I Became a Professional Horror Story Cleaner

The one who suddenly insulted me was none other than Team Leader Yong.

“I was wondering why you weren’t following us. Get up right now.”

“I didn’t expect you to act like this too, Team Leader.”

However, Team Leader Yong ignored my bloodshot eyes and tore a label off the Disassembly Marker.

“Team Leader!”

I knew he cared about Myeong Haebin.

But even so, wasn’t it too much to treat a minor who knew nothing as a paranormal creature?

However, he grabbed my arm with his rough hand and, with the other, stuck the label onto Lee Seryeong’s slender arm.

Just as I was about to rip it off in irritation, a chill ran through my entire body.

It was a cold so intense that it hurt, as if I were embracing a block of ice fresh out of a freezer.

And that cold was coming from Lee Seryeong, whom I was still holding onto.

“……!”

Only then did I realize it.

How had I failed to notice that body temperature, impossible for a human being, her completely colorless face, and the absence of a shadow beneath her feet?

I immediately let go of her hand, but my vision turned white.

“What are you doing?”

The flashlight held by the ‘Professor’ was pointed directly into my eyes.

“We… well…….”

Only then did I look back, but Lee Seryeong, who had been clinging to me, had vanished without a trace.

“We stepped out for a moment because we needed to use the bathroom. Haha…… Should we go back right now?”

The ‘Professor’s’ pressure weighed down on our entire bodies, but Team Leader Yong tried to appease him with an amiable smile.

However, the Professor slowly approached, walked past us, and lifted the teddy bear, which was sitting motionless on the floor, by the tips of his fingers.

“You were doing something unnecessary, weren’t you? And during study hours, no less.”

He extended his arm over the outside of the hallway and simply dropped the teddy bear.

The doll, which had been moving only moments earlier, fell like a completely inanimate object.

‘Why is the teddy bear that was chasing us so terrifyingly just a moment ago……?’

Ah.

This was a game.

A game they played in secret during nighttime study using unauthorized objects.

Wait.

Then this was an activity that had absolutely nothing to do with studying.

The third point in the application.

[3. Activities unrelated to studying will be subject to disciplinary measures.]

“Are we going to be punished?”

“I see you understand well. You two, follow me.”

As though it were an order we were absolutely required to obey, our bodies followed the ‘Professor’ on their own when he turned his back on us and began walking.

“……I’m sorry.”

This was my fault.

Because I hadn’t been able to properly assess the situation and had shouted, I had practically drawn the Professor straight to us.

I could also guess why I had regained my senses.

The Disassembly Marker weakened horror stories as its effects accumulated.

From what I had personally seen, it had been applied to the vending machine, the Professor, the eraser, and the cafeteria.

While I hadn’t even been thinking about it, its effects had quietly continued to accumulate until they reached a point where they managed to make me regain my senses in front of the paranormal creature that was Lee Seryeong.

Although, if I hadn’t reacted, Team Leader Yong probably would have tried to separate me from her by force.

‘This is so damn embarrassing.’

I had been pretending that I could take care of myself and that I was perfectly fine, only to end up becoming this much of a burden.

I received no response.

I didn’t know whether it was because they were focused on the Professor or because they were angry with me.

What was going to happen if we kept following the Professor?

He had said there were two of us, so it seemed Myeong Haebin had somehow managed to escape in the meantime, but……

Damn it.

“Get inside.”

The ‘Professor’ pushed us into the study hall.

His sharp hands pressed firmly against our shoulders and made us sit side by side in the empty seats assigned to us.

“It seems you two don’t know how to stay quietly glued to your desks.”

If there was one thing I had learned after surviving this long in this school, it was that you had to act submissively toward the ‘Professors’.

If you did, you could at least avoid the worst.

“I’m sorry.”

I calmly lowered my gaze like a student acknowledging that he had done something wrong, but the ‘Professor’ tilted his head and whispered right beside my ear.

“There’s no need to apologize. You only need to receive your punishment.”

A heavy metallic object gleamed in the Professor’s hands.

With its coating peeled away and a grotesque appearance resembling a rusted blade, it looked more like an instrument of torture than an educational tool.

The ‘Professor’ grabbed my wrist with his cold hand.

With a force impossible to resist, he stretched my hand out over the desk and held it firmly immobilized in the proper position.

‘Damn it. I don’t know what that is, but I have to get my hand out……!’

Before I could react in any way, the enormous metal object came down on my hand.

Clang—!

The dull impact struck my eardrums.

Perhaps because the sudden blow had numbed my senses, I made the terrible mistake of thinking.

‘It doesn’t hurt as much as I expected.’

