The classroom buzzed with the ordinary.
The smell of chalk dust lingered in the air, mixing with faint detergent from the freshly mopped floors. Pages turned lazily, pens scratched against paper, the teacher's voice droned in a low monotone. Fluorescent lights hummed overhead, their sterile glow bleaching every shadow from the room.
Han Jae-min sat at his desk, back straight but not rigid, his pen gliding across the page. To anyone glancing his way, he seemed calm, attentive even, as though perfectly absorbed in the lecture on dynasties and their decline. But behind his steady gaze, he noticed every tremor in reality.
The glitches had been subtle at first. A flicker at the edge of his vision, like the light twitching though he knew it hadn't. A sound—whisper-thin—slipping between the teacher's words, threading itself into the silence between sentences. Like breath too close to his ear, or the rustle of pages in an empty library.
Most would have shaken their head, blamed exhaustion, ignored it. But Jae-min knew better. These were not hallucinations. They were fractures.
And they were growing.
He forced his hand not to tighten around the pen. Not here. Not now. You're being watched. Stay still.
The whispers swelled, a chorus of sounds not quite human. Words he almost understood, half-formed prayers and hungers. Then—the world around him shifted.
It didn't break cleanly. It folded.
The ceiling buckled like melting film, the fluorescent bulbs stretching into impossible lengths before snapping into darkness. The walls peeled inward, curling like wet parchment. Rows of desks bled away into pale stone, smooth and cold, forming a wide circle. The chalkboard lengthened, warped, twisting into a wall carved with symbols—jagged, deliberate, too ancient to comprehend.
The classroom dissolved.
In its place rose an altar.
And his classmates… they weren't his classmates anymore.
They sat in silence, bodies looped in fractured motion, heads twitching in stutters like broken marionettes. Masks hid their faces—porcelain, gold, cracked ivory. Each mask was painted with grotesque exaggerations: wide gaping smiles, hollow black tears, mouths stretched too far in laughter or sorrow. They tilted in unison, snapping back, as though time itself had caught on a jagged edge.
Except for one.
Ji-hoon.
He sat beside Jae-min, unmasked, pale with terror. His breath came ragged, his eyes bulged with horror as he clutched at the sleeve of Jae-min's uniform.
"J-Jae-min…" His voice broke, stumbling between languages—Modern Korean, jagged English syllables, then something older, archaic, Victorian in cadence. His throat seemed unable to decide which tongue belonged to him. "W-what's happening? Why… why can't anyone else see—"
He shook, nails biting into Jae-min's sleeve, pulling him closer as though Jae-min were his anchor.
Inside, Jae-min's stomach twisted, but his face remained a mask.
The altar's air was thick, heavy with incense and copper, stifling to breathe. The whispers pressed harder.
Feed it. Feed it fear. Someone must pay.
Ji-hoon's terror was like an open wound, bleeding into the air. The glitch feasted on it. Every tremble, every broken sob multiplied the distortion, pulling reality tighter, thinner.
"Help me!" Ji-hoon gasped. His voice cracked, glitching between syllables. His body began to stutter, flickering between frames like a corrupted image file.
The boy clung harder, eyes pleading. "Please… don't let it take me… don't let me disappear—"
For a fleeting second, Jae-min almost moved. Almost.
But his inner voice cut sharp.
One casualty is better than suspicion.
If he reached for Ji-hoon, if he tried to fight the pull, he risked everything. His mask would shatter. He would be noticed. Exposed. The glitch would devour not just Ji-hoon, but him as well.
And yet—Ji-hoon's terror grew. It fed the chaos, sharpened it, made it hungrier.
Better let it devour him.
Ji-hoon convulsed, screaming—a sound that ripped between languages, between realities. His skin warped, stretched, then collapsed inward with a wet tearing noise.
Blood.
It sprayed across Jae-min's desk in a violent arc, warm droplets spattering his hand, his sleeve, his notebook. Ji-hoon's wide eyes froze in terror for half a heartbeat—then vanished. His body was gone, folded into the glitch, erased.
And just as suddenly—
The classroom returned.
Bright fluorescent lights hummed overhead. Chalk squeaked on the board. Students sat bored, scribbling notes, no masks, no altar.
No blood.
No Ji-hoon.
Jae-min blinked once. His desk was clean. His notebook dry. His sleeve unstained.
He glanced at the seat beside him. Empty.
Had it always been empty?
No one looked. No one whispered his name. No one even acknowledged the absence. Ji-hoon had been swallowed completely—not just his body, but his existence.
Jae-min lowered his eyes to his paper, his hand steady as he began writing again. His face calm, indifferent.
Inside, however, his thoughts stirred.
It grows bolder. Closer. The mask is slipping.
He tapped his pen once against the paper, then resumed writing as if nothing had happened.
But the faintest tremor lingered in his chest—not fear, not grief. Something colder.
A question.
How many more before it looks at me directly?