"So stop being so tsundere at a time like this, ojō-sama. I may not be a good person, but abandoning the one who saved my life—yeah, that's something I just can't do. All right, now be good and listen carefully. I'll carry you on my back from here on. You'll handle watching the rear and sides, and I'll focus on what's ahead. We'll try to find the clock or some way out as soon as possible. Don't forget, I can't turn the hands anymore—so even if I just need someone to do the winding, I still have to keep you alive."
Seeing Maki like this, Takumi couldn't help but sigh again. Then he reached out and flicked her forehead directly, speaking in a blunt tone.
'What the hell is this supposed to be?'
'A 2D romantic school-life horror drama?'
'Could we please remove the last two adjectives if possible?'
"Uwah—you—you actually flicked my forehead?! What the hell, you think being two years older lets you act like some elder in front of me…?! Ugh, ugh—you'll regret this! I'm seriously just a burden right now, I'll only slow you down…"
Maki's indignant voice didn't last long; it was quickly cut off by a pained whimper as Takumi rather roughly pulled her up and slung her onto his back.
She knew the man before her had already made up his mind. So she merely muttered faintly, then reached out to wrap her arms around his shoulders and neck, awkwardly pressing her upper body against his back.
Being carried by a man other than her father… this was a first. She'd thought it would be a romantic experience, but instead it was in this hellish place, with a man she'd only known for a few hours—and she'd even been shot in the stomach, the bullet still lodged inside her.
This was awful…
Truly awful…
"Whatever you're feeling, set it aside for now."
Standing amid the heaps of trash, Takumi had no idea what Maki on his back was thinking. He could only guess her heart was filled with frustration, discomfort, and resentment. Even after finishing an entire manga series, truly understanding a girl's thoughts in person was still ridiculously difficult.
Not that his own mood was any better right now.
"If we run into something we can't escape from later, I won't hesitate to drop you as bait. That's the limit of my kindness. So before that happens, do me a favor and make full use of your remaining value—show me the dignity of a proper ojō-sama from a distinguished family, and be my lookout tower."
Takumi deliberately imitated that chūnibyō tone.
He casually picked up a burning piece of wood from the ground, handed it back to Maki as a torch, and started moving forward—running out from the trash piles into a space of completely warped, chaotic buildings.
"Hmph… you don't have to tell me that. Don't underestimate me, you bastard…"
Her words, probably tinged with annoyance, were followed by a few grumbles before she began scanning the surroundings carefully.
No matter what, this man had chosen to take along Maki—someone who had lost almost all ability to move and had become little more than dead weight.
Then, until the moment true despair arrived, she must not betray the resolve behind that decision.
Maki's expression turned solemn; in that moment, her resolve was like iron.
And Takumi, carrying her on his back, felt equally overwhelmed with emotion.
His current thought was simple—
'Wow, these legs are so soft, so warm, smooth, and fragrant… I could play with them for a whole year and never get tired of it.'
Shijō Maki was accustomed to wearing short white socks, and since her school uniform was a one-piece dress, her thighs, knees, and part of her lower legs were completely exposed.
Now that Takumi had her on his back, both of his hands were naturally supporting the girl's thighs.
Of course, such perverted thoughts only lasted a brief moment in Takumi's head. Very soon, he refocused, picked up his pace, and began moving quickly through the distorted area.
It was impossible to tell what floor they were on anymore—or even whether the concept of "floors" still had any meaning in a space like this.
But their immediate goal hadn't changed: find the clock—find the way to restore everything.
As long as he could bring Maki to the clock, everything could return to how it had been at the beginning.
Ha… for now, that was all he could believe in.
[Thud—]
Heavy footsteps echoed through the warped architecture.
And just then, a wave of scorching heat surged from behind.
Sensing danger, Takumi sharply twisted his body, dodging midair while shielding Maki. Both of them landed beneath a slanted double bed.
[Boom!]
A violent explosion followed the next instant. Flames swept outward, collapsing the nearby floors, while vast sections of ground and ceiling came crashing down.
Tanaka's tattered backpack flew high into the air before falling again, revealing several homemade bombs inside—damaged by the heat and left untriggered.
Beneath the collapsed floor, layer upon layer of rubble stacked downward.
At the very bottom, within the darkness, a faint red glow flickered—like a doorway straight out of hell—its outline now emerging into view.
