It Seems I Must Go to Work Even After Falling into a Horror Story 022

Four people burst out from the exit of the ‘Fantasy Train’ and ran.

“Gah, haah!”

The sound of panting typical of those running for their life echoed around them.

It was only natural.

Mascots were pouring out.

“AAAHHH!”

“Ugh, ugh…”

At the entrance of each attraction, in every store, and around every sign, strange and grotesque bubbles bubbled up, spewing out sticky mascots.

And those mascots were chasing us with a bizarre appearance, their mouths turned inside out to reveal countless teeth embedded in their insides.

Occasionally, something that looked like melted tentacles jutted out from drooping ears and arms.

-♩♪♬♬~♩♬♬~♩♪♪♩♪♬♬~♩♬♬~♩♪♪♩♪♬♬~♩♬♬~♩♪♪♩♪♬♬~♩♬♬~♩♪♪♩♪♬♬~♩♬♬~♩♪♪

– Ahhahaha! Hahaha! Ahhahaha! Hahaha! Ahhahaha! Hahaha!

The noise was everywhere.

The theme park’s music mingled with laughter, creating bizarre echoes all around.

Loud, terrifying, chaotic, horrific sounds!!

Every element gave me a headache and made me lose my sense of direction. But…

“This way! This way!”

I gritted my teeth and twisted my direction according to the coordinates carved in my mind.

At that moment.

Whip.

Splat.

The slimy tip of a tentacle narrowly grazed my head.

Szzzzz.

“…Huff.”

I felt the hair on my head dissolve, the burnt scent wafting through the air.

‘This is insane.’

Cold sweat trickled down my back.

But my feet didn’t stop. No, they couldn’t.

‘The moment I stop, it’s over.’

I’ll die. No, I instinctively knew that something even worse awaited me, sending chills down my spine.

The only solace was that the destination was very close!

Even the researcher was running with drool dripping from his mouth instead of whining.

“Get out of the way! Get out of the way!!”

“Shut your mouth!”

The butterfly mask shouted, looking frustrated that it couldn’t throw the researcher to the mascots to buy some time.

It was only natural.

‘Too close.’

The mascots swarming like zombies were multiplying wildly, and some were starting to get dangerously close.

And they were fast.

Faster than humans!

‘Dammit, dammit, dammit!!’

In that moment of terror,

“Gah!”

Someone got caught.

“Gaaah, ugh…”

The cow mask fell over.

‘Oh crap.’

I didn’t look back and somehow flicked coins from my pocket to summon gloves.

I threw several 500 won coins, creating a translucent shadow hand in mid-air.

Whoosh.

The shadow hand flew through the air and shoved the grotesque mascot’s head.

“Run!”

Y Group’s newbie, with numerous holes in his shoulders, crawled out on all fours and started to run.

“I-I’m so, so grateful…”

“Later!”

There was no time to stop the bleeding. I didn’t care about my gear or anything else!

‘After all, the shadow hand will vanish if it goes beyond a radius of 3 meters…’

A crazy blow landed on my left hand.

“~!!!”

I almost screamed, clutching my hand and nearly crying.

The feeling of my hand being crushed alive in a sharp vice and melting was like…

‘My Equipment!’

I realized intuitively.

The hand I had just summoned in mid-air had been utterly destroyed by the mascot’s mouth or tentacles, causing me to suffer a terrible fate.

This was the first time I grasped the weakness of my equipment.

If the hand made by the gloves breaks, my hand would hurt just as much!

But there was no time to scream. I ran madly.

And shouted.

“Over there!”

I spotted the goal.

A giant door.

Painted in colorful colors, it was a typical theme park design….

[Fantasy Land (Westside Gate)]

Decorative.

It was a decorative gate attached to the castle wall surrounding the west side of the theme park.

“It’s blocked!!”

“Get under it!”

I was the first to step under the decorative gate without hesitation and glanced back.

Almost simultaneously, two people tried to step on it—A Group’s Assistant Manager and Y Group’s newbie.

The researcher was slightly behind, in a position that could be dangerous…

“Move, damn it!”

“Ugh!”

Thud.

The researcher pushed A Group’s employee with all his might and used the momentum to rush forward.

“…!”

The suddenly rebounding slender body collided with a mascot.

From the half-melted mascot that crawled up, dark crimson liquid poured over the butterfly mask.

“AAAHHH!”

Splat.

The sound of sizzling echoed in my ears.

“Assistant Manager!”

An A Group employee trembled under the horrific mascots, buried beneath a creature of unspeakable form.

The face not covered by the butterfly mask was already a mess, bubbling with despair.

What I saw were eyes filled with resignation.

Eyes that clearly calculated the impossibility of receiving help.

At the moment I locked eyes with that gaze.

“Nail!”

I shouted.

“Assistant Manager, the nail, here!”

At the same time, I stretched out my left hand forward. A Group’s Assistant Manager widened his eyes and extended his right hand, pointing his index finger.

Pshh!

The thrown nail embedded right in the center of my palm.

“…!”

But there was no agitation.

‘I had already suffered enough pain!’

Having suffered worse pain, my hand ignored this hurt and gripped the nail firmly.

And pulled.

With a whoosh.

With a short noise, the butterfly mask-clad body bounced back.

The terrifying mascots’ teeth plunged into the empty space where the body just was, and the dark liquid gushed out.

“Ugh, ugh…”

I collapsed on the floor beneath the gate, trying to catch my breath.

And right in front of me.

Countless rabbit mascots, dripping with dark liquid like tears of blood, stood near me with empty eyes.

“Eek!”

It was as if an invisible wall was blocking them.

———————=

Cheerful Theme Park User Guidelines (Applicable until Exploration Record 64)

5. Enjoy the Various Areas!

Has the appearance of the mascots changed and the attraction colors shifted? You are standing in a new area.

