Twelve pair of eyes stared at the TV monitor with mixed reactions. The question was rhetorical in nature; the option to not play was non existent. So they remained in their silent deficiency.   “Let’s start the first game,” the Game Master continued speaking. “One of the dishes on the table does not belong. Can you figure out the one that is wrong?”   With that, the screen faded to blackness and turned off on its own. Instead of starting the game or trying to find its answer, they exchanged terrified glances with each other.   “I don’t wanna play anymore.” Mi Joo was the first one to break the silence. She abruptly got on her feet, shifting the chair backwards with a piercing sound. Anyone could notice she was trying to hold her tears and failing hard.   “Where are you going?” Soo Jung asked the girl worriedly, afraid she’d end up doing something stupid.   “Home!” Mi Joo stomped her feet out of the dining room and strolled out. The dining room was located next to the grand staircase which connected to the front door entrance.   Silence fell on them once again, but it took Ho Seok no longer than a second to get up and follow his friend.   “Drama queen.” Ji Ae rolled her eyes and scoffed a mocking laugh.   Yoon Gi slammed the knife on the table, linking his arms behind his head and breathed an annoyed grunt. The girl next to him was already hyperventilating as her fingers frantically smashed the number pad on her phone, and it made him more restless.   “Mom, pick up,” Myung Eun chanted a prayer, placing her phone against her ears. The free spirited look on her face was replaced by an expression full of sorrowful dejection. “I’m sorry I hung up on you. Please pick up the phone.”   “They cut off the network connections,” Yoon Gi repeated again, only this time, he knew it was for a different reason. This was starting to become a very disturbing game. Seeing Myung Eun break down in tears, he knew she wasn’t mentally strong enough to survive it.   “Who is behind all this?” Nam Joon questioned, eyes scanning around the room to find some sort of clue.   Tae Hyung didn’t say a word and began to move on his own. He dragged his chair along with him across the carpet based floor, and set it right below the TV.   “What are you doing?” Nam Joon furrowed his eyebrows.   “Checking for any cables or receptors to see where the TV is connected to. Maybe we could trace it and find out the location of the Game Master,” Tae Hyung relaid his answer as a small mumble when he got up on the chair and reached out to the back of the TV. “Oh?”   “What? What’s wrong?” Seok Jin was immediately alerted by that small reaction. He turned around from his chair at the very far edge to watch him go.   “I should’ve known.” Tae Hyung lightly jumped off the chair and dusted his hands off. “It’s wireless. The Game Master probably used some bluetooth connection as the transmitter.”   “Meaning he can control it from anywhere,” Ji Ae followed his findings, and the guy nodded.   Again, they fell silent and thought of ways to avoid playing the game.   “Maybe we should go along with these games and see what happens,” Jung Kook then proposed an idea, so simple, so stupid, and yet the only solution they had.     “Mi Joo!” Ho Seok didn’t know how many times he had called out to her name as he raced her towards the front door. He didn’t want her to discover the same horror he had noticed before. She would break down.   “Don’t go there!” He repeated as the girl was approaching the door. There was no choice but to take drastic measures as he jumped forward and wrapped his arms around her waist, using all his might to prevent her from moving.   “Let me go!” Mi Joo started squirming her body viciously to break free.   “Forget it!” Ho Seok raised his voice, exerting greater force when she put up a stronger fight. Her energy eventually died down and soon he felt her body hiccupping from her loud sobs.   “Why won’t you just let me go?” Mi Joo whimpered, slapping his hands away when he loosened his grip.   “Because we can’t,” Ho Seok uttered lowly, “We can’t get out.”   Through her damp and watery eyes, Mi Joo’s gaze fell towards the front door and absorbed the true reality of their horror. The doorknob was gone, sealed off, and replaced by an odd vintage looking baseball in place.   “The windows are all sealed as well.” Ho Seok pointed to the metal bar fence rails in front of every window. The glass was tinted in bright yellow, allowing the prisoners to look at the outer world, but preventing passersby from seeing its inside. Not that anyone would ever locate such a deserted mansion in the middle of nowhere anyway.   “So we’re completely trapped?” Mi Joo questioned, and he nodded. Her shock soon turned into a hopeless laughter of disbelief as she fell to her knees on the floor, completely weak and out of mind. “Fantastic.”     “Crab!” Ye In suddenly yelled, breaking the silence. Almost everyone turned to her with shock.   “Jung Ye In, that’s no way for a lady to talk.” Soo Jung was the most horrified one at the youngest’s explicit language.   “No, no, I mean the crab!” Ye In explained herself and pointed at the black pepper marinated crab on the table. “That’s the answer to the first game. Everything is Italian themed, but black pepper is…”   “Oriental,” Seok Jin finished the sentence for her, and the younger girl nodded. He took the closest fork and knife and began dissecting the crab.   “Crab is the only one that doesn’t belong, see?” Ye In repeated, proud she had solved the first question. Knowing the others were too busy examining the dish, she caught Jung Kook being the only one who secretly stole a glance at her. She flashed him a smile, but he awkwardly looked away. It made her chuckle.   “There, in its shell. Take it. Hurry up! Come on! Go go go!” Tae Hyung probably would’ve been the most annoying cheerleader to go down in history. Either way, it did not quicken Seok Jin’s delicate pace in trying to break the shells open as gentle as he could.   “Ugh!” Ji Soo couldn’t take it anymore and used her bare fist to smash the crab’s shell open. It immediately broke apart into uneven pieces, and everyone’s mouth fell open. They were secretly hoping they’d get on her good side.   “There’s something inside!” Tae Hyung repeated out loud like blasting stereo speakers. He stretched his arm to take out a small paper in the size of a postcard. It was filled with the marinated sauce, but the fancy lamination of card preserved it.   “What’s going on?” Ho Seok’s voice appeared as he and Mi Joo reappeared just in time.   “I guess it’s a mission card.” Tae Hyung observed while flipping the heavyweight paper back and forth. The front was rich in luxurious black ink. The back side was a fade out light brown color filled with black lettering in an old English cursive handwriting that read a peculiar riddle.   Three things to remember as you enter the aquatic chamber. An allotted time is bestowed, to retrieve your assigned zodiac code. An electrifying surprise will then activate, eliminating those who failed to locate. Refuse to participate and what awaits you is a doomed fate.   “Poetry?” Ji Ae immediately analyzed the writing. As someone studying linguistic and literature, she wondered whether anything was out of the ordinary. “No, the Game Master is merely rhyming the last words, but this isn’t poetry per say.”   “Is this our first mission?” Seok Jin questioned and took the card from Tae Hyung’s hand. “What is an aquatic chamber?”   “Do you think there is a big fishtank hidden somewhere in this house?” Myung Eun asked innocently, using her entire body to draw an invisible rectangle.   Yoon Gi scoffed a little at her thought, immediately understanding why her mother was so worried about her. She could be a bit ditzy sometimes.   “Like a sink?” Mi Joo guessed.   “That wouldn’t be a chamber,” Ji Ae remarked flatly.   “Maybe he was just trying to be fancy.”   “I am the linguistic major here, and I know he was describing something more grandeur than a sink,” Ji Ae raised her voice a little. Oh how she despised Lee Mi Joo. They used to be on neutral terms before. But now, being in the same room was suffocating; dying in the game was probably more appealing.   “Bathtub?” Myung Eun tried again.   “Still not a chamber,” Ji Ae was losing her patience.   In the middle of the silence, Jung Kook finally got the answer. “Swimming pool.”   The others lifted their head to him in nearly a synchronized timing. That sternness and confidence in his tone made him so certain of his answer.   “I know the house is big, but there is no swimming pool.” Nam Joon laughed at the ridiculous answer.   “Yes, there is,” Jung Kook said sternly. “I saw one while I was passing the hallway on the third floor. There is a swimming pool at the g