WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈

Episode 561: The Great Escape, Voice Phishing

──────

- Lee Eun-sol

「It has been granted.」

The moment a thunderous rumble shook the air, the other person’s face went pale.

Unlike me, they seemed to know what that sound was.

“What... How did you summon this?!”

Apparently, I’d summoned something just now.

It’s fine.

I’m safe, so you should worry about yourself!

--- Rumble!

A second cry rang out, as though the whole world were shaking.

An indescribable presence, immense as a mountain, began pressing down from every direction!

“The Ark is coming! To resort to something this extreme...!”

The next moment, the person who’d been making pathetic threats waved a hand and sent the scroll back, as though they could no longer delay.

The Ark?

What was that supposed to be?

More importantly, why send back the scroll, the Inheritance, in an emergency?

Was it not an Inheritance for escaping danger, like my Flute or Song-i’s bracelet?

There was no time to calmly analyze the situation.

The man’s body began changing strangely after the scroll disappeared!

His frame grew larger.

His flesh transformed into something with a black-blue sheen!

As if he no longer needed to keep up appearances, he rushed at me without hesitation.

More precisely, he took one step forward to rush at me.

--- Rumble!

A third cry erupted as though it had been waiting.

An overwhelming shockwave swept me up, sending my entire body flying through the air.

“Ahhh!”

The place where we’d been standing moments ago vanished!

A whirlpool. A whirlpool!

A massive whirlpool had suddenly risen in the dark sea and crushed the rotting ghost ship!

“Ugh!”

My body floated through the air.

The tremendous shockwave swept in every direction, and I drifted aimlessly through the sky like a helium balloon.

What if I slammed into the wreckage of that ghost ship?

Would Lee Eun-sol turn into a lump of meat that used to be Lee Eun-sol?

“Ugh...”

I had to believe.

The price of Greedy Hand would never come for me!

--- Screeeech!

It felt as though my eardrums would burst.

The sound was so loud, too loud to even understand what it was.

A pale mass of light appeared at the center of the whirlpool.

My head hurt.

It felt like my brain was melting.

“Graaah!”

A scream reached me faintly.

That bastard who’d done nothing but make pathetic threats.

Since he owned that scroll, that unknown Inheritance, he was probably someone who’d escaped the Hotel before me.

His scream sounded like a sweet lullaby.

This was it.

This was exactly it.

If possible, just die here!

“...”

It wasn’t easy to stay conscious.

It had been that way from the moment the mass of light appeared.

--- Fweee!

I forced air into the Flute of Rest.

The whirlpool all around me kept it from producing a proper sound.

Still, the Flute of Rest wrapped me in warm power as though that were enough.

The Flute of Rest.

My precious Inheritance.

It couldn’t perform every kind of miracle like Old Blood.

It didn’t possess overwhelming power like the Sacred Sun.

It couldn’t turn back time like One More Chance, nor could it bring NPCs into reality like the Soul Box.

All it could do was bring a moment of rest to a world filled with Chaos.

That was the only thing it could do.

But when it came to that one thing, it was the best in the universe.

“... Ah.”

A distant gaze fell upon me.

A being we could never reach, even if we pushed our Blessings to their limits and acquired three or four Inheritances.

A being that could treat every effort we’d made as nothing more than the struggling of insects.

A being that could instill humility even in agents who had gained infinity and become arrogant.

A god or demon, or in more familiar terms, something on the level of a Prisoner.

So there really were ridiculous monsters like this even after returning to reality.

No, wait!

Hadn’t I seen something similar to this before?

If my memory was right...

I heard a voice.

「I envy you...」

That was my last memory from that strange world.

* * *

“...”

I woke up in a soft bed.

- Bubble, bubble!

The sound of a pot boiling and the savory smell of chicken porridge stirred my appetite.

I blankly sat up and leaned against the wall when someone familiar appeared.

“You’re awake?”

“...”

“There were ingredients for chicken porridge in the fridge, so I made some. Want some?”

It was A-ri.

The moment I saw her, I burst out laughing.

“Pfft!”

“What’s so funny?”

“I wake up after passing out, and the first thing I smell is chicken porridge... A-ri, are you some kind of house fairy?”

“Want me to give you a waking kiss too?”

“No, thanks. And thank you.”

As I ate a few spoonfuls of porridge, A-ri slowly explained the situation.

