WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
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◈ Escaping the Mystery Hotel ◈
Episode 84: Party Time (6) - Safari of All Eras, The Secret of Room 103 (1)
──────
- Cha Jin-cheol
My first Inheritance. Just how powerful was it?
Of course, I had indirectly experienced an Inheritance’s power during “Common Sense-Altering Media,” but I had already heard about it from Song-i.
An Inheritance’s power differs greatly before and after it is obtained. Even with the bracelet, I had heard that many of the functions it had inside Room 103 had disappeared.
The Otherworldly Star was probably the same.
I doubted it still had the power to twist the entire world as it had inside Room 101.
In the end, I would have to check it myself in this “training ground” the hotel had prepared.
After receiving the bracelet’s mental protection from Song-i, I entered the safari.
/Choose an era.
.
.
.
---74 million years ago
1. 2. 3. Start!/
?
??
Had I just seen that wrong? Seventy-four million years ago?
Before I could even grasp what was happening, I fell from midair.
The moment I got up, retching, my heart began to pound wildly.
Pterosaurs as large as houses flew through the sky.
Massive creatures filled the horizon.
There were even bizarre plants I had never seen anywhere before.
Since arriving at the hotel, I had never been so deeply moved.
When was it? I remembered watching Jurassic Park in a movie theater.
The T. rex biting down on a restroom, with someone inside it, and killing them in one bite.
The scholars had first arrived on Isla Nublar, an island overflowing with dinosaurs, and were left speechless by the majestic bulk of a brachiosaurus.
Then the chairman of Jurassic Park appeared and welcomed them to the park.
I felt like one of those stunned scholars.
I trembled without realizing it as I looked at the miracles filling the world.
This sight before me.
If tickets to a safari full of extinct dinosaurs like this were sold...
I was certain they would sell out in an instant even at hundreds of millions of won per ticket.
These were real dinosaurs, after all. Wouldn’t there be countless wealthy people around the world willing to pay hundreds of millions for a ticket?
I forgot why I had come in the first place and walked through the plains, taking in the ancient Earth with my whole body.
I even threw off my shoes and felt the texture of mysterious plants beneath my feet, something between moss and grass.
My eyes darted everywhere as I watched the massive creatures filling both sky and land.
I constantly drew breath, filling my lungs with ancient air.
I was sure I would never forget this moment.
Even if I left the hotel someday, this would be a moment I would remember for the rest of my life. I really wished I had a camera!
As soon as I got out, I would ask my sister to buy one from the HP Market.
I had to bring a camera tomorrow. I still had plenty of purchase slots left anyway, since I had not been sure what to buy.
If it was a camera for taking dinosaur pictures, everyone would agree to the purchase.
Had about five minutes passed since I began roaming this primordial Earth, feeling almost as though I were touring the age of dinosaurs?
A hideous sound reached me.
---Grrrrr!
Only then did I lower my gaze and look around. Rather than a dinosaur, was it an incredibly huge bird?
Then again, birds were descendants of dinosaurs, so maybe that distinction was meaningless.
A bird with a head larger than my upper body made a vicious sound as it threatened me.
It was not a demon or a monster from a ghost story that shattered the mind. Just some oversized bird?
I had no reason to kill it. There was no need to bring out the Otherworldly Star, either.
I just rushed at it and struck its beak.
- Keeeng! Kkiiing!
One punch sent the huge bird rolling across the ground. It made a cute sound despite its appearance, then ran away.
That was not the end of it.
When I turned my head, lizards with what looked like hundreds of teeth had appeared everywhere without me noticing.
---Thump! ---Thump!
The ground had been trembling for a while now. Something huge enough to shake the earth with every step seemed to be walking nearby.
That was enough playing tourist.
I definitely planned to bring a camera tomorrow and take lots of pictures, but that was not why I had come here today.
I had come to test the Inheritance, the Otherworldly Star Fragment.
