WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

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◈ How to Die in the Office Labyrinth ◈

Chapter 90: Either/Or

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"It looks like a Prisoner's Dilemma, all things considered."

Six more deaths and another arrival at the seventh floor.

"Everything's set up in pairs. Two shopping baskets each."

This time it wasn't a polling station in an auditorium. It was a checkout counter in a supermarket.

Two checkout counters would serve as the ballot boxes, and the large partition wall standing between them would serve as the voting booth curtain.

"The packaging looks like a snack bag, but there's nothing written on it. No image either."

"It'll probably appear once the dilemma begins."

A shopping basket holding one blank-packaged item each would serve as the ballot.

The choices would probably be different from last time, too.

The setting and the options changing every time -- that was the signature of the Prisoner's Dilemma Labyrinth.

"......"

So who would be solving this dilemma with whom.

I looked over the three people who had survived to this point, sweeping my one remaining eye across each of them in turn.

Yu Hyun-jae. Lee Jin-su. Jeong Ji-ho.

Lee Na-hyun, Chae Jae-ha, and Hwang Ju-yeon had all died back on basement three, providing components to the headless rider.

This was the first time I had made it to the seventh floor with my limbs intact.

"Um, uh....... I......"

"Lee Jin-su-ssi? If there's something you need, please say so. Don't force yourself to get up."

Lee Jin-su, who had been the last to lose an arm, had somehow survived this time. Remarkably.

Though he looked like he'd collapse and die on the spot if you so much as nudged him.

"Would it be alright....... if I did it......"

A volunteer was good news. But.

"Lee Jin-su-ssi."

I lowered my voice to a near whisper.

There was something I needed to confirm first.

"Are you looking for an easy death, or an easy life?"

Lee Jin-su was someone who had trouble telling the two apart. That made him an unreliable partner for the Prisoner's Dilemma.

"......"

If he was looking for an easy death, I absolutely could not send him in.

Even if his body and mind were in so much pain right now that he wanted to die -- what if the Labyrinth offered a choice that would erase all of that suffering?

How would anyone know what he'd pick.

People go in thinking one thing and come out having done another.

"I......"

Lee Jin-su's mouth moved soundlessly for a moment, as if words had abandoned him, and he looked away from my one eye.

"I want to....... live......"

He let the end trail off, as though it were something to be ashamed of.

That was exactly why I knew he meant it.

The wanting to live. And the shame at still wanting to live, now of all times.

"Then may I do it? With Lee Jin-su-ssi."

Yu Hyun-jae volunteered out of nowhere.

"...I'm grateful, but."

Where was this coming from.

"It should be me. I'm the one here who can best afford to absorb the losses."

That much was true.

I had lost an eye at Happyland. Lee Jin-su had lost an arm and was hovering somewhere between alive and dead. And Jeong Ji-ho was all of seven years old.

"Lee Jin-su-ssi."

The co-representative of Uiwi Guild sank down to the floor as if kneeling and gently took the employee's left hand, looking him straight in the eye.

"As long as it doesn't cost me my life, I'm willing to take twice the loss. So make the best choice for yourself. Don't worry about me."

A bewildering thing to say.

Made worse by the fact that it sounded completely sincere.

"I....... are you serious......"

"Yes. Completely. Otherwise why would I bother saying it in advance."

Lee Jin-su, still somewhat dazed, and Yu Hyun-jae, expression perfectly calm, split apart at the partition wall and each examined their two shopping baskets.

A rustling sound.

Something had been printed on the plastic packaging of the items inside the baskets. Both of them read the contents closely, faces serious.

"......"

I watched the two of them alongside Jeong Ji-ho.

Thump.

Yu Hyun-jae picked a basket first and set it on the checkout counter. The decision came fast, like there had been no deliberation at all.

Hearing the sound from the other side of the partition, Lee Jin-su flinched.

Tap.

Lee Jin-su placed his basket on the counter a long while after.

Had he been trying not to go with what they'd agreed on beforehand?

For that to be the case, they'd have needed to pick different options -- and it looked like they had, in fact, chosen differently.

One had picked the left basket, the other the right.

"Gift calculation beginning."

Gift?

Zzzzrr......

Both checkout counter conveyor belts started moving.

Beep. Beep.

As the baskets reached the scanner at the end of the belt, the barcode confirmation sound rang out.

"Gift calculation complete."

Lee Jin-su and Yu Hyun-jae still stood on either side of the partition, waiting for the result.

"Printing gift purchase receipt."

Gift.

A gift meant something you gave to someone other than yourself.

Which meant......

The choices might not apply to the buyers themselves.

"......"

That would explain it.

Why Yu Hyun-jae's decision had been so quick. And why Lee Jin-su's had taken so long.

"Item one: 'Thirty grams of glass powder you can only feed in one bite to your friend.'"

Thirty grams of glass powder?

That was enough to fill a small bowl to the brim.

I wasn't sure of the exact lethal dose, but nothing good was going to happen if someone swallowed that much in one go.

And if it doubled, that would definitely kill someone.

"One unit."

"Ha."

A sharp, ragged intake of breath came from Lee Jin-su's direction, like someone nearly losing the thread of life.

Relief and despair tangled together in a single sound.

"Item two: 'Thirty grams of glass powder you can only feed in one bite to a complete stranger.'"

