Got Dropped into a Ghost Story, Still Gotta Work (Novel) - Chapter 22

Chapter 22

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Translated by Jinmu

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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

“Heup, hack!”

The panting sound peculiar to someone running for their life was heard from both sides.

It could not be helped.

Mascots poured out.

D i e

“Aaaack!”

“Heuu, heuuup….”

At every attraction entrance, every shop, and every signboard, alien and bizarre bubbles boiled up, spitting out squelching mascots.

And those mascots, with their snouts turned inside out to expose countless teeth embedded in their entrails, were chasing us in grotesque shapes.

Occasionally their bodies shook, and things like completely melted tentacles burst out from their drooping ears and arms.

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

-Ahaha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha! Ahaha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha! Ahaha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha!

All surroundings were noisy.

The theme park’s melodies and laughter overlapped as if spinning, creating grotesque noises from all directions.

These loud, scary, confusing, and terrible sounds!!

Every element made my head ache and caused me to lose my sense of direction. But….

“This way! It is this way!”

I grit my teeth and turned my direction according to the coordinates engraved in my head.

At that moment.

Fling.

Splat.

The fluid from the tip of a flying tentacle narrowly brushed my hair.

Sizzle.

“…Huuup.”

I could feel the hair where the fluid splattered melting, and I could smell the burnt scent.

‘This is crazy.’

Cold sweat poured down.

But my feet did not stop. No, they couldn’t stop.

‘The moment I stop, it’s the end.’

I will die. No, the premonition that I would turn out in a state more terrible than that made goosebumps break out down my spine.

The only saving grace was that the destination was very near!

Even the researcher ran while drooling instead of whining.

B o r e d

“G-Get away! Get away, aaaack!!”

“Shut your mouth!”

The butterfly mask shouted. Her eyes showed that she was crazily regretful that she couldn’t throw the researcher as bait to buy time.

It could not be helped.

‘Too, close.’

The zombie-like mascots were multiplying like mad, and among them, some began to appear dangerously close.

And they were fast.

More than humans!

‘Damn, damn, damn!!’

The moment fear made my spine stiffen.

“Kuhuk!”

In the end, someone was caught.

“Kuack, uweeek….”

The cow mask fell flat.

‘F-Fuck.’

Without even looking back, I somehow flipped a coin from my pocket and summoned the glove.

And I threw several 500-won coins as if chucking them, creating a semi-transparent shadow hand in the air.

Fling.

The shadow hand that flew through the air pushed the head of the disgusting mascot.

“Run!”

Having barely escaped with his life with countless holes in his shoulder, the Group Y rookie scrambled as if crawling on all fours and began to run.

“Heup, hack, th-thank….”

“Later!”

There wasn’t even a moment to stop the bleeding. Dedicated equipment or whatever, there was no room to care!

‘In any case, if it exceeds a 3m radius, the shadow hand will disappear….’

An insane, violent pain struck my left hand.

“~!!!”

I almost grabbed my hand, wailed, and rolled.

This feeling, as if my hand was being crushed and melted alive in a sharp press….

‘Dedicated equipment!’

I realized intuitively.

The hand I had just summoned in the air had been destroyed after suffering some terrible ordeal, whether from the mascot’s mouth or its tentacles.

It was the moment I realized the weakness of my dedicated equipment for the first time.

That if the hand made by the glove was shattered, my own hand would hurt exactly that much!

But there was no time to scream. I ran like mad.

And I shouted.

“Over there!”

The target point came into view.

It was a giant gate.

Painted in colorful shades, taking the typical style of a theme park….

[Fantasyland (Westside Gate)]

An ornament.

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

“It’s blocked!!”

“Attach yourself below it!”

I was the first to step below the decorative gate without hesitation and look back.

Almost simultaneously, two people tried to step in. The Group A assistant manager and the Group Y rookie.

The researcher was behind them, a somewhat dangerous position….

“Get out of the way, fuck!!”