But that only lasted for an instant.

Pain so intense that I couldn’t even scream spread from the back of my hand throughout my entire body.

A thick, crude iron spike protruding from the underside of the metal object had crushed the skin and muscles on the back of my hand before piercing straight through them.

And, as if that weren’t enough, it had sunk deeply into even the hard surface of the desk, pinning me to it.

The right hand.

And then the left.

Wherever that metal object had struck, gray iron spikes soaked in my blood had been embedded in a straight line.

Only then did I understand what that monstrous object was.

It was a gigantic industrial stapler, the kind used to staple thick stacks of documents.

“First, you’ll have to learn how to sit properly.”

Team Leader Yong couldn’t escape being forced to maintain the proper posture either.

Along with the harsh sound of the spring firing, from the other side of the partition came the sickening sound of metal spikes piercing flesh, the smell of blood, and a groan he barely managed to suppress.

Even after the ‘Professor’ left, the backs of my hands burned with so much pain that I couldn’t open my mouth.

“……Team Leader.”

“If you’re going to apologize, don’t say anything.”

Even though he was right beside me, his voice was so low that I could barely hear it.

“Rookies are like that, aren’t they? It’s fine.”

Blood flowing from the backs of his hands ran across the desk and slowly dripped onto his knees, but Team Leader Yong leaned exhaustedly against the backrest and looked at me.

“It seemed like you already knew.”

That Lee Seryeong was a paranormal creature.

Now that I thought about it, both of their reactions had been strange. They had been excessively cold.

Especially Myeong Haebin.

“I wasn’t sure. She gave away a few clues herself…… Although she looked far too human. Well, I suppose she took on that appearance precisely to bewitch you.”

“You don’t have to defend me that much.”

“Accept consideration when someone offers it to you. What a cold guy.”

“Then, was it also a lie that Lee Seryeong was the cause of the one-person hide-and-seek game?”

“No one knows that. But she’s a paranormal creature now. Tsk, are you sure your head’s still okay?”

“No, that’s not it. I was just asking because I was curious.”

Despite the state we were in, Team Leader Yong still had enough energy to joke and smiled.

Little by little, I was losing sensation in my fingertips.

Meanwhile, the Professor patrolling the inside of the study hall sat down in front of the main entrance, as if guarding it.

We had to get out.

Even if Myeong Haebin came looking for us, escaping in this state seemed difficult.

The staples that had pierced through the surface of the desk kept both of my hands firmly immobilized.

“Start getting ready to leave.”

“How? Were yours driven in with less force?”

They weren’t simply driven in.

Like the staples from a real stapler, their ends seemed to have bent and firmly hooked themselves onto the underside of the desk.

How the hell was I supposed to get ready to leave?

“……Hup.”

Team Leader Yong inhaled deeply.

I saw him tense the wrist of his bandaged hand, and immediately afterward, he ripped his right hand free.

Drops of blood splattered everywhere.

An entire chunk of the desk’s surface had torn off along with the staple and now hung mangled from his palm.

Did this man just rip it out using brute force?

And with the hand that was already injured!

Is he insane?

When he shook his hand, dark blood splattered from the partition all the way to the floor.

“The wood is softer than I expected.”

At this rate, even if he died, they’d say it was from natural causes.

Instead, he looked at me as though I were the strange one.

“What are you doing? Aren’t you leaving? Want me to help you?”

“……This is the method?”

“Why?”

“It’s nothing.”

I must have thought this was insane a thousand times, but I was the one who would have to endure the consequences.

Hanmu.

You have to go home.

Are you planning to stay here forever?

I slowly curled my numb fingers.

The staple tugged at my flesh, and a sharp burning pain pierced my palm.

‘All at once.’

I gritted my teeth.

My molars clenched together so hard it felt as though they might crack.

I leaned my torso backward and pulled my right arm upward with all my strength.

Crack, crunch!

The section of the desk where my hand was pinned tore away.

The bizarre sensation of the metal staple scraping against bone as it passed through the back of my hand made my vision flash white.

“Ha… Haa……!”

How the hell had he done this like it was nothing?

I couldn’t believe my left hand was still trapped.

Even in the middle of all that, I watched the Professor, but he still wasn’t looking in our direction.

I lowered my gaze toward my right hand, which was trembling uncontrollably.

Team Leader Yong had already freed his other hand as well and was pulling out his bottle of painkillers, opening it with his teeth.

“Finish it.”

Damn it.

By the time I finally managed to rip my left hand free as well, I could no longer exert any strength with my hands.

They wouldn’t stop trembling from the pain that felt as though it were tearing them completely apart.

“Ah.”

