WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ How to Die in the Office Labyrinth ◈

Chapter 24: Sounds Like Teen Spirit

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It vibrated. Again.

[Aunt]

[Slide to Chat]

I already told you, I'm not answering. Please stop.

Declined.

[Aunt]

[Slide to Greet]

Hang on. What?

Declined anyway.

[Aunt]

[Slide to Delete]

You can't delete something that isn't there.

Declined.

[Aunt]

[Slide to Unite]

This is getting unpleasant.

Declined.

[Aunt]

[Slide to Kill]

......Declined.

[Aunt]

[Slide to Resurrect]

.......

.......

.......

"Seon Yu-han-ssi."

"Huh? Yes?"

The sudden call startled me, and I nearly dropped my phone.

I turned my head. Chae Jae-ha was wearing the strangest expression, like he didn't know what face to make and had simply failed to make any.

"It's not that I'm trying to, like, be mean about it or anything."

He glanced around even though there was no one else nearby, and whispered in a halting voice.

"Are you maybe, um, mentally... not doing so great?"

"Pardon?"

"Because you were standing there giggling to yourself in the middle of all this, and honestly? It's starting to freak me out."

Had I been laughing?

Without thinking, I touched the corner of my mouth, then dropped my hand and turned off the screen.

I'd need to be more careful.

"If something's wrong, just warn me ahead of time. Please. At least let me brace myself."

"I'll, um, try?"

"It's not something you trrry, it's -- ugh, fine. Fine. Fine, pr-- guh...!"

Chae Jae-ha had been walking ahead just fine when he suddenly clapped a hand over his mouth, leaped straight up, spun a full circle on the spot, and scrambled to press himself against my back.

He was so close I could feel his heart hammering.

"Are you all right? What--"

"Th-that... over there..."

The big accountant was shaking as he stretched out a hand.

"That dark car... don't you see it... there's something in the back seat...!"

I followed the direction he was pointing.

Slowly.

I pressed my mouth shut in case I screamed, and opened my eyes to narrow slits.

Where his finger led, there was one black sedan. And inside it...

"There's nothing there."

"Huh? What are you talking about. That can't be right. Did you look at the wrong car? It's right there, it's -- wait."

Chae Jae-ha had been hunched behind me, but now he crept forward with a blank look on his face.

"What. You're right, it's empty. But I swear -- the most skin-crawling thing was sitting there. It was real. Like a shadow with all these teeth. I'm telling you, it was there."

"I know. I believe you. You're not making it up."

The Labyrinth had probably done it to spook him.

"You handled it well."

"Oh, god..."

Chae Jae-ha grabbed his knees and let out a long, exhausted breath, like someone who'd just sprinted until their legs gave out.

"Good thing I covered my mouth in time. Otherwise I would've really..."

"...Chae Jae-ha-ssi?"

He stopped mid-sentence and went rigid.

Then he slowly straightened up and stared at something in the distance, with the look of a man who had just seen something worse than any monster.

That scared me more than anything else. The fact that he wasn't screaming.

"Minha...?"

"Pardon?"

"Choi Minha? Minha!"

"Chae Jae-ha-ssi, wait--"

He threw my hand off and started running. Wildly.

That same man who was afraid of everything. Running into pure darkness without a single light.

"Choi Minha, where are you? Why are you -- why are you here... Minha. Call for uncle again... I can't hear you! Where are you?"

Rattle, rattle.

I barely caught up to find him wrenching at car door handles one by one, slamming his fists against trunks.

"Are you in here? Choi Minha, where are you! Are you in here? Why? Why? Why? This can't be real... Minha, you, you shouldn't be here... you can't be here, Choi Minha..."

A man trapped in the Labyrinth, face soaked with tears, searching desperately for a nephew who wasn't there.

Because he had heard his nephew's voice. A voice that wasn't there.

"Chae Jae-ha-ssi, please stop. Stop and hide."

I hooked an arm around his neck from behind, just enough to jolt him, and brought us both down to the ground.

He crumpled in front of me and kept murmuring his nephew's name.

"It already heard your voice..."

Maybe it was already too late.

Splash, slap.

The merciful World-Honored One had heard Chae Jae-ha's cry, and would now lead him away from this world of suffering.

Creak, click. The sound of small gears turning.

I bit down on my tongue and pressed both hands over my ears, fighting back the urge to scream.

"Remember this. Delusion takes on form, and form becomes attachment, and attachment calls forth more affliction."

Clank, clunk.

In the sealed darkness, the Tathagata's incantation and its footsteps rang out like a solemn epic.

"Open your eyes."

Did I dare resist it?

"Look."

The World-Honored One's words stood above any rule.

"It is the shadow born of your delusion, and the form of the truth you turned away from."

Within that single body, human flesh and mechanical bone coexisted in harmony.

The plain dharma robe was covered edge to edge in Chinese characters too dense to read.

Between the half-exposed ribs clung remnants that had not yet managed to decay.

It was rusted dark red in patches, as though it had weathered an age far too long. But no, that wasn't rust...