Unfortunately, mascots from other areas cannot exist in this new area.

Bid them farewell. Kindly!

———————=

I looked at the ground.

‘…The brick colors are different.’

Two rows of white bricks, as if teasingly lying beneath the decorative entrance.

Beyond that, the mascots were trapped Unable to cross onto the red brick floor.

I glanced down at my entrance ticket.

[(Cheerful) Fantasy Land Boarding Pass ■□□]

[(Cheerful) Fantasy Land Boarding Pass ■□□]

Expired

The voice faded away.

The mascots clustered together in front of me stood motionless, and then finally, when their eyes blinked…

They vanished.

“…….”

“…….”

The sound of panting drifted through the now quiet air.

I swallowed hard.

“…It seems my time at Magic Bunny’s Fantasy Land has come to an end.”

I survived.

“Escaped successfully.”

“Ah…!”

“Phew…”

Y Group’s newbie collapsed, clutching his shoulder while he sighed in relief and pain.

I leaned my head back against the wall and looked up at the sky.

‘I thought I was going to die….’

My heart was racing.

I’ll definitely complain about this.

A Group’s Assistant Manager coldly glared at the researcher who pushed him aside, but after glancing at the grooves on my palm from his nail equipment, he returned to his calm demeanor.

After all, I survived, and he seemingly decided there was no time to kill the researcher now.

It was impressive how he remained calm, even with the immense pain likely from having an acidic substance splashed on his head.

“For now…”

“Yeah?”

A Group’s Assistant Manager took a deep breath.

“Thanks. I owe you my life.”

“……”

I was surprised.

“No, it’s all thanks to your equipment…”

“It’s pointless to be humble here? Just say you got it. You rode the wave well.”

Ah, okay.

“Unlike some idiots.”

“……”

The researcher desperately avoided his gaze.

A Group’s Assistant Manager glanced at him for a moment, then shifted the topic back to work.

“This seems like a kind of secondary space. Was that your plan? But standing still makes it feel cramped, so what’s the deal?”

“This isn’t our destination.”

“Hmm?”

I finally steadied my breath and turned completely around to face the decorative door.

“Do you know? In a large theme park, there are often other things besides the amusement park.”

“…Other things?”

“Yes.”

Beneath this door, strictly speaking, wasn’t Magic Bunny’s territory or any other mascot’s—it was an empty space.

Since it was a sort of gap within the theme park, they wouldn’t come after us for breaking things.

I tapped the wall shaped like a door with my hand.

Thud.

It made a hollow sound.

“Assistant Manager, can we tear this wall down with your equipment?”

“……”

The Assistant Manager silently raised his hand and pulled out his index finger’s nail.

He then wedged it into the crack and pulled sharply.

“Gah!”

Crack.

A brick-shaped panel popped out, and a gust of wind rushed in.

What came with it…was the smell of water.

– Ahhahaha!

“…!!”

With the sound of a splash and cheerful marching music, the sounds of water splashing, foghorns, and seagulls echoed.

Sunshine poured in through the opening of the broken bricks.

Massive cylindrical slides spiraled down, all splashed with various shades of blue, emitting water and tubes.

[Blue Dream Waterland]

“This is…!”

A water park.

A space of summer that forms a part of a large theme park.

“It’s the blue zone.”

Y Group’s newbie turned his head with an expression of disbelief as he stared at me.

“How, how?!”

“In the color map of Fantasy Land I saw earlier, there were no attractions using water.”

“…!”

“Then I thought there might be a big section separate from it.”

I took a deep breath.

“I also deduced that normally it would be hard to access. Usually, they sell a separate entrance ticket.”

“…So, you ripped down the wall?”

“Yes.”

I recalled the conversation I had with Team Leader Lee Ja-heon earlier.

– It’s in the west…

The west.

Of course, what Team Leader mentioned would be within that water land.

But since we happened to be at the westernmost tip of ‘Magic Bunny Fantasy Land,’ it was plausible that there would be a separate blue zone.

‘The east is blocked by a forest, there’s an entrance to the north, and the south is a cliff….’

It would only make sense that there was space to explore west of ‘Magic Bunny Fantasy Land.’

That’s how I interpreted it…

‘And I was right.’

“The blue mascots expelled from Fantasy Land created a new zone here.”

“Ah….”

“Now, let’s hurry on through.”

“Y-Yeah!”

Hands busily tore away the panel. Even Y Group’s newbie, who had sustained a shoulder injury, tried to help with one hand.

Meanwhile, the researcher was just standing at a corner, rolling his eyes, but there was a smugness about his face.

It seemed he noticed everything was going smoothly.

Then, a few seconds later.

“W-We did it!”

Finally, one by one, they began to slip through the gaping hole in the wall large enough for someone to fit through.

As the last one out, I stood on both feet at Waterland, gazing at the blue pool and blue sky.

A gentle, damp breeze washed over me.

‘The sunlight is….’

So breathtakingly nice.

At that moment, feeling an inexplicable sense of liberation,

I spotted people off in the distance waving and running towards me.

“Doe!!”

“…!”

It was D Group.

“Are you okay?!”

“Assistant Manager!”

D Group members, each carrying large bags, rushed towards me.

Having spent a month bumping into each other, I felt an overwhelming sense of relief wash over me.

“Have you been well?!”

I happily greeted them as I approached.

And I started to wonder whether I should take some of the load off Team Leader’s shoulder as the newbie…

Wait a second.

‘That’s a human body.’

It wasn’t luggage.

A lizard’s shoulder had a human body hanging limply.

‘…Hunting?’

Looking closely, it was wearing a teal duck mask.

It was Assistant Manager from A Group.

“…….”

No.

No!!