At that indifferent syllable, I reflexively opened my mouth, and an oblong pill dropped inside.

It was one of the painkillers Team Leader Yong carried with him.

It seemed to have no coating, because the characteristic bitter taste of a chemical mixture immediately flooded my mouth, but I chewed it and forced myself to swallow.

I only hoped it would take effect as soon as possible.

The pain, which I had thought not even a painkiller could ease, began to diminish so quickly that I wondered what kind of medicine it was.

It was as if my very ability to feel had gone numb.

“How is it?”

“……I feel like I can survive.”

I wiped the cold sweat obscuring my vision with my sleeve.

I immediately regretted it when I realized I had probably smeared blood on myself.

“Then let’s go.”

“Aren’t we going to take these out?”

“I think the moment we pull them out, you’ll bleed a lot more. It’ll be uncomfortable, but bear with it for a while.”

Every time I moved my fingers, it felt as though the muscles were tightening around the metal, making it extremely uncomfortable.

But seeing the staples rusted in several places, I was starting to worry more about metal poisoning.

……That was precisely why we had to get out as quickly as possible.

What would happen if we got caught again?

Would I be able to do this insanity all over again?

‘No way.’

Pain you already know is even more frightening.

I wouldn’t let myself get caught again.

That determination became firmly engraved in me.

Since I couldn’t use my hands because of the staples piercing them, I moved along the floor using even my elbows for support and managed to get out of the study hall.

As soon as we were outside, I leaned my back against the wall for a few moments to catch my breath.

“The surveillance in the study hall…… isn’t it too lax? They weren’t even looking this way.”

“Wipe the drool off your mouth before you talk.”

Thinking I really had drool on my mouth, I tried to wipe it away, but there was nothing there.

He tricked me.

Team Leader Yong chuckled and took me by the arm to help me stand, as if signaling that we should keep moving.

“Either they’re completely confident they can catch us even if we get out, or the real core of this horror story is that hide-and-seek game. Maybe both.”

The hide-and-seek game was the core?

‘Now that I think about it, the application didn’t simply tell me to clean Hwaae High School.’

To be exact, it had told me to clean Hwaae High School’s one-person hide-and-seek game.

If that was the core of everything, then it made sense that they had deliberately left a gap in the surveillance.

Someone had to get out for the game to begin.

Although, as he had said, it could also be both.

Leaning on each other, we made our way down the hallway while avoiding the patrolling Professors and climbed the stairs.

“This is where we got caught.”

“The teddy bear isn’t here. Neither is Haebin.”

If that enormous box cutter had reached her, there probably would have been at least some trace of blood.

The fact that there was nothing was a good sign.

“Boss! Mister!”

As soon as we reached the practice room, Myeong Haebin suddenly appeared and hugged us.

“Agh, my hands, the hands.”

“Ah! I didn’t see them. Ugh, that must hurt so much.”

Only then did Myeong Haebin notice our condition, raise both hands, and step back.

“Didn’t you see the teddy bear? It was nowhere to be found.”

“Me neither. I looked downstairs, but it had disappeared. Although, just in case, I prepared salt water.”

Myeong Haebin shook the plastic bottle I had left behind after drinking from it, now half-filled with salt water.

The hide-and-seek game still shouldn’t have ended.

The application had said so as well.

It wouldn’t end until everyone hiding had been eliminated or until the game came to an end.

“But do you really think that’ll work?”

Honestly, I found it hard to believe that simply sprinkling a little salt water on that teddy bear that had chased us with the intent to kill would be enough to end everything.

“Why do you think methods for overcoming these things exist? Then why do vampires burn to death under sunlight?”

“That’s fictional.”

“You think it’s fictional?”

“Mister, seriously! I told you not to mess with Boss!”

“Ugh!”

Myeong Haebin jabbed a finger into Team Leader Yong’s side.

He doubled over at the waist and staggered backward.

“Salt itself is very effective against things like spirit-summoning rituals. You know how they say you should sprinkle salt over yourself after coming back from a funeral, right? Things like that. In reality, those superstitions don’t work against actual horror stories, but…… it’s written in the instructions for this game.”

It seemed to make sense.

I didn’t know whether the part about salt was true, but so far, nothing we had discovered inside the horror stories had turned out to be false.

“Fine. Then all we have to do is find the teddy bear and…… What?”

Crack, crack.

White powder began falling from the ceiling.

No way.

The moment I looked up with that thought, one of the ceiling panels shattered completely.

“Found you!”

The teddy bear, its entire body covered in dust, leaped down from above and thrust the box cutter vertically toward us.

Weren’t you supposed to move through the hallways?

This is too much.