WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 168: You Take After Your Mother
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“Ah... Can you tell?”
The Labyrinth Management Bureau agent smiled, somewhere between sheepish and shameless.
“Well, it’s not like I absolutely can’t be found out... I just thought hiding it as a general rule would make it easier to carry out my mission. Please don’t take it too badly.”
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.”
One year younger than Lee Na-hyun.
“...Isn’t that too young?”
“People do occasionally say I look older than I am. And you’re only three years older than me.”
Kang Jun-gyeom tugged at one corner of his mouth and joked.
You know that’s not what I meant.
“Anyway... What does age matter? You never know what might happen. If suffering a little means I can eventually be of some real help to this world, well... I don’t think that’s such a bad life.”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I find unpleasant about you people.”
Kang Jun-gyeom shrugged as if to say, what could he do?
Infuriating.
“...Did you come by helicopter, then?”
“Yes. I entered through the rooftop around twenty or thirty minutes before meeting you, Mr. Seon Yu-han.”
The Labyrinth Management Bureau agent answered readily.
“But we couldn’t tell how many meters above the rooftop still counted as part of the Labyrinth, so the rope got fairly long. Helicopters are expensive.”
If they had flown too low and the invasive-type Labyrinth swallowed the helicopter too, it would have been a loss.
Compared to that, human life was cheap.
This man said such things as though they were a joke.
I didn’t like the mindset of someone who voluntarily offered his own life to the Labyrinth, claiming he wanted to help...
But there was something worthy of respect in a joke he could only make because he had faced his circumstances directly and accepted them as they were.
“Ha...”
So I gave a small laugh in return.
It was a joke made in the hope that the other person would laugh, would let it pass.
I could at least do that much.
“But what’s happening outside?”
“Ah. It’s chaos.”
Did I ask because I didn’t know that...?
“Reporters are all over the place. The Red Threads outside started posting one after another on social media that Uiwi Guild headquarters had suddenly become Labyrinthified.”
It seemed the Interview Administrator’s mass message had worked well.
...Perhaps it hadn’t been pointless.
Red Threads were freelancers much like celebrities, so unless they had specific business, they rarely visited the company.
That meant they hadn’t been caught up in this place and could relay news from outside.
That was fortunate.
Red Threads were people who resolved contact-type Labyrinths suited to their individual specialties. They weren’t prepared for invasive-type Labyrinths where no one knew what would appear.
Outside their field, they were just ordinary people with strong bodies or sharp minds.
“Are other places besides this building all right?”
“Yes. The area itself isn’t wide, but this is the middle of Seoul, so there’s a lot of foot traffic nearby. And since it’s an office building, the population density inside is high. By our estimates, this is the invasive-type Labyrinth with the most stranded people in the country.”
“...And no one else has come out?”
“Ah...”
The Labyrinth Management Bureau agent tilted his head with a quiet intake of breath.
Right. I hadn’t expected anything else...
“Well, as for whether someone has come out, we haven’t been able to determine that for certain yet. It’s ambiguous, or rather, an odd coincidence.”
“...What do you mean?”
“Someone came out right before the Red Threads posted on social media.”
“What?”
Without realizing it, I grabbed Kang Jun-gyeom’s arm urgently.
“Who was it?”
“Uh... From what we heard, she was an ordinary homemaker.”
Kang Jun-gyeom glanced down at the arm I held and continued.
“She had been looking at the paintings in the first-floor lobby when she heard the fire alarm and hurried out. She was with a two-year-old baby, so apparently she didn’t stop to consider whether it was a malfunction. She just came out immediately.”
“Ah. Ah... Haha.”
I didn’t even know what I was feeling now, or what I was supposed to feel.
Relief? Anger? Satisfaction? Futility? Hope?
“...Mr. Seon Yu-han?”
Then, in every loop where I had set off the alarm late, or not at all, had that homemaker and her baby been trapped in the first-floor lobby and died? With the exit right in front of them?
“Mr. Seon Yu-han, are you all right? Can you hear me? If you’re panicking...”
“...No, I’m all right.”
I loosened my teeth, which I had unconsciously clenched tight, leaned back, and removed Kang Jun-gyeom’s hands from me.
