WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 173: A Happy Evening, What Was Room 201 Really? (2) (Final)

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- Han Ga-in

“From a business perspective?”

Business had come up in a situation as far removed from business as possible.

Even Song-i, who had said she felt like throwing up, couldn't contain her curiosity and began listening intently.

Eun-sol started explaining again.

“I think the Zero-Dimensional Eye operates much like a fish farmer. The ocean is so vast it feels almost endless, and it's full of countless fish. Still, if humans keep catching and eating even those countless fish, eventually there won't be any left, from fry to adults. That's why humans began managing fish stocks.”

“Fish stock management...”

“Look at it from the Zero-Dimensional Eye's perspective. It could descend to Earth and toy with eight billion humans, but considering an Evil God's madness and endless magical power, how long would Earth last if it did that? A year? It knew that, so it held itself back instead. You could call it a long-term plan to suck Earth dry for a hundred years, or a thousand.”

A-ri sighed.

“Then the Chief Researcher was like a talking mackerel making a proposal to a fish farmer. ‘We'll build a fish farm ourselves so you can keep feeding on us for hundreds or thousands of years, so please manage the fish stocks.’”

“Exactly. The Zero-Dimensional Eye accepted that proposal. Why wouldn't it? If it killed all the mackerel, they might go extinct, which would be a problem. Yet managing them carefully enough to keep them from going extinct would be a hassle. Then a talking mackerel came right up to it and said, ‘We'll build the fish farm ourselves and manage it for you.’ As an Evil God who farms humans, it must've been thrilled.”

“Let's say that's why the Zero-Dimensional Eye held itself back. Then why was preserving humanity through fish stock management only worth thirty points?”

Eun-sol suddenly looked into the distance with a slightly wistful expression.

“My father isn't a good person.”

Father? All of a sudden?

“But as a businessman, he has insight that can't be denied. There's something he says often. ‘Standing still means falling behind.’ It's a common saying.”

“Standing still means falling behind.”

“Businesspeople don't like simply maintaining their current business. They're always dreaming of expansion. The Zero-Dimensional Eye must've dreamed of expansion too. It pressured the Management Bureau once, and they handed over a fish farm on their own. Do you think it stopped there?”

No one could say anything.

“One became two, and two became three. Eventually, wouldn't all of Earth have become a massive Pain Farm built to sustain an Evil God? That's why even the hotel, which treats human lives with the utmost disregard, couldn't give that solution more than thirty points.”

In the cold silence that settled over the room, Eun-sol concluded her hypothesis.

“Don't forget that this is only my interpretation. Just as the Chief Researcher had his own interpretation, I only have mine.”

It sounded plausible. Maybe it wasn't a perfect interpretation, but it felt closer to the truth than the Chief Researcher's.

Not because Eun-sol was more of a genius than the Chief Researcher, but because unlike him, who had needed to find a solution from scratch, we were judging the situation from a kind of future perspective.

One last question came to mind.

“Room 201 has already been judged resolved, so we'll never have another chance to try, but let's think it over as a review for the future. What could have been a better solution?”

After giving it some thought, Eun-sol answered.

“I'd thought about that too... Two possibilities came to mind.”

A-ri immediately asked, “Two? I couldn't even think of one! Tell us.”

“First, Operation: Servants of Evil.”

“What?”

“After experiencing Rooms 102 and 103, I realized there seem to be quite a few intelligent lifeforms in this universe besides us. The Management Bureau seems to know about them already.”

That was certain. Neither A-ri nor Grandpa had denied it.

“We make an offer to the Zero-Dimensional Eye. Humans will become your servants. We'll offer alien races in our place.”

... My head throbbed.

A-ri sounded a little disappointed.

“That doesn't seem right somehow... Tell us the next operation.”

“Second, Operation: Set One Enemy Against Another. After experiencing the hotel, I realized there are endless evil entities out there.”

“That's true. Honestly, it's amazing Earth has lasted this long.”

“What if we brought in another demon and made them fight? Isn't there a demon out there who'd say, ‘What? I was planning to feast on humanity. Who are you to eat them all?’”

This time, A-ri let out a long sigh.

“That strategy is refuted by ‘when whales fight, shrimp get caught in the crossfire.’ The Management Bureau would never attempt something like that. Like you said, it might be possible to make evil entities fight each other, but if demons who think nothing of stars started tearing each other apart on Earth, would any humans survive?”

“Hey! I only thought of it just now! Stop picking apart everything I say and tell us what you think.”

A-ri fell silent again.

This time, Grandpa spoke up.

“I thought of one too. How about Operation: Deception?”

“Deceive the Zero-Dimensional Eye? How would we do that?”

“No, not deceive the Zero-Dimensional Eye. Deceive humanity.”

“What?”

“Do you remember how we dealt with the Zero-Dimensional Eye? It was an entity that could be countered surprisingly well by ‘not recognizing it.’”

“That's right.”

“Let's spread memory-erasing drugs across the whole world and erase everyone's memories of the Zero-Dimensional Eye.”

“... No, at the end, the Zero-Dimensional Eye itself grew so huge it looked ready to cover the sky. Unless we covered the entire sky, could we stop people from recognizing something that's right in front of their eyes?”

