Floor 2 - Mansion (5)

**

We had just fled the Bedroom with the hanging corpse.
While we were inside, Kang Se-rim had picked up a mysterious invitation.

【Honored guests of the Mansion, you are invited to the Drawing Room.

Kang Se-rim

Kim Yohan

Lee Sa-hyuk

Han Gyeong-ah

The four of you are requested to come to the Drawing Room immediately.】

A list bearing four names.
It singled out the four of us specifically.
It felt even stranger and more ominous than the corpse in the Bedroom.

“What even is this…?”
“Where did you find it?”
“I don’t know either…! A piece of paper just fluttered down from the ceiling…”

Kang Se-rim flailed her arms around as she tried to explain.

‘It suddenly appeared right after we went into the Bedroom?’

It was downright uncanny.
The invitation had appeared before us without the slightest warning.
There was far too much intention behind it to dismiss as coincidence.
And the Drawing Room, of all places.

‘That’s where…’

It was the first room I’d visited after waking up at the entrance.
Someone had approached, forcing me to hide inside the ventilation shaft.
Had whoever those footsteps belonged to sent this?
Apparently, they’d known about us for some time. Now they were even summoning us to the room they occupied.
It was phrased as a polite invitation, but the pressure behind it was unmistakable.
I had a feeling refusing would end badly.

“W-What should we do?”
“Let’s go for now. We’ve been invited, so we might as well graciously accept.”

When I agreed without much hesitation, Kang Se-rim asked uneasily.

“Hey… Are you sure that’s safe?”
“At a time like this, not going is probably more dangerous. It’s an invitation in name only… It’s basically an order.”

We didn’t really have the option to refuse.
This wasn’t a choice. It was mandatory.
Just as we decided to head for the Drawing Room,

“…”

something suddenly felt off.
Like I’d left the gas stove on at home.
As though she’d sensed the same thing, Han Gyeong-ah looked around.

…Someone was missing.

“Sa-hyuk’s gone!”
“What?”

Only then did I scan the Main Hall. Lee Sa-hyuk was nowhere to be seen.
He’d still been here when we entered the Bedroom.
At some point, he’d disappeared. The man had so little presence that none of us had noticed.

“Where’d that guy go?”
“Se-rim, weren’t you just with Sa-hyuk?”
“Of course! He was still here when I picked this up…”

Kang Se-rim pointed at the invitation. A possibility immediately occurred to me.

“Did he go to the Drawing Room ahead of us?”
“Without saying anything to us?”
“Does he seem like the type who’d tell us before leaving?”
“Ah…”

For a lone wolf like Lee Sa-hyuk, that was entirely believable.

“That crazy old man…”
“This isn’t the time! We need to catch up with Sa-hyuk!”

With the troublesome one gone, the decision was easy. We immediately ran toward the Drawing Room.
I knew where it was, so we arrived quickly. Just as we entered the corridor near the entrance,

“Finally.”

Lee Sa-hyuk was standing in front of the Drawing Room waiting for us.

“Old man, are you insane? You can’t just disappear without saying anything!”
“Was there any need? You were coming here anyway.”

He stood there with his arms crossed, completely unfazed by Kang Se-rim’s anger.
I supposed we should be grateful he hadn’t gone inside alone.
Once again, Gyeong-ah stepped in to mediate between them.
Either way, we’d reached our destination.

A cold silence hung in the air.
Someone in the Mansion had invited us here. Standing before the door, even the air seemed different.

“…We just go in, right?”

The atmosphere was ominous.
Feeling a little nervous, I glanced at Han Gyeong-ah for no real reason.

“Gyeong-ah, ready?”
“Judging by your face, you’re the one who isn’t ready.”

How did she know?
Apparently, the fear was written all over my face.
We’d come this far. There was no turning back now. On impulse, I threw open the Drawing Room door.

Creak-

A bright, cheerful voice rang out, completely at odds with the ominous mood from moments before.

