Having finished our preparations, Gam Doyeong and I stepped out into the middle of the street we'd been running through.
All I had in my hand was a single wooden stake, sharpened a little more than before.
"Well then, I'm off."
"Have you decided where you're luring the masks?"
"I'll figure that out myself, so stop worrying about it. Focus on what you've got to do."
I crouched down in a nearby alley and clamped my hand over my mouth.
After lightly stretching his waist and ankles, Gam Doyeong slammed his bell-tied foot against the ground.
Jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle!
Then he screamed as if the whole world needed to hear it.
"Hey, mask sons of bitches, get the fuck out here!!!"
His booming voice filled the eerie street and carried far into the distance. Soon after, a skittering sound came back, like insects crawling.
"Oh? Looking to die? Hurry up and get out here!"
Only then did the grinning masks slowly reveal themselves from the darkness.
〖CRE, CREEK. CREEEAK.〗
〖CREEEE, CRE. CREEEAK CREEK.〗
From the ground to the rooftops of shops, roughly ten of them approached from all directions, stretching their arms and legs.
"Shit, look what you bastards did to my hand. You cockroach fucks—want me to put you out of your misery?"
THUD—!
Just then, a mask caked in white flour dropped from a rooftop.
The white mask stared at Gam Doyeong.
It was the one that had been hit by the sack Gam Doyeong threw when I'd tripped earlier.
"Haha, are you actually pissed off? Eat shit."
Gam Doyeong smirked and flipped his middle finger.
〖CREEEEEK! CREEEEEEEAK!〗
Confirming they'd locked onto him, Gam Doyeong took off running into the alley at a brisk pace.
At that, all the masks howled and began chasing him.
'How someone with that personality became a flight attendant, I'll never know....'
After the last mask had bounded away in pursuit of Gam Doyeong, I finally heard that sound.
THUD,
THUD THUD THUD,
THUD,
THUD THUD THUD—
Jingle, jingle, jingle—
'Wait, that bastard—'
Three broken bells dangled by strings from the jiangshi's fingers. It was brazenly showing off its eliminations.
I took a deep breath to relieve as much tension as I could, then stepped out into the street.
The jiangshi spotted me and stopped, maintaining a set distance.
THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD—
The jiangshi kicked off the ground and hopped in place.
It had hopped wildly in place before charging last time, so any moment now—
THUUUD—!
The jiangshi cleared the distance of two entire shops in a single jump. I raised the thick wooden stake overhead and thrust it straight up.
Just as I aimed for the jiangshi's torso—
CRASH—!
While still airborne, the jiangshi spun its body and changed direction.
It used the wall as a springboard and ricocheted off like a coiled spring, then charged.
WHOOOOSH—!
This time, without mistake, I ducked my upper body low and cleanly dodged.
The jiangshi skidded across the dirt road as it landed. Not wasting that brief opening, I hurled the stake at the jiangshi with everything I had, then ran for my life.
That thing actually uses its head!
CRASH, THUD, CLANG—!
Every time the jiangshi gave chase, the ground was gouged deeply, and goods from surrounding shops spilled out—total devastation.
CLATTER CLATTER CLATTER.
I darted past other shops, barely maintaining distance from the jiangshi.
Then I turned sharply into the alley of the spice shop I'd marked earlier.
I grabbed another stake I'd propped up in advance and blindly hurled it behind me.
The jiangshi watched the incoming stake as if it were a joke, then jumped over it with effortless ease.
It jumped far higher than its usual leap—high enough to nearly touch the shop rooftops. Seeing that, I pulled the tarp off the object stashed in the corner of the alley, as if I'd been waiting for exactly this.
Atop the old cart, sharply whittled wooden stakes were secured without a single gap using rope and wooden nails, all pointing skyward.
'You know what a spike trap is?'
'You want to build one out of just this? Think that'll work?'
'A definitive weapon should be better than just swinging a stick around.'
I shoved with all my strength, sending the massive weapon Gam Doyeong and I had built rolling forward in a charge.
RUMBLE RUMBLE RUMBLE—
The jiangshi tried to change direction at the last second, but in this impossibly narrow alley, it was no use.
I pushed the cart all the way forward, then let go.
SKREEEEEE—!
The massive weapon rolled without pause and, the instant the jiangshi plummeted, drove stakes clean through its abdomen, legs, and jaw without a gap.
Through the skin, through whatever muscle and bone might have existed, the stakes pierced through the flesh and punched out the other side with perfect penetration.
『...捉...迷......藏...。』
The jiangshi barely managed to open its mouth, speaking in broken fragments.
From the jaw now riddled with gaping holes courtesy of the stakes, black smoke reeking of decay seeped out.
