WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 46: Room 104, The Cursed Room - ‘Hotel High, the Prestigious Entrance Exam School’ (6)
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[User: Han Ga-in (Wisdom)
Date: Day 18
Current Location: Level 1, Room 104 (Curse Room - Hotel High, the Prestigious Academy)
Sage’s Advice: 3]
Overwhelming.
Late at night, in a plain without a single building nearby. The place was clearly empty, yet the presence of the being that had descended from the sky filled the entire space.
My head hurt. Every companion who had met the Guide had said the same thing. Now I understood what they meant. A hymn echoed through my mind.
Long ago, the Lord sent the waves of heaven down upon the earth, and His rightful child stood upon the land. Let the lowly kneel. The paradise of heaven has been prepared-
--- Thud!
“Get a grip!”
“Gah! What was that just now?”
“You still don't know how to use Wisdom properly. Beings like that are like the sun. Look at them with the naked eye and you'll go blind. Look through your Status Window.”
Through the Status Window? The moment I heard it, I understood. The Status Window was a translucent hologram that always lingered at the edge of my vision.
If I placed it directly in front of my eyes-
The instant I thought of moving it in front of me, the Status Window shifted there on its own.
[User: Han Ga-in (Wisdom)
Date: Day 18
Current Location: Level 1, Room 104 (Curse Room - Hotel High, the Prestigious Academy)
Sage’s Advice: 3]
It was a strange sensation. I made the letters faint, then looked at the angel through the Status Window, as though I were looking through translucent glass. The headache vanished. The hymn ringing in my head stopped.
I learned another way to use the Blessing of Wisdom!
* * *
My child. Why have you accumulated so many sins? Though the Lord is merciful toward children, even that mercy has its limits.
“What right do you have to speak of sin? You killed countless people in the Old School Building, and now you've used people to kill my sister and grandfather too!”
That is not so. In the Old School Building, at the altar, I killed no one. I merely guided them into the Lord's embrace. How could salvation be a sin? And these teachers were people who beguiled children and led them down the wrong path. They were nothing more than fallen shepherds. I cut down those fallen shepherds to guide you onto the righteous path. That, too, was not a sin.
“You take away people's selves, replace them, and even kill them as you please. You call that salvation? Can you just slap the word salvation onto anything and call it done? Then I'll save you now!”
Could your crude Scales possibly weigh me? Could human scales lift one who descended from heaven?
“Don't act as if you're some kind of angel. There can't be gods or angels in a place this strange!”
The Scales began to revolve once more. The weight of the sins Elena had perceived pressed down on the angel.
A sacred song rang out around the angel.
--- Laaaaaaaaaah!
An impossibly high note shook heaven and earth, and the radiance pouring from the Scales lit up the night as brightly as day!
* * *
“Run!”
“Huh? What?”
“Not ‘what.’ If we get caught in a crazy fight like that, we'll die without even being able to breathe.”
Elena had gained power nearly equal to a demigod after meeting the conditions, and was fighting something that truly seemed like an angel. Neither A-ri nor I was in the same weight class as them. I scrambled out of the car and began running.
“I think I'm still sane thanks to my Status Window, and you seem like you'd be fine even if you fell into hell, but how is Elena still sane?”
“Think about it simply. She's carrying out an Execution. Once an Execution begins, all influences, whether arising from one's own will or someone else's, seem to be suppressed, so no one can stop it. And don't casually slip insults into the conversation.”
“It wasn't an insult. I'm saying that because I can't figure you out. It's getting stranger and stranger that you know more about how to use my Blessing than I do.”
“Still, that definitely isn't human, so why does the Blessing work on it?”
A-ri blatantly changed the subject. I was curious about that too, but things were urgent, so I let it go.
“It does look human, broadly speaking.”
“That? Fine, it's pretty. But it has wings and flies. And it got bigger. Even the Management Bureau, where unusual humans are everywhere, wouldn't consider something like that human.”
“I don't know the Management Bureau's standards. As for the wings, maybe some divine being called the Lord gave them to it. Don't you remember the Elder? The Elder was just human, yet had even gone around taking over people's bodies. If a divine being can grant that kind of power, couldn't they give someone wings?”
“The Guide is only a human who gained power? Hmm... I have another hypothesis.”
* * *
I was out of breath. Running while inhaling the cold night air was starting to wear me down.
“You knew about my Blessing. Don't you know anything about Justice?”
“I told you, the Management Bureau only knows a tiny part of it. And we should stop.”
A-ri suddenly stopped.
“What? Why aren't you running-”
“I think the fight is over. If Elena won, we don't need to run. If the angel won, running is pointless anyway, so let's rest.”
“...Right. Since we've stopped, I had a good idea earlier.”