The Esper had begun undergoing a Management Bureau investigation as soon as it arrived at the harbor.

A report had come in that Lee Eun-sol was missing, and A-ri herself had used the Kingdom of Dreams to find me asleep in that strange world.

“Eun-sol, where were you, exactly? If it hadn’t been the Kingdom of Dreams, I don’t think it would’ve been easy to find you or bring you out.”

A-ri asked the very question I wanted to ask.

“You can speak freely. Just in case you’re worried, there’s no Management Bureau surveillance here.”

A-ri confidently declared that there was no Management Bureau surveillance.

Since she was an agent herself, it was a reliable answer, but also meaningless.

Because A-ri herself was a Management Bureau agent.

Could I tell A-ri what I’d learned?

The words caught in my throat.

The man I’d met earlier definitely belonged to the Management Bureau.

He even knew I’d escaped the Hotel.

Had A-ri passed information about me along?

“What’s wrong?”

Let’s just ask.

“A-ri, you reported me to the Management Bureau, didn’t you? How much did you report?”

I didn’t want to become suspicious and engage in troublesome mind games now.

I didn’t have the energy for it, and I didn’t want to do that with a companion.

A-ri answered immediately.

“No. I barely told them anything.”

“...”

“I said we escaped in the confusion and didn’t even know how many people got out. I also used the excuse that my memories weren’t intact because I’d been hit by some unknown power.”

Then, as though making excuses, she added a little more.

“I did report a tiny bit. Things that were bound to be discovered anyway, like Mi-ro, gender, and roughly what age groups we’re in... But I didn’t tell them anything crucial, like our Inheritances or Blessings.”

A weight lifted from my chest.

Logically, I should’ve started by considering whether she was lying, becoming suspicious, and engaging in all kinds of mind games...

I decided not to doubt her.

I thought we had that kind of relationship.

Was it because she’d made chicken porridge for me when I was hungry?

What a stupid thought.

I smiled as I answered.

“Wait, A-ri, they accepted such a vague report?”

A-ri snorted.

“Right? I thought I’d be dragged away and interrogated somewhere. But they believed me without any trouble. Maybe...”

“Maybe?”

“They might think there’s no point pressing me. Forget interrogating me, there’s even a strange rumor going around.”

“A strange rumor?”

“I think I might get promoted soon. I might become one of The Silent.”

That was interesting.

It sounded like there was quite a story behind it, but even A-ri herself didn’t seem to know why.

“I’ll tell you what happened to me.”

I carefully told her three things.

First, I’d met someone presumed to have escaped the Hotel before us.

“He was a tall man. I couldn’t make out his features. His Inheritance was a rolled-up scroll, and judging by the circumstances, it wasn’t for combat. He reverse-summoned it when he was in danger.”

A-ri focused all her attention on me.

“His Blessing?”

“I don’t know. He had some bizarre transformation ability.”

“A Former Participant, tall, with a non-combat scroll Inheritance. He can transform. All right, what’s next?”

Second, he knew I was a Hotel escapee and tried to recruit me with threats mixed in.

“He knew about me. I don’t know how, but...”

“I didn’t report the details.”

“I know. Well, if he’s part of the Management Bureau leadership, he’d have plenty of ways. Anyway, he told me to join him.”

“Did you refuse?”

“... I’ll be honest. If the atmosphere had been peaceful, if he’d openly come to Hotel Delight, I think I would’ve talked to him.”

“Ah, but he locked you up in a hideous Otherworld and approached you like he was threatening you, so you lost any desire to talk?”

“Exactly. Why do that? It creates hostility where there was none!”

It was absurd even thinking about it again.

I still didn’t think the Management Bureau was our enemy.

A-ri and Grandpa belonged there, and beyond that, I’d felt many times at the Hotel just how important the Management Bureau’s role was.

But if they approached me with threats like this, I couldn’t exactly respond peacefully either.

“... Can I try to defend him?”

A-ri was going to defend that unknown man’s attitude.

I understood.

A-ri was my companion, but she was also a Management Bureau agent.

That man might be her superior or colleague.

“Go ahead.”

“The Management Bureau basically considers Hotel escapees extremely dangerous.”

“...”

“Um, there’s a very high chance they survived through betrayal, scheming, fraud, and stabbing people in the back, so...”

“Like your mom?”

“...”

Oh, wow!

That was too harsh!

“Sorry...”

“Yeah. Like Mi-ro in the past.”

