Escaping the Mystery Hotel

[User: Han Kain (Wisdom)

Date: Day 19

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

Sage’s Advice: 3]

“In the past, Buddha said life is suffering. He was naught but a human that could not reach salvation, but had incredible insight about the world. This world is indeed suffering. Why is there evil in this world? Why is life a continuation of pain?”

I wasn’t expecting it to be like this.

“It is because the world had been forged by the deceitful one. Everyone. The Lord is coming. Lord is coming to save you all. His Daughter will guide you to Paradise.”

I thought it would be more occult-like, or be full of madness with human sacrifices.

“Drop everything. Free your body and mind. We are heading to Paradise so why would we need to carry anything with us? Money? Belongings? What meaning is there to them? Let’s drop everything. Body? That should be your first thing to discard. There are immortal bodies ready for us in Paradise so there is no reason for us to remain in our bodies!”

Instead, I was surprised by how normal their heretical speech was. You might ask why I was listening to the preacher of this pseudo-religion speech for over an hour.

It all happened this morning.

*

This morning, after coming to my senses, I shared the rough plan with Ahri and immediately set off for the Old Main Building. I had come up with 10 excuses to give in case I was stopped by a teacher on the way but funnily enough, even though I met several people on the way, none of them stopped me.

To be fair, this school was built to send students and teachers to the Old Main Building as inconspicuously as possible, so there was no reason for them to stop a fish from heading to the net by itself.

The Old Main Building had a different appearance to what I heard in the conversation tab. There was no strange light nor any mysterious songs. When I walked inside, I saw someone who was here to guide the believers inside – he was a normal human.

It seemed that the hypothesis I came up with yesterday was on the mark, but there was no telling what would happen at a place like this.

I changed the system window to filter-mode and covered my sight. My eyes turned a bit blurry but it was still okay. 

Pretending like the ‘brainwash of the angel was still there’ as much as possible, I politely followed him inside.

Soon we arrived at the basement.

It was enormous.

It was hard to believe that the basement of the Old Main Building was in fact larger than the entire Old Main Building itself. This reminded me of the image of the floating iceberg that you often see on the internet – the one that shows how the tip of the iceberg was less than 5% of the entire bulk of ice.

This Old Main Building was a prime example. Underground, there was a small village that had hundreds of people living inside it. Walking around, I looked at the people and spotted faces that I had seen elsewhere. As Songee said, most of them appeared to be the ‘original copies’ of the students and teachers of the school.

I was spooked while observing their faces though. They had a warm expression on their faces and their lips were curved up into a faint smile. At a glance, they looked so benevolent that they induced peace in the minds of others.

If not for the fact that hundreds of them had the same look on their faces.

Feeling uncomfortable, I lowered my head but also tried my best to imitate their expression.

After walking for about 30 minutes, we arrived at the chapel where I started listening to the endless sermon.

*

‘Angel’.

When I first saw her, I was overwhelmed without even having the time to think about anything.

She had an extraordinary charisma that made me worship her just by looking at her without covering my vision with the system window. Her divine appearance wasn’t something that could simply be explained with the word, ‘beauty’.

Songs echoed from the sky; a flick of her hands created a wave from the heavens and a prayer raised dozens of believers from death.

How could you not worship someone like that?

But over time, my ‘cold rational mind’ rose back up. It might be one of the effects of the ‘Blessing of Wisdom’ that Ahri mentioned before.

I came up with two pieces of evidence.

1. The ‘Angel’ was more concerned about the outside world than expected. Instead of abducting people at random, she built a preparatory school and called the police when people died. If she was a truly omnipotent existence, why would she bother worrying about the ‘lowly humans’?

2. Elena’s Blessing of Justice worked against the ‘Angel’, even though the opponent had to be a ‘human’ for the activation according to our assumptions and the explanation about ‘Justice’ at the Sanctum of Blessings.

Those two points led me to a hypothesis.

Maybe the ‘Angel’ was just a human who gained some special powers?

If so, it would be impossible for her to use such an overwhelming power without any restrictions. 

Even if there were some restrictions or requirements, there was no way for me to know about them. It could be a ‘cooldown’ like Seungyub or ‘fatigue’ like Songee. Plus, it could even be ‘very tedious conditions’ like Elena’s blessing.

