5 Ch.4: System Penalty

"Find the door that will lead you to the real world."

I read the red letter and furrowed my brows when my voice didn't sound like it normally was, it was a bit more high-pitched and smaller.

"Eherm! Eherm!" 

It still sounded the same. Did I ingest something? Nevermind.

"What does this mean? How did I come here?" 

I was at death's door but then got thrown to this place. What is this place, anyway? It looked like my room, but it felt different.

If the letter was asking me to find a door so I could go back, which I have no intention of, then I'd find a window instead. Just ignore it, Atlas. 

I threw the red paper. Why would I follow a note written by someone I don't even know? Am I nuts? Hell, no.

"Better find out about something in this place."

I walked to the desk and opened the drawers, looking for something that may answer my questions aside from the crimson letter. I ransacked the entire room, but there was nothing strange inside aside from small clothes that belonged to a kid. 

I felt graver and graver. 

The walls painted with dark blue suddenly felt like zooming in on me, and my skin felt tighter as if all my sweat and fats were drained and burned, and I felt like a walking skeleton. I moved to the bed and sat sluggishly. Like a frail chick, I wearily swept my hair to my back but was stunned after realizing something was missing. 

My hair was gone!

"NO! MY SILKY HAIR!"

I screamed louder than when I was being chased by a monster. I confessed! The reason I keep pushing the day to visit the barber isn't because I'm busy, but because I like my hair! 

Is it because of that deathly experience that my scalp weakened and my hair got lost when I escaped?!

I frantically looked for a mirror. 

There is still hair on my head! I feel it. I rubbed my head and felt it more, my pupils rolling on the top and the side, trying to glimpse a strand. But my head felt like a ball of chestnut, my hair short and spiky. 

"WHAT IS THIS?! DOES THAT GODDAMN SYSTEM INCLUDES A HAIRCUT?!"

I stopped overacting when I recalled the content of the screen that flashed before.

Escape system. Teleportation. And…

'System Use will include Penalty'!

"Is this the penalty?!"

I wanted to claim my hair back, but my plans to throw a strike were halted when the bed I was sitting on began to move, parts of the surface sunk even when nothing was putting pressure on it. The bed creaked and the small sunken part will revert to flat or sometimes bulged like a torso doing its usual breathing. It began creeping into the whole bed, accompanied by the creepy sound of the bed strings. It's like something invisible was lying on the bed, doing sit-ups.

I stood abruptly when the part I was sitting at sunk. 

"What is happening?"

I slowly stepped away as the creaking of the bed became louder and the whole bed looks like it was getting sucked underneath.

Just when I decided to kneel and look under the bed, an eerie sound of giggling entered my ears. My body froze. While the darkness under the bed started to move. 

Dirty small hands slowly emerged under the bed. The ashen nails bled as it crawled hard on the floor as if it was having a hard time releasing itself from underneath.

"A GHOST!!!"

I screamed. Why does this place keep showing me my worst nightmares?! 

I hurriedly stood, grabbed the doorknob, and threw myself outside. I quickly ran down the stairs.

I calmed down after seeing that the ghost did not follow. Perhaps it didn't know how to open a door, or it was still stuck under the bed. I prayed that the ghost was a fool. 

I scanned the first floor and recognized the same surroundings. This is truly where I was raised. Finally, I found a mirror in the living room; the small coffee table at the center of the carpeted room was made of reflective glass. I walked over and found myself gaping at the reflection.

It was me at the age of twelve! When my guardian dragged me and cut my hair using a razor.

"…what…the hell…?"

I tried to look at the mirror again, and my reflection was still my younger self. This place was my home until I was twelve, and now I stood here, turned back to the same age. Was the escape system meant going back in time? 

But I didn't remember having a ghost inside my room!

I suddenly feel parched and dehydrated. I went to the kitchen to get a drink, quench my thirst, and water my dry and sore throat. 

As soon as I stepped on the tiled floor of the kitchen, I was welcomed by a gust of wind and a fluttering white dress that smelled like mud dug six feet underground.

"…w-what is it this time?!"

The headless lady in a muddy white dress was holding a bread knife and a jar of jam. When it failed to open the jar, it scooped the bloody liquid gushing from its neck instead, before it swiped the bloody knife on the slice of bread on the table. It grabbed the bread and extended it to me. 

