Horror Game Developer: My games aren't that scary!

Chapter 741: VILE – 303 [4]

The silence around me felt heavier than before.

It was as if all noise had been stripped from the air, leaving only lingering tension.

I kept the book open, my eyes moving over the little rows of numbers written across the page. Most had been worked out in pencil, with corrections in a darker hand beside them. A few mistakes had been rubbed out hard enough to thin the paper.

‘…Arithmetic?’

I glanced at the boy beside me. He had opened his book towards the back, where a fresh set of questions waited beneath an unfinished exercise.

“Finish yesterday’s work. I’ll take attendance.”

The voice came from the front, followed by the sound of a page turning. I found the same exercise in my book and reached for the pencil, keeping my movements small as the children started writing around me.

The desk was a little too low for my knees.

I shifted one foot back, taking care not to knock against its legs, and looked towards the board.

Do not answer for another pupil.

‘Right… but it called me Mara.’

Sitting here had kept it from coming after me. Whether it had mistaken me for her or simply hadn’t noticed me yet was another matter. I wasn’t particularly interested in finding out by doing something stupid.

“Rachel Zims.”

“Present.”

A pencil scratched against paper at the front.

“Edward More.”

“Present.”

I recognized the names from the attendance sheet. The teacher was going down the list, and as the next child answered, my throat tightened.

What was I supposed to say when it was my turn?

Would it be able to tell that I was a fake…?

My hand subconsciously drifted towards my pocket, fiddling with the paper from before. I still hadn’t checked the back of Mara’s note.

Keeping the book between my hands and the front desk, I took it out. I opened it beneath the edge of the page and turned it over, exposing a few more lines written along the bottom.

She answers when you call my name, too.

Yesterday you told me not to answer twice.

My breath paused.

“Chris Smalling.”

“Present.”

The answer came from somewhere ahead of me. I looked towards the boy beside my desk before returning to the note.

The pencil had pressed deeply into the last line, leaving marks I could feel through the back of the paper.

‘It’s not just someone being on her chair, but speaking for her as well…?’

I folded the note along its old creases as the teacher called another name, my attention returning to the rule on the board.

‘…Just what in the world happened back then?’

Could ‘Mora’ have been haunted by a sort of anomaly back then?

No, that wouldn’t make sense.

The anomaly was the classroom.

Unless…?

I subtly covered my lips.

“Ryan Klose.”

The teacher continued calling names as its soft gravely voice whispered around the classroom.

My head remained low, not once glancing in the direction of the teacher.

Through the corner of my eye, I could distinctly catch a glimpse of its tall, lanky figure, my throat shifting subtly.

“Present.”

I finished writing the question and waited for the steps to move on. A soft scrape reached me through the door, followed by another footstep further away.

Step!

‘Another one?’

My heart sank.

But either way, there was no point looking for a chance to leave just yet.

By the time the teacher reached the last row, I had copied three questions. I moved to the fourth, keeping the pencil against the page as the child on my left answered.

“Mara Balle.”

My fingers tightened a little.

“Present.”

“⎯!”

A soft voice whispered close to my ear, my pencil breaking at its tip as I pressed down with more force than I wanted to.

“…”

It had sounded like a little girl. The answer was quiet, but there was no mistaking where it had come from. I could see the gap between my desk and the next one without turning my head. There was nothing there besides the boy’s bag hanging from its hook.

He kept writing. At the front, the pencil scratched against the attendance sheet, and the teacher called the last name.

‘Was it even talking to me before?’

I thought back to the voice when the teacher entered. You’re back. My eyes drifted towards the space beside my elbow again. The warmth of the seat had faded beneath me, but I remembered how it had felt when I first sat down.

I carefully adjusted my grip, holding the pencil at an angle to use the little bit of lead that remained.

‘Who answered? What happened to Mora?’

The questions settled inside my mind despite the situation. I already knew that these were the clues to contain this anomaly.

But it wasn’t enough.

I needed⎯

“Show your working.”

My head nearly lifted as the same voice whispered from ahead.

Strangely, its voice seemed even softer than before.

Around me, the children continued writing, some turning back a page before starting again.

Step.

The teacher started moving between the desks. Its footsteps stopped every few seconds, occasionally accompanied by the faint rustle of paper. I could follow its progress without lifting my head, listening as it worked its way towards the back.

The closer it came, the more my back tensed.

‘…Shit, I’ve been half-assing them,’

I went back the first one, working through it as neatly as I could. The arithmetic wasn’t difficult. Keeping my attention on it while listening to the pauses between the footsteps was another matter.

The boy on my right moved his book. It was already near the far edge of his desk, but he shifted it another inch and pulled his arm away from the gap between us. A light scuff came from beside my chair.

