WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 669: Room 301, Curse Room - ‘The Origin of Species’ (13)
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- Lee Eun-sol
“Be silent. Forget. Obey. I shall give you three chances.”
“W-who are you?”
“I am the King. The King of the Faithful beyond the galaxy, the King of those who will be born upon this land. I am also your King.”
The moment that incomprehensible being declared it would give Father “three chances”!
--- Whoosh!
Gray fog swallowed my vision.
Then, with a sharp cracking sensation, “Lee Eun-sol” was forcibly separated from “Lee Seok-hwan.”
...
Imagine becoming so immersed in a movie that you mistake yourself for one of its characters.
Then the power suddenly goes out, and the screen goes black.
How would that feel?
That was how I felt now.
“Urgh!”
“Oh my! Eun-sol, are you all right?”
“...”
The person beside me, whose name I suddenly remembered was Elena, caught my arm to steady me. For a moment, I had to stop and consider who I was.
I was Lee Eun-sol, the bearer of the Wealth blessing and a Hotel participant.
This entire world was inside Room 301 of Hotel Pioneer.
This was our second attempt at Room 301. The first had already ended in failure.
My goal this time was to learn Father’s secrets concerning the Great Race of Yith and the Management Bureau.
What had happened again?
I got up early, contacted Elena, and we entered the chairman’s office together.
That much was easy.
Lee Seok-hwan, the chairman of Daeyang Group, was not someone just anyone could meet. But I was his daughter.
Bringing Elena with me had been a bit of a stretch, but neither the guards nor the secretaries stopped us.
...
Even after we talked for a long time, Father hadn’t readily revealed his secrets.
Elena even used a little force, yet Father didn’t so much as blink.
Then again, I had just read through his memories.
For an ordinary human, Father had truly been through everything.
His nerve and judgment were far beyond those of an ordinary person.
That was why I decided to use more forceful means.
We had come all this way with a companion. I couldn’t back down simply because he refused to answer.
...
The more Hotel tools were used, the greater the power they could exert.
Was it because the tools themselves grew stronger?
Or because their users became more skilled?
I didn’t know the exact reason or principle, but it didn’t matter.
What mattered was that Butterfly Dream was no exception to this rule!
When I opened the brooch and summoned the Nightmare Butterfly, a powerful intuition struck my soul like lightning.
I knew I could become a butterfly.
...
I dreamed I had become a butterfly, fluttering about in delight!
So I did not know that I was Eun-sol.
Then I suddenly woke and, to my surprise, was Eun-sol.
Had I dreamed I was a butterfly? Or had the butterfly dreamed it was Eun-sol?
There was surely a distinction between the butterfly and me, yet I could not understand what it was.
...
I, or my mind, became a butterfly and entered Father’s mind.
At that moment, I was Lee Eun-sol and the Nightmare Butterfly. I was also Lee Seok-hwan.
A vague, hazy mind.
Unstable awareness where dreams and reality blended together.
It was truly a power worthy of the name Butterfly Dream!
Since when had I been able to use a power like this?
I could vaguely guess at the trigger.
The reality that felt less real than any unreality, the Moon’s domain, the Plain of Sinners.
There, I used Butterfly Dream while risking my life, even using Greedy Hand.
I thought I realized something in the process.
It probably wasn’t a lofty Enlightenment like Ga-in’s, one that allowed Ga-in to peer into heaven and earth, but perhaps I had expanded my tool’s limits a little.
Thanks to that, I had learned a great deal that conversation alone could never reveal, but it was still not enough.
“Eun-sol, are you all right?”
“... I’m fine.”
I could say that for certain because I had temporarily merged with Father’s mind.
I hadn’t learned everything.
There was clearly more information left!
What was that gray fog that appeared at the end?
It broke the assimilation between Father and me, ejecting me from Father’s dream.
“If I try one more time...”
As I considered it, Father woke a step later than I did and shuddered all over.
“Gasp! W-what did you just do to me?”
“...”
“The brooch, that brooch must be something special! You forcibly opened my memories!”
I had mixed feelings.
It had been necessary, but from Father’s perspective, wouldn’t it feel as though his daughter had suddenly used evil magic to toy with him?
He also seemed likely to create trouble by calling the guards.
So I considered putting Father to sleep again with Butterfly Dream.
