WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 61: Strategy Meeting - Organizing the Rewards. Where Should We Go?
──────
[User: Han Ga-in (Wisdom)
Date: Day 21
Current Location: Level 1, Corridor
Sage’s Advice: 0]
The first reward.
A hint for resolving Curse Rooms.
“I’m personally expecting a lot from this reward. In some ways, it could be more useful to us right now than the mysterious Golden Egg, couldn’t it?
We’re going back into Curse Rooms soon, so this is exactly what we need!”
“Eun-sol, open the letter and check it first.”
---Riiip
A small slip of paper fell out.
It was too small to contain a detailed explanation. Everyone crowded around the table to examine what it said.
Room 101: The Source of the Curse is not □□.
Room 102: Discard the assumption that you must go toward □□.
Room 103: What you see is not everything, and it is not □□□□.
Room 104: □ is the way to □□ a father.
...
It read like a set of riddles.
Since it was called a hint, I hadn’t expected some incredible walkthrough. Still, did they really have to fill the hints with blanks like this?
“At least I understand Room 103.
[What you see is not everything.]
That means everything we see is an illusion.
[And it is not □□□□.] That must mean it isn’t [Animal Farm].”
“Let’s interpret the other sentences in the same way.”
“It feels like a riddle, but I think I know the answer to two of them. What about the rest of you?”
“I have a feeling too. When the hotel says something, the true meaning often becomes clear when we interpret it in reverse.”
“Yeah, yeah. Looks like you and Ga-in figured something out, so explain it properly.”
“I’ll go first. The Room 101 hint.
[The Source of the Curse is not □□.]
That means we have some kind of assumption about Room 101’s Source of the Curse, and that assumption is wrong. What did everyone think the Source of the Curse in Room 101 was?”
“Wasn’t it obviously the family? Problems came up whenever we interacted with those strangely twisted family members.”
“I thought it was the family too. This hint says we were mistaken. In other words, I think it means, [The Source of the Curse in Room 101 is not the family.]”
“Then what is it?”
“That’s what we need to find out.”
“I interpreted the Room 102 hint the same way.
[Discard the assumption that you must go toward □□.]
This means we have an assumption that [we must go toward □□]. There’s a place in Room 102 that we think we absolutely have to go to. You can all think of it, right?”
Song-i’s eyes widened.
“The mansion!”
“That’s it. The Room 102 hint means, [Discard the assumption that you must go toward the mansion.]”
“Huh. Now that you mention it, I remember. Ga-in, didn’t you say that on our first day in the mansion, after we woke up in the SUV? Since we’d regained consciousness before reaching the mansion, why not just avoid going there?”
“Right. I remember too. Then Jin-cheol said we probably had to go anyway, so we all set off together.”
“Ahem...”
“Let’s skip over old stories. The next time we go back, we should try proceeding without going to the mansion at all.”
“Okay. We’re on the same page about Rooms 101 and 102. The problem is Room 104. I have no idea about that one.”
“I don’t know either.”
“There’s plenty to do, so it would be best to organize what we understand so far. How about we leave the parts we don’t understand for later?”
“Let’s do that. We’ll organize what we understand.”
Eun-sol casually took out a notebook and pen.
“The hotel had things like that?”
“They came in a bundle at the market, so I bought them. I figured we needed a way to organize our plans from now on. Everyone’s smartphones have been useless for ages, right? We should keep track of things the old-fashioned way, at least.”
The interpretations of the hints we had uncovered so far were written in the notebook.
* * *
Room 101: The Source of the Curse is not □□.
-> The Source of the Curse is not the family.
Room 102: Discard the assumption that you must go toward □□.
-> Discard the assumption that you must go toward the mansion.
Room 103: What you see is not everything, and it is not □□□□.
-> What you see is not everything, and it is not Animal Farm.
Room 104: □ is the way to □□ a father.
-> ?
“We need to go obtain a new Inheritance soon. When we do, let’s keep these hints in mind while making our plan. For now, let’s look at the next reward.”
* * *
The second reward.
A Three-Day Rest Voucher.
“That one’s the clearest reward. There’s even an explanation written on the back of the paper. The voucher works just like Party Time.
For three days, no negative events will occur, and we can go to places we normally can’t access.”
“Places we normally can’t access. That must mean the Sanctuary of Blessings from before, right?”
“Come to think of it, after Party Time, we tried turning off the lights at the front entrance so we could visit the sanctuary again.”
“Back then, the lights just went out normally, and light from outside came in.”
“There are probably other places we can only enter during Party Time, not just the Sanctuary of Blessings. We’ve already heard about mysterious things like the Resurrection Room and Buddha, haven’t we?”
“Are there any places the Management Bureau knows about?”
“There really aren’t.”
Was A-ri telling the truth? I stopped thinking about it. Even if she was hiding something, we had no way to find out.
“When should we use the rest voucher? We can use it starting tomorrow, or wait for another opportunity.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to use it now? I’m sure everyone feels the same, but I’m exhausted. I still can’t believe the date on the Status Window says ‘Day 21.’ We went through all that hell in the Mission Room, yet a full day still hasn’t passed. Let’s get some rest.”
“... I understand how you feel, Ga-in. Everyone had it hard, but no matter what, the person who made it to the end suffered the most. Of course, Jin-cheol had it rough too, since he made it to the sixth mission.”
“Is this when I should apologize for getting hit by a truck and dying right at the start?”
“It really isn’t. I’m not blaming anyone in the slightest. I’m just saying we should all rest because I’m so tired.”
“What does everyone else think?”