“Oh, really? I died before seeing that part. What if we made all humanity blind for a few years... Damn, even I think that's insane.”

“What if we covered Earth with a barrier so the Zero-Dimensional Eye couldn't be seen?”

“Song-i, we might as well suggest moving Earth out of the solar system.”

“Rather than live miserably as a demon's slaves, all humanity should commit suicide.”

“That definitely sounds like a zero-point solution.”

...

After that, my companions only brought up increasingly insane ideas.

Most of them felt fundamentally misguided.

Why? Why did they sound wrong the moment I heard them?

...

--- Bang! Bang!

“Please listen to me for a moment.”

Everyone turned to me.

“I think we were given a kind of test question.”

“That sounds like something a student would say.”

“What I mean is, when it comes to a test question, you always have to think about the examiner's intent. And the examiner's intent is usually based on clues in the question.”

“Clues in the question... There were clues inside Room 201?”

“Right. So I don't think the answer is to suddenly bring in some other demon with no basis in the scenario, or make all humanity blind. If possible, it should be a method where ‘we’ can do something.”

“Was there any clue inside Room 201 related to a better solution?”

“From here on, this is just my opinion. It's hard to know exactly what the Zero-Dimensional Eye wants, but it seems closer to pain than human death. There was quite a bit of evidence for that. The Chief Researcher himself came to that conclusion. And if it's an entity that can be interpreted in business terms, like Eun-sol said, then rather than acting just for entertainment, it must gain something from the suffering of mortals.”

Eun-sol agreed at once.

“That's how I see it too. If it truly pursued nothing but ‘fun’... I don't know, it would've acted more impulsively. Fun is the opposite of boredom. You feel it when the unpredictable happens.”

“Also, the Management Bureau's technology inside Room 201 was already capable of keeping a person alive with only their brain left.”

Song-i looked like she was about to blurt something out again.

“Wasn't it the Chief Researcher's assumption that people had to be exposed to monsters and actually die? If the Zero-Dimensional Eye wants pain, then making a huge number of tanks where people are reduced to brains and suffer endlessly... It would've been much more efficient in terms of ‘producing pain,’ while reducing the number of actual deaths.”

A-ri tilted her head.

“Wouldn't the process of suffering be necessary too? And you said it had to be something ‘we’ could do. What you just described depends entirely on the Management Bureau. Of course, back then you were basically in charge of the Management Bureau, so promising to do it yourself would have sounded believable.”

“Actually, I held back because Song-i kept looking like she was about to throw up.”

Song-i immediately cut in.

“I understand already, so please don't say any more.”

“We could've made a kind of finished product and shown it to the Zero-Dimensional Eye. We already had Beatrix's floating brain. Song-i could've implanted visions worse than hell into the floating brain and asked whether it liked that approach.”

A-ri muttered cynically.

“If that demon really is an environmentally conscious businessman aiming for ‘sustainable pain development,’ it would be a proposal worth accepting. It could expand the fish farm much more easily by avoiding human deaths, and either way, the fish would still be building and offering up the farm themselves.”

Eun-sol looked as though she was retracing the events in her mind.

“Would that have been possible? To enter the Sealed Area, Song-i had to risk her life to give Ga-in a buff.”

“That was because we couldn't save Patrick. Jin-cheol had to use the Star and smash the device controlling the Irregular Polyhedron by brute force. If we'd saved Patrick, there must've been a safer way to enter the Sealed Area.”

A-ri nodded.

“It's not baseless. You said Beatrix's brain was in the Sealed Area, right? There must've been equipment to maintain the floating brain. The Chief Researcher couldn't possibly have carried all of it in by hand.”

“If we'd saved Patrick and operated the device, we could've entered safely. Then Song-i could've shown the floating brain a vision of being tortured forever...”

“Ah! I said I won't do that!”

The conversation paused at Song-i's angry outburst.

Was this really the only kind of method we had?

It was still a solution that gave the demon what it wanted, one way or another. We had only considered how to minimize human deaths in the process.

A vague thought came to me. Even this kind of method would probably have a hard time earning more than sixty points.

Fundamentally, we, and humanity as a whole, lacked power.

After all, there was a limit to the answers a mackerel could offer a fish farmer.

For the first time, I felt like I understood why the Management Bureau challenged the hotel while sacrificing human lives.

Another concern came to mind.

If we needed to use another extreme solution like this as we moved forward on the second floor...

Some of us would never agree to it. Song-i's fierce reaction just now was proof of that.

This had only been a discussion of hypothetical scenarios, so it ended as a simple complaint. But what would happen if we actually had to do it?

After dinner ended, the hotel displayed a notification.

/Dear valued guests! Congratulations.

You have finally overcome the first trial of the second floor and obtained another treasure! We sincerely congratulate you.

Three days of rest beginning tomorrow! Since this is an ability that isn't easy to use, wouldn't it be best to practice diligently?

Today’s surprise event begins: Party Time!

There are additional notices.

1. Please take out the Ticket immediately and check the notification.

2. The second floor's bitter cold is steadily worsening. Shouldn't you prepare?/

Footnotes:

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