Reborn as a Prophet in a Horror Movie

#109Reader Mode

#109

“Uuugh…”

Seojun let out a pained groan, frowning as he tried to work out the kinks in his back and shoulders with the gavel. He’d been so engrossed in the notebook that he hadn’t even noticed his muscles tensing up, protesting every time he moved. No surprise, really. Getting kidnapped by someone who knocked people out without a second thought and then tying them to a chair was far from a relaxing spa experience.

He clicked his tongue in frustration, shooting a glance at the discarded rope coiled on the floor like a shed snakeskin.

On second thought, those ropes were probably just for show, weren’t they? Maybe the kidnapper’s intent was to make his captives squirm in guilt rather than actually restrain them.

If that was his plan, it explained a lot. The bindings were loose on purpose, not to stop someone from escaping, but to let them stew in their own guilt once their supposed crimes had been “exposed”.

Seojun let out a scornful laugh at the absurdity of it all.

What was the point of setting up this whole elaborate stage if they had the wrong guy in the hot seat? He wasn’t even the first one to get kidnapped. According to the Wizard’s testimony, there were others who’d suffered the same fate. Somewhere in this creepy mansion were the bodies of past victims—people snatched by the same lunatic, killed, and discarded like trash. It just didn’t add up. How could there be a steady stream of criminals when there was only one actual victim, the murdered woman?

It’s not unheard of for multiple people to team up and commit a murder, but the fact that I’ve been dragged into this mess is proof enough of the kidnapper’s irrational thinking.

Seojun was certain—there was no connection between him and these people. Not in this life, and definitely not in his past one. He didn’t need to question it; the fact was crystal clear in his mind. As he sat there, Seojun mindlessly tapped the back of his neck with the gavel in his hand. The wooden mallet struck metal, sending a sharp, jarring ring through the air.

“Argh, damn it!”

The sudden sound startled him more than he cared to admit, and he muttered a curse under his breath. Foolish. Thankfully, or maybe not, it wasn’t enough to trigger the restraint. At least he could take comfort in knowing that accidental contact wouldn’t make it explode and blow his body up into pieces.

Seojun wiped the cold sweat beading on his forehead, his heart still pounding, his mind racing. It took a minute for his pulse to settle back down. Once he was sure the restraint was still inactive, he went back to his half-hearted massage, using the gavel to work out the knots in his neck. It helped lift his gloomy mood, but the lingering tension still hung over him like a dark cloud.

But what about D? There was barely a mention of her in the diary. Did she not matter as much in all of this?

From the little Seojun could piece together from the journal, D had endured far more painful experiments than the others—S, L, and T, who had come before her. The researchers, driven by their mad dream of creating an invisible person, had treated her body like a disposable vessel for their ambitions. As their desperation grew under pressure from their sponsor, they became obsessed with D, neglecting the other test subjects.

Anyone with a self-centered streak might have felt lucky to escape such scrutiny. But S, L, and T—who had endured their own horrific experiments—felt only pity and anger on D’s behalf. The more Seojun read, the more he sympathized with the four test subjects. They weren’t just names on a page anymore; they were real people who had suffered unimaginably.

Seojun rubbed his heavy eyelids with the back of his hand, feeling exhaustion settling in. He reached for his sketchbook, flipping through its pages with a weary sigh. Now wasn’t the time to be sympathizing with others, but he couldn’t shake off the suffocating feeling creeping up on him. He needed a distraction, even if only for a short while.

[Have you found anything?]

After a few moments of hopping around with his sketchbook held up, the Wizard finally seemed to notice the message. The speaker crackled to life, but not before a piercing feedback screech ripped through the room, making Seojun wince. Did the Wizard just bump the microphone?

– I found… Well, not much has changed. The guy who grabbed us is still out cold, and… Ah.

Seojun’s head snapped up. Ah?

The Wizard suddenly fell silent. Through the speaker, Seojun could hear the faint rustling of fabric, which could only mean the Wizard was moving around. The uneasy pit in Seojun’s stomach deepened with every second of silence, his anxiety growing by the minute.

– His body… it’s getting hotter. Like, way hotter.