My pencil slowed. The boy’s shoes were beneath his own seat, close together, and both of mine were still planted on the ground.

Step.

The teacher was a few desks away when something brushed against my trouser leg, followed by a smaller footstep in the gap. I drew a cold breath.

Nevertheless, I didn’t react. I kept writing, though my eyes had stopped following the numbers.

‘She gets up when you come over.’

The lighter sound moved away from my chair. I could still hear the teacher approaching from further up the aisle, its heavier footsteps stopping at another desk while the smaller ones passed behind me.

I finished the calculation and moved to the next.

Step!

Another step.

But it wasn’t from the teacher. They were too soft for that.

And…

‘Behind me.’

They were behind me.

I pressed my lips tightly, trying to keep myself from looking. With the teacher coming this way, I wasn’t going to turn in my chair to check what had just walked behind it.

A shadow fell across my page as the footsteps stopped.

A heavy silence fell across the room.

Sweat formed against the back of my shirt, my expression shifting as I worked through the next question, taking a little longer than necessary to write each number. There was a faint smell of damp cloth beside the desk, stronger than the smell coming from the books.

“Here.”

Something brushed the top of the page. I followed the movement without looking up, my gaze settling on a number in my first answer.

I’d missed a digit.

“….”

I corrected it, my hand steady in the process as the finger remained pressed against the paper.

“….”

It remained there.

Unmoving as I felt a certain gaze on me. It bore down on me from above, each second feeling longer than the last as I forced my heart rate down.

The gaze continued to hover over me, studying every little movement I made as I tried to breathe as little as possible.

Then⎯

The paper lifted slightly, settling again as the teacher moved on.

Step!

The step sounded again.

I waited until it had stopped at the next desk before looking at the correction.

It had checked my work, but the voice beside my chair hadn’t concerned it at all. I rubbed my thumb against the pencil and continued the exercise, keeping my arm well within the edge of the desk.

‘Just how long is this going to go on for?’

The teacher eventually returned to the front.

For a while, there was only the sound of writing, interrupted whenever someone turned a page. Keeping my hands beneath the desk, I tried to feel my nodes again, hoping that something had changed.

There was still nothing. I couldn’t contact Kyle, and when I turned my wrist to check the time, the numbers didn’t help.

[00:29]

‘…A long way to go.’

I lowered my hand and went back to the questions. From time to time, I glanced towards the gap beside me, but I couldn’t hear the smaller footsteps anymore. That didn’t tell me whether anything had returned.

“Pencils down.”

The scratching stopped, and I carefully laid mine along the edge of the book.

“Class dismissed.”

No one stood immediately. The children remained seated while the teacher moved towards the door, their hands resting on the wood as it opened.

I kept my gaze lowered until I heard the footsteps continue into the corridor.

Only then did the chairs start moving. The boy beside me stood and collected his book. He took care not to let his arm pass over my desk as he stepped away, joining the children filing towards the door.

I waited until several of them had left before standing, the seat creaking beneath my hand as I pushed the chair in.

‘I’m not staying here.’

The lesson was over. Whatever protection sitting with the children had given me, I wasn’t going to assume it would last once they were gone.

But there was something I needed to check before leaving. I followed the last row towards the front, stopping beside the teacher’s desk. The exercise books had been moved aside, leaving the attendance sheet exposed.

All twenty-eight names had a tick beside them. I found Mara’s crossed-out entry and followed it towards the edge of the sheet. Now that the books were out of the way, I could read the small annotation at the end.

Withdrawn — 11 October.

See withdrawal record. School office.

“…Withdrawn?”

I glanced towards the doorway before checking the dates at the top of the attendance columns.

October twelfth. Thirteenth. Fourteenth.

Her name had been marked present on every day after she’d supposedly left.

I took the sheet, folding it around the papers in my pocket. The school office should have the record. It might tell me who had withdrawn her, or at least why they’d crossed her name out while continuing to call it every morning.

The Guild’s description hadn’t mentioned any of this. If I had to spend the next few hours here, I needed to know what had happened to the girl whose seat I’d taken.

A chair scraped behind me. I looked back, expecting to see a child who hadn’t left yet, but every chair was empty.

Near the back, the chair at Seat 27 had been pulled away from the desk. I could see the gap between the seat and the wood, wide enough for someone to stand there.

I remembered the smaller footsteps moving away when the teacher approached. My gaze shifted towards the open doorway. The teacher had already gone, and I couldn’t hear the children anymore either.

Keeping my eyes on the chair, I backed towards the doorway.

I stepped into the corridor without touching the door, my eyes fixed on the seat.

But regardless of how much I looked, nothing appeared to be different about it. More than anything, I couldn’t stay here any longer as I moved out of the classroom and followed the children from behind.

First period had ended.

“⎯⎯”

⎯””⎯