Our Hotel Is Open for Business as Usual - Chapter 144

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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 144.

“A time limit??”

Kwon Seung-jae asked, but the response that came from Kwon Do-hyun—who was dashing down the 6th Floor Corridor checking doors—was nothing but an irritated muttering.

“Damn it, this isn’t the Last Room either.”
“Hey, hey, even so, you can’t just open doors like that. What if there’s a Guest staying inside? The Manager said to maintain ‘courtesy,’ didn’t he?”
“Then what the hell am I supposed to do!!”
“This kid’s lost his mind.”

Even as he said this, Kwon Seung-jae understood his nephew’s reaction. It seemed he’d lost about a year’s worth of memories, which meant right now he was essentially just a normal high school student.

‘There’s no way an ordinary civilian could keep their wits about them when suddenly thrust into a situation like this.’

Still, for an Artist, wasn’t he holding up remarkably well? Kwon Seung-jae spoke with a smile.

“How much time do we have left?”
“Seven minutes.”

▶ [Time Limit: 07:02]

“Seven minutes and two seconds….”
“If we move quickly, it should be doable. Come on, let’s head up.”
“If this ends, do I die? Am I going to die?”
“Good grief, has your mental state really deteriorated that much? Calm yourself and look at your Uncle.”

Kwon Seung-jae met his gaze with a smile.

“There are doors you open and look through, and doors you just pass by. What’s the difference?”
“Ah, well, it feels like there’s something inside.”
“So the Manager said there’d be something helpful, and you only opened doors where you sensed something was there? Right? Then at minimum, you’re in a state where you can tell ‘something is there,’ aren’t you?”
“It’s just a feeling….”
“You forgot everything your uncle taught you, yet somehow you manage art. Well, artists do have that trait—losing their memory but keeping their eccentricity. Alright then, your uncle will carry you and run, so if you sense any ‘strange doors,’ you tell me, got it?”
“Carry me and run? Wait, hold on—”
“Hold on, my ass.”

Kwon Seung-jae hoisted his nephew onto his shoulder and took off running.

“Let’s do this methodically, one step at a time.”

Physical exertion was Kwon Seung-jae’s specialty, after all.

* * *

▶ [Time Remaining 00:27]

“Insane.”

Tick-tock-tick-tock—a crimson timer floating in the upper right of my vision, no, suspended in empty air, flashed frantically, its relentless rhythm gnawing at my nerves.

“There! That room! That one! That way!!”
“Say the number~”
“1209! 1209!!”

At the far end of an endless corridor of sealed doors, I caught sight of one that unmistakably felt “open” for the first time. Kwon Seung-jae burst through it without hesitation, throwing it wide.

Crash—!!

“Ahhhhh!!”
“Hey, is that it? Nephew, take a look, will you?”
“What, what is. What is.”

Kwon Do-hyun swept his gaze across the room, breathing heavily.

“Damn it,”

A disgustingly vast guest room.

▶ In the center of a room far from the Entrance, a massive [silver birdcage] sat incongruously among antique furnishings.

Inside the ornately wrought iron bars, a White Owl as pure as snow huddled tightly, its blood-red eyes snapping open as it pecked frantically at the cage with sharp, metallic clangs.

“Is this bird truly the help the Hotel General Manager mentioned? Are you serious?”
“No time, Nephew. Just open it!”

▶ [Time Remaining: 00:05]

Kwon Do-hyun instinctively raised his gun, aiming at the cage’s latch.

▶ Will you unlock the cage’s worn latch?
[Yes/No]

Bang!!

[Yes]

Screeeeeech―!

“Ugh…!”

The cage door swung open with a bone-scraping screech of metal. The White Owl burst forth with a flutter, alighting gracefully atop the silver cage.

▶ [SYSTEM] You have rescued the White Owl!

In that instant.

