WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ How to Die in the Office Labyrinth ◈

Chapter 68: Buying This Thing

──────

Looking at it now, Idle Hamster was no simple luck-based game.

"Wow, it's surprisingly hard......"

That was exactly where the difficulty lay.

You had to track the stats on every hamster card and build a flexible strategy around them.

Twelve hamster cards in total. Not exactly a small number.

Hamsters that needed to go had to be put on the market, fast, before it was too late.

By losing a negotiation.

Hamsters that couldn't be sold yet, ones that needed feeding or grooming or taming, had to be managed just as quickly, just as urgently.

By winning a negotiation.

And to control who won and who lost, you had to card-count on top of everything else.

"The English name for this game is Idle Hamster, but....... Honestly, most idle games aren't actually fine if you just leave them alone......"

"In that sense it's a very Labyrinth-appropriate game. The Labyrinth doesn't like us being lazy."

"Now then, let's move into the negotiation."

At the host's voice, everyone's attention snapped back to the table.

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, please select a child from the breeding pen and place it in the cage."

Hwang Ju-yeon checked her hand, then drew out one hamster card and laid it down.

｜#545｜

｜Status｜Hunger: 2｜Prettiness: 0｜Obedience: 4｜

｜Trait: 545 has curly brown fur. Timid and aggressive in temperament.｜

Prettiness stat, zero.

Definitely not one to put on the market right now. Needs managing.

The shared cards hadn't been revealed yet.

With just the three cards in her hand, Hwang Ju-yeon seemed to be in a decent enough position.

"Let's check the result of the negotiation."

Shared cards. ♦5 ♥8

Hwang Ju-yeon's hand. ♠4 ♦4 ♥4

Dealer's hand. ♠6 ♦7 ♣9

"Ah......"

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, triple fours. Dealer, five-to-nine straight."

If only the shared cards had come out better, she could have had a full house or even four of a kind.

No, even one different shared card. The dealer could have gotten another high card and Hwang Ju-yeon could have won with just her triple.

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim has lost the negotiation. We'll be listing 545 on the market."

The host moved the hamster card from the cage to an empty space on the right side of the table.

As before, a border drew itself around the card. Black this time, not the white of the cage.

"Now then, let's move into the negoti―"

Just as Hosoo went to deal the cards again, he paused.

He turned his head toward the market.

"Oh! An anonymous buyer has purchased 545."

The 545 card vanished without a trace.

......Hold on.

Someone bought 545?

"What?"

Hwang Ju-yeon reacted with the same confusion I felt.

"545 sold?"

"Yes. An anonymous buyer has purchased 545."

545, with its Prettiness stat of...

"Its prettiness was zero."

Someone bought this thing.

"Tastes vary, after all."

That's true enough.

"......"

What was making me uneasy, though, was something else.

What if those anonymous buyers with their varied tastes weren't simply virtual entities created to make the game run?

What if someone was actually buying these hamsters?

Maybe, just maybe. Those "hamsters"...

"Now then, let's move into the negotiation."

No. Stop thinking about it.

There's nothing I can do about it right now.

It's not my game. I can't interfere in someone else's game on nothing but a guess.

Hwang Ju-yeon has every right to play her own way, and every right to do whatever it takes to win.

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, please select a child from the breeding pen and place it in the cage."

"This one."

｜#446｜

｜Status｜Hunger: 0｜Prettiness: 10｜Obedience: 0｜

｜Trait: 446 has pure white fur. Playful in temperament.｜

Extremely lopsided stats.

Hard to tell if Hwang Ju-yeon's hand was good or bad.

Whether she'd judged her hand weak enough that selling was fine, or strong enough that she'd decided to keep and manage it.

Or maybe she'd decided she didn't care either way.

The obedience stat was low, so even if it sold, the new owner might abandon it.

"Let's check the result of the negotiation."

Shared cards. ♦K ♥Q

Hwang Ju-yeon's hand. ♦A ♣6 ♥7

Dealer's hand. ♠3 ♦2 ♥6

"When both players have high card and the shared cards hold the highest values, the shared cards are excluded from the calculation."

"Ah......"

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, seven high card. Dealer, six high card. Hwang Ju-yeon-nim has won the negotiation."

She hadn't expected that result.

As I thought. She's someone who draws her lines quietly but precisely.

She'd decided her hand was weak and mentally written off 446 for sale.

The discomfort of a hamster in the game getting abandoned and the practical gain of winning an extra life are two separate things.

"What action will you take with 446?"

"I'll 'tame' it."

｜#446｜

｜Status｜Hunger: 0｜Prettiness: 10｜Obedience: 0｜

"Hmm......?"

The stats were unchanged.

"446 has refused your touch."

"What? How does that work?"

"It depends on the child's temperament."

"Ha."

Exasperated laughter broke out around the table.

Even Yu Hyun-jae covered his mouth and ducked his head.

What an absolutely insufferable game.

"Now then, let's move into the negotiation."

The cards were dealt again.

This was the fourth negotiation.

Each negotiation burned through eight cards, and three had already been played, so nearly half of the fifty-two card deck was gone.

The shape of what remained was beginning to come into view.

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, please select a child from the breeding pen and place it in the cage."

"This one...... actually, no, this one. Why did this climb so fast......"

Hwang Ju-yeon started to pull out one card, then quickly switched to another.

