Escaping the Mystery Hotel - Chapter 250
Only Krnovel
Episode 250 – No. 202, Room of the Curse – ‘The Little Mermaid’ (28)
– Han Ga-in
As soon as I came to my senses, the first thing I did was look around. An unknown location across the door. What on earth is it?
First of all, the body I was in appeared to be a boy in his mid-teens. He was very thin, probably because he hadn’t eaten very well, but his clothes seemed to be made of quite luxurious silk. The blurry wooden building looked like a small house.
It’s relatively ordinary scenery up to this point. But everything else was strange. It was like I was in a black and white movie, because all around me was gray scenery. Even though the sun was still up, this place was strangely dark. But it didn’t even seem like it was night.
I walked towards the door to follow Ari’s instructions. One step, two steps.
“… As expected, there is no easy way.”
If it were me when I first entered the hotel, I would have been fooled. A little while ago, I don’t know why, but my body moved toward the other side instead of toward the door.
My body moved toward the passage where I could see an unknown light at the back of the house that Ari had told me never to go to. After much deliberation, I took a step and this time my body moved into the passage behind me.
What kind of harmony is this?
It’s clearly moving towards the door, so why is it moving towards the tunnel? Distortion of senses? Was space itself warped? So many possibilities came to mind that it was difficult to decide on anything. What should I do?
It was decided that any problem arising from the distortion of the senses or the process of controlling the body could be solved through the power of incarnation. Consciousness rises again. The spirit, beyond the limits of the body, reached a ‘high realm’ as if floating. The black thread stretched out and touched the body.
The boy’s slow-moving body no longer wandered but headed in the right direction, toward the door. And then, the door separating the two spaces slowly opened.
— Slurp!
“hmm?”
I hear a strange sound.
The sound of something flowing. The sound of an unknown liquid dripping. The sound of splashing water drops hitting the stone floor.
I can’t figure it out –
“great job. “You can return to your body now.”
At this moment of extreme anxiety, Ari showed a surprisingly calm attitude.
*
[User: Han Ga-in (Jihye)
Date: Day 107
Current location: Tier 2, Room 202 – Curse Room ‘The Little Mermaid’
Sage Advice: 3]
“… I’m back.”
At the same time, the body of the boy I had been holding a moment ago fell down on the grass. Ari, who was watching the boy slowly squirming, approached without saying a word.
The boy muttered with a confused expression.
“This place… . Where is it? now -”
“Thank you for your effort.”
“yes?”
“You have worked very hard so far. You probably lived your life without even understanding what you were going through. My name is Ari Kim. Thank you again.”
“What on earth-”
It took less than a second for the boy’s neck to break. For a split second, the eyes that had been filled with pain soon closed comfortably.
“… who is this?”
Instead of answering, Ari closed the boy’s eyes. Ari, who could always see a hint of playfulness in his eyes in any situation, was very serious at this moment, and his attitude toward the dead boy was even polite.
“Gain.”
“huh?”
“Do you have a lot of questions?”
“That’s right -”
“Ask now. From now until the day we die, I’ll take a question or two from you.”
I was momentarily speechless. Until we die?
…
Only then did I feel that the world had somehow changed in a strange way. The sky turns gray. The grass on the floor had completely dried up, and an acrid smell began to be felt in the air.
“It seems impossible to survive, right?”
“If you and I can move faster than sound, we can survive.”
The story is that he died. There was no response even to the crisis notification, as if there really seemed to be no way to survive. At that time, the floor trembled. There wasn’t much time left.
“If you had told me in advance, I would have prepared mentally.”
“I didn’t know what was inside there until I opened it. There are quite a few candidates. If it were us today, there are many people who could escape alive. But there was this guy who had no way to survive. sorry.”
“What is that door? A prison containing monsters?”
“It’s similar.”
— Easy profit!
A sound like tearing cloth is heard in the air.
“similar? Can you explain in a little more detail? I’ve been thinking about this lately, but it seems like if I go out anyway, I’ll be working at the management office. “Just pretend it’s a pre-study session and teach your juniors something.”
Ari’s eyes turned to the sky. As she followed her gaze, she felt that she was reminded of an unknown black crack in the sky. The crack began to slowly, slowly widen, and there was something in that gap whose shape I could not properly recognize.
“we are.”
“…”
“We’ve always changed endings we didn’t like.”
