Our Hotel Is Open for Business as Usual - Chapter 45

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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 45.

CRASH!!

“…!!”

My body slammed into the floor in an instant.

‘What kind of force….’

My ankle felt as though the skin would tear away. Caught in a vise-like pressure as if gripped by steel pincers, I had no time to scream before being dragged across the floor, my fingers clawing desperately against it.

“Ugh, wait…!!”

SCREEEECH—!!

‘This insane Hotel.’

Even as I was being dragged, the doorframe of Room 1814 came into view.

I reflexively grabbed for it. Or rather, it was less reflexive than automatic—a predetermined sequence from a cutscene. I knew exactly what came next.

The door would descend like a guillotine blade, swift and merciless from top to bottom.

Ah….

‘This is maddening.’

CRUNCH—!!

“…!”

A horrific sound of rupture.

My arm convulsed. The sensation of my wrist severing felt vivid and real.

The door slammed shut with a violent crash, and my right hand was caught between the closing edges. My body was dragged in the opposite direction, tearing away cleanly. The severed hand remained alone in the Corridor.

That gruesome scene—I witnessed it. Blood flowing through the gap where the door had vanished, and the hand left behind.

“….”

Thud, crunch—!!

“…ah….”

Even as I was dragged helplessly, I marveled at the phenomenon. It was one of my hypotheses, but to think that the user’s perspective could be projected onto reality, allowing me to perceive scenes from angles that should remain invisible. Truly bizarre.

This too must be part of the Hotel’s mechanism. If I analyze it properly later, I could put it to excellent use….

“Ting.”
“I know this isn’t the time, Coco.”

My body was being dragged at tremendous speed.

Fortunately, game logic spared my clothes from tearing despite the friction against the floor. But if I wasted any more time, it would truly be game over. The owner of this hand would kill me.

‘I cannot afford any more deaths and revivals. I must escape this grip. According to the game’s rules, the mechanism should activate soon….’

I rolled my eyes, scanning the dim landscape flashing past. Within that darkness, crimson gazes gleamed intermittently.

And finally, I spotted it—

—a lever.

‘If I pull that…’

I pulled it.

Click,

“Ah.”

Boom—!!
Crash!!

“―…!!”

I gasped for breath.

My back slammed violently against the isolation shutter that descended in an instant. I had been hoisted upward only to be hurled down midway. Without thinking, my grip on Coco loosened.

My back tingled and my arms trembled. Separate from merely perceiving “pain” as “information,” a groan escaped unbidden from my lips.

“Ugh, ah…!”

Thud!

Bouncing off the shutter, I crashed face-first onto the floor again.

“This….”

What manner of ordeal was this?

‘Like a child’s toy bound by rubber bands.’

An unbearable revulsion welled up within me. My body swaying mechanically against my will—I despised it. Even for a frame as fragile as tissue paper, this crossed far too many lines.

With trembling arms, I pushed against the floor, straining to support my upper body.

“…Yes, fine….”

Between my ragged breaths, the metallic scent of blood mingled in. Now then, let me regain my composure.

“…I perceive pain, yet feel no suffering. This paradox confuses one each time it occurs. Does it not?”
“No?”
“A wretched cat, truly.”
“No!”
“Ha….”

My ankle throbbed. I “registered” it as such. When I glanced down, I saw several blood-soaked fingers embedded deep into my own ankle.

Lee Yeon-woo stared quietly at the grotesquely elongated arm extending from those fingers. Sitting collapsed on the floor, I surveyed the bizarre appendage with an emotionless gaze.

‘It’s been severed.’

The shutter descended and was severed in a single, clean stroke. A hollow laugh escaped me.

“Haha.”
“….”
“…You’re in the same predicament as I am.”

CRASH―!! BANG!! SCREECH!!

As if in response, violent noise erupted from beyond the shutter.

Despite the iron door’s considerable thickness, the vibrations transmitted through completely. The path back beyond that barrier was now utterly sealed off. Swallowing the mounting fatigue that threatened to overwhelm me, Lee Yeon-woo exhaled slowly.

“….”

I stared at the translucent interface window suspended in the air before me.

“I thought I’d made adequate preparations.”

Inventory. A space where I could store and retrieve objects I recognized as ‘items’.

“It seems all my preparations may have been for nothing.”
“No!”
“Is that so?”

Even with such a useful function, variables always exceeded imagination.

Originally, in event situations like this, there were virtually no methods to attack monsters. I’d brought what weapons I could, hoping things might be different now that this had become reality, but the situation was far more dire than anticipated.

‘No, I’ve thought this through thoroughly.’

