Bailonz Street 13

I was afraid of him.

There was always a man by my side while I wandered the dark streets.

This is just figurative speech, but partially true: no matter where I was, that man would always walk beside me.

It was truly strange. How could one person be so blindly devoted to another? It seemed impossible.

…So, he was a frightening person.

When I first saw him, that’s what I thought.

How can such a person exist? Even setting aside his god-like appearance, when he looked at me with those awe-inspiring eyes, fear was my first reaction.

His eyes, like the misty gray sky of London, only reflected me. It was as if I were the entire world to him.

There was a hint of familiarity in his gaze.

Some might find such feelings very romantic, but I… I wanted to run away.

The reason was simple…

“Help me. I’m trapped in a game, and an NPC is obsessed with me.”

Anyone would laugh if I said that.

“Stop playing games and get some sleep.”

People would probably give me that kind of advice. If I could have, I would have done it a long time ago. It’s so frustrating that I could die.

“It’s a horror game. When did it turn into a dating simulator?”

It was something that should never have happened.

A bug, yes, a bug. This is no different than a bug occurring and making him act this way.

The man, who seemed to be bugged, then spoke.

“I thought I had hidden my thoughts and feelings about you well.”

What did he want to say? I wondered.

His gray eyes were still fixed on me.

Now that I think about it, it was like that from the beginning. From the moment I started the game with this character, his gaze was always fixed on me. He found me among the crowd and followed me with his eyes, watching whatever I did.

My mouth went dry, probably because of his gaze. Or maybe it was because of his eyes that persistently followed me.

“Jane Osmond.”

He called me. I didn’t answer.

There’s a word people use to describe accepting the inevitable helplessly: fate.

His hand cupped my cheek. His moist breath was suddenly close. The blue moonlight rested on his forehead, lingered over his eyes, and slid down his cheek.

Some things are inevitable. For me, this man is one of them. I closed my eyes.

A voice was heard. I wasn’t sure if it was me speaking or someone else. But one thing was certain, the words echoed in my ears and lingered in my mind.

─”Jane, this is a game.”

“This is a game.”

And I opened my eyes.

Currently, I am a beta tester for a VR game being sold by “Punk” this quarter.

“Punk” is a well-known game platform among gamers. It sells games of all genres, from big corporate releases to indie creations. Because of this, many users buy games during the frequent seasonal sales.

Among the games I bought this way, horror games are my favorite. I can’t get enough of watching and playing anything horror-related. Thinking back, this might be the main reason my life started to go off track.

Recently, I started a new game set in 19th-century England, a seamless thrill-shock-suspense-horror-murder mystery.

It sounds complicated, but it boils down to a horror game. I’m not sure why they promoted it with “thrill-shock-suspense” as key phrases. Maybe they just wanted to throw everything in there.

The title is <Misty London: Bailonz Street>, a VR horror game.

In its early development, it was criticized as a survival horror genre knock-off, a common game. Critics and seasoned gamers alike pointed out its flaws and ridiculed it.

Then, just when people started to forget about it, thinking it had failed, a playable demo suddenly appeared. The game company easily overturned the “failed game” sentiment and garnered high scores.

Excellent settings, excellent in-game graphics, excellent sound!

Members of the Punk community, including myself, were quite excited about the game’s release. Each element was intriguing, and the developers promised to twist the clichés of horror games.

That was three months ago. Finally, the long-awaited beta test day arrived.

The beta test only covers “Chapter 1”. The rest will be available in the full release. They likely released this beta version to check if the VR game interacted properly with players. I heard it had voice recognition scripts.

Anyway, today is the weekend, the weather is perfect, I have no plans with friends, and the semester is over, so no professors or assignments will bother me. It’s the ideal environment for immersing myself in the game. I put on my VR headset and settled into my chair.

The game started. I heard the fan whirring in the console. Was it the fan? I don’t know much about computer structures.

My vision flickered white, and after a moment, the game title appeared in elegant script:

[Bailonz Street. 13.]

It felt like it was handwritten. I heard the sound of ink spreading on paper and the scratch of a pen. The pen strokes were heavy. Was it a man? Two drops of ink splattered and spread from the pen tip.

Wait, are we starting right away? Just like that? No introduction to the developers or anything?

Before I had more time to wonder, music began to play, and then…

And then I was screwed. In English, it starts with F and ends with K, that word, you know.

“No, no, cancel! I said cancel! Excuse me! You crazy voice recognition game! Ahh!”

It was a truly terrifyingly perverse game.

Interacting with objects, communicating with NPCs, and choosing dialogue options all created cause-and-effect relationships. When certain conditions were met, specific events were triggered. These events helped predict the conclusion and solve the case to reach the ending. That seemed to be the overall system.

‘How am I supposed to do anything when they tell me nothing….’

I made a mistake within five minutes of starting the game and had to retry. I ran away screaming and got killed.

I didn’t even know why. I just died. The cutscene when I died was so realistic that I wondered if I had actually been murdered.

My vision blurred. In the dark alley, I saw blood pooling on the ground.

Restart.

* * *

Let’s talk about the characters while the game is loading.

There are two playable characters: John Osmond and Jane Osmond.

John Osmond is a detective, who can freely use weapons and leverage public authority, while Jane Osmond, as a civilian, is better at gathering information and blending in with people.

Additionally, Jane’s advantage is that she can save the game at any time. Normally, in games like this, you have to interact with specific objects to save, but in Jane’s case, she can save on the last page of her notebook. There are only nine slots, but you can overwrite existing data.

So, you don’t need to find a save table or vase while being chased by a murderer. This is the best advantage. In this type of game, finding strategies through infinite save and reload is the best method, especially in hard mode.

I chose Jane Osmond.

Her job is an assistant to a detective. She lives in a small room in the detective’s office, with a contract to deduct a portion of her monthly salary for rent. Even so, finding such a spacious flat with a kitchen, living room, and all necessary amenities in London for this price is not easy.

Anyway, Liam Moore doesn’t overwork Jane unless they are on a case. During cases, he asks for Jane’s opinions and sometimes jokes that our two brains are better than all of Scotland Yard combined.

The loading is complete. The settings seems familiar now—a boarding house.

We work together from this office-boarding house. Since we’ve been living together from the start, people around us sometimes call me “Mrs. Moore.”

When that happens, I don’t respond, and Liam silences them with a few stern words like, “What kind of mind do you people have?”

When the game first started, the man in front of me asked, “Jane, what about the case list I mentioned before?” I thought he was very harsh, but he wasn’t just that. He laughs a lot, is humorous, and doesn’t mind if I use his name a bit for my own purposes.

For a 19th-century man, he’s not that difficult.

This is my assessment of Liam Schofield Moore.