Chapter 19

Chapter 19. Spa (2)

[19. A special event for hotel guests! Enjoy a one-time complimentary Spa visit — don't miss out.]

Han-su led the group, weighed down by a sense of helplessness.

The space was composed of glass walls lined with identical cabinets and mirrors — no, mannequins.

Aside from that oppressive atmosphere, the floor didn't seem particularly dangerous.

It was just that one person, Su-myeon, had disappeared.

'And yet everyone's badly shaken.'

An uncertain place, enemies of irrational form, situations impossible to comprehend.

Even within all of that, people had been relying heavily on Su-myeon, who kept identifying realistic footholds and pushing forward.

And Kang Han-su himself was no different.

"Was there anything… like that? Some method Su-myeon used to find the way……."

Just as the group was growing exhausted from wandering the same endlessly repeating corridors, Young-cheol asked.

Han-su felt just as frustrated.

Had this damned hotel always been this hopeless?

A fresh wave of fear crept over him.

Su-myeon had guided them toward the next objective and charted their course as if it were the most natural thing in the world, but Han-su had no such confidence.

"I'm… not sure about anything like that."

[PM 10:32]

"We've been wandering for quite a while now."

Ju-hee checked the time and spoke in a heavy voice.

Only now did they truly feel how difficult it had been — the things Su-myeon had made look easy.

After a moment of deliberation, Han-su stopped walking along the only open path.

Just as Su-myeon had done, he tried opening one of the cabinets beside him.

When Su-myeon had opened them, sometimes a new passage appeared right away, but—

CRASH—!

The instant Han-su opened the cabinet, he slammed it shut again.

Inside was a mannequin that looked exactly like Su-myeon.

"Holy sh……."

Du-pal, who'd been watching from the side, clutched his chest as though he'd just lost ten years off his life.

With no clear answer in sight, the group decided to sit down and rest for a while.

They couldn't keep wandering the same way forever.

"How on earth was Su-myeon able to pick which doors had passages behind them?"

"Was there some kind of difference between the doors?"

"……I can't remember…."

While Ju-hee and Han-su retraced Su-myeon's actions in reverse, Ha-min quietly reread the Safety Rules displayed on his Heartphone.

The surrounding glass felt so much like mirrors.

The mannequins, mimicking the group's movements, gathered around them once more.

"Could we be going in circles?"

"There weren't any contamination restrictions, right? If we drop something as we walk, at least we could check for that."

"We don't have any other plan, so for now that seems like the best approach."

While the adults offered their various opinions, Ha-min, who had been silently mulling over the rules, spoke up cautiously.

"Um, excuse me. This is about something else."

The adults' conversation paused for a moment.

Once the group's attention turned to him, Ha-min continued in a voice that grew smaller and smaller.

"There's nothing in the rules about it, and Su-myeon didn't mention it either, but……."

It wasn't a lack of confidence — it was as though he were whispering, afraid something nearby might hear.

Ha-min's voice shrank even further.

"There's nothing that says the mannequins can't talk……."

Mannequins obviously can't talk.

Ju-hee had been about to say exactly that, but she stopped short.

Then again — was it obvious that mannequins could mimic living people and play mirror games?

With everyone too stunned to respond, clinging to the hope that it couldn't be true, a single voice broke the silence.

"Busted."

***

Su-myeon was walking, following the trail of a fragrant aroma.

Following it would lead to the counter where Spa services were offered.

Walking on tired legs, even a familiar path took longer than expected.

"Would you like to receive our Spa service?"

At the counter he finally reached, an employee spoke to him, one who looked identical to the diamond-faced employee he'd met earlier at the Shopping Mall.

The only difference was that a spade was drawn on the smooth, featureless face instead of a diamond.

"We offer full-body care as well as targeted care for specific areas."

The prim, service-industry voice continued its explanation.

Getting to the next floor from here was simple.

Just ask the employee to skip the service and show him to the exit. That was it.

Of course, there were cases where the Spa was actually needed.

'Not right now, though.'

The Spa's effects were too dramatic — he didn't want to use it unless absolutely necessary.

Especially not on himself.

"No, I'm fi——"

Su-myeon was about to give his prepared answer when he froze.

Footsteps.

He heard footsteps.

The group?

The impulse to feel relief lasted only an instant.

"Well, well. Who do we have here?"

This time it was the real Ki San-hyeok in the flesh.

The exact opposite of what he'd hoped for, but judging by appearances, San-hyeok had been through his own share of hell — he looked like a wreck.

Seeing how much he'd changed from their first meeting, at least he wasn't a mannequin.

"You're alone?"

San-hyeok struck a suitably menacing pose, but Su-myeon had no intention whatsoever of playing along.

Without a moment's hesitation, he adjusted his grip on the gun he was carrying.

BANG!

A single gunshot.

But this time, it was nothing like the mannequin from before.

"Ah, f—— fuck……. This bastard greets people with gunfire?"

The shot had clearly hit its mark.

But the scream or the sound of destruction that should have followed — once again, there was nothing.

San-hyeok stood there unscathed, curling his lips into a feral smirk.

"The 'Spa' effect here is incredible."

"……You."

Su-myeon kept the gun trained on San-hyeok as he studied the man's condition.

He had blocked the bullet with his right arm, which had turned pitch-black and been transformed into something else entirely.

"So you know what the Spa does?"

San-hyeok furrowed his brow at Su-myeon's reaction.

The Spa's effect, as Su-myeon understood it, was clear.

'Body modification.'

Altering — or replacing — one's original body.

You'd lose whatever part you gave up, but in exchange, you could have it swapped for something grotesque.

