WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 518: Room 207, Gate Room - Fourth Trial ‘The Fallen King’ (4)

──────

- Cleanup Agent, Kim Min-a

--- Bang!

Just as I was about to turn toward the strange sound behind me, an angry shout came from ahead.

“I was trying to hold back, but I can’t! Park Min-seung, you fucking bastard! Who the fuck do you think you are to -”

“Let go! Let, let go! Fuck, I said I’m sorry!”

“You think saying sorry solves everything? Does it, you son of a bitch? You fucking piece of shit -”

Out of nowhere, class president Ho-jin rushed at Min-seung, the thug, over their earlier argument!

I was briefly stunned by the ear-piercing profanity. Then the class president suddenly began strangling him.

“Ugh! Ngh! Gurgle!”

The class president squeezed the thug’s neck like they meant to kill him, veins bulging in both arms. The others jumped to their feet in shock.

Still, they only hovered awkwardly, unsure what to do. No one stepped in to stop them.

Explosive rage over something that had already ended. Vicious profanity the class president would never normally use!

I’d seen similar things several times already, hadn’t I?

It was a Demon Disaster!

“A, a demon! A demon got into Ho-jin...”

Instead of stopping the class president, the frightened students backed away.

Just as I decided I had to intervene before the thug died, the class president suddenly stood up with a blank expression.

“Huh? Huh? Wh-what’s going on?”

“Cough! Cough!”

“What? Min-seung? Are you okay? Why are you under me?”

The class president had come to their senses?

I’d never seen anyone regain their senses this quickly -

--- Bang!

The sound came from behind me again, followed by a startled boy’s voice.

“W-what the hell is this book?”

Everyone looked toward the back of the chapel.

One of the large tables where Bibles were placed had shifted sideways. That must have caused the bang.

Once the table moved, the knees of a female student beneath it were exposed.

A black book lay on her lap.

It looked nothing like a Bible. Anyone could tell it was dangerous.

“Isn’t that Ji-eun?”

“What? Hey, Seo Ji-eun! What’s that book? Where did you get -”

Ji-eun recoiled in alarm and waved her hands. The book vanished into thin air!

“Wh-what book? There wasn’t anything.”

It was such a clumsy lie that it was almost laughable.

All fifteen or so students in the chapel had seen the book. Did she think making it disappear would fool them?

It only turned everyone’s suspicions into certainty.

As if he had been waiting for this, the thug, who had been coughing on the floor, somehow got up and shouted firmly.

“H-her! It’s her! E-everyone saw that weird book in Seo Ji-eun’s hands, right? It has to be her! Hey! Cha Eun-ho! Grab her!”

The class president, who had only just regained their senses, grasped the situation and shouted at the nerd standing near Ji-eun.

“Eun-ho! Grab Ji-eun!”

“O-okay!”

With everyone yelling at him to catch her, perhaps the normally timid nerd found a burst of uncharacteristic courage and approached Seo Ji-eun.

“... Ho.”

Ji-eun smiled sweetly and held out a finger.

The next moment, the nerd collapsed to the floor, foaming at the mouth without even managing a scream.

“Ahh!”

Fear spread through the room in an instant.

Perhaps she no longer intended to hide it. Seo Ji-eun smiled openly as she looked around at everyone.

“Are you guys idiots? Who are you telling to catch me? You, Ho-jin?”

The class president, singled out by name, turned pale and pressed themself against the wall.

“J-Ji-eun... Please spare me! I-I never bullied you, right? You know that, don’t you? I-I always tried to help you -”

“Fine. I’ll let Ho-jin go. Then... Min-seung, is it you?”

The thug’s face immediately went white.

Unlike the class president, who had never been the type to bully anyone, the thug now seemed as good as dead.

Soon, he began strangling himself.

“Ghk! Cough!”

“Oh my, Min-seung. It doesn’t look like God is helping you, does it? You prayed so hard too~!”

Her voice was almost playful.

Every student was frozen in fear, either lying facedown on the floor or pressed against the walls. None of them even dared to run.

...

This was enough.

--- Click!

It was time to use the handgun hidden beneath my uniform.

“Seo Ji-eun, put down the book right now and -”

Before I could finish, a boy beside me blocked my way!

--- Thud!

“No!”

Startled, I kicked the idiot aside and looked ahead. I heard rapid footsteps racing out of the chapel.

In that brief moment, Seo Ji-eun had escaped!

For the first time, I was flustered.

Her response had been far too fast!

As if she had known I was an agent from the beginning -

No time for this! After her!

* * *

--- Bang! Bang!

I repeatedly pulled the trigger while chasing her, but not a single shot hit.

It wasn’t because my shooting was poor. She was aware of the gunfire and fled while keeping obstacles like bookshelves and doors between us!

Fortunately, the chase soon came to an end.

Ji-eun didn’t have much stamina, and more importantly, she couldn’t leave the field.

“Stop!”

“...”

The girl stood motionless in the middle of the field, as if her mind had gone blank.

Ji-eun must be able to see them now too.

The black armored vehicles completely surrounding the school, including the front gate, and the drones flying nearby!

By procedure, I should execute her immediately.

The field was wide open. Ji-eun had no way to dodge my shots.

“Seo Ji-eun. This is your final warning. Put down the book and surrender.”

“...”

“I said it’s your last warning! If you surrender now, there’s a chance the Inquisition Bureau will let you live, provided the book is destroyed -”

“... You.”

“Huh?”

“What do you know! What do you know? You’re so happy because you’re pretty and everyone worships you, aren’t you? Do you really think you’re some kind of princess? Don’t act so high and mighty! Someone like you -”

Huh?

I was trying to save her, and she suddenly exploded?

Was this some jealousy she’d been holding against me?

