Honestly, it wasn’t the first time people had mistaken me for a Ghost Story resident.
No, before I became 130666—a thing that really wasn’t human anymore—I had actually encouraged that misunderstanding and made good use of it.
But having someone from Baekilmong say, ‘No, you’re registration number so-and-so!’ to me felt weird.
Especially while I was in cat form.
‘Me… a Ghost Story registered with Baekilmong?’
And besides….
‘A contamination state where Kang Yihak worships me…?’
That person… probably just got like that because the cat pointed out an item and showed them how to escape… right?
This felt like a misunderstanding on the scale of an uncrossable river.
Still, hearing the phrase ‘saves people’ at least meant I hadn’t been distorted into something like ‘cat murder machine: mercilessly grinds people to pieces,’ so that was some relief….
Kwak Jegang’s reaction to those words went like this.
“Does it look that way? Then should I beg it to save us?”
“Chief Kwak!”
“Well, better than dying, isn’t it? And if it helps people, then statistically speaking, it’s a decent gamble!”
Chuckling, Kwak Jegang turned his head to me and asked,
“Mr. Cat, do you happen to know where we are?”
“We’re inside a Darkness not registered with Baekilmong.”
Thunk.
Ms. Lee Yeonhwa fell backward.
“Hahaha!”
Staring at me as though she couldn’t believe that I had turned back into a person from a cat, she staggered backward, struck the fire hydrant door with her body, then jolted and caught her breath.
‘My apologies.’
It was an unavoidable decision for impact….
“Y-you said you didn’t remember.”
“That was a lie.”
A shocking thing to say, yes, but please hear a little more first.
“If I had advised you truthfully,…