Before we continued moving, we paused to pray for the dead players. It was a short, solemn prayer to send off the deceased to the afterlife.
Normally, we would have moved on without a second thought, but Kagura insisted, saying it was only right to honor the fallen, even if they were our enemies.
Her attribute was Saint so It was within her setting to show respect even for the deceased. But to me, such gestures felt somewhat swallow.
In a chaotic world like this, where survival demanded bloodshed, what was the point of praying for those who wouldn't have hesitated to kill us?
Taking a life was a sin, wasn't it? Yet, in this twisted game, it seemed almost necessary. Would she still pray for those who sought to take her life, all for the sake of some fleeting story?
I couldn't shake the questions that gnawed at me. In this world, there was the 'Underworld' and there was also the cycle of reincarnation.
When a character of the story dies, would they enter the Underworld to be punished for their sins or would they enter the cycle of reincarnation and be born as a new person in another world?
Or perhaps it was both. Maybe the souls were required to undergo the process of judgement first before their fate would be decided.
At the moment, I decided to stop thinking about any unnecessary thoughts. Reason?
...This is just terrible. I mean, what is this? What kind of joke is this?
I thought as I dragged my exhausted body up the staircase.
Our initial goal was to pass through the ward placed on the building. And that ward was located on the 5th floor. Sadly, the elevators was not an option so we were forced to climb the narrow emergency staircase.
However, there was a problem. My entire body (우주) was hurting.
At first, I thought my exhaustion was due to my stats being reset to Lv. 10, but I reconsidered. To be considered superhuman, all your stats needed to be around Lv. 50, so Lv. 10 would be quite low. Even so, it didn't make sense for me to feel so drained just from climbing a regular staircase.
Indeed, something was definitely strange. Was it mental strain caused from seeing those dead bodies back then? No, that can't be right. I've noticed that the Omniscient Wall protects me from any mental attack or exhaustion so that couldn't be the cause of the unnatural fatigue I'm currently feeling.
Was it something supernatural instead of psychological and physical?
.... Ah, I see. Again with the concept of the 'back' and 'front' of a coin.
There's an impenetrable wall between the 'front' and 'back' of a coin. The 'front' can never meet the back and the 'back' can never meet the front. Therefore, anything that is placed in the 'front' cannot interact with anything on the 'back' and vice versa.
The game master of the library dungeon placed Soo Jinyoung on the 'front' so that the players on the 'back' cannot interact or try to help her. I remembered the scene of Lee Suhye trying to touch Soo Jinyoung and her hand was almost blown apart because of that simple action.
In this scenario, the entire building is part of the 'front'. Therefore, we, the players which were placed on the 'back', were continuously making contact with the 'front'. The result of this part of the game meant that stepping on the floor would recoil against the foot. Even though my stats were around the level of a trained military soldier, the result was rather agonising for my body.
As we continued going upwards, the fatigue seemed to be accumulating 2-3 faster.
"What...the... fuck? I take it back... That blessing was... a fucking scam!"
Lee Dokho grumbled bitterly as he struggled to take his next steps. He seemed more exhausted than I was. Perhaps he was not someone accustomed to strenuous physical activity because what's up with that shitty stamina.
"The blessings of constellations aren't much compared to their divine protection. It's only meaningful when a powerful gods like the mythical constellations bestows it upon you or when multiple constellations come together like back there. Even so, the constellations in question are just historical gods. Nothing more, so expect a bigger result."
"Tck! Why did the elevators have to be unusable in this bloody situation?"
"You want to use the elevators? Even if that was the case, I don't think we would be able to interact with the elevators."
"I know, I know. It's stupid concept of the 'front' and 'back' of a coin. What was the author thinking when he wrote that in the novel?"
"Who knows? Perhaps he must have used the Wall between fiction and reality as a reference. Was it the Fourth Wall? There's also a term called 'Boundary' which used by magicians to construct magic barriers."
"What are you guys talking about?" Kagura, who was walking in the front, suddenly turned her head back and asked.
"Nothing. Wait a minute, why do you still look fine?"
In response to Lee Dokho's question, Kagura scratched her cheek.
