WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 215: Room 104, Curse Room - ‘Hotel High, the Prestigious Academy’ Re (9)
──────
- Lee Eun-sol
As dusk began to fall, I rode toward the Old School Building in the car Grandfather was driving, scrolling through my smartphone when I noticed something strange.
“The news has been completely fabricated. There isn't a single mention of anything supernatural in connection with the Old School Building's collapse. They're just running absurd articles about an aging building suddenly collapsing, how thankfully there were no casualties, and how building safety standards need to be reviewed. That sort of thing.”
“It seems they've treated it as an ordinary collapse caused by shoddy construction.”
“Could your Cult do something like this too?”
Aurelia, sitting in the back seat, only gave an awkward smile. Grandfather, who was driving, answered instead.
“Is that even a question? Of course the Management Bureau did it!”
I wanted to ask whether it was called the Management Bureau in this scenario as well, but Aurelia was there, so I held my tongue. Fortunately, she didn't react much, so it seemed the organization that handled supernatural phenomena here was also called the Management Bureau.
Familiar buildings began appearing ahead of us. At last, we had returned to Hotel High, where every secret of Room 104 was hidden.
--- Bang!
Our welcome began.
* * *
Not long after we arrived at Hotel High, bullets began flying at us from every direction! I'd already learned through death during the first attempt that the cultists were heavily armed. Still, as bullets ricocheted all around us and the car became riddled with holes in an instant, it felt absurd all over again.
Wasn't this supposed to be twenty-first-century South Korea?
Of course, we'd already accounted for something like this. The moment a bullet from somewhere shattered the car window, everyone except Grandfather, who sat in the driver's seat wearing a Protective Suit, ducked beneath the car's frame. At the same time, Elena stood up.
The vast grounds of Hotel High and the unmistakable killing intent of Cult members gathered everywhere!
Justice's Scales appeared in midair, having recognized the need for punishment. Glowing gold, Elena looked as though she were shouting, ‘I'm incredibly powerful!’ in every direction. Naturally, countless bullets turned toward Elena, leaving the rest of us free to move.
Golden light spread like waves. The dim Hotel High grounds brightened as though it were early evening. Floating in the air, Elena flew at high speed and swung the Scales like a giant wielding a yo-yo, attacking cultists in every direction.
The instant they were struck by the Scales hurtling toward them at invisible speed, the cultists were flung into the air like something out of a cartoon. It was a scene of overwhelming destruction! Aurelia, who had returned to the school as a “traitor,” couldn't even raise her head, unable to bear the sight.
“Aurelia, get a hold of yourself. Didn't you say you'd guide us to the Old School Building?”
“... Sorry. I'll get a hold of myself.”
We began moving toward the Old School Building at a relatively slow pace. Due to Justice's nature, Elena couldn't move very quickly, as she had to punish every cultist within range without distinction. Leaving Elena's protection was far too dangerous, so we had to move at her pace.
Aurelia kept watching, and her reaction had moved beyond regret into admiration.
“What ridiculous power. Is this why Father gave a revelation warning against this woman...?”
“You're not exactly weak yourself.”
Aurelia scoffed and looked behind us at Pero Ga-in, the Apostle of God.
“But if this woman's power is the entirety of your strength, it still seems lacking. Father must have hidden something else as well.”
“That's not for you to worry about.”
What was with that presence? Ga-in seemed even more capable after becoming a parrot.
“... Of course, you must have made plenty of preparations, but-”
Aurelia's face twisted as she tried to argue. In an instant, she grabbed me and rolled across the ground.
--- Boom!
A tremendous explosion suddenly erupted! My ears rang, and I could barely think straight. Before I could even understand what had happened, Aurelia picked me up again and hopped somewhere else. When I finally came to my senses, there were five massive craters where we had been standing.
“W-What was that-”
At the center of the craters, Elena, who had been slammed into the ground by the blast, flew back into the air as though nothing had happened. Her clothes were only slightly scorched.
--- Whirrrrr!
The deafening mechanical roar of massive engines. In the dim night sky, lit mainly by Elena's glow, more than ten helicopters suddenly began flying in!
Then I realized that Aurelia had disappeared at some point. With the situation at Hotel High taking an unexpected turn, she must have decided it was too much to keep protecting me as well and headed for the underground city.
“Ah, I guess it's about time to die.”
No, it wasn't. Grandfather, clad in a huge, sturdy Protective Suit, snatched me up in one hand and began running at incredible speed. He held a small parrot in his other hand, curled up like a sparrow.
Once I left the movement entirely to Grandfather and focused on thinking, I quickly understood the situation. A cult group plotting in this remote area while disguised as a college-prep school couldn't possibly operate this many combat helicopters.
We were being pursued by this scenario's Management Bureau!
* * *
- Kim Sang-hyeon
I looked over the Hotel High grounds, which had fallen into chaos in the blink of an eye, and thought.
