WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 644: Ascension
──────
「User: Han Ga-in (Wisdom)
Date: Day 386
Current Location: 50, 63-ro, Yeongdeungpo District, Seoul
Sage’s Advice: 3」
- Han Ga-in
Several weeks had passed since Elder Wisdom left for the School’s third floor.
“Quit spilling sunflower seeds everywhere. Why do birds drop so much while they eat?”
--- Chirp!
“You’re dropping more than you’re eating. Are you planning to start a sunflower farm in Yeouido? Ah!”
--- Chirp!
“Ha! Too slow! You can’t bite my finger with a beak that slow.”
I sat on a bench in Yeouido Park, passing the time by playing with Pero.
“... It’s been a while since I played with you too.”
As the fighting in reality grew more intense, Pero had remained at Hotel Delight with nothing to do.
The situation had become too dangerous for a parrot that could turn into a huge bird to get involved.
“Will there be anything for you to do on the third floor? What do you think?”
Pero ignored me and only gnawed at my hair.
Sometimes, it really did seem like an ordinary parrot.
As I sat on the bench, an indescribable cold filled both my body and mind.
There really was nothing here.
I had no family in this city or this country. No close friends, either.
If I had to name what I was most attached to, it would be Seoul itself.
Oh, there was also Sunrise, the company I established to gather faith.
Was Ictus still alive?
I could have found him if I wanted to, but I didn’t. I didn’t want to leave any lingering attachment to reality.
Even if he was alive, it wouldn’t mean much.
Even if he remembered Pero, he had probably forgotten me long ago.
“...”
It was the result of the Dream I had used.
No one except my Hotel companions could remember me, so there was no way I could form meaningful relationships with anyone.
Why had I used Dream that way in the first place?
Was it because I wanted to avoid the Management Bureau’s attention?
That might have been part of it, but...
When I used Dream, I didn’t know about my eventful past.
“Pero, do you think I meant to leave reality from the very beginning?”
--- Clack!
At that moment, I sensed the person I had been waiting for.
“Lord Horus, it’s been a while.”
“Sophia, I told you to just call me by my name.”
“Well, I’m more used to Horus. It feels more comfortable.”
“If you say so...”
After a brief silence, I spoke first.
“How was it?”
“Pardon?”
“You told me before. You asked me to send you to heaven.”
“...”
The girl born in Room 207 had told me:
“I worshipped you as a god for so long. Please send me to heaven.”
“... The world is much the same everywhere.”
“I figured.”
The latter half of Room 207 had also been Earth in the twenty-first century, so it was not too different from reality.
“What surprised me more than reality was all of you.”
“Really?”
“Especially Fortuna.”
For a moment, I was at a loss for words.
Everyone went speechless when they thought about the gap between Fortuna and Seung-yeop. I was no exception.
“Still, it was nice. I got to understand what kind of people you all are.”
“... I’m glad you can say that.”
Another brief silence followed before I carefully spoke.
“You probably heard from Eun-sol, but we’ll be leaving soon.”
“I heard it from my ‘sister.’”
Calling her sister rather than mother sounded unfamiliar, but fitting.
“If you want...”
“I can come with you? Inside the Soul Box?”
“That’s right.”
Seung-yeop’s Inheritance, the Soul Box.
It was empty now that Elena’s soul had left it.
If Sophia entered the Soul Box, she could go to the third floor with us.
Her answer came quickly.
“I’m sorry.”
Sophia would not be going to the third floor.
“... Right. I thought that might be the case.”
After returning to reality and gaining a body, Sophia had not spent much time with us.
Sometimes she traveled. Other times, she devoted herself to her work as a Management Bureau researcher.
It was less the attitude of a Hotel Party member and more that of someone trying to adapt to reality.
From then on, everyone had vaguely realized it.
Sophia intended to remain in reality.
“You guessed?”
“You seemed to be trying to adapt to reality.”
It was not a strange choice.
If anyone was strange, it might have been us, choosing to go to the third floor despite knowing both the glory and danger of the Hotel.
What was the cause of this fundamental urge I felt toward the third floor?
Did I want to see Buddha?
