WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 501: Room 207, Gate Room - Third Trial ‘Miskatonic University’ (3)
──────
- Kim A-ri
Late at night, I leaned against the window and considered the information we'd gathered so far.
First, the people connected to Miskatonic University's Department of Occult Studies were opposed to the Holy See.
Based on that alone, Mook-seong's opinion from earlier made Miskatonic University seem like the villains...
To begin with, the logic in Introduction to Demonology that justified the existence of Chaos Entities was terribly flimsy.
Just because each Chaos Entity had different origins and tendencies, it was unfair to suppress them all?
Different or not, most of them harmed humans. That's why they got beaten to death without bothering to distinguish between them!
Starting with that werewolf professor, I could guarantee he'd killed five or six people in his life-
“... Whew.”
I took a deep breath and stopped myself from endlessly defending the Holy See and criticizing Miskatonic University.
The Holy See wasn't the Management Bureau, and this wasn't the reality we'd lived in.
There was no need to equate them with each other and get emotionally invested.
Second, what was Pero's taxidermied body supposed to mean?
Judging from the circumstances, Pero had already died and been preserved before the trial even began.
That meant Pero belonged not to the third trial, but to an earlier trial.
Pero usually began alongside Song-i, so perhaps Pero had started with the Ancient Egypt Party...
I couldn't be certain about that.
There wasn't a rule that Pero always began next to Song-i. There had also been cases like Room 206, where Pero started somewhere unrelated to Song-i.
More importantly, who was that old man who seemed to know Pero so well? The Dean?
If Pero had helped the old man, did that mean the old man was on our side?
Or was the old man's claim that Pero had protected him a lie?
What if the old man had actually killed Pero, then had Pero taxidermied as a trophy?
Third, this letter marked with the symbol of Horus.
What was this sudden talk about Horus?
And what was that line, ‘Father, why have you forsaken us?’
No, there was a more important question than any of that.
Who sent this letter to my room?
“...”
That old man I met earlier, the person who might have been the Dean.
I'd acted as though I recognized Pero in front of him.
I made excuses about how beautiful Pero was and how I wanted to touch the exhibit, but even I thought that excuse was absurd.
Had he realized I was something special because of that and sent me the letter?
Was that old man the son of an Egyptian god?
It might sound ridiculous to suddenly call him the son of a god, but the Dean was an incredible monster who had faced the Holy See alone for centuries.
At that point, it would be normal for the truth to be, ‘The Dean is actually the son of a god!’
It'd be stranger if he were just an ordinary human.
“...”
I couldn't be certain about this either.
Believers often called divine beings Father as well.
Even people who went to church were always calling God Father, Father, weren't they?
So the Dean might not be Horus's son. He could be a believer instead.
“... Oh my.”
In other words, there was a Chaos Entity great enough for someone like the Dean, who had opposed the Holy See alone, to worship as a father or a god.
What in the world was Horus?
I summarized my concerns in three lines.
Concern 1: Should we side with Miskatonic University or the Holy See?
Concern 2: What was the relationship between Pero and the old man? Was the old man the Dean?
Concern 3: What was the Dean's true identity? Horus's son or a believer? Then what was Horus?
I couldn't reach a clear conclusion about any of it, but I knew where I needed to go tomorrow.
* * *
I found Mook-seong early in the morning.
“You want to go to the library?”
“Yeah.”
“Hmm, are you planning to dig through materials there?”
“Miskatonic University, the history of Ancient Egypt, and especially Horus.”
“What?”
“Remember those keywords. Oh, and if we have time, let's look into medieval Europe too. There might be something about Elena and Eun-sol.”
“Uh, it looks like you've figured something out, A-ri, but I found something too.”
“Tell me.”
The ‘young man’ hesitated for a moment as if gathering his thoughts, then spoke.
“After finding Pero's taxidermied body, I was so shocked that I searched the area more thoroughly. Miskatonic University seems full of bizarre objects, after all.”
Miskatonic University was a force formed by Chaos Entities and occult researchers.
Naturally, it would be overflowing with strange objects that would have immediately been placed in Containment if the future Management Bureau had existed.
“I found a place that only professors can access. There must be something hidden there.”
“...”
