WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 292: Room 204, Mission Room - ‘Hotel Cinema’ (15)

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In a strange place filled with floating screens, a middle-aged man in a suit, an otherworldly being, and a girl with her hair in two buns sat around a table in the center.

The girl spoke first.

“Why did that kid have to interfere now, of all times? In the movie, no less! What are we supposed to do?”

The otherworldly being answered calmly.

“Well, didn't you already edit the movie? The audience never saw the Witch intervene.”

The girl stared in disbelief.

“Are you kidding? Everyone inside already knows! The moment they get out, they'll discuss it and figure everything out!”

“Then edit it one more time. Just ‘edit’ Cha Jin-cheol's memories at the end of the movie. We have that much authority now. Though I don't see what the point is in hiding the fact that the Witch has begun to awaken.”

“Why wouldn't there be a point? Given the Witch's nature, if everyone in the Hotel Party loses their memories of her, she'll lose the foundation of her existence and collapse.”

The otherworldly being, the Merchant, scoffed.

“I wasn't asking whether hiding the Witch's half-baked awakening would help the Hotel Party. I'm asking why you're helping them at all. Do you think they'll revive you if you do? No matter how I look at it, the next turn has already been decided.”

As far as the Merchant was concerned, this was not something they needed to interfere with in the first place. A being trapped in a Gate Room using strange magic to send a duplicate outside was hardly unprecedented.

The Sponsors with the authority to make decisions also had a consistent attitude toward this sort of problem.

‘This, too, is part of the hotel's progression. If they overcome it, it will only become nourishment for their growth.’

Would Cha Jin-cheol be twisted by the Witch's tricks? Would the Hotel Party be in danger? The Merchant scoffed.

‘So what?’

The girl, on the other hand, thought the Sponsors' attitude was both plausible and irresponsible. Beings that escaped clumsily like this always caused trouble.

She didn't want it. She truly didn't want this party to collapse in vain. She wanted them to go beyond Level 2, reach Level 3, and meet the Great Hand at its end. And then...

For a moment, the girl vaguely recalled a dream from her life that she had never been able to give up on. Then she shook her head.

The Merchant, who had been watching her, spoke.

“Are you still attached to the outside? Isn't it about time you let it all go?”

“I'm not like you.”

“Give up your attachment to the outside. Isn't the hotel quite an enjoyable place?”

“... It feels fucking awful hearing that from you.”

“Ha ha! What's wrong? Ah! Don't tell me you still remember when I killed you while you were alive-”

A pure white sword shot out from the girl's right arm. The blade, as beautiful as a crystal sculpture, emitted a blue light. With two swings, the girl cut the Merchant into seven pieces.

...

Soon, flesh reattached itself in midair, rendering all the damage meaningless. Watching that, the girl sighed.

‘I've gotten caught up in that freak's prank again. This will be used to tease me for months.’

They were not beings who could die simply because they wanted to. They had promised eternal service instead of falling into hell as the price of failure.

“Ha ha ha! That was emotional. At this rate, I'll have to describe what your right hand tasted like when I ‘ate’ it-”

“You fucking perverted alien!”

--- Tap!

When the Guide, who had not spoken until now, tapped the table, the girl and the Merchant both turned toward the Guide.

“That's enough, both of you. A matter far more important than the Witch has come up.”

The Merchant nodded.

“The Hidden Reward?”

“Once Kurta was defeated, the conditions for the Hidden Reward were met. Yet a strange situation arose where we can't give out the reward. I never expected the Escapee to transform Cha Jin-cheol's body in that manner.”

The girl clutched her head and muttered.

“What should we do?”

A small smile appeared on the Guide's lips.

“I have a good idea.”

After hearing that ‘idea,’ the girl and the Merchant thought the same thing as the space collapsed around them at the end of the meeting.

‘That damn theater Guide is the biggest idiot of all!’

* * *

- Cha Jin-cheol

“Cut down the tyrant!”

In the middle of a battlefield filled with chaos, thousands of troops were laying siege to the outer wall protecting the capital! As I watched from the rear and shouted with all my strength, enthusiastic cries rose from every direction.

“Waaaaah! Break through!”

Whoa... This was spectacular. The sight of an army so vast that I couldn't take it in at a glance, building siege rams and enormous wooden towers as they attacked the capital, was a sight to behold!

As I admired the scene, the National Protector Grand General spoke to me.

“General Cha!”

“Yes?”

“What do you think of the course of this war?”

... How would I know? What could I tell just by looking? It seemed like our side had the advantage, but when I didn't know something, a humble answer was best.

“Will you teach me?”

“Not good! Very bad!”

“What do you mean...?”

“General, who do you think benefits if this war drags on?”

“The emperor.”

“Of course! The armies in the southern and western parts of the empire are still heading this way. Once they join up, we'll be the ones surrounded instead.”

“What should we do?”

“We need to settle this as quickly as possible. Bring down the walls and seize the imperial palace!”

I turned to look at the battlefield.

At a glance, the capital's walls were already wavering. Flames burned here and there, creating choking smoke, and many sections of the outer wall had already collapsed. If neither side had reinforcements, our victory would already be certain.

But the National Protector Grand General had made it clear. The emperor's reinforcements were coming, which meant we didn't have much time left.

There was no need for further discussion. This was the moment for me to step forward.

* * *

The moment I pushed off the ground with my legs, my entire body soared as if I were flying into the sky.

Exactly five steps.

That was all it took to reach the wall. My body had already surpassed human limits, but after the Witch worked some unknown magic on it, it was no longer a creature of this world at all.

I felt like I could do it now.

“G-General? What are you trying to do?”

Ignoring the flustered allied general, I began climbing the wall.

