Escaping the Mystery Hotel - Chapter 536

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 535: Room 207, Gate Room - Fourth Trial ‘The Fallen King’ (21)

──────

- Han Ga-in

I got up before dawn and arrived at Florida's famous Kennedy Space Center.

“... Happyhappy Space Center?”

It wasn't Kennedy.

Did Room 207 not have President Kennedy?

Even so, there was no way the American president who took Kennedy's place was named Happyhappy.

“What’s strange about it?”

A-ri didn't find the name Happyhappy strange at all.

Apparently, even in the reality outside the Hotel, its name was Happyhappy or something similar.

“Never mind. Let’s move.”

The plan was simple.

While Fortuna drew the Guardian’s attention, I would head to the Lunar Base where Aedia was.

After that, our companions would join us through the Kingdom of Dreams.

It was a simple plan, but since our destination was the moon rather than Earth, there were many things to consider.

For instance, how were our companions supposed to survive on the moon?

Even A-ri’s Old Blood had its limits.

That was why we needed to get various equipment from the space center, including spacesuits.

* * *

After arriving, we sat in an out-of-the-way corner with few people and waited.

We had to make our move after Fortuna’s fight with the Guardian began.

If we caused trouble at the space center first, the Guardian might come after us instead.

We also needed to keep watch through Sophia in case Fortuna did anything strange.

Then a space center employee started approaching us.

It wasn't a big problem.

Grandfather and I were wrapped up from head to toe, and A-ri only needed to make a simple excuse.

In a normal world, people would have been suspicious of us for covering our entire bodies, but the residents of this communist utopia didn’t suspect one another...

“Hey! Who are you? You hideous monster, do you know where you are?”

At the furious shout, everyone startled and looked at each other.

In that brief moment, I saw Mi-ro taking off her mask!

“...!”

“You...!”

“Y-you thoughtless...”

The three of us were speechless, while Mi-ro smiled cutely.

“It was too stuffy... Teehee!”

Seeing the employee approaching while shouting, A-ri stood with a determined expression.

“Good morning! Hello.”

The employee’s expression softened after seeing the “lovely” A-ri, unlike the “hideous” Mi-ro.

“Oh my, good morning. Are you a high school student? Do you have a field trip scheduled today?”

“It’s not a field trip.”

“Sweetie, what is that monster behind you?”

Mi-ro looked almost exactly like A-ri.

Yet the moment she removed her mask and showed her face, the employee had called her a “monster” without hesitation.

It showed how this world treated the ten percent of people who had not been chosen.

A-ri’s answer was simple.

“She’s my pet. Go on, bark!”

For a moment, silence fell over the area.

“What are you doing? Why aren’t you barking?”

A-ri pressed her.

The employee wondered whether this monster really was a pet.

Mi-ro lowered her head without a word, apparently unwilling to say “woof.”

Finally, I tapped her shoulder.

“Hurry up.”

“... W-woof!”

I hit her once more.

“Louder!”

“Woof! Woof!”

A-ri turned around with a bright smile.

“She can do tricks too.”

“Tricks?”

“Lie on the ground and roll over twice!”

Mi-ro fell silent again.

I smacked the back of her head this time.

“Why aren’t you rolling already?!”

“...”

Mi-ro lay down on the filthy ground and rolled over twice.

“See? She’s pretty cute, isn’t she?”

“Hmm... Well, if you think she’s cute, that’s good. She does seem fairly well-trained, but she doesn’t look like a very safe animal.”

What did this situation look like to the employee?

Like a high school student walking around with a reticulated python as a pet?

Either way, we had gotten past one crisis.

“Mi-ro.”

“...”

“If you make another stupid mistake, you’re going for a naked walk this time.”

“... A-ri is so scary.”

“That’s enough. Fortuna and Sophia have reached downtown Jacksonville. Looks like it’s starting.”

I borrowed Sophia’s eyes to observe the situation.

After creating a duplicate, I made its consciousness reside within Sophia.

You could call it an advanced use of the Grimoire, and it consumed a considerable amount of stamina even for me.

Before long, an unexpected conversation began.

“...”

“What’s wrong?”

Mi-ro had leaked information about the Kingdom of Dreams to Fortuna.

If I told A-ri, would Mi-ro have to walk naked through the space center?

“It’s nothing.”

Mi-ro, I’ll let it slide once.

“...”

The unexpected conversation continued.

Fortuna defined his identity as something other than Park Seung-yeop.

It was a situation I had wanted to prevent...

Still, he had decided to help us, so it didn't matter.

When I told the others about Fortuna’s resolve, they wore complicated expressions.

Not only Mi-ro, but even the Management Bureau duo.

“I made him a promise.”

“A promise?”

“That I’d bring Yumi back to life.”

“...”

“When we return to the Hotel, there’ll be some way. A Ticket or something.”

“... Will you keep it?”

“I want to. Anyway, the Guardian has appeared in Jacksonville. Let’s begin.”

* * *

It took less than five minutes to take over the Kennedy... Happyhappy Space Center and secure the equipment we needed.

We weren't trying to board a spaceship anyway, so there was no need to ask the employees for cooperation.

While A-ri and Grandfather handled several strange pieces of equipment I didn't even know the names of, Mi-ro made an unexpected discovery.

“Look! I found the Protective Suit!”

It had failed to appear for so long that I had half forgotten it even existed, but the Protective Suit was here?

Grandfather was dumbfounded.

