WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 162: Room 201, Curse Room - ‘The Cube’ (11)

──────

- Kim A-ri

--- Crash!

As I stepped back, a hand stretched out like a blade swept through the spot where my neck had been.

“Oh? You dodged? Not bad-”

Before Beatrix could finish, a flash burst from Song-i’s wrist.

“What the-”

With a startled cry, Beatrix began rubbing her eyes. Soon, she’d start making eyes everywhere again.

I had no intention of giving her that time.

The cramped mansion filled with blinding radiance.

In an instant, the Scales flew through the concrete wall and crashed down on Beatrix.

At the same time, Cha Jin-cheol and I began bursting the eyeballs Beatrix was creating all around us with rifle fire.

That was our first plan!

Song-i distorted Beatrix’s senses while Cha Jin-cheol and I kept destroying the eyeballs with our rifles.

While Beatrix floundered, Elena handled the attack.

Even Beatrix’s powerful body, which treated bullets like a refreshing shower, couldn’t withstand the Scales of Justice forever. Each blow carried enough force to crush a building.

Before long, Beatrix’s upper body was completely crushed.

Amazingly, even in that state, her monstrous body kept regenerating!

Justice alone wasn’t enough.

Until now, Cha Jin-cheol had held back the Star because of the risk of hurting us in the cramped mansion. Just as he made a gesture as if to summon it-

--- Rumble!

The entire mansion shook. No, it did more than shake. The mansion spun a full 360 degrees!

What kind of structure did this damn Cube have to make something like that possible?

As we bounced around, unable to keep our balance, Beatrix calmly “flew” out the window despite more than half of her upper body being gone.

“She can fly too?”

Cha Jin-cheol shouted in disbelief.

“Durability tougher than concrete, regeneration that would put a planarian to shame, the ability to make eyes everywhere, and now she can fly. She can even create monsters. What can’t that thing do? The Management Bureau made that? A-ri, are things like that on Earth too?”

I had nothing to say, so I kept my mouth shut.

A brief lull followed.

Song-i spoke, sounding flustered.

“Is that it? I didn’t think it would end this easily.”

“Of course not. Look at Elena.”

Justice was still casting light in every direction around Elena. It wasn’t over yet.

“Seung-yeop.”

“Yes?”

I silently pointed at the mirror, and Seung-yeop hurried toward it.

I had a feeling the second round would start soon. We needed to secure an escape route.

--- Crack!

As Seung-yeop tried to go through the mirror, something grabbed him and flung him into the air.

The mansion’s roof, no, its “lid,” came off.

I understood the Cube’s structure.

* * *

As Elena used two Scales to block the hands lunging at us, I looked outside.

What a mysterious space.

If we hadn’t been fighting Beatrix, I would’ve wanted to stare at the surroundings forever.

Countless translucent boxes floated in all directions through the strange space, which was covered in dark blue fog.

The distant floor looked like a red wasteland.

The boxes were connected by the cables we had called the “underground passage.”

Most of the boxes were filled with “mansions.” Were those perhaps Mimic Rooms or Escape Rooms?

Some boxes had no mansions, only the blurry outlines of enormous monsters. Those were probably the Dud Rooms.

This was on an entirely different level from the glimpse Cha Jin-cheol had gotten through the hole he smashed in the wall with his Protective Suit.

Seeing the Cube’s true structure with my own eyes was so mysterious it left me stunned.

The lid of our box had been removed, and above us, I heard Beatrix laughing as she regenerated her shattered upper body.

“Ahahaha! Thank you, everyone! It’s been so long since I’ve had a fight this fun.”

Even then, Elena and Beatrix continued fighting without pause.

Since Beatrix was in the air, Jin-cheol and Song-i, who couldn’t fly, didn’t know what to do.

She was out of the bracelet’s range, and the rifles had been useless from the start, little better than BB guns.

Elena was practically fighting Beatrix alone.

A bear nearly as large as a bus blocked the Scales as they flew forward with a sonic boom.

I could feel the Scales losing power against the monster.

At least Beatrix was human, and the monsters were her tools, so Justice’s power didn’t seem to become completely useless...

But it wasn’t as powerful as it had been against Beatrix herself.

That was why we couldn’t stop Beatrix from laughing.

--- Creak!

The outer walls of every box began opening one by one.

I could see the monsters from other rooms walking along the cables toward our box.

Ha! Now she was calling over monsters from the other boxes too? This really wasn’t going to be easy.

The Scales kept flying toward Beatrix and releasing golden waves, but we couldn’t avoid defeat like this.

I didn’t even know what had happened to Seung-yeop when he tried to escape, and with the Cube’s structure twisted like this, I had no idea how we were supposed to get out.

“Elena! Can you hear me?”

“Yeah.”

“Justice loses strength against monsters, so we’re at a disadvantage like this.”

“A-ri...”

“Justice forces the fight itself, but you can choose where and how to fight, right? Just fly over and face Beatrix one-on-one. Don’t hold your ground here!”

“If I leave-”

“It won’t change anything if you stay here because you’re worried we’ll die. The best thing you can do for us is kill Beatrix!”

Elena looked back at us once with a sad expression, then hardened her expression and flew toward Beatrix.

--- Boom!

At that moment, a blade came through a gap in the collapsed wall and struck Song-i.

