Our Hotel Is Open for Business as Usual - Chapter 105

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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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Chapter 105.

Rawi’s patience appeared to be wearing thin.

“Senior, senior.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“It’s not just me feeling uneasy, right?”
“Sigh….”

Seme looked at Rawi, impressed by how boldly he’d voiced what they were both thinking. Under that piercing gaze, Rawi straightened up.

“There’s nothing there.”

This was after we’d searched every corner of the room. We hadn’t found any sign of surveillance equipment or devices watching us. At that, Seme spoke again.

“We might have just missed it because the place is so vast.”
“It really is enormous. The kind of scale you’d only see in movies or dramas. Why does such an empty birdcage even exist? It’s there, so it does have atmosphere and charm, but….”
“Don’t read too deeply into the Labyrinth’s decorations. If you try to dissect every detail, you’ll go mad. What’s more surprising is that there are multiple rooms this massive on every floor.”
“It’s less a room and more like a mansion, isn’t it? I’ve visited plenty of houses, but I’ve never felt anything quite like this. Why is it so enormous?”
“Does the size of the room matter right now?”
“But I really can’t see any eavesdropping devices or anything.”

Well, Lee Yeon-woo had said that in this place, we could rest a bit more comfortably.

Seme, standing with his back to the birdcage, asked.

“Do you believe that?”
“What choice do we have but to believe it right now?”
“I’m uneasy. This isn’t underwater—it’s hard to get a sense of our surroundings.”
“You seemed quite reassured in the water mist, senior. Perhaps it’s because of your water attribute.”
“You make it sound like I’m some kind of Pokémon, but I’ll assume that’s just my imagination.”
“How do you even know what Pokémon is?”
“Such things exist. Anyway….”

In the guest room where no sign of the outside world could be felt at all, Seme spoke.

“Even if it seems like there’s nothing to worry about, we should still be careful.”
“But Lee Yeon-woo seems like he’d let it slide~”
“You’re really going to get yourself killed like that….”

Yet he didn’t scold her too harshly. Seme shared his sentiment to some degree.

“….”

No, but why exactly.

“…I wish there was nothing this confusing about it all.”
“Then wouldn’t we have gotten ourselves killed in a different way?”
“That’s true enough.”

After all, this confusion was something they’d gained precisely because Lee Yeon-woo had taken considerable care of them.

“We were lucky.”
“Hmm….”

Rawi, mulling over Seme’s words, sat down on the edge of the bed and scratched at the scar near his mouth with the barrel of his gun.

“By the way, senior.”
“Yeah?”
“That man—doesn’t his personality seem rather inconsistent?”
“Hmm… in what way?”
“Even when we were in the basement, it was like that.”

He’d sneer one moment, then suddenly smile the next, and after coming up to the Hotel, he’d put on the airs of a refined adult. His demeanor shifted dramatically depending on the situation.

“The only time it became so obviously apparent was during that jellyfish incident back then.”
“That still feels vivid—it was a dangerous situation even thinking about it now.”
“I still can’t quite figure out what kind of person he is.”
“From my perspective….”

Seme drew a circle in the air with his finger as he spoke.

“For someone with such a cynical personality, he’s surprisingly human?”
“Human? You mean he keeps his promises well?”
“That too, but doesn’t he seem like he wants to throw everything away?”
“So you’ve noticed that as well, senior.”
“I wonder if he has some kind of obsessive-compulsive disorder or PTSD.”
“Ah, that.”

Rawi nodded in agreement.

“You mean when he scratches his neck sometimes?”
“It’s not just his neck. Anywhere his skin is exposed, there are marks.”
“Is it really obsessive-compulsive disorder? He does seem meticulous though.”
“Does being meticulous cause obsessive-compulsive disorder?”
“How would I know? I’m not a doctor.”

