How to Rewrite Ghost Stories - Chapter 27

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Natty

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ How to Rewrite Ghost Stories ◈

Episode 27: A Safe Place (2)

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1. Pretend I’m a candidate.

2. Fail after they doubt my sincerity because I don’t know a single doctrine.

3. Return to the world of the living.

4. Easy, right?

‘Nothing worked, and it all went to hell.’

The bracelet around my wrist seemed to twitch whenever my pulse beat.

When I looked around, white cloth surged like waves all around me.

The priests, the escort instructors, every cultist, lifted the cloth that had covered their faces with both hands and spread it open.

This was beyond the level of a candidate. With a reaction like this, the leader of this cult should be rushing out barefoot to welcome me.

Somehow, I had become something like the Second Coming of Jesus, standing at the heart of a cult with what appeared to be a sacred relic wrapped around my wrist.

“The Guide will lead us!”

“The allotted place stands empty. At last, the Guide has returned!”

The sound of gears filling the Candidates’ Square stopped.

After a brief silence, a strange vibration rang out, like a Tibetan singing bowl. Then an eerie hymn began to echo throughout the entire space.

‘Guidance, and arrangement. Based on the Helical Cult’s doctrine centered on spirals and gears...’

The Guide probably meant the one who designed things so the gears could properly mesh and turn. Arrangement likely meant deciding where those gears would be placed.

Behind that silver holy-water basin, where the most cloth draped down, I could see something like a massive gear mechanism still at rest.

‘If I’m unlucky, I could end up as one of that machine’s gears...’

In short, the cultists had practically declared that they would jam me into the center of this enormous machine.

Thoughts piled on thoughts, but one thing was clear.

The moment I was accepted as the Guide, or whatever, and became part of this place, my life would be over.

‘Unqualified, my ass. Third revision of the plan.’

Was this what hell felt like for an honor student who could not even afford to fail?

The cultists surrounded me in a circle, praying as they bowed on their knees without raising their heads.

Though none of them dared look up, I could feel gazes beyond the veils that went beyond reverence and bordered on obsession.

“Take the Guide to the Place of Arrangement. The promised foresight!”

I had been worried about the holy-water basin, but this was worse.

The priests who had been lying flat on the floor must have gone somewhere in the meantime. Three came from each side, seized me, and began draping layers of ornate, heavy white sacred robes over me.

‘...It itches.’

Every time white cloth embroidered with tens of thousands of intricate geometric patterns in silver thread touched my skin, it stung.

It felt like the electric treatment they gave you alongside acupuncture.

The priests were practically carrying me farther inward, not toward the holy-water basin. The believers’ chorus began to resonate louder and louder.

It was less like music and more like the sound of something idling, a vibration that seemed impossible for human throats to make.

The vibration made by human voices alone struck every corner of the dome and amplified dozens of times over. I could practically see it trembling across my skin.

“Do you need help, partner?”

‘Got a good idea? Could you send out high-frequency sound like you did in the tunnel?’

“I can cause a minor broadcast accident... But this is a live broadcast. Where do you intend to go after the accident? This is why a visualized stage always carries an element of instability.”

‘Save the media debate between television and radio for later.’

Hertz was not wrong.

Unless I suddenly developed superpowers and slaughtered everything here like it was a game boss fight, I needed to find a way out first.

‘There has to be a passage or entrance here that leads to the disposal chute.’

White pillars, white priestly robes, white veils.

Even the light filtering through the veils had burned white, leaving the place close to a whiteout. Still, I shook my head and desperately searched my surroundings.

My sense of direction in the circular space was slipping.

It felt as though I were surrounded by a massive vacuum membrane made of sound.

The only reason I had not collapsed was not willpower alone. The cult priests holding me up from every direction were doing most of the work.

‘There!’

An unusually dark space hidden between the white cloth.

A black iron door stood between intricately carved pillars.

‘Hertz, I found it. Help me when I give the signal.’

“Let me warn you again. You will be hurt as well.”

‘I’m ready. Make it as strong as you can.’

The believers’ prayer surged toward its climax.

The entire space vibrated, and I began to hear massive gears turning overhead.

The priest holding my arm loosened their grip.

Every cultist around me reflexively bowed to offer up their prayers.

‘Now.’

I shook free, pulled out one of the Eyeballs That Never Sleep from inside my clothes, and shoved it into my mouth.

The slimy, sticky taste clung to my palate and tongue. The candy-like thing hardened in my mouth, taking on the moist shape of a real eyeball.

“Hertz, now!”

Click.

A short electronic tone, like Morse code being tapped out.

Beep. Beep. Beep...

A grating metallic shriek, like glass being scraped.

Then,

Keeeeeeenng!

An explosion made of sound swept through the entire dome.

Ultrasonic waves beyond human hearing pounded through the space, centered on my phone.

They said that if you matched the right frequency and vibration, even a single strike could dismantle a building.

Cough.

The front of my robe turned red.

It felt as though something inside me was boiling over, and blood came spilling out with my cough.

My legs gave out, tangled in the sacred robes as I flailed.

“Aaargh!”

“M-My ears!”

“Arghhh!”

Then everything became chaos.

The cult priests could no longer hold me. Blood ran like water from their eyes, noses, mouths, and ears, mixed with clear bodily fluid.

The cultists clutched their faces, rolled across the floor, crawled, and floundered amid white cloth dyed blood-red.

The chorus could no longer protect them.

As screams replaced praise and ultrasonic waves replaced resonance, cracks began forming in the walls.

I felt like I was dying.

It was not as if I had some special trick that kept me from coughing up blood, either. The world spun before my eyes. It felt as though the whole world were shattering and pouring out with the blood.

