horror story: the old stationery shop in Bupyeong had a locked basement

I wasn't going to post this but it's been living in my head so here we go.

Late 90s. Incheon, Bupyeong district. A kid named Sunwoo grew up near Bupyeong Market and basically lived at the little stationery shop in front of his elementary school. Tiny two-story building, first floor crammed with old toys and junk snacks instead of actual school supplies. Creaky wood floors. You know the vibe.

There was a rumor though.

"There's a basement. She never lets anyone go down."

The lady who ran the shop always kept big cardboard boxes stacked in front of the basement door. Every time you walked past it you'd catch this strong mold smell. Like wet rot and something older.

So one afternoon Sunwoo and his friends decided to look. School got out early that day. The shop lady stepped out for a bit. They moved the boxes, found the keyhole, peeked in.

Locked.

And then. From inside. A click.

The door swung open. Just a little.

Sunwoo looked down into it. Pitch black. Not like dim, like NOTHING, like light just stopped existing down there.

And then he heard it.

"Two together, boom-chak~ three together, boom-chak~"

Children's song. Sung by what sounded like kids. Except the pitch was wrong, warped, like a cassette tape left in the sun. And every time it ended, someone laughed.

"hehehehe…"

He slammed the door and they all ran.

But after that day things got weird. Every night when he tried to sleep, he'd hear this slapping sound from somewhere in his room. Like someone flipping ddakji¹ in the dark. He'd turn around. Nothing.

Then one of his friends spiked a fever and said something while half-delirious.

"Under the stairs. There are kids with no eyes. They're waiting for us."

A few days later the shop just. Closed. The owner disappeared. The whole place was left exactly as it was, untouched.

Years later the building got renovated. During demolition they opened up the basement walls.

Inside the cement they found dozens of old ddakji. The beat-up cardboard disc kind kids used to play with.

Each one had a child's name written on it.

One of them said Sunwoo.