On that door hung a rusted, filthy number plate:
[304]
...
The massive explosion had shattered at least five or six floors of walls and ceilings.
When Takumi helped Maki up from the debris, what he saw within the blazing flames was a series of twisted building layers, stretching endlessly upward—no end, no peak, only chaos.
"An explosion this big… high explosives?"
Maki murmured weakly, her face pale, then quickly noticed the abnormalities around them.
But since she could barely move, Takumi took the lead. Grabbing Maki by the shoulders, he lifted her up like a large rag doll, turned swiftly, and began running away from the blast zone at full speed.
The surrounding noises were growing louder.
Within the ruins, countless distorted doors began to stir as the massive commotion awakened more and more of the things lurking inside.
They couldn't afford to be caught by any of those things.
Without a clock to rewind time, if they were captured here, that would truly be the end of everything.
"What is this place, really? It feels like no matter which way we go, it's all the same chaotic structure… Is this even the same apartment building we were in before?"
Maki muttered under her breath while nervously scanning their surroundings.
She had thought that she had already seen enough today to defy common sense—but this hellish place seemed determined to surpass her imagination again and again. The endlessly stacked, shattered clusters of buildings before her looked like scenes of destruction from a disaster movie, yet carried a surreal, otherworldly eeriness that made them even more unsettling.
Could they really find a way out of here—or find the clock hidden somewhere within this place?
Doubt was slowly beginning to creep into the girl's heart.
"This should be the third floor," Takumi answered calmly.
"The third floor? How could that be, with this place looking like…"
Maki froze for a moment, not quite understanding what he meant.
"No matter what Shirakawa Apartments used to be, it's already become an unreasonable, supernatural world. The second floor where we were before might have looked relatively normal because it was far from 304—the most dangerous part of Shirakawa Apartments—and also not as close to the exit on the first floor. But in contrast, the first floor has now been sealed away, making it impossible to leave through normal means. The third floor's distortion expanded outward from 304, engulfing the entire level. This massive, fragmented ruin you see now is what the third floor has become—an endlessly extending wasteland. Well, that's just my guess, but it shouldn't be too far from reality."
Speaking in that calm tone, Takumi continued running forward with Maki on his back.
"304… If I remember correctly, when I looked down through that hole earlier…"
Maki's expression shifted slightly. She hadn't seen clearly at the time, but she still remembered: at the bottom of the ruins exposed by the explosion was a blood-red floor, and on it stood a door—one she hadn't seen in full detail, yet whose mere presence had filled her with dread.
"Yeah, that's right. I think the real rooms of the third floor are all hidden within various areas of these ruins—like the place we were in before, and that hidden area the explosion just exposed."
While answering, Takumi couldn't help but think once again of Tanaka, that veteran player with more tricks than he'd shown so far.
Speeding up the clock—what exactly had that guy gained from it, to the point that he dared to risk dragging the apartment's time into the night?
Was it because something had to be explored only after dark, or did some sort of profit drive him to take the risk—or perhaps there was another reason altogether?
Whatever the reason, he was now dead beyond saving. Whether he'd ever regretted his actions, no one could say.
That said, judging from his behavior so far, he at least possessed some kind of supernatural item capable of hypnosis or manipulation—perhaps the same type of "Obsession Object" Green had mentioned.
On top of that, he had a gun, shot with decent accuracy, and was both agile and tough. That fake Kaguya, while the weakest among the anomalies Takumi had encountered so far—and currently the only one he could actually fight or escape from—still, judging from how Maki and Tanaka had wrestled with her up close, she had at least Captain America-level physique, the kind that stays standing even with her health locked at zero.
And since Tanaka managed to endure several minutes of beating without dying, it was clear the old man had some real grit too.
That guy even had high-grade explosives in his gear. If he'd used them earlier on the second floor, well… it probably wouldn't have done much except wipe out every player in the area. After all, it didn't seem like these anomalies feared that level of physical attack.
Takumi even wondered idly what would happen if a player somehow brought a nuclear bomb into a rule-based horror story game and detonated it.
It had only been a short moment without danger, yet Takumi's mind had already started brimming with all sorts of random thoughts again.
Up ahead, the twisted roads and scattered furniture stretched endlessly—beds overturned onto the ceiling, cabinets slanted against walls, half-ascending staircases, doors hanging open or closed at odd angles, and piles of garbage bags and rubble scattered everywhere.