Escaping the Mystery Hotel - Chapter 653
Only Krnovel
EP.653 Episode 653 – Meeting, Exploration (4) Fin
Episode 653 – Meeting, Exploration (4) Fin
“User: Han Ga-in (Jihye)
Date: Day 2
Current Location: Tier 3, Guest Room Area
Wise Man’s Advice: 3”
– Han Ga-in
“You can’t see the whole thing from the inside. You can’t touch the inside from the outside. There’s only one answer.”
After staring at the enigmatic sentence for a while, he said to his colleagues.
“I think I’ve seen everything there is to see in the guest rooms.”
Grandfather nodded and answered.
“There are six rooms in total, the last room is unknown, and there are probably four or five cursed rooms. Considering the number of rooms, two or more wishes are tied to one room. Is this enough?”
“Yes. You’ll have to go into room 301 to find out more specifics.”
“Okay. Let’s go somewhere else.”
I returned back to the information board in the lobby.
? Observatory
? Rooms
? ??? – Under construction.
“It looks like we can’t go to the question mark area yet, so we’ll have to go to the observatory.”
As we followed the arrows and headed left, Eunsol spoke about the question on everyone’s mind.
“What kind of place is this for observation?”
I’m curious too.
*
“Current location: Tier 3, Guest Room Area -> Tier 3, Observatory”
As I opened the door to the observatory entrance, a rather mysterious yet subtly familiar interior appeared.
The space itself was a giant hemisphere, and at its center was an elongated object resembling a celestial telescope.
A place that resembles an observatory overall.
“Is that a telescope? It looks incredibly large.”
Sang-Hyeon answered Jin-Cheol’s question.
“It’s quite large, but there are many larger telescopes on Earth. Of course, the performance is far superior since it’s located in a hotel… But isn’t it strange that the objective lens part is outside the ceiling?”
Near the telescope was an old-fashioned table and chair, which seemed to suggest that meetings could be held there if necessary.
“There’s a door here too! It says bedroom above.”
“Maze, don’t touch it.”
“No, I was just talking.”
While Miro was slightly dispirited, I opened the door marked bedroom and looked inside.
During this process, no crisis alerts were activated.
As the name suggests, inside there was space where several people could sleep comfortably.
“It’s literally a bedroom. There’s also a shower room next to it. At first glance, it doesn’t look like anything special, but…”
Looking at her colleagues, Ari answered immediately.
“Isn’t it special just to have a bedroom?”
“That’s it.”
The hotel has room 105, which is a space just for relaxation, so there is no reason to have bedrooms on other floors.
In fact, there were no beds or bathrooms anywhere on the second floor.
“I see there’s a bedroom and a bathroom, so I guess there’s food on that table.”
“It’s probably similar to the tea table in terms of usage. I’ll give it a try.”
Eunsol approached the table, put her hand under the table, and then performed a magic trick of pulling out a sandwich and coffee from thin air.
“As expected.”
“There are separate spaces for eating, sleeping, and washing…”
At first glance, it may seem like a kind consideration, but it is not at all.
Elena, who was drinking iced tea next to her older sister, said with a bitter smile.
“I think I might be locked in the observatory. While I’m locked in, I won’t be able to use Room 105.”
A fact implied by the existence of another rest area.
While progressing through the 3rd floor, there comes a moment when you cannot go to the 1st floor.
“Let’s take a look through the telescope.”
Naturally, Songi tried to move the telescope, but was stopped by Ari.
“Oh, you first.”
Seeing some of my colleagues acting careless made me realize that it had only been two days since I started working on the third floor.
The moment I was about to look into the telescope eyepiece.
“Advice: 3 -> 2”
“Stop observing.”
The warning was quick and concise.
“…”
“Brother?”
“Did something pop up? What did it say?”
“Stop observing.”
My colleagues suddenly became quiet.
Because crisis alerts only appear when my life is in danger.
That is, if I had just forced myself to observe, I would have died or fallen into a dying state.
“… As expected, it’s a hotel.”
For the first time in a long time, goosebumps appeared on my back.
Even if someone like me were to become someone like Horus, there would be chaos outside, with people praising him as a great demigod and a superman.
However, once you enter the hotel, you are in a situation where you could die on the spot if you touch the telescope wrongly even once.
I took another step back from the telescope, feeling a dizzying yet indescribable joy.
Jincheol asked as if it was difficult to understand.
“If you see that there is a telescope, then you are telling me to use it, right?”
“Yes.”
“How can you use it if it’s dangerous to even get close to the eyepiece?”
“Are there any conditions for using it?”
“What is that?”
For a moment I debated whether or not to write some advice, but then decided that I had no choice.
No matter how you look at it, it wasn’t a problem that we could figure out an answer to by thinking about it among ourselves.
“Advice: 2 -> 1”
‘Why are telescopes dangerous, or what are the conditions for using them safely?’
“It’s dangerous because it’s not focused yet.”
“It’s dangerous because it’s not focused yet. What does that mean?”
I looked at Sang-Hyeon, who seemed to be the most familiar with this kind of thing among us.
My brother seemed to think for a moment and then gave his own opinion.
“Focusing a telescope is the process of observing the object accurately. To put it simply, out of focus means looking at the object too close or too far away.”
When I heard this, I had a vague feeling.
“… Of course, the subject of observation is not ordinary.”
“Of course.”
At this point, Ari also vaguely understood the situation and opened her mouth.
“So this is the situation. Let’s say the subject of observation is a prisoner somewhere in space. In a situation where the focus is not right, you end up looking at the prisoner too close or too far away. Looking at it close is obviously dangerous, and looking at it from far away is also dangerous.”
Sang-Hyeon nodded.
