I Became a Professional Horror Story Cleaner

So the store that had suddenly appeared wasn’t an anomalous phenomenon.

Judging by how strongly the notice emphasized accident prevention, it seemed that the higher the water-level indicator rose, the more dangerous things would become……

If that was the path of wrong answers, then what was the path of correct ones? In other words, how could we get out of here?

“About the loop. Normally, how do you escape from these kinds of loops?”

“Hmm―. They say that a lot of the time, you have to find a certain number of anomalous phenomena or go around a certain number of times. Something like that.”

Whether it was the first or second option, it looked like this was going to turn into a very long struggle.

One full lap around the park seemed to be about three kilometers.

“Ah! Look over there. The booth is wrecked again this time.”

“You’re right.”

The booth was still wrecked and the paranormal creature was gone, exactly the same as before.

“Phew, at least that’s a relief. Honestly, when I saw those bags, I thought they were going to force us to pick up trash.”

That was such a positive way of thinking that it could almost be called optimistic.

……Ah.

Maybe that wasn’t exactly it.

“Haebin, you don’t really like cleaning, do you?”

“How did you know?”

Myeong Haebin opened her eyes wide, genuinely surprised.

“It shows.”

“Wouldn’t it be stranger if someone actually liked it? Well, except for you, Boss.”

“I don’t like it that much either.”

I had never thought anything like, Wow, I love cleaning so much it drives me crazy!

I simply felt uncomfortable seeing things messy, and I found it difficult to ignore them.

And I knew the way to solve that was by cleaning.

“Hmph, you’re a liar.”

“I didn’t expect you to believe me anyway. It’s just…… Never mind.”

I almost added something else, but closed my mouth.

An awkward silence settled between us for a brief moment, but Myeong Haebin seemed unable to endure it and spoke again.

“Cleaning is annoying, but I like you, Boss, so I don’t mind.”

“And why do you like me……?”

Before I could finish the sentence, something behind the booth caught my attention.

All the equipment in the exercise area was lined up in front of the entrance.

Every single one was facing us.

Toward the path.

“Since when have they been like that?”

It was an anomalous phenomenon.

They definitely hadn’t been like that when we saw them from a distance.

But the moment we approached, they had suddenly appeared like that, as though they had been waiting for us to arrive.

They didn’t attack.

Nor did they come charging after us at full speed.

But the gaze that seemed to emanate from that silence sent a chill crawling up my back until my hair stood on end.

Clack.

When we took a step, the exercise equipment lined up along the edge of the path turned slightly to follow our movement.

As though they had their noses pressed against a fence and were watching us.

“Let’s get past this quickly. Quickly.”

We decided simply not to look back.

Fortunately, the exercise equipment wasn’t the kind that would chase after us ferociously.

‘This is fucking creepy too.’

I would rather they openly try to kill us, like the Professor or the stuffed bear.

We practically fled until we reached the pond, where the stepping stones had returned to their original number.

Good.

Then it really had been an anomalous phenomenon.

“Were there fish here before too?”

As the water-level indicator had risen, it seemed like the pond had a little more water in it.

Or maybe not.

The difference was so small that it was difficult to tell.

In the distance, beneath some fallen leaves, a black shadow moved back and forth.

It could have been either a fish or trash, but if something was moving like that in stagnant water, it was most likely a fish.

“There weren’t any. Maybe they appeared when the water level rose?”

That was possible.

Then was this an anomalous phenomenon or not?

After passing by the still-open store again, it was once more time to choose between the West Gate and Gomyut.

“How about we take the West Gate this time? We went through Gomyut and ended up coming back.”

We had to go through Gomyut.

Anomalous phenomena had occurred.

But how could I explain that to her?

I had lived a life where I was better at solving things with my body than with words, so I had to rack my brain.

“I think differently.”

“Why? I think what I said is pretty reasonable!”

Ah.

Right.

There was that.

“Look. If we go through Gomyut, there’s a place where we can mark the anomalous phenomena. Why do you think it’s there? Because if we see an anomalous phenomenon, we have to mark it.”

“Hmm―. That makes sense.”

“Then wouldn’t the path on the other side be the one we’re supposed to take when there aren’t any anomalous phenomena to mark?”

“That makes sense too.”

Convincing Myeong Haebin was really easy.

Even if she had doubts, a few words were enough to make her accept my reasoning.

It wasn’t as though what I was saying was completely illogical, but if she had wanted to find flaws in it, she probably could have.

“Then we have to mark the anomalous phenomena again this time.”

“The pond and the exercise area. But the booth…… worries me.”

“What worries you about it?”

The stones had returned to normal.

But the booth was still wrecked.

Why?

“There are two possibilities. The first is that, by coincidence, the exact same anomalous phenomenon appeared again. The second is that the booth, just like the store, was never an anomalous phenomenon in the first place.”

“Isn’t the second one a little strange? If we were wrong about that, it should’ve appeared in the notice, shouldn’t it?”

“By that logic, the first one would also be an incredible coincidence.”

Should we mark the booth as an anomalous phenomenon or not?

There was only one way to find out.

The tip of the pen returned to its holder without marking the booth.