“Oh my, so did I. Then I can guess what you're about to say.”
“If the angel won, let's not resist and just get captured. I thought of something good.”
“Fine. This angel keeps saying the Lord is merciful toward children, so if we bow our heads and beg, we'll probably be spared.”
A-ri suddenly took out a small syringe from somewhere and drew their own blood.
“What are you-”
“Call it a contingency measure. Drink it.”
...
I'd suspected it, but was what I drank in the House of Horror really A-ri's blood?
“What is it for? I'm still fine physically.”
“It isn't for restoring stamina this time. It's for when the angel wins. Just drink it.”
If it wasn't for restoring stamina, what was it for? I drank it. Like before, it tasted fishy and salty. There was a faint warmth to it. It wasn't something I wanted to drink twice, but now that I'd had it a second time, I somehow felt like I'd be drinking it often in the future.
* * *
About three minutes later, the angel descended in front of us.
By now, I was used to it. I immediately switched the Status Window to filter mode and looked at the angel.
I thought you would run about like unruly children. Have you given up?
“How could lowly lambs like us escape an angel's grasp? You can fly. We'll repent and bow our heads.”
“Is Elena... dead?”
The sin of trying to lift me with human scales. It runs deep. The Lord is merciful toward children, but even mercy has its limits. I could not leave it unpunished. Which path will you choose?
“We will kneel before the Lord.”
“Please tell the Lord we're sorry~”
The angel was not in good condition. Its wings were torn in several places, and golden blood flowed all over its body. One eye appeared to have been crushed. Lowering my head to examine its feet, I saw that three of its toes were missing as well.
I was honestly amazed. What kind of power was Justice, to drive a surreal being like this into such a state?
Of course, that was something to discuss after we got out. Even if this angel were three times as badly injured and missing both arms, it looked capable of defeating us with a single finger.
For now, we had to bow our heads. If we got out, we could grow stronger and return to make it pay.
Ah. How grievous. This land is filled with screams. Today, more than thirty of the faithful have breathed their last upon this land. O Lord. Your young daughter Aurelia beseeches you. Grant the faithful another chance.
The angel bowed her head toward the sky and prayed before us.
Then, a miracle occurred.
The bodies of the cultists Elena had blown apart rose from nothingness. The dead breathed again, and the wounded were healed.
Wasn't this... an utterly overwhelming divine power? The power to revive dozens of people with a single prayer. Could she truly not be a god or an angel?
It didn't make me want to worship her anew. Still, the thought that I would someday have to defeat a being like this made it hard to breathe.
* * *
The moment heavenly light poured down, Aurelia turned to look at us.
Ah-
The hymn rang through my mind again. I understood instinctively. This was power beyond what the Status Window's filter could block.
Had she thought stronger mental suppression was necessary because we were speaking normally in front of her? My consciousness drifted away. I rose out of my body.
Naturally, I watched myself kneel before the daughter of a great being.
???
I watched.
I was watching myself kneel.
What the hell was happening now? I was looking at myself as if I were playing a game in third-person view. Had I left my body?
* * *
The police arrived. Absurdly, the police were the ones who handled the aftermath of the surreal events that had unfolded in the middle of the night.
Who had called them?
I didn't know, but the officers carefully collected the bodies of those killed in the “traffic accident,” Kim Mook-seong, Lee Eun-sol, and Elena. Then they asked the cultists who had “returned from death” various questions. Under the pretext of protecting “students traumatized by the incident,” the cultists put A-ri and me in a car, watched us closely, and sent us back to the dormitory.
I watched it all as though it were happening in another world, detached from my body. I had clearly left my body, yet my body naturally followed the cultists' instructions.
So they really were going to let us live.
Honestly, I had doubted bowing our heads would save us, but they really did spare us. It was completely unlike the time the teachers had been shot without hesitation for attempting to flee. The cultists did not even try to intimidate us. They merely recited strange scripture, as though lecturing us to return to the right path.
Did the cultists think everything was fine because the angel had already suppressed our minds?
It seemed the claim that the Lord was merciful toward children wasn't just something they said. Maybe their doctrine was that minors would not be punished unless they committed a grave sin on the level of grabbing an angel's wings and tearing them apart like Elena had.
The reason didn't matter. What mattered was that A-ri and I had survived to the end because of it. And... I was still floating in the air, watching everything unfold.
Only then did I understand.
A contingency plan for when the angel wins!
The blood A-ri gave me must have had a special effect. If I waited, I would learn exactly what it did. For now, I would do what I could. I thought carefully about the events of the day, about the clear operating principles revealed through this religious group's actions. The arrival of the police confirmed it.
Tomorrow night, we would truly escape this time!
Footnotes:
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