After leaving Room 205, Takashina Kai found an opportunity to inform both Kaguya and Maki about the second corpse hidden under the bed in 205.
So now, at this very moment—when they heard the sound of the wooden stick falling over and the door slowly opening—Shinomiya Kaguya understood very clearly that what was standing out there in the hallway was most likely that grotesque male corpse. The one with half of its body twisted and deformed, like it had been torn apart and then messily stitched back together.
Back in 205, that thing had been hiding under the bed the whole time… silently watching their group comb through the room?
If so, the key issue now was: where would it go?
Before they left the room, Kai had intentionally mentioned Room 210 aloud, intending to mislead it. But that misdirection relied on the assumption that the creature possessed some level of intelligence and lacked any special tracking ability.
Thud—
A heavy footstep echoed down the corridor.
Its direction… was toward Room 210.
Kaguya let out a silent sigh of relief.
For Shinomiya Kaguya, who had always been used to rational thinking, the thing that frightened her most was undoubtedly the kind of existence that could not be predicted or reasoned with—things that acted without following any logic. And up until now, everything she'd faced fit exactly that description.
But now, a strange corpse of unknown origin had been successfully misled by Takashina Kai's words and had chosen Room 210 as its target.
This meant that not all the threats in this apartment were irrational monsters. At least, they could be deceived and tricked. That alone gave Kaguya room to devise more strategies—strategies that might actually work.
Creak—
She heard the sound of Room 210's door opening.
That thing which had come out of Room 205 had now entered Room 210.
Shinomiya Kaguya turned to look at Takashina Kai, who was standing at the border between the hallway and the living room.
She raised one finger, then three, then two—repeating a sequence of hand signals. Takashina Kai mirrored the motions, replying with the same gestures.
This was a nonverbal communication method Kaguya and Takashina had agreed on. Every few minutes, she would turn back and silently check in this way. While there was no way to confirm if it was entirely effective, should Kaguya be attacked by something with mental interference, Takashina would likely notice. At that point, he would plug in earplugs and rush to her side, drag her into the living room, and shut the door to cut off the source of contamination. If that didn't work, they would consider using the wall clock to rewind time.
Given the near-total lack of information, this was the best temporary solution the three of them had come up with.
In the kitchen, Sun Dajun and Maeda Miwa were still sitting against the fridge. Opposite them was Green, who had been acting cocky but now looked ready to bolt ever since he learned something was inside the fridge.
In the living room, Maki was organizing a pile of letters and notepaper she had found, trying to uncover something of value.
From the handwriting and content, she deduced that all the documents belonged to a man named [Lin Wenfu], who appeared to be a minor magazine contributor writing inspirational essays and slice-of-life columns to scrape by.
Apparently, one night after falling asleep, he woke up to find himself in Room 205.
From his notes, Miko gathered that the survivors in the building had helped him. The leader of the survivors was a man named Masaru Kusuo in Room 309. From the first to the third floor, around twenty people lived in this apartment. Masaru Kusou had been here the longest—more than five years. Thanks to his efforts, what was once a place of despair had become a bitter but bearable home for the survivors.
However, Lin Wenfu, due to his melancholic personality and broken relationship with his girlfriend (caused by his inability to leave the Shirakawa Apartment), grew to hate this place and eventually stopped documenting anything related to it.
"Damn it. Finally found some information, and this guy just didn't bother writing more because he was in a bad mood..."
Maki cursed under her breath. She wanted to rush out and beat the bespectacled corpse to a pulp—just a thought, of course. She wasn't really going to do that.
But toward the end of the notes, things started to take a darker turn.
[Sanchez]
This name appeared in the final few pages of the documents Maki had collected.
There were only two entries about him. The first was short:
[Today, a foreigner came out of Room 109. He said his name is Sanchez. He was originally assigned to Room 206, but the kitchen floor there collapsed, so he was moved to 109. He doesn't seem mentally stable. I don't think he'll like it here.]
That was it.