“You’re finally here! I’ve been waiting forever!”

…What?
My brain stopped.
The scene was so unexpected that all my earlier tension suddenly felt ridiculous.

“Welcome, honored guests!”

A blonde girl greeted us with a radiant smile.
Her bright, energetic demeanor left me speechless for a moment.
I glanced to the side and found everyone else reacting about the same.
Seeing the dumbfounded look on Gyeong-ah’s face reassured me that I wasn’t imagining things.

“Come on in!”

The girl I’d seen recently grabbed my arm without hesitation.
She guided me into the Drawing Room.
I found myself following along as if under some strange spell.
The large round table I’d seen before stood in the center of the Drawing Room.
Even the neatly arranged refreshments and tea set were still there.

“Come sit down! I baked cookies and made black tea!”
“…Hold on.”

Han Gyeong-ah was the first of us to speak. She raised a hand to stop the girl.

“Yes? What is it?”

The girl tilted her head with open curiosity.

“Who are you…?”
“Oh, right! I forgot the most important part, introducing myself!”

Flustered by her own mistake, the girl hurried into position in front of us.
She lifted the sides of her skirt and gave an elegant curtsy.

“Nice to meet you. I’m the Administrator of Floor 2.”

I couldn’t believe my ears.

“Wait. Floor 2?”
“Yes! Floor 2!”
“And Administrator means…?”
“Exactly what it sounds like!”

The girl who’d introduced herself as Floor 2’s Administrator beamed brightly at us.

“This is Floor 2 of the Tower, the stage you honored guests were chosen to enter! And I’m the Administrator in charge of managing and running Floor 2.”

She puffed out her chest with a proud little “Ahem!” while I could only stare in bewilderment.

‘There’s an Administrator?’

There hadn’t been anyone like that on B1 or Floor 1.
More importantly, she knew this place was the Tower.
Han Gyeong-ah flinched and immediately questioned her.

“W-Wait…! The Tower? What are you talking about?!”
“Why, this place we’re in, of course!”

Her cheerful answer finally brought the existence of the Tower into the open.
The unknown building where people had been abducted and imprisoned, its location a complete mystery.
Han Gyeong-ah immediately pressed for answers.

“Do you know where this is? Its location? Are we even somewhere in South Korea? You don’t have to know exactly, just tell me roughly where…”

Faced with the barrage of questions, the girl looked troubled.

“I don’t know anything like that either… My role is only to serve as Floor 2’s Administrator.”

She kept calling herself an Administrator, but what exactly did that mean? She wasn’t a participant who’d been dragged here like us.
That left one obvious possibility. She was part of the group behind the death game.

“Be careful. She’s with the kidnappers.”
“Kidnappers?! Absolutely not!”

The girl protested vehemently.
Looking genuinely offended, she waved her arms frantically as she denied it.
Watching her reaction, Gyeong-ah cautiously asked,

“Then… are you trapped here too, like us?”
“That’s right! I don’t want to be doing this either!”

I had no reason to believe her, but… was she claiming to be a victim too?

“So what do you want?”

Lee Sa-hyuk abruptly spoke up.
He didn’t seem remotely interested in who she was. He only wanted to know why she’d called us here.
After composing herself, the girl answered with surprising solemnity.

“I invited you here to tell you how to escape this Mansion.”

She pulled something small and shiny from her clothes and held it up.

…It was a Front Door Key.
Kang Se-rim’s eyes widened the instant she saw it.

“Hey! Where’d you get that?!”
“I’ve had it from the beginning! Locking up properly is important. It’d be terrible if a thief broke in!”

No wonder we’d searched the Mansion and never found it…
She’d had it all along. Gyeong-ah gently tried to coax her.

“Could you… give us that key?”
“I’d love to if I could… but as the Administrator, I can’t simply hand it over!”

Kang Se-rim’s face immediately twisted at the firm refusal.