“What, what is this. What—”

The timer in the upper right of the void froze at [00:03], the numbers bleeding away like blood before scattering into nothingness. The ticking that had been strangling them fell silent as if it had never been. Kwon Seung-jae lowered his Nephew and asked.

“Did we make it?”

“Barely made it safe~”
“3, 3 seconds… damn it, with 3 seconds left and this…?”
Kwon Seung-jae continued, gazing at the White Owl perched atop the cage.

Kwon Seung-jae continued speaking as he looked at the white owl perched on top of the birdcage.

“Whether it’s unfortunate or fortunate, I can’t know what happens if we exceed the time limit. I was curious what would occur, though.”
“I’d rather not know, damn it….”

That was when it happened.

▶ Dong―, dong―, dong―.
▶ [Midnight] had passed.
▶ The lights in [Room 1209] went out. Something seemed to have changed.

“….”
“Huh?”

As Kwon Do-hyun fell silent at the sudden darkness and dropping temperature, Kwon Seung-jae scanned the surroundings.

“That’s strange. Wasn’t it supposed to be a ten-minute timer?”
“Yes, what?”
“That’s the chime marking the hour. The grandfather clock in the Lobby made the same sound. I’ve been thinking about it since the Manager’s hand gesture made those clock hands spin backward.”

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he spoke.

“Time here seems to operate rather arbitrarily, doesn’t it?”

The Hotel General Manager had reversed time by exactly ten minutes. The timer had been running from that point, so the chime should have sounded when the time limit ended just now. But the grandfather clock hadn’t done that.

“There was a gap of several seconds, as if giving us time to grasp the situation….”
“Clock hands? Time, what? How does that work?”
“The Labyrinth is inherently capricious, after all. Good grief, if that’s the case, we won’t know exactly how many days will have passed when we escape this place. The Outside and the interior of the Labyrinth don’t seem to flow at the same rate, do they?”
“Did we fall into some universe or something? Is this relativity theory?”
“Perhaps something similar?”

Kwon Seung-jae removed his hand from his chin and asked.

“Our nephew—do you see anything?”
“Is it right to ask me that?”
“I’m not an expert in this field, so my eyes aren’t trained for it.”
“Then do I have them, old man….”

Even as he said this, Kwon Do-hyun looked around.

When I first entered the Room, I was in such a hurry that I hadn’t noticed. Or perhaps something had changed once the hour struck. Grotesque inconsistencies lurked in every corner.

▶ [Dilapidated Vanity]
▶ Before the Mirror, an overturned ink bottle drips dark-red liquid onto the floor. The stench—acrid and metallic—was far too much like blood to be mere ink.
▶ The liquid did not seep into the floorboards. Instead, it crept along the seams like blood through capillaries, oozing and writhing forward.

“….”
“Yeah, even I have to admit that’s wrong.”
“I’m going to be sick.”
“Maybe we could tell what he ate? Want to try?”
“Uncle, you’re seriously insane.”
“What? As if you’re not?”
“Ugh….”

This was beyond the pale. I turned my head away from the metallic reek, my face contorted, when a massive oil painting hanging on the wall seized my attention.

▶ [Landscape Painting on the Wall]
▶ An oil painting of a misty Forest. The longer I stared into it, the more I felt the sickening sensation of dozens of viscous, grotesque gazes observing me from within the canvas—a crawling dread that climbed my spine.

“Damn it, there’s another one.”
“Since you’re cursing anyway, let’s both enjoy this—have you seen that before?”
“It’s similar to one I saw in the Corridor when I came out of the Room where I was just sleeping….”

Now that I thought about it, what was the number of that Room?

“….”
“Let’s both enjoy this, I said?”
“…I was trying to remember which Room I came out of.”
“It was on the 4th Floor, at least.”
“The number was roughly….”
“That’s not something I’d know.”

I had joined up with Kwon Seung-jae while wandering the Corridor. There was no way he would know the Room number where Kwon Do-hyun had been sleeping. As unease twisted my expression, Kwon Seung-jae added with an “ah.”