“Ugh!”

Thud.

The researcher pushed the Group A employee with all his might, using that force as a recoil to advance.

“…!”

The slender body that was unexpectedly flung back collided with a mascot.

D i e

From the eyes of the mascot that came crawling while half-melted, dark red fluid poured onto the butterfly mask.

“Aaaack!”

Sizzle.

The sound of burning echoed in my ears.

“Assistant Manager!”

The Group A employee lay beneath a mascot of an unspeakably terrible form, her limbs trembling.

The face not covered by the butterfly mask was already a mess with bubbles rising.

What was visible was the eye of resignation.

The eye of a person who had clearly calculated that this was a situation where she could absolutely not receive help.

The moment our eyes met.

“Nail!”

I shouted.

“Assistant Manager, your nail here!”

At the same time, I opened my left hand and extended it forward. The Group A assistant manager’s eyes widened, and she reached out her right hand and extended her index finger.

Thip!

The shot fake nail embedded itself right in the center of my palm.

“…!”

But there was no hesitation.

‘Because it already hurt to the point of being shattered!’

My hand, which ignored this pain due to the greater pain, firmly grabbed the nail without shaking.

And, I pulled.

Whoosh.

With a short noise, the body wearing the butterfly mask was flung over.

B o r e d

Narrowly, the teeth of mascots lunged into the empty space and fluid poured down.

“Heup, heuuueup….”

“Huuup…….”

I fell onto the floor below the gate and caught my breath.

And right in front of my nose.

Numerous rabbit mascots spilling fluid like tears of blood stood rigidly still with empty pupils.

“Hik!”

It looked as if a transparent wall was blocking them.

———————=

Pleasant Theme Park User Guide (Applied up to Exploration Record No. 64)

5. Enjoy various sectors!

Did the mascot’s appearance and the attraction color change? You are standing in a new sector.

Regrettably, mascots from other sectors cannot exist in a new sector.

Please wave goodbye. Warmly!

———————=

I looked at the floor.

‘…The brick color was different.’

Like a lie, there were exactly two rows of white-colored bricks below the ornament decorated like a main gate.

The mascots stood there, unable to cross that red brick floor.

B o r e d

I looked down at my ticket.

[(Pleasant) Fantasyland Ticket ■□□]

[(Pleasant) Fantasyland Ticket ■□□]

N o t F u n

The voice vanished.

The mascots that were clinging closely in front of my eyes also stood without moving, and then, the moment I blinked my eyes….

They vanished.

“…….”

“…….”

Panting sounds flowed through the quieted air.

I swallowed my saliva.

“…It seems Magic Bunny’s Fantasyland ends here.”

I survived.

“Our escape has succeeded.”

“Ah…!”

“Heuuuu….”

The Group Y rookie fell over while holding his shoulder, making groans of relief and pain.

I also rested my head against the wall, looked at the sky, and caught my breath.

‘I thought I was going to die….’

My heart pounded too much.

To think I survived this.

The Group A assistant manager stared formidably and coldly at the researcher who had pushed her, but after glancing at my palm where the flesh was gouged out in the shape of her nail equipment, she became calm again.

In any case, we survived, and she seemed to judge that she did not have the leeway to make a fuss about killing the researcher right now.

It was amazing that she remained calm even though she must have been in immense pain from having acid-like liquid poured over her head.

“For starters.”

“Yes?”

The Group A assistant manager took a deep breath.

“Thank you. I survived thanks to you.”

“…….”

It was unexpected.

“Not at all. It was thanks to your dedicated equipment, Assistant Manager….”

“Humility has no meaning here, you know? Just say you understand. Because you played your hand very well just now.”

Ah, yes.

“Unlike some piece of trash.”

“…….”

The researcher desperately avoided her gaze.

The Group A assistant manager stared at him for a moment, then turned the topic back to work.

“This place seems to be a kind of leftover space, but is this what you aimed for? But just standing here, it’s so narrow… what are you planning to do?”

