Ghost Story Club

“First, I’ll go over and summarize the events we’ve experienced since last week.”

I started writing down the events by date on the whiteboard.

Starting from the midterm exams at the end of April, only excluding the days when I was just lounging around because no ghost stories greeted me for about a month.

April 23rd, Tuesday – Doomed Midterm Exam ghost story (Location: School classroom + science lab + clubroom)

April 26th, Friday – Corner Game ghost story (Location: clubroom)

April 27, Saturday – MineCraft ghost stories (Location: Leon internet cafe)

May 1st, Wednesday – Kim Eunjung ghost story (Location: ShinLim Station + Seoul Station)

May 2nd, Thursday – Haunted House ghost story (Location: My apartment)

“Haunted House ghost story?”

Gyeongwon asked in puzzlement.

“Did someone die at Prez’s house in the past?”

“….. Someone did a long time ago. The apartment building area used to be a mountain.”

“Oh my….. “

Gyeongwon and the other members made a face of disbelief.

“If you put it that way, is there a place where no one has died in the past…..”

“Exactly.”

It was absurd from the perspective of the person involved, but it wasn’t exactly a completely implausible story.

There is a ghost story that a building where ghosts frequently appear was once a cemetery. And stories similar to that are found almost everywhere.

But there was this annoying part about the ghost stories sent by the Demon King.

He would weave anything that could lead to ominous imaginations, even the smallest clue, and materialize it into a tangible form of reality.

‘And strangely enough, that ability resembles that of the system, which is supposed to be the direct opposite of the Demon King.’

The cliché ability of the system, which I was desperately struggling with last night.

It was also something that could quickly weave together even the smallest situations and manipulate reality.

The Demon King and the System, although I had no idea what kind of relationship they have, but strangely enough, they exert their power in the same way.

By manipulating reality and changing perception.

‘Maybe they are essentially the same being.’

Leaving those doubts aside, I continued my briefing on each case.

“This time, I’ll try to attach a clue to who is behind the ghost stories tied to each incident.”

First, the Doomed Midterm Exam ghost story.

April 23rd, Tuesday – Doomed Midterm Exam ghost story (Location: School classroom + science lab + clubroom)

“This, needless to say, was caused by the suspicious forces within the school from beginning to end. It has nothing to do with the Demon King.”

The club members nodded.

“Next is the Corner Game ghost story.”

April 26, Friday – Corner Game ghost story (Location: clubroom)

“This is definitely from the Demon King.”

Once again, the members nodded again as if it was obvious.

Dukhun glanced down at the floor worriedly, probably bothered by the fact that the Demon King is buried beneath us right now.

“Next is the MineCraft ghost stories.”

April 27, Saturday – MineCraft ghost stories (Location: Leon internet cafe)

“This game itself was created by Clover Corporation, but the information about its existence was gathered by the system and Gyeongwon. Additionally, as soon as we started the game, we were sucked into it, and the situation kept getting more complicated. I think it’s more likely that the Demon King exerted some influence over that.”

“I agree.”

Gyeongwon nodded in affirmation.

“If everyone who played that illegal version experienced that phenomenon like we did, the world would be in chaos.”

“That’s right. It was a strange phenomenon that was already happening, but I think the probability of being sucked into the actual game would have been low. That’s why the Demon King must have exerted his power and dragged us in.”

And judging from that, it could be inferred that the Demon King, although buried beneath the school, was beyond perception and knew everything that happened above, even having the ability to exert influence.

Like an omnipotent god of a religion who knows everything.

“Next is the Kim Eunjung ghost story.”

Well, the name of this ghost story is The Forgotten Friend. But since it was a ghost story involving a real person, I decided to use the name as it sounds intuitive.

May 1st, Wednesday – Kim Eunjung ghost story (Location: ShinLim Station + Seoul Station)

“Eunjung’s death itself was the fault of the strange force sweeping through the school. However, it was the Demon King who brought her back to reality after 6 years and used her.”

The counselor who sent Eunjung to an alternative school as a test subject knew nothing about this incident when we visited her.

“Here’s one thing we can infer from this.”

I raised my index finger.

“It may sound strange, but I believe the Demon King and the rest are not working together.”