“Eun-sol, calm down! You need to listen to me!”
I expected Father to feel betrayed and grow angry, or become frightened and call the guards.
It was neither.
His attempt to persuade me in such an earnest voice caught me off guard.
“... I’m listening.”
After giving us both a moment to calm down, I cautiously asked Father.
“What was that gray fog that appeared at the end? It ejected me from Father’s dream.”
“Gray fog? Ah! So the security measure I received long ago wasn’t for nothing!”
“A security measure?”
“About twelve or thirteen years ago, I met a retired Management Bureau agent.”
“Father, a Management Bureau agent can’t retire...”
“There’s no retirement, yes. I know. But there are people who ignore the Management Bureau’s summons and live at leisure.”
Thinking about it, Grandpa Mook-seong was in a similar situation, so I understood.
“I see.”
“That person helped me. I asked them to erase or seal part of my memories.”
“...”
“They charged me two billion won for a single procedure. At the time, I complained that it was highway robbery, but now I see it was worth every won.”
So the fog that broke the assimilation caused by Butterfly Dream was a security measure installed by a former Management Bureau agent.
Memory erasure, distortion, and Containment were among the Management Bureau’s specialties, so it was possible.
Still, a thought occurred to me.
I didn’t know how the security measure worked, but even if it could withstand Butterfly Dream, it couldn’t withstand the Flute of Rest.
With the Flute’s power, I could break any security measure, even one specially made by the Management Bureau.
Then I only had to enter again with Butterfly Dream!
Just as I reached that conclusion, Father’s expression turned urgent.
“I can tell from your eyes that you have another plan! You mean to destroy the security measure and see the next memory, don’t you?”
For a moment, I wondered if Father had learned how to read minds.
“... Did you read my mind?”
“Eun-sol, you must not see the next memory. It is a very, very dangerous memory...! I, I know. If that memory, that information, leaks outside, something truly terrible will happen.”
“Something terrible? What do you mean?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know exactly. But I’m certain something beyond what you and I can handle will happen.”
Father’s half-terrified attitude left me confused.
Then a pale hand settled on my shoulder.
When I looked beside me, Elena gave a slight nod.
Father appeared to be telling the truth.
“...”
Let’s organize the situation.
According to what I learned through Butterfly Dream, Father was what one might call an incomplete Regressor.
He vaguely remembered the previous Loop, but rather than recognizing the fragmented information as memories of the past, he mistook the fragmented information for a Prophetic Dream of the future.
At first, he had dealings with the Management Bureau for more than ten years, and Daeyang Trading was one of its partner companies at the time.
Then, as if guided by fate, he headed to a Management Bureau research facility built in Gangwon Province...
He alone survived a massacre and encountered the King of Yith.
What came next? What did he do after meeting the King?
He must have served the King as his new superior and done something, but only the memories of that part had been edited out.
I still had questions, so I intended to use even the Flute to force the truth out.
As expected of someone who had been through so much, Father immediately saw through my intentions.
There was a reason he had sealed those memories.
If I forcibly opened them, something beyond our ability to handle would happen.
That alone was confusing enough, but the warning Elena quietly conveyed left me even more uncertain.
Father’s words were true.
More precisely, Father himself clearly believed them to be true.
What should I do? Should I stop here?
No, wouldn’t it be a waste to stop now?
I hadn’t been through all that in the Hotel for nothing.
The next piece of information was obviously the real key!
“...”
I made my decision.
Without a word, I rose to my feet, holding Butterfly Dream in one hand and the Flute in the other.
Seeing my attitude, Father wore a complicated expression, half fear and half concern. Still, he did not shout or resist.
He only looked resigned, as if he had known this day would come eventually.
I slowly approached, one step at a time.
So that the companions outside could fully understand the meaning and purpose of my actions and give me a signal!
After moving slowly for about ten seconds!
--- Rumble...! Crash!
An unknown vibration swept through the room, and several plaques and booklets scattered around suddenly fell.
“Ah! Eun-sol, this is...”
“I know. It looks like they’re telling me not to.”
We had agreed beforehand that a Poltergeist meant, “Danger!”
A little disappointed, I sent the Flute back and pressed the brooch back into my hair.
Father watched with interest and asked,
“What was that? Some kind of supernatural power that warns of danger?”
“Something like that.”
