Escaping the Mystery Hotel - Chapter 143

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 142: Room 107, Gate Room - Final Trial (33)

──────

- Han Ga-in

Classes. More classes, more classes.

The world had been turned upside down countless times, yet somehow I still couldn't escape school.

After sighing and muddling through classes at the new school, we gathered in one corner of an empty classroom.

“...”

A-ri was the first to speak.

“We've gotten pretty cute.”

“Doesn't Ga-in look even younger than I do now?”

“You and me both. More importantly, how did we end up like this?”

“...”

Once again, A-ri spoke first.

“There's one thing we failed to notice. Elena is much more deeply immersed in the dream than we thought.”

“Why is Elena the only one caught up in it this badly? The three of us woke up much sooner than we expected.”

“Well, it is the final trial. Honestly, things have been too easy until now.”

Something came to mind.

“Compared to Song-i and me, Elena seems to have a much stronger desire for something she hasn't achieved. Maybe that made the psychological mechanism driving her to fulfill that wish much stronger? Compared to A-ri, anyway...”

“She has less training than I do. I came from the Management Bureau, so I'm fairly mentally strong in situations like this.”

In short, Elena seemed to be in this state because she was mentally weaker than A-ri and had more regrets about her life than Song-i and I did.

Song-i sighed, then began talking with A-ri.

“What should we do? If you think about it, our method was to strongly stimulate a sense of dissonance and lead her to recall the hotel memories she'd forgotten, right? Elena remembered the hotel, but it feels like she went back into the dream anyway.”

“It's a cliché situation. You could say she chose to bury herself in a happy dream instead of an unhappy reality. Our first plan didn't wake Elena up. It only made her dream a new dream.”

“Then reminding Elena of the past again probably won't help. No matter what we say, instead of waking up, she'll probably just change the contents of the dream.”

“If we keep pushing her, she might see us as unpleasant and lock us away somewhere.”

While the two of them talked, my thoughts drifted back to the past.

The process through which those who had already awakened came to their senses. The method we'd used on Elena.

There had been one important element missing from the method we'd chosen.

* * *

At least in Elena's second dream, it was easy to understand what her wish was.

Creating the happy childhood she'd never had.

Elena attended a peaceful school, surrounded by friends.

In this place, Song-i, A-ri, and I were also Elena's close friends.

The memories Elena had seemed to clumsily regain near the end of the first dream appeared to have vanished again.

Maybe erasing those memories had been part of her wish as well.

...

“Take that!”

--- Thump!

As I stood there lost in thought, a tennis ball flew at me like a bolt of light after a powerful smash and struck me in the head.

“Urgh!”

“Huh? Oh! Ga-in! Are you okay?”

Elena, who had hit me with the ball during PE class, rushed over in a panic and helped me up.

I let out a hollow laugh as I got to my feet, and Elena quickly broke into a bright smile.

We went back to hitting the tennis ball back and forth, having a good time.

... This isn't bad.

Honestly, the Elena in this dream was unbelievably cute and looked so happy.

* * *

Lunchtime came.

“Elena.”

“Yeah?”

“Are you having fun right now?”

“Hm? What's that all of a sudden? Of course I am! Oh, come to think of it, did you know there's a performance at the Vakhtangov Theater tonight?”

“First I've heard of it.”

Looking a little shy, Elena held out a ticket.

“My dad told me to invite my friends! Let's go see it together.”

After taking the ticket, I asked, “Are you only giving one to me?”

“W-what are you talking about? I gave tickets to my other friends earlier too! Don't get any weird ideas.”

My seat was next to Elena's.

* * *

As evening approached, there was some kind of time for walking animals. I had no idea what it was supposed to be.

As usual, the other kids brought out snow-white Samoyeds and Norwegian Forest cats from who knew where and began taking them for walks.

Thankfully, unlike music class, we could at least join in because we had Pero.

Pero was no less dazzling than any of the other animals.

Of course, Pero's ferocity surpassed that of every animal there combined.

“Ahhh! Pero! You can't pull out the Samoyed's fur!”

“Just leave it alone. Pero needs time to gather nesting material too.”

“A-ri! The Samoyed's owner is crying!”

“So what? The animal world is survival of the fittest. It's the Samoyed's fault for being weaker than Pero.”

I couldn't believe what I was hearing, so I laughed.

In the end, I had to step in and pull Pero away as it tried to swim into the Samoyed's fur.

* * *

Elena was truly a happy child at school.

Whenever the teacher asked a question, she was always the first to raise her hand, answer correctly, and receive praise. Every child liked Elena.

At home, she had warm, well-off parents. Her life was filled with enjoyable performances, happy trips, and kind people.

A true Perfect Life.

The ideal life everyone had wished for at least once.

There wasn't a trace of the darkness Elena had felt when she was half-awake in the coffee shop.

It felt as if the world's genre was subtly changing.

A beautiful girl, a shining world. A lively, happy everyday life.

No.

It was just a meaningless illusion.

The genre of the world we belonged to had been decided on the first night we fell into the hotel.

