WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 226: Room 202, Curse Room - ‘The Little Mermaid’ (4)

──────

[User: Han Ga-in (Wisdom)

Date: Day 100

Current Location: Level 2, Room 202 - Curse Room ‘The Little Mermaid’

Sage’s Advice: 2]

- Han Ga-in

After my meeting with the Saintess, the scenario updated and gave me a hint: gather rumors related to the Saintess on Haesin Island. But putting that hint into practice was harder than expected. Whenever we went outside, the islanders glared at us with wary eyes.

Fortunately, someone had an ability that could gather information without any trouble, even in a situation like this.

Me. I could borrow a Merfolk body with the Grimoire’s power.

I felt a little bad about it, but I decided to temporarily “borrow” the body of a young Merfolk man who had come to the government office on business. A moment later, Grandpa ambushed a young man walking by, knocked him out in an instant, and silently dragged him into the limousine.

The Doctor, who had been observing the young Merfolk Grandpa had kidnapped, spoke up.

“Would it be all right if I observed him for a moment?”

“What kind of observation?”

“I’ve been observing the species called Merfolk, and something seems strange. I’d like to examine his physical structure in more detail.”

“Sang-hyeon, if this man stays missing for too long, there’ll be an uproar. Ga-in needs to borrow his body and gather information before then. We don’t have much time.”

“Ten minutes will be enough. I believe this observation may help us progress through this room.”

After he put it that way, we couldn’t refuse the Doctor’s request. We laid the unconscious young man on a bed in the guest room provided by the Saintess of the Deep, or perhaps the governor, and let the Doctor examine his body.

“It’s hard to make sense of. It’s very strange.”

“What is?”

The Doctor tilted his head before giving a simple answer.

“He’s too human.”

“What?”

“I received materials about the Merfolk from Eun-sol and read through them. In this world, the god of the sea raised Haesin Island and brought the deep-sea people, who originally lived underwater, onto land.”

“Right. They say their history as intelligent life forms is longer than humanity’s, in their own way.”

“In other words, they’re life forms that underwent evolution entirely different from humans. Yet considering that, don’t they resemble humans far too closely?”

“Uh... Wasn’t there an explanation for that? The Merfolk’s ancient form was different, but the god transformed them to resemble humans, an intelligent species already adapted to life on land. Naturally, they look alike if the god recreated them in humanity’s image.”

“There are elements that can’t be explained by that-”

“Wait! Sang-hyeon? Didn’t you say we didn’t have time?”

“My apologies.”

The Doctor stepped back, and I immediately borrowed the body of the young man, who had begun to wake up, and left the government office.

Once I entered the city in his body, though, I had no idea where to go. Grandpa and the Doctor suggested places like bars and restaurants, but I wasn’t sure whether Merfolk, whose culture differed from humanity’s, would chat about all sorts of things in places like those.

[58:17]

Two minutes had already passed. It looked like I’d have to use another of the powers I’d been saving.

[Sage’s Advice: 2 -> 1]

‘Where can I go to hear some information?’

[People who drive alone all day have an occupational habit of chatting whenever someone gets in their car.]

A job where someone drove alone all day and was known for making small talk whenever a customer got in.

A taxi driver.

* * *

I rode taxi after taxi. I named some random destination, then casually brought up the Saintess to test the driver’s reaction. If the driver said nothing and focused on driving, I got out right away. Only after repeating this taxi-driver selection process for nearly forty minutes did I finally find one who liked to talk.

“Please take me to the bank across from Haesin Port.”

“Sure~”

I was getting the hang of it now. Rather than bringing up the Saintess out of nowhere, I had to start with a topic that would naturally lead to her.

“Ah, when is the renovation work on this damn port supposed to be finished? They said they were rebuilding it!”

“Sir, you’ve got the wrong idea about that.”

“Huh?”

From there, the driver went on at length, lecturing some ignorant young man while worshipfully prattling about Cheongseong Group’s evil conspiracy involving the port and the Saintess’s outstanding judgment in stopping it.

...

[09:24]

Less than ten minutes remained.

Had I picked wrong? What I needed to learn was an “unsettling rumor” about the Saintess. This human, no, this Merfolk taxi driver might have been talkative, but seemed to support her. I needed to throw out a little more bait.

“Well! I understand what you’re saying, but hasn’t the Saintess been making a lot of reckless moves lately?”

“Young man, watch your mouth! What the hell are you talking about?”

The form of address had changed from “sir” to “young man.” Let’s poke at the driver a little more.

“Even so, she did go ahead and kill the heir of Cheongseong Group-”

--- Screech!

The car stopped in the middle of the road, suddenly turned into a side alley, then stopped again.

“...”

“...”

“Young man, putting aside my job, let me give you one piece of advice as someone with more life experience.”

“...”

“That mouth! That trap! If you don’t watch that carp-like mouth of yours, you’ll have a lot of trouble in life! Got it?”

“Did I say something wrong?”

“The Sea God had three daughters. And now, Serenade is the only daughter left. Where do you think the other two went? The Saintess is scarier than you think. That’s why you shouldn’t spill every thought in your head without putting it through a filter first! If I were cruel, you’d be fresh sashimi by tomorrow.”

The driver said there was no need to pay and told me to get out. Of course, I gladly paid anyway, thanks to the joy rising deep inside me, then got out.

It wasn’t my money, after all!

