WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 356: Room 205, Curse Room - ‘□□□□’ (5)

──────

- Cha Jin-cheol

The moment Eun-sol’s head fell, the rest of us reacted swiftly.

A-ri moved in front of Mi-ro and drew on the power of Old Blood, while I immediately pulled out my spear and thrust it at the old man.

I knew who he was at once.

Only three people in this room could give off such overwhelming pressure, but the sealed Phantom Demon and the Fire Cult Leader, who had not even crossed the barrier, could not possibly be here.

That old man was Yi Ja-seong!

The next moment, a pale light flashed at the old man's waist before shooting toward me at lightning speed.

There was no time to test him. I had to use Instant immediately.

Time slowed across the world.

The streak of light flying at me like lightning slowed, and the solid form of a sword came into view.

I angled my thrusting spear to the right, cutting off Yi Ja-seong's sword path in advance.

Then, as though he had read the changing angle of my spear, his sword quietly pulled back.

I had no intention of leaving myself open by letting my spear stab empty air, so I twisted my body and withdrew it as well.

A vaguely amused voice reached me.

“Not bad. Did you say you were the Big Dipper Grand General? You deserve that title.”

“...”

The meaning of that exchange was clear.

That monster, Yi Ja-seong, could react and make decisions perfectly even in the hyper-accelerated world created by Instant.

“And what a shame. If I had the leisure, I could have enjoyed a pleasant time with you...”

So he had no intention of doing that now.

The leader of the Heavenly Righteous Alliance's sword radiated threatening force once more.

I borrowed the power of Instant again.

Then something incomprehensible happened.

If the leader of the Heavenly Righteous Alliance had become twice as fast as before, I could have understood it.

By Room 205's standards, he was a superhuman who might have been the strongest in human history. Even if I used the power of my blessing and Instant, I might still have been unable to keep up with his movements.

But...

The old man's sword was slow.

To my mind accelerated by Instant, it was slow enough to make me yawn.

Yet his sword moved without hesitation or obstruction.

I had clearly tried to block it with my spear, but no “collision” occurred.

Like a salmon swimming upstream through rapids, like a bird using a headwind as propulsion.

My spear could not become an obstacle to his sword.

Because Instant had accelerated my perception to the limit, I could do nothing but watch for a “long time” as the old man's sword approached my heart.

It was like a terrible nightmare.

Still, I had one final measure left.

--- Fwaaaa!

A wave that twisted the world spread out.

An incomprehensible power had to be met with an incomprehensible power.

The wave released by the Otherworldly Star began overturning the entire space in an instant.

“Urgh! He's insanely strong!”

Time began flowing normally again.

As I barely caught my breath and checked my upper body, a throbbing sensation told me that an enormous amount of blood was pouring out in real time.

Yi Ja-seong had twisted his sword path in fear of the Star's power, keeping it from piercing my heart, but I still could not avoid being badly wounded.

A-ri suddenly appeared behind me and poured her own blood from the thermos all over my body.

“A-ri, did you, did you see that?”

“See what? All I saw was you two going whoosh, slash, then suddenly you summoned the Star.”

“T-that old bastard is insanely strong!”

“I'll take that as a compliment.”

When I finally turned toward the leader of the Heavenly Righteous Alliance, I saw that the exchange had dealt him considerable damage too.

Had he been exposed to the Star's power for even 0.5 seconds?

Still, he had been far too close, and more importantly, his body had no resistance to the Star's power at all.

“Truly fearsome power...”

Yet the old man did not seem frightened in the slightest.

Like a carpenter shaving away a piece of wood, in that brief interval, he began slicing away his grotesquely twisted skin and flesh with his sword.

A-ri could not hide her disbelief at the sight.

“Doesn't that hurt?”

“It does.”

Just as A-ri and Mi-ro exchanged glances and prepared to counterattack, the old man spoke.

“Lackeys of the Phantom Demon.”

“What?”

“An old memory comes to mind...”

A sudden trip down memory lane?

Honestly, this was an obvious attempt to stall.

Yi Ja-seong had also been hurt by the Star's power, so he needed time to tend to his wounds.

Still, I needed time for my wounds to regenerate too, so I had no choice but to play along with that shallow trick.

“Thirty years ago, I slew thousands of innocents.”

“...”

“If they had any sin, it was only that they had the misfortune of being near the Phantom Demon.”

“...”

“I thought then that we had killed too many in this dreadful world. That our sins could never be washed away.”

A-ri replied with interest in her voice.

“Why are you telling us this?”

“The Phantom Demon is an evil beyond the ages, one who must never again set foot upon this land. Yet what are you thinking, trying to bring about his resurrection?”

The moment I heard that, I found myself at a loss for words.

If you thought about it, hadn't that old man appeared here for the greater cause of preventing the Phantom Demon's resurrection?

Meanwhile, for strange reasons the people of this world could never understand, we were trying to resurrect what was said to be the most evil being in human history.

A-ri gave a simple answer to something that, from another perspective, might have made us feel guilty.

“Just because.”

“...”

For that one moment, even Yi Ja-seong seemed speechless.

“It'd be fun. Three Absolute Masters beating the hell out of each other would be something to see.”

Ah, A-ri was saying that to shake Yi Ja-seong's mind, right?

Right?

Then the old man answered in a strangely hollow tone.

“You resemble the Phantom Demon.”

“What?”

“Long ago, there were two factions called the Flying Sword Sect and the Geum Family Manor. Both enjoyed a measure of prosperity in Henan Province, and they had no particular conflict between them.”

“...”

