WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ How to Die in the Office Labyrinth ◈
Chapter 59: Maze Walker
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<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙸 𝙷𝙰𝚅𝙴 𝙺𝙴𝙿𝚃 𝙴𝚈𝙴𝚂 𝙾𝙽 𝚈𝙾𝚄
==========================
That bastard.
The creepy lunatic who'd been staring at me this whole time.
==========================
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙸𝙽𝙳𝙴𝙴𝙳
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙸 𝙰𝙼 𝙻𝚄𝙽𝙰𝚃𝙸𝙲
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚆𝙴 𝙰𝚁𝙴 𝙺𝙸𝙽
==========================
It felt like laughing. Like it found this whole thing a very funny joke.
I had to run.
But where?
The screen was still pitch black, and in-game I'd lost both eyes.
I couldn't even tell where I was.
The air was oddly dry, so at least I was still somewhere inside the maze.
The biggest problem was that I had no way to pinpoint where exactly this "root" thing was.
That gaze had felt like it was coming from far away one moment and hovering right beside me the next. Physically shaking it seemed like a long shot.
How do you run from something when you don't even know where it is?
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<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙸𝚂 𝙱𝙴𝙻𝙾𝚠 𝚈𝙾𝚄
==========================
A cold current brushed up from the tips of my toes.
Crawling upward, slow and steady, like a bug.
The kind of thing you'd want to crush underfoot.
So it reads my thoughts, too.
Then how about sending me home.
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<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙰𝚁𝙴 𝙷𝙾𝙼𝙴
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙾𝚄𝚁 𝙷𝙾𝙼𝙴
==========================
Our home, it says.
Oh.
Then can't you let me step outside for some fresh air?
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<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙵𝙸𝙽𝙴
==========================
Hm?
Fine?
==========================
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚆𝙸𝙻𝙻 𝚁𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝚃𝙾 𝙼𝙴
==========================
......Ah.
Fine because I'll come back anyway.
==========================
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚈𝙾𝚄
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚆𝙸𝙻𝙻
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚁𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚃𝙾
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝙼𝙴
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚁𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃
==========================
Yeah, yeah. I get it.
I'll come back.
==========================
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚂𝙴𝙴 𝚈𝙾𝚄
==========================
The moment something like an invisible hand brushed my cheek, the damp smell of soil from the front yard touched the tip of my nose.
That damned gaze was gone.
I was out. Out of the maze.
Lesson learned: pass out inside the maze and a lunatic stalker gets its hands on you.
Another lesson: sweet-talk it right and it'll let you go.
Click, click.
I couldn't see a thing, but I felt my way around by instinct and stopped the moment my legs touched the well.
Click.
I reached out and felt the hide and intestines I'd hung over the well. Still not dry enough.
A full day to dry out, apparently.
I'd stay home and rest until then.
Pushing myself while blind was only hurting myself.
I didn't feel like going back into the maze anytime soon anyway.
......Come to think of it, had it treated my eyes?
Something was covering the area around my left eye, where the trap had stabbed me earlier.
The pain had settled to a faint, numb sting.
What even is this thing.
―――――――――――――――
Q: "I'm lost. How do I find my way back?" / A: "<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> will ask you a question. Give the right answer."
―――――――――――――――
Even the FAQ said that thing helps when you're lost, so it wasn't exactly a hostile mob.
But watching how it actually behaved, I liked it even less than that bull-headed monster.
Stalking me through the maze. The moment I passed out, whisking me off to what it called home, like it had been waiting for exactly that. The sheer gut-level revulsion was something else.
Anyway, next time I went into the maze...
I was mentally tracing through the maze's layout like that when I must have drifted off to sleep.
Pressing buttons did nothing. My body wouldn't move.
"We'll probably need to go back into the maze at some point. It said to return, so... I don't know the exact time limit, but if we let it run out without any interaction, I'd think there's a penalty..."
While my in-game self slept, I talked with the others. Mostly with Lee Jin-su, about the game.