Serenade, the Saintess, had purged the other Daughters of the Sea God and taken the throne for herself. What could that mean for the scenario we were progressing through?

* * *

“That’s all the information I found. For reference, the Possession time limit ended around the time I returned near the government office, so I released the young man. Could that cause any problems?”

Grandpa spoke as if there was nothing to worry about.

“I ambushed him from behind and knocked him out immediately, so he won’t know what happened to him. He’ll probably think the heat gave him some sort of memory lapse. Even if he realizes he was affected by some unknown supernatural power, he won’t know we were responsible. There’s no problem.”

Eun-sol considered the information for a moment before speaking.

“Serenade purged the other two daughters and took the throne on the island. Could that be the secret she’s hiding? What does that have to do with the secret behind the murder case we need to solve?”

The Doctor cautiously gave his opinion as well.

“I do have a hypothesis of my own.”

“Tell us.”

“Look at the situation on this island. If we exclude the supernatural aspects and view it through common sense, isn’t it a surprisingly common situation? It resembles many modern islands that fear and guard against invaders from the mainland while also depending on exchange with the mainland.”

“Depending on exchange with the mainland...”

“When we arrived on the island and saw the government office earlier, what did you all think? Isn’t it much more modern than expected?”

“Definitely. It’s just like Jeju Island in the twenty-first century.”

“There are probably two factions on this island. One seeks to strengthen ties with the mainland, while the other seeks to reject the mainland. It’s common enough.”

The fragmented information came together, forming one massive hypothesis.

Cheongseong Group had crossed over from the mainland, seeking to modernize the island and profit enormously in the process. One faction wanted to reject Cheongseong Group, while another wanted to accelerate the island’s modernization alongside it.

Perhaps the other two Daughters of the Sea God who had supposedly been purged supported developing the island through businesses from the mainland.

If that was true, Serenade might have purged the other two daughters to reject the mainland. As I thought it through, the answer to one question we’d had began to take shape.

“Serenade said she had no reason to harm Cheongseong Group’s eldest son, right?”

“She argued that killing him wouldn’t end the lawsuit over the port, so what would be the point?”

“Honestly, she was right about that. It’s a lawsuit over ownership of the port. Would the lawsuit really end just because the chairman’s son died? Maybe Serenade had an entirely different reason.”

“Lee Su-ho may have been the person linking the island’s reform faction to the mainland.”

“It wasn’t an act aimed at Cheongseong Group. Of course, that may have been one purpose, but it makes sense if her larger goal was to use terror to suppress the opposing faction on the island.”

“Grandpa, if Serenade killed Lee Su-ho, was her purpose to frighten the reform faction on the island?”

“If we interpret it that way, all the information we’ve gathered fits together rather nicely. Think back to the attitude of the taxi driver who told you that information. Didn’t the driver seem like someone afraid of a dictator, careful with every word?”

“It definitely felt that way.”

Even if she killed Lee Su-ho, there was a limit to how much she could suppress Cheongseong Group. As a private company, it had the Management Bureau’s protection. As long as Cheongseong Group had the Management Bureau as a powerful backer, it would never back down.

The opposing faction on the island was different. It had no backer at all. Their representative, another Daughter of the Sea God, had disappeared, and the person connecting them to the mainland had been assassinated.

Could they still resist Serenade?

Little by little, the schemes laid by the dictator Saintess began to take shape in everyone’s minds. We began building our argument for tomorrow’s meeting.

* * *

- Park Seung-yeop

In moments of desperate crisis, movies often showed the protagonist facing death and seeing their whole life pass before their eyes like a panorama...

I was consumed by a single thought too.

What the hell were the others doing right now? They weren’t suffering more than me, were they?

--- Rooooar!

The cry of a colossal Ragworm shook heaven and earth. Innocent citizens, too exhausted even to scream, collapsed as they awaited their final moments.

And now, in this very moment, the energy of the Great Cosmic Heaven-Shattering Emperor dwelled within me!

“Nowww!”

I leaped from the terminal roof toward the Ragworm. The moment my body flew through the air-

Something that might have been a tongue or a tentacle, which the Ragworm had “coincidentally” spat out at that exact moment, “naturally” passed beneath my feet!

I had no idea what I was supposed to do, but I had to do something! I stepped on the red flesh and ran, then ran again.

--- Wriggle!

The tentacle jerked powerfully through the air, sending my body soaring upward. My body floated in the air as, for one brief moment, everything seemed to stop.

I realized there was a small, unfamiliar figure on the Ragworm’s head.

Who was that? Some evil sorcerer controlling the Ragworm? I didn’t know what it was, but shouldn’t I take that bastard down? But I was in midair?

Countless thoughts flashed through my head in an instant, but reality didn’t change. My body was floating in the air, and there was still so much space between me and the Ragworm’s head-

--- Whoosh!

A powerful gust of turbulence “coincidentally” arose and pushed my body through the air. I naturally rotated 180 degrees, then landed atop the Ragworm’s head as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Wow! This is insane! Even I think this is insane! Aren’t I like a movie protagonist? Wouldn’t Tom Crxse be shocked by this scene?

The moment I became intoxicated by my own storm-like coolness, the “girl” on the other side blankly muttered,

“Void Stepping, a state where one runs as if stepping on empty air? Soaring Against the Current, a state where one controls energy and rises into the sky?”

... What the hell was that girl talking about now?

Footnotes:

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