About ten or twenty minutes or so later just when Surya started his exploration.
"Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!"
At the entrance of the Taekwondo Club, Surya can be seen running for his life, his heart pounding against his ribs like a caged bird trying to escape from this hellish place.
His breath came in ragged gasps, each one burning in his lungs. Sweat poured down his face, stinging his eyes and making his vision blur. His school bag bounced wildly against his back with every desperate stride.
Because behind him, there were six headless female students, and not only that in addition of them there were four headless male students giving chase to him from behind.
Ten monsters. Ten supernatural entities that wanted him dead. The sound of their footsteps created a terrifying stampede, like a herd of predators closing in on wounded prey.
"Wuwuwu—"
"Hee-hee-hee—"
This group of headless or we say brainless high school students were either sobbing pitifully or laughing with disturbing glee as they pursued him relentlessly at an unnaturally fast pace, their footsteps creating an eerie rhythm against the concrete pathway.
The cacophony of crying and laughter blended together into something that barely sounded human anymore. It was the soundtrack to a nightmare, growing louder with each passing second as they closed the distance.
The whole nightmare had started about ten minutes ago or so, when Surya first stepped into the eastern section of the school grounds.
It quickly became apparent that "Bhoot Katha" was absolutely overflowing with malicious intent toward its players showing zero mercy to them in anyway.
This was not a game designed for casual players. This was not something you could button-mash your way through. Every step was a potential death trap, every corner a possible ambush point.
In reality, Delhi Public School was just an ordinary private school with the usual mix of academic pressure and teenage drama.
But in this supernatural game world, the place was absolutely crawling with monsters!
Headless students were everywhere both male and female versions of students were roaming the campus like some twisted parody of normal school life.
It was like someone had taken a normal school day and replaced every student with a headless horror. The uniforms were right, the postures were almost normal, but the missing heads made everything fundamentally wrong.
They moved around like regular students in many ways, scattered throughout the various buildings and courtyards.
Some sat motionless on benches as if lost in thought, whole others paced back and forth in small, repetitive patterns like broken automatons.
The sitting ones were the most unsettling. They would remain perfectly still for minutes at a time, their hands folded in their laps, as if they were waiting for a class that would never come.
While still some others gathered in groups of three or five, creating an unsettling chorus of crying and laughter that sounded almost like normal teenage conversation if you ignored the complete absence of heads on them.
These group behaviors were disturbingly social. They stood in circles like friends gossiping between classes, or sat together on the grass like study groups. It was as if they were acting out the memories of what they used to be.
Fortunately, these monsters seemed to lack brains in every possible sense of the word, and their awareness was frustratingly limited.
As long as Surya did not venture too close to them, they appeared completely unable to detect his presence, like NPCs with a very short detection radius in them.
He had tested this theory carefully, watching from a distance as they wandered in their set patterns. They never looked around, never searched, never showed any sign of awareness beyond their immediate vicinity.
This behavior was remarkably similar to the headless student he had encountered in the gulmohar grove yesterday evening.
That creature had only shown aggressive behavior after Surya had wandered deep into its territory and gotten within striking distance.
It was like they operated on proximity triggers. Get too close, and they activated. Stay away, and you were invisible. Simple video game logic applied to supernatural horror.
Based on this observation, Surya had adopted a cautious approach to keep his head down, walking as quietly as possible.
And maintained a respectful distance from the wandering headless students while he carefully explored the eastern section of the school campus.
He had moved like he was navigating a minefield, each step deliberate and careful. His eyes constantly scanned his surroundings, tracking every headless figure, memorizing their positions and patrol patterns.
For a while, this strategy worked perfectly, and he managed to avoid any dangerous encounters.
He had successfully mapped out the cricket grounds, noting three headless students near the pitch. He had circled around the basketball courts, where two more sat on the bleachers. All without triggering a single aggressive response.
That's how he eventually made it to the entrance of the Taekwondo Club without incident.
Outside the Taekwondo Club building, there were several headless students wandering around the area like lost souls.
Following his established strategy, Surya had no intention of getting too close to them.
His plan was simple that was to take a wide detour around the decorative flower bed and continue his exploration from a safe distance.
The flower bed was large, filled with bushes and ornamental plants that the school maintenance staff kept meticulously trimmed. In the real world, it was a pleasant spot. Here, it just looked ominous.
That's where everything went wrong....horribly wrong.
