Escaping the Mystery Hotel

[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)

Date: Day 14

Current Location: Floor ???, Sanctum of Blessings

Sage’s Advice: 3]

It was a strange place. 

Perhaps because it was a ‘sanctum’, brilliant light like that of a starlight fell endlessly from the sky. There was a huge aggregation of light and a display screen that we had seen all across the Hotel.

At least it didn’t feel dangerous. 

Words appeared on the display screen as we were starting to feel relieved.

/Congratulations on reaching the Sanctum of Blessings!

However, that will be limited to those who have the qualification./

Unlike the usual announcements of the Hotel that confused its readers by adding unnecessary lines upon lines, the announcement of the ‘Sanctum’ was very short and straight-forward.

You can understand and empower blessings. But empowering required a qualification. 

Shortly after standing around in confusion, everyone understood the situation.

“This… doesn’t look that dangerous to me. It literally feels like a place that gives help regarding blessings.”

“Understanding and empowering. They’re both great options, aren’t they? There are some like me who have a system window that can go, ‘Ah so this is my blessing!’, but some blessings aren’t clear, so I think understanding will be very helpful, and empowering is of course going to be good.” I replied.

“Thank goodness. I was so frustrated because I was just given something ambiguous like, ‘Justice’ without being told anything while everyone else had super powers,” said Elena.

“By the way,” Jinchul-hyung said. “What is this ‘qualification’ that we need to empower the blessing? Besides, what happens when we empower them in the first place? Do I become stronger to the point that I can break concrete with bare hands?”

“Let’s go into that light first. That should tell us something.”

The display screen changed immediately after everyone entered the cluster of light.

1. Understand 2. Empower

Two big words appeared in the middle.

Urged by something unknown, I pushed my hand forward and touched ‘Understand’ as the screen immediately flashed in response. It seemed to be a touch-screen.

Han Kain (20) – Wisdom -> Acquire knowledge that assists with survival at the Hotel

Cha Jinchul (31) – Courage -> Enhancement of physical abilities 

Yu Songee (17) – Affinity -> Creates an affinity towards beings of chaos

Park Seungyub (14) – Fortune -> A periodic manifestation of luck

Lee Eunsol (32) – Wealth -> Access to HP Market and supply

Kim Mooksung (64) – Communication -> A mental connection between participants

Elena (23) – Justice -> Punishment to evil people

Kim Ahri (16) – Allusion -> Hypnosis of self and others

Most of them were the same as what we had assumed.

Wisdom, Courage, Affinity, Fortune and Wealth weren’t very different from what we had predicted, and Allusion wasn’t too different either.

As expected, what everyone was most interested in was ‘Justice’.

“Punishment to evil people?”

“Miss Elena? Do you have any clues about what this means?”

“I have no idea,” she replied. “We already met a lot of evil at the Hotel but I never received any abilities that could let me punish them.”

I raised my thoughts.

“I think I have an idea. It’s not ‘evil beings’ but ‘evil people’, meaning that they at least have to be existences that look like humans, right? Looking back, Athanasias weren’t humans and the family of farmers weren’t evil at all, so that’s probably why it didn’t activate.”

Eunsol-noona rebutted with a question, 

“As you said, Kain, Room 103 the Human Farm might be because there was no ‘evil person’, but what about Room 101, the Strange Family? They must have been evil.

And even in Room 102, the Mansion of Fear, the last person Elena met – the possessed Songee – was definitely an evil back then.”

Room 103 was easy to understand but I wasn’t sure about why ‘Justice’ wasn’t activated in rooms 101 and 102. We were keeping our silence when Ahri opened her mouth.

“Maybe it’s only when you perceive it yourself?”

“You mean Elena needs to be aware that the opponent is an evil person?”

It was possible.

In Room 101 the Strange Family, her mind had been distorted and it was impossible to make a normal judgement, which was why she couldn’t perceive it. In Room 102, she died during her sleep so she probably didn’t have the time to perceive the evilness of the possessed Songee.

“Aren’t there way too many restrictions for my blessing then? It’s hard to even tell what happens in this Hotel.”

“Noona!” Seungyub said with a shout. “Think about it this way. This Hotel is a bit like a game. If there are a lot of conditions, that means you will be super strong when all those conditions are met. Because that’s how balance works!”

Balance.

He was probably right. If our assumptions were correct, it meant that Elena’s blessings were a lot harder to activate than the other ones.

Considering how difficult it was to meet the requirements, it would only make sense for it to be very powerful once all those conditions were fulfilled. 

After coming to that conclusion, I pressed the next button of the display.

2. Empower

You may empower Park Seungyub, Han Kain and Yu Songee. Would you like to proceed? (Yes / No)

There were only names of 3 people, with no other names on the list. Everyone understood what the ‘qualification’ was as soon as we looked at the 3 names.

It was that you needed an immense contribution to the escape / resolution of a Cursed Room!

In Room 101, Seungyub escaped by himself,

Room 102 was honestly pretty much done by myself,

And Room 103 was resolved by Songee.

“That’s a bit of a shame. I did use my brain as much as possible every time but… I guess it has to be those 3 people anyway.

Try clicking it. Let’s see how the empowering works.”

I immediately clicked on yes.

/Empowering in progress ———– Complete!/

!!!

The orb of light that had been brightening up the centre of the Sanctum suddenly struck Seungyub, Songee and me.

I immediately felt my consciousness fading away from my body.

*

Up.

Up and up.

Ahh, was I flying in the skies?