Did I want to know what heaven truly was?
Did I want to understand the world’s profound secrets?
Or did I want to leave the fishbowl?
“A while ago, Eun-sol kept me talking for quite a while. She said she couldn’t remember a conversation we had before and asked me to tell her everything I could remember.”
“I heard.”
“As far as I remember, it was a story about a teacup in a bowl.”
“...”
“If the teacup is Room 207, the bowl is reality. To the residents of reality, Room 207 would be a false illusion, but...”
“Outside the bowl is a table, and outside the table is a room.”
“That’s right.”
“...”
“To use a different metaphor, it’s like this. If the Curse Room you speak of were a painting, reality is the museum where it hangs.”
“...”
“But to a higher being, the museum is also a painting. The Hotel is a painting within a painting.”
“That must be it.”
“Once I realized that, a thought occurred to me. There’s no point worrying about which world is real and which is false. Unless I intend to become an eternal wanderer, drifting through time and space...”
“I should choose one suitable world and settle down?”
“... Yes. Did that answer help you?”
“Of course.”
“I’m glad I could help you one last time.”
As the conversation drew to a close, Sophia looked at me with lingering regret.
She had followed me in the past, but this time she chose to remain in reality.
It was proof that the Sophia of Room 207 and the Sophia of today had changed in many ways.
As she said, she must have gained a kind of enlightenment.
I didn’t think this was a complete farewell.
Sophia might not be able to, but the rest of us would likely still be able to affect reality.
“Lord Horus. I pray that glory awaits you in your future.”
“Thank you.”
After the blonde girl left, only Pero and I remained.
--- Chirp!
“What? You don’t want to go to the third floor either?”
--- Chiiirp!
“You can’t. Sophia can go wherever she wants, but you’ll have to follow us no matter what.”
--- Chirp! Chirp!
“You’re a hero too? Since you’re a hero parrot, you get to choose for yourself?”
--- Chirp!
“Fine, fine. Hero Parrot Pero, let’s go together.”
As I rose from my seat, I wondered.
What had Pero actually said?
That we’d run out of sunflower seeds?
Or maybe...
* * *
「Current Location: Hotel Delight, Yeongdeungpo District, Seoul」
When I arrived at the Hotel Delight lobby, my companions were already gathered there.
As I casually waved, I noticed banners hanging all around the lobby.
“What’s this?”
Mi-ro and Seung-yeop snickered when they saw the banners. Once I read them, I couldn’t help laughing too.
「We thank the glorious Agent Kim A-ri, a member of The Silent, for her long-standing contribution.」
That much seemed like the Management Bureau’s own farewell message.
「It is a profound sorrow that you are setting off upon a faraway road from which you can never return.」
“... Never return?”
「Though this eternal farewell is certainly regrettable, thanks to Agent Kim A-ri’s decision, the world will be spared a grave threat -」
“They’ve said twice that they don’t want us to come back. And what’s this ‘grave threat’ supposed to mean?!”
Song-i answered with a smile.
“What else could it mean? They mean us. Especially you, Ga-in!”
“They’re calling us a threat right out in the open.”
「Agent Kim A-ri’s name has been permanently recorded in the Hall of Fame.」
“The Hall of Fame?”
Grandpa Mook-seong gave a dry laugh and explained.
“It records the names of people who distinguished themselves in the Management Bureau and died.”
“They already consider A-ri dead.”
The Management Bureau’s determination to send us to the third floor and make sure we never returned was so blatant that it became funny.
“When we first came here, the staff even set off fireworks.”
“...”
“A-ri chased them all out.”
I was starting to laugh too, so I looked toward A-ri. She was taking down the banners with a slightly annoyed expression.
“When we get to the third floor!”
“Hmm?”
“We’ll definitely be able to affect reality. Definitely.”
“I’m sure we will.”
It was information indirectly conveyed by the Third-Floor Manager.
Everyone agreed with that interpretation, which was why even companions with families in reality could make their decision.
“I’m really hurt! I devoted my whole life to them, and this is how they treat me!”
“Ha ha! They said they’d put you in the Hall of Fame. You should be grateful...”
