Chapter 128

Blaine, finally stopping his tears, sniffled through his red-tipped nose as he climbed down from the chest. He then reached out to support Theo as he followed him down. Having landed safely on the floor thanks to Blaine, Theo suddenly spotted something hanging from Blaine’s waist and his eyes widened.

“Huh? A pendant…”

“Pardon?”

When Blaine asked back, Theo pointed to his waist; only then did Blaine look down and startle.

“…What is this?”

Theo reached out in place of the awkward, arm-raising Blaine, grabbing and pulling the pendant attached to his waist. Blaine’s pendant, like the others, wouldn’t budge from his belt.

“Noquia had one on her too, and now you have one.”

Blaine’s eyes rounded at Theo’s words.

“Noquia Noona?”

“Yeah.”

“Is Noquia Noona… alive?”

Theo couldn’t help but burst into laughter at the cautious question. It was the exact same reaction he’d had.

“Yeah, she’s alive. I met her after we got separated from you guys, so it was at least a little less scary.”

“Ah…”

Blaine let out a somewhat deflated sound. It was a relief that Theo hadn’t been alone, but for some reason, he couldn’t help feeling a bit slighted.

Blaine quickly composed his expression so as not to get caught in his petty thoughts and asked while pretending to look around.

“S-so, where is Noquia Noona?”

“She’s hiding in another room.”

“Another room?”

Blaine tilted his head. He couldn’t understand why she was in a different room when there was plenty of furniture to climb on in this one.

Reading the question in his eyes, Theo led the way out of the room while explaining.

“To avoid the bride, you have to climb higher than her height.”

“What?”

“After we were attacked by the bride in that room and I woke up, you guys were all gone. While I was looking for you, I found a hint saying that ‘rotten things cannot lift their heads.’ At that time, I was the only one on top of something high like a wardrobe, and you guys were all on the floor. That’s why everyone except me disappeared.”

“Then you weren’t attacked at all, Hyung?”

“Right.”

“Ah…”

Blaine let out a small sigh and checked Theo’s waist. There was no pendant on Theo. Considering that Noquia, who had vanished once, had one, and he had one too, it seemed the ‘pendant’ might be a mark of being attacked. It would be more certain once they found Father and Holanghee to check for them.

Theo, walking ahead and warily watching all directions of the corridor, entered a room in the corner. It was a dark room without a single ray of light. Blaine frowned and shone his lantern inside, spotting Noquia lying flat on a chest in the corner.

“Noona!”

Blaine called out to her in a burst of welcome, causing Noquia to flinch and jerk her upper body up. She looked around restlessly with anxious eyes—as if she couldn’t see them. Seeing Noquia’s strange behavior, Blaine tilted his head and looked at Theo, who approached and tapped the chest twice as if it were routine.

“It’s me.”

“Theo?”

“Yeah.”

Only then did Noquia relax. She waved her hands as if asking to be caught, and Theo grabbed her hands to help her down.

“I thought I heard Blaine’s voice just now. Did you not hear it?”

“It is Blaine. He came with me.”

“Oh? Really?!”

Noquia brightened up and whipped her head around this way and that. She even reached out to fumble through the air. Her actions were naturally alarming; Blaine took a step back and looked at Theo, who grabbed Noquia’s wandering arms and pulled them down.

“She says she can’t see very well.”

“…Pardon?”

Theo explained what had happened to Noquia while she was missing, and Blaine’s face went pale with shock.

“Then… you’ve been wandering around all alone this whole time while barely being able to see?”

Noquia crossed her arms with a solemn face and nodded nonchalantly.

“I did. Until I met Theo.”

“Wow… that must have been truly terrifying.”

“Hmph, fear is no obstacle to me.”

“She clung to my pant leg and cried her eyes out.”

“Pardon?”

“Hey!”

Noquia, her grand lie exposed in an instant, huffed with a beet-red face. Theo chuckled pointedly before looking at Blaine as if he’d remembered something.

“Oh, right. We found another item at an altar.”

“Ah, I saw an empty altar too.”

“You did?”

“Yes. And I discovered a few things while I was alone, too.”

“Like what?”