What Surya had not anticipated was that there was a headless male student hiding behind the thick bushes in the flower bed, concealed from view!
The bushes had been dense enough to completely obscure the figure crouched behind them. There had been no crying, no laughing, no indication whatsoever that anything was there.
He had no idea what this particular monster had been doing back there maybe it was some twisted game of a student who used to skip classes behind the bushes, or perhaps it was just randomly positioned there as a trap for unwary players.
Maybe in life, this student had hidden here to smoke cigarettes or skip gym class. Now in death, it continued the same behavior, lurking in its familiar hiding spot.
Regardless of the reason, the moment Surya's sneaky path took him within the creature's detection range, all hell broke loose.
"Argh-argh-argh-argh!"
The headless male student burst out from behind the bushes with a guttural roar that sounded like someone trying to scream without vocal cords.
The sound was wet and choking, like air being forced through a throat that ended too soon. It was one of the most horrible sounds Surya had ever heard.
The commotion immediately attracted the attention of every other headless student in the vicinity, like a dinner bell calling hungry predators to feast.
Their heads, or rather their necks, all turned toward the source of the noise. Then, as one, they began moving. Slowly at first, then faster, then running at full sprint.
Surya was not stupid, he was quite the opposite, actually.
He had quick reflexes and sharp situational awareness, which meant he immediately understood exactly how screwed he was.
This was not a situation he could talk his way out of. This was not a problem he could solve with clever thinking. This was pure survival, fight or flight, and he had no chance in a fight.
Without hesitation, he spun around and ran as fast as his legs could carry him, leading to the current situation where more than a dozen headless students were chasing him through the school grounds.
His muscles burned with the effort. His lungs screamed for more oxygen than he could possibly provide. But stopping meant death, so he kept running.
The headless students were abnormally strong and fast, just like the one that had killed him the night before.
Surya had already experienced their terrifying physical capabilities firsthand.
That cold grip, that inhuman strength, the way they moved with jerky but incredibly quick motions. They were not bound by normal human limitations.
He knew he could not outrun them indefinitely, and honestly, he had no real intention of trying to escape anyway.
His stamina was finite. Theirs seemed limitless. It was simple math. Eventually, they would catch him. That was inevitable.
After rounding a corner at the edge of the flower bed, Surya pushed himself to his absolute limit and charged straight toward the entrance of the Taekwondo Club, throwing caution to the wind!
His reasoning was simple enough that if he was going to die anyway, he might as well make it count worth it.
Dying inside the Taekwondo Club after getting a glimpse of what secrets it might hold was infinitely better than dying pointlessly in the courtyard, right?
Every death should have purpose. Every failure should teach him something. That was the gamer's mindset. Turn defeat into data.
While running, he activated his incomplete Panchmukhi Art technique regardless of whether it would actually help, surrounding himself with crackling static electricity as he sprinted desperately toward potential salvation.
Blue sparks danced across his skin, his hair standing on end from the electrical charge. It probably would not save him, but it was all he had.
Cold wind rushed past his back which was probably from a headless student that was already dangerously close to catching him but he did not turn to look.
He could feel them right behind him, sense their presence like ice against his spine. One glance back would slow him down, and even a fraction of a second could mean the difference between life and death.
But just at the moment when powerful hands were about to grab him and drag him down, Surya reached the entrance of the Taekwondo Club.
Crash!
The door swung open instantly, like a massive dark mouth swallowing him whole, then slammed shut again with finality.
He stumbled through, nearly falling on his face from momentum, and heard the thunderous bang as the door sealed behind him. The sound echoed through what he assumed was a large room.
Those frustrated headless students were left standing outside the entrance, unable to follow him in.
"Wuwuwu—"
"Hee-hee-hee—"
They cried, they laughed, they probably clawed at the door too but not a single one of them dared to actually push it open.
Their sounds were muffled now, dulled by the barrier between them. He could hear them pacing outside, their footsteps scraping against concrete, but they went no further.
It was as if some invisible rule prevented them from entering this space. As if the Taekwondo Club was a safe zone, a sanctuary that even monsters could not violate.
Surya collapsed against the wall just inside the entrance, gasping for breath, his entire body trembling from exertion and adrenaline.
His legs felt like jelly. His heart was still racing so fast he thought it might explode. Sweat dripped from his chin onto the floor, forming small puddles.
"Safe," he wheezed between breaths. "For now, at least."
He did not trust this safety to last. Nothing in this game had been kind to him so far. Why would that change now?