Editor’s Survival Guide - Chapter 139

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Editor’s Survival Manual Chapter 139

ep19. Expedition! The Timeless Hotel! (11)
“I’ll do it.”
Go Hong-sang answered without expression.
No anger, no protest—just a calm, measured reply.
It was the obvious choice.
His pride would take a hit, but there was no point clinging to stubbornness when life and death hung in the balance.
Besides, once he left, he could always change his mind later.
So I pressed him despite his immediate agreement.
“Really?”
“Yes. Do it.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“……?”
“If you were just going to agree this easily, why did you object in the first place? Are you planning to walk out and take it back?”
“Take it back? Who’s taking anything back? Have you lived your whole life being fooled?”
Go Hong-sang bristled at my suspicion, his voice sharp.
Then he raked his eyes over me from head to foot.
As if I were some lunatic asking for a favor and then picking a fight about it.
A fair assessment of the lunatic I was being.
So I pressed harder, more earnestly—leaning into the madness.
“You’re genuinely granting permission to enter the Train Station?”
“Yes, I grant it. I’m granting it.”
“But you said excessive privileges couldn’t be allowed. That we had to follow the manual.”
At my challenge, Go Hong-sang’s straight brow creased slightly.
He glanced sideways at Kwon Mu-seop beside me, then replied smoothly.
“The manual was written by people. So when necessary, we should be able to exercise discretion.”
I hadn’t expected him to parrot back exactly what Kwon Mu-seop had said earlier.
It was surprising, but I didn’t point it out.
Because I was about to do the same thing with his own words.
“But if you only exercise that discretion for people you know, what happens to ordinary citizens with no connections?”
“Staff morale is directly connected to this. Without staff, there’s no Management Bureau. Without the Management Bureau, we can’t rescue citizens. So what do we do?”
“Isn’t it unfair that you overlook it all this time and suddenly start making exceptions?”
“Does past neglect mean we should neglect it forever? If this situation becomes a chance for positive change, wouldn’t that be better?”
“…….”
“…….”
So this is how you climb the ladder.
You needed to be capable of this kind of pivot to handle bigger responsibilities.
Go Hong-sang’s enemy was Go Hong-sang himself, and yet he could rebut himself as Go Hong-sang.
Whether to call it shameless or seasoned, I wasn’t sure.
Earlier, Kwon Mu-seop had told me things about Go Hong-sang.
This handsome middle-aged man had just turned fifty this year.
He was an elite civil servant with the circumstances and ambition to reach even higher positions.
For him, the reassignment to the Management Bureau seemed like his greatest career crisis.
It had twisted his path to promotion, burdened him with bizarre work, and saddled him with crushing responsibility.
More than anything, Go Hong-sang was afraid of the Special Zone itself.
Yet he still tried to steer the organization to produce results and get promoted.
His cautious do-nothing approach clashed with Kwon Mu-seop’s agenda.
They clashed often, and Kwon Mu-seop always won.
For a director, that was deeply frustrating, but thanks to Kwon Mu-seop’s oblique personality, it had caused no major problems until now.
The crisis came with the rescue operation on The Bleeding Island.
There, Kwon Mu-seop had practically coerced Go Hong-sang into granting permission when he tried to stall—and Go Hong-sang had developed something close to resentment toward him.
So when Kwon Mu-seop came asking for permission for the special Train Station operation, Go Hong-sang had no reason to grant it.
Of course, the opposition wasn’t purely out of spite.
The operation carried considerable risk, and Go Hong-sang’s future was on the line too.
So the chances he’d willingly permit the Train Station operation were near zero.
Meaning everything he was saying now was just empty talk.
Because we both knew this, we had no choice but to be somewhat underhanded.
“Understood. If that’s your decision, please put that promise in writing.”
“In writing?”
“Yes. Then I’ll truly believe you.”
“I said I grant it. Shouldn’t you understand by now? What writing are you asking for?”
Go Hong-sang could make a verbal promise, but he dug in against a written one.
As he bristled with irritation, Kwon Mu-seop—who’d been watching—cut in as if on cue.
“Writing isn’t necessary. Thank you, Director. I’ll prepare the Team 1 to enter the Train Station as you’ve approved.”
“Hmm…….”
At Kwon Mu-seop’s gratitude, Go Hong-sang’s expression grew even more uneasy.
It was clear both were thinking different thoughts.
Go Hong-sang was planning to reverse his position the moment he left.
Kwon Mu-seop was determined to use this conversation as leverage to force the operation through.
This was all Kwon Mu-seop had asked of me:
To make Go Hong-sang state the justification for the operation in his own words.
I’d performed that role quite well.
Now the rest was up to Kwon Mu-seop, and he would surely beat Go Hong-sang at his own game.
As always.
So I should have stepped back at this point…….
“Keep your promise, Director.”
“I said I would, so stop—”
“And I hope you keep this promise because of what you’ve experienced, not for any other reason.”
After some thought, I added that extra comment.
But Go Hong-sang didn’t immediately understand what I meant.
So I explained slowly.
“I’m sorry for disparaging and excluding you earlier.”
“……?”
“If you think about being left alone in a place like this, anyone would hate it. More than hate it—they’d be terrified.”
Go Hong-sang stared at me as if I’d suddenly started talking nonsense.
But it wasn’t nonsense. It was an editor’s meddling.
You can’t beat Kwon Mu-seop anyway.
Of course, Go Hong-sang had his own future at stake, so he’d be desperate.
But Kwon Mu-seop was carrying his subordinates’ lives on his shoulders.
The weight classes were fundamentally different.
And Go Hong-sang had already walked into the trap.
Any stubbornness now would yield a predictable result.