“Should I just take it by force?”
“Eek!”
“Hold on. She didn’t say she won’t give it to us. And she said she’d tell us how to get out.”
“Th-That’s right…! You should hear someone out before jumping to conclusions…”

The girl trembled as she hid behind Gyeong-ah. Apparently, Kang Se-rim terrified her.

“I understand how you feel… You’re only on Floor 2, so you probably aren’t used to a place like the Tower yet.”
“You know about the Tower?”
“Of course! I’m about to tell you how to escape, so listen carefully!”

Avoiding Kang Se-rim’s glare, she instead turned to me and started lecturing as though I were the one who needed scolding.

“To escape the floor you’re currently on, you have to play that floor’s game.”
“…Game?”
“Yes! It’s the same on every floor, not just Floor 2! So don’t forget it!”

Everyone looked bewildered by the unexpected explanation, but I quickly understood what she meant.
Because this was the Tower.
The word “game” immediately triggered an instinctive realization.

‘…A death game.’

We’d already experienced one just a few days ago.
On B1.
That was exactly what Chapter 1 of 「Tower Death Game」 had been about.

“Don’t tell me the same thing is going to happen again?!”
“Oh, no! The type of game is different on every floor.”

The girl held up her fingers in an X. According to her, the basic rules were as follows.

1. Every floor of the Tower has a game. The type varies completely from floor to floor.

2. To escape the floor you’re currently on, you must play that floor’s game.

Something like that…
Kang Se-rim looked unconvinced.

“How do we know you’re not lying?”
“Eek!”
“Why should we bother with any of that? Sounds like a pain in the ass. We could just take the key by force.”
“N-No…! If you honored guests harm me, you might be executed!”

Executed?
Everyone froze at the word.
It was an unnervingly grim warning coming from such a bright, high-pitched voice.

“Executed…?”
“Yes! Those are the rules here! If you disobey the Administrator’s orders or use force, it’ll be a violation of the rules, and all of us will…!”

Apparently even imagining it terrified her. She squeezed her eyes shut and went pale, so I hurried to calm her down.

“All right. We won’t take it by force, so calm down.”
“Phew…”

Only then did she sigh in relief. Her desperation felt sincere.
So resisting an Administrator counted as breaking the rules…?
That certainly gave us a reason not to refuse the game.
The word “execution” carried that much weight.

“Judging by her reaction, I don’t think she’s lying. We probably shouldn’t do anything reckless.”
“Tch.”

Kang Se-rim reluctantly backed down. Taking the key by force was off the table.
That left only one option.
If we wanted to escape the Mansion, we’d have to participate in Floor 2’s game. It wasn’t much of a choice.

“For your information, the four guests who came before you won the game and made it back safely yesterday.”

Han Gyeong-ah stared at her in shock.

“I-Is that true?!”
“Yes! It happened just before you arrived.”

According to her, the group that came before us had already left Floor 2.
And they’d done so just before we arrived.
No wonder we hadn’t seen a single one of them.
We’d missed them by an absurdly narrow margin.

“Thank goodness… Everyone’s safe…”

Hearing news of the people who’d been missing all this time, Gyeong-ah placed a hand over her chest in relief.
Meanwhile, I deeply regretted not simply waiting downstairs.

‘Couldn’t they have come back just one hour earlier…?’

They hadn’t returned even after an entire day, so we’d finally come up to Floor 2 ourselves.
And now we were suffering for that decision.

“Gyeong-ah, what do you want to do?”
“Even if you ask me…”

Han Gyeong-ah hesitated and glanced around.
Kang Se-rim looked thoroughly dissatisfied and ready to seize the key by force the second she got the chance.
Across from her, Lee Sa-hyuk was… exactly the same as always, standing there with a bored expression.
Getting useful input from those two was hopeless. In the end, I stepped in first.

