Bailonz Street 13-Chapter 254.1

Let’s put this in order.

Section Chief Lee Jaheon is trapped inside a ghost story about a lunatic boarding school that conducts groom lessons.

He’s even been selected as a groom candidate.

And as preparation for the wedding, he’s been drawing out nearly a bowlful of blood every night, so he’s expected to collapse in four days.

Lastly…

– …The wedding is in four days, too?

“That is correct.”

I’m going crazy.

‘Why the heck are you so calm!’

He should know that in this kind of ghost story, a ‘wedding’ is always the kind of ending that gets censored out!

By sheer force of will, I pushed down the imminent rising feeling that was crawling up the back of my neck.

Actually, I didn’t even need to hold it back. Right now I exist only as a consciousness connected to Section Chief Lee Jaheon’s mind and have no body. …Not that what he has now could really be called a human body, anyway.

In any case, first things first.

The blood.

– Couldn’t you receive an item from the Space Shopping Mall… Or rather, from ‘us’, and at least replenish the blood you’re lacking?

“Yes.”

Then why!

…Of course, as expected from Chief Lizard, he had a reasonable and logical explanation.

“If the effectiveness of the current method of bloodletting is deemed insufficient, there’s a high probability it will order an even more life-threatening act.”

In other words, from the ghost story’s point of view, it would go, ‘Why isn’t this working? I should try another way,’ which might lead to it suddenly draining all of his blood overnight…

That actually makes sense.

Still made me sigh though.

[That my friend must spend his time for such a dull, unimaginative blade grunt, goodness!]

……?

Braun?!

Why is he… Wait a second. Even back in Sekwang City, Braun had been classified as part of my consciousness structure and had accompanied me as a VIP shopper at the Space Shopping Mall.

And this time too, I entered Section Chief Lee Jaheon’s body as nothing but a spirit through an item made by the aliens who ran the shop.

The mechanism was probably similar.

If that’s the case… did he get the same classification?

[Oh, correct, Mr. Roe Deer! A very clever deduction.]

Y-Yeah…

The problem was this.

“Mr. Roe Deer.”

Section Chief Lee Jaheon knew Braun very well.

Because he was the alien reptile who had destroyed half of Braun’s studio in response to my item usage.

“Was that remark made by the host of the Late-Night Talk Show Darkness?”

– Y…es, technically.

“I see. Do you need advice?”

– …Uh, well. Would that advice be about removing him?

“Yes.”

[Oh, I’m hardly surprised. Such taste and eloquence from the rude blade grunt who bombed my studio and tried to kidnap my crew!]

I felt a knot in my stomach…

We’re in a crazy ghost story where the housemaster cuts open trainees’ soles and stuffs in sound-dampening pads because their footsteps were loud, and now this is happening…

– ……Anyway, your current situation is more urgent, Section Chief, so I’d prefer to talk about that later.

“Yes.”

Because, literally, he’s set to die in four days.

This is insane…

After soothing Braun’s temper, I swallowed my sigh and thought.

It seems Section Chief Lee has absolutely no intention of yielding control of his body.

Besides, the conditions are completely different from what I prepared for.

I came here to take the groom-training test in his place so he could pass, but he’s already passed, become a groom candidate, and now needs to escape as a formal trainee.

‘That changes everything.’

Rather than choosing the ‘answer key’ of this Groom Lesson ghost story, it would raise our chances of rescue to dig into the structural loopholes behind that answer key.

I immediately checked.

For now… The Dark Exploration Records only stated that, according to the boarding school’s policy, one cannot leave the bedroom at night.

– Is it difficult for you to leave your room at night? If so, please explain why.

“Yes. At night, structural anomalies appear throughout the building, and in the areas without anomalies, there are watchers.”

In other words, the nighttime boarding school is both a labyrinth twisted by anomalies and patrolled by housemasters.

A nightmare if there ever was one.

– Have you ever gone out yourself? If so, please tell me the purpose and where you went.

“Yes.”

And then Section Chief Lee did not open his mouth.

…What?

But in the next moment.

Lee Jaheon ‘told’ me.

“…!”

A shared chunk of information.

No. Perhaps it should be called memory, or sensation.

Unrefined visual, olfactory, tactile, auditory. These were sensory data values poured directly into my thought system.

Like my own memory.

I was moving soundlessly through a dark hallway of the boarding school.

The curtain stirred, and the moment the patrolling housemaster began to emerge from behind it, I hung from the ceiling with my body upside-down to avoid the watchful gaze.

Controlling my strength so as not to damage the ceiling lights, I slipped my hand into the grooves of the brick wall and moved again.

The destination was the main gate.

I knew.

During the experiential course of this boarding school ghost story, if one was about to fail, there was a last-resort method: attempting to flee through the main gate.

If the escape was successful, one would rarely awaken somewhere near their home address… that fact could also be found recorded in the <Dark Exploration Records>.

The same data appeared in Daydream Inc.’s database, so from the context, it was clear that Section Chief Lee Jaheon had decided to try this method based on that information.

But in truth.

There was no need.

‘…Just knew, for some reason.’

I naturally understood that Section Chief Lee Jaheon—‘we’—had reached this judgment based on similar background knowledge.

Because it had been shared.

A shocking sense of unity.

– …So this is how ‘we’ share information?

“Yes.”

Was this sort of process constantly happening among the reptilian aliens?

It was certainly not a form of information transmission a modern human could comprehend.

No. It wasn’t transmission so much as the unification of experience itself…

Even so, my memory reassembled.

After a long, suffocating game of hide-and-seek combined with carefully measured force, I…

I reached the location of the main gate.

It had taken 2 hours, 48 minutes, and 14 seconds from the dormitory to that spot. If one abandoned sleep, it would be possible to try again.

But we knew there was no need.

Because where the main gate should have been—

I bit back a curse.

—there was only a wall.

Night exploration terminated. Returning to the dormitory.

This damned boarding school had sealed every official entrance and exit.

No one could enter or leave.

Salt Goblin

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