Chapter Content
Since there was no answer, he decided, for the moment, to think positively.
“Nice weather.”
“No.”
“…….”
Pitter, patter....
The faint sound of raindrops.
“...Yes, yes. I was talking nonsense. I admit it.”
The weather beyond the hotel’s windows was, by default, vicious.
No matter when he looked outside, all he ever saw was thunder and lightning, torrential rain, or fog. Judging by the fine mist falling today, it counted as relatively mild by this place’s standards.
“But I am in such a state that even this sort of nonsense would help me achieve some peace of mind. If you would cooperate, then at the very least you would not have to watch me die because I failed to manage my blood pressure.”
He rolled his eyes toward Coco, sitting on his lap.
“Would not the frequent deaths of your Co-owner be rather troublesome for you as well?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll take that as an affirmative.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
There were indignities, and then there was this.
“It has been quite some time since I visited home.... Had I known my life was going to turn this dramatic, I would have gone sooner. I am being repaid for putting people off in the most absurd way imaginable.”
“…….”
“Did you choose silence just now?”
“Yes.”
“I do not know whether you are learning tact or consideration, but either way, yes. That was rather helpful.”
“Yes.”
“The fact that even these curt replies sound cute to me proves I am a rather strange man.”
“No.”
“From your perspective, of course, it is an excellent strategy. Winning the goodwill of a colleague is the foundation of social life. I almost feel I ought to praise you for it.”
Lee Yeon-woo rose from the bed. It was large and soft.
“Shall we change the subject a little.”
“Yes.”
“I think this every time I wake up, but what do you suppose is the principle behind this bed? By what mechanism does simply falling asleep allow one to recover from the more basic status ailments?”
“Hello.”
Did it not know, or did it not wish to answer?
“...Even so, I think it is a research subject worth digging into.”
The same went for this body.
“It seems to be the result of the game being reflected in reality... but that is only the result, not the process.”
“Yes.”
“I am glad you agree with my view, Coco.”
As befitted a horror game, the Operator suffered all manner of status ailments while playing. Beginning with mental contamination, and ranging all the way to coughing up blood and even weeping tears of blood.
And most of those conditions disappeared after sleeping in the Operator’s quarters.
‘There are status ailments that are not healed even by sleep or death, but that is a matter for later.’
So long as no problems arose from bugs, it was not something the current tutorial required him to worry about.
‘But this is not a body that truly requires sleep.’
The same went for meals. Food merely handled the status ailments that sleep could not. It did not require food and rest as necessities the way an ordinary human body did.
“…….”
...It was, once again, a fascinating subject.
“If possible, I would like to try cooking as well.”
“No.”
“Yes, I remember. Unless I finish the tutorial, I cannot cook either. There are separate recipes available at each level....”
He rolled his eyes dryly.
“In this case, you are going to tell me to finish the tutorial first, are you not?”
“Yes.”
“I cannot cooperate with a structure that presupposes needless sacrifice. Even so, I have been diligently attending to the monster guests. Should that not be enough?”
“No.”
“What we need at a time like this is something called compromise.”
Lee Yeon-woo did not even have the usual interface.
Now that the game had become reality, it might have disappeared altogether. But Hoone was a game that only provided a proper interface after the tutorial was finished.
‘In other words, if I finish the tutorial, my present life may gain additional conveniences.’
Once the interface opened, various functions were unlocked. Cooking, hunting, performing music, and so on. Even the sealed-off areas would open. The underground hunting grounds were a representative example.
‘And once that happens, the hotel’s front doors should open naturally as well.’
That was why Coco kept telling him to admit human guests.
He understood the intent, but even so—
“Only a madman would bring people into a place like this. I am not exactly a child, and to do something so shameless... well, I am, for all my faults, a reasonably educated man.”
“No.”
“So for me, this is a problem that lies even before morality and ethics.”
He spoke dryly.
“I have a hard time bearing the thought of causing trouble for others.”
“Yes.”
“And beyond that, when I think that someone might be hurt or die before my very eyes... my head starts to spin. My stomach turns sour enough that I feel I should go looking for my ulcer medicine at once.”
“No.”
“Ah, is that so. It seems I look rather sturdy in your eyes. Then again, nineteen is supposed to be the age when one can chew stones.”
That was more confidence than he deserved.
“Allow me to object, however. This is not exactly a hotel that treats its Operator gently, is it?”
He could lose his mind here as easily as anything.
“I may truly go mad and open the hotel’s doors to people. I, too, have clear limits, and beyond them my judgment may blur enough for me to do something utterly reckless.”
“Yes.”