｜#845｜

｜Status｜Hunger: 5｜Prettiness: 6｜Obedience: 3｜

｜Trait: 845 has black fur mixed with white patches like a spotted pattern. Wary in temperament.｜

The same hamster card she'd put out at the very start.

She'd won a negotiation earlier and fed it, dropping its hunger all the way down to one.

The host had said keeping hunger under five was statistically advantageous.

Which meant even below five, it could still eat its fellow hamsters.

Cutting it close.

"Let's check the result of the negotiation."

Shared cards. ♦10 ♣8

Hwang Ju-yeon's hand. ♠5 ♠K ♥K

Dealer's hand. ♥A ♣A ♣2

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, one pair of kings. Dealer, one pair of aces. Hwang Ju-yeon-nim has lost the negotiation."

Hwang Ju-yeon didn't look particularly disappointed.

She'd gotten the dangerous one out of the breeding pen.

"We'll be listing 845 on the market."

845 moved inside the black border.

Ones like this, with precarious hunger stats, it didn't matter whether you won the negotiation and fed them or lost and sent them to market.

The outcome of the negotiation didn't matter.

All that counted was getting them out of the breeding pen.

That was the moment a question flickered into my head.

Was that really enough?

The question stayed with me the whole time I watched the game continue.

If a hungry hamster was listed on the market...

"Now then, let's move into the negotiation. Hwang Ju-yeon-nim, please select a child from the breeding pen and place it in the cage."

"I'll take this one."

And if that hungry hamster remained unsold while another arrived on the market...

｜#845｜

｜Status｜Hunger: 7｜Prettiness: 6｜Obedience: 3｜

And if that hunger kept growing stronger...

"Let's check the result of the negotiation."

Could it eat its fellow hamsters in the market, not just in the breeding pen?

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim has lost the negotiation. We'll be listing 555 on the market."

When 555's card was moved next to 845's, the black border enclosing 845 reshaped itself to swallow 555 as well.

The host's lips curved smoothly upward.

"Oh!"

Hosoo pointed at the market.

555's card was gone.

"It sold?"

"845 ate 555."

"......What did you say?"

｜#845｜

｜Status｜Hunger: 0｜Prettiness: 6｜Obedience: 3｜

The hunger stat that had climbed all the way to seven had quietly dropped back to zero.

"What kind of game is this......"

After that, one more negotiation finished and fewer than eight cards remained, so the deck was gathered and reshuffled.

"These six negotiations count as one set. Any unsold deadstock remaining at the end of a set must be disposed of."

Even 845, which had eaten its fellow hamster, vanished somewhere in the end.

Of the twelve hamsters she'd started with, the only one that had sold cleanly was the one with a Prettiness stat of zero.

Nine hamsters left in the breeding pen now.

"Haah......"

The freelance magician, jaw clenched, tapped their fingers against their knee in a rapid, repeating rhythm, as if playing something at speed on a keyboard. Probably their own way of managing their feelings.

From that point on, Hwang Ju-yeon's playing grew colder. More desperate.

No way to know how big a Fragment of Life was per hamster, but she had to sell as many as possible.

That meant she couldn't afford to be careless with a single one, couldn't throw them onto the market carelessly.

More precise card-counting was the only way to cut down on mistakes.

Time passed. Midway through the fourth set, with only a few hamsters left.

"Oh? Unni, your nose! You're bleeding!"

The player who had stopped caring about her long hair coming loose and clinging in sweat to her cheeks and neck, who had shut everything out to focus entirely on the game, finally drew blood.

"Yeah. I'll go with this one. It needs to sell."

Hwang Ju-yeon wiped it away with her sleeve without much concern and kept playing.

Her eyes looked like she and the cards were the only things left in the world.

I had no doubt that a certain many-eyed gambling die was watching that expression with deep satisfaction.

"Hwang Ju-yeon-nim has lost the negotiation. We'll be listing 546 on the market."

"The card counting is getting more accurate, it seems."

Yu Hyun-jae was watching with interest, too.

Come to think of it, they had once played a poker game against Doi with a Labyrinth escape on the line.

Using hwatu cards as betting chips, flipping them face-up alongside the dealt cards...

That strange modified Texas Hold'em.

It hadn't seemed like a set of rules invented on the spot, which meant Yu Hyun-jae had played something like it before, and had chosen it as the game to stake a life on because they were confident in it.

From the way they carried themselves, it seemed more like a hobby than an addiction...

"Oh!"

I turned my attention back.

"An anonymous buyer has purchased 546."

From everything I'd watched so far, most hamsters sold quickly once their Prettiness hit six or above.

With a few exceptions for buyers with unusual tastes.

"Now then, let's move into the negoti―"

"―What?"

A sharp cry cut through.

From Hwang Ju-yeon, who hadn't said a single unnecessary word during the game.

Everyone went quiet and watched.

She was staring down the dealer.

"A card disappeared. What's this?"

What she was pointing at was the breeding pen.

There should have been two hamsters left, but there was only one.

"What happened? You didn't even say anything about eating."

"Oh."

Hosoo's brows drew together in that unbearable way.

"The ones who eat the children are not necessarily of the same kind, are they? Don't you think?"

Ah.

All the unease I'd been pushing down and suppressing crept back up again.

What if those anonymous buyers with their varied tastes weren't simply virtual entities created to make the game run?

What if someone was actually buying these hamsters?

Maybe, just maybe. Those "hamsters"...

What if they weren't really hamsters at all?

What if they were a metaphor for living people?

What if something real was out there, buying human beings?

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried