On a sun-drenched roadside in Seoul.
Though it was still early, the streets were already bustling with people who had gathered to enjoy themselves.
I-I just made eye contact with a human! My disguise is holding up properly, right?!
"Wow... That woman was incredibly pretty just now...!"
"Seriously. White hair—do you think she's a foreigner?"
Amid them walked a woman with an anxious expression.
Her fluffy white hair, alluring yellow eyes, and slim, slender figure drew the attention of everyone passing by.
Ugh. If it weren't for Maestro, I wouldn't even have looked outside...!
Miho herself, however, did not welcome that attention.
Tap, tap.
Miho tapped the empty air and pulled up the record of the conversation they had just had.
Maestro: Miho.
└Maestro: Your senior's house has summoned us.
└ㅇㅇ: What..?
└Maestro: It seems they have something to say, so please come to the designated location.
└ㅇㅇ: ???
I can't exactly refuse when it concerns my senior, but what sort of title is 'my senior's house' supposed to be?
Miho shook her head and let out a deep sigh.
She wanted to avoid leaving the house if at all possible, but she had no choice.
Her senior was frightening, Maestro was frightening, and that anomaly called a house was somehow frightening too.
With only three tails, she had no hope of standing up to such a lineup.
"Whew... Is a lesser anomaly simply fated to obey the great anomalies?"
As she resigned herself to reality and walked down the street, she finally reached the entrance to the alleyway Maestro had told her to gather at.
"I was supposed to message him again once I got here, I think."
ㅇㅇ: I have arrived.
└ㅇㅇ: What should I do now?
└Maestro: Yes, you can see the alley in front of you, correct?
└ㅇㅇ: I can!
└Maestro: Inside it is your senior's house.
└Maestro: I have already arrived, so you may come in.
└ㅇㅇ: What?
Wearing a dumbfounded expression, Miho looked back and forth between the alleyway and the chat screen.
"This is my senior's house... you say?"
Was Maestro playing a joke on her?
Miho found herself thinking that without meaning to.
That senior of hers—her creator and the de facto head mod of the Ghost Story Minor Gallery—lived in a place like this?
Of course she had her doubts.
"Well... Maestro doesn't seem like the type to lie, though."
Tilting her head in utter disbelief, Miho slowly walked toward the dark alley.
Bzzzzz!
"?!"
Then her vision began flickering violently.
A swimming pool, a library, a prison, and more.
Her eyes cycled through all manner of locations.
Eventually, her vision stabilized, leaving only some ocher-colored room behind.
"Phew... R-right! There's no way the Rookie would live in an alley like that!"
Relieved, Miho rubbed her chest.
She herself did not know exactly where that relief came from.
Perhaps she simply wanted her creator to be living well.
"You're here. You're later than I thought, huh?"
"It's some distance from where I live. Please do not be too hard on me."
"...Gasp?!"
Two voices sounded from behind her.
Miho spun around in alarm to find Maestro sitting at a table with Backrooms, a blonde woman.
"I'm not gonna be hard on you. It's fine, so come sit down already."
"Y-yes...!"
Scurry!
Miho hurried over to the table.
Sitting in an empty seat, she stared up at Backrooms.
An oversized dress shirt thrown on carelessly.
Long, unkempt hair.
Despite having made no effort whatsoever to dress herself up, she gave off an inexplicable beauty and mystique.
"Why are you staring at me like that?"
"Ah! M-my apologies!"
...That was, only when she kept her mouth shut and her clumsy pronunciation did not come spilling out.
Tap, tap.
Backrooms tapped the table with her index finger.
"Anyway, do you know why I called you guys here?"
"No. I was not informed."
"I-I was not informed either..."
The two anomalies answered in their respective ways.
Looking steadily at them, Backrooms took two sheets of paper she had tucked into her cleavage.
Why were those in there...?
Miho had plenty to say about that sight, but she merely wore an ambiguous expression and swallowed her words.
"This is the old house where the owner—your senior—used to live in the real world."
"Then the other one must be... the house where he currently resides."
"Exactwy."
One was his old house, cramped and dreary-looking; the other, his current home, spacious and luxurious.
It looked as if he had moved somewhere much better, so what was the problem?