“Even so, by my standards as I am now, that would be an unmistakable crime. Personally, I suspect that you, Coco, are recommending I admit human guests for the sake of my growth and convenience....”
“Yes.”
“I still do not like it.”
Day 100 of hotel confinement.
“...Enough small talk.”
Lee Yeon-woo had still not finished the tutorial.
“Thank you for visiting us.”
“…….”
Humanoid. Refused attempts at conversation during reception.
Long, drooping hair hung unpleasantly over a thin frame. Its ordinary clothing clung heavily to its body, soaked through, while water dripped to the floor at every step.
Its dim eyes reflected no light at all, and the color had already drained from its face until it was no different from a corpse.
‘Which means....’
As if by habit, the appearance conditions lined themselves up in his head.
‘Increased usage rate of plumbing and water-system facilities. Condition unmet.’
‘Activates upon check-in by someone bearing drowning trauma or survivor’s guilt. Condition unmet.’
‘Outside humidity above 60%, with rain in the forecast.’
The faint sound of rain began to mix into the air around his ears.
“…….”
Condition met.
“How may I help you?”
The “guest” answered his question with silence. All surrounding noise died away as if the air had been vacuum-sealed, and only the sound of rain grew oppressively clear against his eardrums. Water-associated noise amplification confirmed.
A metallic scent of blood, mingled with the smell of dampness and stagnant water, pricked at his nose. Moisture contamination warning. It was a sign that provocation through emotional contamination was about to begin. At the same time, the tips of Lee Yeon-woo’s fingers turned cold as ice.
‘Hypothermic response confirmed.’
Risk of water-binding detected. An instinctive urge to leave his place surged up, but one of this hotel’s absurd rules was that movement was impossible while a guest was being checked in.
His body temperature kept falling. His ears felt muffled, as though submerged.
‘Pressure of water-binding confirmed in succession.’
Put simply, it was mental contamination.
‘...It is unusually aggressive today. Or else my luck is especially rotten. Then again, bad things do tend to arrive all at once in life....’
If it were up to him, he would have wanted to hand in a resignation letter on the spot, but when was that ever easy? In a place whose exit was sealed shut, nothing could be more foolish than seeking an HR department to process it.
‘Let’s see.’
Type: monster guest common to both versions.
Grade: high risk.
Collective-erosion pursuit-type entity.
‘Name.’
[The Wet Person]
“…….”
...This was not a guest that should appear in the tutorial.
‘It seems my hundred days of prayer reached hell rather than heaven.’
He checked the available rooms as he organized his thoughts.
‘The monster guests that visit this hotel fall into three types.’
The open version, the type common to both versions, and the close version.
The farther one went, the hospitality difficulty rose vertically. The close version in particular was, so to speak, content designed for hardened veterans, and it was at that point that most users severed their relationship with the game.
‘And yet this is still the tutorial.’
Under normal circumstances, only low-grade monster guests from the open version should have appeared. But standing plainly before his eyes was the Wet Person, an intermediate-grade guest common to both versions.
An unmistakable system error—in other words, the product of the bug that had arisen after he dragged the tutorial out for a hundred days.
“Yes, sir. Would you mind waiting just a moment?”
But it was not surprising.
‘They are rare, but a few guests common to both versions have shown up before. Nothing serious happened then, either.’
If one knew the opponent well enough, methods of response naturally followed. Had these not been regular guests he had watched from beyond the screen for twenty-six years? Even with reality added to the equation, they were not particularly unfamiliar.
Lee Yeon-woo inspected the guest once more.
‘Requested stay....’
In the original game, the guest’s requirements appeared as brightly glowing guides, but now he simply understood them instinctively. Even if the guest itself was the taciturn sort who did not utter a single word.
“...A stay of two nights and three days. Confirmed.”
The standard response was to guide them to a room on the seventh floor. However, Room 707 absolutely had to be avoided. The moment one put them in that room, the entire hotel would be plagued by flooding and nonstop accidents for a week.
‘And in the end, the one who will have to deal with the aftermath is me.’
It would be a problem if either the Operator or the guest died after getting caught in one of those incidents, and dealing with the aftermath was troublesome as well. If the Wet Person wandered into the pool or the shower room, someone died with one hundred percent certainty.
‘And with no one else in the hotel right now, that would mean I would be the lucky winner.’
What if he assigned a room outside the seventh floor instead? Then the Operator drowned within a short period of time.
‘And I am not in a position with enough room to humor the sulking of a water ghost.’
It would saddle him with all manner of status ailments and gnaw away at the hotel’s precious resources as well. Above all, he had no desire whatsoever to learn through experience just how unpleasant and suffocating drowning was.