“Since it’s come to this, why don’t we try this game? We don’t have another way out… and that execution thing bothers me.”
“All right… Honestly, I still can’t believe any of this… but if the people before us did it too, I suppose we don’t have much choice.”

Gyeong-ah reluctantly nodded, then sought agreement from the other two.

“Se-rim, are you okay with this?”
“I don’t like this game crap, but if that’s what you want, unni…”
“What about you, Sa-hyuk?”
“Do whatever you want.”

That was close enough to unanimous agreement.
Once we’d decided to participate, the girl beamed and pointed toward the round table in the center of the Drawing Room.

“That’s enough chatting! Please take whichever seats you like!”

I still felt uneasy, but for now we followed her instructions.
The possibility of being executed was hard to ignore.
The four of us took seats around the round table.

“Hmm-hmm, hmm-hmm♪”

The girl hummed cheerfully as she served us black tea.
It smelled wonderful, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch it.
Han Gyeong-ah and Kang Se-rim hesitated too, apparently thinking the same thing.

“No coffee?”

…Except Lee Sa-hyuk.

Apparently disappointed because he preferred coffee, he casually raised the teacup to his lips.
Without the slightest concern for what might be in it, he leisurely drank the tea.

“…”

How could that man stay so calm in a situation like this?
He looked like you could stab him with a needle and not get a single drop of blood.
Once she’d served everyone, the girl clapped her hands.

“Now then, honored guests, I’ll explain what the game on Floor 2 is! And that game is…”

Everyone’s attention focused on her. A strange tension filled the room as she finally revealed it.

“Uncovering the secret hidden within the Mansion.”
“Hidden secret?”

That wasn’t what I’d expected.

“I’m sure you’ve noticed already. This Mansion isn’t an ordinary place…”
“…”
“It’s the site of a certain incident that happened in the past.”

She gave a little shrug and continued explaining.

“From now on, you need to determine what happened here in the past.”
“…”
“Reach the truth, and you’ll be considered the winners. As your reward, I’ll give you this key. Simple, right?”

The moment she finished explaining, a quest window appeared from the system just like before.

Flash-!

‘So this is Floor 2’s game…’

It was clearer than I’d expected. Uncover the secret hidden within the Mansion.

“How are we supposed to do that?”
“Anything works! The best method would be a vigorous discussion.”
“Discussion?”
“You pit your opinions against each other, clash the clues and ideas you each have, and work your way to the truth!”

So basically, we were supposed to figure it out through something like a debate.
Come to think of it, we’d found plenty of suspicious clues while investigating.
Had they all been there for us to use now…?
Now it finally made sense.
Especially the first message I’d seen when I woke up at the entrance.

【Investigate the Mansion and gather as much information as possible. It will definitely help you.】

At the time, I’d assumed it was simply telling me to search for the key.
But gathering information had been an essential prerequisite.

“Gyeong-ah, you ready?”
“I’m still a little overwhelmed…”
“This is a pain. Let’s get it over with.”
“…”

Once the explanation ended, silence settled over the round table.
The blonde girl clasped her hands politely and watched us like a moderator.

“Is everyone ready?”
“More or less…”
“Then let’s begin!”

Snap-!

The girl snapped her fingers, and something astonishing happened.
The entire room began to ripple around the round table.
The magical sight left all of us stunned.

“Whoa…!”
“Kyaa!”
“What the fuck?!”
“…”

Gradually, the Drawing Room transformed around us.
It took on the atmosphere of a solemn chamber where some important proceeding might be held.

“It felt a little plain, so I changed the atmosphere. What do you think?”

The sight was so absurd that I couldn’t think of a response.
For the first time, I truly understood what it meant for her to be Floor 2’s Administrator.
With the Drawing Room transformed, the girl declared energetically,

“All right! Please begin your discussion!”

And so the showdown began.
Floor 2’s death game.
The discussion surrounding the Mansion’s secret officially began.

【What is the secret hidden within the Mansion?】