[What?]

– Not me, Oz. I’m talking about him. He’s heating up like a furnace. If this keeps up, his brain might fry, don’t you think?

Seojun didn’t need clarification on whose body was hot or not. He didn’t even bother reacting to the Wizard’s offhand comment. The rising fever, the swelling on the man’s head, and the complete lack of response despite being slapped… it all painted a grim picture.

For both Seojun and the Wizard, the kidnapper was a double-edged sword—dangerous alive, but equally problematic if he died. If he regained consciousness, there was a chance he could overpower the Wizard. On the other hand, if he died, they’d lose their only lead on getting out of here.

And then what? Would they be left to rot here, trapped and slowly starving to death, one by one?

The ideal scenario was for the kidnapper to regain consciousness, but only just barely. That way, they could restrain and threaten him into revealing a way out. It was the cleanest, least violent option.

But, as if determined to spite them to the very end, even in his unconscious state, the kidnapper teetered on the edge of death. Any lingering sympathy Seojun had for the four youths, along with his own exhaustion, vanished in an instant. Anxiety took its place, prompting him to pace the room restlessly. He tried to calm himself by flipping through his sketchbook, but his efforts were in vain.

– Oh, I found something, by the way.

The Wizard’s voice came through casually, like they weren’t in the middle of a life-or-death situation.

– A photo, yeah. Could be a clue. Let me explain.

Seojun’s irritation simmered at the Wizard’s nonchalant tone, like he was lounging by the pool instead of trapped in this creepy place. Had he stumbled upon a fever reducer for their kidnapper and just forgotten to mention it? Seojun’s pencil wrote out a furious question on the page, his strokes quick and jagged.

[What about the kidnapper? How’s he doing?]

– I told you, still burning up. It’s been a minute, relax. You’re an adult, right? Have a little patience.

The Wizard’s laughter was light, almost playful, as if Seojun’s concern was a ridiculous joke. Seojun’s grip on the pencil tightened, his knuckles whitening with anger. He bit back the urge to fling the sketchbook across the room, to lash out at the infuriating calm on the other end of the speaker.

“What’s so damn funny, you crazy bastard?! We’re in deep shit right now!” Seojun’s shout echoed off the walls, only to be swallowed by the emptiness. It was like screaming into a void—no matter how much he cursed, only his own echoes responded. It was like spitting in his own face.

Meanwhile, the Wizard’s voice floated through the speaker, soft and soothing, almost like a grandmother telling a bedtime story.

– The photo’s in black and white, but something’s weird about it. There are these tiny red and green dots scattered all over, like old TV static. It shows two people standing in front of a large three-story mansion. One’s a man in a white lab coat, and the other… tall, dressed in a hospital gown. Barefoot. I can’t tell if it’s a man or a woman… the image is too blurry. There’s writing above the photo, pointing to the mansion. The first and second floors say ‘Corpus,’ and the third says ‘Caput.’

[Why do you think it’s a house?]

– You can barely make out the front door in the photo, but above it, there’s a semicircular window.

The Wizard’s deduction sounded spot on, more than just plausible. What mattered most was that Seojun agreed with him. According to the legend Tim had shared, the lab had been disguised as a regular house. If that was true, then the building they were stuck in wouldn’t resemble some sleek, high-security facility. It would blend in, look almost… welcoming. Like a home.

[What do you think ‘Caput’ and ‘Corpus’ mean?]

Seojun’s handwriting, already a mess, degenerated into near-illegibility as he scribbled the unfamiliar words in a hurry. There was a brief pause, likely because the Wizard needed a moment to decipher the chicken scratch.

– I know ‘Caput.’ It’s Latin for ‘head.’ So, if the third floor’s labeled ‘Caput’…

“Ah.”

Seojun’s breath hitched, his eyes widening in a flash of insight. The word ‘head’ had triggered a buried memory, and his fingers flew across the pages of his notebook, desperate to find what he needed. Every second felt like an eternity, his hands shaking with urgency. Finally, he stopped on the page he was searching for.

