A week had passed since Rumi enrolled at Saint angelicus' School of Exorcism.

  Every night, Rumi went to bed without drinking holy water and deliberately stayed awake during times she shouldn't be awake.

  But in that week, she hadn't seen that girl again from the first night.

  So she couldn't confirm if that girl was Medina and could only hear the singing coming from the corridor.

  That day, Rumi was reading a book in the library after lunch.

  Usually after morning classes, first-year students had to gather in the second-floor library for self-study time.

  Honestly, it seemed designed to keep new students from causing trouble by wandering around during free time.

  Though drowsiness hit right after lunch, the library's unique atmosphere meant probably no one could fall asleep there.

  Because outwardly, this library appeared to be the most cursed place in the school.

  Despite sunlight streaming in as brightly as possible, the faded walls and bookshelves, along with the smell of old books, made it seem like ghosts could be hiding anywhere.

  But strangely, no ghosts were visible. Perhaps that made it feel even stranger?

  Even Rumi, who couldn't sense curse energy, could feel something like the chill of an abandoned building permeating the library.

  Unable to sleep and unwilling to do homework in such a library, Rumi started checking the rulebook about the library section just in case.

  'The library is the place where curses occur most frequently in the school.

  At the same time, the library is also the most thoroughly purified place in the school.

  Just as scripture words exert powerful force, words from books entering directly into the brain can easily and powerfully lay curses...'

  Rumi skipped the boring parts and moved to the section with rules and examples.

  'Dori's nose started bleeding while reading a book.

  Dori immediately closed the book and reported to the exorcism teacher.

  That book was cursed. The exorcism teacher removed the book to prevent the curse.

  Though Dori was clearly reading a scripture-related book, she noticed the text was inverted and strange words were bursting from her mouth.

  If you discover inverted text while reading, immediately close the book and report to the exorcism teacher.

  That book is possessed by a ghost. If you keep reading, the ghost in the book will possess your body.'

  While Rumi was rather enjoying reading the book with its unpleasant illustrations depicting various cases that could happen in the library,

  She heard nearby students starting to murmur.

  Wondering what it was, Rumi lifted her head to look beside her.

  Medina had stopped reading and blood was trickling from her nose.

  "Huh? Her nose is bleeding."

  Nearby students shouted seeing this.

  "Hey, your nose is bleeding!"

  Just then Rumi remembered the library rules that she had just been reading.

  And checked the black book in Medina's hands.

  "Hey, Medina! Close the book you're reading! It's cursed. It says so right here in the rules!"

  Rumi said while waving the rulebook.

  "Someone quickly call Professor Myers!"

  Raoul, who saw this beside Rumi, urgently called out.

  "Aaaah, Professor Myers!!"

  Dave ran out of the library to call the teacher.

  Raoul quickly searched his bag and pulled out holy water.

  When Rumi checked the book Medina was tightly gripping again, she saw all the text was inverted.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Moreover, Medina was reciting something like strange incantations.

  Inverted text meant the book was possessed by a ghost.

  Coincidentally, it seemed all the worst cases described in the rules were overlapping.

  "That book seems possessed by a ghost too! All the text is completely inverted!"

  Just then Medina's body started trembling and her eyes began rolling back.

  "Oh no! She's getting possessed. The curse is spreading! We need to get that book away from her!"

  Rumi immediately ran to try to remove the book.

  "Don't touch that!"

  Just then Eve's voice came from somewhere.

  "No, I'm curse..."

  Rumi hesitated for a moment.

  She remembered again how Raoul had told her not to reveal being curse-immune.

  "Uuuuuugh!"

  Medina started having convulsions while foaming at the mouth.

  Raoul saw this and started spraying emergency holy water on Medina's body.

  'Hiss hiss' white smoke rose from Medina's body. But still, Medina wouldn't let go of the book in her hand.

  Finally, Rumi realized she had no choice but to step in herself with her curse immunity before it was too late.

  So Rumi approached the convulsing Medina without hesitation.

  "What are you doing! I said don't touch it!"

  Eve shouted again.

  Rumi didn't understand why Eve, who was so sensitive to curses, wasn't running away and stayed close by.

  "No... she'll die at this rate."

  "Wait Rumi! At least let me spray this on your hands first..."

  Just then Raoul came over and sprayed holy water on Rumi's hands.

  Raoul seemed to have realized too that only Rumi could touch the book right now.

  While spraying holy water, Raoul's other hand was tightly gripping his flask that seemed to be trembling somehow.

  Rumi slowly approached the convulsing Medina. But honestly speaking, since this was her first time seeing an object under such a powerful curse, she was slightly afraid the curse might transfer to her.