“S-stop him!”

A sticky liquid poured down on me. Boiling oil? It didn't matter. My body had endured Kurta's lightning.

--- Ting!

Arrows fired from above struck my body one after another. They didn't matter either. My body was as hard as if it had been covered in iron plates from head to toe.

Grabbing the stones jutting out here and there, I threw myself into the air a few times and reached the top of the wall. The soldiers around me could only stare at me in shock.

I hesitated for a moment. This situation differed from the battlefield on the grasslands. Back then, I had been fighting foreign tribes, so I had cut my way through without restraint. This was a civil war.

There was also public sentiment after the war to consider. Rather than slaughtering large numbers of soldiers, I needed to show overwhelming strength and make them surrender.

Slowly, slowly, I began descending the wall.

I deflected the incoming arrows with my body.

When they rolled a huge boulder at me, I smashed it with my fist.

When a soldier charged at me with a spear, I lifted the soldier, spear and all, and shoved them aside.

Eventually, when the enemy began to see me not as a powerful general but as something beyond human, I spoke before the hundreds of soldiers defending the fortress.

“Is this the best you can do?”

...

“I'll give you a chance. Try again.”

I walked slowly and calmly to the gate and brought it down. Until that very moment, not a single person on the battlefield could stand in my way.

* * *

Come to think of it, once the battlefield changed from the Wall to the capital, the movie's genre seemed to change quite a bit. Of course, the first film had been the same.

The siege that brought down the capital was the highlight of Guardian of the Wall, Cha Jin-cheol's story. Once the army that had guarded the empire's Wall entered the capital, there were no more major crises.

Since it was a civil war, the Grand General strictly forbade looting, and we soon stood before the imperial palace.

“Is this about to end?”

Considering the movie's runtime, it was about time. I thought that if there was still a villain left in this exhausting movie, it would be the emperor, but even that prediction was wrong.

Deep inside the imperial palace, they found the emperor's hanged corpse.

The last emperor of the Ming Dynasty, the Chongzhen Emperor, chose to end his life as emperor rather than become a prisoner and cling to a miserable existence when his empire fell. The emperor of the Jincheon Empire in the movie must have tried to preserve his last shred of pride through suicide as well.

In one corner of the imperial palace, generals discussed the postwar situation. From now on, they would fight among themselves over who got to swallow up the empire whole. Of course...

With the movie about to end, what happened afterward wasn't my concern.

“Hey.”

“Yes, General?”

“Bring me a drink.”

The drink I had beside the emperor's body, dangling from the ceiling, felt strangely fitting. I looked out the window and waited for the ending credits to roll.

...

“This is taking a while. Don't tell me another boss is going to show up here? Hotel, don't drag this out with some ridiculous twist.”

“That's what I thought too.”

“Fuck! What now? Damn it!”

The moment I turned around in surprise, the emperor's hanging corpse twitched and spoke to me!

Seriously, who wrote this movie's script? Was this suddenly a zombie movie? Was the emperor secretly some kind of sorcerer?

I grabbed the spear I had laid beside me and readied myself. If that bastard was a necromancer, I was a paladin! Burning with fighting spirit, I spun the spear halfway around and-

“No, no! Wait a moment!”

The spearhead I thrust out shattered the emperor's head in a single strike. But that bastard had said something weird just now...

“Ha!”

The chunks of human flesh scattered before my eyes flew back together, and bone fragments scattered in every direction gathered to reconstruct the emperor's head. I never expected the emperor to wield such evil black magic!

That didn't mean I would lose. Even if he was not just a dark mage, but the Lich King or the Demon King, with my current strength-

“No, listen to me! The movie is already over!”

‘The movie?’

“What is this? A character in the movie wouldn't say the word ‘movie’...”

“Now, now. Actor Cha Jin-cheol, think about it. Isn't there an essential element that always appears in dramas?”

“What are you talking about all of a sudden? And who are you?”

“It isn't usually part of Korean movies, but in India and Vietnam, they include it even while the movie is playing. So I added it.”

“What kind of bullshit is that-”

“There! You can see the words in front of you, right? I put them up for you, so please read them.”

I stared blankly at the words that began appearing in the air before me.

“Once you read this, it will be over.”

“... This is a truly fucking idiotic movie.”

“Thank you for the compliment. Please read it.”

I had no choice.

“Ha, ha, ha, ha...”

“Can't you read Hangul?”

Ah, fuck it! Let's just read it and get this over with!

“Hair-root strengthening! Follicle recovery! Reduced hair loss! Scalp restoration! Scalp aging prevention! Can you believe it contains all these effects?”

“Happyhappy Hair Country! The hotel's specialty, ‘Sprout! Sprout!’ Please make sure to buy it. Shall we read the final words together?”

“Thirty-nine! Thousand! Eight! Hundred! Won!”

“Thirty-nine! Thousand! Eight! Hundred! Won!”

Just as I felt like I was losing my mind, I felt something sticky on my head. When I looked up blankly, the emperor's corpse, controlled by ‘someone,’ raised one hand and rubbed something that might have been shampoo or medicine onto my head.

“... What are you doing?”

“Ha ha, do you know how flustered I was earlier?”

“Why?”

“You defeated Kurta, whom you were supposed to avoid, and met the conditions for the Hidden Reward. Yet your body had become incapable of receiving that reward. What was I supposed to do?”

“Hidden Reward? A body incapable of receiving a reward?”

“Don't worry. You can receive it now.”

My head itched. I felt something strange sprouting out, and the scales around my head began to peel away.

[You have obtained ‘Hair of a Lightning-Enduring Warrior’!]

Amid the ending credits that filled my vision...

I was left speechless.

Footnotes:

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