Of the shattered head, the only things left intact were its smiling lips and its full, round ears.

Truly a wondrous and perfect form.

"Open your ears."

I lowered my hands. What had been a muffled sound finally became clear.

"Listen."

The Tathagata's hand drew closer.

To me.

"The dharmadhatu will unbind you."

No.

Not to me. To the one lying in front of me, who was not me.

Mercy was not mine to receive.

Crack, crunch.

I closed my eyes again.

"Gh, nngh..."

Shut my ears.

Thud, slap.

Pressed my mouth shut.

Clatter, clank...

Stay calm. Stay calm. I have to stay calm. It's not like this is the first dead body I've ever seen. I've been through this before. It's not my fault. It's not on me. I'm okay. It's not my fault? It's not on me? Calm down. Cover your ears. Close your eyes. Shut your mouth. That's it. Like that.

"......"

At last, peace came.

"...Yu-han-ssi."

The World-Honored One departs from me -- no, it was never my World-Honored One.

Not a Tathagata statue to offer prayers to, not a Buddha deserving of worship.

"Seon Yu-han-ssi...!"

"Yes?"

A hand on my shoulder. The world shifted. I startled and turned my head.

Yu Hyun-jae was crouching in front of me.

His living body blocked the view of the dead one.

"I heard a commotion and got worried, so I came to check..."

Yu Hyun-jae helped me to my feet and turned me so the body wasn't in my line of sight.

"By the time we arrived, that monstrous buddha statue was already close... I'm sorry we couldn't help."

"Seon Yu-han-ssi..."

Hwang Ju-yeon had her arms around Jeong Ji-ho, covering the child's eyes.

She stood at an angle where Chae Jae-ha's body would be mostly out of sight as well.

"What about the box, though..."

"Oh, this."

Once I seemed calm enough, Yu Hyun-jae and Hwang Ju-yeon glanced at the delivery box crushed in my hand.

"It appeared on top of a car with the same tires as that skid mark."

I peeled the box away from my palm, where it seemed to have fused, and gave a short explanation that came out sounding more like a sigh.

Creak, creak...

I opened the box. Inside was a small wooden cross on a cord a little too short to be a necklace -- more of a decoration.

"Oh, I recognize this."

Hwang Ju-yeon knew right away.

"It's the kind you hang from a car's rearview mirror. So this time we need to find a car with a cross pendant like this?"

"That may well be it. Then, Seon Yu-han-ssi, please sit here and rest for a bit -- Ji-ho-gun can stay with you..."

I looked up at Hwang Ju-yeon and Yu Hyun-jae as they moved to leave me behind.

"But I'm fine--"

"--Seon Yu-han-ssi. I was wrong."

A voice steady to the point of sounding almost flat.

"You're not cut out to be a Red Thread. Not at all."

Yu Hyun-jae pressed me back down as I started to rise.

"You don't know where you are right now."

"...What don't I know?"

"What kind of Labyrinth you're in. And what state you're in."

What do you know. What could you possibly know. You had it hard when you were young, sure, but now you're sitting at the top of that tall building looking at Labyrinths from across the river, so what do you know. What do you know about me, about Labyrinths, about what it's like to have to keep living when you've already died so many times.

A mess of unrefined words swarmed inside me like insects.

"From where I'm standing, this floor looks like the kind of place where pushing yourself too hard is a fast way to die. Am I wrong? Take a breath and calm down. You said you were Ji-ho-gun's guardian, didn't you?"

That landed.

I looked down. The child's round eyes were looking up at me without a word.

I'd frightened them.

"Ji-ho-gun needs a rest anyway, so I'm leaving him with you. Can you help me out?"

"...Yes."

I nodded, my head dropping like it had no strength left.

The undeserved anger I'd been aiming at them slowly drained away, and shame crept up in its place.

"We'll be back soon. Rest while we're gone."

"Back in a bit, Seon Yu-han-ssi. Ji-ho, get some rest too."

The child's small hands waved them off.

I leaned against a pillar and sat down, pulling the child close so there was as little to see as possible.

...Wait.

I was staring blankly at the badly crumpled empty delivery box when a sudden, ugly premonition ran through me.

"Samadhi Delivery... does a place like this even exist. The address is Seoul... this building, and -- huh? Go1020? What kind of address is that? What kind of lunatic sends a delivery to their own car?"

Why a delivery box?

Why was the cross pendant inside a delivery box?

If the cross really was the clue.

Did it need to be inside a delivery box at all?

Just the cross pendant on its own would have been enough.

Oh. No.

Buzz.

I stared uneasily at my phone as the screen lit up and started vibrating.

[Samadhi Delivery

Ding-dong¿

Dear customer, Seon Yu-han¡

This is Samadhi Delivery, carrying compassion to your door.

As you were unavailable, your delivery has been left at an authorized location (with a designated representative). Please come collect your precious Pure Land. Right.

Away.]

Clank...

From somewhere, a faint metallic sound drifted over.

From where the others had gone, chasing the wrong clue.

Footnotes:

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