I clenched my teeth to keep from swallowing the Eyeball That Never Sleeps.

My senses slowly returned with a sharp, smoky sensation.

I needed to cause enough trouble that they could never follow me.

The silver holy-water basin came into view through my red-stained vision.

“Hngh...”

Suppressing a groan, I shoved the basin with all my strength.

It overturned and rolled away. The glittering silver liquid flowed down the steps and beneath the altar.

Far more silvery liquid spilled out than could ever have overflowed from one basin.

It spread in every direction.

The white cloth began to melt in it.

The cloth, the floor, the pillars, and even the crawling people.

White, red, and silver things stuck together and clumped like ice cream mix.

I ran through the confusion.

Melting fingers kept tangling around my ankles, and I kicked them away.

The cloth fluttered.

As people grabbed at anything and tried to cling on, the veils tore apart. Even the gears hanging from the ceiling and walls burst into sparks and came crashing down.

Clack, crunch! Crash!

“Salvation...!”

“The foresight... Guide!”

Even then, I could hear people calling out.

The escort instructor, with half their face melted away, called desperately to me. They grew smaller with every step, like a candle burning down.

There was no resentment or terror in their eyes when ours met.

Only fear and sorrow.

“Please don’t leave us behind...!”

I forced away the sudden guilt rising inside me and ran.

The only thing that mattered now was that the silvery liquid melting everything did not affect me.

The black door had melted open wide, swallowing blood and white fragments within.

Cold wind brushed my cheek, and a sour smell of oil mixed with sewage rose from inside.

“Guide...!”

“The Guide is clocking out!”

Without hesitation, I threw myself through the black door.

I fell down the dark passage as if sliding down a playground slide. Behind me, the believers’ screams and the thunderous roar of uselessly spinning gears gradually faded away.

I rolled down for a long time, tangled in slimy flesh and melted cloth.

Thud! Crash!

I landed headfirst on the damp floor.

“Urgh... Haa...”

If I could have, I would have stayed sprawled out for thirty minutes.

There was no room for that.

When I forced myself upright, the Eyeball That Never Sleeps, which had nearly gone down my throat, almost popped back out of my mouth.

“Damn, my whole body aches...”

I bit down on the Eyeball That Never Sleeps again and rolled it around my puffed cheek a few times.

My throbbing body slowly returned to normal.

‘Good thing I ate this in advance.’

The Eyeball That Never Sleeps observes the body’s condition at the moment it is placed in the mouth. Its functions as a body part can also be transplanted, but given its shelf life, consumption is recommended. While it remains in the mouth, the body’s state cannot deviate from its initial form. If it leaves the mouth even once, the eye closes and the effect ends.

Without this, my head would have burst from the ultrasonic waves like a Nutcracker doll.

I wished I had eaten it after a meal, when my stamina was at its best, but I should have been grateful that this much worked.

‘I need to get up and move...’

When I looked around, the place I had reached was filled with piles of trash that looked like someone had visualized their memories and dumped them here.

Keys from an old typewriter. Pieces of someone’s diary. A doll with its face melted away. Gears worn down at the end of their lifespan.

This was the Hollow of Discards.

“...Looks like I got out safely, thanks to you. ...Hertz? Hertz?”

I hurriedly touched my ear, but the earbud that should have been there was gone.

Had it fallen out during the drop?

With shaking hands, I pulled my phone from my pocket.

The radio app only flashed the words “Frequency Out of Range” amid crackling static.

“Hertz!”

I called their name into the empty air, but only the echo of my own voice came back, swallowed by the damp air.

Please, let them be okay.

Anxiety rose in me. I had been thrown into a bottom-level ghost story that could come with sudden mental contamination.

‘You could do this alone before, too. It’s fine.’

I pulled out a handkerchief, roughly tore off both ends, balled them up, and shoved them tightly into my ears.

Perfect soundproofing was impossible, but at least I should not listen to unnecessary sounds.

It was quiet.

The only things I could trust were the sensations beneath my fingertips and the faint shapes before my eyes.

I staggered to my feet and started walking.

The disposal passage.

A massive garbage chute where everything the cult had deemed “incorrect” fell.

Every time I moved my foot, remnants that had failed to be forgotten bubbled up from the bottom of the swamp, making a gurgling sound.

‘Find the marker, then take ten thousand steps.’

The passage looped forever like a maze, but the way out was simpler than expected.

Find the “correct marker,” then follow the color it indicates.

Like following the Yellow Brick Road in The Wizard of Oz.

The flashlight could not properly illuminate even two meters ahead.

Every step took effort, and each time my feet sank back into the swamp, cold seeped into me.

‘Found it. The marker.’

A gear marker fitted with several spirals appeared.

A red marker.

I searched out the red heaps around me, pushed through them, and climbed over them.

My legs were going numb, and it felt like damp air was filling my lungs.

Seven thousand five hundred steps.

Ten thousand steps was about seven to eight kilometers at the stride of an adult man.

If this had been flat ground suitable for running, an hour and a half would have been enough. But the red heaps felt like stepping on badly made rubber, and it took more than two hours just to reach seven thousand steps.

I was barely climbing over another obstacle.

‘And I’m out of water.’

I had scarfed down all the calorie bars right at the start, and there was no clean water left.

The eyeball stuck in my mouth occasionally spat out mucus as if it were blinking. That was my only source of hydration.

‘I’m not going to die before I make three thousand more steps, am I...?’

In the distance, I could see red ground I would have to crawl up.

Not much farther.

The moment I started walking again, prepared to drink blood if I had to,

“Help... me...”

“...?!”

I almost screamed, almost kicked it away, and almost stumbled backward.

A skinny black hand, thin enough to break with the slightest force, was gripping my pant leg.