Miho and Maestro wondered.
"I can tell what you're thinking just from your faces."
"M-my apologies! How presumptuous of me...!"
"It's okay. More importantly, you talk kind of strangely."
As if you're one to talk.
Once again swallowing her words, Miho listened to Backrooms continue.
"This new house. It looks fine, but it's got a huge problem."
Swish.
Backrooms slid the photograph of the new home toward them.
"This is a location-type ghost story."
"...?!"
"Eterno Baekdam. That was the gallery user's name."
Miho and Maestro were both greatly startled—and immediately understood.
No matter how nice a house might be, they could not entrust their senior's body to an unidentified ghost story.
Surely Backrooms had called them to protect their senior.
"I see. If that's the situation, then we must lend our strength."
Thinking so, Maestro nodded.
...In truth, it was closer to Backrooms stubbornly refusing to have the owner taken from her.
"Y-you! Do you intend to involve yourself in this?!"
"Naturally. It concerns my senior's dignity, and besides, this will be an opportunity to gain experience fighting a location-type anomaly."
Miho stared at him with a shocked expression.
Unlike Maestro, Miho did not particularly want to get involved.
She was not the type to enjoy fighting, and she thought that anything involving her senior would surely involve no easy opponent.
"Miho, you'll be joining us too, of course?"
"M-me?!"
"It'd be really reassuring if Miho fought with us too."
"I...!!"
Miho hesitated.
Fear of an unknown enemy, and the sense of duty that she had to protect her senior.
Between the two, Miho's decision was—
"..."
"I-I shall join you as well..."
"An excellent decision!"
To stand on their side.
Absolutely, positively not because the expression on Backrooms' face as she looked at Miho had seemed pitiful.
"But are the three of us the only ones?"
"Of course not. I've called one dependable spider."
"...?"
"Spidergirl."
**
Ding-dong!!
[Rabbit State announces that it is noon!]
"Whoa, I slept like a log for ten hours."
Listening to the announcement, I got out of bed.
Last night, I'd meant to sleep for just an hour or two, but I'd completely passed out.
Maybe it was because the bed was expensive, but its ability to suck you in was no joke.
"The summoning ticket... It's fine now. Why was it buzzing so much yesterday?"
I found and picked up the Backrooms Summoning Ticket I had left on the living-room table.
It was sitting quietly without a single vibration.
But that did not mean nothing had changed.
[Nothing's going on! You really don't have to come in!!]
The sentence that had appeared yesterday was still there.
That was why I had not gone in after all.
"You can communicate through this too? The more I look at it, the less I understand how it works."
Well, what use was there in demanding principles from an anomaly?
I took a few simple snacks out of the refrigerator.
I had not even requested it, but the fridge had been stocked full of food.
At this point, wasn't even the title of a good apartment insufficient?
"It's not like the refrigerator is an anomaly, like in some plagiarized novel... right?"
Clatter.
After setting the snacks on the table, I took out my phone.
Just because I was living in an expensive apartment did not mean what I did would change.
I'd browse the gallery for a while, then go to my part-time job when it was time. That was it.
"...Huh, wait."
Then a post caught my eye.
[Chat] A Message to the Ghost Story That Swallowed Our Owner
Author: ㅇㅇ(599.1)
(A photo looking up at a luxury apartment building)
(A photo of a woman, the viewpoint shaking violently)
@Eterno Baekdam
You think you'd get away with brazenly taking them from us like that????
Stay right there.
If you won't hand them over, we'll rescue them by force.
[Total comments: 10]
Eterno Baekdam: ??????
└[Author]ㅇㅇ(599.1): =͟͟͞͞( •̀д•́)))
└Eterno Baekdam: No, wait, this is a misunderstanding—
└[Author]ㅇㅇ(599.1): =͟͟͞͞( •̀д•́)))
Maestro: Surrender peacefully.
└Maestro: If you release them willingly, there will be no bloodshed.
└ㅇㅇ: There will not be!!!
└EightSpiderLegs: There won't be.
└CleanlinessKing: Who the hell are these people??
That apartment...
That golden hair...
The suddenly quiet summoning ticket...
"...Backrooms, is that you?"
Wiggle.
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