WETRIED TRANSLATIONS

The Legendary Newbie of the Ghost Story Labyrinth

[Translator – Aren]

Chapter 87 - Desertion (2)

As the 2.5-ton truck barreled down the road, a sudden commotion erupted behind us. When I turned around, the sight nearly stopped my heart.

"...!"

Leading the pursuit was a Retona with the battalion commander himself inside. Behind it, a whole line of 2.5-ton military trucks thundered after us. There had to be more than 10 of them.

I immediately understood why.

"Damn it, the readiness drill!”

Because of the readiness drill, all those military trucks had already been gathered on the parade ground. The moment Floor 15 sounded the alarm, the battalion had been able to mobilize instantly.

The readiness drill had made it easier for us to leave the base, but it also made it just as easy for pursuers to come after us.

"Sergeant Ma! Faster!”

"If I push it any harder, this truck’s going to fall apart, Master!”

"That’s not the problem! Have you seen what’s behind us?!”

"Got it!”

The truck rattled so violently, it felt as though it might shake itself to pieces.

I looked back again. The Retona carrying the battalion commander had closed the distance. I could clearly make out both the driver and the passengers. But something about them was wrong.

No, it was far beyond just wrong.

"What the…?!”

The battalion commander, the one who’d forced that strained smile, pretending to be kind after the incident I caused, had transformed into a monster.

His mouth split open all the way to his ears. Inside, row after row of blade-like teeth glistened. Then he let out a horrific scream at me.

"Why only you?! Why do you get to leave?! We’re supposed to stay together! KRAAAAAAH!!”

No human throat could ever produce a sound like that. It was a howl of a vengeful spirit.

The soldiers riding the trucks behind him all began screaming as well.

"Take us with you! Let me come with you!"

"I want to leave this floor too! KraAAH!”

"If we can’t, then you’ll become one of us instead!”

Their voices were impossibly loud. Even over the roar of engines and the rushing wind, their bitter cries reached us with perfect clarity.

They weren’t even trying to hide that they were entities anymore.

They were furious.

Furious that I might find freedom instead of being swallowed by Floor 15 like they had been.

"Trying to get out all on your own?!”

"The battalion is one!”

"You’re one of our company!”

Seniors, peers, juniors, company officers. They all leaned out from the military trucks, starting at me as though they wanted to devour me alive.

None of them were human anymore.

The blood vessels in their eyes had burst, sending streams of crimson tears down their faces. Their jaws stretched unnaturally wide, drool pouring from mouths like those ravenous predators.

Even the senior-most soldier, the one who’d ordered everyone not to harass me after I returned from the brig, had changed. Where his head should have been, a writhing bundle of parasitic, horsehair-worm-like tentacles twisted and writhed in the air.

It was a sight that belonged in the deepest pits of hell.

And if I failed to escape Floor 15, that was exactly what I would become.

"Private Park! We live together! And if we die, we die together!"

"You’re abandoning the battalion?”

"Aaagh! Comrades-in-arms, go!”

When words failed, they finally resorted to gunfire.

-Ratata!

I shoved Nicola’s head down and ducked as low as I could.

The soldiers behind us had opened fire with their K1 rifles. Bullets sharply whistled through the air, slamming into the frame of our truck.

-Clang! Claaang!

"Holy shit! They’re actually serious!”

I’d never imagined this. Entities using guns.

To be honest, I’d always assumed firearms were something unique to humans. That misconception had just been completely shattered. Thinking about it, there was no reason entities couldn’t use guns.

-Ratatatata! Ratata!

Entities were already terrifying enough. Now they were shooting at us too.

It felt like there was no way out.

For a moment I thought we were going to die. But something wasn't right. Sure, they were firing from moving vehicles. Even so, with that many shooters aiming at us, we should’ve been riddled with bullets already.

Yet somehow every single shot narrowly missed us.

Nicola suddenly shouted as if he’d figured it out.

"They’re not trying to kill us, Brother!”

"What?"

"The environment wants to turn us into entities! If it kills us now, everything it’s done up until now would be meaningless.”

So that was it. They were firing warning shots, trying to capture us alive. Or maybe they were aiming for the tires.

Either way, once we understood that, we both leaned out and unleashed a barrage of return fire.

-Ratatatatatatatata!

-Ratatatata!

The sudden hail of bullets sent the pursuing vehicles swerving all over the road.

-Clang! Thud!

One of my rounds pierced the Retona’s windshield and struck the battalion commander squarely in the forehead.

