WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

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◈ How to Die in the Office Labyrinth ◈

Chapter 37: Labyrinth vs. Human

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"Time loops, time leaps, time slips. Ah, I hear people use the word regression these days too. Either way, I believe it's possible. Any of it."

When someone with genuine social standing believes in strange conspiracy theories, it stops being purely a personal problem.

"The Labyrinth is fundamentally a phenomenon that warps space. Contact-type Labyrinths work by passing through a Fissure into a completely separate dimension from Earth. And invasive-type Labyrinths, well, you can see for yourself. If it can warp space like this, why couldn't it do the same to time?"

This was precisely the argument made by conspiracy theorists who believed in Labyrinth regression.

I used to think it was delusional escapism, something closer to religious faith than reason.

The problem, though.

Even if no one understood why or how the space-time of the Labyrinth existed, as long as it existed concretely in reality, that conspiracy theory started sounding quite plausible.

And the real problem.

I was experiencing exactly that kind of phenomenon right now, which meant the truly strange one here wasn't the conspiracy theorists. It was me.

"Part of why our company supports Labyrinth survivors is that. We want to know if anyone has experienced something like a time reversal."

Uiwi Guild funded PTSD treatment programs for Labyrinth survivors.

However much the odds of dying inside a contact-type Labyrinth had come to resemble the odds of dying in a traffic accident, the trauma couldn't be treated the same way.

"If someone like that exists, I want to be the first to know."

"Is that the real reason you help people, then?"

"No. Having an undisclosed purpose doesn't make the disclosed one fake, Seon Yu-han-ssi."

He didn't look like he was lying.

I wasn't inclined to criticize either motive.

"I genuinely want people to escape the Labyrinth, not just physically but mentally as well."

The Labyrinth was a place that was hard to fully leave behind. Yu Hyun-jae added that last part in a murmur.

"Mm. Getting back to the point, the questions we ask during interviews are a kind of aptitude test, or maybe a lighthearted prank, you could say. Someone who had actually experienced time regression wouldn't come in for a mundane little interview like this."

Lack of imagination.

They could very well experience time regression at that mundane little interview.

"Representative."

"Yes?"

"Why do you actually believe something like that is possible?"

When I asked directly, the conspiracy-theorist co-representative of Uiwi Guild widened his eyes as if no one had ever asked him that before.

"Doesn't Seon Yu-han-ssi have moments you'd want to go back to?"

The words died in my throat.

"You do. All of us have moments like that."

"Then, if you found one, that is."

I worked to keep my voice from shaking.

"If you met someone who had moved against time, what would you do, Representative?"

"I'd have to run experiments, wouldn't I? There's so much to verify."

The owner of Jaelae Building smiled, vague as fog.

"Even if it meant locking them in a Labyrinth again."

I stared at his face blankly.

A very famous meme surfaced in my mind.

Question: between the Labyrinth and a human being, which is more frightening?

Answer: a human being trapped in a Labyrinth.

* * *

I cannot get caught. I cannot get caught. I cannot get caught. Not ever.

I barely remembered what we talked about after that.

My head was too full of one single thought: I must never let Yu Hyun-jae find out about the regression.

Trapped in the same Labyrinth as someone willing to lock a survivor back inside just to run experiments.

It wasn't just that I'd laid out the dinner table and invited him to eat me. I'd scooped up a heaping spoonful and dropped it straight into his mouth myself.

If he found out while I was in here, I might be trapped in this place forever.

I'd been certain he wasn't a bad person, and honestly I still believed that.

But something was clearly screwed on very wrong.

Then again, there were conspiracy theorists out there with perfectly pleasant personalities. Good at socializing and everything.

Just with one peculiar belief lodged in there.

"I'm thinking we should try heading down again. Does everyone feel up to it?"

It was already past five o'clock.

Until now, even with the power out in the corridors, sunlight had been filtering through the glass windows and keeping things merely dim. But once the sun started going down, it would get much darker.

"Oh, yes. I'm fine."

"Ji-ho, how about you? Can you walk? You okay? Good. Let's get up."

"But we'll actually reach the next floor this time, right? Since handing over that photo is the condition?"

I hoped so too.

"It's a shame the Diary only has information up to the 14th floor."

"Right."

Clunk.

I answered casually and pushed open the emergency exit door.

I'd have to be careful with the Diary from now on.

Every time I regressed, the printed text in the Diary warped into something different from my actual handwriting, but the content itself was the kind of thing that might arouse Yu Hyun-jae's suspicion.

"This feels uncertain. For an artifact from a Labyrinth, it looks almost like something a person wrote."

He had said something like that once before.

It might be better to cut off the very possibility altogether, the idea that there could be a time-regressor somewhere in this Labyrinth.

The only reason I'd started pulling out the Diary in front of others was to record the Happyland game script anyway.

Now I already knew I just had to keep picking the "become unhappy" choice, so there was no need to write any of it down anymore.

Getting through to the 14th floor without the Diary would just be a minor inconvenience. Nothing I couldn't manage.

I'd simply come across as someone whose boldness was directly proportional to their perceptiveness.

Clunk!

I pulled my thoughts together and pushed the emergency exit door open one more time.

"Huh?"

"11th floor?"

"Was this floor always laid out like this?"

Finally.

We were out of the 14th floor.

My nerve had been spent on something worthwhile after all.

