By Zephyria 
The escape room cafe they had booked had a mystery concept. The premise was that they were guests invited to a grand mansion where a tragedy had occurred in the past; they had to break through the rooms one by one while solving the mansion’s mystery. As a “closed circle” scenario where one is isolated in a cursed mansion, the backstory was gripping, making it a highly-rated theme.
The important thing was that the horror level was an 8 out of 10.
‘No matter how much the old man has been through in his life, he couldn’t have experienced 21st-century horror!’
In truth, Yoo Jiha had an ulterior motive. Horror created with 21st-century technology was bound to be on a completely different level from 20th-century techniques. Thus, his ambitious goal was to play the mature adult and comfort Jeil Heon when he inevitably got scared, experiencing vivid horror for the first time.
For this day, he had spent his spare time tempering his mind and body by watching horror games, horror movies, and horror content on YouTube.
‘I’m not confident about a 10, but I can handle an 8!’
Probably. He had to be able to. Just imagining the sight of Jeil Heon trembling and clinging to him made him feel smug. Absolutely perfect.
Unaware that Yoo Jiha was wearing a sinister smile behind him, Jeil Heon listened intently to the staff’s instructions.
And so, they entered the long-awaited first room. As they stepped into the first room, which was decorated as an entrance hall, they were greeted by eerie red lighting. The props were genuinely vintage.
“I’ll solve the puzzles, so you can just enjoy yourself, Mister!”
As if responding to the triumphant Yoo Jiha, a broadcast played. The combination of a mechanical voice and eerie, crackling static was superb.
Welcome, guests, to the Mansion of Tragedy. I am Redrum, the caretaker of this mansion. I hope you have a happy time within the secrets of this estate.
Redrum is a famous anagram for Murder. Thinking there might be hints utilizing this word, he looked around, only to find the pupils of a portrait hanging on the wall sliding over to follow his gaze. A chill ran down his spine, but he calmly composed himself. It was certainly worth the high price.
While he was admiring the realistic production, Jeil Heon clicked his tongue softly.
“I wondered where I’d heard the name of an escape room cafe before… Jiha, listen carefully and stay calm.”
“Huh?”
“We’ve entered an Aberrant Realm.”
“…?!”
As if answering his words, the smartphones provided by the escape room cafe simultaneously emitted a notification sound.
[Common Survival Procedure Manual for Victims of Aberrant Realm Phenomena]
“….”
The long-awaited date had thus devolved into overtime work.
Aberrant Realms with a high difficulty for rescuing victims are as follows: cases where the wavelength is weak, making it difficult to immediately identify victims; cases where the number of personnel who can enter is extremely limited; and cases where the Procedure Manual has not been properly written.
The Aberrant Realm they had currently entered fell into all of these categories.
“Since it’s a recently generated Aberrant Realm, it was only being shared among Team leader level staff. The number of people who can enter is two or fewer, and since the conditions were uncertain, there were discussions about whether to close it off or not…”
“The Exploration Division has never entered it?”
“Only once, by chance, just like us. They said they entered while doing an escape room; looking at it now, the condition is probably a horror concept.”
This was the first time he had entered a realm without any time to familiarize himself with the Procedure Manual or prepare his mind. Yoo Jiha felt like crying, but hearing the other man’s consistently calm voice settled his churning stomach.
“If it’s an Aberrant Realm with a weak wavelength, the company won’t know we’re here, right? Even if we find a safe place, we won’t be able to escape because we don’t have an Ear Guard…”
The automatically sent messages utilized incantations, making it impossible to track them individually. Even the Measurement Center could only identify victims through changes in the wavelength of registered Aberrant Realms.
“It’s alright. If someone is late or absent without word, they immediately assume they’ve been hit by an anomaly and begin a search. They’ll quickly trace our movements up until we arrived at the escape room, so they’ll realize we’ve been swept into an Aberrant Realm.”
He felt more stabilized by the gesture of the man stroking his hair, telling him not to worry, than by the Bureau’s regulations. He wasn’t alone; Jeil Heon was with him, so there was nothing to worry about.
Taking a deep breath, Yoo Jiha pulled the Procedure Manual from the inbox on behalf of Jeil Heon, who could not see the printed manual. Even reading the rules written so far would be a great help.
[Ulala Escape Room Cafe Survival Procedure Manual]
At the time of writing this manual, the survival rate of the Ulala Escape Room Cafe is approximately 80%. This is a significantly meaningful and high survival rate, so do not panic and calmly follow the manual.