“Well, let's start with the library. That'll be easier.”
* * *
Before long, Mook-seong and I were buried among musty old books.
As expected of a university library, it was overflowing with books that seemed worth examining.
--- Thud!
“Whoa! This pharaoh took his own daughter as his wife. This guy isn't related to our Party, right?”
--- Thump!
“It's just a book about civil wars among the late Egyptian pharaohs. I thought there might be a Hotel Party among them, but it doesn't seem like it.”
--- Thud!
“This book has several famous beauties from medieval France. Doesn't this woman look a little like Elena?”
“I don't see any similarity besides the blond hair.”
“Look closely! This maid's nose looks like Eun-sol's.”
“They're far too different in age. To a man in his seventies, someone in their thirties and someone in their forties might look about the same, but-”
“A-ri, does it make sense for you to say that to me?”
We were passing the time with little to show for it when I sensed someone nearby.
It was Emily, the beautiful girl who had begged me to show her the “power of a vampire” in class yesterday.
--- Grab!
“A-riii!”
She suddenly hugged me from behind, startling me!
She wasn't even Mi-ro. What was this supposed to be?
We'd only met yesterday!
“... I think it's rude to do that out of nowhere.”
“Sorry. But A-ri, why were you absent today?”
“...”
Come to think of it, Mook-seong and I were both university students according to our roles.
We weren't on break, so of course we had classes.
We just came to the library without giving such trivial matters a thought.
“I came to the library to study.”
“Mm, how diligent! Still, wouldn't it be better to attend class?”
“... I'll go from tomorrow.”
“There are afternoon lectures too.”
“I'll attend those.”
If we were absent too often, the professors or our classmates might find it strange. We needed to be careful.
“Ah, you're Mr. Mook-seong, right? Hello!”
“Ahem, how do you do?”
There he went again!
Did he still think he was a man in his seventies?
I immediately gave him a look.
“... Greetings, Miss Emily.”
“What are you two studying together? Could it be? Eek!”
“...”
“...”
“Y-you're freshmen, and you're already dating-”
“Miss Emily, I am a married man, and I have children back home.”
Considering the times in 1897, it wasn't strange for a university student to be married.
“Oh! I'm sorry. That was terribly rude of me!”
“It is all right. I only happened to meet Miss A-ri in the library, so I hope there will be no strange rumors.”
It was true that Mook-seong had married long ago and had children.
The sad truth was that he had even had a grandson, and his child and grandson had both died in an unspecified incident.
Either way, I needed to send her away.
“Emily, I'm studying right now, so I'd prefer to talk later-”
“What are you studying? Ah, I can tell from all the Egyptian history books. You're studying the roots of Miskatonic University, aren't you?”
“...”
The roots of Miskatonic University...
Hearing Emily's words reminded me of what the werewolf professor had said yesterday.
‘According to ancient records, our origins go all the way back to Ancient Egypt.’
The professor himself didn't seem to believe it, but there must have been a reason such a rumor existed.
“Oh? But I think you're looking at the wrong books.”
“... Thank you.”
I truly meant that this time.
“Emily, could you tell us which books we should read?”
“Sure!”
Emily soon hurried around the nearby shelves and brought back several very old books.
“By the way, these books are difficult to find outside Miskatonic University.”
“Really?”
“People who study the university's roots usually focus on the Shift of Faith.”
“The Shift of Faith?”
I'd never heard of that concept before.
“You don't know? Long ago, I mean, early in Ancient Egypt's long history? The Egyptians of that period worshipped a strange god.”
“A strange god?”
“It governed death and the afterlife, and its symbol was a skull, but...”
“But?”
“Its name had been forgotten.”
The Egyptians of primordial times were said to have worshipped a bizarre god that governed death and the afterlife and used a skull as its symbol.
“One day, the Egyptians' faith suddenly changed. The ancient god with no name was completely forgotten, and all its temples were destroyed. There was apparently a large-scale civil war in Memphis, the capital, during that process.”
“Hmm...”
“The faith that took root afterward was the Egyptian mythology we know well. The faith centered on Horus, god of the sun and sky, protection and vengeance.”
The Shift of Faith that occurred in Egypt in primordial times.