“This isn’t the destination.”

“Hmm?”

After catching my breath completely, I turned around fully and stood facing the decorative gate.

“Do you know this? In a large theme park, there is usually something else besides the amusement park.”

“…Something else?”

“Yes.”

Strictly speaking, below this gate was an empty space that belonged neither to Magic Bunny’s territory nor to other mascots’ territories.

Since it was a blank space within the theme park, they probably wouldn’t chase us to kill us for damaging property.

I tapped the gate-shaped wall with my hand.

Thump.

An empty sound rang.

“Assistant Manager. Can we tear this down with your dedicated equipment?”

“…….”

Without a word, the assistant manager raised her hand and pulled out her index fingernail again.

And she wedged it into the gap in the wall, and yanked it.

“Heup!”

Rumble.

A brick-patterned panel came loose with a clatter, and wind rushed in.

What drifted in was… the smell of water.

-Ahaha ha ha!

“…!!”

Whoosh, the sound of water spraying coolly, a steam whistle, and seagulls crying flowed in along with a pleasant march.

Through the gap in the bricks, the sunlight pouring down on a wide-open space was visible.

The giant cylindrical slides wrapping around in the air were all various shades of blue, spewing water and tubes.

[Blue Dream Waterland]

“Here is…!”

A water park.

The space of summer that handles one axis of a large-scale theme park.

“It is the Blue sector.”

The Group Y rookie turned his neck as if it would break and looked at me with an astonished expression.

“H-How?!”

“On the Fantasyland color map we saw earlier, there was not a single attraction that used water.”

“…!”

“If so, I interpreted that it would be located separately as a large section elsewhere.”

I took a deep breath.

“I also deduced that normal access would be difficult. Because normally, they sell a separate admission ticket altogether.”

“…So, you tore down the wall?”

“Yes.”

I recalled the call I had with Group Leader Lee Ja-heon earlier.

-It is the wes….

West.

Of course, what the group leader meant would have been the west within that Waterland.

But because we happened to be at the western end of ‘Magic Bunny’s Fantasyland,’ the deduction that the Blue sector was located separately was possible.

‘Because the east was blocked by forest, the north had the entrance, and the south was a cliff….’

It meant the only direction where space could exist beyond ‘Magic Bunny’s Fantasyland’ was the west anyway.

That was how I interpreted it, and….

‘It was correct.’

“The Blue mascot, having been kicked out of Fantasyland, must have created a new sector here.”

“Ah…….”

“For now, let’s cross over quickly.”

“L-Let’s do that!”

Hands were busy tearing down the rest of the panels. Even the Group Y rookie, who had suffered a shoulder injury, tried to help with one hand somehow.

In the midst of that, the researcher stood in the corner while rolling his eyes, but a slick expression returned to his face.

It seemed he had noticed that things were going well.

And a few seconds later.

“I-It’s done!”

Finally, through the wall panel torn to a size a person could slip through, they began to exit one by one.

Exiting last, I stood with both feet in the Waterland and looked at the blue pool and the blue sky.

Whoosh, a moisture-laden wind blew.

‘The sunlight is….’

Insanely good.

At the moment an strange sense of liberation was about to rise,

I saw people running toward me from afar, waving their hands as they spotted me.

“Roe Deer!!”

“…!”

It was the Group D people.

“Are you okay?!”

“Assistant Manager!”

The Group D people, each carrying a bulky load as if they had tubes, drew close in a crowd.

Whether having rubbed shoulders for a month definitely had an effect, a wave of relief rushed in.

“How have you been?!”

I also approached while greeting them happily.

And I agonized over whether taking over the load on the group leader’s shoulder would make me look sharp as a rookie….

Wait.

‘It’s a human body.’

It wasn’t a load.

On the Lizard’s shoulder, a human body hung limply.

‘…Hunting?’

Looking closely, it was wearing a mallard duck mask.

It was Group A’s leader.

“…….”

No.

No!!