Escaping the Mystery Hotel

- Han Kain

Elena’s newly acquired superpower, “Ominous Imagination”, turned out to be more troublesome than I ever could have anticipated!

I had to cover Elena’s mouth to stop her from saying any more strange things.

Is it a good thing, after all?

The wolf’s howling was so unnerving that the others who were ahead of us sensed that something was amiss and came back to check on us.

“Kain! What on earth is happening? There weren’t any wolves before!”

“It seems Elena created it!”

“What?”

“I’ll explain when we get downstairs. Let’s go for now!”

Roles were quickly assigned.

Eunsol-noona, who was wearing the Protective Suit, picked up Elena with one hand and sprinted ahead, while Jinchul-hyung took up the rear, ready to fend off any wolf attacks.

“…”

But there was no wolf attack. Instead, something even more absurd happened.

- Ding! Dong!

“Everyone, get in! Let’s take the elevator—wait, Songee? What is that?”

“Unni, isn’t it cute? I named it Snow.”

“Songee, are you crazy? That’s not cute at all; it’s a monster wolf!”

“Let’s just get inside, Noona.”

Fortunately, the Hotel elevator functioned perfectly, carrying all of us—including the monster wolf.

The giant wolf, ignoring its creator Elena, was busy licking Songee’s hand with great affection.

The wolf’s body wasn’t made of flesh and blood but of snow.

Not long after we reached the first floor, a scream rang out.

“…”

“Huh? Huhhhhhh?! Snow? What’s wrong?”

“…What do you mean “What’s wrong”—it’s just that the wolf is made of snow, so it’s melting.”

“Elena-unni, can’t you do something?”

Elena awkwardly turned her head away.

Soon, the wolf disappeared, and Songee became visibly depressed.

Even though Perro tried to console her by rubbing his beak against her, he couldn’t fill the void left by the vanished Snow.

Once again, I couldn’t help but think that Songee was truly an unusual high school girl.

Meanwhile, Ahri asked Elena a question, “Can you make other monsters? Like, say, Snow 2?”

“Don’t try to replace Snow so easily!”

“Elena just made it out of snow. She can probably make Snow 3, Snow 4, and so on.”

“Hey!”

“Ow! Don’t kick me~!”

Elena, who had been silent until now, let out a sigh.

“I’m still trying to understand ‘Ominous Imagination’, but it’s somewhat different from the power Beatrix used in the Cube. For example, the monsters I create seem to disappear on their own after some time.”

“That’s more of an advantage than a disadvantage, isn’t it?”

“Is it?”

Elena’s expression brightened a little as she stared intently at something like a picture frame on the wall—

“Nope!”

“Eek! K-Kain?!”

I quickly tore off a piece of the blanket we used as a makeshift cold-weather suit and covered Elena’s eyes with it.

Seeing this, Eunsol-noona sensibly grabbed Elena’s hand and started pulling her along.

“Well done. Elena, no more strange ideas. Let’s get you to Room 105 to get some sleep.”

Whatever had been trying to “come out” from the picture frame receded once again.

Ahri and I spoke simultaneously.

“This is going to be quite exhausting for a while…”

“This is going to be quite entertaining for a while!”

Ahri’s expression was so bright that I felt like kicking her.

***As always, everyone’s mood lifted considerably at the sight of a dining table overflowing with delicious food.

“Unni? Where’s Elena?”

“She’s too exhausted, so she went to sleep.”

During this enjoyable meal, the main topic on everyone’s mind was, of course, Room 201.

Eunsol-noona, who had just bitten into a piece of garlic bread, asked the first question, “Kain, it’s about time you explained. How exactly did you resolve Room 201? I heard bits and pieces on the way here, but it was hard to make sense of it.”

“Well… I’ll briefly summarize the facts, and we can discuss any confusing parts together.”

“Alright.”

“In the 1980s, the Eye of Zero Dimension appeared in the world and began causing massive damage. The Administration realized they couldn’t defeat this entity with force. That’s when the Chief Researcher came up with an idea. The Eye of Zero Dimension was an entity that enjoyed watching the suffering of humans, so the plan was to create a small, endless hell of continuous suffering and present it as a gift. Despite the heavy amount of opposition, the plan was carried out, and surprisingly, it worked.”

“It worked?”

“According to the memories, the Eye of Zero Dimension settled into this small hell, known as the Cube.”

Ahri nudged me.

“Don’t stop. What happened next?”

“However, there were growing limitations to managing this hell. Internally, people began to question whether they had crossed the line. Patrick was a representative of this group. Externally, the Eye of Zero Dimension began showing signs of wanting to leave the Cube. The Chief Researcher interpreted this as the Eye growing bored.”

Jinchul-hyung, with a perplexed expression, asked, “Is that where that Beatrix came from?”

“That’s right. While Beatrix herself seemed unrelated to the Eye of Zero Dimension or the Cube, the Chief Researcher believed she could solve the Cube’s problems. Earlier, we discussed what the Cube’s problems were, right?”

Ahri answered, “There were two, right? First, some people in the Administration began to express their doubts, saying it had crossed the line. Second, the audience was starting to get bored and wanted something exciting.”

“The Chief Researcher saw Beatrix as the solution to both problems. First, if Beatrix’s monsters replaced the killing facilities inside the Cube, far fewer people would be needed to manage the Cube. Second, since she could kill people in unimaginably diverse ways, the Eye of Zero Dimension would be more satisfied. That was the idea.”

My comrades, who had been blankly listening, looked utterly dazed.

Unable to bear it any longer, Jinchul-hyung spoke up, “This is the most insane story I’ve ever heard in my life.”

“I feel the same way.”

“Hey, Grandpa. Tell us, is this really the kind of thing the Administration has been doing?”

