Long Hair and Fingerprints

"No!"

"The traps you set could never have cut the rope like this. These segments are far too messy, yet the cut ends are perfectly neat!"

It was only as she spoke and shone the flashlight onto the red rope that she realized something was wrong.

Bang!

The bathroom door, which had already been shut from the inside, suddenly flew open as if kicked in with brute force. It opened completely without rebounding in the slightest.

"Watch out!"

"Ah!"

The passage beyond the doorway was pitch-black.

Je-yoon suddenly felt an itch on the top of his head. Confused, he reached up to scratch it, only to find his hair soaking wet—and noticeably thicker.

So he looked up.

Then he saw a long cascade of wet hair hanging down through a hole in the ceiling, all the way to the top of his head.

As he raised his head, the dripping hair slid across his face.

The stench of filthy water that had accumulated for years rushed into his nostrils.

In that moment, he even felt as though his airways were about to rot from that single breath.

But that was not the most terrifying part.

Within the hole at the end of that long hair, half a face was revealed in the fringe of the flashlight's beam.

That face was beyond description.

Pale and bloated, it completely blocked the hole, which was nearly the size of a washbasin, squeezed tightly into place.

Its eyes blended into the darkness, as though there were only pitch-black eye sockets. Yet in truth, the black eyeballs were like glass marbles embedded in soft bread.

Unable to bear their own weight, they had slipped out and dangled outside the sockets.

It stared straight at Je-yoon, like a bloated corpse that had been there all along.