My job now was to figure out that requirement. And if possible…

*

At the end of the sermon, we came outside together and spun a strange item around but the Angel – the so-called Heavenly Daughter – never showed up. In normal religions, it might be normal for the higher-up at the level of the leader to not show up whenever there was a new believer, but that wasn’t the case for this specific religion.

I had already confirmed that it was the ‘Heavenly Daughter’ who always came out and welcomed the new believers to suppress them using her absolute charisma. 

In other words, the fact that she wasn’t here meant that the aftermath of yesterday’s fight was still having a toll on her body.

There were more things that entered my eyes.

I could see so many points that could be taken advantage of as long as we used our brain a little.

They didn’t do any physical check-ups whenever there were people coming in from outside, so it was very easy to carry a weapon. 

But that was probably normal. In the first place, their usual job was to bring in normal staff members and students of the school so why would they bother checking for weapons? Besides, the Heavenly Daughter would suppress their minds during the process, so it was natural for them to be more relaxed in terms of security.

As long as we could enter this place after somehow finding a weapon, it might be quite easy to resolve this room. Slowly, I proceeded while thinking about ‘what to do if I were to come here again’.

*

How long has it been, I wonder?

It was hard to tell what time it was in the basement of the Old Main Building. It wasn’t necessarily dark and this was essentially like a kingdom underground with bright lights and ventilation but they didn’t have any clocks.

According to the plan that we came up with in the morning, Ahri would start getting to work at night. Before that, I had to pull the ‘aggro’ and make sure both the ‘Heavenly Daughter’ and the pursuers of the religion wouldn’t be able to move with ease.

For that, I needed to see the Heavenly Daughter but…

I decided to ask the preacher who had the title of a ‘Bishop.’

“Sir.”

“Hmm?”

“Thank you for your teaching today. It was a great opportunity to think about the intentions of the ‘Lord’. However, as someone as dull as me, I would like to ask for more lessons from the ‘Heavenly Daughter’ who has personally given me enlightenment yesterday. May I please see her?”

…

It was quiet.

…

He wasn’t responding, so I curiously raised my head and…

I saw the bishop’s eyes stretching apart disgustingly wide with his eyeballs rotating inside!

I had a feeling that something would have happened then if not for my system window acting as a filter.

“Hmmm. You definitely need more education. I understand. Sometimes, there are those with too many worldly stains that are slow at taking in the guidance. But it’s not bad. Big bowls take more time to fill up. My belief is that slow children grow big. Come with me.”

Did it go well? I definitely made some type of mistake there. The ‘bishop’ realised that my brainwash wasn’t perfect! But because of the trick that Ahri added just in case, it seemed that he hadn’t fully noticed what was happening just yet.

‘Slow children’. 

Did he think I was partially brainwashed but not completely? Whatever the case, anything was fine as long as I could approach the Heavenly Daughter.

*

The Heavenly Daughter’s residence wasn’t particularly fancy or strange. It looked like every other underground house of other believers, and I wouldn’t have made it here without the help of the bishop. 

I memorised the location in case I had to come here again. She won’t change houses or anything right?

— Knock, knock.

“Miss Aurelia. I am your loyal servant, Park Suhyuk.”

“I believe I told you I am feeling unwell, and that I would take today off.”

“My apologies, but the student whom you personally gave guidance to yesterday appears to be slow at taking it in… Your lacking servant tried to add the ‘finishing touch’ but it wasn’t easy.”

“…In that case, you may come in.”

This easy? I was thinking of Plans B, C, D, E and F in case this didn’t work but Plan A worked like a charm. She was the most important existence of the religion and was in a weakened state, and yet they allowed others to approach her with extreme ease.

These guys had absolute trust in their ‘mind control’, to the point that they did not even doubt the possibility of others fighting against it.

Using their blind trust in their ability, next time I would—

No.

‘This time’.

It might be rare to have such an opportunity come by, and I might have gotten lucky this time around. 

Ahri should be able to escape by herself without a problem, so I decided to try this out.

*

“Come in.”

