NOVEL WEB Chapter 172
<172 - The Child Trapped in a Nightmare>
In the Academy, there are items that can be obtained at specific times in specific places with a certain probability.
One example is an item that can be obtained before the Midterm Exams during the [Curse Commotion] weekly event by drilling a hole in the seventh tile horizontally and fifth tile vertically from the 11 o’clock position on the ceiling of the empty space below the art room.
[Curse Storage Device]
Grade – Magic Level 7
Description – A special laser point that can store and then fire curses below a fixed capacity.
Effect 1 – Stores any curse that touches the laser.
Effect 2 – Fires the stored curse at the designated area affected by the laser.
If used in combat, it can distract enemies, and if used for training, it can automatically increase curse resistance every night—a convenient device. It’s so well-known that it’s considered an essential item for veterans during curse week.
“Managed to obtain it, huh!”
It’s an item that has a 40% chance of failure. Usually, it’s a location full of throwing memory or raw materials instead. Why wouldn’t you get the item? I don’t care about that. All that matters is that I got what I was looking for; no need to know the details!
“Oknodie. Don’t come over here. There’s a very suspicious curse nearby.”
As I searched for curses, flitting between the trees, Dorothy’s face peeked out from behind some nearby leaves.
A particularly tall tree.
A blanket caught on the branches shows signs of being clawed.
It’s the blanket used in the [Sleeping Well Anywhere] lecture. What in the world were they sleeping on?
“I noticed something was off with the trees in the forest, so I checked and found a curse at the top of this tree.”
“Really? Is that so?”
“The height of the tree is connected to the area of the third years. There might be a third-year level curse.”
“Thanks, Dorothy!”
“Just helping out a friend! It’s what we do when things are dangerous… Ahh!? I just said it’s dangerous! Why are you climbing up there!?”
There is indeed something up there. A nest woven from ominously looking hair with a mysterious, pitch-black egg.
It’s an egg containing the [Curse of Random Nightmares], one I’ve often seen in games.
Thunk.
When I pressed the button, the curse shot into the laser point.
The woven nest of hair, the unidentified black egg, and the ominous aura hanging over the tree all vanished into the Curse Storage Device.
“With this device, you can get rid of curses!”
“Ah… what’s this? I thought I was jumping into the curse to work on my resistance. Even Oknodie wouldn’t be that ridiculous, right?”
“…”
“Oknodie?”
“Uh, I… I’ll just go ahead since I forgot my homework!”
“Oknodie!?”
Ignoring the voice of Dorothy calling me from behind as I ran, I continued onward.
The Curse of Random Nightmares.
As the name suggests, it’s a curse with the property of an ‘egg’ whose contents are unknown.
This curse isn’t exactly popular. If you’re lucky, you might gain a necessary resistance among the curses, or you might get an extremely difficult nightmare that doesn’t allow for any resistance to be gained.
If something goes wrong, you might fall victim to the curse that requires stat depletion before waking up, and if the current specs aren’t enough to awaken from the nightmare, it could lead straight to game over!
But I have a way.
Before entering the curse, there is a method to know the contents.
“Answering Door, Answering Door. What curse is in this egg?”
That’s right! Asking the [Answering Door]!
“…It’s dangerous.”
“Can you give me more details?”
“…No.”
The Answering Door’s response was blunt, perhaps due to me not raising its favorability by answering at night. But at this point, I have no confidence in increasing my favorability with the Answering Door better than Hestia.
I needed a change of tactic here.
“If you don’t tell me, I’ll expose your identity to Hestia!”
“That’s not good.”
“Then if you tell me, I’ll inform you how to escape there!”
Get the door on board easily and make sure it doesn’t end up trapped in a dangerous nightmare—insurance in place!
“…The curse within the egg is the curse of experiencing death.”
“Whoa. That’s a crazy curse.”
The curse of experiencing death requires you to die a specified number of times in a dream to wake up.
Of course, it’s incredibly painful or tormenting, and usually, you find yourself struggling not to die, which increases the time spent suffering and drives a person insane in reality.
The escape method? Just close your eyes and die for the designated number of times.
But that way, resistance doesn’t increase—kind of like scratching during the curse of itching doesn’t raise your resistance.
However, the reason that this curse is an advanced one isn’t just the difficulty of the escape method; it’s also the demanding conditions for raising resistance.
‘To raise resistance in the curse of experiencing death, you must resolve the cause of death!’
In a curse that requires dying a hundred times to resolve, you must solve the cause of death a hundred times.
“…Now tell me. How to escape.”
“Only after confirming if you’re telling the truth!”
I lay back in bed, pulled the blanket up to my neck, and tucked my arms and legs snugly beneath it.
Knock, knock.
