WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Natty
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◈ How to Rewrite Ghost Stories ◈
Episode 53: Radio Mountain Lodge Murder Case (4)
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“Set it on fire?!”
“What if this whole place burns down?!”
“I don’t think we can get out alive that way...!”
Thank you for the fervent doubts and accusations. But surely I had a reason for suggesting it. I waited until everyone had said their piece, then went through what needed to be done one at a time.
“Mr. Moses, do you have a lighter?”
When I looked directly at Moses, who had been watching this chaos without offering a single opinion, Moses glanced to either side, then pointed at themself.
“Me?”
“Did I look like a smoker?”
“No. You said you were a government official here to assess the situation, so I assumed you would. Every government official I’ve known carried emergency supplies like that.”
I deliberately stressed “government official,” drawing everyone’s attention to Moses. Just as planned. If Moses backed out or refused to cooperate here, Moses’s credibility as an official would be the first thing to crumble.
‘Besides, the item Moses has is the key to this.’
“...I do have one, but it’s not an ordinary lighter. You know, it’s for emergencies...”
“Will you lend it to me?”
I cut Moses off again and held out my hand. Despite my being this aggressive, Moses did not so much as blink.
If anything, that expression...
Was Moses enjoying this?
‘Seriously, this is a world where people compete over who’s crazier...’
In the end, Moses took out a lighter and handed it over.
Good. All the keys were in place.
“The instructions are...”
“I more or less know them. It’s dangerous now, so please step back with the civilians.”
The lighter in my hand flared hot once.
‘I opened everything.’
I started pouring oil everywhere, including on “that” inside the refrigerator. Ordinary mountain lodge fuel, cooking oil, even oil for the Blue-and-Red Lantern.
After confirming that the gas supply had been shut off and every power cord disconnected, I tossed in the flame.
Whooosh!!
A pale white fire blazed up with a violent roar.
“...!!”
“The fire... isn’t spreading?!”
Just as expected, the flames surged up in an instant, swallowing the kitchen with a tremendous explosive boom and smoke. But they could not cross the kitchen threshold. There was not even any soot. The smoke gathered at the ceiling before fading away like mist.
“How is the fire only burning inside...?”
“Probably because of the ghost story’s nature.”
No. That was the property of Moses’s lighter.
An anomalous item that created flames which confined an anomaly and would not go out until it was resolved.
Judging by Moses’s expression, they were wondering how I knew how to use it. But I had neither the obligation nor the need to answer, so I just shrugged.
“Odd? How strange. One person disappeared, so why is everything the same?”
Just as I thought, the ghost story was on my side. Before Moses could speak, the radio sounded again. The girl’s voice grew hoarse as static began to mix in.
“Let’s have a delicious meal. One person, bubble bubble. One person, chop chop chop. Just one person is enough... Mealtime. Mealtime, meal...”
“W-what happened?”
“Just as the radio said. One uninvited person is in there, bubbling or chopping or whatever, and burning in the fire.”
“Th-the refrigera...”
“If the result is the same, that’s enough.”
It only told us to cook an uninvited person. It never said whether that uninvited person had to be dead, alive, or just a dismembered part.
Hertz said, “Don’t you need to collect it? It’ll make another murder prediction.”
‘I hate handling corpses, even props. It somehow feels like committing a crime.’
The body in the refrigerator was not a real person or victim. More accurately, it was likely an altered addition that should never have existed here in the first place.
A fake corpse Moses, a central figure in another ghost story, had inserted to add an uninvited person so he could enter this ghost story.
‘The goblin oil keeps the ghost story from telling a fake apart from a real person. Taking it out would only expose a loophole.’
I could not waste oil. I needed to move on to the next step as quickly as possible.
“Be careful of the stairs. Be careful of the stairs. You’ll catch on the railing and tumble like a guillotine.”
“Th-the radio again...!”
‘Nice timing.’
“The stairs this time... But we couldn’t go upstairs earlier.”
“M-maybe the constantly burning kitchen opened up a new area?!”
Everyone still looked frightened, but fear and relief were beginning to mingle together.
The second prediction had reassured them instead. If they listened to Seon Jaehyeon, they could escape without dying. Just as he had set the fire, he would solve the stairs too.
“Jaehyeon, what do we do? Are we going up?”
“Of course. We have to. Ah, just in case, I’ll go up alone first.”
“Al-alone?”
“You uninvited people are more likely to die before you even make it up one step if you set foot on those stairs.”
And there was something I needed to find on the second floor. It would be best to gather all the civilians on the first floor and keep watch over them.
“Then may I follow you?”
Moses smiled faintly.
“No. Mr. Moses, could you keep everyone else from approaching the stairs on the first floor?”
You smile at a smiling face. Not that I was going to let him come with me.
“No one is going upstairs after hearing a prediction like that.”
“As far as I know, this ghost story can sometimes play out with cause and effect reversed, like a Greek oracle. As long as invited Mr. Moses occupies the stairs, nothing will happen.”
Go ahead and argue. No matter what logic he tried to throw at me, I would throw it right back.
The look in his eyes was intense, but after we stared at each other for a few seconds as though having a contest...
“I was only worried. In a locked mountain lodge like this, someone wandering around alone is likely to become the next victim.”
“Thank you for the kind concern. But I’ll be fine.”
And thank you for giving me exactly the line I wanted!
I slowly climbed the murderously creaking stairs. Dust and the smell of mold rose in clouds.
Windows covered in black cloth, walls with protruding nails, a bathroom with broken pipes, a collapsed bedroom with springs sticking out...
‘It’s more fully constructed than I expected.’
If it had been the crumbling herb gatherer’s shelter from the famous version, things would have been twice as difficult. The fact that two invited people had been added, turning it into a large mountain lodge with a modern kitchen, meant that the Radio Mountain Lodge Murder Case itself had a flexible structure.