Kang Jun-gyeom...
I studied his face carefully once more.
I never thought I would meet someone from the Labyrinth Management Bureau again.
Especially not in the Labyrinth...
“...Ah.”
Now I roughly understood.
Why this man had looked familiar.
If he’d been a daughter rather than a son, I probably would have recognized it right away.
Though I hadn’t exactly been close to that person.
“Come to think of it, Mr. Kang Jun-gyeom, it seemed you already knew who I was.”
Kang Jun-gyeom trailed off with an “Uh,” then smiled again, somewhere between sheepish and shameless.
“I wasn’t given a profile beyond basic personal information such as your appearance, name, gender, and date of birth, along with the fact that you’re a person of interest. But we really had never met. I wasn’t lying about that.”
What a personality...
But had the Labyrinth Management Bureau sent him in after figuring out that I was here?
“Were there no special instructions regarding me? It seems they spent taxpayer money on petty surveillance to keep watch over whether I was saying stupid things somewhere.”
When I said it like a joke, Kang Jun-gyeom understood the implication and frowned in disbelief.
“No, what exactly do you take us for...?”
“Civil servants who send a green kid on a suicide mission?”
“...I was a Navy special warfare noncommissioned officer.”
“Ah, really.”
The fact that he had been trained to wield violence sanctioned by the state didn’t sound like much of a point of pride to me.
The rule that some people could commit violence without punishment, while others had to accept violence inflicted upon them...
I understood its necessity for maintaining society with my head, but the unspoken agreement underlying that rule...
It simply made me uncomfortable.
“That’s why, Mr. Seon Yu-han, what I mean is that I’m fully prepared. I enlisted from the beginning because I wanted to enter places like this.”
I quietly looked at the foolish man who had crawled into a Labyrinth of his own accord, even though his mother had died in one.
“Anyway, there were no orders concerning you specifically. It would be good if your life or death could be confirmed, that was all.”
“And if I’m alive?”
“In that case, I was told I could accompany you at my own discretion if I thought you would help with the mission.”
“And that mission is information gathering?”
“Yes.”
Kang Jun-gyeom answered as he slowly pushed up his glasses, so deliberately it seemed artificial.
The gesture had an intention behind it.
“It would be nice if we could resolve things while we’re at it, but...”
He gave a light smile and shrugged.
“It’s easier to clean things up later if you set performance targets conservatively, you know? That’s working life.”
Enough. I should stop talking.
“Do you know why I’m a person of interest?”
I asked, forcing my expression and voice to soften.
The feeling that made someone insist on pressing their head to the grave of a family member was not completely impossible to understand.
“Uh... I wasn’t told that properly either.”
The Labyrinth Management Bureau field agent blinked, then pointed toward the ceiling with a tapping motion of his finger.
“They said knowing would get me hurt. That you were connected to someone important.”
What kind of fucking nonsense was that...?
They hid information about a survivor even from their own staff?
No matter what, there were things you didn’t hide.
How could they make it so he wouldn’t even recognize the one person who had returned alive from the Labyrinth where his own mother had died...?
What on earth was this?
The Labyrinth Management Bureau’s version of consideration, or one huge screw-you.
What did they expect me to do...?
“Um, Mr. Seon Yu-han, excuse me, but I’m genuinely curious, so...”
“If you know it’s rude, don’t ask.”
“Yes, understood.”
Kang Jun-gyeom backed off readily without looking offended.
I didn’t know whether it was a professional trait, but it was nice that he listened.
“Mr. Kang Jun-gyeom.”
“Yes.”
I pointed at the pen holder on the corner of the table.
“Let’s deal with this place first.”
There would be a chance to tell him about his mother later.
And very many times, too.
“Bring a pen... No, not that one. A permanent marker. Yes. Write important things you need to remember somewhere easy to see, like the back of your hand. Just in case, write a note too and put it in your pocket.”
When I demonstrated first, Kang Jun-gyeom quickly followed.
“Should I write something like my name?”
“I don’t know. It seems you can’t properly recognize even your own name in there. Your role matters more than your name. Don’t write only your name. Write all kinds of things. Anyway... I don’t know if this will definitely help, but it’s better than doing nothing.”
