Chapter 105

Our Hotel Is Open for Business as Usual

Rawi's patience seemed to have reached its limit.

"Sunbae-nim, sunbae-nim."

"What are you going to say?"

"It's not just me who feels off, right?"

"Good grief...."

Admiring his nerve, Seome looked at Rawi. Under that frank gaze, Rawi shrugged.

"There's nothing here."

It was right after they'd examined the room. They'd found no signs of surveillance—no devices, no presences. Seome spoke again.

"Could be we missed something because it's so huge."

"Fair enough, it really is massive. The kind of thing you'd only see in movies or dramas. What's with that empty birdcage over there? It does add atmosphere, I'll give it that...."

"Don't read too much into labyrinth props. Try to dig into every one and you'll go insane. What surprises me more is that rooms this enormous exist on every floor."

"'Room' is generous—this is just a mansion. I've visited actual houses that didn't feel like this. Why is it so big?"

"Is the room size really what matters right now?"

"But there's genuinely nothing. No bugs or listening devices."

Well, Lee Yeon-woo had said they could rest a bit more comfortably here.

Standing with his back to the birdcage, Seome asked.

"Do you believe that?"

"Do I have a reason not to, at this point?"

"I'm uneasy. We're not in the water here, so it's harder to read our surroundings."

"You were incredibly reliable in the mist, being water-attribute and all."

"I feel like you're treating me as a Pok○mon, but I'll chalk it up to imagination."

"Wait, how do you even know Pocket○?"

"It's a thing. Anyway...."

In a room where not a shred of outside presence could be felt, Seome said.

"Even if it seems clean, we need to stay careful."

"I feel like even if he overheard us, Mr. Lee Yeon-woo would let it slide~"

"You're really going to get yourself killed...."

Yet he didn't scold too harshly. Seome agreed to some extent.

"......"

No, but seriously—why.

"...I wish things weren't this confusing."

"If they weren't, we'd probably be dead in a different way."

"That's true enough."

All this confusion was a product of Lee Yeon-woo having shown them considerable care, after all.

"We were lucky."

"Hmmm...."

Mulling over Seome's words, Rawi sat on the edge of the bed and scratched the scar by his mouth with a gun muzzle.

"But sunbae-nim."

"Yeah?"

"That guy—doesn't his personality seem to swing back and forth?"

"Hmm... in what way?"

"Even just when we were underground."

One moment he'd been sardonic, and the next he was suddenly smiling. After coming up to the hotel, he'd put on the act of a proper adult. His persona kept shifting with the situation, pretending nothing had changed.

"The only time it was really blatant was the jellyfish incident."

"Still vivid in my mind. A dangerous moment, looking back."

"I still can't get a read on what kind of person he is."

"The way I see it...."

Seome drew a circle in the air with his finger.

"For someone with a cynical personality, he's got a decent amount of humanity?"

"Humanity? You mean keeping promises?"

"That too, but doesn't it look like he wants to throw it all away?"

"You noticed that too, sunbae-nim."

"Makes me wonder if he's got something like OCD or PTSD."

"Ah, that."

Rawi nodded in agreement.

"You mean how he scratches his neck sometimes?"

"It's not just the neck. Wherever skin is exposed, there tend to be marks."

"Could it really be OCD... he did seem fastidious."

"Does being fastidious cause OCD?"

"How would I know? I'm not a doctor."

There was actually a slight misunderstanding here. Lee Yeon-woo's body had the durability of acorn jelly, so even a light scratch or a firm brushing left red marks. The two of them had been seeing those.

"But yeah, even a light touch and he'd be wiping it off."

"That's true."

Under normal circumstances, you'd need to scratch fairly hard to leave marks like that. While they hadn't seen the behavior often, the neck and wrists visible between his clothes were within view.

"But what do you mean by PTSD?"

"There are moments where I see something like a sense of loss."

"'Sense of loss'—that makes him sound awfully pitiful."

"Not that he's anyone to underestimate."

This part, too, involved a slight misunderstanding. Lee Yeon-woo's sense of loss was largely about his formerly spotless career. Tragic in its way, but somewhat removed from what the two imagined.

Unrelated to such truths, Seome added.