Also, Song-i’s mental protection had a time limit. I had wasted nearly five minutes getting too moved by the dinosaurs as soon as I arrived.
I took a deep breath and held my hand out into the air.
Unlike the bracelet, the Otherworldly Star was a tool that destroyed all things simply by existing.
Perhaps out of consideration from the hotel, the Otherworldly Star did not remain attached to my arm at all times like the bracelet.
Normally, it had no physical form, as if it existed in a space beyond the world. It descended into the world the moment its owner wanted it to.
At the tip of my outstretched hand, the Otherworldly Star descended.
* * *
If I had to describe my image of the Otherworldly Star in one word, it was “radiation.”
A tool of destruction that endlessly released waves that twisted and destroyed everything, without distinguishing between enemies, allies, or even its user!
Sure enough, the moment I brought out the star, my surroundings began to warp.
Unknown crystal-like things sprouted from the ground in an instant.
Claws and eyeballs suddenly erupted all over the lizards around me, and their bodies underwent severe transformations.
Most creatures could not even move, much less attack me, as they suffered in fear and pain.
It had not even been five seconds since I brought out the star.
Every animal within dozens of meters lay sprawled on the ground, doing nothing but groaning.
Clutching the star, I ran across the plain.
I found myself becoming a harbinger of death, a horseman of the apocalypse appearing at the end of the world.
With every step I took, strange stones rose from the ground, and a bizarre smell filled the air. Even the colors around me warped until I could not tell what color anything was anymore.
Every animal within dozens of meters began collapsing in pain, dinosaur or not.
A huge ostrich-like creature’s head split vertically in an instant, while a pterosaur flying toward me had hundreds of claws sprout from its wings and crashed down.
After running for quite a while, I spotted a massive sauropod grazing. It was the creature that had been shaking the earth with every step since earlier.
What an unbelievably beautiful creature.
Come to think of it, the giant bird and lizards that had threatened me were all long dead.
That enormous creature had only been eating grass. It had never threatened me...
The thought of harming a creature like that just to test the star’s power filled me with intense guilt.
It felt unpleasant, as though I were ruining this primordial world that felt almost sacred.
Let’s finish this quickly. My companions were probably waiting outside.
Holding the star, I approached the massive creature and judged the distance.
Thirty meters? It reacted from around there. Something like a groan came from the dinosaur.
Was that the range of the star’s power? Or was it wider, and the dinosaur only reacted now? I did not know that much.
I ran right up close. The star’s power began twisting the creature’s body in earnest.
Its body suddenly warped, horns burst from its back, and its legs split apart!
---Uooooooh!
I did not know how dinosaurs communicated, but I was not so clueless that I could not understand the meaning of that cry filled with pain.
The creature, so tall it seemed to touch the sky, collapsed after transforming into a grotesque body that looked as though an evil painter had carelessly scribbled all over it.
That miserable sight shook me deeply.
By then, even I was starting to struggle.
I looked at my right arm holding the star.
It was no longer an “arm.” It was closer to a huge mass of flesh with the star embedded inside.
The mutation that began in my right hand was about to reach my shoulder.
The fact that the pain had been suppressed even in this state was probably due to the protection Song-i had given me.
It was an extreme mutation, but paradoxically, it made me realize something.
Even that huge dinosaur had collapsed in less than thirty seconds under the severe transformation once it came near the star.
Yet I, directly holding this star in my hand, had a mutation that had only reached the area around my right shoulder.
As Elder Mook-seong had said, my body had strong resistance to the star’s power.
It would have been nice if I had even a little of that resistance in my mind, too.
I had brought a watch to time Song-i’s blessing, but unlike my body, the watch had no resistance at all. It had long since lost even the shape of a watch.
This was about my limit.
I sent the star back through the crack in the world.
When I looked around, I felt anew just how demonic the star’s power was.
Not a single living creature remained normal. Not just the animals, but the plants, ground, and even air had long since warped.
... To the creatures of this world, was I not the demon who had risen from hell?
That was enough getting emotionally attached to this world.
