"...."
A pungent and musty iron smell penetrated Cale's nostrils, settling in them as if it were always their home
His eyes were met with the same old and wrecked school that looked far from modern, only this time he was prepared to face anything
Or so he wanted to delusion himself thinking that as long as his body followed the thin White line he'd somehow miraculously survive but-
"There...Is no white line...."
A sense of helplessness filled the entirety of his being, lips quivered in fear
And his face paled like a ghost's
There was nothing guiding him, the situation was reminiscent of a sheep without its shepherd stuck in a place where a single mistake could cost Cale dearly not only that-
'It's also different...'
The entire atmosphere of the School changed like day and night with every light source being tainted and illuminating with red
The sun or what Cale believed looked like the sun was no exception to this change, The giant moon that stayed dangling in the sky like a pendulum was the only thing not affected by the change
The school also looked even more run down, almost like an abandoned building with no lifeform in sight, However he knew
'This place is teeming with them'
Thud
Thud
Thud
Countless footsteps were heard in every direction left, right, up, down and-
'Behind me...'
The only reason the thought of survival had crossed Cale's mind for even a second and kept himself calm and collected was for one simple hope.
The White Line that seemed to want to guide him to safety
All he could now see around were Pitch Black Lines littered everywhere In the vicinity, he could feel a prickling in his skin and hairs, it was as if it were telling him and whispering in his sensitive ear 'that danger Lurks everywhere so exert extreme caution'
As Cale was about to move, The pitch black lines also reacted with his movements and he could also start to hear a faint pulse from the pitch black lines.
He took a step
Step
Creakkk
The floor creaked heavily under his weight, the sound reverberated throughout the entire school
Several gazes locked directly at him the instant a step was heard, the pitch black lines also grew Immensely thicker than before making him feel like he took a step closer to a guillotine than a step closer to survival.
The pitch black lines pulsated like veins
"Ha-ha am... I perhaps... screwed?"
To cope with this hopeless and utter ridiculous situation that Cale somehow found himself in
He attempted and tried chuckling to think positively about the situation, hoping it would bring him some sense of solace to his turmoil driven mind but it only made him less calm, more scared and everything else that shouldn't be happening right now when one's life is in danger
'What should I do now?'
'Every step I took basically alerts them, giving me virtually no way to move without them noticing'
Neurons shot and fired as Cale pondered on what course of action he should take right now
However, he didn't have to think long before-
CRASH
BOOM
RATTLE
"?!"
A Loud Deafening piercing sound broke the suffocating Silence and almost made Cale jump out of sheer fear
"H-huh?"
Confusion sparked in Cale by the sudden shaking of the building
Almost Immediately after, all of the pitch black lines started to dissipate one after another at an alarming rate.
Not wasting this golden opportunity Cale started sprinting towards the staircase.
'I don't who or what it was that did it, It can be a natural phenomenon for all I care just the fact that I have a shot at surviving this crap is all that matters right now, nothing else matters!'
The thought of going out of the school and climbing out did pop up and surface in his brain
But he knew well from previous observations that trying to do so would almost certainly lead to his death.
So, he racked his brain for a solution, any solution
"Huff Huff" Cale rushed down the stairs and went down a floor.
At that moment
"Wait"
Realization struck Cale as he racked his head for survival in order to find a way out of this situation, his movements stopping and coming to a complete halt
"This School..."
It had similarities with his School
The most noticeable one being
'Carlos Ashen'
And
"What the voice said when I first got here"
The voice said to go to Class A3
'Why would Gardenia assign me to the same class as my school?'
What other common thing did those two facts have with each other?
'Carlos, Voice, Carlos, Voice'
Those thoughts kept on repeating into his mind like a mantra, trying to see the commonality between the two
"!"
Cale realized what it was, the two things that seemed interconnected with each other
'Carlos was in charge of class A3, the voice had told me to go to where class A3 was, so what was commonality between the two?'
A schedule
To be more specific. Class A3's schedule
Carlos followed his schedule and was put in charge of class A3, and Cale needed to go to class A3 because that was his schedule as a student, In following the schedule set for him,
He was 'safe' in the classroom and returned back to his world
A thought-no a theory surfaced in Cale's panic driven mind
A theory formed out of a singular previous experience with Gardenia
'They also follow a schedule....'
There was no proof, but then nothing would make sense
If the strange creatures in Gardenia didn't follow a schedule, why was Cale still alive?
'They must be following a schedule, a set of rules that they can't bend or break'
He didn't know why they followed such a schedule. It wasn't even certain whether he was right or wrong in that regard, it was simply a logical theory, and theories weren't always right
But the only thing he knew right now based from his train of thoughts
Is that they couldn't go against their schedule which copies the schedule of class A3 , he also theorized that they can only go against the 'schedule' when he breaks the rules like-
'Climbing the school walls to avoid classes'
Which means, in order to survive
To reach the 'other' temporary safe zone
'I need to go to classroom 23 In order to survive!'
That was his next 'class', and his last class for today
If Cale was right
Going into the classroom his schedule needed him to go in, likely meant that it would be his 'temporary safe zone' until the next class started
No evidence backed this but coincidences kept on piling on top of each other, which made this theory hold some ground
Desperately running through the Hallways, Cale looked at the classroom numbers at both of his sides, the air that expanded his lungs leaving and constantly burning with intensity and panic
'5, 7, 6, 8 ,9'
"You've got to be kidding me" Cale quickly realized that Classroom 23 remained on the floor that he previously found himself at
Time was running out, he didn't know how much time was left but he knew it wasn't much
Cale sprinted to the end of the Hallway In order to use the wide stairs that was on the left side
"Ug!"
Crack!
The floor broke, causing Cale to tumble over and fall down
"Damn it..."
The foot that fell through the floor was quickly raised from the floor, it felt damp and it stung for some reason, but Cale didn't linger any focus on it
Having reached the end of the hallway, he gasped for the cold air and next to him was a marble cracked staircase
'It really did have a staircase at the end of the hallway!'
Recalling the times of running up the stairs in school as a little kid and the times of going to middle school where the staircase was always at the end of a hallway or at the middle of it
Cale naturally judged by the size of the school building that it would have a staircase in the middle and at the far end
'Never have I thought a useless fact like that would help m-'
Turning to face the stairs, while also complimenting his past self for being curious for the most random things ever. Instead his face paled, his eyes shook and tremored
'Is that...blood?"
A giant puddle of flowed from the stairs, inside the puddle
"Ukh!"
Were intestines, just the sight of it made him nauseous and ready to puke
And
Rustle
They were wiggling and struggling as if they were still alive