“From a distance, you can see the entire prisoner at a glance. In that context, it can be more dangerous than seeing it up close.”
“The safe observation range will be very narrow, so you have to focus and write.”
Miro muttered with a slightly frightened expression.
“If you look through that telescope, you can see that whale-like creature from before?”
“The maze and the prisoner are examples. I say this because even if the subject of observation sees them, they seem dangerous.”
“Then, is it possible that you are observing something other than prisoners?”
“I don’t know either.”
No one yet knows what the observatory’s target is.
However, suddenly, a strong intuition flashed through my mind.
“Gain, you seem to have been thinking deeply for a while now.”
“…”
“Is it still difficult to answer? If I interrupted you -”
“The subject of observation will not be a prisoner.”
“then?”
“… Let me think about it a little more.”
The subject of observation is unlikely to be a prisoner.
Because, as the hotel said, I am different now from when I first entered the hotel.
Would I die instantly just by seeing the prisoner from afar?
Honestly, I don’t think so.
This is not an arrogant story about being able to win against prisoners.
It just means that we have passed the point where we would face a life-or-death crisis just by looking at it.
“…”
Something that is far beyond even the capabilities of a prisoner.
No matter how much inheritance or powerful blessings a participant receives from the hotel, it is something they cannot handle.
The observatory was built to observe such beings.
“Okay! Everyone, let’s look around carefully. If something seems off, don’t touch it and call me. I still have one piece of advice left.”
*
Nearly two hours passed without any results.
I have to enter the cursed room as soon as the sun rises, so I thought I should finish exploring soon.
“Huh? Brother Gain!”
Surprisingly – perhaps not surprising, considering the blessing – Seungyeop let out an excited voice from the bedroom.
He muttered as if the maze was fascinating.
“I thought you were secretly sleeping because you were tired, but I wasn’t?”
Seungyeop, who had been coming out smiling, looked at Miro for a moment as if he was dumbfounded.
“Hey! Aren’t you really ignoring me too much?”
Miro stuck his tongue out at Seungyeop, and it seemed like he was trying to tease him, but he was so cute that I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Brother, I found a strange piece of paper in the bedroom.”
“Good job! Everyone, come this way.”
It’s full of small letters.
“A thought on the missing link….”
***
A Thought on Missing Link
Let’s go back in time as an explorer.
If you’re lucky, you might find fossils that drifted in from upstream.
From the fossils, we can discover traces of a past that has already passed.
Unfortunately, there are often long gaps between fossils, which some call missing links.
Why does this phenomenon occur?
The odds of a fossil forming are about as low as the odds of your first love accidentally finding a letter in a bottle you dropped into the ocean.
The number of species in an era exceeds 50 million, but the number of species that can be identified is less than 2 million.
Of those 2 million species, how many will be able to leave behind fossils 10,000 years into the future?
Therefore, it is inevitable that missing links will form between fossils.
A species that does not leave behind fossils will leave no trace in the future.
It seems that it has disappeared into the sand without a trace in the flow of time.
but….
Even if it leaves no trace, it doesn’t mean it didn’t exist.
They certainly existed, and must have had moments of beginnings and endings, prosperity and stagnation, glory and ruin.
The loss of all this would be nothing but an utter tragedy.
Therefore, I swore.
Somewhere in this empty world, I will leave an unchanging record.
***
The surroundings became quiet.
Everyone seems lost in thought, or unwilling to disturb a colleague who is lost in thought.
“…”
While various complicated thoughts were passing through my mind, one thing vaguely occurred to me.
The word missing link is a metaphor.
This is not about the missing link in biology or evolution, but rather an article that explains something completely different by borrowing the concept.
Sang-Hyeon muttered cautiously.
“Missing links, fossils, sand without traces, unchanging records… these seem to be keywords.”
“…”
“I’m curious about one thing. Who do you think wrote this?”
Miro said with an expression that showed he couldn’t contain his curiosity.
“Can’t I ask for advice by writing it down?”
“I’ve already used two, so I have one left.”
I wanted to save one, as I had to enter the cursed room within a few hours.
Miro soon understood my intention and nodded.
“Oh, I see… .”
“I’ll ask you later when I have time.”
After that, nothing special was discovered until daybreak.
“Let’s end the first exploration here. We have to enter the Chamber of the Damned in a few hours, so I think we should all cool our heads until then.”
*
“User: Han Ga-in (Jihye)
Date: Day 2
Current Location: Tier 3, Guest Room Area
Wise Man’s Advice: 1”
Around 11am.
Finally, I stood in front of a door with a nameplate that said ?301?.
I did my best to prepare, but…
No matter how much you prepare, the room of curses is a place where you will die in vain once you enter.
Thanks to that, everyone couldn’t hide their nervous expressions.
Since no one wanted to grab the handle, I stepped forward.
“I wonder when it’s time to open the door. Do you remember what the manager said?”
— Gulp!
Instead of an answer, a swallowing sound is heard.
Everyone looks really nervous.
Sister Eunsol muttered with a trembling voice.
“… There are advantages to having fewer people, and there are advantages to having more people. The appropriate number of people is a matter of choice.”
“I heard that you can choose the number of people per room starting from the third floor. How is it like?”
“Only those who hold the handle can enter?”
“Look at the size of the handle. It looks like it would be difficult for two people to hold it at the same time.”
“Uh, sorry. I was so nervous that I made a weird sound.”
“No. I think….”
I said this while trying to appear as relaxed as possible, trying to ease everyone’s tension.
“I think we’ll decide how many people will be allowed to proceed after we open the door. Then we’ll open it.”
— Bam!
It’s a beginning.
“Current Location: Level 3, Guest Room Area -> Room 301, Cursed Room – ‘Origin of the Species’”