The second entry appeared in the third-to-last page:
[Sanchez opened the door to Room 304.]
[He missed his daughter too much. But the Shirakawa apartment was too far from his hometown. With only three days to visit, he could barely spend any time with her. His family was poor. Honestly, none of us were well off. Ever since we got trapped here, even people who once had normal jobs had to make sacrifices. Even if we wanted to help him with money, we had none.]
[Masaru Kusou stopped Sanchez from going into Room 304.]
[I heard anyone who enters that room—even if they come back out—will never be the same again.]
[They shatter, disappear, and become ghosts that no one can see, forever wandering the apartment, trapped in an unending loop of pain until they forget everything.]
[But Sanchez said he had to go in. He said the root of everything was in there. He could change everything. He could save us all.]
[Is it really that easy?]
Smudges and messy strokes marked the note, and though the tone appeared calm, Miko could sense the writer's complicated feelings.
Then came the second-to-last document—only two sentences:
[Masaru Kusou is dead.]
[We can't get out of the apartment anymore.]
Seeing the scrawled handwriting, Maki couldn't begin to imagine what Lin Wenfu was feeling when he wrote that.
She looked toward the door where Takashina was stationed. She wanted to call him over, maybe have him bring Kaguya too, so they could analyze the information together.
But she quickly remembered—they were on high alert guarding the hallway from that corpse, the one that had likely written these very notes and was now something far more terrifying.
So, after hesitating for a moment, she looked down and opened the final document. A piece of letter paper stained with dark red, previously found under the desk in Room 205.
[Don't go near the window! Don't look outside! Don't look! Don't!!!]
The deranged writing sent chills down Maki's spine, making her feel physically uncomfortable.
[Don't trust anyone! Don't enter anyone's room!]
[Everyone's gone mad! They're not the same! They've all gone mad!]
[I'm a good kid. I'll behave. I'll stay home and won't be punished. I'm a good kid. I'm not crazy. I'm a good kid. I'm not crazy. I'm a good kid, good kid... (The words "good kid" took up nearly half the letter, written perfectly and neatly.)]
[Don't trust anyone. No one. (The last line was written messily at the bottom.)]
[Don't trust anyone. Even separating once is enough to ruin it. Just once.]
[Don't go to the third floor. The third floor doesn't belong here.]
[Can't leave the first floor. I can't leave. None of us can. We already live here. Why do we need to leave? (This was written slanted from the bottom to the middle of the page, overlapping with the repeated "good kid" section.)]
[No one can be trusted.]
[Don't trust anyone.]
[Don't trust anyone.]
[Don't trust anyone.]
The handwriting grew increasingly chaotic—almost a madman's scribble.
If Maki hadn't studied Chinese cursive script and developed the skill to read even the most illegible handwriting, she wouldn't have been able to make out anything.
The repetition continued until the very bottom of the page.
Only one line wasn't finished. The ink seemed to bleed onto the back of the paper.
So Maki flipped it over.
[Don't trust anyone.]
Still messy, but oddly clearer than before—as if the writer had calmed down.
[Didn't I say not to trust anyone?]
The next line felt different—as if the writer were talking to someone.
[I said, don't trust anyone. No one is trustworthy!]
Like someone was yelling at her.
[No one can be trusted. Not even me.]
[Don't believe me. Don't believe my words. No one's words.]
[Why do you believe me? Why?]
Until the very last line—written in blood-red ink—Maki suddenly remembered that when she first picked up this letter, the back had been completely blank.
Rustle—
The letter slipped from her hands, revealing its now-empty reverse side.
Soaked in cold sweat, Maki nervously looked around. Only after confirming there was nothing new in the room did she manage to calm her racing heart a little.
In this place, unexplainable things happened one after another.
Still, at least now they had a few valuable clues.
Maki exhaled slowly and, trying to steady herself, stood up to inform Kaguya and Takashina.
Boom!
A sudden, violent tremor rocked the entire building, sending Maki, Kaguya by the door, and Takashina in the hallway crashing to the ground.