‘Well, mountain lodges are a ghost-story classic to begin with.’
Ghosts, people, crime... From romance to regret, anything was possible wherever humans were isolated. In other words, a place’s character could change with the people and elements that filled it.
From an And Then There Were None-style psychological thriller where people suspected one another, died, killed, and committed suicide, to a stronger, more primal, more... explosive genre.
“...Found it.”
❖ ❖ ❖
“Um, don’t you think something might be happening up there?”
Lee Eunseong raised their head and looked at the ceiling, which occasionally shed bits of debris. The old wooden lodge had terrible soundproofing.
The sounds of something heavy being moved upstairs, or of walls being struck roughly, carried clearly into the living room.
“What if Mr. Seon is in danger...?”
“Maybe we should go upstairs too...”
Once one person spoke, the others began murmuring one after another, as though flames were spreading. Even Kim Minjae, who should have backed away or blown up in anger, seemed to agree as they kept glancing toward the second floor.
Being swept up in irrational thoughts and illogical reasoning was proof that they were fully under the ghost story’s influence.
‘So that’s why he told me to guard them.’
Moses narrowed his eyes and looked over the five “civilians” one by one. The waves around them shimmered in colors. The radio’s black color wrapped around them as well.
“Let’s wait a little longer. The expert must have a plan. And don’t come any closer.”
Moses looked toward the ceiling. Moses’s expanding senses filled their vision like a thermal scanner blending colors as they raced after the presence upstairs.
‘What on earth are they planning?’
For a long while, there were sounds of someone rummaging through things, searching around, and shoving furniture aside.
That creaking sound must be door hinges. This is... pipes. Maybe there’s a faucet upstairs?
That floor slopes severely. It would be a good place to hang yourself. Ah, is there a chandelier up there? Maybe it was designed for the floor to collapse. That impact just now... There must be an attic.
‘Who on earth are they?’
Moses closed his eyes for a moment, then frowned. This person was a complete mystery.
‘It was definitely an official invitation... A form that had never been issued even once.’
The phenomenon was certainly under management. Moses’s participation this time had merely been part of a routine investigation to observe what form the murder would take.
But this phenomenon had never involved an “invitation.” Being stranded, a club trip, getting lost... That was supposed to be its essence.
How had they intervened here? What exactly were they?
Thud!
A heavy, rhythmic pounding came from upstairs, then everything became terrifyingly quiet.
“Uh...?”
“M-maybe something went wrong...”
“B-behind you!!!”
Park Chaeyeong let out a piercing scream. A shadow fell over Moses’s head.
Moses slowly turned his head, as though the world had gone into slow motion.
Huff. Huff. Huff.
A strange mask stained with grease and blood. A torn rubber apron. The stench of blood and gasoline was sickening.
Bloodshot eyes flashed beneath the mask.
Grrrrr... Vrrr!
The sharp, heavy machine noise came with an oily smell that stabbed into Moses’s nose.
It was a chainsaw.
A huge chainsaw that made an old-fashioned racket was clutched in the masked assailant’s hand.
Vroooom!!
“Ahhh!!”
The chainsaw cut through the air. The stair banister Moses had been leaning against only seconds earlier shattered apart.
“Moses!!”
Moses tumbled down the stairs. Not missing that moment, the assailant leaped down after him.
The leather mask, as though crudely stitched from someone’s skin, gleamed hideously in the lodge lights.
“Ahh! Run!!”
“D-don’t come this way!”
The living room fell into chaos. The chainsaw wavered as it sliced through the air. Everyone screamed and scattered in different directions.
“G-get away!”
“Please save me!!”
Walls shattered and curtains were ripped away. The assailant staggered around, wildly swinging the saw in every direction as though unable to control it. It was impossible to tell whether they were trying to kill people or the lodge itself.
“W-we have to get to the second floor!!”
“I don’t want to die!!”
Kim Minjae shoved Park Chaeyeong and Hwang Dogeon aside before running toward the stairs.
“You can’t! You can’t go to the second floor!”
“Move!! Maybe you’re putting on a brave face and acting like you can’t die, but we...! We...!”
Craaaash!!
The assailant raised the chainsaw high over the fallen Im Hojun’s head, then brought it down with all their strength.
“Ahhhh!”
Screeeeech!!!
“?!”
The chainsaw’s roar stopped.
It had not split Im Hojun in two. Trembling, Im Hojun, who had been certain of death, barely managed to open their eyes.
The chainsaw had cut into the old radio in the living room, spraying sparks and smoke, and was lodged there. It spun uselessly several times, rattling where it was embedded in the radio.
“I-it got caught in the radio!”
“We need to subdue them now...!”
“No!! Come this way! It’s dangerous near there!”
Moses blocked the others again.
The trapped chainsaw gave off a burning whine, then the motor revved fiercely with a crack. With a screeech of breaking metal, the chainsaw finally began to spin again.
Then,
Crunch!!
The radio split in half. The vacuum tubes shattered, sparks flew, and a piercing scream filled the lodge. Black blood, as though the radio were vomiting it out, poured around it like oil with the black smoke.
‘The first premise of the Radio Mountain Lodge Murder Case... has been broken.’
Every ghost story had an unbreakable central device, its core.
Since this was the Radio Mountain Lodge Murder Case, the radio could not be broken.
Even if it was destroyed by chance, at least one medium, whether a TV or a phone, capable of carrying “the ghost’s murder prediction” had to remain.
That was the kind of ghost story it was.
“I was only worried. In a locked mountain lodge like this, someone wandering around alone is likely to become the next victim.”
“Ah...!”
Something like a sigh escaped Moses’s mouth.
From the sparks scattered across the floor, fwoosh, flames rose.
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