. It mimicked the one in reality. To desperately hide the fact that it was an imitation, it sounded more lively.
—This is an announcement from the broadcasting club to all students on campus.
However, an imitation could never take the place of the original.
—Please return home if you aren’t attending the night self-study session. There have recently been multiple reports of students remaining on campus even after school hours. Again, those who have not signed up for the night self-study session should return home.
“Sunbae, wake up! They’re telling us to go home!”
Feeling nauseated, I opened my eyes.
“Oh, you’re already awake.” The Inquisitor beamed. “But sleeping face down on your desk is bad for your health, especially for your back. More than anything, you can’t get a good night’s sleep . Midterm season is coming soon—”
Instead of waiting for the Inquisitor to finish, I stood up and ran out of the library. I could hear him shouting at me.
“Ah, sunbae! No running in the hallways!”
I gritted my teeth as I ran.
This was definitely the trauma of the Constellation Murderer, Lefanta Aegim. It was just that my memories had been overlaid on Lefanta Aegim’s nightmare like a veil.
I was in the same world that had been a nightmare for him to live in, surrounded by the same people who had killed him. However, the people’s appearances were based on my acquaintances, not the Constellation Murderer’s. That was why the Black Witch, the Paladin, and the Countess were students, and Teacher and the Guardian were my parents.
I could taste the blood in my mouth; I had bit the inside of my cheek too hard.
I’m the perpetrator. The role I was given is the main reason behind the trauma.
I had already witnessed many traumas so far, but each time I had been just an observer. Maybe because the penalty got stronger as my Hunter Class increased, I was now part of the trauma. It wasn’t just me, but everyone I knew was here... except for one person.
I reached the stairs, finding outrageous slogans hanging on the walls.
—Positive Mental Attitude♪
—Keep Your Heart Happy♪
Stop with the bullshit. It’s not even funny.
I looked up at the stairs leading to the rooftop, finding the only person in this world I didn’t recognize.
Constellation Murderer...
He was small, almost like a child. Holding on to the metal door that was tightly shut, the student pulled the doorknob back and forth.
The chains around the door were so strong that they seemed difficult to break.
The student sighed and turned around. Our eyes met. He briefly paused and then bowed politely.
Why didn’t I realize it sooner?
I should have known something was off when I realized that kid was my classmate. It was obvious. Who would bow to another classmate? Something was seriously wrong.
After studying my face for a bit, the student quietly walked away. I stopped him when he was about to pass by me. “Wait.”
“Yes?” The student didn’t look directly at me but cautiously to the side. It looked like he was used to this.
I felt a lump in my throat. “Please give me your phone for a moment.”
My request was met with silence, so I repeated, “Please.”
The student obediently handed over his phone. There was a brief silence before he did, but it wasn’t out of resistance to my request. His silence was a question—why was I making a request so respectfully?
I opened the phone. It didn’t even have a password.
I opened and read the messages one by one.
—I feel so sorry for the juniors at my school T.T Why? Because they need to call you sunbae. Have you thought about how they feel? How do you sleep at night?
—Hey, why aren’t you answering my messages?
—Shocking news! There is a student who doesn’t wash his school uniform!
—■■... You’re really dirty. How can you be dirtier than the math teacher? LOL. I didn’t think something like that was possible.
—LMAO. You really loved it when I said hi to you in the hallway yesterday. Hey! I only did that because I lost at rock-paper-scissors! Don’t delude yourself. T.T
—■■ lives in a garbage dump. All his school uniforms and indoor shoes are recycled. There is only one piece of trash that cannot be recycled, and that is ■■.
—You smell really bad. Seriously, you’re soooo gross.
—See you after class.
Unable to keep reading, I closed the phone and my eyes. I then tried to calm my breathing, but it was difficult. I didn’t have my dagger or Raviel’s handkerchief.
“Why...” I looked at the Constellation Murderer’s past self. “Why do you bring your phone to school? Stop bringing it.”
“You said you’ll kill me if I don’t,” he replied.
I felt a shiver run down my spine. Dizziness overtook me.
“Just throw it away, then. Throw it as far away as you can. If you say you lost it, no one can do anything about it.”
Quietly, the boy said, “You gave me this phone, Mr. Kim. It’s what you used a long time ago...”
I was rendered speechless.
“My family doesn’t have money, so you’re also paying the bill for it. In return, I have to come to you the moment you tell me to. That’s why you gave me the phone. You said you’ll kill me if I lose it again...”
The school building was now an eyesore to me. Friendship and love were not real. Nothing mattered, even though it seemed like it did.
“Can I really throw it away?”
In this prison guarded by masked people who pretended to be special, only malice wasn’t covered by a mask.
1. The number for Korean fire stations. ☜