“What do we do if we’re wrong?”

At her words, I simply smiled.

“I don’t think we’re going to die from that.”

[Chodam Park — Gomyut]

[The current level of our pond is]

[Dry]…[Insufficient]…[Average]…[High]…[Abundant]…[Perfect]

[Notice]

There may be facilities within the park that require repairs.

If you find any, report them immediately.

※ This notice is intended to prevent accidents.

— Chodam Park —

The consequence of that choice came far too quickly.

‘I didn’t think we’d find out immediately that we were wrong.’

If it was talking about a facility that needed repairs, it couldn’t be anything other than the booth.

“Damn it. Then fix it already. Why does it keep showing up again just to confuse us?”

“Uh…… Boss. That thing is still wrecked.”

Myeong Haebin pointed toward the booth, which was barely visible in the distance, right at the edge of a bend.

The booth’s banner, still unrepaired, hung halfway down and swayed in the wind.

‘At least now we know for certain that even anomalous phenomena that repeat still have to be marked.’

The water level was at [Average].

That meant we had already given two wrong answers.

I didn’t know whether I should be glad that we hadn’t received an immediate penalty or worried for precisely that reason.

Whatever the answer was, there was nothing we could do.

We had no choice but to keep walking through the park.

Blub.

As I was about to cross the stepping stones in the pond, a translucent, crinkly fish approached my feet and opened and closed its mouth.

No.

Was that really a fish?

It had something resembling the faded logo of a store on its back, and its eight fins, which moved freely, made it look more like a plastic bag than a fish.

Its grayish eyes stared at us without focusing on anything as its crinkly mouth contracted.

It was disgusting.

“They didn’t even come near us before.”

“There’s a lot more water now. Couldn’t that be why?”

The water rippled dangerously close to the first stepping stone, almost reaching it.

A penalty for making the wrong choices.

What would happen when the water level filled up completely?

Surely nothing good.

But could we really get out before that happened?

I should have realized then that this was the question I needed to ask myself first.

***

[Chodam Park — Gomyut]

With my breathing growing increasingly ragged, I wiped the glistening sweat away with the back of my hand.

“How many laps have we done?”

“With this one…… twelve.”

Thirty-six kilometers.

That was the distance we had walked.

I had once heard that the average walking speed of an adult man was around five kilometers per hour.

That meant we had effectively been walking for more than seven hours.

“This is insane.”

I had expected it ever since we discovered that we were trapped in a loop, but it seemed as though time itself had stopped.

The sun never rose, and the moon’s position didn’t change either.

“Haah, what did you say?”

“Nothing. Let’s rest for a bit.”

“Please. I’d really appreciate that.”

There were only about ten steps left until we reached a bench, but even that must have seemed too far, because Myeong Haebin dropped straight to the ground.

The truth was that I was just as exhausted, so I wiped the sweat covering my face as best I could with the inside of my uniform.

“The ground isn’t going to go crazy again, right?”

“For now, pray that it doesn’t.”

“Okay.”

We had discovered a few things over those thirty-six kilometers.

There was an absurd number of anomalous phenomena in this park.

And it wasn’t as though only one appeared per lap.

‘Aaah! Boss, grab me!’

Sometimes the path began undulating like a wave.

Other times, the water in the pond boiled and surged toward us.

There was even one occasion when the moon in the sky began growing larger and larger until it rolled toward us like a gigantic boulder.

And not all the phenomena were that easy to detect.

‘Boss, this duck has three legs.’

On one occasion, the drawing on one of the signs beside the pond had subtly changed.

‘The sign is flipped horizontally. That’s not the right way.’

‘Huh? Ah! You’re right!’

Just when we were finally starting to get used to the layout of the place, the park would subtly alter the paths.

It would also arbitrarily increase or decrease the number of products displayed in the store……

I was already getting angry, so I’d better leave it at that.

We couldn’t indiscriminately mark everything we had doubts about either.

[The current level of our pond is]

[Dry]…[Insufficient]…[Average]…[High]…[Abundant]…[Perfect]

‘I told you, Boss. You were being too sensitive.’

‘I could’ve sworn I saw a shadow……. Wasn’t it an anomalous phenomenon?’

Because extremely subtle changes kept repeating, our nerves had become so sensitive that we had even started hallucinating.

We had already tried practically everything we could think of.

Spending a long time on a single lap.

Running an entire lap without stopping even once.

We had already tried all kinds of things.

Nothing worked.

Of course, I knew that the way the application wanted me to resolve horror stories was by cleaning them.

But what was the point of cleaning if all the trash reappeared as soon as we completed a lap?

‘How the hell do we break this loop?’

Not caring that my backside was getting dirty from the ground, I remained slumped there for a while before holding out my hand to Myeong Haebin.

“Haebin, give me some water. You can drink first.”

It was practically the only resource we had left now that we had ended up like beggars, so we had been carefully rationing it.

But it was time to at least wet our lips.

“You drink first, Boss. Do you want the energy bar I stole from Team Leader Yong too? I have candy.”

Myeong Haebin rummaged through her pockets and pulled out several things, but all I could see was the water.

“Thanks.”