Gulp.

The members nodded in agreement with nervous expressions.

The Demon King buried beneath the school.

The secret religion spreading among the faculty members of the school.

The transnational conglomerate with insane technological prowess.

These three are not on the same side.

I decided to stop here and gradually finish my turn.

“After looking into each of these incidents, I discovered that there are two other organizations in this world that know about the ghost stories besides us. And now, Gyeongwon will give a presentation on the profiles of those two organizations.”

Gyeongwon nodded and then stood up with the materials he had prepared.

“Then, let’s welcome him with a round of applause.”

Clap, clap, clap, clap.

Gyeongwon stepped forward, awkwardly smiling as if to ask why they were doing that toward the members who were clapping.

“Awesome, F**k~!”

Jinhee suddenly whistled.

“Enough.”

Gyeongwon muttered and awkwardly began sticking the materials he prepared with magnets onto the whiteboard.

[Demon King］

[Dogma of Void]

[Clover Corporation]

“The three entities that are entangled in the ghost stories surrounding us. The Demon King, the Dogma of Void, and Clover Corporation.”

Gyeongwon cleared his throat and prepared to begin the presentation.

“First, the Demon King.”

[Demon King]

“Actually, I haven’t found anything about this. I’ve searched through history, but there are no records of any monsters appearing in the ShinLim Neighborhood, and there haven’t been any unusual incidents that we should be concerned about.”

Gyeongwon tapped the word ‘Demon King’ with the back of the magic pen, using it like a chalk.

What we know right now is that this unidentified giant monster will be resurrected three years later during the graduation ceremony. And that, for now, it’s buried beneath the school.

“What if we dig up the ground……”

Dukhun shared his opinion.

“If we dig it up and get rid of it while it’s still asleep before it’s resurrected…..”

“……”

“Like, put dynamite or some explosives inside……”

It was an absurd suggestion, but still, Gyeongwon cleared his throat and answered.

“Typically, sewer and water pipes are buried up to 4 meters underground, right? Digging that deep would be an incredibly noisy construction project. Moreover, this school must also have gone under construction at some point, but since no one has discovered anything, I think it’s buried much deeper than that.”

“T-That’s right……”

Dukhun nodded as if he understood, but I encouraged him, appreciating his suggestion.

“It might be worth a try. Of course, we can’t do it right now because of the attention it would attract.”

“Really……?”

The members look at me with a look of interest.

“During the vacation, when the school is mostly empty, we can just check it out, and if necessary, dig it up as well before turning back time.”

We would raise money, hire heavy machinery and workers, and recklessly tear up the playground.

“It’s illegal, and it would attract too much attention. We won’t be able to handle the aftermath, so it’s not something we can do right away. But still, assuming we could turn back time if something happened, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to check it out and move on.”

“That would be fun……”

Sunah voiced her agreement shyly in a small voice.

Soon, after the atmosphere around that topic settled, Gyeongwon cleared his throat and pointed to the next word.

[Dogma of Void (Belief of Empty Space)]

“If we write ’empty’ for the first character and ‘space’ for the second.”

The guy pointed to the Chinese characters and explained them.

“The secret forces involved with our school. That’s their true identity.”

“…..!”

Both the members who knew and the members who didn’t know put on tense expressions.

“And the reason I found out about this, thanks to Lee Jinhee’s elementary school counselor. From that person we came to know that the alternative school where Kim Eunjung was sent to was actually a very suspicious place. Starting from there, I investigated the information and discovered that..…”

Gyeongwon attached a few more pieces of paper with a magnet.

“The organization that funded that school and the founder of our Nakseong of High School. They’re the same group of people.”

“As expected……”

The members swallowed their sighs.

The school we were currently attending, Nakseong High School, is said to be an autonomous private high school that receives support from a certain organization and is operated by that organization.

That organization is also the founder of the alternative school where Kim Eunjung was sent.

“The name of the foundation itself is appropriately named, like some kind of meditation center, which is obviously a disguise. When I looked into the information of the people behind it, I found out that all the officials of the organization are members of this particular religion.”

Tap, tap, Gyeongwon tapped the word ‘Dogma of Void’ with his pen as he spoke.