"Ah, about that... I don't feel anything. Am I supposed to feel anything?"
"Maybe you need a new tutor." A voice said in unserious manner.
"Easy for you to say. Some of us aren't naturally gifted."
"Hey, I didn't say I was a genius," the first speaker replied and rasied their hands in mock defense. "I just studied hard. A lot of late nights and way too much coffee."
"Late nights? More like early mornings," another voice groaned. "I haven't had a proper night's sleep in weeks. My brain feels like mush."
The cafeteria was crowed to the extreme with students, their voices mingling with the clatter of trays and the soft hum of the air conditioning. Laughter bubbled up from various corners and blended with the chatter of the carefree girls as they ate. Every single one of them looked around the age of 18 or so or even younger.
Even so, all of them wore the same uniform of the Sookmyung Girls' High School. Their neatly pressed skirts and blazers bore the school emblem reminded me of a world that made sense.
I stood in place frown at the entrance of the cafeteria like a fool. A chill suddenly crawled down my spine. Were they the supposedly kidnapped students? My eyes swept over the room, searching for any abnormalities or hidden enemies but there was none. It was a scene so ordinary, so painfully normal, that it made my head spin.
The destruction of the world... was everything that happened so far an illusion? I would have loved to believe such a reality exists but it was one fat lie. This was an illusion. Yes, it was definitely an illusion. There was no other explanation.
But why did it feel so real? The cold sweat on my brow, the tight knot in my stomach, the faint scent of food drifting through the air—it was all too vivid, too tangible.
Was the destruction a lie? I closed my eyes and remembered everything that has happened till now. The memory of crumbling buildings, the screams of people being pierced by monsters, the feeling of pulling the trigger of a gun and the emptyness that comes afterwards. Those events had definitely happened before my eyes. And yet, here they were, these girls, living as if nothing had ever happened.
The others were also shaken by the scene infront of them. Kagura was holding the two metres long curved sword while Lee Dokho was surveying the environment.
"What is this? Are these the students of the academy?"
"It seems so. But something's off. How is the air conditioning running when there's no electricity?" Lee Dokho scanned the room with suspicion.
He was right. The air conditioning hummed softly despite the power outage, and the cafeteria was fully stocked with food. But what puzzled him even more was the sight of the students still wearing their school uniforms. All school activities should have ended with the start of the new year, yet these girls were chatting about a makeup exam as if it were just another ordinary day.
Wouldn't such an exam be taken before the holiday in the first place?
I looked around and found an original school poster on the cafeteria wall. I narrowed my eyes.
The poster read."Focus on your studies now, and you'll pave the way to a prestigious school and a successful future. But neglect your studies, and you risk falling behind and facing great misfortune."
Such an extremely ordinary poster looked innocent enough but it was a tactic the school authorities used to brainwash the students without disorder. It was like saying that those who cannot study here over the summer are inferior, wasn't it?
"Tck! Tck!"
I clicked my tongue twice. Perhaps these girls had no choice but to study here over the holiday. As a result, they had to suffer a terrible fate because of very that decision.
"...!"
Almost Immediately, an eerie silence filled the cafeteria and the high school girls turned this way. Normally, I would have thought they were attracted by the noise we were making. But the 'laws' set on this place didn't allow such a thing to be possible as long as they remained on the 'front' side of the coin. Yet somehow, they were able to locate and see us, who were placed on the 'back'.
Such a thing would have been only possible if these girls were the residents of the 'back instead of the 'front' Simply put, It was a bloody trap from the get-go.
Kagura and Lee Dokho stiffened at the sense of the bad omen. Lee opened his mouth.
[Intruders has been detected.]
[The defence mechanism will be activated.]
"Wait a minute... Deputy-nim, doesn't this look very bad?"
"Indeed. It's seems like there's some kind of alarm in this place and those girls are the trash cleansers."
"You say that but why do you sound so unserious?!"
"Is that so? What am I supposed to do in this situation?"
Although the tone of my voice sounded half serious enough, our current situation was rather dreadful. As if that was not enough, the system window that appeared infront of me made my unease to skyrocket over the roof.
[A sub trial has been updated.]
[Defeat all the magicians to enter the secret room.]