I simply lacked the capital to procure anything better.

‘Even if I can’t use them as direct weapons, I can certainly find other uses for them.’
“Are you there?”
“I’m fine. Come here.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”

I reached out with trembling hands and pulled Coco back into my arms. Cradling the soft, silken bundle against my chest, I slowly pushed myself upright. My severely weakened body swayed.

A deformed arm connected to fingers embedded in one ankle dragged across the floor like a shackle.

“This is ridiculous….”

I clicked my tongue and shook my foot lightly to dislodge it.

Perhaps because my body was so soft and malleable, the monster’s fingers that had been deeply embedded came free surprisingly easily. Though as a result, my ankle was now half severed as well.

‘The smell of blood is intense.’

I looked down at my ankle. Coco’s gaze followed mine downward. As I stared quietly at the blood gushing and spurting from there, I furrowed my brow slightly.

‘No, it’s not coming from there.’

Plink….

Something was dripping from a point distinctly higher than my ankle. Clear crimson drops marked the floor. When I touched my forehead, a sticky, slick sensation ran down my fingers.

My forehead wasn’t cracked open.

“….”

…Ah, something felt wrong with the back of my head.

My back was thoroughly soaked as well. Even amid the extreme confusion, an ominous certainty gripped me. I asked Coco for a moment’s patience.

“One moment.”
“Yes.”

I tucked Coco under one arm and felt the back of my neck with my free hand.

“Oh no.”

All my hand touched was blood.

“There was no such scene in the cutscene.”
“Yes.”
“I suppose I’ve grown too weak after all?”
“Yes.”
“You have no talent for softening words.”
“Yes?”
“Yes.”

In the original cutscene, all that happened was colliding with the shutter and falling before getting back up. There was never a situation where half my body turned to pulp.

Not under an intact game system.

“Having a body that crudely mimics a human form certainly creates troublesome complications.”

In truth, calling it a mimicry of humanity was embarrassing. Since my very composition was blood, any impact of this magnitude caused my bodily structure to collapse and scatter.

“Let me see….”

Fortunately, enough blood remained to maintain my form.

Lee Yeon-woo began filling the empty spaces using blood magic. As time passed, the hollow back of my head and spine gradually filled in.

With the torn pocket sewn shut, there would be no further leakage.

‘Or should I call it blood loss?’

Either way, there was little difference in terms of system deficiency.

“I’m nothing but an empty shell at this point.”
“Yes.”
“A human empty shell—I must truly be insane.”
“Yes.”

At this point, it seemed Coco actually understood what was being agreed to.

“….”
“Hello?”
“…I’m running low on blood.”
“Yes.”
“Is there truly no way forward except to set aside my human dignity for a moment?”
“…? Hello?”
“I’m hardly doing well. My blood supply is critically insufficient.”
“Manager’s Quarters. Bedroom. Rest.”
“I’m aware of that.”

Sleep once in the Manager’s Quarters and wake, and my depleted blood would be restored.

But now, I couldn’t leave until I completed the game in Room 14. My life, already flickering like a candle in the wind, was on the verge of extinguishing entirely.

‘Then truly, my options are….’

I gazed at the blood-soaked floor.

“….”

I looked at the shutter rattling with each impact.

“….”

And I surveyed the dim surroundings.

“…Do you know what crossed my mind just then?”
“Yes.”
“A grave conflict of values emerged beneath the fundamental premise that I must preserve my humanity. Dignity is an essential element of being human, yet no matter how dire my circumstances, I questioned whether lapping up my own blood from the floor could truly be justified. That was my dilemma.”
“….”
“But if my life hangs by a thread, if this form deteriorates further after death, what use is such dignity? I cannot descend deeper into ruin merely to preserve dignity. Am I simply being stubborn?”
“….”
“Only at times like this do you clam up like a ghost.”

I added with a sigh.

“The shutter will break through soon.”

Yes, dignity or not, my immediate priority was escaping this place.

Picking up blood from the floor was hardly a wise choice. Not only would impurities dilute its potency, but licking it clean from the ground would consume far too much time.

Before I could even finish collecting enough blood, the creature that had smashed through the shutter would devour me first.

“If only I had completely mastered the blood-drinking technique.”

There were levels to the art of blood consumption. As a novice who had merely succeeded in the Red Heart Experiment ritual through sheer luck, Lee Yeon-woo had only mastered the primitive method of direct oral intake.

“….”

Oral intake, then.

“It’s not an immediately fatal situation, at least.”
“Yes.”
“Quite right.”