“Come to think of it, there is no 4th Floor here.”
“Damn it!!”

Disgust washed over me.

“What are you talking about? You said you came down from the 4th Floor.”
“No, no~ I mean the elevator numbers were like that. I came up through the Emergency Stairwell and forgot for a moment, but there was no floor with the number 4 on the elevator buttons.”
“Now that I think about it, there was no Room 4 either…?”
“Then what, there are places like Room 404 or Room 444, right?”

Kwon Seung-jae, having said that, burst out laughing.

“Were you scared? It’s been a while since I’ve seen you shrivel up like a little runt.”
“I want to go home….”
“Yeah, well, that doesn’t look quite as easy as it seems, does it.”
“This is really frustrating….”

Kwon Do-hyun, who had been covering his lowered face with both hands, soon straightened his back.

“Looking at it, there are quite a lot of frames depicting natural landscapes.”
“Most of the kinds that hang in hotels are like that. Landscapes, fruits, portraits and such.”
“The interior design is really in poor taste.”

I deliberately ignored the unpleasant sensation and turned my gaze back to the center of the Room. The White Owl, perched atop the birdcage grooming its feathers, met my gaze, then fluttered away, parted the curtains, and alighted on the Veranda railing.

“…? A Veranda….”
“Strange, it wasn’t there until we came in?”

Bewildered, I turned to look at Kwon Seung-jae.

“How are you saying that so calmly.”
“Then should I say it while crying? Is that really what you want, Nephew?”
“Uncle, you have no friends.”
“Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.”
“Let’s not talk about this.”

Kwon Do-hyun, hesitating, thought to himself.

‘That strange person said to find it, and it seems like that White Owl is the one.’

There it was now, on the Veranda. Outside, torrential rain was falling, and the wind was far from ordinary. Since there were no windows or bars on the Veranda to contain the White Owl, if I approached too hastily, it might simply fly away beyond the Hotel entirely.

‘I still don’t understand how that bird is supposed to help….’

I had taken just one more step forward.

Flash―!!

▶ …What?

A grotesque navy lightning bolt crackled, and the shadow of the White Owl stretched long across the closed, translucent chiffon curtain. My footsteps froze.

The undulating shadow cast upon the curtain was decidedly not the form of a round bird.

▶ The silhouette of the shadow became sharply visible in the lightning’s glow.
▶ [A child my age with short hair] was huddled with knees drawn to chest.
▶ For some reason, they looked terribly lonely.

‘What on earth was that…’

Boom―!!!

“Gah!!!”
“Hahahaha!”
“Gasp, ugh…!”

The tremendous thunder that followed the flash startled me so badly I collapsed to the ground. My legs gave out completely, and I fell flat. Kwon Seung-jae was convulsed with laughter at the sight of his nephew sprawled out.

“Hehehehe, cough,”

I’m going to die laughing at this old man.

‘This is absolutely ridiculous.’

I pressed my hand to my racing heart and pushed myself up from the floor. I wanted nothing more than to kick that idiot still lying there cackling, my foot actually itching to do it, but I held back out of respect.

‘But what was that just now?’

I approached the Veranda and pulled back the curtain.

“….”
“…It’s just a bird….”

But behind the curtain on the Veranda, there was only the White Owl sitting quietly, tilting its head at me. The child’s shadow was nowhere to be found.

‘Perhaps I’m exhausted and seeing things.’

Reviewing today’s schedule, it was certainly possible.

As I lowered the gun I’d raised just in case with an uneasy expression, the White Owl fluttered its wings again. I was startled, thinking it might be trying to escape entirely, but it merely continued fluttering in place.

My gaze naturally turned toward the landscape of the Outside.

“…What?”

It was vast.

“What?”

And it was high.

