"Should’ve eaten and then headed out."
I finally made it home and even ran into Heo Sanghyun, only to leave without a meal.
This is right after wrapping a big quest in Sokcho.
Normally I would’ve lazed around for days, eating the good food Heo Sanghyun cooks for me...
[rustle]
It’s a humid, windless, quiet night, yet the long hem of my overcoat flutters and tickles the back of my hand.
The [Winged Robe of the Night Veil] is an artifact woven with warp drawn from a dream’s illusion and weft drawn from the darkness of night.
"Sleep a little—was that it?"
Maybe I’m just so tired I’m over-identifying, but it felt like this garment was worried about me.
I am a bit tired.
"Well... worst case, I can blink home with magic."
I kneaded the stiff knot at my nape and shoulders and scanned the surroundings again.
A rusted metal plate that reads [House of Healing].
Not printed. Someone wrote it by hand. How old is this facility supposed to be?
A main gate below it with a big padlock and chain.
CCTV cameras placed at fixed intervals.
So this is...
"Security for people, huh?"
In Paju, wedged between Daebang Wall and Seoul, you wouldn’t even imagine security this sloppy.
"Well, fair enough."
They don’t exactly have to deal with surreal monsters, raving cultists, or problem-solvers with superpowers.
This is Ansan.
For somewhere not that far from Seoul, it’s remarkably peaceful.
How peaceful? Well...
Ansan has no quests or events a player needs to care about.
No—worse than that.
Ansan isn’t even a place players can visit in the first place.
In [Cthulhu World], Ansan is an unimplemented region with no city map at all.
Which is why, when Jang Hyundeok said he was going to Ansan, I didn’t pay much attention. There’s really nothing there.
‘Great. Headache.’
Even aside from game info, I don’t know the city of Ansan. I’ve never had a reason to visit or to care.
So I can’t even be sure whether this [House of Healing] is dangerous, much less whether it exists only in the game.
"If someone would at least tell me the theme or genre, that’d help."
I recalled the strange thing Park Gwangrim had said.
"It’s not normal. Everyone here is way too happy—way too peaceful! Something’s wrong here! Kim Sinhwa! A place like this can’t exist! Jang Hyundeok, that man is probably dead."
What happened here?
Healing? Happiness? Peace?
It does feel a bit like a cult. But in [Cthulhu World], “cult” is like kimchi in a Korean meal, right?
You can’t conclude anything from that alone.
"Either way, that’s all I can squeeze out of this place for now."
Up to now, it’s mostly been events and quests I knew.
The game and the setting would often diverge, but I’ve never had things happen in a place I know absolutely nothing about like this.
"Hmm..."
Not this time.
I could trust my level and just push straight in, but if I do that, some ridiculous, out-of-left-field catastrophe might break loose.
"Last time, just getting the departure date wrong turned the whole thing into a circus."
[Cthulhu World] is a game made by lunatics braiding malice, irrationality, and unfairness.
We’re at the point where you have to consider worlds ending because you stepped in with your right foot instead of your left. I can’t move rashly.
"It does feel like getting a free DLC, though, so that’s nice."
[flutter]
The hem of the overcoat snapping in the wind.
In the end, I spread my senses in all directions and moved along the barbed-wire fence.
Standard play for a new area is to circle slowly and gather information from the perimeter first.
The [House of Healing] sits on the slope of Surisan, in northeastern Ansan, with plenty of trees for cover.
"What are those flowers?"
Unnervingly vivid blossoms beyond the fence. Bristling thornbushes running along the wire.
"Nothing about this is normal."
The thorny stems look like rose canes, but those red—no, purple—hmm, better to just call it magenta.
Anyway, flowers in a strange hue, almost fluorescent.
I’ve never seen those before.
At first I thought they only bloomed on the rose vines, but there are scattered blooms in the grass where there are no roses at all.
"Still, since it’s Park Gwangrim, he’ll have left something."
I didn’t throw money at him for nothing.
Park Gwangrim is an NPC specialized in investigation and exploration.
Counting the fact that he literally goes places on foot and moves around, he can be more useful than Tudor in some ways.
And when he’s in danger during an investigation, Park Gwangrim always leaves a clue the player can find.
"Probably... over there?"
[Leap]
[flutter]
I picked the direction on instinct, but I did consider the terrain.
I don’t know how large this [House of Healing] is, but unless they dug out a warren in the mountain, I should see something from there.
"Hmm. I do see something."
In the distance is a building that calls to mind a school.
It, too, is smothered under vines like ivy, and along those vines the same uncanny, glowing blossoms bloom in tight clusters.
"What are those flowers?"
Why do they sprout in the lawn, on rose canes, and also cling to the ivy?
It’s like the flowers themselves are a separate organism parasitizing other plants.
And—there it is.
[Leap]
[flutter]
There’s something under the barbed wire.
"A diary?"
A thick, binder-style notebook with a leather cover and a snap button.
You wouldn’t find it easily without help. It’s faint, but mana is leaking from the notebook.
I undid the snap and opened it. Packed Post-its, folded papers, and—
"Mana-stone fragments."
A small mana-stone shard wedged by force between the pages.
Someone hurriedly stuffed a tiny piece of mana-stone into the notebook and tossed it through the fence.
Hoping someone who can sense mana would find it.
With no light to speak of, I focused mana at my eyes and read what was written inside.