“And the reason I was able to figure this out so quickly was….. it seemed like they weren’t really trying to hide it as much as I thought. If you just look at it a little more closely, it’s easy to figure out.”

“Hmm…..”

The unidentified religion spreading among the school’s faculty and staff.

I naturally thought it would be tightly wrapped up and hidden in secrecy, but turns out, it was actually an organization operating in the open, more than we expected.

“They even have a website. Go check it out.”

Gyeongwon took out his phone and sent a link to the group chat.

[Ahn Gyeongwon: spademind.com]

When Teacher Hwaeun asked, ‘Group chat?’ and looked around in bewilderment, I quickly added her to the chat room.

“I just made it.”

“Really?”

Soon, the homepage of Dogma of Void appeared on the screen.

Dogma of Void (空白教)

Contentment can only be attained by emptying one’s mind.

“When you reach a state of emptiness by completely emptying yourself, all that remains is for the divine Lord to arrive.”

– Taesang (Tai Sheng)

Taesang.

The name of the Head of the religious organization.

And then, this person is suddenly elected as the President two years later.

‘…. Well, if this person becomes the President, Dogma of Void will almost become the state religion and spread among all the citizens, so there’s no need to secretly hide it in the shadows.’

Since that was the case, it made sense that Dogma of Void was not hiding itself and was openly operating in the light at this point.

After all, the Head of the organization is an ambitious individual who is even aiming to become the President in the future.

What’s truly terrifying is that, despite openly operating like this, the internal solidarity of the believers, where eerie rumors and sinister secrets do not get exposed to the outside, was what kept it hidden for so long.

“The Taesang (Tai Sheng) written here is the name of the Head, and since Prez said that he became the President in the future before Prez’s return under the name of In Taesang, I searched for his real name, but…… so far, there haven’t been any notable search results on the internet. Only strange martial arts novel characters come up.”

I glanced at Hayoon.

‘In’.

It was not a common surname.

“…….”

Hayoon, with her usual calm expression, lowered her eyelashes and was simply scrolling down on her phone screen.

“This Dogma of Void, they are a new religion that hasn’t even been around for 40 years, but from the general societal perspective, they’re not considered a cult. Of course, from our point of view, seeing the teachers using ghost stories and killing people, it’s obvious they’re a cult. But on the outside, they seem like a very normal meditation organization. They also do a lot of charity and volunteer work.”

It seems they are two-faced bastard.

But I heard from Sunah that her parents got involved in this religion and even lost their lives.

Whether they practice meditation or whatever on the outside, with the presence of the alternative school and all, they were definitely not an ordinary religious organization.

“Even if there are suspicious aspects to the general public regarding the religion, because it’s a religion based on Taoism, perhaps they look a bit shady? But other than that, there’s nothing else. Originally, their influence was really small. Even if you add them all up nationwide, the number of believers is probably just under 10,000.”

“Is 10,000 believers a small number? Seems like a lot to me.”

With 10,000 people, if each person just gives me 100 won, that’s 1 million won.

Gyeongwon clicked his tongue in disapproval.

“That’s an incredibly small number for a religion. The Christian population in South Korea is well over 10 million, and the Buddhist population is about 4 million. As for other religions you’ve at least heard of more or less, most have over 100,000 followers within Korea.”

Compared to those religions, the Dogma of Void has a very small presence in terms of influence, and its name is almost unknown.

On the surface, it seemed like there were no problems with the group.

‘But that can’t be.’

I decided that when I meet the Detective soon, I would ask him to thoroughly investigate this religion.

“This is about all I know about Dogma of Void for now. I’m not sure what their purpose was for building this school, but it just so happens that it was built on the place where the Demon King was buried. There definitely, must be some suspicious secret hidden here. Now, let’s move on to Clover Corporation.”

Kyungwon points to the next group of letters.

[Clover Corporation]

Everyone here knows about this company without him having to explain it.

No, there’s probably no one in the world who doesn’t know about this company except for a newborn.

A unique and unprecedented multinational corporation that dominates the globe.

A transnational corporation led by a young genius who is literally uniting countries through insane technological prowess.

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