What does it feel like to have a bullet pierce through your skull, drill a hole through your brain, and exit from the other side of your cranium?
Normally, no one would ever truly experience such a thing—because ordinary people would simply drop dead on the spot, robbed of any further sensation.
But Takakai could feel it.
He could feel the pain lingering in his shattered nerves, the chaotic disruption of thought as his brain matter was obliterated.
For a brief moment, his mind blanked entirely. He couldn't think, couldn't even process thought. It was as if his consciousness had been reduced to static.
But soon, his cognitive functions began to recover.
Even though his head had been blown open by a bullet with the force of a rocket, even though the projectile had torn through his skull, nearly vaporizing his brain—he didn't die.
And his awareness was rapidly returning.
This power came from Hirano Sousuke's second blessing—the one that allowed him to survive fatal wounds and fully recover after ten minutes.
Thanks to it, even with his head functionally destroyed, his senses flickered back to life.
And what he saw was an empty, dilapidated room, long abandoned.
A skeleton lay collapsed beside the computer desk, its clothes suggesting it had once been an adult male. Takakai recognized him.
Yoshitaka Saburou.
Over a decade ago, on his way home one night, Yoshitaka had been caught in Shirasawa Elementary's manifestation in the real world. His lover and home had been dragged into the dungeon.
He had tried to escape many times.
Through the computer's timestamps, he realized he had been trapped here for six days. He left behind records—and then died.
Not from supernatural forces.
From starvation and thirst.
Logically, he should have perished by the third or fourth day.
Yet he clung to life until the seventh.
Takakai didn't know why—only that the number 7 held some significance in Shirasawa Elementary.
"Once you pass the seventh day, there's no escape."
That was why Kumai had stressed that they had to rescue Hayasaka before then.
Takakai remembered now.
He had shot Yoshitaka earlier.
That bullet had temporarily sealed the small bedroom, forcing him to wake up in the living room during the next reset.
But because he hadn't targeted the real anomaly, the suppression round had only struck an illusion—a fleeting phantom.
The effect hadn't lasted.
Soon, he had woken up in the bedroom again.
But this time—
He had made the right choice.
Staggering forward, his head still a ruined mess, Takakai stepped out of the bedroom and into the living room.
The children were gone.
But unlike the false phantoms, they hadn't simply vanished.
They had left on their own after seeing him shoot himself.
These children were real cursed entities—not mere illusions conjured by the dungeon based on names or memories.
Why had they approached him, only to retreat now?
He didn't know.
And right now, he didn't have time to find out.
"I need to find Kaguya."
He remembered reuniting with her once before.
But after entering that small bedroom, a doppelgänger—a fake version of himself spawned from Kaguya's perception—had locked the door.
In the subsequent resets, he hadn't been able to reach her again.
Because the hallway leading to her had been sealed by another illusion—this one based on Takai, a figure conjured from his own mind.
"Illusions."
That was the temporary name Takakai had given them.
They were manifestations of Shirasawa Elementary's rules.
Once a player learned someone's name—whether through documents, photos, or other records—the dungeon would latch onto that impression and materialize a phantom only they could see.
These phantoms existed solely within the player's perception.
Look away, and they disappeared—along with all memory of them.
From what Takakai could tell, this phenomenon had distinct traits:
Only the dead could be instantly conjured. Living people required direct observation (like seeing Kaguya or his own reflection) before their illusions formed.
The effect was contagious. During their brief reunion, Kaguya had started seeing Yoshitaka and Takai after encountering him—just as he had begun seeing Miyazawa Hana.
Most crucially, the illusions were designed to mimic "teammates." They wouldn't raise suspicion—but given the chance, they would sabotage the player.
Like locking doors.
Imposing an [Unopenable] state.
That was why he hadn't been able to reach Kaguya again.
Strangely, these illusions shouldn't have physical form. They existed purely in the mind.
Yet when they "locked" a door, it stayed locked.
Was it the player's perception of the door that was being altered—not the door itself?
Takakai had no answers.
Just as he had no explanation for Shirasawa Elementary's reset mechanism—how the slightest misstep could send players back to the starting point, memories wiped clean.
Writing on his hand had worked—once.
But the second reset erased even that.
Was it because he violated some unspoken [Role]?
Or was there a hidden rule in each room—break it, and the loop restarts?
"Damn it. Why can't I get one simple dungeon for once?"
By now, Takakai had reached the locked door in the living room.
Like before, it refused to budge.
Once sealed, it became [Indestructible].
The walls were no different—no forcing his way through.
Perhaps because, in a child's world, walls can't be broken. Locked doors stay locked.
Unless—
BANG!
He drew his pistol and fired.
The bullet struck the lock mechanism from the other side.
Click.
The door swung open.
He repeated the process down the hallway, through the grand hall, and finally to the bedroom where Kaguya had started.
This time, he didn't need a bullet.
The key was already in the lock.
Takakai pulled it free, examining it.
Dirty. Faint fingerprints. Child-sized.
Had one of the children left it here deliberately?
No time to ponder.
Eight and a half minutes remained.
He turned the key.
The door opened.