In truth, there was a slight misunderstanding here. Lee Yeon-woo’s physical constitution was as delicate as acorn jelly—even a light scratch or vigorous brushing would leave red marks. That’s what they had witnessed.

“But he wipes or cleans himself even with the slightest contact.”
“That’s true.”

However, with a normal body, one would need to scratch quite hard to leave such marks. While they hadn’t often seen the action itself, both could see his neck and wrists exposed between his clothes.

“But what do you mean by PTSD?”
“Sometimes I see a sense of loss in him.”
“When you put it that way, it sounds quite pitiful.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s someone to be taken lightly, though.”

There was also a slight misunderstanding here. Lee Yeon-woo’s sense of loss stemmed largely from his once-pristine career. It was tragic in its own way, but quite different from what the two imagined.

Regardless of that truth, Seme added.

“He seems deeply uncomfortable with the mere act of rubbing shoulders with people without any particular reason. It could just be his nature to be reserved with strangers.”
“If he’s reserved twice, he’d kill someone.”
“Well, Lee Yeon-woo does have a rather cool demeanor.”

He continued his speculation in a measured voice.

“One way or another, it’s clear this person has many personas. Or maybe they’re going insane.”
“Then their true nature must be incredibly prickly and twisted.”
“Just as you say—their original temperament is abrasive, but they’re barely suppressing it through learned rationality. And then they fall into this horrific Labyrinth, their mind reaches its limit, and they’re gradually falling apart… Well, something like that. I can see why you’d be confused.”

Rawi flinched slightly at those words before responding.

“Isn’t it terrifying when you put it so specifically?”
“You’re the one who brought up the topic in the first place.”
“So I’ve been thinking about it, senior.”
“What if you just didn’t?”
“What do you know, senior?”
“….”

When Seme fell silent, Rawi let out a crooked smile.

“It’s nothing much~ but from the basement, it seemed like you were suspecting something….”
“You’re really annoying….”
“Could you find it in yourself to think of me as cute?”
“What part of your dark self am I supposed to find cute?”
“That’s not wrong, but you’re really rational.”
“Where exactly do you find me irrational….”
“So?”

At Rawi’s urging, Seme exhaled a sigh.

“There are cases like that sometimes.”
“Cases like what?”
“I can’t say for certain….”

Seme continued, watching the Lantern flicker strangely.

“An offering.”

Had Lee Yeon-woo heard this, he would have been not just bewildered but indignant. But as someone from the Gap Society, Seme had no choice but to think this way, especially given the circumstances so far.

For some reason, Rawi’s smiling face went subtly rigid.

“…An offering? Are you perhaps referring to a human sacrifice?”
“It’s almost unheard of in the Outside, isn’t it?”
“Almost unheard of might be an understatement—it might not happen at all. Of course, I don’t claim to know every incident in the world, but at minimum, I’ve never seen it reported in the news.”
“In the Gap, you can find it fairly often. The concept of an offering here is broader than the term used in the Outside, though. There are several different cases.”

Seme tapped a decorative Lantern with his finger as he spoke.

“Let me explain the direction you’re already thinking of first.”

He tilted his head.

“Cities are somewhat better off, but as you venture into provincial areas, the Gap becomes increasingly insular villages. When a Labyrinth emerges in such places, there’s no solution.”
“Does sacrificing people make the Labyrinth disappear?”
“It’s more about buying a reprieve, really. There are plenty of Dokkaebi who treat people like toys. If you know what that Labyrinth’s preferences are and push someone matching that taste into it, things stay peaceful for a while.”

Rawi asked, his eyes rolling as if gauging an imaginary village.

“Aren’t Dokkaebi and Labyrinths different concepts?”
“In the end, a Dokkaebi is just a Labyrinth that’s developed a sense of self, so there’s no major difference.”
“No, what I mean is… doesn’t a Labyrinth cause damage in all directions without even being entered?”
“Ah, the Labyrinths in the Outside are relatively docile, so you wouldn’t know. The Labyrinths in the Gap generally run rampant. Natural disasters don’t cause damage because they have a sense of self, after all.”
“But the fact that they calm down after receiving a human sacrifice makes it sound like they have a sense of self.”
“It’s malicious enough to feel that way.”