Grandpa Mooksung wore a deeply troubled expression for a long time before he answered, “I swear on my name—though it may not mean much—that I’ve never heard of anything this extreme.”

Ahri began to look puzzled.

Then, Eunsol-noona nudged me.

“Well, even if it did happen, now’s not the time to dwell on it. Kain, keep going.”

“There was a critical flaw in the Chief Researcher’s grand plan. His tendency to treat all humans as tools overlooked the fact that Beatrix wasn’t just a monster-creating demon—she was a girl who sought freedom and happiness in her own way.”

“…I never thought of her as a normal girl at all.”

“I’m saying that side of her existed, too. Of course, she had a cruel side as well. But in any case, Beatrix had no intention of becoming a slave who endlessly created monsters for the Cube. Realizing this, the Chief Researcher sealed her away, leaving only her brain in the containment area.”

At that point, Songee spat out the meat she was eating.

“This story is starting to make me feel sick. Maybe this wasn’t the best dinner conversation.”

Eunsol-noona, who had been listening intently, asked, “But in the end, the rebellion succeeded, right?”

“It did. While Beatrix couldn’t have rebelled alone, the situation escalated with Patrick’s cooperation. The Chief Researcher had anticipated Beatrix’s rebellion and prepared for it, but Patrick had been a loyal subordinate for a long time. He never imagined Patrick would lead a revolt. In the end, the containment area for the Eye of Zero Dimension fell into the hands of Beatrix and Patrick, and we entered Room 201 sometime after that.”

“I understand what happened in the middle. After all, we were the ones who did it. To summarize briefly, we tore through the Cube, found a TV connected to the research lab, crossed over, and raised hell until we woke up the Chief Researcher. What happened after that?”

“Not much. It was basically a rebellion suppression. We wiped out most of the rebels, and the few remnants died when the Eye of Zero Dimension descended. After waking up, the Chief Researcher sealed Beatrix’s brain inside a box within the Cube, where there was no door to the outside world, making it impossible for her to rebel again.”

“So now Beatrix is endlessly creating monsters in that box, and the Administration keeps sending in people?”

“Something like that.”

After listening quietly for a while, Ahri finally spoke up, “It might sound strange, but when you strip away the shocking parts, it’s a relatively straightforward story.”

This time, everyone turned their eyes to Ahri.

“If you think about it without the murder traps, feeding humans to monsters, and all the other shocking elements, it’s a simple story. A containment facility for an evil god fell into the hands of rebels, but the Administration managed to take it back and resolve the situation.”

It was a rough summary, but it was a valid perspective.

Songee, who had stopped eating earlier, tilted her head and asked, “So… what exactly was the ‘curse’ of Room 201? At first, we thought it was the Cube, but it turns out the Cube was the containment facility, and the problem was solved by fixing the Cube, right?”

Ahri responded simply, “The source of the curse was the Eye of Zero Dimension, and the problem we had to solve was that the Cube containing the Eye had fallen into the hands of the rebels, right?”

Is that how we should interpret it?

Based on the facts, it didn’t seem like a wrong interpretation, but something about it didn’t sit well with me.

While everyone was deep in thought, Eunsol-noona, who had been thinking deeply, broke the silence, “It feels like we’ve been basing our interpretation of Room 201 from the Chief Researcher’s perspective. Since we’re on the topic, let’s consider it from a different angle. Didn’t the Chief Researcher himself admit that his solution was an incomplete resolution by the Hotel’s standards?”

I added to her explanation, “Yes. From the Hotel’s perspective, it was like a solution that barely scored 30 out of 100. It was my thought, but since I was more than half-merged with the Chief Researcher at that point, you could say it was his thought as well.”

“Why was the score so low?”

Jinchul-hyung answered with an exasperated tone, “Is that really a question, Noona? If feeding people to demons earned a high score, that would be even stranger, right? I’m more surprised that such a method was even considered a ‘solution’.”

“No, think about it more carefully. The evaluator is the Hotel, right? Do you really think this place values human life that highly?”

““…””

The feeling of being struck on the back of the head with a hammer left everyone silent.

“I’ve never seen a place that disregards human life as lightly as this Hotel. So why would tossing a few dozen, maybe a few hundred, people to a demon be such a big deal here?”

““…””

“And another thing has been bothering me since earlier. According to the Chief Researcher, the Eye of Zero Dimension enjoys watching people suffer as they die. But if it’s truly that kind of being, why would it be satisfied just sitting inside a Cube? I don’t understand the mindset of a psycho god, but wouldn’t it be more entertaining to watch 8 billion people on Earth suffer rather than a few hundred in a tiny Cube?”

“”…””

“That’s the part I couldn’t quite understand. Maybe it’s because I’m not used to the ‘occult’ mindset of the Administration and think too much in ‘business’ terms…”

Ahri summarized, “So, what you’re saying is this: First, there’s no place that disregards human life as much as this Hotel. If the Chief Researcher saved the Earth by sacrificing some people, why does that only score 30 points? Second, if this evil god enjoys human suffering, why doesn’t it play with the entire Earth instead of just watching a tiny Cube? Is that it?”

“Exactly.”

Songee lowered her head.

“I’m having a hard time following this conversation.”

On the other hand, Eunsol-noona and Ahri seemed to be getting more absorbed in the discussion.

“I think I’ve come up with a logic that could explain these questions.”

Ahri, looking incredibly curious, asked, “What is it? Honestly, when you leave the Hotel, you should ditch the boring stuff with the Daeyang Group and join the Administration instead.”

“…Let’s think about that later. I believe the strange behavior of the Eye of Zero Dimension can be understood quite simply if you think about it from a ‘business’ perspective. I think the Chief Researcher fell into a trap by interpreting it too ‘occultly’. That’s why the Hotel gave him such a low score.”