My phone battery still had about 71% remaining. A 29% deficit wouldn’t cause an immediate shutdown. If I rationed it carefully, I could survive several more hours.

‘It’s merely an inconvenience—my compulsive need to keep the battery above 90% at all times.’

The sporadic coughing and nausea that erupted whenever I thought things were improving posed a real problem, but completing the event to its end left me with no other choice at present.

Lee Yeon-woo adjusted Coco in my arms. She felt soggy.

“There is a method, however.”
“A person?”
“No, I must decline that option.”
“Meow.”
“And I suspect the other party would decline me as well.”
“Meow.”
“The Facility has blood packs.”

Packs containing fresh blood.

“Finding them shouldn’t prove difficult. They’re along the path we’ll be taking anyway.”

In the game, they served as bait items to lure pursuers in the latter half of the playthrough. For the sake of dignity, targeting those would have been the better choice.

“Well, now that the situation is settled, shall we drop the act?”
“Pardon?”
“It’s time….”

I swept my gaze across the surroundings.

“….”
“I have work to do.”

Countless holes riddled the walls.

Beyond them, eyes watched Lee Yeon-woo intently.

* * *

14th Floor, Central Control Room.

“This is the sector that controlled all the unethical experiments and rituals conducted within the building. The benefits of obtaining authority over the Central Control Room are substantial, but the dangers are proportionally significant.”

Lee Yeon-woo added as if posing the question to Coco nestled in my arms.

“Wouldn’t you agree?”
“Yes.”

I walked through the corridor shrouded in thick darkness. The room lay in profound silence, yet beyond the countless holes puncturing the walls, innumerable eyes fixed upon Lee Yeon-woo with relentless intensity.

“The true identity of the playable character is a question I myself have pondered for a long time.”

Human or spirit? Or merely a monster? What causal connection bound it to this Hotel?

“The developer answered that it was up to the player’s interpretation. A frustratingly vague response. Despite knowing this game for over twenty years, I still haven’t reached a conclusion.”
“Yes?”
“The Hotel’s reaction to the character is excessively contradictory. At times it attacks with hostility, yet at other times it defends in ways that defy understanding. Sometimes it displays an utterly neutral stance.”
“Yes!”
“That’s precisely what makes it so enigmatic. What exactly was the Hotel General Manager in the Hotel’s history?”

Lee Yeon-woo stared into the Wall Holes.

“But whenever I encounter such a sight…”
“….”
“…I can’t help but wonder if I myself might have been one of the perpetrators.”

From within the wall hole, beyond the fractured gap, a gaze fixed upon him.

The vivid things within that gaze bore down upon him like a blade splitting through entrails. Screams saturated with terror and agony, with anguished cries. Without a single sound. Without any words, without any form of language.

Without even the bestial wails of animals, they were screaming such silent screams at Lee Yeon-woo.

“It creates an unsettling sensation, as though the victims of the past are watching me from within this sealed room. I cannot discern whether those eyes plead for help or pour forth resentment.”

A noise echoed from somewhere. Lee Yeon-woo used that mechanical sound as a waypoint to guide his steps.

“Yet when I actually open the door and step inside…”

The interior of the room beyond the iron door.

“There is nothing within.”
“Yes.”

As though the gazes that had poured forth moments before were illusions, as though the bloodshot eyes were mere delusions, the room stood empty.

Only an old, dust-laden cathode ray tube television sat in the silence.

“It doesn’t function, as expected.”

In the game, it had been a background object incapable of interaction. Reality changed nothing about that.

“Yet isn’t that fortunate? Even though this has become reality, I remember every path through this labyrinth. When I first entered the Room 14 event, I died quite a number of times because of this vicious structure.”
“Yes.”
“Do you remember? That’s quite remarkable….”
“Yes.”
“Moments like these remind me that you are a being who has walked alongside me for twenty-six years.”

A space where similar rooms connected infinitely. Every crack in the walls teemed with groaning eyes. The only clue was to follow the television’s noise.

‘Now that this is reality, this part is actually easier.’

By now I could navigate the path silently, memorizing every turn—but during the game, it had been quite the ordeal. The difficulty of listening varied wildly depending on the device’s performance and audio settings.

And when I reached the end of that path….

“Ah, that’s right.”
“….”
“You’ve arrived.”

All sound cut off in an instant.

A cathode ray tube television sat in the center of the room, a chair facing it, and a remote control resting on the seat. I brushed away the dust that had accumulated on the chair and sat down.

I gripped the remote and fixed my gaze on the screen.

“Well then, shall we begin.”

[Welcome, Hotel General Manager.]

It was time for the mini-game.

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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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