“What is that-”
“Sometimes we observed the starting point of despair and prevented it, and sometimes we eliminated people who would accelerate the destruction. “If I thought this or that was difficult, I would force a change of direction right before the end.”
“…”
“But, in this world, there is also something called an ‘inevitable ending.’ An ending that cannot be changed no matter how much money and manpower is poured into it. That door is where that ending is locked away. In other words, it’s a trash can that only collects bad endings.”
I don’t know. At the same time, I felt like I knew. Strangely enough, the story Ari told felt somehow familiar.
“Don’t worry too much. There are a lot of trash cans like this and we only opened one of them. At this level, we can stop it at the Korean branch line. but… . We will invest a lot of resources to stop it. In that gap, Eunsol or Jincheol will achieve their goal. everything will be alright. So, let’s take a rest together.”
Ari slowly approaches me. A silver flash flashed from her fingertips.
This was my last memory.
*
– Eunsol Lee
The man knelt on the cold asphalt and prayed. Of course, there were no cars around that should have honked, asking what was going on in the middle of the road. This is because we are moving in dozens of military vehicles carrying hundreds of armed soldiers.
As Cha Jin-cheol began to kneel and pray, watching the soldiers stop and say blasphemous prayers made me lose all sense of reality.
“Sister, should I wear a bracelet again?”
Song-i, who had periodically placed a protective bracelet on Jin-cheol, now wondered about the meaning of that action.
“It doesn’t seem to mean much anymore.”
“…But we were able to communicate a little while ago.”
“If I talk to you now, will you answer?”
This is a question that can be answered if we think of Lee Su-ho, who completely crossed the line from the beginning. Lee Soo-ho, who had been eroded by Rudach for a much longer time, still had strange feelings for Elena, his former lover, until the moment of his death. This means that the human ego does not disappear completely even if it is eroded. However, values only shift little by little.
To whom and what is Jincheol praying now?
“Sister, can you see the people around you?”
As Songi said, I looked around.
On the busy street from Gangnam Station to Seocho Station, the streets were filled with so many people that it was difficult to count them even though it was pouring down like a ton of rain.
Someone sat down on the floor and cried.
Some held crosses or rosary beads and prayed earnestly.
Someone shouted frantically that the day of judgment was approaching.
Little by little, something comes towards us.
As if someone had spilled muddy paint on the canvas of the world, gray light slowly colored the ground from the sky.
The blue light fades from the sky. The unholy aurora shimmered and shook everyone’s hearts. Strange stones kept rising from the floor. Inside the stone that rose up, pushing against the hard asphalt, there was an unknown red flesh.
— Rumbling!
The salvation that those who prayed for came with thunder. From the other side of the gray sky in the western sky, so many ‘powers of civilization’ flew that they could not be captured at a glance.
— Bleep!
A rough tone that pierces your ears. As I stumbled, feeling a strong wave that seemed to shake everything from my skin to my internal organs, Songi, who was next to me, grabbed me.
To have a headache. Is it because I was looking at a strange phenomenon occurring in the distant sky with my eyes earlier? She had a headache that felt like pricking her head with a needle.
It was a strange fight.
No missiles flew and no bullets were fired. In the first place, I couldn’t understand at all what the ‘enemy’ that Ga-in and Ari were supposed to have liberated was.
But the Bureau clearly fought ‘that’.
Destroy enemies that can be destroyed. We fight against an enemy we cannot understand with means we cannot understand.
A little, very little. The world has returned to its correct light.
It wasn’t until this moment that I realized what it meant to fight the Bureau. Also, I realized why Ari had a hard time accepting what I said when I discussed the responsibility of the management bureau for the situation in Room 202.
These people have truly protected the world. And I ended up blowing a hole in the huge wall they had been protecting.
It takes my breath away. My heart is beating violently. I am… .
“sister.”
“Uh, huh?”
“Focus on the current situation. A little while ago, Jincheol ran away screaming. “His brother’s role will soon end.”
“…”
“We also have to do what we have to do. and -”
Songi, who seemed to be contemplating whether to say something or not, added one word.
“Don’t get too emotional about what’s going on inside the room. Also, it is true that, apart from the fact that those people have protected the world, they have repeatedly made wrong decisions in matters related to the Sea God.”
Yes. His heart sank coldly at Song Yi’s words.
The heroism they are showing now and the scenario of Room 202 are separate issues. It’s time to cool off. Because Songi and I still have work left to do. By now, it’s as if the people traveling in the limousine have their share of roles left.
See next episode