Chapter 2:

I Want to Go Home (2)

BANG!

“…Hk!”

The loud noise coming from the doorway of the small cabin made a startled gasp escape my lips, and my shoulders instinctively hunched.

I glanced nervously toward the door and pressed a hand against my pounding heart.

Then—

Scratch—

Scrrrk, scrrrk—

Along with the sound of something like fingernails scraping wood,

David, I’ve come.

It’s me.

My son, David, beloved… David, damned child who left this place and □□ alone, David, my David, won’t you open the door this instant, you ungrateful wretch, how dare you do this to me—

A flood of auditory hallucinations poured into the room.

Clutching my ringing ears, I hurriedly turned my head and saw the darkened sky beyond the cabin window.

I stared at it for a moment before pulling a blanket around myself.

‘…I swear, no matter how many times I hear that thing, I can’t get used to it.’

Every time those screams pierced my ears, my knees weakened and goosebumps crawled over my skin. The sensation of alarm bells endlessly ringing inside my head hadn’t gone away either.

‘Of all things to get reincarnated into, it had to be a horror game… And I’m terrible with horror stuff.’

At least the original game had been made with pixel art, which made it somewhat bearable.

…Well, it was still scary, but still!

Taking a short breath, I picked up the <Bag – Inventory> item I had left in the corner.

Opening it and dumping its contents out, several objects spilled onto the floor.

One .

One .

Seven .

Five .

And two pieces of .

After counting them one by one, I noticed that it was getting dark outside.

Pop.

I pulled several candles from the wall and added them to my supplies.

Fsssh.

Whoosh…

After placing a candle in the holder and lighting it, I looked at my left arm again.

Two cross-shaped emblems resembling intertwined vines were etched onto my forearm.

After glancing once at the marks and once at the scenery outside, I picked up one of the items.

Description: Dried meat from an unknown creature! It might give you energy if you eat it?

The cross-shaped marks on my arm and this dried meat were among the clues that convinced me this world was the RPG Maker horror game Mirábĭlis, and that the original owner of my body was the game’s protagonist, David.

Mirábĭlis had been created by developer Min Hana, the current CEO of SFS Soft, before she had even founded the company.

This horror RPG Maker game, set in a Western-style village and filled with supernatural elements, was the work that first made her name known.

However, thanks to its enormous variety of monsters and some rather unique mechanics, it was also infamous as:

“A ridiculously difficult hardcore trash game that’s brutally unfair for absolutely no reason.”

And this was one of the reasons why.

‘I thought this even when I played it, but… what kind of grudge against humanity did the CEO have when she made this?’

Her recent space games didn’t have systems this absurd.

‘Seriously, what kind of lunatic makes a game where losing all three lives deletes your save and sends you back to the beginning?’

The cross emblems represented lives.

And once all lives were lost, every record of progress vanished and the game restarted from scratch.

Unlike other games that simply returned you to a save point, Mirábĭlis erased everything.

A truly garbage system.

And I currently had only two life marks on my arm.

Why two instead of three?

Simple.

‘Because three minutes after arriving here, a monster ripped my head off.’

After writhing in agony and opening my eyes again, one life had disappeared, and I’d found myself in Lētum Village, the setting of the game.

Just remembering it made my back damp with sweat.

Whether my eyes were open or closed, I could still see the monster opening its maw to devour me.

My breathing became ragged, and I repeatedly clenched and unclenched my cold hands.

Scratch—

BANG! BANG! BANG!

One of Mirábĭlis’ horror events—the hallucinations at the door—snapped me back to reality.

I hurriedly steadied myself and looked down at the dried meat.

There were two ways to restore lost lives in Mirábĭlis.

The first was obtaining a meal from the kitchen of the church, the game’s main location.

The second was eating dried meat—a precious item that had such a terrible drop rate that after searching the entire village, I’d only managed to find two pieces.

The first option wasn’t possible right now.

Because the church was an absolutely horrifying place.

‘That’s where I woke up immediately after being reincarnated… I think.’

That place was hell itself.

Every night, different monsters roamed its various sections.

Ghosts wandered everywhere.

Creatures both human-shaped and utterly inhuman moved freely through its halls like water striders skimming a pond.

Every terrible thing in the game originated there.

Who in their right mind would willingly enter such a place just to recover one life?

‘Of course, I know I can’t avoid it forever.’

Ten days had passed since I arrived in this world and experienced death.

During that time, I’d mostly barricaded myself inside this house because I didn’t want to enter the church, where the main story took place.

Occasionally I’d sneak around nearby collecting items, but even then I kept my head down and avoided everything.

If I encountered monsters, I’d die.

If I encountered NPCs, the story might progress.

And that would be a problem.

Because once the story advanced, David would immediately go:

“Hmm, so that’s what’s happening in the village. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.”

And then march straight into dangerous locations.

At one point I’d been so overwhelmed that I’d even considered trying to live here permanently, like protagonists in fantasy novels.

I genuinely tried adapting.