“No, those Hotel lunatics hid the Protective Suit at a space center? How were we supposed to find it?”

“We did find it in the end.”

“That’s only because of how things turned out! Think about how we ended up in Florida!”

“...”

We had boarded a plane in Texas for Spain, only to be exposed to the Light That Calls the End.

After barely holding out with the Hourglass, we crashed and came to in Florida.

We had reached Florida through one coincidence after another.

Had the Hotel truly foreseen every possibility and placed the Protective Suit here?

“This just occurred to me...”

“What is it?”

“Didn’t this Protective Suit just ‘appear’ here a little while ago?”

Could the Hotel have simply been watching us, then placed it here when it decided we needed a Protective Suit?

There was no way to know.

“We’re ready. Ga-in, you can leave now...”

At that exact moment.

“Ahh!”

“Aaargh!”

“T-the sky is falling!”

An overwhelming pressure so intense that my skin tingled descended on everyone.

Instantly overwhelmed, people stared blankly up at the sky.

The sky split apart.

Starlight shining from the high heavens settled into a single sword, and at last, it shattered the boundary between Earth and space.

It was utterly mystical.

Without realizing it, my heart began pounding wildly.

At this moment, it felt as though Fortuna was the protagonist of the world.

Did Mi-ro feel the same way?

She suddenly clasped her hands and gestured at us.

“Hurry up!”

“Why are you suddenly putting your hands together...”

“Not that, um, the fi, fist...”

Grandfather let out an incredulous laugh.

“A Fist-and-Palm Salute? Kid, you have to make one hand into a fist to do that.”

“Like this?”

“That’s right.”

The two naturally made a Fist-and-Palm Salute.

In the end, A-ri and I joined them.

“Um... Ga-inie! Say something cool! Hurry!”

“...”

After a brief silence, a fitting line came to mind.

“Fortuna, Greatest Martial Artist Under Heaven. Trained under Yi Ja-seong, the Sword of All Under Heaven, he spent thousands of years in a dream before finally surpassing his limits and making a leap.”

A-ri continued for me.

“... He will remain in our memories forever.”

“Pfft!”

“Don’t laugh. Yours was about the same.”

Honestly, it was childish.

Still, hadn't Song-i said something like that before?

That childishness was simply another word for the innocence that remained even after growing up.

I thought this was the best farewell we could offer.

It was time to head for the final stage.

--- Rumble!

* * *

After reaching the moon, I closed my eyes for a moment.

This was also one of the powers the Sacred Sun had granted me.

‘The ability to fall asleep whenever I want.’

What kind of superpower was that?

An ordinary human couldn't fall asleep in one second on the moon, so it really was an incredible superpower.

...

Soon, A-ri and Mi-ro joined me.

Mi-ro wore the Protective Suit, while A-ri wore a spacesuit she had found at the space center.

I wondered whether the spacesuit was functioning properly, but A-ri had probably taken care of it.

A-ri handed me something like a helmet.

--- Crackle!

“Can you hear me?”

“I can.”

Space, a place where even a simple conversation like this was impossible without separate equipment.

“There’s a Lunar Base four hundred kilometers north. Aedia is probably there.”

“Did you figure that out with something like GPS?”

“It’s completely different, but let’s say it’s roughly similar.”

“Fine.”

“Look at this!”

Even now, Mi-ro jumped with all her strength, then stared in amazement as she floated gently upward.

Looking only at that sight, it felt less like we had come to fight Aedia and more like we were on a trip to the moon.

A-ri suddenly looked doubtful.

“Was it really right to bring her...? Maybe we should've left her on Earth with Mook-seong and brought Sophia instead.”

“Think of Midnight Mi-ro.”

As we moved toward the Lunar Base with the two of them, I told them about the advice “Fortuna” had given me.

“What do you think?”

“There are walls in this world that can’t be overcome in two or three attempts, walls that can only be crossed on the first try...”

“It seems like he meant we shouldn’t rely on One More Chance.”

“Ga-in, Fortuna clearly reached a great realm in his final moments, but he’s a martial arts master. He isn’t a sage who can see the future.”

“That’s true.”

“It sounds interesting and convincing, but there’s no logic behind it. We have to desperately pour everything into one chance? Why should we when we have One More Chance?”

“...”

“Wasn't it the Hotel that told us we needed One More Chance for Room 207 in the first place?”

The Hotel had told us that the Inheritance from Room 206 and the Hourglass were treasures needed to save reality.

Not Room 207!

“It never said we needed it for Room 207. It said we needed it for ‘reality.’”

“What...”

“Think about it. We thought we needed the Hourglass to withstand the Light That Calls the End, right? But we didn’t. Sophia is fine even though she wasn’t protected by the Hourglass.”

“...”

“Even if we hadn't used the Hourglass, Aedia wouldn’t have distorted us.”

The Hourglass hadn't been essential in Room 207.

If so, perhaps One More Chance wasn't essential either.

A-ri raised another point.

“Our objective isn’t to awaken as the Greatest Martial Artist in the Galaxy and destroy the Evil God with Chaos-Erasing Slash.”

“Chaos-Erasing Slash! I want to learn that!”

“Mi-ro, be quiet. We just need to resolve Room 207. And beyond that, the reality outside the Hotel too.”

“...”

When I thought about it, the listener's interpretation of certain words mattered more than the speaker's intent.

I had gained my own Enlightenment from Fortuna’s advice.

“Maybe...”