Seme traced back through his memories.

“I don’t claim to understand the exact mechanism, but I suspect that when an intruder appears, resources concentrate in that direction instead. That’s probably how human sacrifice works.”
“That’s….”
“In other words, a meat shield.”

He shrugged.

“Bait.”

Threaded onto a hook, rendered immobile, then cast into the sea.

“This is actually a pretty universal method that works in the Gap. You can find it without much difficulty in areas under the Labyrinth’s influence.”
“I was half-joking when I called it a dystopia.”
“Really? I thought you were serious.”
“Well, I was being somewhat serious about it.”
“As a resident of the Gap, it’s embarrassing every time.”

The Gap Society had particularly stark disparities between cities and provincial areas. Resources, manpower, even culture. Perhaps it wasn’t a world suited to show a Young Artist who might have arrived with romantic ideals.

“You can’t just throw anyone in. The Labyrinth needs people that suit its tastes.”
“For example?”
“Specific genders or ages are the most common. Men, women, children, the elderly. If you dig deeper, it can be people with scars on their bodies or people with certain disabilities….”
“It’s like a horror movie all on its own.”
“….”
“…Senior?”

A beat late, Seme continued.

“…Sometimes it considers family relationships too.”

Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, siblings, and so on.

“No one knows what happens to the people who are offered up that way. So many things change depending on the situation or the individual. The method differs depending on which creature consumes them.”
“Differs? How exactly?”
“Some, like the Su-gwi we first saw here, hunt while openly displaying malice. But then again, there are Labyrinths that sometimes obsess over stories and romance.”
“Romance? That really doesn’t fit.”
“They cherish the stories of the offerings.”

Seme continued.

“So they preserve them in their most beautiful state, forever on an eternal stage. Treating that person as a proper character in a story.”
“I can’t tell which way is a more graceful death.”
“The ‘endings’ that Dokkaebi can show are endlessly varied, so it’s natural to feel that way. But what’s certain is that all of those endings are bad….”
“Are there cases where people survive intact?”
“From what I know, there are almost none.”

Because if that were the case, the ‘offering’ wouldn’t be fulfilled in the first place.

“Even if I tried to survive, those who made the offering would do everything in their power to block my path.”
“….”
“If they were satisfied with me, they wouldn’t have left the Labyrinth as it is.”
“Hmm….”

After a moment of silence, Rawi broke into a grin.

“My nonexistent compassion for humanity is starting to shatter.”
“But then again, a sorcerer isn’t exactly human, so it should be fine, shouldn’t it?”
“And what am I supposed to do, being human?”
“I think it’s okay to just laugh—it’s a race joke, after all.”
“I’m not entirely sure which part was supposed to be the joke.”
“It’d be awkward if a human said it, but a sorcerer? That’s acceptable.”

Seme withdrew his hand from the Lantern.

“So my theory is, perhaps Lee Yeon-woo is in a similar situation, don’t you think?”
“You mean someone who was offered? But for that to be the case….”
“I already told you—offerings in this place are a more encompassing concept.”
“That’s true.”
“Ultimately, being offered means you ‘become part of it.'”

Rarely, very rarely, such cases occur.

“You become one.”

How that’s even possible remains unclear.

“I don’t know exactly what Lee Yeon-woo’s situation was. In similar cases, sometimes people are forcibly offered, like in villages across the land, and sometimes the artist themselves ventures into the Labyrinth.”
“The former might be one thing, but wouldn’t the latter be difficult to call an offering?”
“I suppose outsiders might find it hard to understand. But when a person becomes one with the Labyrinth, what matters most is the Labyrinth’s will.”

Not the will of the one who entered.