“Looking at the mood, it seems Eun-sol sees things differently. Just say it. Our party tends to follow whatever you and Ga-in decide.”
... Was that what A-ri thought? I’d thought Eun-sol made almost all the decisions. Thinking back, though, I did seem to speak up often during meetings.
“I completely understand the view that we should rest starting tomorrow. Still, I think we should use this rest voucher strategically, rather than using it just because we’re tired.
For example, say some special event turned the entire hotel into something like hell. What if we used the rest voucher then?
I think that special event would probably end. I want to use it in a situation like that.”
Everyone fell silent.
Our views were simple.
Topic: Use the rest voucher now versus save it.
Ga-in: I’m exhausted after clearing the Mission Room. We should rest now.
Eun-sol: We should use the rest voucher strategically. It isn’t just for recovery. We should save it for a situation where the whole hotel becomes dangerous because of a special event, a situation where we’ll die if we don’t use it.
...
Eun-sol’s argument was more persuasive.
My opinion had come from being exhausted right now, while Eun-sol’s was far more strategic.
In the end, we decided to save the rest voucher for a future crisis.
The third reward.
A Completely Delicious Sandwich.
The moment the sandwich was written in the notebook, everyone fell silent.
“...”
“Is there even anything to analyze? It’s not some sandwich with a secret hidden inside, is it? Eun-sol, did you search the container?”
“I thought the same thing as Song-i, so I searched all over it just in case. There’s nothing. There’s no explanation either.”
“Isn’t it just a dud? It came from a copper balloon in the first place. In the games I played, you got duds from random draws sometimes.”
“... So I hit a dud. Looks like I’ll have to keep apologizing today.”
“Grandfather, just take it easy. If someone else had fired the gun, they probably wouldn’t have hit anything at all.”
In the end, the eight of us split one sandwich.
On sesame seed bread,
three strips of perfectly fried bacon,
special sauce, lettuce,
cheese, pickles, and onions.
The sandwich was incredible.
The fourth reward.
The Red Pill.
We unfolded the instruction sheet beneath the pill and read it together. The explanation was simple and clear.
One use. Immunity to all types of mental attacks while progressing through the relevant room. Restores mental damage already sustained.
“In short, it seems like a consumable that lets us clear one room where mental attacks are the main threat for free.”
“Did they give it to us to use in Room 101?”
“I don’t know about that, but it should be a big help. If the person who uses it becomes immune to the mental contamination in Strange Family, wouldn’t we be able to clear it fairly easily?”
“Its purpose seems clear. Let’s decide where to use it later.”
“Deciding where to use it matters, but deciding who uses it might matter more. Jin-cheol, maybe?”
When A-ri nudged him, Jin-cheol nodded.
“If I use that, I’ll probably get one chance to shine.”
Jin-cheol’s weakness was that although he was physically stronger than anyone, he was vulnerable to mental attacks.
Wouldn’t Jin-cheol end up using this item? It was a shame it could only be used once, but if we obtained an Inheritance with a single consumable, it would never be a bad trade.
The fifth reward.
The Golden Egg.
It was the most valuable reward, yet also the treasure whose purpose we understood the least.
“Does anyone have any idea what this is?”
“There isn’t even an instruction sheet, so I have no idea.”
“Song-i, have you ever seen an egg like this?”
“I can’t tell from the egg alone. In the first place, I doubt a normal animal would hatch from an egg that came up as the most valuable treasure in a strange hotel like this.”
“For now, let’s put it somewhere warm. It’ll hatch when the time comes.”
We settled the matter by setting up a cushion near the stove in Room 105 for the Golden Egg.
* * *
“Eun-sol, are we done talking for today? I’m really tired.”
“We’re done with the rewards. I’ll put up the final summary here.”
* * *
1. Curse Room hints
-> In Room 101, look for a cause other than the family. In Room 102, try not going to the mansion.
2. Three-Day Rest Voucher
-> Use it when we truly need it later.
3. Sandwich
-> We ate it. It was delicious.
4. Red Pill
-> For defending against mental attacks. Use it when absolutely necessary.
5. Golden Egg
-> Put it in front of the stove. It’ll hatch someday.
* * *
“Now, let’s decide something truly important. Where should we enter tomorrow? Strange Family? House of Horror? Hotel High?”
“Let’s eliminate one right away. We couldn’t interpret the hint for Hotel High at all, and it seems to have the highest difficulty.”
“The Lord worries me too. Okay. Room 104 is out. Let’s choose between Strange Family and House of Horror.”
“I’ll summarize the pros and cons of both. Let’s make the final decision by majority vote.
The advantage of Strange Family is that escaping is easy.
All we need to do is stay away from the family and run, right? We struggled during our first attempt because we had no way to resist the mental contamination, but we aren’t the same people we were back then.
Now, we should be able to escape safely if I use Filter Mode or Song-i uses her bracelet. Seung-yeop can also stay shut in a room like before, then leave through the window.
The disadvantage is that there’s too much we don’t know. The Source of the Curse isn’t the family? Then what is it? We have no idea what the danger is.
The advantage of House of Horror is that we know relatively more.
Who is the enemy?
At its root, it’s probably the demon underground, but we likely won’t have to fight that demon. The demon is in the mansion, and the hint advises us not to go there. It’s probably the master of the mansion. The Elder.
The disadvantage is that escaping is difficult. The known way to escape is to stop the Elder from fulfilling his victory condition, ‘six human sacrifices.’ I think some of us may have to commit suicide as soon as we begin.”
“To sum it up, Strange Family is easy to escape but we don’t know much about it. House of Horror is hard to escape, but we know more.”
“Where do you all think would be best?”
Footnotes:
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