“Hey, small dad. Damn it, Uncle! Uncle!!”
“Yeah, coming now~”
“Damn it, hurry up!! We’re screwed!!”
“We’ve been screwed for a while now~”

With that, Kwon Seung-jae emerged onto the outdoor Veranda and exclaimed “Oh.” Before us, the Mountain Range rose far more menacingly, and above and below, the Hotel’s outer walls extended endlessly.

“D-damn it, a hundred something? Did I finally fall into that Room?”
“Didn’t they say there were Labyrinths of that format too?”
“That wasn’t a lie? It actually exists?”
“Maybe the bell chime on the hour was the trigger…?”

He continued, rolling his eyes.

“The Guest Room lights went out from that moment, and the Room structure changed somewhat too.”
“You should share things like that. Aren’t we a team now? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought you’d figure it out on your own~ I feel wronged.”

A dark blue sky with a raging storm and harsh rain. The landscape had become even more dizzying than before, which had at least felt minimally grounded in reality. The White Owl flying through it all cried out.

“Hoot.”

Kwon Seung-jae blinked.

“…? Goodness, whose owl has such an honest call?”
“It’s honest, right? Do owls normally go ‘hoo’? Is that correct?”
“Oh right, that’s how it goes…?”

The White Owl, which had been fluttering, fell silent, then called out again.

“Sigh.”
“Is that even a call?”
“From what I can see, it looks more like a sigh.”

Kwon Seung-jae stroked his chin.

“Judging by its appearance, it might be a barn owl~”
“Do different owls have different calls?”
“Just because I’m your uncle doesn’t mean I know everything….”
“Then what do you know?”
“I may not know much, but I can hunt.”
“Are you insane?”

Kwon Do-hyun, alarmed, quietly shifted his position to stand between the Veranda and Kwon Seung-jae, as if protecting the White Owl. Though the owl was flying higher anyway, it was a reflexive gesture.

“I’m definitely reporting you for animal cruelty.”
“Sure, I’ll show up if I have time~….”

The White Owl, which had been watching the two of them with disdain, soon landed on Kwon Do-hyun’s head.

“Chirp.”
“Ah, it said ‘chirp.'”
“So barn owls go ‘chirp’~ I never knew that before.”
“Uncle, please be quiet.”
“Squeak, chirp.”
“Ow!”

The White Owl gently pecked at Kwon Do-hyun’s scalp with its beak, then took flight again. As it flew toward the Entrance, it called out as if urging something.

“Huff— huff—”
“What kind of cry is that? It has absolutely no consistency.”
“Please, just be quiet, sir.”
“Anyway, it seems like you know the way, doesn’t it?”

Kwon Seung-jae tapped his nephew’s back lightly and continued walking.

“Let’s go then. The Manager’s words don’t seem to be lies.”
“…Though I’m still not sure what kind of help it will be.”
“Maybe it’ll lead us to our police officer friend.”
“I hope so.”

At his uncle’s words, Kwon Do-hyun gripped his pistol firmly and stepped out into the corridor beyond the entrance.

“…?”
“…What the….”

And what they encountered upon stepping into the corridor was a complete collapse of reality. Kwon Seung-jae’s eyes rolled wildly as he asked.

“What did you call it again? White Owl?”
“…Yes, White Owl.”
“Is this really the place?”

Kwon Seung-jae stroked his chin as he continued.

“An infinite space.”

The corridor stretched on endlessly.

* * *

At the Aqua Park, Hotel General Manager Lee Yeon-woo, dining with the Wet Person, thought to himself.

‘It is similar, I suppose.’
[Yes? Yes.]
‘I hadn’t anticipated this, but I should go guide them soon.’

Water squelched softly near Lee Yeon-woo’s ear.

“Why is there no meat? Meat, meat, meat.”
“Next time, I’ll prepare beef brisket doenjang stew instead of plain doenjang stew, so please enjoy it.”
“Oh, beef brisket sounds delicious….”

What should I prepare for the Human Guest’s meal?

‘Korean cuisine would be appropriate, wouldn’t it?’

Thus, the peaceful mealtime passes.

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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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