"It also looks like he finds the very act of being around people deeply uncomfortable, for no particular reason. Could just be that he's naturally shy."

"If he gets shy twice, someone's going to die."

"He does run cold, sure. Mr. Lee Yeon-woo."

He continued his speculation in a calm voice.

"What's certain is he's a person with many personas. Or he might be going mad."

"Then his true nature is probably intensely prickly and twisted."

"Like you say—innately prickly, barely held down by learned rationality. Then getting dropped into a nightmarish labyrinth like this, his brain hitting its limit, slowly breaking down... something like that. No wonder you're confused."

Rawi gave a small shudder at that.

"When you put it that specifically, it's genuinely scary."

"Don't bring up a topic and then get scared of it."

"So I've been thinking, sunbae-nim."

"Can you just... not?"

"Is there something you know?"

"......"

When Seome fell silent, Rawi smiled slyly.

"Nothing major~ I just noticed from underground that you seemed to have some idea...."

"You're truly a nuisance...."

"Can't you see it as charming?"

"What part of your pitch-black self am I supposed to find charming?"

"Not wrong, but you're impressively rational."

"Where do you see anything in yourself that would make rationality fail...?"

"So?"

At Rawi's prodding, Seome sighed.

"There are cases like that, sometimes."

"Cases?"

"I can't say for certain, but...."

Watching the lantern flicker with a strange shimmer, Seome continued.

"An offering."

Had Lee Yeon-woo heard this, he'd have been not just flustered but indignant. But for Seome, a Gaps native, the circumstances so far left no room for any other conclusion.

How it sounded to Rawi—his smile subtly stiffened.

"...An offering? You don't mean human sacrifice?"

"Almost unheard of on the Surface, right?"

"Almost nothing—maybe outright nothing... well, granted, I don't know every incident in the world. But at least I've never seen it in the news."

"It's not uncommon in The Gaps. The concept of 'offering' here is broader than the Surface term. There are various cases."

Seome tapped the decorative lantern with a finger.

"Let me start by explaining the direction you're probably thinking."

He tilted his head.

"Cities are somewhat better, but the farther you go into the countryside, the more closed-off Gaps villages become. If a labyrinth appears in one of those places, there's no solution."

"Does sacrificing a person make the labyrinth go away?"

"It's more like hoping for a reprieve. There are plenty of Dokkaebi that view humans as toys. If you figure out the labyrinth's tastes and push someone matching those tastes in, it'll be peaceful for a while."

Rawi, picturing a hypothetical village, asked.

"Aren't Dokkaebi and labyrinths different concepts?"

"A Dokkaebi is just a labyrinth that's gained a self, so there isn't much difference."

"No, what I mean is... do labyrinths normally cause damage in all directions even without you entering them?"

"Ah, Surface labyrinths tend to be tame, so you might not know. Gaps labyrinths are generally much more active. Natural disasters don't cause damage because they have a self either."

"But being pacified by receiving a human sacrifice sounds like it does have a self."

"Malicious enough to give that impression, yes."

Seome dug through his memory.

"I don't claim to know the exact principle, but I suspect that when an intruder appears, resources get concentrated that way—which is how human sacrifice works."

"That...."

"It's a meat shield, basically."

He shrugged.

"A lure."

Threaded onto a hook, immobilized, and tossed into the sea.

"Surprisingly, this is a universally effective method in The Gaps. You can find it without much difficulty in regions within a labyrinth's sphere of influence."

"I was only half-joking when I said dystopia."

"Really? I thought you were serious."

"Part of me was, of course."

"As a resident of The Gaps, it's embarrassing every time."

Gaps society in particular had severe disparities between urban and rural areas. Resources, manpower, even culture. Perhaps not the ideal world to show a young Artist who might have arrived with romantic expectations.

"You can't just throw anyone in—the labyrinth needs someone who fits its palate."

"For example?"

"Specific sex or age is the most common. Men, women, children, the elderly. Going deeper, it could be someone with scars or a particular disability...."

"This is a horror film in its own right."

"......"

"...Sunbae-nim?"

A beat late, Seome continued.

"...Sometimes they consider family ties."

Father and son. Mother and daughter. Siblings. Et cetera.

"Nobody knows what happens to the person after they're offered. Too many variables change depending on the situation and the individual. The method differs depending on what consumes them."