[flip]
"Mm..."
As expected, this is Park Gwangrim’s notebook.
Not exactly a shock.
In other quests I played, Park Gwangrim left clues in a similar way.
But...
"I hope what comes after isn’t the same."
In that quest, Park Gwangrim had his brain extracted by a Mi-Go and met a horrific end.
What did Park Gwangrim see in there?
I read his notebook at speed.
The contents are a jumble of Chinese and Korean and fragmentary besides. It’s written so the player can’t grasp the truth immediately, but I can read Chinese now without a hitch.
Reconstructed, it goes like this.
[Hahaha!]
Joy, repeated several times.
Up to this point he must’ve been in a good mood. I really did wire him something like ten billion won.
"Ten billion just to find one person? Where would I ever get an offer like this? Not Mr. Kim Sinhwa but Lord Kim Sinhwa—no, God Kim Sinhwa is what he deserves to be called. From now on..."
Why did he write this drivel? He was excessively giddy.
How he’ll spend the money goes on for page after page.
"With what I’ve saved, I could get a place in Sejong City, or bring my family to Korea. Korea is the only place in this world that still resembles a functioning country."
A wish that’s the exact inverse of Jang Hyundeok’s.
Judging by the reality [Cthulhu World] implements, Park Gwangrim’s wish is the more sensible one.
But this wish has a time limit.
This world is going to be destroyed soon.
Family back in China. A sister with a strange tumor growing in her body and the hospital bills. An uncle slipping into derangement. A brother who became a cultist. Relatives the brother murdered. Another brother, yet another brother, cousins, kin.
No need to read all ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) that.
I skipped a few pages, and the tone changed.
"Jang Hyundeok. Dead? Deceased?"
Park Gwangrim soon realized his ability wasn’t working properly and grew flustered.
He uses an ability called [Dowsing], mediated by a special pendulum.
An ability to determine a target’s location by how the pendulum swings over a map.
He spread out dozens of paper maps and swung the pendulum again and again, but he couldn’t get a proper answer.
"The largest portion is definitely in Ansan. Zhijie?"
Zhijie—dismemberment.
A punishment used in old China: a capital sentence where the body is cut into pieces and displayed.
Words like organ trafficking and dismemberment murder come up repeatedly after that.
Park Gwangrim’s [Dowsing] does not account for the target’s condition. Suppose, for example, that your target’s arm has been severed.
If the target left the severed arm in Mokpo and then moved on to Busan, where would you say the target is now?
Mokpo? Or Busan?
Normally you’d answer Busan—go with the larger mass, or the part with the head.
But Park Gwangrim’s [Dowsing] does not classify humans that way.
It recognizes the severed arm as equally “the target,” making fine tracking impossible.
Judging from the notes, it doesn’t pick up pieces too small.
However, the fact that an intact person has been divided into pieces above a certain size... means the quarry—in other words, Jang Hyundeok—might be involved in something grim like organ trafficking or a dismemberment murder.
"Surely he won’t ask for a refund because the man died, right? Lord Kim Sinhwa. Please. Mercy."
In the end, Park Gwangrim gave up on using his ability, hurried to Ansan, and started old-fashioned canvassing and investigation.
"He went to an orphanage, they said, but among the facilities registered as orphanages there’s no trace of any visit by a Jang Hyundeok."
Normally the investigation would be getting tangled, but Park Gwangrim soon picked up a clue.
He adapted [Dowsing] to find people who could help him and moved by talking with them.
"Looks like Jang Hyundeok headed to a place called the House of Healing."
He confirmed that someone presumed to be Jang Hyundeok moved to a facility called the [House of Healing], and that the facility is near [Surisan].
At the same time, he picked up a curious rumor.
"House of Healing is an orphanage? No. Why would that be an orphanage?"
That’s the testimony of one of the few illegal fixers-cum-informants operating in Ansan.
"The [House of Healing] is where they park washed-up, retired problem-solvers and bleed them for money."
If you keep working as a problem-solver long enough, either your mind or your body’s going to go.
The testimony says it’s a place for their convalescence and rehab.
"Oh, and I did hear there are some kids. It’s shady, sure, but by current standards it’s run comparatively well. Some of the brats grow up fine there and get jobs in other regions, or work as problem-solvers."
The informant’s expression turned odd as he continued.
"It’s mostly illegal work, by the look of it, but in times like these, being able to do even that is lucky."
It’s minor info, if minor.
Park Gwangrim was also curious how the informant knew any of this. But the informant answered like it was no big deal.
"The kids stopped by Ansan on a regular basis. They’re ‘kids,’ sure, but that’s a problem-solver operating out of town suddenly coming back into Ansan. I looked into it, wondering what was up, and found out."
Park Gwangrim paid a small fee and asked what those kids usually did in Ansan.
"They just bought toys or sweets, dropped by that House of Healing, and came right back out. For a place run by a cult, the treatment must not have been bad."
Beneath that answer, a marginal note from Park Gwangrim catches the eye.
Brainwashing? Or maybe hostages?
"Whatever’s going on lately, the brats who came out of the House of Healing all started showing up at once. But although people saw them go in, no one’s seen them come out. That’s definitely new. Since when? The first one showed up..."
The date was the day after [Predator in the Mountains] descended and the world rolled back.
Did the rollback trigger some kind of change?