I added a detailed explanation of what would happen when we opened the book called Nail Shell, and what we would need to do.
“You came in here to die too, so I think it’ll affect you a lot.”
“Me ‘too’?”
I ignored Kang Jun-gyeom’s short question.
“How do you know all this information anyway, Mr. Seon Yu-han?”
I ignored the long question too.
But Kang Jun-gyeom didn’t ask about the sentence written on the back of my hand.
Just as I didn’t ask about what was written on his.
“Then I’ll open the book now.”
―――――――――――――――
In Act One, a boy and girl introduce a story that kills everyone who hears it.
The Nail Shell Story.
A story whose true contents no one knows, because everyone who hears it dies.
The boy tells a short anecdote related to the Nail Shell Story. Its plot goes as follows.
Three brothers go on a picnic in the forest, build a campfire, gather around it, and take turns telling scary stories.
Finally, the youngest, the third brother, tells the Nail Shell Story. The eldest and second brother flee in terror, and at that moment, the campfire spreads through the entire forest, killing everyone.
Thus Act One ends.
“Let’s tell scary stories.”
Act Two begins.
―――――――――――――――
Man: Where are we...?
That Man: (Pressing down on the Man’s shoulder to make him sit) You two go first. The real Nail Shell Story as you see it.
Girl: Do you know the Nail Shell Story too, big brother?
That Man: I don’t know the real story.
Boy: Aren’t you curious, big brother? What kind of story would kill everyone who heard it?
That Man: (Smiling, in a low voice as though talking to himself) That kid said the person who told the story probably killed them all.
Man: Pardon?
That Man: (To the Man) Take the story of the three brothers, for example. The youngest actually killed them all.
The boy and girl smile brightly.
Boy: You could interpret it that way.
Girl: Right. There’s no correct answer!
That Man: There do seem to be wrong answers, though. Anyway, you go first.
Boy: Fine. (Pause) A very beautiful woman moved in next door to a man...
―――――――――――――――
“And so the blind woman and the Hunter had their second child the following year and lived happily ever after! The end!”
The girl finished her story after the boy.
“...That was a really unpleasant story.”
The Man leaned forward slightly and spoke softly, as though whispering in someone’s ear.
“Was it? I like it.”
Now I understood why the woman had liked that love story.
“Love is unpleasant by nature, isn’t it?”
The boy and girl clutched their stomachs, their shoulders shaking.
The Man’s laughter could not be heard.
Blackout.
Act Three begins.
―――――――――――――――
That Man: (To the boy and girl) My turn now, right? Let’s finish this quickly. (Pause) There’s a mansion in the forest. The people living there can’t sleep properly every night, and some even bang their heads against the walls. They’re so afraid of something that it could drive them mad. As it turns out, the children they killed keep returning alive. They certainly drove nails into them and strangled them to death in the forest that day...
Boy, Girl: Why did they kill them?
That Man: I don’t know. To offer them as sacrifices?
Boy, Girl: Sacrifices for what?
That Man: (Smiling) It was a sacrifice after all.
The boy and girl do not answer.
That Man: I don’t know yet. That’s the end of the story for now.
―――――――――――――――
Lastly, the Man told the story of his mother, who had gone away on a business trip and returned dead.
“To be honest, she wasn’t a good mother. She wasn’t very interested in me. To begin with, a good mother wouldn’t run into a Labyrinth, leaving behind a child about to start high school.”
When the Man calmly finished in a subdued voice, the boy and girl rose from their seats.
“We told you to tell a scary story.”
“I’m a Gardener.”
I quickly claimed a new job before anyone else.
―――――――――――――――
The Gardener woke from a long dream.
Still half asleep, the Gardener looked out the window and saw that it was still early dawn.
“Ah...”
The Gardener yawned and rubbed their eyes, then froze.
“Hm?”
Something black was smeared across the back of the Gardener’s hand.
The Gardener got out of bed and walked to the window.
When the Gardener held the back of their hand in the moonlight seeping through the window, letters appeared clearly.
『The Gardener’s name is Lee Si-woon.』
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