We had obtained such destructive power!
It meant the odds of everyone getting out of the hotel safely had gone up.
---Riiip!
---Plop!
Strange sounds came from my arm, which had lost sensation long ago, so I turned my head.
Twisted masses of flesh were falling off. Skin that had risen like scales peeled away on its own, and eyeballs, tongues, fingernails, and teeth that had sprouted everywhere fell away by themselves.
Once all the grotesque flesh had fallen away, I no longer had a “right arm.”
Still, that flesh had been twisted by the star and could not move normally anyway.
Once it fell off, I actually felt lighter. This was probably Regeneration.
I understood what my Sponsor had meant when it said this would help me use my blessing.
Regeneration could not regrow a severed body part the way a lizard can.
Still, it could shed body parts contaminated by the star and seal the wound.
Song-i’s blessing would end soon.
The reason I had not felt much pain despite my body being this fucked up was surely the bracelet’s power.
I thought she had said ten minutes at first, but the duration kept getting longer over time. Had Song-i gotten better?
I needed to leave before the mental protection completely wore off. I was certain I would feel terrible pain once it did.
How did I get out of this safari? I was sure they said I could leave whenever I wanted.
Was there some kind of Status Window?
I just shouted once.
“Hey! I want to leave now! Let me out!”
That was the answer.
The moment I shouted, both my body and mind floated up.
---Crash!
When I came to my senses, I found myself outside the safari.
It felt similar to leaving a Curse Room.
I looked around and saw my companions.
Ah. The majestic forms of those sacred dinosaurs came back to me the moment I got out, and I regretted leaving!
When else in my life would I get to see something like that again? A camera. I had to order one.
“Wow! I never imagined the hotel had a place this amazing! Did you all enjoy your visit?
Dinosaurs showed up for me. What did the rest of you see?
Let’s come to the safari every day for the rest of Party Time! And hurry up and get a camera -”
“Jin-cheol. Be quiet for a second.”
Startled by my sister’s tired voice, I looked around.
What was this? We had just been to such an incredible place, so why did everyone look like that?
Unlike me, they all looked utterly worn out and exhausted!
Ga-in, who had been standing there blankly, spoke up.
“Looks like you had a great time, Jin-cheol. I guess it’s good that at least one person enjoyed themselves. I wouldn’t know. A tail hit me, and I died in five seconds.”
Song-i chimed in.
“I’m jealous, Ga-in. You died in five seconds. I was chased by man-eating prehistoric humans for hours.”
No, no? What was with this mood?
“Why did you go through all that? If it felt wrong, you just had to shout for them to let you out. They would have let you out right away.”
Everyone looked at me.
The Elder let out a sigh.
“That was how you got out? You shouted for them to let you out? Hah... I never thought to shout. I ran around, unable to figure out how I was supposed to leave, until I got bitten to death.”
It seemed I was the only one who wanted to visit this safari every day.
* * *
- Han Ga-in
Seeing Jin-cheol, who seemed to have enjoyed himself alone, made me sigh.
Fine. At least one person had fun, so that was something. The safari was a place we had come to learn how to use our Inheritances, after all.
Jin-cheol could go to the safari every day and train from now on.
As I listened to the discussion about the star’s power beside me, I grew curious again.
Diverse Perspectives, a tool on par with the star.
Song-i had practically obtained the bracelet on her own.
... What exactly was Room 103?
Now that we had cleared even Room 101, I was curious all over again.
As soon as it began, everyone saw the hallucination of Animal Farm. At the same time, their intelligence and souls were siphoned away through the necklaces around their necks, creating a race against time.
That condition alone was terrible enough, but powerful Athanasia, creatures that even a human army likely could not defeat, were everywhere. On top of that, the setting was a spaceship flying through space.
How had Song-i managed to clear it in that environment? Was there even a scenario where it could be cleared without Affinity?
What were the escape conditions, anyway?
I thought I should ask Song-i.
Footnotes:
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