"Why is Spider Sis coming out of there?"
"That’s what I should be asking."
We stared blankly at one another.
I had no idea why Arachne was here, and she had no idea why I was here.
It was like Petu and Mattress, or Saw and Jelly.
"Ppyuuuu."
"...Ah, Guming! Get out here instead of hiding behind the Rookie!"
[One powerful nonhuman entity has felt fear!]
[+50 GP!]
What broke that absurd silence was the spider anomaly’s cry, followed by the Status Window’s announcement.
I pointed behind me and asked Arachne,
"Don’t tell me this guy is your kid?"
"Ugh, he’s an unfilial brat, an unfilial brat. The rotten little bastard ran away from home ages ago and never showed his face again."
Arachne let out a deep sigh and glared at the spider anomaly—no, Guming.
Slide...
Guming’s many eyes avoided Arachne’s gaze and turned toward me.
What, punk?
I can’t save you.
"You should count yourself lucky, Guming. If you’d accidentally hit the Rookie while running away just now, you’d have been dead already."
Arachne said this while poking Guming repeatedly with her index finger.
Was she trying to raise her child to be tough?
She looked like a formidable mother teaching her child to take responsibility for his mistakes.
"He’s still your kid. You don’t have to go as far as killing him..."
"Huh? No, I meant you’d have killed him."
"?"
"If anyone touches you, you hunt them down to the ends of the earth for revenge."
Tremble, tremble, tremble.
At her words, Guming’s whole body shook violently.
...How am I supposed to get revenge?
I’d just been prepared to stake my life on fighting him.
Forget revenge—could I even make him bleed a single drop?
"Anyway, did you come here because you saw the help post on the gallery too?"
Arachne asked as she stroked Guming’s fur.
"Huh? What help post?"
"MadamRabbit said she was trapped in here and asked for help."
"...This is the first I’ve heard of it."
I had heard that username before.
MadamRabbit.
She was the anomaly who occasionally fought with YoungIsBest in my posts.
"Then why did you come here? Were you trying to conquer a ghost story or something?"
"Um, it’s kind of a long explanation."
After that, I gave her a rough explanation about the Backrooms and this swimming pool.
Of course, I left out my identity and the part about suicide.
"So this is your habitat, then?"
"Habitat... I suppose you could call it that."
"...Now I feel terrible."
Arachne cleared her throat for a moment, then patted Guming with her palm.
"Sorry. I came in without knowing this was your territory."
Arachne bowed to me along with Guming.
Judging by her grim expression, she seemed to be asking forgiveness for entering without permission.
"It’s fine. You came to do a good thing, after all."
"Phew..."
Arachne wiped away cold sweat with a sigh of relief.
Then, after staring intently at me for a moment, she suddenly nodded and said,
"Hmm. I think I can trust you with it."
"Huh? With what?"
"Saving the gallery members. I was going to look for them myself, but if this is your home, it wouldn’t be right to stay long."
I tilted my head in confusion.
She kept saying she had come to save gallery members, but there were gallery members trapped in here?
The Backrooms hadn’t told me anything like that.
"You’ll probably have an easier time finding them than I would. Guming spread webs everywhere, so there aren’t many places left for them to go."
Arachne said, tapping Guming.
Guming wore a proud, smug expression.
...That didn’t sound like praise, though.
"Well, all right. By the way, do you know the way out?"
"Nope. We’ll just run around until we find it."
"Um."
When I looked at her incredulously, Arachne simply shrugged as if she couldn’t see the problem.
Despite how she looked, she had a bit of an airheaded side to her.
I stared at her for a moment, then pointed with my index finger toward the path I had come from.
"There’s a way up over there. If you ask the Backrooms from there, it’ll show you the exit."
"...The Backrooms?"
"It’s a location-type ghost story. Just talk to empty air."
Start!
Arachne’s eyes flashed wide open.
What was that? Her expression had seemed a little murderous just now.
"You can communicate with a location-type ghost story!?"
"Yeah, it writes on the walls to talk."
"Huh... All right, I understand for now."
Arachne trudged off in the direction I had indicated.
I heard her mutter, "What the hell is the Rookie, anyway?" and something about the First whatever, like a gallery topic, but I couldn’t make it out properly.
"Oh, right."
Hop!
After jumping over a puddle of water on the floor,
she turned back with a short grunt.
Swish.
"Hold onto this. It’ll help you find the gallery members."
"Hm?"
It was a mysterious ball of thread Arachne pulled from between her breasts.
When I looked at it closely to see what it was, a strand protruding from its center led off somewhere.
