Chapter Content
"No."
Day 11 of hotel confinement.
Judging that he had adapted to his new body to some extent, Lee Yeon-woo began the tutorial. It was not easy, but neither was it especially difficult for Lee Yeon-woo, a player with twenty-six years of experience.
First, learning the building's layout.
Second, receiving guests.
Third, cleaning.
Fourth, how to use the staff.
The fifth was learning how to use the power plant, but....
"Not a single part of this hotel seems to be operating legally."
"My little partner does have generous standards. Which part, exactly, is not? Pardon me, but to my eyes this is a plain labor-law violation."
He was not talking about his own work. The Operator was both the owner and the general manager, so that much could be excused. The real horror lay in the fact that the monsters classified as "staff" worked without rest.
"To think I am the owner of a company like this. What a rotten joke."
It was the very picture of an exploitative company.
"No?"
"It seems you are not quite aware that this is reality rather than a game."
Or perhaps it did know, and simply did not care.
"Of course, when it was a game, this was only natural. The developer of this game was not the sort of person with enough time to implement rest animations for every last NPC. But what I am trying to say is that this is... reality."
Assuming he had not truly fallen into a coma, that was.
"To apply the game to a perfectly respectable hotel exactly as it was... how inflexible. To my eyes, this looks less like work and more like exploitation. Might you have any advice on how to resolve it?"
"Yes."
"What a hopeless company."
"Yes."
"I am astonished to hear you admit it."
As though it were none of its concern, Coco rolled around in Lee Yeon-woo's arms.
With its purring, it was an infuriatingly adorable cat. Coco yielded like slime to the touch, and its fur was as soft as a carpet. Its mild warmth was exceptional.
"This sits rather badly with me."
Having meekly acknowledged his own limitations, Lee Yeon-woo stepped out of the power generation room.
"To bear the title of Co-owner and yet have so little I can do... this leaves me in a rather awkward position."
"No."
"Would you not agree that my circumstances are far from easy?"
This hotel had certain situations and areas with extremely high entry difficulty.
One of them was the power generation room. Merely breathing there corrupted the mind and raised the Operator's probability of suicide. When he could barely look after himself, he could hardly be expected to consider the staff's working conditions as well.
"...That was a rather shameful complaint."
The priority was to secure enough breathing room to look around him at least a little.
And so, day 27 of hotel confinement arrived.
"......"
In the end, Lee Yeon-woo hit a wall.
"The door will not open."
"Yes."
"At my age, after coming this far doing hotelier work in the body of a minor, and in a field outside my specialty, one might at least find me a little admirable. I even did it unpaid, so instead of wages, perhaps you might open the door for me."
"No."
"Now that reply interests me a little. Let us be precise, partner."
Looking down at the four-legged beast, he asked flatly,
"Are you refusing, or are you unable?"
"Hello."
"My apologies, I phrased the question incorrectly again. Are you refusing?"
"No."
"Ah, I see...."
Lee Yeon-woo merely rolled his eyes.
"...Even my only friend, who is willing to speak with me, does not possess the authority to open this door. What a disaster. And now that I have become a Co-owner as well, where exactly am I supposed to go to negotiate...?"
He had finished the tutorial tasks long ago.
He had done everything asked of him. He had learned nearly all of the hotel's functions as well.
'Even if it has become reality, it is no different from the flow I remembered. Perhaps the bugs from the game were carried over as they were, because I have even received monster guests of a difficulty level that should never have appeared during the tutorial.'
There was, however, exactly one stage he had been unable to complete.
"...Coco."
He called the monster whose form had become so familiar that he could have drawn it with his eyes closed.
"There are many problems with bringing an actual human being here."
"No."
"It is not that I do not know what process the tutorial requires. I remember as well that after monster guests comes learning how to attend to human guests."
"Yes."
"I know that. But as a matter of basic human decency, that is unacceptable. And I am human. A human, not a beast, ought naturally to observe certain lines. Are you familiar with morality and ethics?"
"No."
"My, was this the third time I had died of high blood pressure?"
"No."
"I was speaking to myself."
"Yes."
"......"
There were many kinds of beings that visited or resided in this hotel, but "guests" could largely be divided into two categories. They were "monster guests" and "human guests."
And human guests were, in the most literal sense, simply... people.
"Shall we sit down, Coco."
"Yes."
"Let us have a conversation."
"Yes."
"I have no intention of bringing any new person into this place besides myself. There are things that are only possible because a game is a game, and this game is especially so in that regard. Who exactly am I supposed to bring in here to kill?"
"Yes."
"Did you just say that bringing people in here to get them killed is indeed the correct course?"
"Yes."
Fine. He did not particularly want to concede the point, but even if he yielded a hundred times, a thousand times, and accepted that....
"Then can that person resurrect as well?"
"No."
"Let me confirm one more thing, then, sir. Is that person something closer to the game characters I know? An NPC? Or are they an ordinary human being, the sort who wakes up in the morning, goes to school or work, eats their meals, and gets through the day with ordinary emotions?"
"Yes."
"Are you saying that an ordinary person, one who cannot resurrect the way I can, is supposed to come here and stay the night? That this is part of the tutorial? And that I am to learn how to attend to such people?"
"Yes."
"For my sake, I am to drive unrelated strangers onto a path of thorns?"
"Yes."