"Different? How?"

"Some are pure malice, hunting outright—like the Water Wraith we first encountered here. But then again, some labyrinths are obsessed with stories or romance."

"Romance and labyrinths—that really doesn't match."

"They cherish the stories of their offerings."

Seome continued.

"And so they taxidermy them in their most beautiful state, upon an eternal stage. Treating that person as a full-fledged character."

"I can't tell which way of dying is gentler."

"That's natural, given how endlessly varied the 'endings' a Dokkaebi can show are. But what's certain is that they all end badly...."

"Are there cases of people getting out alive?"

"Almost none, as far as I know."

Otherwise, the 'offering' wouldn't hold.

"Even if they tried to escape, the ones who offered them would claw and scramble to block the way."

"......"

"And if the labyrinth took a liking to them, it wouldn't allow it either."

"Hmm...."

After a pause, Rawi grinned.

"Whatever traces of love for humanity I had are starting to shatter."

"Technically, mages aren't really part of humanity, so maybe it's fine."

"And how should I, a human, react?"

"It's a species joke, so I think it's okay to laugh."

"I'm not sure which part was a joke."

"If a human said it, it'd be iffy—but when a mage says it, it's fine."

Seome took his hand off the lantern.

"So my thinking is that Mr. Lee Yeon-woo is... probably in a similar situation."

"On the offered side? But for that to be the case...."

"I said earlier that 'offering' here is a more encompassing concept."

"You did."

"Being offered ultimately means 'belonging to' it."

Very rarely, such cases existed.

"Becoming one."

How that was possible wasn't entirely clear.

"I don't know Mr. Lee Yeon-woo's exact circumstances. In similar cases, sometimes people were forcibly offered—like in many villages—and sometimes the Artist themselves entered the labyrinth of their own will."

"In the former case maybe, but the latter... wouldn't that be hard to call an 'offering'?"

"I can see how that'd be confusing to a Surface person. But when a person becomes one with a labyrinth, what matters most is the labyrinth's will."

Not the will of the person who set foot inside.

"Whether they were dragged in or entered willingly—it's the labyrinth that accepts. At that moment, the person is as good as offered. How the labyrinth uses someone already inside is entirely up to the labyrinth."

"So even someone who went voluntarily—if the result is the same, it's still an offering."

"Yes. Voluntariness is just the process. If the outcome—belonging—is the same, so is the category. If personnel were used to pacify a labyrinth, they're broadly called 'offerings.'"

And.

"...Mr. Lee Yeon-woo is outright 'belonging' to this place as one of its higher-ups."

"Oh, right. Are there precedents for that?"

"Very rarely."

Seome opened his mouth slowly.

"You know what a labyrinth is?"

"A parallel Gaps society formed from some event or story, right?"

"And its structural components?"

"Uh... Stage, Script, Actor?"

"Right. Setting, Narrative, Characters."

Seome fixed his gaze on the faintly wavering lantern.

"It becomes possible when a person inside the labyrinth writes a new story within it."

The flame trembled.

"If they share the labyrinth as their setting, become the Actor themselves, and their story becomes the Script—if that specific human is placed in a position where they're identified with the labyrinth...."

"Is that possible?"

"I said it was very rare."

Seome squeezed his eyes shut—from fatigue.

"That's why I was confused. Normally, someone who belongs to a labyrinth and holds a degree of authority is, first, a Dokkaebi belonging to that labyrinth, or second, the Artist who created it."

"......"

"But then I remembered—there are cases like this too."

Rawi murmured.

"Like a... spin-off?"

"Closer to a revised edition."

Seome cracked his eyes open and rubbed them. Perhaps from staring at the light too long—they were dry and sore.

"In that case, the labyrinth treats that person as irreplaceable. Because without them, the labyrinth can't function properly."

"So is the person who's been absorbed like that a human, or a Dokkaebi?"

"I think it's a question of how much of the original remains."

"The original...."

"And that's no easy thing."

Something Seome knew well.

"No matter how fused they are, from the labyrinth's perspective, it's still an intruder—a foreign body. No matter how long it takes, there's an inherent tendency to revert to its original form."

"To the time before the new story overwrote it."

"No matter how much you revise, it's still a revised edition."