“I will guide you to Room 703.”
On the key rack behind the front desk hung a neat row of old-fashioned keys. When he checked the nearest slot, the key to Room 703 came readily to hand.
Even now that it had become reality, it was a convenient system that still called the game to mind.
“...Hmm.”
After checking the number attached to the key, he handed it to the Wet Person. Cold dampness touched his hand, but he did not so much as blink, maintaining his smile throughout.
“Please enjoy a comfortable stay.”
When the drenched guest left, a puddle of water remained in its wake.
“My.”
One of the Wet Person’s traits was that it left traces at every step. It was a typical guest of the difficulty common to both versions—one whose mere existence damaged the building’s plumbing and brought about accidents great and small.
‘The staff are going to be busy again. This is exactly the sort of thing that would invite grumbling after hours.’
As he entertained that oddly everyday sort of fantasy, so out of place in this hotel, he rang a small bell to summon the staff. Soon, employees dressed in the same suits as his own approached in silence.
“I leave it to you.”
He cast a glance at the damp floor, then narrowed his eyes in a smile.
“As you can see... the floor is a bit slippery.”
At that short request, the staff began wiping the floor in perfect order. Their movements were swift, skilled, and so polished that they did not make a single unnecessary sound, as though demonstrating the very fundamentals of service.
When the cleaning was finished, they bowed crisply to Lee Yeon-woo and returned to their positions. Watching their backs recede, Yeon-woo thought,
“…….”
...They resembled humans closely, but they were not human.
“...That said, they do not seem like androids either....”
“Yes.”
“I realize this is an impolite sort of curiosity, but I still cannot help being curious. They have no breath, of course, but neither do they make the sound of machinery running, and I cannot hear even the slightest noise that ought to accompany movement.”
At this point, it almost felt deliberate.
“As though someone wanted to advertise them as mass-produced goods stamped out by the power plant.”
It was as if everything in this place were shouting at him not to see them as human. If so, then whether that could truly be called mere spite was another matter entirely.
“Were they not described in the game’s setting only as ‘parts of the hotel, born from the hotel’s resources’?”
“Yes.”
“At the time, I accepted that because it was a game, but now that it has become reality, the structure is exceedingly hard to accept biologically. They look as though they are neither living nor nonliving....”
Each had a different face and build, yet their height and physique were similar, and all wore the exact same smile.
“...Who can say.”
Lee Yeon-woo had never once heard their voices.
“Would it be prejudice to assume that, because they resemble humans, they would possess vocal cords?”
“No.”
“I had hoped that now that this has become reality, I might at least exchange a few words with them. It may make me look childish for my age, but from the perspective of a long-time player, it is a disappointing thing.”
“Yes.”
“It would have been nice if we could communicate more actively.”
The monsters of this hotel could be defined in many ways. First came the monster guests he had already mentioned: limited to the open version, common to both versions, and limited to the close version.
Next came the master-and-servant monsters. Present only in the veteran-only content of the close version, they were, literally, the masters and servants of each floor.
And if one added to that the horror elements permanently resident across all versions....
Sixty-six monster guests.
Thirteen master monsters.
Thirteen servant monsters.
Sixteen major phenomena.
‘If the secondary horror elements are excluded, that is.’
A total of 108 entities.
“Coco, you....”
“Yes.”
“What category of monster do you think you belong to?”
“No.”
“Then perhaps one of the staff monsters outside those categories? One that I can command?”
“No.”
“Then do you truly not belong anywhere?”
The more monsters there were, the more the hotel’s power source—nightmare—filled. In other words, every monster within the hotel was a resource. But Coco’s existence did not fill the power source in the slightest.
“That may be because you are the hotel itself.”
That said, if one had to be precise, Coco was less a salaried employee and closer to the landlord of the building.
“Yes.”
“I thought as much. That would explain your distinctive attitude.”
Then perhaps it had fulfilled its role.
‘Much like me.’
Lee Yeon-woo, the user—in other words, the owner and general manager—oversaw the operation of the hotel. There was a reason Coco had been given the form of a cat. It was, quite literally, a relationship of butler and master.
‘In the end, it is still a game, and a hotel that stops the moment its user disappears.’
Lee Yeon-woo stroked Coco. As though pleased by the touch, it skillfully burrowed deeper into his arms.
“Really....”
The texture and weight had become familiar now. It had turned into Lee Yeon-woo’s everyday life before he knew it.
“How ironic.”
He held the hotel’s leash, and the hotel held his shackles.
“When are you going to open the door for me?”
“No.”
“You really must have lost your mind.”
At this rate, I might actually grow attached.