But staying in a world without electricity, proper water purification, food delivery, or the internet was pure torture.

More importantly—

I had to share the same sky as monsters like the one I’d already seen.

That was something I absolutely could not tolerate.

And so I’d eventually arrived at one conclusion.

‘Maybe if I clear the game, it’ll send me home.’

After all, wasn’t that how these stories usually worked?

‘Which means I’ll eventually have to enter the church and follow the main story…’

But not yet.

I needed more preparation.

More item farming.

More contingencies.

And most importantly—

‘Mental preparation!’

The original David, the playable protagonist of this body, was an incredibly steadfast person.

Raised from childhood in the capital as a holy knight, he arrived in Lētum Village under orders to investigate the supernatural incidents occurring there.

Since David had originally been born in Lētum, the villagers’ testimonies quickly made him realize the seriousness of the situation.

Then he proceeded to wander through the church—the source of all the horrors—as if it were his own home.

After enduring countless hardships, he eventually reached the proper ending.

An impressive man.

But—

‘That’s the real David’s story.’

My nerves weren’t nearly that sturdy.

If I had to compare them to something…

Maybe spider silk?

Meaning they snapped very, very easily.

And yes, that’s why I hadn’t eaten the dried meat despite finding it ten days ago.

You might ask:

“Who cares? If it restores lives, just eat it.”

A fair point.

A perfectly reasonable point.

But…

Dried meat from an unknown creature!

The description alone made my eyes narrow.

Seriously.

Who would willingly eat food marketed with a label like that?

‘I’ve been trying different foods because I wanted to see if normal food could restore lives too…’

But in the end, fate had caught up with me.

Keeping my lives at maximum was important.

And I still had to go outside today.

Carefully, like someone retrieving a phone that had fallen into a toilet, I picked up the item.

The shriveled, dark-red piece of meat sat in my hand.

Closing my eyes tightly, I repeated my mantra.

‘This is seasoned fried chicken.’

‘This is perfectly cooked sous-vide steak.’

‘This is delicious food.’

And then.

Not long afterward—

Tap.

A tiny piece of meat touched my tongue.

Its salty flavor lingered there.

And immediately my mind filled with terrible possibilities.

‘I-Isn’t human flesh supposed to taste salty…?’

…No, wait.

Jerky is salty too.

Obviously you’d salt meat if you wanted to preserve it.

There’s no proof it’s human meat!

Right.

That’s true.

But…

‘T-This is a horror game.’

Anything could happen, couldn’t it?

Groundless conspiracy theories floated through my mind.

An undefined terror plucked at my fragile nerves like the strings of an instrument.

And after a very…

Very long time…

Fwoooosh—

Bright sunlight poured through the window.

The noises from the doorway ceased.

The room’s eerie chill faded, replaced by warm air.

The candles decorating the cabin walls extinguished themselves.

Warm sunlight tickled my eyelids, and my eyes opened naturally.

I stared blankly at the shining sun.

Then lowered my gaze to inspect myself.

“…”

My tongue was still sore from spending the entire night wondering what that meat had been.

And it still tasted salty.

I smacked my lips a few times and curled up.

A few tears escaped.

Seriously.

How unlucky could one person be?

I’d barely joined a new company before getting thrown into a horror game.

I’d been ripped away from my comfortable home and forced to eat mysterious meat in a cabin.

What crime had I committed to deserve this?

‘Was wasting thirteen minutes on a coffee run and daydreaming during work really such a terrible sin…?’

I wiped my eyes.

I knew crying would only dehydrate me.

But this was simply too miserable.

After a while, I steadied my breathing and gathered my resolve.

‘Whatever happens, I need to adapt. I need to get home.’

Back home, I could eat boneless seasoned fried chicken while watching American TV shows and enjoy the luxury of a proper evening.

For that, I had to keep going.

Encouraging myself, I looked at the scattered bag and items beside the blanket.

And the weasel standing on top of them.

…

Huh?

“…W-W-W-Weasel?”

The black eyes of the brown-striped weasel sparkled as it looked at me before tilting its head.

Startled, I quickly darted my eyes around the room.

Only then did I notice that the window I’d left slightly open yesterday after throwing out the apple was still open.

Apparently, it had wandered in while I was busy feeling sorry for myself.

‘W-What do I do…? Call animal control…? No, wait. There aren’t smartphones here. There’s probably no animal control either… Then should I catch it and release it…?’

But what if it bites me?

No, maybe I could keep it—

The moment I began considering my options—

Snatch!

One of the weasel’s tiny fluffy paws grabbed a piece of dried meat from the bed.

Its adorable little toes firmly gripped the shriveled meat.

Then it stuffed it into its mouth.

And raised its head.

Whoosh!

It launched itself through the window.

I sat there blinking, still processing what had happened.

A moment later—

‘D-Did that thing just steal… the dried meat… my spare life…?’

“Stole it…?”

I shot to my feet.

BANG! BANG!

Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap!

I secured the door and window and sprinted outside like a madman.

“Hey! Where’d you go?!”