  But Medina foaming and convulsing looked like she would die soon, so Rumi finally grabbed the book in Medina's hand.

  "..."

  Rumi felt nothing in her hands. As expected, she was truly curse-immune...

  "Aah!"

  But at that moment Rumi felt extreme pain in her hands and immediately pulled the book from Medina's hands and threw it away.

  "What? Are you okay?"

  Eve came over and looked at Rumi's hands as she asked.

  "Rumi, are you hurt?"

  Raoul also came over and asked.

  "I'm... fine. What do we do about her now!"

  Rumi said while pointing at the still convulsing Medina.

  Just then Raoul had found a stick somewhere and used it to push Medina's face sideways to lay her on her side.

  Meanwhile, Eve kept staring at Rumi like she was crazy.

  "Are you really okay?"

  "Yeah, I told you... I'm strongly resistant to curses."

  Honestly, Rumi wasn't sure if she was okay or not.

  The pain she felt when grabbing the book had been substantial.

  But now she felt fine again...

  Rumi was confused by this first-ever curse-like sensation. She was definitely supposed to be curse-immune...

  Rumi immediately shifted her gaze to the book she had thrown away.

  What kind of book was that?

  The book looked very old with faded colors, and the most noticeable thing was a certain symbol drawn on its cover.

  It had an upward-pointing arrow-like symbol engraved on it.

  Strangely, looking at that symbol made Rumi feel nauseous.

  It felt like she had seen something she shouldn't have.

  Just then Professor Myers burst into the library with students.

  "Where is it?!"

  Professor Myers saw Medina still lying there foaming at the mouth and ran over to immediately start emergency exorcism.

  'Hissssss'

  He sprayed a fire extinguisher filled with holy water all over Medina's body.

  The upperclassmen who had followed Professor Myers started evacuating the first-year students from the library.

  "Children, everyone out of the library! The curse might spread if you stay nearby!"

  Among them was the white-haired upperclassman they had seen in the school cafeteria.

  As Rumi left the library with the other children, she pondered what exactly had happened.

  She had been happy these past few days because Medina had become less talkative near her, but if she got cursed like this, she would be more happy...

  No, everything was suspicious - from the reason why she talked less, to that female student seen in the corridor a week ago, to Medina's cheat sheet and the doll in that huge bag, and now this curse.

  As Rumi left the library, she looked around to see if Medina had brought that human-sized bag, but strangely the bag wasn't visible.

  As Rumi remembered, Medina always carried that bag around.

  The afternoon class was basic exorcism with Professor Myers, who had performed emergency exorcism on Medina.

  But even before class started, all the students' attention was focused on Medina.

  When Professor Myers entered the classroom, the children showered him with questions.

  "Professor Myers, is Medina okay?"

  "Did we already get our first school death?"

  "Who was the fastest first-year to become a ghost so far?"

  "I saw a ghost senior who became a doll, will Medina also become the doll ghosts and join the class?"

  "Hey, kids, don't be too extreme. We still need to observe the situation more...

  What's clear is that your friend is in critical condition from an unusually powerful curse rarely seen at school.

  We also need to find out where that cursed book came from.

  Just don't misunderstand. Today's incident doesn't happen often.

  So no more questions, let's start class."

  "..."

  The children looked disappointed, though it wasn't clear what they had expected to hear.

  Looking somewhat tired, Professor Myers pulled two round chairs to the front of the classroom and placed them side by side.

  Then he went to the shelf at the back of the classroom, opened the glass door, and took out an old stuffed doll.

  He then placed the doll on one of the chairs he had set up.

  The students watched, wondering what Professor Myers was doing.

  "Professor, what are you doing? Aren't we studying exorcism theory again today?"

  Just then one student asked.

  Professor Myers held the chair and took a deep breath as if considering.

  "Today I'll specially teach emergency exorcism rituals. After what happened today, I felt you should learn this quickly."

  "Professor, does this mean we're done with curse prevention theory classes?"

  "No, we'll just learn simple emergency exorcism rituals today then return to theory classes. And since we won't do theory classes for long anyway, please stop showing how much you dislike them."

  "..."

  Professor Myers placed a wrinkled, dried-up apple on the chair next to the doll.

  "This doll on the chair is a cursed doll.

  And this apple on the chair beside it is a purified apple but it’s about to go bad.

  From now on, think of this doll as a cursed classmate, a friend, and think of this apple as a vessel to receive your friend's curse."

  The children focused, wondering if they would finally see real exorcism rituals instead of theory.