“Whether they were dragged in by force or entered of their own accord, it’s the Labyrinth that accepts them. The moment that happens, they’re as good as offered. How the Labyrinth uses someone already inside it is entirely the Labyrinth’s prerogative.”
“So even if someone went willingly, if the result is the same, it’s ultimately an offering.”
“Exactly. Willingness is merely the process; if the outcome of belonging is the same, the category is the same. If human resources were used to appease the Labyrinth, we call it an offering in the broader sense.”

And.

“…Lee Yeon-woo is already affiliated with this place as one of the ‘higher-ups.'”
“Ah, I see. Such cases exist?”
“They’re genuinely rare.”

Seme opened his mouth slowly.

“Do you know what the Labyrinth is?”
“It’s another Gap Society created from a particular incident or story as its material, isn’t it?”
“What’s the structure that comprises it?”
“Um… a stage, a script, actors?”
“Right. A setting, a narrative, characters.”

Seme’s gaze fixed on the Lantern, wavering indistinctly.

“It becomes possible if someone who enters the Labyrinth writes another story within it.”

The light flickers.

“If they share the Labyrinth as a setting while becoming an actor themselves, their story becomes the script, and that particular human is positioned to become identical with the Labyrinth itself….”
“Is such a thing even possible?”
“I said it was genuinely rare.”

Seme’s eyes squeezed shut—fatigue was taking its toll.

“That’s why I was confused. Normally, when someone is said to belong to a particular Labyrinth and possess a certain degree of authority, they’re either first a Dokkaebi belonging to that Labyrinth, or second the artist who created it.”
“….”
“But then I realized there could be another case.”

Rawi murmured.

“Like a side story, perhaps?”
“More like a revised edition.”

Seme’s eyes narrowed slightly as he rubbed the corners of them. Perhaps from staring at the light continuously, his eyes had grown dry and ached.

“If that happens, the Labyrinth will treat that person as irreplaceable. Because if that existence disappears, the Labyrinth cannot function smoothly.”
“Then, is a person who has become affiliated like that still a person, or a Dokkaebi?”
“I think it’s a matter of how much of the original remains.”
“The original….”
“It’s not an easy thing to do.”

It was something Seme already knew well.

“No matter how fused they become, from the Labyrinth’s perspective, they’re an intruder and a foreign substance. No matter how much time passes, there’s an inherent nature to return to something closer to the original form.”
“Unless it was covered over by a new story, I suppose.”
“No matter how much you revise it, it’s still just a revised edition after all.”

The fundamental structure itself cannot be changed—that’s the nature of such a story.

“In that process, the person who was offered up gets swept away. They lose the form they had when they were human, lose their memories, and when they’ve lost everything, you can no longer call that a person.”
“Then does that person disappear within the corresponding Labyrinth? Like sugar dissolving in water?”
“From that point on, it depends on their own capacity and the Labyrinth’s will.”

It was a combination of complex factors.

“First, how long they can endure matters. But for a being that has already become one with the Labyrinth to maintain individual consciousness is difficult. Usually, they get swept away in an instant.”
“….”
“What’s important here is the Labyrinth’s will. Even if it’s a foreign substance, if its story harmonized well with theirs, they’d keep it. But if the narratives had conflicting natures, they’d try to erase it completely. Without a trace.”
“Then….”

Rawi, who had been hesitating, asked.

“What happened to Lee Yeon-woo?”

It wasn’t a difficult question to answer.

“Just looking at it, this Labyrinth has a bad personality, doesn’t it?”
“This upper floor that looks like a Hotel seems even worse.”
“Lee Yeon-woo and this Labyrinth seem to have completely opposite natures.”
“That does seem to be the case.”
“Yet those opposite natures remain, as if the Labyrinth hasn’t already perfected things to its liking.”

Seme summarized.

“Could he be in the process of dying?”
“…Dying….”
“….”