“The moment we arrive on the third floor, they’ll all pay for this!”
“Isn’t that exactly why they’re chasing you away?”
“You have no right to say that!”
We spent a little while having fun like that.
The Management Bureau’s reaction to us was so blatant that it was funny, but it also seemed to ease some of my companions’ tension.
Maybe the Management Bureau intended that. No, that was reading too much into it.
Some of my companions passed the time talking about what they had told their families, such as saying they had been assigned to a long business trip.
Then...
A heavy silence fell.
At last, the pressure of the third floor began to weigh down on everyone’s hearts.
--- Gulp!
The sounds of people swallowing and hiccuping came from all around us.
We had overcome the trials of the Hotel’s first and second floors, as well as reality, but even for battle-hardened veterans like us, the unknown territory called the third floor was not easy to face.
“Let’s go.”
Jin-cheol was the first to stand.
“Yes, we should.”
Grandpa Mook-seong rose while rubbing his chin, and Jin-cheol called the elevator.
--- Ding!
At last, the elevator arrived.
“Let’s get in.”
“... Everyone, come over here.”
Eun-sol’s face had gone a little pale.
Come to think of it, why was Eun-sol going to the third floor?
Our earlier conversation had been cut short by the sudden appearance of the Third-Floor Manager.
I asked her a few times afterward, but she only smiled awkwardly and never gave me a clear answer.
Well, Eun-sol had her privacy too.
I would find out when the time came. There was no need to press her.
As everyone looked tensely at the top of the elevator’s control panel, we saw an unusual button.
〚Third Floor: Celestial Realm〛
“It’s amazing every time I see it. Celestial Realm?”
“That’s why the Management Bureau employees called it the Celestial Floor.”
After construction ended, a button leading to the Celestial Floor appeared in the elevator.
A button only we could press.
“Should I press it?”
“Eun-sol, stop sweating and press it. Someone would think lightning would strike the second you pressed it!”
“... Lightning would be nothing.”
“Eun-sol, just press it. It’s getting scarier and scarier.”
“Sorry.”
--- Click!
The moment the button was pressed...
--- Rumble...!
With a tremendous vibration, the elevator shot upward at an absurd speed!
“Argh!”
“Aaaah!”
--- Chiiirp!
--- Crash!
“Take, take my hand...!”
“Ga-in!”
“Mi-ro, stay still!”
Before even a second had passed, everyone was sprawled across the elevator floor, and unimaginable pressure began crushing us.
The agony was so intense that I felt like I would lose consciousness at any moment.
My companions instinctively summoned their Inheritances, but it meant nothing.
“Argh...!”
I had felt something like this before! Where was it?
The Sacred Domain!
It was exactly the same pain I felt when advancing from the Sacred Domain into the High Realm!
The type of pain was similar, but the intensity was dozens, hundreds of times greater.
“...”
We weren’t all going to die in an elevator, were we?
Danger Alert was silent, so at least I was not in immediate danger of dying!
“Argh...!”
We continued rising endlessly.
At some point, the elevator vanished, and an incomprehensible force dragged us toward an unknown realm.
Earth had long since disappeared.
The Sun had become smaller than a speck of dust, and I could not even be sure whether that tiny dot was the Sun.
Before a few seconds had passed, countless glittering lights passed by us.
Soon, I realized I had seen countless planets and stars, even galaxies.
It was dizzying!
Amid pain so intense that I felt I would black out at any moment, I saw the other side filled with pure white light.
“...?”
A pale straight line, or perhaps a thread, stretched across the center of the white space.
What in the world was that...
「Advice: 3 -> 2」
「You have seen too much. Close your eyes and cover your ears.」
“...”
Only then did I realize that my entire face was covered in blood.
Some might consider me a being halfway into a higher realm, but even for me, the sight before me was far too distant.
Still, I could not hold back my next question.
「Advice: 2 -> 1」
‘What exactly is that?’
「Everything.」
“...”
「Advice: 1 -> 0」
‘What should I do now?’
「Go to sleep already. Help your companions as soon as you awaken.」
Help my companions?
Only after hearing that did I realize there was no one around me.
That was my last memory.
Footnotes:
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