“Mister. How many victims have survived here?”
“One.”
“….”
Ah, these absolute liars… Shedding tears of blood over the company’s consistent policy, he read the next part.
Do not gaze out at the external sea for a long period. You will gradually fall into the deep thought that the place where humans originally should live is not the land, but the sea, the source of all life.
No matter how comfortable the depths of the sea may feel, like the bedding of a five-star hotel, please keep in mind that humans lack gills and swim bladders, meaning they cannot breathe underwater nor obtain nutrition from plankton.
He glanced at the window, but outside the shimmering fog lay a desolate wasteland, not a sea. Yoo Jiha sighed and folded the manual. It was an Aberrant Realm where the interior changed randomly, much like the Hansung Opera House.
“I guess we have to wing it.”
“What do you mean, wing it?”
Jeil Heon smiled faintly, leaned down, and gently brushed the corner of Jiha’s eye with his thumb. Then, he planted a kiss on his eyelid with a soft mwah sound.
“We have our Jiha’s eyes, don’t we?”
“T-that’s true, right?”
His courage was instantly recharged. Since it was just the two of them, wasn’t this a kind of date in its own way? If so, he could achieve his original goal of gallantly comforting the trembling man…!
“Then let’s go!”
Yoo Jiha marched confidently ahead into the hallway. And exactly 1 minute and 17 seconds later, he clung tightly to Jeil Heon’s arm. He was fine with the fact that there were flowerpots in the hallway where human body parts were growing. However, it was not fine that the eyes of the figures in the classical paintings on the walls and the dolls on the pedestals slid over and followed them in unison.
If the entire face had moved, he could have brainwashed himself into thinking they were living paintings, but only the pupils—just the pupils—moved. Under the dim lighting, the gaze of the Baptist’s head on a platter followed them, and the gaze of a floating corpse submerged in water followed them.
‘Aaaagh…’
Yoo Jiha bit his lip to keep from screaming. The only person beside him was Jeil Heon, yet the air was thick with watching eyes. When he finally reached an area where paintings were sparse and looked up while catching his breath in relief, he nearly collapsed upon meeting the gaze of a ceiling painting following him.
“Are you okay? Shall we rest for a bit?”
“N-no… they’re just staring…”
Yoo Jiha tried his best to ignore the fact that even the patterns on the floor carpet looked like giant eyeballs.
“Out of everything I’ve seen so far, only a few could be read with the true eye. The rest don’t have True Eye Text, so they seem like Aberrations without egos, bound like the general patients at Eight Phases Mental Hospital.”
[■■No■■Seat■■■■■■… ]
The same True Eye Text had appeared in only a few of the paintings on the wall. Jeil Heon seemed to have a hunch about something, but they decided to refrain from jumping to conclusions and proceed to the end of the hallway first.
How long had they walked? By the time he was drenched in cold sweat from the gazes piercing his back, Jeil Heon stopped.
“The paintings are repeating from here. These are the ones we saw when we first entered the hallway.”
“Gasp. Is it an infinitely looping hallway?”
“Jiha, did you record which paintings had the True Eye Text?”
“Y-yes.”
Any device that captures video or photos of the interior of an Aberrant Realm becomes a Contaminated Entity. Since the captured photos also have their clear images erased and perception distorted, Agents of the Exploration Division took notes by hand.
Yoo Jiha hurriedly flipped through a notebook that had undergone incantation measures to minimize the effects of Contamination.
A painting of servant sisters happily cleaning and cooking in a grand mansion.
A painting of the eldest daughter being beheaded by the servant sisters’ axe.
A painting of the grand mansion engulfed in flames.
A painting of the sisters being abused by their parents.
A painting of the mansion’s owner family and the servant sisters with gentle smiles.
A painting of the owner couple dying with their heads crushed by a hammer wielded by the servant sisters.
A painting of the servant sisters feeling warm Essence from the mansion’s owner family.
A painting of the second daughter being stabbed to death all over her body with a kitchen knife by the servant sisters.
A painting of the youngest son dying with his scalp peeled off by the servant sisters.
A painting of the owner couple raising their voices at the servant sisters.
There were ten paintings in total where True Eye Text was visible. Because there were so many paintings in the hallway, he hadn’t noticed while taking notes, but seeing them listed like this, a clear commonality emerged.