「Thanks to him, we’re stuck living in this limbo, with the head separated from the body. At least they can only monitor us through the head, so we’ve got some breathing room.」

He had glossed over it before, thinking it was just an odd detail, but now, with the Wizard’s insight, the words snapped into focus, taking on a whole new level of significance.

When ‘S’ mentioned “they,” he was talking about the researchers, who were always watching, always monitoring the test subjects living in the mansion’s main structure—its ‘body’. But that wasn’t the key part. The crucial detail was this: the researchers only paid close attention when the subjects ventured into the mansion’s ‘head’ – the part marked as ‘Caput’, the third floor.

Seojun’s hand shook like a leaf, and he had to clamp it down with his other hand to try and steady himself. His handwriting was barely legible as he forced himself to keep writing, his heart racing with the implications.

[Wizard, I think I know where you are. You’re in Caput, the third floor of the mansion.]

The third floor—Caput—where the CCTV control room sat, silently monitoring the Invisible Man’s mansion. But despite the weight of Seojun’s realization, the Wizard responded with nothing more than a soft, almost indifferent hum. No shock, no surprise. Not even a flicker of acknowledgment that matched the gravity of Seojun’s discovery.

That lack of reaction, the Wizard’s casual disinterest had a strange effect on Seojun. His frantic heartbeat began to slow, calming the storm in his chest. The room around him felt still, neutral, neither hot nor cold. His panic, once all-consuming, began to recede.

Then, without warning, the Wizard’s laughter erupted through the speaker.

– Are you saying you’re coming to find me?

The voice crackled and warped through static, distorted just enough to sound unnatural, almost painful to hear. But it wasn’t the distortion that made Seojun shiver… it was the man behind the voice, his laughter sending a chill through him.

The Wizard’s tone was soft and gentle, cutting through the mechanical filter with a strange, almost eerie kindness. Yet beneath that softness lay an unsettling emptiness, a vacuum where emotion should be. It was a chilling indifference that lingered in the air, like a threat cloaked in false warmth.

– I’d appreciate it if you did. After all, we’re comrades now, aren’t we? I’ll do my part for Oz as well.

It was simple for him. Seojun could pinpoint the difference because he had once known a voice just as kind, just as gentle. That voice had been alive, overflowing with warmth. He had felt the joy radiating through it, seen the happiness sparkle in those familiar blue eyes that met his. Every laugh had been rich with affection, grounding him in a sense of belonging.

But this voice? It was a pale imitation, a hollow shell of what true kindness sounded like. Cold. Indifferent. Devoid even of mockery! The Wizard’s words grated against Seojun’s nerves like a dull blade.

Ugh, listen to this guy. Even when he offers help, he sounds smug. What a damn arrogant bastard.

Any fleeting sense of camaraderie dissolved instantly. Seojun scoffed, backing away from the dangerous edge of trust he had almost—foolishly—leaned into.

A strategic ally, nothing more. Just until we get out.

They weren’t friends. The Wizard’s attitude made that perfectly clear. So why should Seojun play along, bending over backward to accommodate him? Annoyance flared, and with a sharp crack, Seojun slammed the gavel down on the podium in front of him, the force causing the stand to wobble. The plain notebook, resting near the edge, teetered before falling to the floor with a dull thud.

The Wizard’s voice, startled and now tinged with something closer to sincerity, crackled through the speaker.

– Ozz? What’s going on all of a sudden?

But Seojun, too weary to care, waved him off without even looking at the CCTV camera. He bent down to retrieve the fallen notebook, his movements slow and heavy, weighed down by the exhaustion pressing on him.

When he opened the notebook, the pages fell to one he hadn’t read before. His indifferent gaze skimmed the lines, only for his brows to furrow as something caught his attention.

「My God, it actually worked! S, you saw it too, right? D became completely transparent! She was walking around, and we couldn’t see her, only her shoes. You saw it too, didn’t you? Until now, I thought these researchers were mad, like rabid guard dogs! But now… Oh my God! D really became invisible!」

The handwriting trembled with excitement, practically shouting at him from the page. Seojun read it again, and then again, his mind reeling. This wasn’t one of his hallucinations. The letters remained solid, unmoving.

The invisibility experiment had succeeded.