Jin-cheol knocked it away with a metal rod he seemed to have picked up somewhere.

“Doesn’t what you just said apply to you too? Unlike us, you can fly. Go help Elena.”

“If Elena can’t win alone, me helping her won’t be enough.”

“Even so, that’s better than not helping at all-”

“You need to come with me. Your Star will definitely work.”

“Can you fly while carrying me? Didn’t you say it was hard to fly while holding someone else?”

“I can, for a moment. If I give up on surviving. So grab me and jump up! With all your strength!”

Cha Jin-cheol said nothing more. He grabbed a piece of exposed rebar from the collapsing mansion with one hand and held onto me with the other.

Right before we jumped, Song-i lay on the floor and waved as if to say she was fine.

The wall beside her collapsed, and a wasp as big as a house lunged at her.

--- Boom!

With the sound of the floor exploding, Jin-cheol and I shot more than ten meters into the air!

“Did you learn pole vaulting too?”

“Just fly already!”

My blood was being consumed at an incredible speed. As expected, I had no chance of surviving this round.

Jin-cheol and I flew across the strange space toward Elena and Beatrix’s battlefield, which looked like a battle between an angel and a demon.

* * *

Telling Elena to fly over and fight had been the right decision.

Most of the monsters couldn’t fly either. In a one-on-one battle, Elena clearly had the upper hand.

Beatrix looked too busy dodging and blocking the Scales to do anything else.

“You see it, right?”

“I do. It looks like Elena will win even if we leave her alone.”

“We can’t only think about a short fight. Unlike Elena, that thing has incredible regeneration.”

The radiance surrounding Elena’s body was gradually fading.

Elena looked toward us.

The next moment, somehow, the Scales slammed Beatrix into one of the boxes.

“Now!”

I released Cha Jin-cheol toward the box Beatrix had crashed into.

Carried forward by inertia, Cha Jin-cheol flew farther ahead before falling toward the box.

This should be enough, right?

This was really too hard. My flying ability had terrible fuel efficiency from the start...

Jin-cheol, next time, ask your Sponsor to give you wings.

I had used too much blood. It was hard enough just to stay afloat.

The moment I relaxed, I began falling helplessly toward the floor.

The red wasteland I had seen from afar drew closer.

...

...

...

???

What was that?

The floor wasn’t a wasteland. It wasn’t dirt, either.

It was a vast space filled to the horizon with endless mountains of twisted corpses.

The end of a world where the Avici Hell spoken of in Buddhism had become real.

That was the last thing I remembered.

* * *

- Elena

Wasn’t that thing absurdly tough?

That monster was less a creature made of protein and more like a concrete building, no, something even more durable.

And on top of that, it kept regenerating like mold growing endlessly in a nutrient-rich petri dish!

The Scales’ destructive power alone couldn’t finish it.

Even after more than ninety percent of Justice’s power had been spent, Beatrix endured.

At least, her attacks didn’t seem as powerful as her durability or regeneration.

Maybe she’d planned to use her tough body to keep her distance in the air while having the monsters she created attack us.

Still, aerial combat was Beatrix’s mistake!

I could fly, and A-ri had flown over with Jin-cheol, but most of Beatrix’s powerful monsters couldn’t fly.

Just as Justice’s power was nearly exhausted and I thought I would lose, A-ri arrived with Jin-cheol.

I used all my remaining strength to bind Beatrix!

Jin-cheol arrived, summoned the Star, and shoved it into Beatrix’s mouth.

Just as expected, Beatrix’s body, which even the Scales couldn’t easily kill, twisted instantly and lost its durability and regeneration.

All that remained were grotesquely warped lumps of flesh!

Around then, the Scales lost their light and disappeared, but Jin-cheol simply brought down his fists and smashed all the flesh apart.

A smile of victory appeared on the faces of those who remained.

Would either Jin-cheol or I get the Inheritance this time?

“Hahaha! Aren’t Elena and I an unbeatable combination?”

“Good work!”

“Good work. We’re about to get another Inheritance-”

Jin-cheol’s expression hardened in an instant.

--- Whoosh!

By the time I came to my senses, Jin-cheol had already grabbed me and was rolling across the ground.

“You dodged? Well, you really are strong! I’ve never seen people this strong before. What are you?”

Beatrix’s body began to be “created” in midair.

First, only an arm appeared and aimed for my vital spot. Then came her torso, then her legs, and finally her head.

Ah...

Now I understood.

Beatrix’s impossibly diverse abilities.

She didn’t have countless superpowers.

Every ability came from one power.

Using her power to shape monsters, she had created the monster called “Beatrix.”

All strength left my body, and I collapsed to the floor.

I saw Jin-cheol summon the Star again and charge at her.

The Star could destroy Beatrix in less than five seconds, but...

Five seconds was enough time for Beatrix to rip Jin-cheol’s head off ten times.

Jin-cheol’s head rolled to a stop beside me.

... Was this how it ended? Really? Like this?

An indescribable despair filled me.

Something sharp pierced my stomach.

Right before I lost consciousness, Beatrix’s expression stiffened.

“What? You! What did you do to Headquarters?”

Sorry, but she should’ve asked that before putting a hole in my stomach.

Holding onto a little, very little hope, I lost consciousness.

Footnotes:

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