San-hyeok had apparently surrendered his right arm to the Spa's effects and had it replaced with a different material.

"……Fine, what you know doesn't matter."

Bored by the standoff with the unresponsive Su-myeon, San-hyeok cracked his neck with a sharp pop.

"I'm going to kill you right here anyway."

San-hyeok flashed a feral grin and charged straight at Su-myeon.

Su-myeon barely managed to stumble backward, the black fist grazing past him.

The fist slammed into the wall right beside him, and the sound of it shattering rang out.

"Would you like to receive our Spa service?"

Even amid all this, the spade employee kept repeating the same line like a broken record.

Perhaps it was urging him to accept the service and gain the same kind of power.

"Ugh!"

San-hyeok, charging recklessly without regard for anything, drew a gun with his uninjured hand.

A small, light revolver.

It was pressed against Su-myeon's chest and fired.

BANG—!

But fortunately, Su-myeon was still wearing the jacket made from the Nemean Lion Hide.

He felt something like a hard shove and tumbled across the ground.

San-hyeok had fired the gun properly, yet saw that Su-myeon wasn't hurt in the slightest.

It didn't take long for him to understand the situation.

"So you got something special too?"

Kahahahahaha!

San-hyeok burst out laughing as if he found it genuinely amusing.

Su-myeon had no reason to sit through his antics any longer, so he immediately readjusted his grip on his own gun.

His trigger hand shook from tension and agitation, sending several shots wide, but blood burst from multiple spots across San-hyeok's body.

Clearly, the damage would've been significant against any normal human.

And yet San-hyeok stood there unscathed.

"Even with all that, this is the best you can manage — this is why bottom-feeders never amount to anything."

As if he couldn't even feel the pain, San-hyeok murmured with a look of contempt.

But that son of a bitch's bullshit couldn't shake Su-myeon.

Carefully. Aim for the heart this time.

Just as Su-myeon steadied his resolve, something appeared behind San-hyeok.

BZZZZT.

Something strange. Making a strange sound.

"You have no idea what kind of limitless potential this place holds."

A sharp, crackling sound, like sparks flying from a short-circuited wire.

Listening to it, Ki San-hyeok let out a sickening little laugh — heh heh heh.

"I took a worm less than nothing and personally made him into something special."

What emerged from behind San-hyeok was, Lee Min-su. The person they'd believed to be the sole survivor among San-hyeok's group.

BZZZZZT.

That person appeared with the sound of sparking electricity, his head seemingly fused with a stun gun.

Electricity crackled from the empty sockets where his eyes had been.

"……."

His mouth gaped wide open as though he wanted to scream, but no sound came out.

It was impossible to tell what had been taken and from where.

His identity as a human being — destroyed.

"W-wait!"

Su-myeon shouted, but as if he couldn't hear, the ruined Min-su charged at him.

The Nemean Hide blocked physical impacts well, but whether it could stop electricity was another question entirely.

Su-myeon had never seen a monster assembled from a destroyed human like this before!

"What the hell did you do to him?!"

All Su-myeon could do right now was run.

He dodged through the glass panels and cabinets scattered everywhere, and the ruined Min-su smashed through everything in pursuit.

Without eyes, he lacked precision, but he was chasing Su-myeon by sound.

CRASH! CRASH!

"Ahahahaha! Go on — it's a mouse hunt! Go! Kill him!"

San-hyeok howled with laughter, screaming orders at Min-su.

Like a hunter loosing a hound.

The surroundings were being steadily destroyed, shrinking the space Su-myeon had to maneuver.

But San-hyeok noticed something — the more cornered Su-myeon became, the more his expression shifted. Not toward panic, but toward growing certainty.

'Why?'

What was he scheming now?

San-hyeok should be the one who had best exploited and adapted to this hellhole.

So why was that unremarkable nobody wearing such a confident expression?

THUD!

Min-su charged again and collided with a wall, crashing to the floor.

Su-myeon dodged past him and felt his suspicion confirmed.

Whatever had been done to modify Min-su, it was clear he no longer had any will of his own.

Su-myeon spoke firmly to San-hyeok, the man radiating an incomprehensible degree of hostility.

"How much do you think you actually know about this place?"

What?

Before San-hyeok could even process the question,

THWACK.

A dull impact to the back of his skull was the last thing he felt before he pitched forward.

"……Are you all right?"

Behind the fallen San-hyeok stood Han-su, breathless and gripping a hatchet.

Clumps of hair and blood clung gruesomely to the blade that had struck San-hyeok's skull.

***

The group was finally able to reunite with Su-myeon.

Min-su, who had been under San-hyeok's control, was huddled in a corner, motionless.

"Are you hurt anywhere?"

"No, well. For now, I'm fine."

Su-myeon nodded in response to Ju-hee's concern.

Rubbing his brow against the exhaustion that made him want to collapse and sleep right there, Su-myeon stood up.

Min-su, trembling in a corner with his broken body.

It weighed on his conscience to just leave him like that, so Su-myeon tapped on the counter.

"Can you restore that guest's original body?"

The spade employee behind the counter glanced over and answered in a regretful, deflated voice.

"Were you unsatisfied with the service?"

"Yes, he says he preferred the original."

The spade employee fiddled with a computer for a moment, then spoke.

"Hmm… in the case of a reversal due to a change of mind, it would count as an additional session."

"Can you deduct it from my session count instead?"

"I'm sorry, but transfers aren't possible."

No other choice, then.

Su-myeon showed his voucher, which still had tens of millions of won remaining.

"Payment on someone's behalf is possible. However… this might be difficult."

"Why?"

"The brain has already been purchased by the Mad Hatter, and the eyes were purchased by the Red Queen."