Because the fundamental structure couldn't be changed—such was the nature of 'that story.'

"In the process, the offered person gets swept up. Losing what they looked like as a human, losing their memories, losing everything—at that point, you can't call them human anymore."

"So does the person vanish from that labyrinth? Like sugar dissolving in water?"

"From there, it's down to individual capability and the labyrinth's will."

A combination of complex factors.

"How long you can hold out matters most. But it's a tall order for someone already practically fused with the labyrinth to maintain a personal identity. Usually, they're swept away in an instant."

"......"

"This is where the labyrinth's will becomes critical. If it found the person's story harmonious, it'll keep them. If their stories clashed too much in nature, it'll erase them without a trace."

"Then...."

After hesitating, Rawi asked.

"What happened to the person called Lee Yeon-woo?"

It wasn't a difficult question to answer.

"Even at a glance, this labyrinth has a nasty temperament, doesn't it?"

"The ground floors—this hotel part—seem even worse."

"Mr. Lee Yeon-woo and this labyrinth seem like polar opposites."

"That does seem to be the case."

"If it had already been completed to the labyrinth's tastes, those opposite traits wouldn't remain."

Seome summarized.

"Could he be in the process of dying?"

"...Dying...."

"......"

After a pause, Seome continued.

"...But when we first met him, the subordinates' loyalty seemed high."

"...That's how it looked to me."

"Then it means the labyrinth is quite taken with him. So perhaps it's not dissolving him but shaping him into the form of a Dokkaebi."

"A Dokkaebi—you mean a labyrinth with a self? Making him part of itself?"

"For now?"

Rawi answered in a slightly troubled voice.

"Even now, he doesn't look like an ordinary person."

"Well, I don't know what he used to do."

"But he is human, right?"

"Oh, we're starting from there? Hmm...."

Seome frowned in thought.

"I don't even know what source material this labyrinth was built from, or how...."

"Does that matter?"

"I need to guess the process to speculate at all. He could have been caught up during the labyrinth's creation, or trapped in a labyrinth already formed."

"You can get caught up during creation?"

"Even with all three essential foundations in place, the time it takes for a labyrinth to form varies wildly. I've heard of cases where people were offered that way during the labyrinth-ification process."

"Could it be both?"

"......"

Seome turned to Rawi.

"...My turn to ask. What do you know?"

"Well, the way I see it...."

Stroking his chin, he answered.

"I think Yeon-woo sunbae-nim has an attachment to this labyrinth?"

"Attachment? Not hatred?"

"Both seem faint, but if I had to choose, it looked closer to a love-hate where the hate was larger."

"Wait—when you said 'Yeon-woo sunbae-nim also'...."

"You can tell from how loyal the subordinates were."

"There's a mutual relationship?"

"To my eyes, it was quite an emotional one."

Seome groaned.

"Ah...."

"What is it?"

"An unpleasant thought."

"What kind of unpleasant thought?"

"Maybe... hmm."

He pressed his fingers to his tired eyelids.

"It could be both."

"Oh."

"If he was caught up in the labyrinth's creation and then couldn't escape even after it became a labyrinth—that would explain the depth of the relationship."

Seome lowered his hand.

"It's just my theory, but...."

"Sounds like a pretty rare case."

"As far as I know, it's only happened about three times in history."

"I realize it's awkward to ask after I'm the one who brought it up, but—once you get caught up, is it just over?"

To Rawi's question, Seome exhaled a slow sigh.

"Like I said, surviving after being caught up depends on the individual's capability."

"Ah."

"Even after being caught up once, they remained in a form close to human—but all that struggle could have been rendered meaningless by the labyrinth forcibly preventing them from leaving."

"Is it possible for a situation that unfair and horrifying to exist?"

"When a person falls into the abyss, the fall is bottomless."

Having said that, Seome blinked.

"......"

He frowned.

"...Wait."

"......? Yes."

"Then is he a Dokkaebi?"

"You said the same thing earlier."

"No—not that kind of Dokkaebi."

Two kinds of Dokkaebi existed in this world. Especially in Korea.

"A Traditional Dokkaebi."

"......"

Rawi looked at him with a sour expression.

"...Indigenous... near-endangered species... natural monument...."