For a brief instant, his head snapped backward. Then he slowly lifted it again. Blood poured from the hole in his skull, yet he continued staring straight at me.

"Private Park! Don’t disappoint your battalion commander any further!”

That guy definitely was an entity. Getting shot in the head didn’t even slow him down.

"This isn’t going to work!”

Just then Ma Ilho shouted from the driver’s seat.

"Master! There’s a stack of cement bags under the tarp in the back!”

There was only one place he’d gotten those. Some construction side he’d borrowed them from. The moment I saw them, I knew exactly what to do.

-Riiiiiiip.

I yanked on the white pull-string sealing one of the bags and threw it onto the road behind us.

-Whoooosh!

A massive cloud of gray dust exploded outward, like a smoke grenade.

Almost immediately, the sound of crashing vehicles echoed through the mountains.

-Craaaash! Boooom!

-Screeeeech!

The instant their vision disappeared, the vehicles began crashing into one another, starting with the Retona at the front.

I kept throwing bag after bag of cement onto the road. Before long, the entire convoy had descended into chaos.

"Yes!"

We’d at least bought ourselves a little time.

* * *

"Ugh……”

A groan came from behind us. The supply sergeant slowly opened his eyes. He glanced around, his eyes widening in shock. Before I could say a single word, he was already moving.

He lunged straight at Nicola.

"Aagh!”

Nicola was knocked backward, his rifle nearly torn from his hands. He really did have excellent instincts.

Even in this situation, his first thought was to seize the easier target’s weapon and turn the tables.

From his perspective, we’d kidnapped him and deserted while armed, but things weren’t nearly that simple.

Without even a moment’s hesitation, I fired.

-Bang!

Not at his leg. Not at his shoulder. I shot him straight through the stomach.

Gu Bonjae screamed and collapsed onto the truck bed.

"Aaaaaagh! You crazy bastard!”

He’d never imagined I’d actually pull the trigger. After all, his assigned role still chained him to ordinary human common sense.

The smell of burnt gunpowder drifted from the muzzle, carried away by the wind. I answered flatly.

"You won’t die, so just bear with it for a bit.”

"Aaaagh! How the hell am I not supposed to die after getting shot in the stomach?! You damn psychopath!”

"Because you’re an entity, Sergeant.”

“An entity?”

“Let’s just say it’s something that exists in this world.”

At that moment, the alarm echoed across all of Floor 15 once again.

[Armed desertion! Armed desertion! Emergency Alert! Emergency Alert!]

But as it repeated, its tone gradually became distorted.

[Armed desertion…Armed……Emergency……Alert]

Eventually, it no longer sounded like a human voice at all.

[Kiieeeeeek……Alert……]

It sounded like the cry of something monstrous. Something impossible to comprehend.

At the same time, the world around us began to change.

It started with the trees lining the roadside.

The ordinary countryside trees slowly lost their color. Gray spread across them until they no longer looked like trees at all. Looking closer, I realized what they really were.

They were bones.

Enormous spinal columns rose from both sides of the road.

The asphalt softened, becoming wet and organic until it resembled a gigantic blood vessel.

"What is this…?”

Nicola answered my question.

"I think we’re seeing Floor 15’s true form. Its fake outer shell is disappearing. That is what it really looks like!”

"Its true form?”

I stared blankly, then following Nicola’s gaze, I slowly looked upward.

"Huh...?"

There was something enormous in the sky. At first, my mind couldn’t even recognize what I was looking at. It was simply too vast and surreal. It was as though my brain refused to process it.

Like being dead drunk, my thoughts slowed to a crawl. I just stood there, mouth hanging open. Then, after several long seconds, my mind finally began to catch up.

Filling the entire sky was an immense mass of flesh.

Embedded throughout that flesh were countless eyeballs. Hundreds of thousands of eyes, all staring down at the world below.

But the most grotesque part was the countless tentacles hanging from it. Long, endless, and thin like fishing lines. Dangling from the end of every single one was a person.

They were all members of the battalion, who had been chasing me like vengeful spirits.

The battalion commander, the company commanders, every officer, my seniors, my peers, my juniors. They all hung there like marionette dolls swaying from those grotesque strings.

"Aah......."

Only then did I finally understand what Floor 15 truly was.

This entire world had merely been that thing’s playground.

"That’s the entity……?”

I’d never seen anything with such an overwhelming, crushing presence.

