This World is too Cruel to Men – Chapter 392

Something went wrong.

A realization of that sort quickly filled my mind.

And along with it began to flow an indescribably ominous premonition down my spine.

A chilling sensation, almost too cold to bear, seemed to sweep along my back… that kind of feeling.

It sprouted from the vicinity of my tailbone and seized my entire body in an instant, which I had denied the existence of because, logically, it couldn’t be true.

Right, it couldn’t possibly be true, could it?

Who else could be in this corridor aside from us?

So, when Dogun’s presence following me suddenly vanished, I thought he might have just gotten bored of walking and decided to mess around to lighten the atmosphere.

Dogun must have some thoughts of his own—would he really prank me in a situation like this?

If it were anyone else, maybe, but with Dogun, it was entirely possible.

He might seem responsible and mature as if living a second life based on his usual behavior, but he loved to joke around way too much for that to be true.

To put it accurately, he had developed a taste for teasing someone.

In addition, he couldn’t stand awkward atmospheres, so he had enough motivation to pull such pranks.

‘But more than anything…’

What if Dogun truly vanished without a trace?

If that were the case, Chae-rim, who was likely busy unleashing her talent like a chaotic current, wouldn’t be so quiet.

“…Dogun?”

So, when I asked that, a reply was supposed to come… yet why was there no answer?

The nuance of “Hey, can you please respond?” should have been conveyed quite clearly.

Then why… was it so quiet?

In that precise moment, the ominous feeling I had been consistently ignoring opened its eyes again.

It was because I had instantly stopped moving, having not paused even once since entering this corridor.

I did halt my steps, but I couldn’t dare to turn back.

If, when I look back, Dogun was there with a mischievous grin, that would send me into a small panic right there, but if I turned back and found no one… I felt I might not be able to bear the outcome.

So, I found myself in a moment where hesitation simply grew, unable to decide what to do.

As the footsteps following behind me disappeared—one, then two—Chae-rim, who was leading our group, surely must have sensed that as well.

“Is it perhaps…”

Had she concluded that my stopping was due to a lack of stamina? I saw her face harden in an instant as she turned toward me.

“…Where’s Dogun?”

And as those words flowed into my ears, I couldn’t help but realize, good or bad, that Dogun, who had been following behind, had vanished in an instant.

…

…

…

“Ugh…”

The moment I regained my senses, what crawled up my body was?

An overpowering feeling of nausea.

To be precise, it was more like dizziness.

It felt like someone was playing with my body as if it were a game of hot potato, and the world around me was spinning like I was inside a top.

Nothing else was happening, yet I felt the world spun around as if some elephant’s trunk was swirling around me.

And with what I was feeling at that moment, I couldn’t immediately think clearly about what had just happened.

‘So, I definitely…’

It was after quite some time, in a subjective way, that that thought floated into my mind.

‘First of all…’

I distinctly remembered crossing through the pitch-dark corridor while following Chae-rim ahead of me.

Just as I felt a sudden jerk pulling my body back… my consciousness then completely cut off.

And when I came back to my senses, this was my situation.

The important thing was, where exactly was I…?

So, after regaining my senses, I cautiously opened my eyes, which had been tightly closed.

What I saw when I opened my eyes was a view resembling a boiler room in a building about to be demolished.

Consequently, another round of question marks popped up in my head.

As I was busy raising a flood of question marks in my mind, something that looked like a door creaked open, letting in a sudden burst of light.

Just like a flashbang exploding, a flood of light began to pour in, pricking at my eyes and reflexively making me squint them shut… and then I started to hear something unsettling.

And what I began to hear was…?

A sound I had heard enough for a lifetime that day.

Swoosh…

It sounded like breathing, yet it was something fundamentally different.

As time passed, it felt like that sound was getting closer, unknowingly making me squeeze my eyes shut and tense up my body—

“Eek—!”

That peculiar sound intertwined with the continuous breathing that pierced through the air.

And what echoed after that was… the sound of someone being thrown to the ground.

“Ugh…”

When I partially opened my tightly shut eyes, I saw a girl’s familiar face.

Wasn’t it the Mia girl who had previously called me “Dad,” getting me into a predicament?

Thanks to that, her clearly imprinted image in my head surfaced again as I saw her face buried in the dusty floor, tears welling up in her eyes.

Could it be… that girl was dragged here suddenly, just like I was?

Based on the current situation, it certainly seemed that way.

But the problem was, why would a being presumed to be a monster drag us here…?

Were they planning to kidnap people in the chaos of the Association to stockpile food?

It might really be their intention, but… there was nothing I could do about it.

In a situation where there was no one beside me and what was at stake was not just my life, it was even more so.

Of course, I had been steadily learning self-defense from Chae-rim just in case, but… my opponent was a monster, not a human.

So, it was crucial to act with caution.

Rather than attempting something, I naturally continued to play dead, just as if I hadn’t regained consciousness.

While maintaining that act, I worried about whether it might not work on the creature… even though it essentially was a person, but they had most likely turned into an Another, making it hard to distinguish such matters.

Though what unfolded while my eyes were tightly shut wasn’t entirely certain, the creature hovering near my face repeated that unsettling and bizarre breathing, then it stepped back and exited the room.

With the rusty hinges letting out a screech, the door slammed shut with a thud.

But I didn’t open my eyes right away.

Since the existence of the creature was entirely different from the known Another types, I thought it might be a trap to draw me out.

So, I opened my eyes when…

The sound of its footsteps began to fade completely.

And even while I was doing that, the girl who had collapsed beside me was busy groaning in pain.

Perhaps she had hit something wrong when she fell.

It seemed like her pain was severe, as she let out a sound that mixed whimpers and moans, which was quite pitiful.

“Hey… a-are you okay?”

That was why, the moment I opened my eyes, I checked on the girl’s well-being first.

And maybe she had been waiting for someone to ask her that.

Usually, when one feels like crying, if someone’s nearby and gives you a comforting pat, it makes your tears flow even more; the moment I asked if she was okay, the joy in her eyes grew even larger.

Thanks to that, I had to spend quite a while comforting her as if she were about to burst into tears at any moment.

“Don’t be too scared. Soon, my brother and the hero sisters will come to save us.”

“…Really?”

I thought since she had not recognized Yoonseo, who was immensely popular among kids my age, that she wouldn’t be too interested in heroes, but maybe she was just still a child.

When I told her that hero sisters would come to save us soon, her sobs began to calm down a little.

“Really!”

“But what if the sisters pass by without knowing we’re trapped here?”

“That’s…”

From my perspective, there couldn’t be a more favorable turn of events, so I pulled out my mobile phone and explained about the location tracking app installed on it.

“Oh, I see…”

Something felt off about the girl’s response.

“Then we just have to get rid of that, right?”

As a question mark unexpectedly floated in my mind, something shot up from behind the girl, and suddenly, the mobile phone I was holding vanished without a trace.

As if it had never existed at all.