Elena, I'm sorry, but no matter how I looked at it, the hotel's genre wasn't a romantic comedy.

* * *

“Hey, Han Ga-in! What was that earlier? I thought this was your dream, not Elena's.”

“What?”

“You were playing tennis with Elena while looking happier than anyone in the world.”

“You ignored Song-i and me and played the violin alone. It felt like we were from another world.”

“How old are you that you still can't play a single instrument?”

“I can play the recorder.”

“I bet Pero can play the recorder too.”

“...”

“Ah, enough joking around. What are we really going to do? I have no idea how we're supposed to wake Elena up. I'm sure even killing Elena wouldn't help. She'd probably just move on to the next dream.”

“I think I know now. And I know what we did wrong.”

Song-i and A-ri looked at me at the same time.

“I'm sorry to say it, but we catered to Elena too much. Think back on how we woke up. A-ri, you only woke up after getting confused and trying to throw yourself off a building, right? Song-i, you said you almost got into a huge fight with A-ri. I woke up while nearly getting fried in boiling oil, even if I was the one who summoned it.”

“So?”

“None of us woke up peacefully. Just stimulating a sense of dissonance isn't enough. When all you do is make things feel strange, it's still just a happy dream. You don't really think about waking up.”

Song-i looked uneasy.

“Ga-in? Then you're saying...”

“She has to feel that this dream isn't happy. Only then will she wake up on her own.”

A-ri, who had been about to say something, nodded after hearing me. Her expression hardened.

“You're right. That's how we woke up in the first place. We need to make her feel not just that something is strange, but that she has to wake up from this dream. Now I understand what was missing from our plan. It needed some spice.”

Spice.

Song-i picked up on the ominous feeling behind that word and replied with a slightly gloomy expression.

“I understand what you mean, but what about trying to comfort Elena a little more? Maybe help her feel better...”

“The more we do that, the deeper Elena will sink into this dream.”

“Okay. But if we make a clumsy attempt to upset her, she might send us somewhere.”

“What are you worried about? You already tried it on me. We need to do this without getting caught. We followed Song-i's peaceful plan, but it didn't work out. This time, let's do it my way.”

There had been one important element missing from our original plan.

Spice.

It was time to set off an alarm in Elena's sweet dream.

* * *

- Elena

I waited beneath the clock tower in Cohort Square, trying to calm my racing heart.

When would they arrive? When would they arrive?

About twenty minutes passed before the person I'd been waiting for appeared in the distance.

The moment Ga-in arrived, he looked at me in surprise and shouted.

“Elena! You look like you came straight down from heaven!”

“Ahh! Don't say things like that. Did you bring the theater ticket?”

“Yeah. But aren't your parents coming?”

“We're not children. Why would we need parents just to watch a play?”

I happily turned around.

Behind me, Ga-in muttered something with an uncertain expression, like, “Well, you are a child right now.”

I'd always felt this way, but Ga-in was cool yet strange, smart yet careless, kind yet cruel.

Had I ever had such complicated thoughts about Ga-in?

After tilting my head for a moment, I entered the theater.

The performance was a lot of fun.

As I listened to people dressed as cats singing, I found myself singing along a few times. Time passed happily.

Ga-in, seated beside me, was quiet. Near the end of the performance, he spoke.

“Elena.”

“Yeah?”

“Are you having fun?”

“Yeah! It's so fun.”

“I see... I'm happy that you're happy, Elena.”

His tone was strangely cheesy for him. Yet his expression was cold.

For some reason, Ga-in was different from usual.

Ah! Could it be... Was Ga-in feeling strange too because we'd come to the theater alone?

The thought made my heart start pounding.

--- Thump! Thump!

What's wrong with me? It's not a big deal. We're just watching a performance-

--- Thump! Thump!

...

--- Thump! Thump!

What? That wasn't my heart pounding. Something was actually making the floor shake.

Startled, I raised my head slightly and saw people begin to murmur.

Suddenly, Ga-in grabbed my hand and pulled me along.

“G-Ga-in?”

“Let's get out. Something smells strange.”

“A strange smell? I don't notice anything...”

Ga-in ignored me and pulled me to my feet.

Less than ten seconds later, a thunderous cry filled the theater.

“Fire! Fire!”

In an instant, the theater was thrown into chaos!

The entrance was narrow, but everyone in the theater stood up and tried to leave at once. Caught in the middle of them, we couldn't move a single step.

What was this? What was going on? Why did this have to happen today?

--- Thump! Thump... Crash!

The theater floor suddenly burst apart!

“Aaaah!”

“Ahhh! It's a monster!”

A dinosaur-like bird draped in black cloth appeared in the middle of the theater, which had turned into complete pandemonium.

I stared blankly as the monstrous bird destroyed everything around it.

What was I supposed to do? Why had a monster like that appeared in the theater in the first place?

Why today of all days!

A powerful resentment filled my heart. Something, something that could punish that bird-

“Ah!”

“Elena, why are you just standing there? Let's get out of here.”