Dark Fantasy Guide for the Summoner - Chapter 2

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Episode 2.
The Express Circular Train Armand II
I remember PoPop’s first event.
The very first enemy you encounter.
Given that it’s already in quarter-view format and the graphics are far cruder than I expected, it wasn’t frightening in the slightest.
‘Now?’
I’d forgotten to breathe.
—Hey.
What the hell.
Whoosh!
The moment I yanked the curtains shut, the moonlight vanished and the cabin plunged into darkness.
The atmosphere itself grew far more oppressive, but I was certain: this was the right call.
……Or was I already too late?
—Hey.
The voice came again.
—The view outside is beautiful.
It wasn’t a human voice. It was thick as if clogged with phlegm, distorted, and somehow cold.
‘I’m losing it.’
A cold voice—I can’t exactly argue if someone wanted to curse me for such flowery language, but what was I supposed to do when that’s genuinely what it felt like?
—Hey. Are you listening?
—Come now, draw back the curtains for me.
Of course I wouldn’t.
I couldn’t afford curiosity about whatever lurked behind those curtains.
I had no capabilities whatsoever at this moment.
Until I possessed the bare minimum to cope, I had to avoid confronting the Shadow.
‘In other words…….’
PoPop during the tutorial phase is barely different from a horror game.
Against enemies you can’t handle, ‘attack’ isn’t an option; ‘evasion’ is the sole means of survival.
—Hey.
—Hey. Hey.
—Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey.
‘Shit…….’
My fists clenched involuntarily.
Holding my ears wouldn’t help in the slightest, but neither would it hurt to try.
[Shadow: You have encountered the ‘White Woman Tapping at the Window.’]
[Your Stress Meter spikes dramatically.]
[Mental Corruption: 6%]
Dangerous as the situation was, I remained perfectly still and silent.
There was no way I was leaving this cabin.
‘That’s the first trap of this route.’
If you panic at the Mental Corruption notification and bolt from the cabin, you’ll run straight into another Shadow roaming the corridor.
Unlike the White Woman Tapping at the Window, that one leaves no room for any countermeasure.
An unreasonable entity that kills you the moment you encounter it.
I recalled the specs of the Armand, the train I’d boarded.
Armand
Royal Kingdom Express Circular Train
Route: Royal Capital (departure) → Corn Prairie → Horizon Lake → Forest of Eternity → Pendal, Fairy City (waypoint) → Royal Capital (terminus)
That’s all the information revealed at the starting point…….
But there’s data that unlocks once you progress further in the game or clear it on a different difficulty.
By the time the player boards, the Armand has already permitted the Shadow’s intrusion.
That’s right.
The Armand has already let the Shadow in, and the train’s derailment is essentially a predetermined future.
In other words, if you can’t escape before the train tips, that’s also a game over—which is why the Armand Route has such an absurdly brutal difficulty.
Tap, tap, tap.
The voice that had vanished was replaced by knocking.
Each knock sent my Stress Meter soaring, my Mental Corruption creeping steadily upward.
Had the moon broken through the clouds?
Beyond the rippling curtain, a finger’s shadow undulates.
Creak, creak…….
Unnaturally elongated, withered like rotting deadwood—that was the shape I saw.
Are you watching…?
…Stay calm.
When things are this chaotic, you have to filter and process only the information that matters most.
First: I’ve fallen into PoPop—
Second: I’ve become a player character.
The same two propositions I’d been rehearsing throughout my patrol, the hardest truths to accept—I forced them into my head, and finally, my thoughts advanced to the next question.
‘So what do I do now?’
Shadow. Tutorial. Time Attack…
As I obsessed over a handful of words, I could at last recall the most rational course of action in this situation.
“Hah…”
Damn it. My hands are still shaking, but from here on out, it’s a race against time.
I got to my feet and began, with careful movements, to search through Derek’s corpse.
What they call looting.
In the game, it was simple—just press a button. Reality is different.
Handling the body with my own hands made my skin crawl.
‘Damn this.’
Fingers trembling uncontrollably, forced to suppress any sound, and all the while drowning in guilt for what I’m doing—
Even as my head threatened to split, I didn’t stop my hands.
And then.
[You have obtained the Cheap Hand Mirror.]
At last, I found what I was looking for.
Cheap Hand Mirror
A shoddy mirror made of inferior materials, but it can still serve its purpose.
It’s odd that a one-eyed thug like this would carry such a thing.
There seemed to be some backstory I wasn’t recalling—but since I can’t quite remember it, it probably had nothing to do with the game’s progression.
With the mirror secured, I now pulled the pocket watch from my pocket.
The time had just passed 11:57 and 51 seconds.
‘…About two minutes left?’
My grip on the watch tightened.
Antique Pocket Watch
It’s working. For now.
The sole item a player possesses at the starting point of the Instant Death Route.
Back then, I’d been puzzled.
Why would I be carrying only this item?
As a gift from the developers, some kind of hint to distinguish day from night?
‘No way.’
I can say this with certainty.
The creators of PoPop aren’t that considerate.
No one knows that better than I do—the person who had devoted myself to this game more deeply than anyone.
‘Light.’
More precisely, moonlight.
The soft glow of moonlight is the Shadow’s weakness.
And midnight is when the moonlight is strongest. That’s the window—I’d need to draw back the curtains and use the mirror to reflect the moonlight at it. That’s the only way to dispose of it.
“…”
The cabin fell silent.
No more eerie voice, no more knocking, and the silhouette visible beyond the curtain had vanished.
Screeeech—
Instead, a chilling sound emanated from the window.