"I really wish you'd develop a habit of watching your words."

"Anyway, isn't that what they are? I heard the Dokkaebi remaining in Korea can be counted on one hand."

"Last I heard, it was one or two."

"So my question is—are Dokkaebi still being born in this day and age? Can someone who was originally human become a Traditional Dokkaebi?"

"It's not like I'm saying this with any certainty. It's just—as you said, he's too human for a normal Dokkaebi, and that's what bothers me."

Dokkaebi were fundamentally ill-tempered by nature.

"They're called by the same word, but ordinary Dokkaebi and Traditional Dokkaebi are completely different. People becoming ordinary Dokkaebi is more common than you'd think, but Traditional Dokkaebi...."

"I've never heard of such a thing."

"Neither have I. To begin with, the birth of a Traditional Dokkaebi requires a long period of affection and attention—or gaze—directed toward some object. It's hard for a person to become that."

"If that kind of thing were directed at a person, they'd just be a stalker."

"But in the case we're discussing, a labyrinth is involved."

Seome murmured, organizing his thoughts.

"If someone was caught up in the labyrinth's creation to the point of receiving all that focus—if they'd been in the labyrinth that long—couldn't they have become a Traditional Dokkaebi?"

"......"

"You called it love-hate."

That the two were emotional toward each other.

Framing it this way explained everything about this contradictory situation. Lee Yeon-woo and the labyrinth—belonging to the same entity yet opposite in nature—and the relationship between the two.

"If he was offered during the labyrinth-ification process and became a Dokkaebi, and the labyrinth still has no intention of letting him go—trapping him in perpetual offering even in Dokkaebi form."

"...Is that possible?"

"Obviously it's a far-fetched hypothesis. I only thought of it because Mr. Lee Yeon-woo's behavior is so contradictory to the situation. The odds are astronomically small."

"But if it's true."

"We should be grateful."

If his nature truly stood in such opposition to this labyrinth. If he was still gritting his teeth, struggling with everything he had not to fall—if he was 'human.'

"He'll do his best to find a way to help us...."

He just felt a bit sick, was all.

"......"

However vast and deep it was.

He had no room to spare a glance for another's misfortune.

"......"

"......"

He had to have none.

***

Meanwhile, on the 17th Floor corridor.

Lee Yeon-woo—about as unfortunate as a salaryman discovering urgent work right before clocking out.

Having deliberately ignored the notification windows from his Sixth Sense to avoid unnecessary invasions of privacy unrelated to anyone's survival, he was presently—

Standing before 'Room 1714.'

"...Hmm...."

After recalling his tattered past and his memories with No. 14, he spoke.

"I've succeeded in extracting it to an arbitrary location."

"Yes."

"Obviously, using it as-is won't be feasible."

Naturally, he'd blocked No. 14's senses inside his body so it couldn't see anything. If this hidden room—'Room 14'—was to be utilized, some analysis and modification would be needed.

More precisely, he was interested in the system of 'hidden rooms' itself.

'No matter how I pretend otherwise, as the Operator, I can't stay in an ordinary guest room.'

The system itself was blocked. How could the hotel's managing player lodge in a guest room? He could find an exploit to make it possible, but that was unnecessary work for now.

What he'd thought of instead was this very 'hidden room.'

"Since I've succeeded in cracking the files, this shouldn't be hard either."

"Yes!"

Cracking game files. This meant opening the game's internal files and executable code to directly analyze and modify data and behavior. Lee Yeon-woo had, in effect, summoned the image and space of 'Room 14' from within Hoone.

Based on this, he needed to create and install a new 'mod.'

'Only then can I at least play the part of a fellow victim.'

Lee Yeon-woo intended to appear to the two Human Guests as though he were a guest of this hotel. He had no plans to reveal himself as the Operator just yet. He couldn't afford to lose the trust he'd barely earned.

"Fortunately, I haven't brought up anything about 4 yet."

"Yes!"

"If I tell them I'm staying in Room 4 somewhere, then for now...."

As he stood before 'Room 14,' cycling through plans—

"...Oh."

A damp presence registered in his senses.

"You've arrived."

"Snacks."

"I'll prepare them right away."

"Very sweet."

What had she done to deserve it—and the Water Wraith smiled.