Seme, who had been pondering for a moment, continued.

“…But when we first met, his subordinates seemed quite loyal.”
“…That’s how it appeared to me as well.”
“Then that means Migun was quite pleased with him. So rather than dissolving and consuming him, I suspect Migun is transforming him into a Dokkaebi instead.”
“If you mean a Dokkaebi with self-awareness, you’re saying Migun intends to make him part of himself?”
“For now?”

Rawi responded with a somewhat perplexed tone.

“Even looking at him now, he doesn’t seem like an ordinary person.”
“Well, I don’t know what he was doing originally either.”
“He is human, though, isn’t he?”
“Starting from there? Hmm….”

Seme furrowed his brow in contemplation.

“Since I don’t know what material this Migun was made from or how it was created in the first place….”
“Does that matter?”
“I need to infer the process to make any educated guess. He could have been caught up during the Migun’s formation, or he could have been trapped in a Migun that was already complete.”
“Can he be caught up while it’s being formed?”
“Even if the three essential foundations already exist, the time it takes for a Migun to form varies greatly. I’ve heard there are cases where people are consumed in that manner during the Migun’s transformation process.”
“Then both couldn’t have happened simultaneously?”
“….”

Seme turned to look at Rawi.

“…This time, let me ask—what do you know?”
“Well, from what I can see….”

He answered while stroking his chin.

“It seems Lee Yeon-woo has some attachment to this Labyrinth as well?”
“Attachment? Not hatred?”
“Either way, it seems faint, but… if I had to say, it looked more like a love-hate relationship with hatred being the stronger emotion.”
“Wait, when you said ‘Lee Yeon-woo also’….”
“You can tell by how loyal those subordinates are.”
“There’s a relationship between them?”
“From what I observed, it was quite an emotional one.”

Seme sighed.

“Ah….”
“What is it?”
“I have an uneasy feeling.”
“What kind of uneasy feeling?”
“Perhaps… hmm.”

He rubbed his tired eyes.

“It could have been both.”
“Oh.”
“If he got caught up in the process of the Labyrinth’s creation and couldn’t escape even after it became the Labyrinth, that would explain such a deep connection.”

Seme lowered his hand.

“That’s just what I think, anyway….”
“That sounds like a rare case.”
“As far as I know, there have only been about three instances of it in history.”
“I’m embarrassed to ask after bringing it up myself, but isn’t it the end once you get caught up?”

Seme exhaled slowly at Rawi’s question.

“Like I said before, surviving after getting caught up depends on one’s own capability.”
“I see.”
“Even after getting caught up once, if someone manages to retain a form close to human, all that effort could be rendered meaningless if the Labyrinth forcibly prevents them from leaving.”
“Is there really such an unreasonable and terrible situation in this world?”
“When a person falls into the abyss, they fall endlessly without rhyme or reason.”

With those words, Seme blinked slowly.

“….”

He furrowed his brow.

“…Wait a moment.”
“…? Yes.”
“Then is it a Dokkaebi?”
“You said the same thing earlier.”
“No, not that Dokkaebi.”

In this world, there were two kinds of Dokkaebi. Especially in Korea.

“The traditional Dokkaebi, I mean.”
“….”

Rawi looked at him with a reluctant expression.

“…Indigenous… those are endangered species… national treasures….”
“I really wish you’d develop the habit of watching your words.”
“Anyway, isn’t that what you’re saying? I heard there are fewer than ten traditional Dokkaebi left in Korea.”
“From what I know, there’s maybe one or two.”
“Exactly. In the first place, are Dokkaebi even born in this modern age? Could someone who was originally human actually become a traditional Dokkaebi?”
“I’m not claiming to know anything, but the thing is—there are too many human aspects about this one to call it a typical Dokkaebi.”

Fundamentally, Dokkaebi have a filthy nature.

