Im at ch 5 and really want to like this bc everyone hypes the novel up but im just so conf...

I suggest to read the manhwa together with the novel for more context.. below some background info, let me know if it helps

MC, is just your average office worker. He is a fan of 《Dark Exploration Records》, an open source horror wiki (kinda like creepypastas with characters, lore, & exit strategy). MC was visiting DER pop up booth in “his world”, but after winning the raffle - he woke up into the world of DER, in the company Daydream.

Daydream is a pharmaceutical company/ dark organisation that collects Dream Dew from finishing ghost stories/ darkness to create magic potions/ wish tickets. Dream Dew has ranks, the more difficult the ghost stories, the higher the rank - the stronger the luminescent color of the Dream Dew.

In Daydream, the people from the Field Exploration Team, carries out this task of exploring the ghost stories, which risk them of dying. The recent Research Team, who studies how to enter ghost stories. The manhwa also mentions the Security Team, these are security guards under Daydream who are in charge of subduing anomalies happening in the company. (The security guy is shown before they enter the item maker no.99)

The major reason that our MC stays with Daydream/ DER even though he’s a coward - he wants to wish to GO HOME to “his world”, back to his family and his office.

also, DER is a world where ghost stories happens everyday.

Disaster Management Bureau, is a government agency handling the paranormal events. They work to save civilians from ghost stories, and ways to end ghost stories for good.

This contradicts with Daydream business model. If the ghost stories ends, how do the company collect Dream Dew and make money? That’s why it’s a dark organisation, risking people’s lives for profit.

This was so helpful thank you for explaining the context for me

Do you mind also explaining what happened with the eye in chapter 4 and what the viper guy’s problem was? Idk that entire scene confused me. As well as how the MC knew which stop to get off at? What kind of advantage does he have over others and why? And also I don’t get what he meant by the viper guy already being an employee

Not sure how it was translated so this is just going off the novel, but basically there are famous characters in the DER wiki that the MC read about, which he refers to as ‘named’ characters. Baek Saheon is one of those characters, an employee of Daydream Inc. with the nickname ‘Viper’, and eventually he even becomes a Section Chief/Manager. But as of chapter 1, he is still only a new recruit (so not all the events in Dark Exploration Records has happened yet).

What the announcement asked for is a lost item: a left eye of a man with type A blood (I believe). The only person that fit the criteria is Saheon and the other man that got injured (well the MC also fit the criteria but he lied). The reason why Saheon injured that guy’s eye is because he wasn’t sure if they would accept two lost items, so he did it as assurance to secure his escape. He already knew he was going to lose his own eye.

MC, on the other hand, knew from the wiki that you can find those lost items in the train compartments. Ofc he didn’t find the ‘correct’ eye but he still showed the eye with the label covered to Saheon, just to mess with him for injuring an innocent person.

The MC knows from past records which station names are ‘safe’, the problem is he didn’t know if they would ever come, nor the pattern that dictated *why* they were safe. When Yeongeun brought up the question of what ‘destination’ meant, he realised from past records that the people who succeeded in escaping got off at stations with names that didn’t apply to them. Because a ‘destination’ or ‘goal’ is to achieve something you don’t have at the moment.

So in the end they got off at ‘serenity’ station which by definition is an emotion that’s impossible to achieve and very likely no one has experienced (because you can appear serene but it’s impossible to be completely at peace).

This clears up so much thank you so much !!!!

I realized it’s the wacky translation and missing panels on this site! I went to a different site to read it and it’s making a lot more sense and flowing a lot better now. Thanks so much

One more thing, will they explain why MC sees the other guy as a lizard and not human? And another thing, do you mind explaining what the team is meant to do when they’re in a ghost story and how they come out? The Tuesday quiz show was a little confusing for me.

No worries! Yeah the translation isn’t very good mainly because it was a speedrun - it was completed and uploaded less than four hours after all 20 chapters were released. Hopefully someone will do a proper TL.

For the first question: I believe we still don’t know the exact reason why the MC sees the lizard head but we can infer it’s because he’s an otherworlder. Btw the lizard appearance is his true form.

For the second question: the Field Exploration Team simply needs to explore and ‘clear’ ghost stories and their Dream Essence collector will fill up automatically. As for the clear condition, it’s different for every ghost story. Many of them, like the Tuesday Quiz Show, has a known clear condition (answer every question correctly) because people have already explored it and escaped successfully + created a manual for it.

For others, they might be new and have very little information on them so it’s up to the field exploration team to figure it out. You’d be right to think all they need to do is enter and leave, but leaving is actually the hardest part.