Even so, at a time like this -

“Give it to me! Give me that body!”

When the ominous book appeared, its black leather seeming coated in obsidian dust, I made my decision with a heavy heart.

--- Bang!

Blood burst from Ji-eun’s chest, and the ominous book vanished without a trace.

...

Feeling numb, I approached Ji-eun.

It wasn’t for any grand reason.

I just wanted to witness the final moments of the girl I had considered, in my own way, a close friend.

“...”

As I took Ji-eun’s hand, I heard a tiny voice that seemed to tickle my ear.

* * *

The Demon Disaster at Hotel High ended that way.

“There were four deaths. Two were beaten to death with that person’s bat. The gym teacher, I think? One was crushed to death while trying to escape. And the Witch was shot dead at the scene by a Cleanup Agent.”

By the time the report ended, I was looking downcast, so an Inquisition Bureau employee tried to comfort me.

“Agent Min-a! Don’t take it too hard. Only four people died, and you killed the Witch. We contained the incident at an exceptionally low cost! You’ll definitely be able to lose that trainee tag now -”

“Ahem, ahem. I heard you were quite close to the Witch.”

“Oh my!”

“Ah, um. Anyway, you’ll have to get used to things like this over time -”

“I’m fine.”

I merely repeated that I was fine and left the uncomfortable gathering.

...

There wasn’t a trace of a lie in the employee’s claim that they had got off cheaply with only four victims.

If they hadn’t found the Witch, Ji-eun, the Inquisition Bureau would have had to kill every survivor at Hotel High.

It was fortunate that it happened on the field.

Since it was a mental-erosion-type Demon Disaster, the Inquisition Bureau hadn’t rashly sent people in. However, they had monitored the scene in real time through drones and other means.

In other words, everyone had seen Seo Ji-eun die.

Thanks to that, the Inquisition Bureau swiftly declared the case resolved.

“Agent Kim Min-a.”

“Yes.”

“You worked hard today.”

“Not at all.”

“Are you all right?”

“Yes.”

“... The mental health clinic -”

“I’m fine.”

“Then take about a week off. We’ll contact you about your next mission then.”

“Yes.”

* * *

Late at night.

I wandered through a living room far too spacious for a girl living alone, lost in thought.

“...”

My heart felt a little heavy and bitter.

I said I was fine in front of the others, but maybe I wasn’t....

I had spent eight years posing as a high school student.

It wasn’t a short time, so I had plenty of people I could almost call friends.

Had Ji-eun been a little special to me?

Maybe it was only natural that she stayed on my mind because I had killed her myself, not because we had been particularly close.

“...”

People’s feelings were so hard to understand.

I had spent months getting along with Ji-eun, but I’d never felt that she was so jealous of me.

I thought I could easily read what the students were feeling after spending so long at school. Maybe that was arrogance.

Of course, it wasn’t as though Ji-eun had been jealous of me and cursed me until the moment she died.

What had she said at the end?

She had said something in a fading voice.

‘Min-a, I’m sorry.... That wasn’t me just now -’

She was probably apologizing for suddenly swearing at me, but what did she mean by, ‘That wasn’t me just now’ -

“... Huh?”

In that instant.

Memories from the past flashed through my mind like a panorama, and scenes I had never consciously noticed surfaced.

As if a bolt of lightning had struck the back of my head!

The first scene.

When the possessed class president strangled the thug in the chapel, someone discovered the black book Ji-eun had summoned after the bang?

No! The order was reversed.

The bang came first, then the class president strangled the thug.

That meant someone had already pushed the chapel table aside and found the black book before Ji-eun used magic, or at the moment she summoned the Grimoire to use magic!

The second scene.

When someone tried to catch Ji-eun, she knocked him unconscious with a single gesture.

Afterward, as if showing everyone, she controlled only the thug’s hands and made him strangle himself while leaving his consciousness intact!

She had never shown power like that before while turning the school upside down.

It was like her magical proficiency had suddenly skyrocketed!

The third scene.

The moment I tried to draw my gun in the chapel, she controlled the male student beside me and blocked my path in less than a second.

Even thinking about it again, it had been an absurdly quick response.

As if she had known from the start that I was an agent!

...

I remembered what happened at lunchtime.

The cafeteria lady’s rampage immediately afterward had made me forget it, but it had been quite puzzling at the time.

I had clearly waited until the other students left before moving, yet someone had come up from behind as if they had been waiting and bumped into me.

Could they have checked the handgun I had carefully hidden beneath my uniform then?

“...”

That someone had been the same person every time.

* * *

A series of murders had occurred.

If one of the survivors was the culprit, but it was impossible to identify which one, how should they respond?

If the decision-maker was a judge, everyone would be acquitted for lack of evidence because they didn’t know who the culprit was.

The fundamental principle of criminal law was that it was better to let ten criminals go free than punish one innocent person.

If the decision-maker was the Management Bureau, every survivor would have to die because they didn’t know who the culprit was.

Their fundamental principle was that even if they had to kill ten innocent people, they must not let even one culprit escape.

Therefore, for me to survive, the culprit had to be definitively identified.

Fortunately, I was able to recover the Grimoire and escape the scene without much difficulty.

...

That aside, who was that agent who vaguely resembled A-ri?

I had been certain it was A-ri....

Even the soft spot where she hid her gun beneath her uniform was exactly the same as A-ri’s.

Yet her actions were vaguely clumsy.

It was as though she had gone back to the cover identity A-ri had made up when I first met her, a Cleanup Agent.

More than anything, her soul!

I discreetly checked it as soon as I recovered the Grimoire, and the condition of her soul was strange.

What on earth was happening in this room?

I should find an opportunity to approach her.

The Cult was next.

Footnotes:

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