"Looking at it, the maze itself seems to be a basic maze you can solve by keeping one hand on the wall. Maybe they thought that was already hard enough on its own..."
I agreed.
Honestly, I'd expected something far nastier. Walls that shifted and rerouted paths, traps that forced you into completely different sections. That kind of sadistic variation.
But it didn't need any of that to be plenty hard.
I'd already died in that maze twice.
I could die and come back, which was the only reason I'd made it this far. An ordinary person never could have, not without extraordinary luck.
I was starting to wonder whether I'd need to pull out the Jaelae Diary and map things out in real time once the paths got more complicated.
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙰𝚆𝙾𝙺𝙴
==========================
Consciousness came back slowly.
No working eyes to open. The world stayed dark.
No way to know how long I'd slept.
No sun, no moon in that purple sky.
I had the vague sense I'd dreamed something.
Click.
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙾𝙿𝙴𝙽𝙴𝙳 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙳𝙾𝙾𝚁
==========================
I opened the door and stepped into the front yard.
A horrific smell punched into my nose and my stomach turned inside out.
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙵𝙴𝙴𝙻 𝚂𝙸𝙲𝙺
==========================
The rotting soil where the half-decomposed swan carcass had been buried. The monster's dismembered remains shoved into a corner. The hide and intestines draped over the well to dry. All of it blended into one gut-wrenching stench.
I retched and gagged, but nothing came up.
Why. Why now?
Strange. Yesterday had been worse. The smell was actually fainter today than it had been.
Fighting through the nausea, I made my way to the well and stopped.
Click.
Good. Everything stiff and dry, no moisture left. Done.
Click.
I pressed the interact button again and my hands moved on their own, twisting the hide and intestines together, weaving them into something strong enough to hold my weight.
Ugh...
Dry-heaving the whole time from the smell.
Somehow I put together a rope.
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙲𝚁𝙰𝙵𝚃𝙴𝙳 𝙰 𝚁𝙾𝙿𝙴
==========================
Feeling it out by hand, roughly ten meters, maybe. That should be enough.
I thought back to the time I'd fallen into the well and died.
Click.
I secured the rope to the well and tied it around my body.
Click.
Gripping the rope, I braced both feet against the inner wall.
No rope last time, and I'd gone in like a bungee jump.
With a rope, even blind, my body knew what to do.
Click.
Shhh.
Bare feet against the stone, edging down slow and steady.
Thud.
How far had I gone?
Finally my toes touched bottom.
Very cold. Slightly damp.
Click.
Creak.
Hm?
I pressed the button half-wondering if anything down here was interactable. My hand closed around something and turned sideways.
Felt like a lever.
SPLASH.
Right. A lever.
Water started pouring in from somewhere.
A well you work with a lever instead of a rope and bucket. Strange, but fine. More than fine, actually.
I'd been about to get thirsty soon anyway.
* * *
Water sorted.
I climbed back out and turned toward where the maze should be.
The remaining problems were "light" and "seeds."
Going back into the maze was really the only option.
And that lunatic might come hunting for me if I took too long without showing my face, so I'd need to at least make an appearance.
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙰𝚁𝙴 𝙸𝙽
==========================
==========================
＊ 𝙰 𝙿𝚁𝙴𝚂𝙴𝙽𝙲𝙴 𝙸𝚂 𝙵𝙸𝚇𝙴𝙳 𝚄𝙿𝙾𝙽 𝚈𝙾𝚄
==========================
Good. Just watching for now. It was giving me about a day's grace, apparently.
New objective: don't pass out. Find the light in one piece.
Blind, I felt along the wall and walked slowly.
Straight at the first fork in the road.
Right at the second fork in the road.
Then came the third, where I'd turned left last time and caught a trap in my left eye.
I stopped in front of that two-way split and thought it over.
A trap flying at me didn't necessarily mean it was the wrong path.
But in my current state I couldn't afford to just walk into it.
......If only my left eye still worked.
I could at least try to dodge around things, feel my way through.