My chest tightened, breathing became difficult, and my mind threatened to go blank. That was when it spoke. The moment its will reached me, I merely collapsed and wet myself from sheer terror.

[……Where are you going……?]

Those countless eyes, all fixed upon me, made it feel as though my sanity were being ground into dust.

To keep from losing my mind, I hurriedly lowered my head.

I glanced sideways. Nicola had already fainted. Foam dribbled from the corner of his mouth.

But averting my eyes wasn’t enough. The voices of the countless battalion members hanging from those tentacles forced their way into my ears.

[......Private Park……! You belong with us……! Where are you going……?!]

[......Private Park…...!]

It felt as though my mind was about to shatter completely.

"Kwaak! Kweeek!”

Then I heard Ma Ilho, no, Unit 1.

At some point, he had already returned to his original mannequin Faceling from.

"...!"

The instant I saw him, I realized what had happened. Floor 15 had grown desperate enough to reveal its true form. And in doing so, the roles it had forced upon us had begun to disappear.

If that was true, then recovering our memories was only a matter of time.

Sure enough, countless memories began flooding back into my mind.

Just then, Gu Bonjae slowly sat up in the truck bed.

He was no longer the company supply sergeant. His body had returned to that of a humanoid entity covered in pitch-black skin. Baring rows of incredibly sharp teeth, he gave me a bitter smile.

"You really didn’t hold back, shooting me like that."

Even so, a gunshot wound meant nothing to Gu Bonjae. The injury had already regenerated completely. Judging from the way he spoke, his memories had fully returned. Naturally, I answered him in kind.

"I’m sorry, Mister.”

"It’s fine. First let’s deal with that thing.”

Clicking his tongue, Go Bonjae spoke with complete certainty.

"It made a serious mistake. It ended the roleplay thinking that even after we recovered our true strength, it would still be vastly stronger than us.”

"Isn’t it? I’ve never seen an entity like that before…It’s completely beyond anything I’ve ever encountered.”

"Looks like your memories still haven’t fully returned. Remember who you are.”

Without another word, Gu Bonjae swung a fist the size of a pot lid straight into my face.

"Gaah!”

As I tumbled across the truck bed with a cry of pain, Gu Bonjae grinned as though he’d found the perfect excuse. He raised his fist again.

"If you still can’t remember, how about another one?”

It was a crude method, but it worked.

"Uuugh……I’m good.”

Something inside my head felt as though a nail had just been pulled free. At the same time, a flood of memories came rushing back.

Apparently, Gu Bonjae’s punch hadn’t been simple physical violence. It had been meant to shatter the anomaly lodged inside me.

My memories had completely returned.

"Ah......!”

The first thing I felt was disappointment.

"She wasn’t my girlfriend.”

I couldn’t believe it. Seol Suyeon, the woman I’d even lived with, wasn’t actually my girlfriend. Sure, we’d been close, but thinking back, neither of us had ever actually said anything definitive.

No, I’d thought the old me was some incredible guy. Turns out, I was the JOAT instead?

She was my favorite VTuber, Sommong, and even after seeing her real face, which happened to be exactly my type, I still held back?

I couldn’t help letting out a dumbfounded sigh.

"After all that, shouldn’t I have confessed already?”

"So you’re still saying ridiculous things even in a situation like this. Then you really are the Park Minho I know.”

Gu Bonjae lowered his fist, looking almost disappointed. Just then, Unit 1, gripping the steering wheel, let out a harsh cry and pointed ahead.

"Kieeek!”

I immediately looked forward. There it was. Hwangcheon Tunnel. Our destination. The problem was that its entrance had been completely sealed off by a massive wall of concrete.

If we crashed into that, we’d all end up as bloody paste.

As if it had been waiting for this exact moment, the colossal entity in the sky finally moved.

-Ruuuumble! Boom!

With a deafening roar like thunder, countless tentacles descended toward us.

Hanging from their ends, the battalion members screamed.

"Where do you think you’re going?!”

"Private Park! We’re one!”

"Battalion, sing the battalion song!”

I honestly wanted to curse. These damn entities were actually trying to force me back into military service.

"I’ve had enough.”

I released the King’s Noose from within my shadow.

It was true. The transcendent entity filling all of Floor 15 was stronger than I was, and if I let things continue, everything would end exactly as it wanted.

But it had made one fatal mistake. It knew nothing about the King’s Noose, and because of that ignorance it had ended the roleplay too soon.

-Craaaackle!

Reality Manipulation, fueled by rage unlike anything I had ever felt, began to unfold.

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