A-ri admitted it honestly.

“So when he had the chance to meet you one-on-one, he probably intended to put shackles on you.”

“...”

“But I can guarantee you this.”

“What part?”

“That man’s thoughts aren’t the thoughts of the entire Management Bureau. There will be people who want to approach you peacefully too.”

That man didn’t represent the entire Management Bureau.

I understood that much.

As Room 202, The Little Mermaid, had revealed, there were several factions within the Management Bureau too.

“They’ll approach again soon.”

“Probably. Is that all you have to say?”

“No, there’s a third thing.”

Third, the god of the Otherworld that had appeared when I used Greedy Hand to escape.

“It was incredibly strong. It appeared and just took hold of the whole world.”

“Did it feel like a Prisoner?”

“Almost that level.”

A-ri thought for a moment, then smiled as though she found it amusing.

“So, Eun-sol, you used Greedy Hand at maximum output, an absurd god appeared and settled the situation, then you woke up here after passing out?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m honestly curious. Were both the appearance of that Otherworld god and my rescue of you guided by your Greedy Hand?”

“Probably...”

“Amazing! That’s seriously amazing! What even is your Sponsor? I wondered what it was thinking when it gave you online shopping as a Blessing, but had it been waiting for this moment?”

“...”

Could that really be it?

If so, my Sponsor was an incredible being in more ways than one.

“More importantly, A-ri.”

“Yeah?”

“I’ve seen something similar to that Otherworld god before.”

“Huh?”

For the first time, A-ri’s eyes widened like a rabbit’s.

“At the Hotel?”

“Yeah.”

“How... is that possible? Normally, Prisoners should only exist inside the Hotel.”

“No, I’m sure of it even after thinking it over. It was far too similar. I just knew.”

“... Similar to what?”

The instant I saw the god of the Otherworld, I had vaguely sensed it.

Maybe it was because the Flute’s protection had allowed me to stare at it for quite a long time.

“The Lord.”

It was extremely similar to the Prisoner in Room 104, the Lord.

It might not have been the same being, but it was a god made from similar principles!

* * *

After hearing my answer, A-ri thought for a long time before reaching a conclusion.

“I should call Ga-in. You know his number, right?”

“I do, but... You still don’t know.”

“Know what?”

“Ga-in told me his Sponsor said, ‘Don’t approach the Management Bureau first.’”

“... That was something it told Ga-in, right?”

“What?”

“It told Ga-in not to take the initiative and contact the Management Bureau. That doesn’t mean it’s a problem if I contact him first.”

Did that work that way?

Thinking about it, she wasn’t entirely wrong.

“Give me his number.”

Soon, A-ri and Ga-in’s first phone call began.

“Hi, it’s been a while. Mr. Exorcist, have you been well...”

“Who is this?”

What?

“... Stop joking around. The Management Bureau...”

“Ah, Management Bureau, my ass! Hey! I heard all about this on the news! Do you think I don’t know this is voice phishing?”

--- Click!

The call ended.

A-ri’s eyebrow twitched.

“...”

--- Ring-ring!

“If you joke around one more time...”

In Chinese, “Stop trying to scam people and work honestly, will you?”

--- Click!

That was where I couldn’t hold it in anymore!

It seemed Ga-in still didn’t think it was time to contact the Management Bureau.

Even so, who would’ve thought he’d treat A-ri like a voice phishing scammer!

Was Ga-in trying to respond like an ordinary person?

Well, ordinary people usually suspect voice phishing when someone suddenly calls and says, “I’m a prosecutor!”

“Oh, my God, hahaha! Ah, seriously, pfft!”

“...”

“A-ri, he said you should stop running voice-phishing scams and work honestly...”

“I’ll freeze all of Han Ga-in’s assets.”

“C-calm down...”

“I’m an agent. If I say I’ll do it, I will.”

Leaving A-ri trembling with anger as I struggled to hold back my laughter, I went out to the living room.

“Heh! Hahaha! Ah! Seriously, these people!”

As I laughed myself silly, one forgotten memory came back to me.

“...”

The wishes I’d made with Greedy Hand.

I’d made them on the spot, then all that chaos with the god of the Otherworld had happened, so I’d forgotten.

The first was escaping, and the second was...

“I wished for Hotel Delight to become the No. 1 hotel in Korea.”

I was worried.

Suddenly, incredibly worried!

Footnotes:

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