Chapter: 30
Chapter 30 – Room 103, Cursed Room – ‘Animal Farm’ (4)
[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)]
[Date: Day 12]
[Current Location: Floor 1, Room 103 (Cursed Room – Animal Farm)]
[Sages Advice: 3]
—
My chest felt stuffy. Breathing was a struggle.
A fiery sensation surged from deep within my heart, scorching its way up through my esophagus.
The sound of the gunshot that pierced Seungyub’s heart still echoed in my ears.
But why?
I distinctly told him to run away! I said not to overexert himself and that it was fine if I ended up dying alone!
And yet, that silly goose not only failed to escape, but he provoked the farmer dangerously, leading him all the way to the barn.
The price? A single bullet.
The consequence for a wolf taunting a human armed with a gun was brutal.
I must be patient. It’s still not over.
All we needed was to survive.
If we could just make it out, the fool who died trying to save me would rise up again.
I could scold him for not listening to me and give him a good whack on the head for good measure, and then…
Maybe I’ll help Seungyub meet Ahri more frequently? Ah, I guess I should consider Ahri’s feelings in this too.
I twisted my thoughts around like a pretzel.
Trying to think of how to escape and what to do once we’re safe helped calm my emotions a bit. I slowly froze my anger; it would be useless.
Unlike the green monster in those movies that grows stronger with rage, that doesn’t apply to me.
Anger only leads to foolish decisions.
As my emotions froze, the reason began to surface, warning me with red flags.
One of my legs was shattered. It was definitely not functioning like it should.
While fighting against three wolves, I had to keep my eyes on the one in front of me. Meanwhile, one behind bit my leg so ferociously that I could barely stand.
Rat King (Kim Mooksung): Is everyone okay?
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): Situation resolved. No other issues. One wolf dead, cow injured.
Pig (Cha Jinchul): How bad is the injury?
Black Cow (Han Kain): It’s severe on the leg.
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): More variables have been introduced. Information gathering is necessary.
More variables.
Looks like my sister is thinking the same as I am.
She’s right.
The farm was a chaotic scene, with livestock injured and groaning in pain.
I could hear the family members sobbing miserably here and there.
The wolf incident wasn’t entirely over yet. Only about ten wolves had actually died, and more than thirty remained lurking in the area.
From our perspective, things had become even more perilous.
With Seungyub gone, we had no way to assess the pack’s movements, making it even more difficult to predict what would happen on this farm.
Then an ominous thought crossed my mind.
Would there really be a farmer who continues to raise a cow with a shattered leg?
That ominous thought soon became reality.
Kim Cat (Kim Ahri): They’re talking about recovery plans for the family.
Kim Cat (Kim Ahri): The mood is grim. The wife insists on selling the farm.
Kim Cat (Kim Ahri): The husband wants to handle the livestock first.
Kim Cat (Kim Ahri): Discussions about slaughtering the injured cows have arisen.
Ah, I knew it.
Nothing strange there.
I had never actually participated in farm work, and I was probably just meant for the chop, being a beef cow.
But a beef cow with a serious leg injury… how many would actually call a vet to treat it instead of sending it off to the butcher?
Still, I had come to terms with it.
It wasn’t a time to kill someone else just for my survival. If I did that, it would lead to everyone’s doom.
Black Cow (Han Kain): I’m prepared. No more rescue needed. Let’s hope for escape.
Yeah, this feels right.
At this point, I decided to maintain a relaxed mindset.
It seemed better to die at the farmer’s hands than being devoured by wolves; after all, he wouldn’t go out of his way to torment me.
He’d use his tools and put an end to it quickly.
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): No, we are changing the strategy.
Black Cow (Han Kain): I’m really okay—
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): → From now on, I’ll write everything, so let’s all hush!
The situation is different from the Mansion of Fear; I had made a misjudgment.
Mansion of Fear: The danger was uncertain. We had to find it through sacrifice.
Animal Farm: The enemy is clear. Sacrifice has no meaning, it’s just a loss of personnel. We must strike while our forces are intact.
Rat King (Kim Mooksung): Are the farmers’ family the enemies?
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): The farmer (Park Seungyub) was killed; both Goose (Yu Songee) and Cow (Han Kain) are at risk. It’s clear the family is the enemy in Room 103.
Eunsol-noona’s reasoning was crystal clear.