I twisted the cap off the new bottle, still sealed, and brought it to my mouth.

My mouth was so dry that the water touching the tip of my tongue felt strangely slimy and rough.

I even thought I could smell something fishy.

Then a round, soft mass entered my mouth along with the water and made me cough.

“Cough.”

The moment I turned my head, something resembling green algae fell to the ground with a splash along with the water.

No.

It looked more like a mass of fungal spores that had grown to maturity.

I looked inside the bottle again and immediately spat out all the water still in my mouth.

Damn it.

I hadn’t imagined it.

“Isn’t that mold?”

“Yeah.”

The bottle I had just drunk from was completely filled with something resembling murky moss.

Strange substances whose nature I didn’t even want to know floated in the water.

I wanted to scrape my tongue clean.

At least rinse my mouth out with clean water.

But all I could do was spit out as much as possible.

“Give it to me.”

“Here.”

Myeong Haebin took the bottle and examined it from several angles, insisting that it definitely hadn’t been like this when she handed it to me.

Then she opened the cap, smelled it, and deeply furrowed her brow.

“The fishy smell is horrible! How could you drink that? Doesn’t your stomach hurt?”

“Not yet.”

I didn’t think it would.

In fact, as much as I hated to admit it, I even felt a little better from having taken in some liquid.

Who would have thought that eating those grotesque things in the cafeteria would end up helping me like this?

That didn’t mean I intended to drink any more.

“Give me an energy bar.”

“One moment. Hmm―.”

Myeong Haebin opened an energy bar that she had clearly gotten from Team Leader Yong—it was even the same brand—and spent quite a while examining it.

After smelling it, she handed it to me.

“Here you go. It’s a little melted, but this one is definitely completely fine.”

Crunch.

As if mocking that confident declaration, a single bite was enough to make blood start pouring from my gums and lips.

“Blood, blood! A tissue…… Here! I should’ve checked the inside too. I’m sorry!”

“It’s fine.”

I had expected as much.

The sharp tip of a broken fishhook protruded from the bitten section of the energy bar.

And were those small things stuck between the nuts nails?

I spat out what was in my mouth because swallowing it would probably tear apart my esophagus.

The inside was a complete mess too.

“Give me another bar. I’ll check it myself first this time.”

I broke Myeong Haebin’s new energy bar in half.

But this one was perfectly normal.

Chewy caramel, ordinary nuts, and the sweet aroma of chocolate.

“Looks like they become inedible when we try to eat them.”

It was literally food we could only look at.

A horror story that trapped us in a park for hours and then did something like this on top of that.

What fucking cruelty.

I pressed a tissue against the torn-up inside of my lips to stop the bleeding, then carefully wrapped the energy bar before putting it in my pocket.

“Aaah, what a waste! It was hard sneaking those in!”

“You said yourself that food you bring into a horror story often ends up becoming inedible. We’ll have to accept it.”

“I know! But it still feels like such a waste every time it happens.”

I silently stood up and held out a hand to help Myeong Haebin to her feet.

“Let’s go. Let’s get out of here quickly, take a nice shower, and drink as much water as we want.”

“Understood. Break time is over!”

This strange space called a horror story wouldn’t even allow a person to rest peacefully when they needed it.

The longer we stayed there, the more the park’s sticky humidity seemed to seep into our bodies, and it gave me a very bad feeling.

It was time to start walking again.

***

Forty-two kilometers.

In the end, we had reached the distance of a marathon.

At least a marathon had hydration stations along the way.

This damn horror story wouldn’t even give us that.

Abandoning every shred of human dignity, we had even tried the faucet beside the recycling station, but the water was so acidic that it felt like it was burning our mouths, so that had failed too.

“This is driving me insane.”

The anomalous phenomena in this park didn’t chase us or threaten us.

They simply forced us to walk.

To walk over and over again along a path that repeated eternally.

This loop slowly wore people down.

It wasn’t the terror of a blade slicing through your neck in an instant.

It was the pressure of feeling yourself being ground down without rest, as though you were turning a millstone in water whose level was gradually rising.

Very slowly.

As though it were squeezing you dry.

As though it were wearing you away.

Gradually, but with absolute certainty.

The intervals between our breaks grew shorter and shorter, while each break lasted longer.

And even so, our bodies, unable to replenish calories or fluids, continued to wear themselves out without stopping.

‘What the hell am I supposed to clean?’

Damn application.

No matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t figure it out.

What the hell did the hidden fourth rule say?

What else could I possibly do here?

The headache caused by thirst stabbed through my skull without pause.

I had to drink or eat something.

One or the other.

There were two options.

Try drinking the water or eating the energy bar stuffed in my pocket.

Or……

“Haebin, let’s go find some water.”

“How? Are you planning to drink from the pond?”

“……That would be too much even for me.”

Trash fish could be seen floating everywhere with the naked eye.

How could I possibly drink that?

Instead, I pointed toward the container that had just appeared in front of us as we approached the forty-five-kilometer mark.

“Let’s go to the store.”

We couldn’t consume the food or drinks we had brought in from outside.

Then what would happen with the things sold inside the horror story itself?