The house was very clean. Apart from the extreme necessities, there was nothing including TVs.

I made myself as polite as possible, like a servant worshipping the esteemed daughter of a god.

Remembering the attitude of the ‘bishop’ when facing the Heavenly Daughter, I walked inside while lowering my head as much as possible.

The Heavenly Daughter… how did she look like again? Funnily enough, I couldn’t remember her appearance even though I saw her yesterday. I thought she had an otherworldly beauty and the literal appearance of an angel the moment I saw her, but I couldn’t think of any concrete shapes when I tried to think of her actual appearance!

As expected, that otherworldly beauty might have been the product of some type of magical power.

The Heavenly Daughter was sitting on a couch.

“Young lamb. Open thy heart and raise thy head.”

I slowly lifted my head.

For the first time, I looked at the ‘real’ Heavenly Daughter with no lights. She was still pretty without the halo. 

She looked to be about mid-20s. Her black hair and brown eyes gave off the appearance of a Western beauty that would gather the eyes of everyone nearby, but she certainly didn’t seem divine like an angel. 

That made me certain.

This woman – she couldn’t use the power of the angel right now.

“There are many walls around thy heart. Without receiving the Lord’s guidance with thy soul, thou compares it with worldly eyes, thus the slow growth. However, the bishop is not wrong. A bowl that takes time to fill up is a big one. Come here and sit.”

Even though I was the student who did something terribly wrong yesterday, she was still endlessly generous after seeing me as a part of them. Thinking of what I was now going to do to her despite that, I felt slightly guilty.

I sat next to her as the ‘Heavenly Daughter’ brought her face closer and met my eyes with hers.

And—

I didn’t feel the need to hesitate any longer.

—Stab

“Kuhuk! Haak! What do you think you’re doing!”

“Will the curse of this room be resolved when I kill you?”

“What kind of… nonsense… Bis–Hupp!”

“Sorry for blocking your mouth. It’s going to be over very soon. I really didn’t know I would do something like this ever in my life but, it is what it is.”

She was extremely powerless. There was no angel nor the Heavenly Daughter in front of me, but a lady whose body was turning cold without any halo after being stabbed by a knife. 

It was over.

I felt relieved.

Even though it hadn’t been that much, I still longed to meet my Hotel teammates! I waited for the Hotel to show me the message that everything was over.

That was when a door opened in the sky.

A wave of heaven flooded down.

*

…

…

…

My soul was wandering across an endlessly vast plane. I became one of the countless pebbles scattered about space. 

…

Unending time. Unending length. Even the standard of time had collapsed in this horizon.

……

…

..

I raced across the dark space to no end.

Earth? Sun? Various stars went past me.

…

Infinite space. Infinite time.

…

At last, I landed on a vast wasteland of suspended time. I realised what I had to do.

…

I walked and walked, until I could atone for a thousandth of the sin I had committed against the Heavenly Daughter. Christ walked the desert for 40 days and won against the temptations of Satan despite his hunger.

I was no Christ. Someone as weak and foolish as me couldn’t handle this.

…

Pain. Suffering. Everything was like the infinite repetition of Sisyphus.

…

I heard a voice. The voice of mercy that called for the salvation of the young sinner.

…

Following the guidance of the voice, I mindlessly walked. Or did I run? Fly? I had no idea. Running and flying till no end, I reached the voice. 

He was on the heavenly throne. He was the owner of this world; the everlasting owner of humanity.

…

I kneeled in front of him. I will now forever serve the owner of this world. Along with Aurelia, I am the hand of the ‘Lord’, the son and a loyal servant.

[Activate Filter Mode. Close your eyes and block your ears.]

A cold heart rose back up.

Confusion. Fear.

Where was this place? What was I going through right now?

More importantly, what in the world was that thing in front of me…?

That was when something – a ball of radiant light – struck me.

I felt my consciousness slipping away…

/You have failed to escape!

Rationally, you managed to take a step closer to the hidden truth of the secret organisation! However, blindly attempting to assassinate the Heavenly Daughter without enough preparations was a rash judgement was it not? Perhaps—

No, my child. Thou have not failed. Wait for my call… I have granted light unto thee.

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…

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