"The only rule of this game is simple: survive.
It is also a game with a survival rate of nearly ninety-seven percent. Thirty people enter. Statistically speaking, sacrificing a single person to the Devil should be enough to keep everyone else safe.
But that's only true in theory.
A man holding a knife is still a man holding a knife, even if he has no intention of using it.
Isolation and contempt come first.
Suspicion comes second.
So tell me, how do you win the game without ever drawing the knife?
Simple.
Become the scapegoat yourself.
By the logic we've discussed, the black sheep is the devil.
Then the white sheep must be the sacrifice.
Quan... I have a plan.
A plan that will free me from being the devil."
A brief silence followed.
"But remember this.
If you can still remember these words...
forget them.
It may hurt.
It may be unbearable.
It may drive you insane.
But do it anyway.
The pain won't be pleasant."
Another pause.
"Remember only these two sentences.
This is a message from me...
to myself."
"AGGHHHHHHHHHH!"
Quan shot upright from the bed.
His body folded forward as he struggled to catch his breath.
He clutched his head and retched violently, trying to suppress an indescribable agony rising from somewhere deep inside him.
His skin itched.
No.
It burned.
He immediately clawed at his neck like a madman, digging his fingernails into his own flesh.
His pupils darted wildly.
The dark brown of his eyes seemed to drown beneath spreading veins of crimson.
"Agh..."
A wet cough escaped him.
Then he vomited across the blankets.
His entire body collapsed forward as consciousness began slipping away.
Violent tremors ran through his limbs.
The last fragments of rational thought were being stripped away from him.
BANG!
"God damn it!"
The door burst open.
Lunas rushed inside carrying a medical kit and a syringe filled with sedatives.
"Easy! Relax! Stop fighting it!"
He grabbed Quan's arm, quickly searching for a vein.
His intention was to inject the sedative and calm him down, but Quan's violent resistance made the process dangerously difficult.
Lunas wrapped both arms around him, trying to restrain him without causing further injury.
"Drugs? ACE-3? Did Ron give this to you? Hey! Can you hear me?"
He tried to pull Quan's hands away from his neck.
Then he froze.
The fingers were already broken.
Several had been bent backward at unnatural angles.
Quan's neck was covered in fresh scratches.
Some of them were so deep they resembled knife wounds.
Fortunately, the major blood vessels appeared mostly intact.
The bleeding could still be controlled.
Without wasting another second, Lunas reached for a bedsheet nearby.
He lunged forward.
With a swift motion, he wrapped Quan's arms and pinned them down before using his own weight to keep him from thrashing.
"Damn it!"
One hand released its grip long enough to grab the syringe.
Without hesitation, he drove the needle through the thin layer of cloth he had intentionally left exposed.
Thunk.
"Calm down. I'm already being as gentle as I can!"
The syringe was tossed aside.
Lunas focused entirely on keeping Quan stable.
Then his expression darkened.
"Shit! Stop biting your tongue!"
Blood was flowing from Quan's mouth.
Lunas immediately lifted him and placed him in a recovery position on the bed.
He loosened the buttons on Quan's shirt and adjusted a pillow beneath his neck to keep his airway clear.
Then something unexpected happened.
Quan moved his lips.
Barely.
Weakly.
"...W-Who... are... you...?"
No sound emerged.
Yet the exhaustion in those eyes made the question unmistakable.
Instinctively, Lunas answered.
"Lunas. Branch One Director of One Line."
He forced a reassuring smile.
"You're not dead. I'm here to help."
He expected those words to calm Quan.
Instead, the opposite happened.
The veins along Quan's neck suddenly became visible.
Blue lines surfaced beneath the skin of his face.
Blood began trickling from the corners of his mouth.
Then more followed.
A dark stream stained the pillow beneath him.
Mixed within it were tiny fragments of torn flesh.
"Damn it!"
Lunas immediately adjusted the pillow again, lowering Quan's head to prevent blood from choking him.
He reached into the medical kit, pulled out a roll of gauze, and began wrapping it around Quan's neck to control the bleeding.
Halfway through the first layer, he stopped.
His hands froze.
Beneath the pale skin, something was moving.
At first he thought it was a hallucination.
Then he looked again.
The shapes were still there.
Tiny bulges crawled beneath the skin.
Like worms.
Like ants.
Like countless insects struggling to surface from underneath the flesh.
The movement was so vivid that it made his stomach turn.
Lunas glanced toward Quan.
Quan was looking back at him.
Tears shimmered at the corners of his eyes.
Yet there was almost nothing left behind that gaze.
Only exhaustion.
Only emptiness.
"...R-Ron...?"
His lips moved weakly.
Trying to say something.
Trying to communicate.
Lunas frowned.
Sweat dripped down his face.
For the first time since entering the room, uncertainty gripped him.
Then Quan's eyelids slowly lowered.
The strength left his body.
His consciousness drifted away.
Deeper.
Deeper.
Into a darkness so complete that nothing remained.
Not even pain.