It seemed as though frost was forming on the glass—but this wasn’t my imagination. I could feel the temperature inside the room dropping sharply.
In other words, the crisis was escalating.
’59 minutes and 30 seconds.’
Suddenly, my breath misted into white vapor that dissipated into the air.
It was time to prepare.
Just as I was frantically wiggling my fingers and toes to keep my body from freezing stiff, I took a step forward.
Bang!
The door suddenly swung open. Not the window—the cabin door.
‘What?’
Why would that open now?
As my mind and body both froze, the man standing in the doorway tilted his head.
“You—it’s patrol time. What are you doing in here?”
I looked up at the man’s head.
[Conductor, ‘Duron’]
A Conductor is the person responsible for managing one or more train cars.
The man named Duron, who had been glaring at me, caught sight of the one-eyed corpse and his expression hardened instantly.
“What the—? You didn’t—”
“Shut the door!”
I shouted urgently, but it was already too late.
[You have opened the cabin door.]
[Shadow encounters the ‘man who greets with an embrace.’]
The thing appeared behind Duron at some point, as naturally as if it had always been standing there.
Its face was not visible.
I couldn’t tell how tall it was, but all I could see inside the cabin was up to the man’s chest.
“Huh…?”
It wasn’t Duron who spoke.
The creature standing outside the door tilted its head, glanced back, and then that head slowly rose upward.
-Hello?
“What are you?”
The moment Duron replied to that innocent greeting.
The body shot upward abruptly.
Grey-hued hands wrapped around Duron’s waist and lifted him.
“L-let go!”
Duron thrashed about.
It couldn’t last long.
Crack.
Then came the sickening sound of bones snapping, mingled with a voice desperate and wet with blood.
“Ack, gah… cough! P-please… save me…!”
A sound like something tearing followed, and the voice ceased.
Thump.
Duron’s waist bent in half as he fell below.
Blood slowly pooled from the corpse.
-Hello?
The man’s voice came again.
‘Damn it.’
I’d encountered it. If I’d waited until after midnight to open the door, I wouldn’t have met this bastard.
‘What do I do?’
Should I just hold out in here?
But…
Screeeeak.
At that moment, the window slowly opened, and withered fingers like an old tree began to draw back the curtain.
The ‘white woman who taps on the window.’
-…There you are.
In my moment of surprise, pale, elongated hands stretched out and seized my throat in an instant.
“Ack…!”
My breath caught short.
Damn it. That grip—it feels like it could snap with just a tap. And on top of that, it’s cold as ice.
‘All right….’
Let’s try this, you son of a bitch.
I thrust the Cheap Hand Mirror I’d been holding forward.
-Huh…?
It was the one who opened the window with its own hands and drew back the curtain.
Naturally, the brightest moonlight now streamed into the cabin.
The moonlight striking the mirror reflected and became an even stronger beam of light that hit the white woman.
-Aaaaaaaaaaagh―!
This thing was a low-grade Shadow.
The kind that could be destroyed with nothing more than purified moonlight from a cheap hand mirror.
Normally, that would have resolved the crisis right there.
-Hello?
The thing standing outside is of a higher grade.
This one probably can’t be easily repelled by moonlight alone…
But there’s no other choice anyway.
-H-hello there……!
The man bathed in moonlight raised his voice.
The furious creature paid no mind to his own bulk and shoved his entire body through the doorway.
‘Damn.’
Look at the pathetic state of him.
His face was ashen—not merely pale but painted white as powder—his eyes grotesquely wide, and tears of blood streamed freely down his cheeks.
-Hello!
The Shadow greeted me with a face fit to haunt nightmares.
In the next instant, an outstretched arm seized my shoulder.
Crack-pop!
The pain of my shoulder bone wrenching nearly made me scream aloud.
Even in that agony, I found myself grateful I hadn’t dropped the Cheap Hand Mirror—but bathing him in moonlight again proved useless. The thing had no effect on him whatsoever.
‘Then……!’
All or nothing.
I gritted my teeth and hurled the Cheap Hand Mirror to the floor.
Crash-tinkle!
-Hello!
Was that when he thought I’d given up?
The moment the Shadow screamed with excitement——
‘Shrieeeeeeeek!’
Countless shards of light erupted, flooding the cabin.
-A-hello?!
Broken glass.
The fragments scattered across the floor became a kaleidoscope, each shard drinking in its own piece of moonlight.
If one won’t work, use many. A war of attrition, pure and simple.
-H-hic, h-hiccup……!
The man embracing me made sounds other than his greeting for the first time, then let loose a prolonged, wailing shriek.
-Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee―!
The grip on my shoulder gradually weakened.
‘Just die already…….’
The Ghost’s Wail, which in the game would fade in an instant, had become so torturously drawn-out in reality that it left me absolutely drained.
And then, as if cut by scissors, the scream simply ceased——
[Shadow has defeated ‘the White Woman Who Taps at the Window.’]
[Shadow has defeated ‘the Man Who Greets and Embraces.’]
[An unbelievable Achievement has been unlocked in the Tutorial stage.]
[Achievement 「So Much Prowess Without Any Gear?」 has been unlocked.]
⁝
[A duplicate Achievement has been detected.]
[This Achievement was previously unlocked in another playthrough record.]
[No Achievement Points will be awarded.]
⁝
[Updating information for Player ‘Caindale.’]
[Multiple Playthrough record confirmed.]
[Achievement Points are being inherited.]
[……Updating point data…….]
⁝
[Update complete.]
[Achievement Points held: 12,615,151]

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————