Was this how it felt to be a bodiless soul?

Without a body restricting me, my soul was endlessly soaring high up. Rather than a physical sense of the word, ‘up’, it was an ascent in a more fundamental sense of the word.

I was reaching a place that truly transcended the ground.

A land that existed nowhere.

At one point, my soul stopped going up.

And — a large bird was standing in front of me.

An owl.

Looking closer, I realised it looked familiar. It looked similar to the sculpture I picked up on the night before coming into the Hotel.

It has been very disappointing recently.

Was it talking to me?

I was thinking you weren’t a fool, but to think you couldn’t even notice the simple trick of those Athanasias.

Was this about Room 103?

However you weren’t that bad at the Mansion, so overall, I will say you stand a chance.

What was this bird, and why was it giving me an evaluation?

Let’s say I am your sponsor. You will see me a few more times…

I will give you a bit more. Hope you earn yourself an Inheritance by the time you come to this place again.

It was a short conversation – or rather, a one-sided conveyance of words.

After that, my consciousness plummeted from the endlessly high plane…

*

[Han Kain (20) – Wisdom -> You may now see the locations of your teammates.]

*

[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)

Date: Day 15

Current Location: Floor 1, Room 105 (Room of Rest)

Sage’s Advice: 3]

I checked immediately after waking up in bed. It was Day 15.

Absurdly enough, that short period of time had gotten rid of an entire day.

I wanted to spend my sweet 3-day holiday as nicely as possible but…

Day 13 went by with our bracelet experiments; the morning of Day 14 was gone due to the exploration and the evening of Day 14 and the morning of Day 15 were all gone in the blink of an eye.

If I heard some compliments and stuff, I wouldn’t be feeling this down either.

What a disappointment. Get an Inheritance before you come next time.

It was utterly dumbfounding to hear such an annoying ‘evaluation’.

Did I ask them to kidnap me to such a strange place or something? I was about to swear when I suddenly noticed the new function in my system window.

[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)

Date: Day 15

Current Location: Floor 1, Room 105 (Room of Rest)

Sage’s Advice: 3

Teammate Location Information (!)]

I checked just in case and it said everyone was currently in Floor 1, at the Room of Rest. Would this become more specific after entering a Cursed Room?

This definitely was a helpful ability.

It just happened to be mealtime, so I headed to the dining room and found everyone.

“Hiya! You’re finally out. Do you know how surprising it was to see the three of you suddenly collapse? I carried all of you guys back! And Seungyub and Songee woke up ages ago, so I was wondering what was taking you so long.”

“So Kain, did you get anything new?” Eunsol-noona asked.

“Yes. Now I have a button called ‘Teammate Location Information’ that tells me about where everyone is. Right now, it only has the rooms but I assume we will have more specific locations once we go into a Cursed Room.”

Unlike me who could immediately check the difference, Songee and Seungyub tilted their heads when explaining about their change.

“Hmm… I can’t say anything because there are no ‘beings of chaos’ next to us right now.”

“I just got an opaque window. It says [98%].”

Jinchul-hyung replied to Seungyub.

“So hitting [100%] is probably going to refill your cooldown. Maybe you can choose when to be lucky? 98% is pretty much back to full.”

After a slight conversation about the changes to our blessings, I also joined them for a late dinner.

It was depressing.

I was forced to come to this place and yet was pointed out for being bad, and one of my rest days was just gone.

Even the military won’t be this heartless.

*

After the meal, we started a full-on discussion.

The agenda was, ‘What should we order through the HP Market?’

“I said this yesterday, but I will make one of them capsaicin. I gathered all the sprays I saw and made four, but we don’t have the capsaicin itself.”

“Are we going to order a weapon for the remaining two? Like my tonfa?”

“That’s debatable. Whatever it is, a physical tool would probably be less effective than a capsaicin spray for girls, and besides, there are plenty of ornamented blades here. Even Kain’s silver dagger is something we picked up at the Hotel.”

She had a point.

It wasn’t as if we could buy a gun or a sword through the HP Market. The most we could get was probably a kitchen knife.

They weren’t any better than the ornamented daggers and blades that were located throughout the Hotel.

Ahri broke her silence with a word.

“Lighter.”

“A lighter?”

“I think something that can help light a fire will be helpful in a lot of ways. And I didn’t see any lighters around the Hotel.”

“That’s not a bad idea. Then for the last—” Eunsol-noona’s words were cut off by Jinchul-hyung’s interjection.

“Noonim. It’s not like we’re going to light a cigarette, so how about we get a blow torch since we can use that somewhat like a weapon as well?”

“Hyung. Don’t you think a blow torch is too hard to carry around?”

“Let’s make it a gas lighter then.”

“What’s a gas lighter?”

“You know, the long ones they use at the BBQ places. You’ll recognise it when you see one.”

We talked a bit more afterwards but couldn’t come up with anything good for the third item. 

Since capsaicin was a consumable, we decided to order two bottles of that and a lighter, and that marked the end of that day.

The next day, on the morning of Day 16, we entered Room 104.

*

[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)

Date: Day 16

Current Location: Floor 1, Room 104 (Cursed Room – Preparatory Selective, Hotel High School)

Sage’s Advice: 3]

RINNGGGGGG~~~~

A familiar uniform.

My teammates were looking around with blank looks on their faces among crowds of countless student NPCs.

Me – a former high school graduate that hadn’t yet entered university – from one of the few golden ages of a person’s life…

I returned to high school. To one without any hope called ‘Hotel High School’.