He’d end up revealing only his cowardice and shamelessness, his dignity shattered, his dignity a joke.
A tragic villain’s ending.
In novels, such characters and endings serve a purpose.
But people don’t deserve that kind of humiliation, so I said to Go Hong-sang:
“A fifteen-year-old girl is terrified in that same situation. For four months, no less.”
“…….”
“I’m appealing to your emotions—I’ll admit it. I’m hoping you yield for emotional reasons—compassion, pity, conscience—not because of external pressure. So you understand why I’m saying this.”
That way, he might avoid becoming the tragic villain.
He might even be upgraded to “the somewhat decent director.”
With that intention, I spoke.
But Go Hong-sang said nothing in return.
He only stared at me as if I were a very strange creature indeed.
* * *
“So this space contains memories from the past, and by opening and closing doors, we can move to any point in this hotel’s history.”
At my explanation, Vice-Director Kim Sun-woong stroked his chin and asked:
“And?”
“If this space stores all past memories, then it should contain memories from when it functioned as a Special Management Zone. And those spaces wouldn’t be the Special Zone in its infancy—they’d be the ‘ordinary Hotel Special Zone’ that the Management Bureau explored in the past.”
Though “ordinary” seemed like a strange word to use for a Special Zone.
But it was the only way I could explain it now.
“If we enter that ‘ordinary Hotel Special Zone,’ there should be an exit route.”
“You’re planning to use that route to escape from here?”
“Yes.”
“You’re going to jump to a time when it was an ordinary Special Zone and break through it…….”
Vice-Director Kim repeated my explanation several times.
Then he crossed his arms again and asked me:
“But this space itself is a Special Zone. What guarantees there’s a Special Zone inside it? What if the memories stored here are limited to real memories only?”
A fair question.
But I answered with confidence.
“If this space were excluding Special Zone memories, Director Go wouldn’t have come back to life.”
“Why not?”
“The Crow brought out the living director just thirteen seconds before we arrived—from our perspective. But we’re not in reality now; we’re in the Special Zone.”
“Hmm…….”
“And Kwon Mu-seop confirmed that Special Zone memories are included in this space.”
At that, Kwon Mu-seop nodded and began:
“I observed the spatial changes in Basement 1 for an hour. In that time, I witnessed our team members attempting to destroy the Core. It’s certain that Special Zone memories are included.”
Since Kwon Mu-seop had seen it himself, Vice-Director Kim didn’t press further.
Instead, he identified a different problem.
“Will that exit route actually work?”
“We’ll have to test it directly. But I think there’s a good chance it will work.”
“What’s your reasoning?”
“The space in Basement 1 keeps shifting its time point. But what if this space’s time point locks when we open and close doors?”
“Then we’d go to a time when the Core was docile and destroy it.”
At the vice-director’s blunt assessment, I nodded.
The vice-director seemed satisfied, while Go Hong-sang simply observed our conversation.
“So we’re planning to escape through the Fitness Center. Once we reach the Fitness Center from the era when the Shadow was growing in the Hotel, we should all be able to escape.”
“Finding the space of a specific time period will mean opening and closing that door over and over.”
The vice-director sighed at this, but as long as we could escape…….
Having decided, we headed toward the Fitness Center.
We had to pass through the lobby again and climb to the 3rd floor, and since we were moving away from the Core, there was no interference like before.
As a result, we reached the hotel’s Fitness Center quite smoothly.
The space looked like a luxury hotel fitness center—upscale and sparsely occupied.
“From now on, we’ll keep changing the space until we find the Shadow with Noose. That entity is in front of the mirrors inside the Fitness Center. Since we need to open the door and check inside, we’ll work in pairs and take turns.”
At Kwon Mu-seop’s instructions, we all nodded without objection.
If we opened the door and found normal people inside, we could just close it without checking further.
But if the atmosphere felt eerie and empty, we’d need to go in and directly confirm whether the Shadow with Noose was there.
It was simple work, but we’d have to keep trying until we got the result we wanted.
We began immediately.
Kwon Mu-seop and I formed one team; Go Hong-sang and Vice-Director Kim formed the other. We’d alternate every hour.
“It’s like the old lunar exploration days.”
The vice-director had expressed this tedious, stupid task in the kindest way possible.
* * *
Four hours had passed since we started.
It was Go Hong-sang and Vice-Director Kim’s turn, so Kwon Mu-seop and I leaned against the doorframe, nodding off.
“I, I found it……!”
Go Hong-sang’s voice came from inside the Fitness Center.
“Looks like he found it.”
Vice-Director Kim, who’d been holding the door, kicked us awake.
Kwon Mu-seop and I jolted up and peered inside the Fitness Center.
Go Hong-sang was gesturing to us, his face bright with excitement.
Really?
We actually found it?
We all rushed in, relieved.
That’s when it happened.
Crash!
Something fell from above onto the head of Go Hong-sang, who’d been signaling to us.
He slammed to the floor under the impact.
We gasped in horror as we saw what had crushed Go Hong-sang.
A massive, pitch-black creature stood trampling him.
“……!”
That nightmare of a thing had appeared.
But perhaps it was inevitable.
We’d walked straight into the Special Zone of our own accord.
And this was the monster that roamed freely between multiple Special Zones.
It was Alpha.
We froze, unable even to think of rescuing Go Hong-sang.
That’s when Kwon Mu-seop muttered beside me:
“……What’s that next to Alpha?”
There was another entity shaped like a human, standing beside Alpha.
It wasn’t a Fake Human modeled on Kwak Jae-gyeom.
But it wasn’t a face we were entirely unfamiliar with either.
“What…….”
I groaned at the sight of that strange yet familiar entity.
It was me.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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