Why is my Isekai in the Slice of Life anime was become a Horror Story?

Chapter 46: Fragments of the Past Seen Through Connections

The winding path and bizarre items that could never exist in reality, the layers upon layers of obstruction that block the view, made it nearly impossible to recognize the way ahead.

The sound of footsteps echoed without any visible figure walking through the corridor, one after another.

Children, like porcelain dolls, laughed and played, continuously appearing and disappearing in various locations.

And the windows opening, with stars and the moon visible through them... or were they corpses floating in the water?

The situation here was far more dangerous than anticipated.

Even though Takakai and Kaguya were always careful to hide their presence, they almost got discovered several times. Especially those things that appeared very cute, seemingly children made of porcelain dolls—if these things didn't make noise, Takakai and Kaguya would have never noticed their proximity. Once these things got close enough, they would fall into a trance-like state, making escape extremely difficult.

However, luckily or not, after once being captured by these dolls and scalded to death in boiling water, Takakai now had a certain level of resistance against them. Therefore, every time they encountered such situations, he could always free himself, pull Kaguya to safety, and find a tall cupboard where they could hide out of their reach.

The calm expression Kaguya initially had when starting the exploration gradually became tense, and she could no longer maintain her composure after encountering these strange things multiple times.

After escaping from five or six "children" once again, she and Takakai huddled together in a tall cupboard, unable to stop herself from turning her head back, her face pale as she asked:

"Don't you feel any pressure when facing things like this?"

These strange things, hard to describe with words.

Especially those strange laughs that seemed to infect consciousness, each time hearing them made one fall into a dazed state.

Yet this man could always respond in time, always escaping and quickly pulling her away from danger.

At this moment, Kaguya felt a sense of defeat that words couldn't fully express.

She might have understood why Maki had such strong confidence in this man. Even when deciding to let her and Takakai take action, Maki had shown an expression as if "there's no problem with Takakai leading the team." When faced with these bizarre creatures beyond human understanding, this man's ability was completely different from hers, someone with no experience.

"Of course, there's pressure. How could there not be? But when there's pressure, you just have to keep moving forward, right?"

Takakai smiled at Kaguya with a relaxed expression, then continued to move forward.

At this moment, he wasn't thinking too much; he was just reflecting on the distinct changes he felt upon entering the third floor, compared to the previous two times.

The most noticeable change was the significant increase in the number of monsters.

The first time they entered the third floor, Takakai and Maki were trapped in a room, then "poisoned" by the group of abnormalities who had impersonated Kaguya, followed by the explosion created by Old Guo. That time, although Takakai noticed there were clearly many bizarre things on the third floor, in reality, they didn't encounter too many.

The second time, when he entered, he was directly "Cursed" by the core of the building. When he went outside, he had nearly completely transformed into part of the bizarre creatures in the rescue team. It was perhaps because he was no longer fully human that these things didn't approach him.

This time, Takakai entered the building without any contamination or transformation, and without anyone helping to divert attention. He entered as an ordinary person, and as a result, he clearly felt a great difference from the previous two times: the abnormality was such that after just a few steps, they were already encountering strange things.

Hihi—hihi—

The children were running around again.

They were always laughing, laughing in a carefree and loud manner.

They wore new clothes, had toys to play with, their faces were clean, their bodies without wounds.

Hahaha—

Those children were laughing joyfully.

They were mocking another child.

Another child different from them, always dirty, with bruises on their face and body.

Wait, why am I seeing this?

Takahashi Takakai frowned, trying not to let himself hear these sounds, desperately imagining everything in his mind to shift his attention. He persisted like this until the sounds gradually faded away, and he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

It had been 13 minutes since they reached the third floor.

So far, he and Kaguya had encountered four instances of [children] and three instances of [footsteps].

Avoiding the footsteps wasn't difficult, since although the shape of the figure wasn't visible, the sound was very clear. It could be heard from afar, allowing them to find a hiding spot. The real problem was those children. Their vision seemed very sharp, and almost every time Takahashi Takakai and Kaguya noticed them, they would inevitably be noticed in return, leading to a chase. In the end, they had to hide in places like cupboards where the children couldn't reach.

It was like [her] situation in the apartment. Once those children noticed someone, they would treat that person as a target to tease, and no matter where they hid, it was useless. They could only climb trees or high cupboards that the children couldn't climb to avoid being further harassed.

Takahashi Takakai frowned and rubbed his temples lightly.

"Is something wrong?"