Those who worshipped Horus had exterminated the traditional faith whose name was now unknown.
It was interesting, but events like that had happened countless times throughout history.
Whenever Christianity spread, hadn't local folk religions been crushed?
“I understand. But what does Egypt's Shift of Faith have to do with Miskatonic University?”
Emily murmured with a strange expression.
“As time passed, the Christian forces that rose in Europe swept over Egypt.”
“You mean during the Roman era?”
“They say something similar happened again. This time, the Priests of Horus were driven out. And then...”
“And then?”
“There's a story that those very Priests of Horus became the roots of Miskatonic University.”
“...”
During the Roman era, the Holy See rose in what is now Europe.
They were a group that called Chaos Entities demons and burned them, and while expanding their influence, they drove the Church of Horus out of Egypt.
“You should look through the books rather than asking me about the rest.”
“Thank you.”
* * *
After Emily left, Mook-seong and I carefully examined books related to the period of the Shift of Faith in Egypt.
Stories of members of the old royalty suddenly transforming into grotesque monsters.
A rebellion started by Egyptians suffering under the monsters' tyranny.
The Priests of Horus were said to have stood at the heart of it.
“...”
There were descriptions of Horus everywhere.
Unlike conventional myths, which described gods vaguely and abstractly, there were detailed records not only of Horus's deeds, but also of his appearance.
As though Horus were not a god from myth, but a historical figure!
“A young man in his late teens or early twenties...”
“Apparently, he was also of a different race from the Egyptians. Isn't that strange? I don't think Egyptians from this era would even have known East Asians existed, yet the description fits one exactly.”
One who tuned fate.
One who made all people kneel.
One who could take many forms, each one still being himself.
The liberator who overthrew the Corrupted Royalty and saved suffering Egypt.
Above all, a being whose symbol was a bird.
“Hey, A-ri, this, this can't be!”
“...”
“Isn't it way too similar to the abilities of someone we know? Is it a coincidence?”
“No way.”
In Ancient Egypt, Mi-ro had been there, and she possessed the Inheritance, Time Lender.
“It's Ga-in. It has to be.”
Horus was Ga-in!
The moment I realized that, the information that had confused me until now began to fall into place.
I'd found the thread that could string together all the beads when I hadn't known where to start.
“The Priests of Horus, they were the first Party.”
Kim Sang-hyeon, Yoo Song-i, Park Seung-yeop, Mi-ro, and Yumi.
They were the Priests of Horus.
“The Corrupted Royalty must have been the boss of that trial.”
“What about the forgotten god?”
“Maybe that bastard was the boss too. Either way, the first Party dealt with both of them.”
What came next was the important part.
“Do you remember what we talked about on the train before entering the third trial?”
Mook-seong nodded.
“The four trials are actually one massive trial. In the past, we started separated by space in the Curse Room, but this time we started separated by time. Is that what you mean?”
“I realized that before we entered. The others didn't. But!”
“After entering the trial, those guys realized it too! Well, Sang-hyeon is smart enough that he probably would have figured it out.”
They might have realized it themselves, or Ga-in, summoned by Mi-ro, might have told them.
“After defeating the boss, some of them must have survived. And those companions...”
“They spread the faith of Horus!”
So the force centered on Miskatonic University was made up of the descendants of the Han Ga-in worshippers whose seed the first Party had planted!
Then Mook-seong cautiously murmured.
“But what do you think this passage means?”
Near the end of the records from the Shift of Faith period was the following passage.
「Great Horus showed mercy, allowing the survivors of the Corrupted Royalty to leave Egypt alive.」
“Reading it as it is, it sounds like Ga-in, um, spared the enemies and left trouble for the future.”
“...”
“There's an annotation saying it represents the infinite mercy of almighty Horus.”
No way.
That was just an interpretation some later scholar had added on their own.
Maybe Eun-sol or Jin-cheol, but mercy from Ga-in? What mercy?
“I don't know.”
I couldn't understand the meaning of this passage.
Was there another reason he had to let the enemies live?
--- Tap!
Mook-seong stood up.
“Good. We've researched the past enough, so let's go to the place I found. There should be something there too.”
“Yeah.”
Footnotes:
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