"It’s the thread I sprayed around while moving through here. If it shakes, that means a gallery member touched it."
"Oh..."
So if I followed this, I could find the gallery members?
No. Not only the gallery members—I could find the agents too.
I had received something quite useful.
"Anyway, I’ll be going now. I need to discipline this little guy."
"Ppyuuuu..."
"Yeah, take care."
After seeing off Arachne as she dragged Guming along by his fur,
I set out once more to find the gallery members and the agents.
Tap, tap.
"But this is kind of sticky. How did she keep it in there?"
As I played with the ball of thread, stretching it out and pulling it back in,
Bzzzzzz-!!
"Oh."
The web drew taut, as though something had pulled it.
[Chatter]: Swapped out the rescue team, yeah
Author: EightSpiderLegs
I’m in a hurry, so here’s the three-line summary.
1. While rescuing people, I found my runaway kid, chased after him, and ran into the Rookie.
2. Found out this place is a location-type ghost story under the Rookie’s command.
3. Apologized to the Rookie and swapped out the rescue team.
Ask if you’ve got questions.
By the way, I need to find a switch, so I can’t answer for long.
[Total comments - 14]
MadamRabbit: Huh?????
└MadamRabbit: Wait, does that mean the Rookie is coming to find us???
└[Author]EightSpiderLegs: I guess so.
└[Author]EightSpiderLegs: But us? Are other gallery members trapped besides you?
└MadamRabbit: Well, that’s... uh...
└[Author]EightSpiderLegs: ??
CleanlinessKing: Under the Rookie’s command? The Rookie had a location-type ghost story too?
└[Author]EightSpiderLegs: Yeah, and it can even talk.
└[Author]EightSpiderLegs: Was it called the Backrooms? I talked to it and got out just now.
└CleanlinessKing: ???
└FenceLover: Wait, a location-type ghost story can talk??
└[Author]EightSpiderLegs: Apparently... Even I can barely believe it, and I saw it myself.
└HeartHeart: What the hell is the Rookie, seriously...?
└ㅇㅇ(599.5): ( ^ꈊ^ )
└Chrishimas: What the hell is this one supposed to be...?
[Info] About the location-type ghost story that’s the gallery topic right now
Author: Archivera
Location-type ghost stories.
Their anonymous user code is 5.
They’re the kind that usually comes to mind first when people hear "ghost story," and at the same time, they’re arguably the most pitiable members of the Ghost Story Minor Gallery.
For one thing, they can’t move or talk.
They’re buildings themselves, so in a way that’s only natural.
But that’s the problem: because they can’t move, they have to sit around waiting for humans to come.
In other words, they can’t hunt flexibly.
Since they can’t hunt, most starve to death.
And since they starve to death, there aren’t very many of them.
They’re what you’d call a rare species, yeah.
Yet the Rookie doesn’t merely have one of those rare location-types as a companion—he has an utterly insane powerhouse that can even communicate, and keeps it as a subordinate.
Conclusion: As expected, the Rookie does Rookie things~
[Total comments - 10]
AshesMimic: At this point, I’m honestly getting scared...
└AshesMimic: Why does an absurdly fucking overpowered monster like this treat us as equals?
└WatchYourStep: Want to know?
└AnalysisIs: Then join us.
└AshesMimic: ?? What are you guys—
└AshesMimic: Whoa, a private chat, holy shit. So this is it. I’ll go right away.
└DeleteReplay: To the Rookie’s First Conspiracy Gallery...
└FenceLover: What on earth did they tell him?;;;
**
After arriving where the thread pointed,
I stared in shock at two people.
No, one person and one anomaly.
"Hey, you two."
"T-that voice! Are you the humanoid anomaly from back then...!?"
A woman glared at me with both fists clenched.
I remembered that hair and that reinforced suit.
She looked exactly like one of the team members who had entered the Backrooms and escaped again before.
"That’s true, but first, let me explain—"
"Now that you’re done playing with us, you came in person to dispose of us!!"
"C-Chief Seoyun? Please calm down first..."
Reuniting with the agent called Seoyun was shocking, but that was not what truly startled me.
Boing, boing.
The rabbit ears attached to the green-haired woman’s head.
The gallery member I was supposed to rescue was named MadamRabbit, too.
Rabbit ears were attached to Seoyun as well, but the other woman’s were bigger and twitched more often.
"Rookie! Ah, no. Chief said we’re not supposed to fight that anomaly, haha..."
The green-haired woman trying to stop Seoyun with an awkward expression—
MadamRabbit.
Why are you wearing a Bureau reinforced suit...?
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