“Though they share the same name, typical Dokkaebi and traditional Dokkaebi are completely different. It’s more common than you’d think for humans to become typical Dokkaebi, but traditional ones….”
“I’ve never heard such a story.”
“Neither have I. The birth of a traditional Dokkaebi requires prolonged affection, interest, or attention directed at some object. It’s difficult for a human to become that kind of Dokkaebi.”
“If that kind of attention is directed at a person, that’s just stalking.”
“But in the case we’re discussing now, the Labyrinth is involved.”

Seme murmured, organizing his thoughts.

“If they were swept up in the process of the Labyrinth’s creation and received all that attention upon themselves, if they spent such a long time in the Labyrinth… couldn’t they have become a traditional Dokkaebi?”
“….”
“You even spoke of love-hate, after all.”

Each emotionally invested in the other.

With this arrangement, I could explain everything about this contradictory situation—Lee Yeon-woo and Migun, who belonged to the same organization yet possessed completely opposite natures, and the relationship between them.

“If during the Migun transformation process he became a Dokkaebi instead of being offered, and even in that state Migun had no intention of releasing him, so he remained trapped in the offering while being a Dokkaebi…”
“…Is such a thing even possible?”
“Of course, it’s merely baseless speculation. It’s just a hypothesis I came up with because Lee Yeon-woo’s actions contradict the situation so much—it’s originally an absurd probability scenario anyway.”
“But if that were truly the case…”
“We’d have reason to be grateful.”

If he possessed a nature so opposite to that of Migun. If he was still desperately, stubbornly gritting his teeth, trying by any means not to fall—if he was still “human”…

“I’ll find every possible way to help us…”

There was just something unsettling about it.

“….”

No matter how vast or deep that unease ran.

There was no capacity left to spare attention for other misfortunes.

“….”
“….”

There couldn’t be.

* * *

Meanwhile, in the 17th Floor Corridor.

Lee Yeon-woo, unfortunate as a salaryman who suddenly had urgent work to handle just before clocking out.

Deliberately ignoring the guidance window that surfaced in his “sixth sense” to avoid unnecessary invasion of privacy unrelated to everyone’s survival, he now.

Found himself standing before Room 1714.

“…Hmm….”

Recalling the tattered memories he shared with Room 14 from the past, he finally opened his mouth.

“We’ve succeeded in extracting it to an arbitrary location, at least.”
“Yes.”
“Of course, using it as-is won’t be feasible.”

Naturally, I had already blocked Room 14 within my body from my senses. If I were to utilize this hidden chamber—Room 14—I would need some analysis and modification.

More precisely, I was fascinated by this system itself: the ‘hidden room.’

‘No matter how much I pretend otherwise, as long as I’m an operator, I can’t stay in ordinary guest rooms.’

The system itself was locked. How could a user who was the Hotel’s administrator lodge in the guests’ rooms? I could find loopholes and make it possible, but that was unnecessary work for now.

What I conceived then was precisely this ‘hidden room.’

“Since we’ve succeeded in cracking the files, this shouldn’t be difficult either.”
“Yes!”

Cracking game files. This meant opening the game’s internal files or execution code to directly analyze and modify data and operations—Lee Yeon-woo had essentially extracted the image and space of Room 14 from Ho-won.

Based on this, I would need to create and install a new ‘mod.’

‘Only then can I at least play the role of a hapless victim.’

Lee Yeon-woo intended to appear as a guest of this Hotel to the two visitors. I had no intention of revealing my operator status immediately. Why would I lose the trust I’d barely earned?

“Fortunately, we haven’t mentioned Room 4 yet.”
“Yes!”
“Whenever it comes up, if I just say I’m staying in Room 4, then for now….”

As I gazed at Room 14, repeating my plans, my senses detected something.

“…Ah.”

A damp presence had been caught.

“Have you arrived?”
“A snack.”
“I’ll prepare it right away.”
“Make it very sweet.”

What did I do well? the Water Ghost laughs.

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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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