A companion observing from outside would warn me if they thought I was in danger, so it was close enough.
At last, things settled down.
The three of us slowly calmed down, our tension easing slightly. Father picked up the coffee that had long gone cold on the table and began drinking it.
“...”
“...”
Then he abruptly said something unexpected.
“It was you.”
“...”
“It was you... It was you...”
“...”
“Ever since that monster gave me its revelation, I have always wondered. Jeong-ho, Jin-uk, you, Hee-yoon. Which of my two sons and two daughters would receive this ‘great destiny’...?”
“Is that why you made your children fight?”
“Made them fight? That is truly a misunderstanding. What parent in the world would deliberately create discord between their children?”
“...”
“Still, yes. It is true that I wondered which of you was the ‘special person.’”
“...”
“Perhaps that curiosity drove you all too hard.”
Before I realized it, I muttered,
“Aren’t you curious?”
“What?”
“How I obtained these powers and such mysterious companions.”
“...”
“What your daughter went through in an unknown place.”
Father answered in a calm voice.
“I am curious. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t. But...”
“But?”
“Not as much as you, perhaps, but I have been through all kinds of things too.”
“That’s true.”
“I learned one lesson in the process. Curiosity killed the cat.”
“...”
“Eun-sol, it is dangerous to be too curious about stories from a special world. Evil, greed, goodness. Curiosity is more dangerous than all three.”
My next words were somewhat harsh.
Perhaps they were an expression of dissatisfaction that had built up over many years.
“Curiosity is dangerous in your case, Father. Not mine.”
He readily admitted it.
“Yes, that is true as well. I am a fox, so I should live with my head bowed. You are an eagle, so you should live looking toward the sky.”
“...”
Many of the questions I had about Father felt as though they were being answered.
The way he had led the company through astonishing decisions as though he knew the future, and the way he had encouraged competition among his children.
In the space left behind after my questions disappeared, there was only a worn-out old man.
I saw a mind weakened beneath the pressure of an unfathomable being too immense for such a small, small person to bear.
I also felt as though I could vaguely understand how Father must have seen what happened today.
He had not seemed surprised even when I suddenly brought in a mysterious companion and used absurd magical tools.
He did not show much displeasure even when I forcibly read his memories, nor did he ask anyone for help.
To Father, today’s events were a destiny that would come someday.
The moment the great King of Yith prophesied, “Someone born of you, so small and small, will gain a great destiny,” the future had already been decided.
Just before I left the chairman’s office, I spoke without thinking.
“I’m sorry.”
“... That is what I should say. I have always been sorry.”
Let’s tell the others what I learned.
It was disappointing that I couldn’t learn more, but what I had already found was substantial.
“Eun-sol.”
“Mm?”
“I’ve been wondering since earlier about what the King of Yith said to the chairman.”
“Yes.”
“‘One Who Cries Out for the Three Thousand Worlds has chosen one of your young children.’”
“...”
“That felt very... strange to me.”
“Later. Let’s talk about it later.”
* * *
‘So, you stopped Miss Eun-sol from obtaining important information from the chairman?’
‘Yes.’
‘Was it dangerous to dig deeper? It seems you saw something through Insight.’
‘... I don’t think Eun-sol and Elena noticed.’
‘Which part do you mean?’
‘The revelation the King of Yith gave the chairman. You saw what I wrote down, right?’
‘“Be silent. Forget. Obey. I shall give you three chances.” You wrote that down.’
‘The chairman has already used up two chances.’
‘Oh dear!’
‘If we forcibly obtained the memories, that would be the third violation. Supernatural punishment would begin. Eun-sol and Elena, as the people receiving the leaked information, would have been in danger too.’
‘I understand. Then are we giving up on this information?’
‘Let’s find another way.’
‘Then let us switch again. Ga-in has a nosebleed, so...’
‘I’ll do it! You two are always the only ones taking turns!’
‘...’
‘...’
‘I’ll do it! You’re both tired, aren’t you? Trust me!’
‘I’ve never found the words “trust me” this unsettling before.’
‘Fine. Mi-ro can do it.’
‘Ga-in?’
‘It’s time to look at Song-i and A-ri’s side now. It’s only natural for a mother to protect her daughter.’
‘I suspect Miss A-ri would see it differently.’
‘But A-ri isn’t here.’
Footnotes:
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