Antoine Bush.
The man who played a pivotal role in turning Nutty Putty Cave into a horror attraction—the副本's biggest troublemaker.
Howard Smith, a mere captain in the city fire department, had no means of reaching someone of that stature. He scavenged public records, tracking Bush's speeches, meetings, anything—but it was like chasing smoke. His notes were a mess, directionless.
That changed when he shifted focus to the mayor.
[Military]
The word stood out in Howard's notes.
Out of hundreds of events the mayor attended yearly, about 20 involved military representatives—discussing the civilian adaptation of a certain [military technology].
Howard never figured out what that tech was. The mayor and military reps spouted buzzwords, but all he gleaned was [BUY BUY BUY]. Then he discovered a shell company operating in the city—no employees, no activity. Just a front.
Rustle—
Takakai flipped the page, scanning his surroundings. The fire truck's exterior remained still.
Howard didn't infiltrate the company. He wasn't that bold. Instead, he planted a surveillance camera nearby.
After a month and a half, he caught two midnight entries. Both times, the vehicles headed to one place:
Red Nut Ash Cave.
[Some were clearly military—their demeanor gave it away. Others? Unclear. But they carried strange research equipment. Scientists, maybe?]
[They enter the cave at midnight. I don't know what they do inside. I can't access the cave's nighttime surveillance either.]
[But I've heard night-shift guards disappearing. Always assumed it was the anomalies, but... what if it's something else?]
[I don't know their goal.]
[But... could the cave's horrors be connected to them?]
Howard's notes grew erratic. Takakai sensed the man's turmoil.
He recalled Loop 2—when his team fled the guard's timeline. He'd ordered a rescue member to sprint into the [Gentle Slope].
Back then, he'd seen nothing but the [White Dress Entity].
But the anomaly appeared the moment the rescuer shouted [I'm human!]—before they'd even fully entered the zone. An attack followed, and Takakai got dragged into the [Blood Vessel Pathway].
At the time, he'd missed it.
Or had he?
Takakai closed his eyes.
Maybe he had noticed something. Something buried deep.
He replayed the memory:
Dark caves.
Pitch-black tunnels.
Footsteps.
The entity's gaze.
And—
No.
That wasn't all.
He had seen it.
In the darkness, where his flashlight's beam cut through—
A patch of black unaffected by the light.
Black... clothing.
Takakai's eyes snapped open.
The soldiers' tactical gear.
Fully black, full-body suits.
In the chaos, he'd overlooked them. But now, the memory sharpened.
The research base was built after the cave's lockdown—after the horrors began.
Yet the soldiers and researchers had been entering long before.
The [Gentle Slope] was always a death trap, even without the [White Dress Entity]. Because the real danger was the ghosts of the soldiers and scientists themselves—lingering there, slaughtering intruders on sight.
"Then what's in the[Great Crevice]? If the hauntings started near the[Giant Slide], why focus there? And that thing beneath the crack... What's so special about it?"
One answer led to ten more questions.
The [White Dress Entity] was a later addition—born during the base's final days. Before that, the crevice held no [Core Grudge]-level threat.
So why had the military been obsessed with it?
[The lost ones' memories guide an unquenchable wrath.]
The dungeon's hint resurfaced.
The last rule was obvious: [Don't admit you're human]—avoid the entity's hunt. But the other three remained cryptic.
[The God-Tamperer], [The Pact], [The Lost Ones]... Takakai had assumed the tourists were the [lost ones], but their behavior didn't match [wrath]. Had he missed the real [lost ones]?
As for [The Pact's Proof]... He had a theory.
He glanced at the silver ring in his palm.
Andreas and Hedda's wedding ring.
Andreas's obsession—the vessel of his deepest emotions. Like [Li Zhaodi]'s toy in Shirakawa Apartments, these artifacts were the answers.
In his final moments, Andreas hadn't wished for [escape]. He'd known death was certain.
His true desire?
[To return to his wife.]
This ring was the key. Deliver it to Hedda, and Andreas's obsession would resolve.
Wait. In Andreas's memories, Hedda wore a white dress—
No way.
It hadn't registered before, but now the similarities hit him.
The [White Dress Entity] in the crevice—twisted beyond recognition—but the dress, though bloodied and torn, was identical.
"Did the base...experiment on his wife too?What the hell kind of monsters—"
Takakai exhaled sharply, pocketing the notebook. Time to investigate the next [Grudge Site].
He opened the door—
And froze.
Dripping, bloated firefighters surrounded the truck, their hollow stares locking onto him. Every exit blocked.
"Second time this crap's happened. Do these things just love ambushing people?"
He triggered the [Black Umbrella]. The anomalies faltered, disoriented, before dispersing.
Slipping past, Takakai approached an ornate wooden door and slipped inside.
What awaited him was—