"It seems you have lost your mind."
This kidnapper was now trying to turn him into a murderer.
'As expected of a monster cat. Does it truly possess no conscience whatsoever?'
Naturally, Lee Yeon-woo had no intention of attending to real people.
In the end, he gave up on doing things fair and square. Life was full of variables, and it was better to find another path to survival than become a murderer.
'There must be a way even without clearing the tutorial.'
Thus time passed, and day 34 of hotel confinement arrived.
"It is unpleasant to realize that I am adapting."
"No."
All in all, it was livable enough.
"It should be interesting to see what happens once I finish the tutorial."
'Hoone' did not progress like an ordinary game. Even the proper interface only appeared after the tutorial ended. And for all its unusual systems, it had plenty of bugs as well.
Lee Yeon-woo's present situation was exactly such a case.
'If left alone, resources pile up without limit.'
Normally, the tutorial in this game ended in four days at the latest. But if one deliberately dragged it out for more than thirteen days during that short stretch, the system became overloaded and several fatal bugs occurred.
The first concerned the type of guests. High-difficulty monsters, who were supposed to appear gradually in accordance with the user's level, began showing up from the very beginning. In a game already difficult to begin with, it was hardly a welcome development.
'And the second is the accumulation of resources.'
The amount of resources one could store was determined by the hotel's Grade.
But at the tutorial stage, there was no interface, which meant there was no upper limit on resources either. It was like having no storage at all while goods piled up without restraint.
From the perspective of a veteran player, it was manageable enough to adapt to, but....
"...Without an interface, I cannot know the exact figures."
"Yes."
"But the amount can hardly be small."
Resources far surpassing the tutorial average must already have pooled up throughout this hotel.
'Then will that be reflected as well?'
Ordinarily, excess resources piled up in this way were reset when the tutorial ended. The problem was that Hoone's error-handling code was poor.
To process undeleted resources, the system force-converted all of them into experience points.
'I once reached level 666 all at once with this method.'
Under normal leveling, one had to consume a special item every five levels and perform a "Limit Break." But this bug ignored that process and sent the level skyrocketing.
And naturally, various side effects and conveniences came with it.
'In a situation like this, where the game has become reality, those aspects would loom even larger.'
How high would his level rise this time?
"Since it is only the two of us, I will be quite honest. I am rather looking forward to it. And that makes me deeply uncomfortable. Clearly, twenty-six years of attachment have clouded my reason."
"No."
"The fact that living like this is not as bad as I expected makes me reproach myself. No one short of truly losing his mind ought to be able to enjoy such an unreasonable situation...."
"Yes."
"......"
He looked at Coco with an indifferent gaze.
"At times, I find myself wondering whether you are not expressing a desire to pick a fight with me, Coco. Though of course, I assume you will say no."
"Yes."
"I really should not be adapting to this sort of thing. I shall reflect on that."
It was a game he had played for over twenty years. Regretting the end of service, he had inquired about the rights and ended up receiving a transfer of copyright as well. And now he had entered the very game he cherished so much that it had become part of his daily life.
'I admit I cannot help feeling attached to it.'
Death was no real threat, and living posed no hardship. Though he had been kidnapped and confined, looked at generously, it might even count as a kind of vacation.
'At this point, it is not so terribly bad. It is hardly different from stepping into an immersive studio secretly built around my game, the one that never even got updates, let alone merchandise.'
If he thought of it as staying overnight in a theme park or a haunted house, it was tolerable in its own way.
"Even so, I would still like to return to my original life."
"No."
"How very firm of you. But I understand what you mean. In the state I am in, nineteen and as fragile as wet hanji paper, it would be difficult to expect a return to my old life. Even if I did escape from here."
"Yes."
"Could I truly live an ordinary human life? Would I not risk being snatched up by the National Intelligence Service? Would people even recognize me in this suddenly younger body...? In truth, I cannot know."
"No."
"Hearing that only makes me less confident. If this was an attempt to keep me from even thinking of leaving this place, I would say it was not a bad one...."
He murmured,
"...When will that door open."
And so time passed.
Before long, it was day 52 of hotel confinement.
"Now, repeat after me."
Across his usually dry expression, Lee Yeon-woo drew a "painted-on smile."
Controlling his expression was one of his specialties. As always, the corners of his mouth lifted smoothly.
Then he spoke in a pleasant tone.
"Hello."
"Hello."
Lee Yeon-woo nodded at Coco's answer.
It was a sign of mutual understanding. He was teaching it the language of human society.
"You are doing very well. Please remember that human language can express a great many things through intonation alone. Since you understand my speech, I am certain you will learn intonation quickly as well."
"Yes."
"In that case, nodding your head would express your understanding more clearly. For reference, by head here I mean the part above the neck, especially the chin...."
Lee Yeon-woo began interacting with the hotel in earnest.
Since Hoone had become reality, there was no reason he could not aim for something beyond the game. Above all, the reason was simply that he was bored and had nothing to do.
'If the tutorial feels boring, that must mean I am in a situation with that much room to spare. I ought to be grateful.'
If he had entered the main playthrough, he would have been busy beyond measure. Between attending to guests and managing the hotel, he would have had no time to breathe. But it was not like that now.
He still had not finished the tutorial.
"Hello!"
"Excellent, Coco."
He could not become a murderer for the sake of his own safety.