Kaguya noticed Takahashi Takakai didn't seem well, so she stopped and asked with a frown.

"It feels like some kind of hallucination, and it's the kind that pulls emotions into it unconsciously. Right now, it's not affecting our actions. Anyway, we have to stay cautious. If I show any obvious abnormality, we may have to retreat early."

With that, Takahashi Takakai shook his head and continued walking.

The path ahead was strangely winding, with an open refrigerator filled with rotten food and maggots.

A lot of adult and children's clothes were hanging from strange hands that extended out from the walls, and it seemed that there was something like eyes blinking in the cracks of the walls.

The sound of footsteps echoed again.

The footsteps heading toward room 304 began to reverberate.

Takahashi Takakai and Kaguya hid in a corner, staying silent, pretending they didn't hear the footsteps.

Just like the people who lived in this apartment, they carried a sense of disgust, pretending not to notice the existence of those footsteps.

That damn gambler.

Because of him, these debt collectors kept coming to this apartment, knocking on doors day and night, disturbing the entire building.

His wife was also detestable, always starting with this rule and that rule. Didn't she just want to find an excuse to control others? The problem was, she couldn't control anyone. Her husband beat her like a dog, and only her silly daughter listened to her and let her manage her. She didn't even dare control her son, just because two-year-old son of her husband's was precious, so she dared not intervene.

Her daughter was also detestable. Was it because she was beaten that she sometimes wet the bed? She always stood there in a daze, never moving, and whenever someone asked her one or two questions, she would start to run away.

Was she not bathing? She smelled so bad, there were lice in her hair.

It was truly disgusting.

Really disgusting.

If it weren't for the existence of this family, no one would have to suffer this trouble. Many children were scared to tears by the debt collectors, causing trouble for others, only knowing how to be a nuisance every day. This family should just die out.

".....".

Takahashi Takakai opened his eyes and looked to the side.

On the wall beside him, there was a family photo, resembling a happy family of five.

However, in the photo, all five members wore expressions of disgust, all looking in the same direction, and then showing an extremely repulsive face.

That direction was the direction of the footsteps approaching.

That direction was the direction of room 304.

"...Ugh."

Having heard so many footsteps and children's laughter, Kaguya's mental state wasn't great either. She held her forehead and let out a short breath.

Takahashi Takakai remained silent, not making a sound, silently enduring this discomfort.

So far, they had been exploring for half an hour.

One-sixth of the exploration time had passed, and throughout this period, Takakai and Kaguya had only passed through chaotic hallways, still unable to find room 304.

"It seems there's a room here that's still relatively intact."

At this moment, Kaguya, with her sharper eyes, found a room that was deformed but not too severely damaged.

The two of them approached the door, and when they saw the number 305 on it, they decided to enter and rest for a while.

Creak——

The door opened, revealing a dim hallway.

[Did the debt collectors come again last night at midnight?]

[They spilled paint on the door of room 304. Tsk, it got on our door too, what scumbags. The one who owes the money isn't us.]

[What now? Are you daring to look for Li Youtai? That bastard is always looking for reasons to beat people up, and then go to jail for a few days—just the perfect excuse to escape from the debt collectors.]

[That's disgusting, that guy. Oh, have you heard? The young man who just moved into 309 seems to have left.]

[Ah, about that, all I can say is he was too young and dared to interfere in the business of this filthy family. Don't worry about it, it's not our concern.]

These hallucinations were clearer than before, as if they were ringing in his ears.

Takahashi Takakai seemed to be able to see the people in the house gathering around, eating dinner, and chatting at the table.

But when Kaguya fully opened the door and he looked back, he only saw an empty, desolate room with no one inside.

"The layout of this room is different from the second floor. Could this be the original layout of the Shirakawa apartments?"

Noticing something odd, Kaguya frowned and whispered.

Behind her, Takahashi Takakai once again placed his hand on his forehead.

How strange.

Why, since reaching the third floor, had these hallucinations been appearing more and more?

It was as if his sight no longer fully aligned with the present in the Shirakawa apartment, but had connected to some other place.

Why was there such a change?

While thinking, Takakai reached out to grasp the doorframe, intending to close the door.

During this process, he unconsciously looked up, gazing out of the door.

And then, he saw that dirty child, wearing torn clothes, appear and disappear, vanishing into the chaotic structure of the building.

"..."

At that moment, Takakai understood.

He had been noticed by that thing, and once again, it had started to establish a connection with him.

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