I was beyond horrified! Who would even want to eat that shit?! I shook my head, hoping the ghost would understand that I had no intention of tasting her creation.

I almost vomited my guts when I saw the bread with an extra filling of maggots swimming on the bloody surface! 

I shivered and wasted no time; and quickly ran to the main door, grabbed the door open, and stepped out without thinking twice. But to my horror, the door led me back to my room again! 

And this time, the ghost child was sitting properly on the bed, swinging his legs back and forth, while grinning widely at me. His teeth were covered in grime, and the edges of his mouth were covered in foam. His eyes glared at me even though his lips were curved in a creepy smile.

I immediately shut the door and pressed both my hands on it. I need to catch my breath. 

"Hah…hah…."

Tiny giggles came from behind the door, and I almost cried in fear. I almost shout my mother's name.

The twelve-year-old me was scared of ghosts!

And I'd rather fight the terrifying monsters than live in a loop with those scary spirits! 

I ran to the opposite side of the stairs and trod on the corridor leading to other bedrooms. There were four remaining rooms. And the note said 'to find the door that will lead to the real world', yet I had no idea. There wasn't even a hint!

I ran to the nearest door and kicked it open. A white smoke slipped out and it blurred my vision, but heck, I no longer had the strength to watch another horror performance, so I quickly shut the door again.

I went to the next. 

I almost pissed myself when white fingers grabbed the door after I tried to shut it close again. The frail-looking white fingers gripped strongly at the door and the door jamb, opening the door forcefully while the head covered in damp and thick black hair that reached the floor seeped between the cracks. 

A lock of that hair touched my arms, and I almost had the urge to cut the part where it touched. Throwing the door with all my force, I rushed to the next one, abandoning the one occupied by the hairy ghost. 

I opened another!

And another!

Until all the ghosts inhabiting the second floor had introduced themselves to me. Yet I still failed to find the 'right' door.

"ARGH! WHERE IS IT?! WHAT DOOR IS IT? IS IT EVEN A DOOR?! IS IT THE LID ON THE TOILET?! THE DOOR OF THE FRIDGE?! THE CABINET DOOR?! AT LEAST GIVE ME A HINT!"

I cursed my situation and let out all my frustration. 

Because of that note, I forgot to sing a gospel song and wore myself running here and there. When I was younger, whenever I would encounter a strange thing or mistake a mere hallucination for ghosts and spirits, I would just close my eyes and sing a gospel song very loudly, and with the magnificence of my voice, even the ghost would disperse very quickly, traumatized and never bothered me again.

I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply, ready to perform my fight song when suddenly, there was a tap on my shoulder. Who dares interrupt me?

Annoyed from getting stopped, I spun my head to scold whoever that was. But I froze in my spot instead. My knees shook. The one who tapped me was the headless lady in a white dress!

Regaining my senses, I leaped meters away from the headless figure, my body trembled and got goosebumps.

"H-How the heck did you even find me without a head?!"

But the headless figure lifted her hands, and they were holding a paper covered in blood. The writings were of blood as well, and what was written made me stop running away.

The bloody paper contained the words – 'THE DOOR YOU'RE LOOKING FOR IS THE ONLY ONE HIDING'.

I furrowed my brows. It was obviously a hint! But why would the headless ghost help me?

When the figure moved, I backed away a few steps, but it only whirled around and went downstairs again, leaving me dumbfounded. I racked my tiny brain to discern the answer behind the given hint.

"The door you're looking for…is the only one hiding…" I mumbled to myself. My eyes lingered down the stairs and scanned the surroundings until they settled on the door to my room.

The headless lady was right in the kitchen from the start. Could it be that the 'door' wasn't a door? What if it's something else? Why would the note ask me to find the door directly if it's only talking about a normal door? 

I thought deeply – aside from me inside that old house, there were only ghosts, the thing that my younger self feared the most. And among all the ghosts, only one didn't welcome me the way others did. Only one was hiding at the beginning!

I slowly took a step forward to that door. I nervously clicked the door open, and pushed it forward carefully, not letting it create a sound. When my room came into sight, the ghost child was nowhere to be found.