Tonight was the group's last chance in Room 104. Tomorrow, or the day after at the latest, the Lord would regain His strength. After that, the group would have no chance left.
What were this room's completion conditions? The collapse of the Saintess and the Cult. The Saintess had already left the Cult, so all that remained were its surviving forces. Most of them couldn't leave the area around the Old School Building where the Lord was buried. To them, this place was the Sacred Domain where their god had descended.
In other words, once the Lord woke up, all He had to do was shout, “Thank you for the meal!” and bite into the cultists like a cake. I understood that, so I sent my companions the message, ‘We have to settle this today,’ and they arrived here in just a few hours.
The cultist remnants couldn't pose any threat to Elena while she used Justice. Therefore, this situation was surely a crisis for the Lord as well!
...
That was what I thought.
What I had overlooked was that the Lord could read this plan as clearly as the palm of His hand. The first card the Lord played after seeing through our plan was none other than the Management Bureau!
I looked down at Hotel High from the roof of the Old School Building.
More than ten helicopters filled the sky. On the ground, around eight unidentified multi-legged robots resembling spiders approached. As if that weren't enough, countless drones carrying unknown silver boxes blanketed the entire sky like a net.
How had the Lord managed to bring the Management Bureau's army here at exactly this moment? There was no way to know. More importantly, this wasn't the time to investigate it!
The group was driven into a crisis in an instant. Elder Mook-seong, who had been running while carrying Eun-sol, was soon surrounded by the spider robots and unable to move. Elena, radiating golden light, had already been struck by heavy weapons several times and slammed into the ground dozens of times, yet she couldn't properly fight back.
Why couldn't she fight back? Based on what I'd heard from the others about Justice's power, she shouldn't have been so helpless.
The reason wasn't difficult to figure out. It was because of Justice's nature. The target had to be an evil human, didn't it? The Management Bureau's strike team members were certainly human, but it was difficult to call them evil. At their core, they were an organization that protected the world.
Look at the situation from the Management Bureau's perspective.
Wouldn't it seem as though an unknown woman wielding supernatural power was massacring civilians on school grounds? Of course, those civilians were actually followers of an evil god who would ruin the world, but the Management Bureau had no way of knowing every detail.
This was one of the Lord's prepared cards, an army that protected the world.
I understood anew why my companions had found the Lord of Room 104 so unsettling. The Lord had prepared a counter that could undermine the principle of Justice, which punished the wicked. It felt as though the Lord had analyzed the Hotel's party and developed a strategy to defeat us!
This was probably what it felt like for a player who had analyzed a boss monster's patterns to suddenly encounter an enemy that analyzed the player and devised a strategy against them.
A huge object resembling a birdcage, seemingly made of a special metal, appeared and trapped Elena inside. Was it some kind of sealing tool that suppressed the power of supernatural beings? Elena's power gradually began to fade inside the cage.
...
Vague memories of the past came back to me. Long ago, there had been someone who received the same blessing as the young lady trapped in that cage. According to Miss A-ri, Mi-ro had used Justice completely as she pleased after becoming a child on the second floor, but Mi-ro, when she was in her right mind, couldn't use it so recklessly. Mi-ro had her own standards for judging good and evil, and she had to use her blessing to punish those who fell outside those standards.
Naturally, Mi-ro had often faced the same problem Elena was facing now. NPCs who had to be defeated to clear a room, but who could hardly be considered evil. Justice becoming useless before them. How had Mi-ro dealt with that?
... I remembered.
Fortunately, a little of the power the Lord had given me remained. It had originally been given to deceive and harm my companions, but there was no need to use it for that purpose.
My body floated into the air. It was an amusing sensation, as though I had boarded an invisible flying taxi. I crossed the night sky and approached the cage containing Elena. The young lady trapped inside looked at me with startled eyes.
“Miss Elena, what are you doing? You can tear apart a cage like this whenever you want, can't you?”
She said nothing.
“Are you unable to talk while using Justice? That's different from Mi-ro.”
I poured the small amount of power I had left into both arms and began forcing the cage apart. Elena's eyes widened like a rabbit's when she saw what I was doing.
“I'll get you out soon. Just hold on a little longer.”
It was about time, wasn't it? At first, she must have been startled because someone had suddenly flown in from midair, but now that I had acted, it was time for a response.
--- Bang!
A thunderous blast. Excruciating pain that nearly shattered my mind in an instant.
Heavy fire from somewhere, whether a bullet or a shell, pierced my upper body. I avoided immediate death thanks to the remnants of the mysterious power the Lord had granted me, but I would only last a few more seconds anyway. Elena's eyes began burning like flames when she realized I was dying.
... That was enough. My role ended here. Just before my consciousness faded, I remembered a conversation from long ago.
‘My power was originally meant to punish bad people. But...’
‘But?’
‘Sometimes, to punish someone, you have to make them bad first.’
Footnotes:
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