* * *

12. Bring a photo containing your happiest moment. The entity in the vacant unit across from Neosoft will accept it.

* * *

11th floor.

[Strategic Planning Division | Future Strategy Team | Budget Planning Team]

That was what the directory sign next to the elevator read.

The characters for "Strategic Planning Division" were printed slightly bolder than the rest.

"Ah. Up here on the 11th floor, the Future Strategy Team and Budget Planning Team used to face each other on opposite sides."

According to a brief explanation from the co-representative, the Strategic Planning Division contained the Future Strategy Team, the Budget Planning Team, and the PR Planning Team.

The PR Planning Team was on the 10th floor.

"It has changed somewhat."

"I'd say it's changed more than somewhat..."

Jaelae Building was originally a square courtyard building, hollow in the center, shaped like a rectangular frame.

"Let me correct that. It has changed a great deal."

The 11th floor as it stood now was closer to an H-shape, or a capital I with crossbars on both ends.

On this side of the corridor, the elevator and emergency exit were lined up in a straight row.

There was a single passage connecting this side to the other.

On the far side, the Future Strategy Team and Budget Planning Team, which had originally faced each other across the courtyard, were now situated side by side.

"I hope the employees are all right..."

The 11th floor was quiet enough to feel unsettling.

From the offices on the far side, there was no sign of anyone.

"What do you think would happen if someone fell from here..."

We crossed a newly formed passage that cut straight through the middle of the 11th floor.

"You'd die, probably, or fall right back onto this floor."

When I had looked out through the windows on the 14th floor, I hadn't noticed any passage like this.

The Labyrinth warps space, so there was nothing strange about it, but still.

"What on earth is inside all of this..."

Judging by the single door, the two teams of the Strategic Planning Division seemed to have been pushed together until they merged into one connected space.

"I'll open the door. Please be careful."

Shhk.

When I slid the office door open, what greeted us was...

"Ah! Finally, the first guests."

A scarlet cube.

Bigger than a human head.

It looked like chunks of flesh, blood vessels, and mucus kneaded together like clay.

Convoluted folds, something between intestines and brain matter, writhed across its surface.

That inexplicable cube floated in midair.

"I was so bored I nearly lost my eyes."

"Ugh, ngh..."

"What in the world is that..."

Eyeballs were set into each of its six faces.

One face had one, another had two, another had three, four, five, and then six.

"A die?"

"Sharp-eyed guest. Quick on the uptake, are you?"

Whoosh!

The flesh-made die flew right up in front of me and spun rapidly in the air, as if showing off every face.

Blink, blink.

Every time the large eyeballs blinked, red membranes peeled back slightly, and the sound of wet eyelids slapping against mucus came squelching through.

All twenty-one eyeballs, like a chorus.

Was that my imagination?

For just a moment, it looked like a frown. Directed at me.

"Opponents like that make for an interesting gamble."

The voice that spoke the ill-omened word had a genderless, melodious quality, the kind that latches onto your ankle like a shadow and won't let go.

No mouth, of course. No throat either.

"Gambling! Betting! Wagering! A gamble!"

The die suddenly bounced this way and that, crying out like a song.

Something like veins on the surface of the cube pulsed in time with the voice.

"A contest where you stake your money, your time, your life, your everything, on a future you can't see an inch ahead of! That is my reason for being."

Was that why it had appeared in the Future Strategy Team and Budget Planning Team?

"My name is, let's see. 'Doi' will do."

It was obvious to anyone that the name had just been made up on the spot.

"Now then, everyone, take a seat."

Doi drifted in a wide circle around a white round table large enough for several people to sit at.

"Go on."

"Let's just sit down, shall we..."

"I, I suppose so."

They say even a dog at a village school picks up some poetry after three years.

Three floors of Labyrinth and you become remarkably cooperative.

I sat down and quickly scanned the room.

No Uiwi Guild employees anywhere. Not even a body.

I had assumed there would be at least one or two people on every floor. Apparently that wasn't always the case.

"Hmm."

Doi drifted around the five of us, blinking those fist-sized eyes.

One by one, as if appraising each person.

"What, why, why are you doing that..."

The flesh-cube die ignored Chae Jae-ha's miserable protest and glided sideways.

Doi stared with intense focus at a child three times its own size. Jeong Ji-ho squeezed his eyes shut and shook from head to toe.

Next, Hwang Ju-yeon met the die with a rigid stare before looking away.

Doi swooped sideways again.

Right in front of me.

"......"

Just as I thought.

Not my imagination.

Those bloodshot eyes trembled around the edges of their lids and glared at me for a moment before moving on.

Barely the blink of an eye. An instant.

Last was Yu Hyun-jae, who tilted his head as if finding it curious that a die had nineteen more eyes than he did.

"Good. I like this group."

Doi floated in the air for a long time, savoring our reactions with all those many eyes, before finally speaking again.

"This is going to be a very interesting contest."

"A contest?"

"That's right."

The scarlet die spoke cheerfully.

"A contest between you all and me. Call it a game if you prefer. Or a gamble, a bet, a wager. Any of those will do."

Its voice had the quality of someone already happy just from imagining it.

"Every match is strictly one-on-one. Conducted in private. Those who defeat me."

The die with its red eyes made the declaration in a voice full of temptation.

"I will let them out of this place."

Footnotes:

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