In the Mansion of Fear, the risks we uncovered (corrupted priest, possessed Songee, the depths demon, and moving statues) remained murky until the end.
We had to sacrifice a few to identify the threat.
In contrast, the risks in Animal Farm were already apparent!
The family had repeatedly threatened our lives and had already killed one of us.
In this situation, additional sacrifices held no value. Instead, we needed to act as quickly as possible while we still had most of our strength!
After hearing her explanation, I clapped my non-existent hands in my mind, struck by the brilliance of the plan.
This was it!
I felt a wave of relief wash over me. Following this strategy meant I wouldn’t need to be the sacrificial lamb!
As expected, everyone began crafting a plan with the understanding that we had to act before I ended up on the butcher’s block.
Tomorrow, we would bring this cursed farm down!
—
Yu Songee
Is this really the right approach?
While I tidied my feathers with my beak, a cascade of thoughts filled my mind.
Farm Destruction Strategy.
Everyone had started discussing in detail how to bring the farm down effectively and how to obliterate the family.
Something feels… off.
But I couldn’t pinpoint what exactly it was. For some reason, this didn’t seem like the right course of action, yet I couldn’t explain why.
I kept feeling that everyone was acting out of emotion.
I can understand why they were angry; the farmer’s family kept threatening us, and Seungyub died right before our eyes. I felt like crying too.
But this just feels… wrong.
Goose (Yu Songee): Is this plan correct?
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): Any thoughts?
Goose (Yu Songee): Feels like something’s not right.
I sounded foolish. I regretted saying that as soon as it left my beak.
Everyone else was coming up with life-or-death strategies, and my only counter was this vague feeling of something being off.
It sounded dumb, but I truly couldn’t articulate it in any other way.
El Doggy (Elena): Songee doesn’t have to leave the barn; just sit tight.
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): The Boar and the Snake are vital. Don’t worry!
Ah.
They probably thought I was saying that because I was scared. In an instant, I understood how others perceived me, and it stung.
A timid young student who couldn’t engage in important matters. A target of concern.
I get it. Up until now, my contributions had just been for others to consider me.
And still… it hurt. I didn’t want to be a burden.
As for the older siblings, that’s one thing, but feeling inferior to someone younger like Seungyub or Ahri is embarrassing.
Ahri is at least a disaster management recruit, but Seungyub was just a middle school kid who threw himself into danger to save Kain-oppa and ended up dead.
What am I even doing?
While I was lost in these gloomy thoughts, the operation concluded.
Since I had nothing else to do, I decided to head to the outskirts of the goose enclosure to see the monster once more.
It was late at night.
Only when the darkness deepened to a point where I couldn’t see my own body without the silver moon shining above did a shadowy figure emerge from the shadows.
Just like yesterday.
The moment the figure appeared, an eerie silence enveloped the surroundings.
The animals fell quiet as if nothing was happening, and the noise from the farm family, which seemed to be having a lively discussion, vanished into thin air.
The dark figure scanned the area as though observing something and then approached me.
I was sure of it. Despite its lack of eyes and an unclear shape, I somehow knew.
Like the day before, that being approached me, fully aware of my presence.
Maybe it was a second encounter? It didn’t frighten me as much as the first time. A long tentacle extended towards me from the approaching figure.
As if the walls of the breeding barn were nothing but water, the tentacle stretched through, playfully tapping my head a few times.
This time, it even brushed through the feathers I had tidied up!
What was this? This behavior felt oddly… familiar.
About thirty minutes passed.
The shadowy form melted away into the air, disappearing without any forewarning like the first time it had appeared.
—
[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)]
[Date: Day 13]
[Current Location: Floor 1, Room 103 (Cursed Room – Animal Farm)]
[Sages Advice: 3]
—
I woke up as the sun rose. The leg pain that had kept me tossing and turning through the night had lessened significantly.
Today, things were about to get real busy!
Gone were the days of sitting idly in the barn, going Moooo without a clue of what to do.
It seemed everyone was on the same wavelength, as we promptly began our morning operation briefing.
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): Night squad? What about the gun?
Kim Cat (Kim Ahri): The gun is broken.
Clever Snake (Lee Eunsol): Operation starts. Cats, pigs, dogs, go! Cows, get ready. I’m in position.
Finally, we were ready to begin. It was time to dish out some payback for all the suffering we endured.
On the fourth day at the horrifying Animal Farm:
We finally commenced our operation to demolish the farm.
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