“One day, the third son of the Flying Sword Sect Leader suddenly seized and imprisoned the eldest son of the Geum Family Manor before brutally murdering him. The Geum Family Manor could not simply overlook such a thing. In the end, blood flowed through Henan Province like a river, and as leader of the Heavenly Righteous Alliance, I moved to mediate the situation.”

“... Was that something the Phantom Demon did?”

“At the time, the Phantom Demon who appeared before me had borrowed the body of a pretty little girl. He was sitting atop the head of the Geum Family Manor Lord, who had fallen into despair after realizing the Phantom Demon had orchestrated it all to toy with them.”

“...”

“Do you know what he said to me?”

“No.”

“He asked why I was taking it so seriously.”

“No, honestly, I'm not like that guy...”

“Perhaps that very attitude was what made the Phantom Demon an invincible superhuman.”

“What?”

What was that supposed to mean?

That insane attitude had made the Phantom Demon an invincible superhuman?

Everyone was briefly baffled by his incomprehensible words. Then the sharp voice of the girl who had remained quiet until now rang out.

“Then ask the Phantom Demon himself!”

--- Click!

A small watch was in the silver-haired girl's hand.

The instant its hands turned, a young man appeared in midair.

* * *

[User: Han Ga-in (Wisdom)

Date: Day 156

Current Location: Level 2, Room 205, Curse Room ‘□□□□’

Sage’s Advice: 3]

- Han Ga-in

I suddenly came to my senses. The situation around me was...

Had I been summoned by the power of the Time Lender?

“Ga-in!”

Without giving me time to think, Mi-ro stretched out a hand and pointed at the old man ahead.

I did not know what was going on, but this was a kind of “signal” we had agreed on before.

Someone summoned by the Time Lender's power had no information about the current situation, and in an emergency, there was no time to think it through.

So we had agreed to immediately attack whoever Mi-ro pointed at.

“I'll bind that bastard!”

At the same time, Jin-cheol charged at the old man, while A-ri ran beside him, releasing red mist in every direction.

Before long, the clamor of melee weapons striking one another filled the area.

I summoned the Grimoire and attempted to possess my opponent.

...

What was this?

The moment my floating consciousness tried to seize the old man's body, his eyes flashed blue, and I experienced something strange unlike anything I had ever encountered.

Come to think of it, the biggest factor in whether taking over someone's body through Possession worked or not was the opponent's rank.

This “rank” was a different concept from physical strength.

For example, even if someone was as weak in a fight as Seung-yeop, if they were the messenger or servant of a divine being, there was a high chance Possession would not work on them at all.

On the other hand, even a monster capable of toppling a building with one swing of its tail would have no way to resist Possession if it was only a beast.

The old man was closer to the latter than the former.

Judging by Eun-sol's corpse nearby, Jin-cheol bleeding onto the floor in real time, and A-ri's tense expression, he seemed unbelievably strong.

That was why they had called me.

But he did not possess a rank high enough to repel Possession.

In other words, he was resisting the Grimoire's power not through Soul Rank, but with some strange technique I could not understand.

The old man had created a wall.

A bizarre wall stood between us, one the Grimoire's power could not cross.

It was not something that physically existed. It was a wall dividing mind from mind.

The moment I understood the principle behind his feat, admiration escaped me.

I sometimes watched animal documentaries on TV.

One animal that had remained in my memory was the beaver. I would marvel at how a creature that looked like little more than an oversized rat could build dams so enormous they made me laugh in disbelief.

It felt exactly like that.

No matter how great a genius he was, he was still human. How had he created a technique so close to a miracle?

I could not help admiring him, but I also laughed.

Because that was all it was.

No matter how high a mortal leapt, they were only a flea. No matter how they flew, they were only a sparrow.

--- Whoooom!

As the Power of the Avatar manifested, black thread-like magical power surged from the Grimoire toward the old man, who suddenly swung his sword.

I could scarcely believe it, but this time, the old man displayed the mystical art of cutting through the Grimoire's magical power with his sword.

He was even doing all this while fighting Jin-cheol and A-ri at the same time.

At this point, I almost felt respect for him.

It was difficult to understand how a human could reach such a realm.

But one person could not withstand three superhumans.

In the end, Cha Jin-cheol charged in and took the old man's sword strike with his body, restricting his movements, while A-ri filled the area with blood mist and threw off the old man's senses.

At that moment, the Power of the Avatar seized the old man's body completely.

* * *

Mi-ro sniffled for a long while as she explained the situation to me.

“An Absolute Master?”

“Mm-hm...”

“No wonder it felt like he knew my powers.”

“Huh?”

“When I tried to possess Yi Ja-seong's body, it was like...”

“Like what?”

“It was like he split his mind and built a wall inside himself. He couldn't stop my Possession, but it prevented me from taking complete control of his body all at once.”

“What are you talking about?”

Instead of trying to explain it to Mi-ro, I thought it through.

Splitting his mind to resist Possession, and that strange sword energy capable of cutting through the magical power of the Power of the Avatar.

No matter how I looked at it, it felt as though he had known the Grimoire's power in advance and created techniques to counter it. But given that Room 205's setting involved someone like me called the Phantom Demon running wild, I could understand it.

Yi Ja-seong, the Sword of All Under Heaven, had created techniques to face the Phantom Demon he might one day encounter again.

“This is ominous...”

“Huh?”

“If Yi Ja-seong made techniques like that, Jo Won-hong probably did too.”

“What?”

“Mi-ro, listen carefully from now on. Eun-sol, Jin-cheol, and A-ri are all dead, so you're the only one I can pass on what I've realized to.”

“O-okay! I'm good at remembering things.”

“... No. I'll write it down, so don't forget.”

Quite a few companions had already died. Would the remaining people be able to escape safely...?

With less than twenty minutes left to exist, all I could do was pray.

Footnotes:

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