But the game screen was as black as my in-game vision. That kind of fine control wasn't possible.
I went right.
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽𝙴𝙳 𝚁𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃
==========================
Shuffle, shuffle.
One hand on the wall, careful steps forward.
Minutes passed. Nothing happened.
Maybe this was the right way after all. Not the trap corridor from before.
I was building a mental map, tracking distances, when:
Thud.
Something hard touched the top of my head.
Click, click.
I stopped immediately and spun in every direction trying to interact with it.
But whatever it was, it wasn't interactable. My arms stayed pressed to the wall.
What is this?
I thought maybe I should turn back, and the moment I started to.
Creak.
The faintest sense of added weight. Whatever was touching my head had dropped just a little lower.
So...
Like the ceiling had settled onto my skull.
Like it wasn't stopping there.
Like it would keep pressing down and crush whatever was underneath it.
Ha.
"Shi."
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<𝚈𝙾𝚄> 𝚂𝙷𝙸
==========================
The trap path was the right path.
* * *
"If it were possible to turn back time, what would you do, Seon Yu-han-ssi?"
I'd rather fall into the well and die.
Death by falling would be a mercy.
Compared to being slowly ground down from skull to vertebrae, without even being able to duck.
* * *
【Don't worry! It will hurt. A minor curse will make you miserable: feet】
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙰𝚆𝙾𝙺𝙴
==========================
==========================
𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗕𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗼𝗳 𝗛𝗘𝗣𝗛𝗔𝗘𝗦𝗧𝗨𝗦
𝘓𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘓𝘦𝘨, 𝘊𝘳𝘢𝘧𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘏𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘴
==========================
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＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽𝙴𝙳 𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
==========================
==========================
＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽𝙴𝙳 𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
==========================
==========================
＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽𝙴𝙳 𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
==========================
==========================
＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽𝙴𝙳 𝙱𝙰𝙲𝙺
==========================
"If it were possible to turn back time, what would you do, Seon Yu-han-ssi?"
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙴𝙽𝙲𝙾𝚄𝙽𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙴𝙳 𝙸𝚃
"If it were possible to turn back time, what would you do, Seon Yu-han-ssi?"
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙴𝙳 𝙸𝚃
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
"If it were possible to turn back time, what would you do, Seon Yu-han-ssi?"
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
𝙻𝙴𝙵𝚃
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙴𝙳 𝙸𝚃
𝚁𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃
==========================
<𝚛𝚘𝚘𝚝> 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚆𝙸𝙻𝙻 𝚁𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝚃𝙾 𝙼𝙴
==========================
𝙵𝙾𝚁𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳
==========================
"𝙸𝙵 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝙱𝙰𝙲𝙺 𝚃𝙸𝙼𝙴 ... "
==========================
* * *
Farming could wait. I threw myself into exploring the maze.
Every time I started the game, I walked straight past the front yard and went directly in.
The pace picked up. I moved faster with every run.
Minotaur-like monsters at every turn. Cobbling together weapons from the pitchfork and their horns. Dodging traps from every direction...
Six more deaths later, I finally found the light.
==========================
＊ 𝚈𝙾𝚄 𝙵𝙾𝚄𝙽𝙳 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙻𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃
==========================
The light looked like ripe fruit.
It looked like an egg full of promise.
It looked like a bright, fresh eye.
Inside a large transparent sphere floating high above, blazing light was held.
==========================
＊ 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙻𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃 𝚂𝙷𝙸𝙽𝙴𝚂 𝚄𝙿𝙾𝙽 𝚈𝙾𝚄
==========================
The moment it touched me, the shadow-like gaze pressing in from all sides vanished, and an endless, spreading satisfaction filled me from within.
==========================
𝙴𝚅𝙴𝚁𝚈 𝙰𝙽𝙶𝙴𝙻 𝙸𝚂 𝚃𝙴𝚁𝚁𝙾𝚁
==========================
The problem came on the way home, after I picked up a fragment that had fallen from the light like a teardrop.
Footnotes:
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