“After I was attacked by the bride, I woke up alone in a room. There was a man lying there like a corpse and a funeral bier.”

“What is that… how creepy.”

“Then, after leaving that room and wandering around, I found a hidden chamber. Inside, I found some writing about a spell called ‘The Rite of the Living Ghost.’”

“The Rite of the Living Ghost?”

Theo and Noquia asked back simultaneously, clearly uncomfortable. Blaine nodded and continued.

“The man I found in the first room looked like the man from the scroll… I think the bride wants to use that The Rite of the Living Ghost spell to bring him back to life.”

“So in the end, the goal of this dungeon is for the bride to revive the man, and we have to stop it?”

“And if she revives him, we lose?”

Theo and Noquia asked in succession. However, it was still just a theory; the dungeon’s objective wasn’t certain yet. Theo opened his inventory and checked the Taesahye.

“It seems likely these items we’re finding at the altars are connected to the man’s revival.”

“That must be why the bride is chasing us so desperately,” Noquia chimed in, and Blaine nodded in agreement.

“We should find the others first. They might have found more information.”

It was a proposal no one could argue with. The three of them quickly left the room to search for Father and Holanghee.

At some point, the hanging lamps that had been sparsely lighting the interior vanished. Lacking even a single lantern, Father and Holanghee looked troubled as they faced total darkness.

“Dammit, how are we supposed to go anywhere when we can’t see an inch in front of us?”

“Seriously stingy. Would it kill them to give us one measly lamp?”

Grumbling, the two felt their way forward along the walls. As they turned a corner, they saw a lantern sitting all alone in the middle of a crossroad ahead—as if it had heard their complaints.

They rushed over and picked it up. The flickering light brightened their surroundings. Having a light to rely on finally gave them a small sense of relief.

“Anyway, where the hell are we?”

Father moved the lantern around to inspect the area, and Holanghee linked her arm with Father’s lantern-holding hand, looking around as well.

“Exactly…”

They had intended to find a way out, but every door led to another room and every window looked into another room. They couldn’t get their bearings.

“We’re definitely in the same building as the others, right?”

“Let’s hope so.”

With nothing certain, the more they talked, the more drained they felt. Soon, they fell silent and just walked.

After wandering aimlessly for quite some time, a four-way crossroad appeared ahead. The distance was so great that the halls seemed to stretch into eternity.

Father narrowed her eyes and raised the lantern to see the end of the path. Suddenly, she saw a light at the far end of the opposite hall. She squinted harder. Though it was dim, a human figure was visible alongside the light. At first, she thought there was a mirror at the end of the hall reflecting her and Holanghee, but she soon realized that wasn’t it. The person at the end of the path was Theo.

“Ah!”

Father let out an exclamation. Holanghee, recognizing Theo a moment later, began fussing and swatting Father’s shoulder.

“Hey, isn’t that our Sweetie?!”

At the same time, Theo began jumping up and down on the other side, shouting something, though his voice didn’t carry across the distance. Father and Holanghee ran toward Theo, feeling as though they might burst into tears of joy.

As they ran, Theo began running toward them too. Moving at full tilt, they were able to identify each other more clearly as they drew closer. Behind Theo were Blaine and Noquia.

Father and Holanghee were more shocked to see Noquia than Theo and Blaine. That thing was still alive!

As they reached the central intersection of the four-way path, they were all ready to embrace and celebrate their reunion. However, none of them reached each other. Every single one of them was forced to stop in their tracks.

From a corner of the intersection, a young girl with long, flowing hair glided out without a sound. Upon seeing the girl, Theo quickly put his index finger to his lips while looking at Father and Holanghee.

It was a gesture to stay quiet. Father and Holanghee, though initially puzzled by the sight of the unfamiliar girl, realized the truth upon seeing Theo’s signal. This was a “dead thing.”

The girl glided slowly between Theo’s group and Father’s group. If they just stayed quiet like this, nothing would happen. That’s what everyone thought. But things didn’t go as expected.

From not too far away, a creak, creak sound of floorboards being stepped on began to ring out. Everyone looked around in horror, searching for the source of the noise. Even as they did, the footsteps drew closer, and soon, the bride appeared at the end of the path Theo’s group had just come from.