Now I wait with my eyes closed until I feel sleepy!
Knock-knock. Knock-knock. Knock-knock.
“Geez. I can’t sleep with all this noise!”
“…Keep your promise.”
“I told you I’ll check and let you know!”
Knock-knock-knock. Knock-knock-knock-knock-knock.
Fuming at the loud knocking, I jumped out of bed and ran to the desk.
“Goo?”
“Mandragora. Powerfully unleash Goo at the wall for 5 seconds!”
“GooGooGooGooGoo!”
The booming cry of Mandragora, when it becomes an adult, made the wall tremble and cry out in pain, potentially bursting some eardrums.
“If you keep messing around, I’ll unleash it for 10 seconds next time!”
The Answering Door was finally silent after establishing dominance.
[You are experiencing the advanced curse of experiencing death.]
[You cannot escape the curse until one of the escape or resolution conditions is met.]
A freezing wind swept across the campus.
In the ominous atmosphere of the classroom, I saw upper-class students gathered.
“Hey, everyone!”
“Who’s that guy?”
“I don’t know.”
An aggressive response as if all prior friendships had reset.
Neither Jezel, Isabel, nor Son Ohchun, my first friends of the current session, could be seen.
In a place where familiarity had vanished.
Suddenly, it hit me—this was the memory of a different session.
Step. Step.
A single person came down the hallway, accompanied by the stench of blood.
Seeing her manic grin and the disgust in her eyes towards humanity, I called her name.
“Hestia.”
In her hand, she held a neat-haired combatant with a headband whose head rolled off.
[Chapter 1 Boss]
[Rampaging Hestia (100%)]
With a familiar game screen, I realized the nightmare’s gimmick.
This was a gimmick that induces you to be killed by a friend you have some degree of intimacy with.
If it had been a low or intermediate experience of death, the [Intimacy Buff] would not have activated!
“Ugh. How foolish.”
The Academy I had repeated so many times.
The clears I had accomplished countless times.
How many of the battles I had never experienced in this Academy remained, and how many had I failed to defeat?
“Only the top-tier nightmares would be worth looking at.”
I took off running to block Hestia, now armed with an axe.
Oknodie didn’t show up for the lecture.
Isabel couldn’t hide her worry.
“Has this happened before?”
“No. This is the first time.”
“Isn’t she off looking for some hidden piece or something weird somewhere?”
With Oknodie’s personality, that wouldn’t be too far-fetched, Son Ohchun remarked, but Isabel briefly hesitated at his words, while Jezel disagreed.
“Oknodie isn’t that kind of person.”
“Mr. Sun, how would you know?”
“I’ve been observing for a longer time, and I’ve thought about it longer.”
“Mr. Sun, you little…”
Son Ohchun pressed with a serious expression.
“Speak the truth. Oknodie, she’s yours, isn’t she?”
“…What sudden nonsense are you spouting?”
“How could you say something like that if she’s not yours?”
“It’s because she’s been on my mind since the entrance exam.”
“What’s so concerning about that little mouse?”
“Not acting like a child… I suppose?”
Not every child lives in a happy world.
Workers forced to mature before becoming children are everywhere.
“That innocent smile on her young face… No matter how twisted or suppressed, it’s an essence that cannot be erased.”
“Hmm.”
“Our little lady deserves to smile. We made a promise to ensure that shadow doesn’t loom over her… didn’t we?”
Isabel empathized with Jezel’s sentiments.
“Right. Oknodie doesn’t express her feelings clearly. Good feelings come out easily, while bad feelings don’t even know they’re bad. It’s as if her value judgment is broken.”
“She’s not just like a little mouse; she’s already broken.”
“Anyway, I think I understand why Jezel is sensitive about this. If we don’t reach out to Oknodie first, we won’t know if anything happens to her.”
All three of them agreed.
“Let’s check Oknodie’s dorm room.”
From there, they would try to find hints in reverse.
Where Oknodie was now.
What predicament she was in.
“If a student didn’t show up for class… if that’s the reason, then there’s no other choice. I’ll give you the spare key to Room 111 from the dormitory office.”
The dorm supervisor willingly handed over the key.
The three of them entered Oknodie’s room.
“Oknodie…?”
Upon entering the room, the three discovered Oknodie, drenched in cold sweat, struggling on her bed.
“Wow, this nightmare really goes too far.”
What began as a lighthearted method of enhancing resistance while sleeping had escalated to a terrifying degree with the advanced curse of experiencing death.
Each time the difficulty increased, it added brutal gimmicks to the mix.
Following the [Intimacy Buff] was the [Continuous Impact] gimmick.
They were trapped in a curse that wouldn’t let them wake until they had finished slaying an unknowable number of nightmares one after another from beginning to end.