"One unit."

That was the better option.

Normally, killing a stranger is easier to stomach than killing a friend.

"Executing gift purchase results."

"Buyer 'Yu Hyun-jae' has had sixty grams of glass powder fed to their friend."

"......"

Whoever that friend was, I hoped they died on the spot. As painlessly as possible.

"Re, representative....... Thank, no, I'm so, so sorry....... Truly......"

"Ah....... It was a promise I made. Instead of thanking me, perhaps you could pray for them together......"

I had plenty to say about the loathsome nature of all this, but I decided not to.

"Buyer 'Lee Jin-su' has had fifteen grams of glass powder fed to a complete stranger."

Fifteen grams, I wasn't sure about.

Could someone survive that if they got to an emergency room fast enough?

Whoever it was, I hoped they were outside the Labyrinth.

"It would have been nicer if the choice had been to fix Lee Jin-su-ssi's arm, though."

"Oh, yeah, that's....... true......"

The dilemma had wrung Lee Jin-su out so thoroughly that he looked like he had stopped caring about most things.

And honestly, whether Lee Jin-su's arm was restored or not didn't really matter much at this point.

"Let's rest a little longer before heading down."

Given that we were all very likely to die on the next floor anyway.

* * *

Basement two. The Mechanical Room.

Drip, drip. Water falling.

Thrum, creak. The deep chorus of massive metal bodies vibrating together.

Step, tap. Four people splitting into three directions, picking their way carefully through the gaps between pipes.

We swept the Mechanical Room as thoroughly as we could by the light of our phones.

Metal vines tangling across the ceiling like a maze, metal trunks growing up from the floor.

There was an eerie beauty to this forest of machines.

CRACK!

Without warning, from somewhere deep in the dark, the sound of a hot water pump bursting.

Splash, rush......

The sound of death rising fast, starting at my feet.

"Here! Over here!"

"It burst somewhere we weren't watching again."

Whether we were together or spread out, the sabotage always managed to find the one spot no one was looking at.

"That much seems certain, at least. It only ever goes off outside our line of sight."

"Then what do we do....... There's no way four of us can cover an area this big......"

How many people would it take to cover this entire Mechanical Room?

Probably thirty, at minimum. Maybe not even that.

"It may not be a question of numbers."

My thoughts exactly.

The Labyrinth had no conscience, that was clear, but it didn't set impossible problems. And getting more than thirty people into the Mechanical Room was impossible.

Even back when Labyrinthification began and the building's occupants were divided and shuffled like an instanced dungeon, I doubted there had ever been thirty people assigned here to begin with.

"There's probably a way to solve it with the people we have. If we could just learn the rules in a bit more detail......"

"We may not have much time for that."

Splash.

Yu Hyun-jae, carrying Jeong Ji-ho, lifted one leg above the waterline and set it back down.

The water had already crept past the ankles and was climbing toward the calves.

Walking properly was going to get difficult soon.

"At this rate....... forty minutes is probably our ceiling."

Meaning in forty minutes we would all be submerged and dead.

"......"

In the heavy silence that pressed down like an ocean, I looked quietly at the three of them.

I had died in a lot of ways by now, but drowning was one of the worse ones.

"You remember how the floor collapses if you stand still on the emergency staircase for more than five seconds?"

"....... What?"

These people didn't need to suffer through something like that.

If they had to die regardless.

They at least deserved to go out with a little less pain.

"Once the water's past my knees, we won't be able to force the emergency exit open even if all four of us throw ourselves at it. The water pressure."

"Why are you suddenly......"

Lee Jin-su trailed off, brow creased in confusion, then closed his mouth.

He'd understood what I meant.

"Whatever's at the bottom of that emergency staircase, it's probably better than drowning, I'd imagine."

That much I could say with certainty.

"But....... why are you giving up already....... We still have more time......"

"Hm? I'm not giving up."

It wasn't likely I was going to clear this floor in one shot this time around.

I'd like to, but.

So if I was going to die, I had to die having collected as much information as possible first. Running away down the emergency staircase wasn't going to help with that.

"I'm going to die here if I die. I'm just letting you all know that option exists."

Lee Jin-su's expression shifted into something unreadable, like he couldn't decide whether to be angry or exasperated, whether he even knew what he was supposed to feel.

"Then, I'll....... stay here too....... I want to think a little longer....... I want that."

"....... Alright. Then let's think it through together while we can. How to get out of here."

There was nothing wrong with someone fighting to live in the face of a terrible death.

CRACK!

Somewhere, another pipe burst.

Again, in a spot none of us were watching.

"It really does feel like it's taunting us on purpose......"

"Could it be a monster with actual intelligence? Not just a mindless phenomenon?"

"That's possible. Hiding somewhere in the shadows --"

"-- Oh!"

Lee Jin-su cut Yu Hyun-jae off with a sudden shout.

"What is it? Are you alright?"

I had assumed it was the pain from his arm.

But it wasn't.

"What if....... it's not taunting us at all? Whatever it is, monster or phenomenon, what if it's not trying to mess with us, but......"

Lee Jin-su looked straight at me.

More precisely, at the empty socket where my right eye used to be, the one I'd lost at Happyland.

"What if it's avoiding us?"

Footnotes:

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