I dodged the thrashing jiangshi's hands and snatched the talisman from its forehead.
The eyes, stitched haphazardly with black thread, and its pallid face were fully exposed. Now that I could see it properly, it looked almost like a rotting doll.
I placed the talisman on the ground and pulled the small brush and cinnabar ink from my pocket.
I opened the lid of the silver tin case containing the cinnabar ink solution, dipped the brush, and began correcting the damaged characters.
『.........捉迷...藏...。』
Impaled firmly on the wooden stakes, the jiangshi kept creaking its body, endlessly repeating nothing but "hide-and-seek."
I focused every nerve to avoid making a mistake in my haste.
天長地久
From the 天 (tiān) whose stroke had been bent all the way to the final 久 (jiǔ).
"Done."
I held up the completed talisman in my hand for all to see.
......Was I supposed to do something more...?
Looking around, it was still the same narrow alley in the Chinese market street.
"I'm sure the strokes are right...?"
I turned around to look at the jiangshi impaled on the stakes.
"?!"
But only a faint smear of blue, pallid flesh remained on the stakes. The jiangshi was nowhere to be seen.
"Where did it disappear to—"
『 捉迷藏。』
Hide-and-seek.
A voice as deep as a cavern and somehow viscous sounded right beside my ear.
Goosebumps erupted across my entire body.
DING—.
Just then, a melody that sent my head spinning floated through the air.
The bouncing notes of a pipa, the smooth melody of an erhu, and the guqin's strings brushing against fingertips produced a tranquil yet profound tone.
〖Hahahahaha—〗
〖Kyaahahaha!〗
As if at a festival, the surroundings filled with nothing but music and the boisterous laughter of crowds.
The red lanterns and yellow lights that had been dark at first now blazed, illuminating the entire street.
I burst out of the alley in a panic.
'What in the world is happening!?'
Everyone had eyes stitched shut with thread just like the jiangshi, wore colorful, elaborate outfits resembling banquet attire, and were spinning around like petals in bloom.
Beneath the red lanterns blazing with the intensity of roaring flames, the jiangshi stood—the same one that had been run through by stakes.
Its arms, which had been rigidly outstretched, were now pressed together, palms touching in a prayer-like stance.
『 还没结束呢。』
It's not over yet.
The jiangshi spoke words completely different from the "hide-and-seek" it had been repeating.
'...What does that mean?'
I don't understand all Chinese, but the feeling was enough to tell me it was nothing good.
!?
My hand was empty. The yellow talisman I'd painstakingly restored had turned into a clump of black dust and vanished into thin air.
At my panicked expression, the corners of the jiangshi's mouth split upward in a grin.
'Was it a fake all along?'
My empty hands, now holding nothing, trembled mercilessly.
CRACK, GRNNNND, CRACK CRACK.
The jiangshi wrenched its neck, then shoulders, then knees into grotesque angles without restraint.
From every single joint came the sound of bones being crushed and realigned.
All around, people twirled in circles holding flowing fabric, dancing in a frenzy.
Then the jiangshi opened its mouth toward me.
HISSSSSS.
From inside its mouth, black smoke poured out like a crashing wave.
THWACK—!
The jiangshi, which had been slightly bending its knees, shot forward like a bullet.
And in time with the music, the people parted gracefully, clearing a path for the jiangshi as they danced.
Without hesitation, I slid across the dirt road.
The jiangshi's body grazed past me and sailed far behind.
Now that its hands were free, the jiangshi no longer stumbled upon landing—it touched down as easily as a beast.
DRIP, DROP.
Whether it had grazed me when I dodged, bright red drops of blood trickled down my cheek.
The gravel on the dirt road had scraped my back and waist raw, but now wasn't the time to worry about that.
The jiangshi readjusted its stance.
And just before it sprang—
SKREEEEEE—!
"?!"
A long wooden stake suddenly jutted out from the jiangshi's abdomen.
"Cheongho, are you okay?"
"Siun!?"
Jeong Siun peeked out from behind the jiangshi.
The stake Jeong Siun had just driven through the jiangshi was one of the ones I'd thrown earlier.
"Hurry, get away from the jiangshi!"
The jiangshi raised veins bulging across its hand, then wrenched the protruding stake from its abdomen.
『怎么对我，我就怎么回击。』
Whatever you do to me, I'll pay back in kind.
The jiangshi swung the extracted stake like a baseball bat.
Jeong Siun immediately arched his back, dodging the jiangshi's attack. His reflexes really were top-notch.
Then Jeong Siun, in a pinch, threw the cinnabar ink and brush he'd been carrying straight at the jiangshi's face.
The cinnabar ink lid popped open and splashed all over the jiangshi's face.
HISSSSSSS—!
White smoke rose from the jiangshi's face, accompanied by a sound like flesh being seared.
『啊啊啊啊啊啊啊啊!』
AAAAAAHHHH!
In utter agony, the jiangshi doubled over and clawed at its own face, screaming.
This was the only opening to run. Jeong Siun and I slipped into the crowd to regroup.
Looking back as we ran, the jiangshi's right cheek and eye had melted away, turned bright red.
The black thread stitching its right eye had dissolved, revealing the inside of the socket.
The black pupil contracted into a long slit, and the iris blazed like magma.
Those eyes, brimming with madness, glared at us—as though they intended to destroy us in the most agonizing, most brutal way possible.
『你会后悔的。』
You'll regret this.
The jiangshi spoke through its torn, smoldering mouth.
***
"First the whole place transforms, and now the jiangshi—it's not even a Digimon, yet it's evolving and going berserk.... Aren't we way too outmatched here?"
Jeong Siun and I hastily hid ourselves behind a white wall as far away as possible.
"...When I fixed the talisman on its forehead, this happened. I think it was a fake."
"What!?"
Seeing the shock on Jeong Siun's face, I let out a sigh of my own.
Now there was no clue where the real talisman that needed restoring even was, and the jiangshi had evolved significantly.
The future looks bleak....
"...Still, at least we found one weakness. We confirmed that cinnabar ink itself is lethal to the jiangshi. So how about we gather it all in one place and set it off at once?"
Jeong Siun said, drawing a round, bomb-like circle on the ground with a twig.
"Ah...."
"Ah, ahem, I know it sounds reckless."
Jeong Siun said sheepishly, reading my reaction.
But my reaction wasn't because the plan was reckless.
"For your plan to work, we'd need to gather enough cinnabar ink to actually detonate. But before that, we need to regroup with the other flight attendants who are still hiding."
Assuming Jeong Siun's idea was our only option, we'd first need to gather the other attendants and coordinate a plan.
But right now, showing ourselves even once would mean getting caught for sure. The question was how to gather everyone.
"If we shout a specific location, the jiangshi could follow. That's the problem."
"What kind of term wouldn't the jiangshi know.... On top of that, something only we'd understand...."
Jeong Siun squeezed his eyes shut, groaning as he thought.
...Wait, a term only we'd understand?
It hit me like a flash.
"There is one. A term only we'd know."
"Huh? Something like that exists?"
"Our profession. Flight attendants."
"!"
I pointed at the Cheonsu Airlines badge on Jeong Siun's chest.
Right—how would a jiangshi know this!?
After forming a quick plan, Jeong Siun and I gathered noise-making objects from a nearby shop.
"Siun, you've got your phone on you, right?"
"Oh, of course."
"Not apps that need internet—do you have any music downloaded offline?"
"Yeah, I do, but... oh!"
In Type 2 scenarios where you enter a secondary space, phones themselves don't work.
Not just internet—even basic pre-installed functions like the camera or voice recorder are useless.
Photos come out distorted, and recordings simply don't capture anything.
But thinking about it differently, things already saved on the device could still be used.
We each ducked into different buildings, then set our phone volumes to maximum.
Then we silently counted a generous thirty seconds.
The phone blasted an upbeat pop song at concert volume, its brassy trumpet riff filling the street.
From the other building Jeong Siun had ducked into, an energetic trot melody blared just as loudly.
CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG!
After leaving the blaring phones in place, we grabbed the kitchen utensils from the shop and smashed them together nonstop as we ran.
Then we screamed at the top of our lungs.
"Based on the main hall, gather at the inner galley of L5!"
To keep the jiangshi from pinpointing our location, we knocked over every object lining the street, never stopping the noise.
And we kept shouting.
"Based on the main hall, gather at the inner galley of L5!"
Jingle jingle jingle jingle jingle—
The faint sound of ankle bells from here and there told us our voices had reached the others.
Here, "based on the main hall, gather at the inner galley of L5" meant the following:
The only thing on this street that could be called a "hall" was the main plaza of the market.
The plaza was shaped like a large Y, and L5 meant the fifth entrance on the left side.
Galley is the onboard workspace where flight attendants prepare food and beverages on an aircraft.
Directly translated, it meant: meet up at the kitchen in the fifth building down the left alley!
Jeong Siun and I shouted this phrase about ten times as planned, then went into hiding.
The phones were still blasting music at speaker-bursting volume.
I waited until the jiangshi's hopping sounded far enough away.
Then, keeping the bell noise to a minimum, I slowly made my way to the rendezvous point.