Escaping the Mystery Hotel

As I walked under the blue-lit city lights, I pondered…

Who am I?

My hazy mind, slowly clearing, told me something.

This is a false world.

There is a place I should be.

I have a goal to achieve.

But my awakening is still incomplete.

Why have I been caught in this false world?

What was I doing before this?

I could only vaguely recall that I was an agent of the Calamity Management Bureau.

Did that mean I got caught in an unidentified illusion while working as an agent?

I didn’t know.

This world was too complete to simply dismiss as a mere illusion.

The power to manipulate illusions, simply put, was the power to input false visual information into the brain.

The difference in means aside, modern humanity's VR devices fundamentally handle illusions in the same way.

How much computational power would it take to input information that perfectly simulated the entire world before me into a person’s mind?

With these thoughts, I arrived at “Barum Publishing”.

The building looked ordinary.

Since it was already late, most of the lights were off, and the entrance was locked.

While I pondered my next move, the door clicked open.

As I stepped inside, a security guard nodded at me from a distance.

How do I get inside? The access method differs for each branch.

As I stood still for a moment, the guard spoke to me, "Are you lost?"

"..."

"Shall I guide you?"

"How did you know I'm an agent?"

The guard gave me a look as if I was speaking nonsense, "Isn't your phone currently in agent mode?"

"...Right."

"They're already waiting inside."

I made a foolish mistake.

The guard led me to the elevator and manipulated the control panel.

Soon, the elevator moved “horizontally”.

- Clang! Whirrrrr!

...At this point, the elevator should have left the building, right?

Despite knowing the notion of “common sense” was meaningless in the Administration, I couldn’t help but question what happened in front of me.

"Ah!"

I couldn't help but exclaim as soon as I stepped out of the elevator.

How can such a place exist in the middle of Seoul!?

The space was vast and almost impossible to take in at a glance.

At least a hundred employees in white were bustling about.

Somewhere, a cart was carrying an object as large as a car.

Somewhere else, a sphere emitting lasers was being transported in an opaque box.

Elsewhere, a man with a name tag reading “13th Reincarnation of Jesus” was being dragged away.

There are reincarnations of Jesus? Are there also reincarnations of Buddha or Allah?

Though 99.9% of such people were likely ordinary humans without supernatural powers, the Administration caught them because of the 0.1%.

As I sighed and looked around, my forgotten memories began to resurface.

From afar, the Administration appeared to be an infinitely mysterious and transcendent organization.

However, up close, it was a chaotic mess whose operations fell short of even the local convenience store.

This work condition made me grab my neck in frustration more than once!

From afar, most members of the Administration were the best geniuses humanity had to offer.

However, up close, it was a black company full of idiots who made me wonder if they got into Harvard by playing poker.

All in all, it was a typical day in the Administration.

***As I walked down the wide corridor, I received countless greetings.

I couldn't remember anyone clearly, but they all knew me.

Eventually, not knowing where to go, I just stood still and grabbed anyone nearby.

"Hey! You there!"

"Yes? Agent Kim Ahri?"

"Who's the highest-ranking person here?"

The man, who looked like a researcher, examined me with a puzzled expression.

"My mind is a bit of a mess because of a mission," I roughly explained.

The researcher tilted his head and replied, "If you mean the highest-ranking person, are you referring to Director Park? Director Park's office is down the hall to the right—"

"You lead me there. I can't remember the layout well."

"I'm a bit busy right now—"

"Hey! Let someone else handle that reincarnated Jesus. It's just some self-proclaimed Jesus getting kicked around the street anyway. Next time, catch a self-proclaimed Buddha or self-proclaimed Allah."

"One out of hundreds can turn out to be real monsters..." he mumbled before guiding me.

After walking through numerous twists and turns in the corridors, I was glad I asked for guidance.

The researcher left me in front of a large, ornate office door and disappeared.

- Click!

The office was rather barren.

There were no decorations, just a single orchid pot in the corner.

"Don't just stand there, come over here."

A man, seemingly in his 40s or 50s, stood up from his desk and called me from the window.

"What should I call you? Director Park?"

The man turned his head and sighed, "I received the report. Did you really lose your memory?"

"The report came in already?"

"You've been making it too obvious that you lost your memory, so the report had to come in."

"Is that so..."

"This is very uncomfortable. Drop the formalities. Since when have you ever used polite language?"

"Okay. So what should I call you?"

"Call me Park Hyunmin."

"Hyunmin. Something seems really wrong with me."

"...Hyunmin is a bit much, call me Director Park Hyunmin."

"I'll just call you Director Park."

I then told him about all the abnormalities I noticed.

The overabundance of bars, buildings without drones, the moon shining in the sky.

And one clear realization; this whole world is fake.

I had an inexplicable certainty of this fact.

The director, who had been listening quietly, finally spoke, "Let me give you my honest answer. You're crazy. The bizarre elements you've mentioned are things even I, as a director of the Administration, have never heard or seen.

“A world where pigeons eat people... that's something I can't even imagine in my dreams.

Alcoholic fungal parasites, the Red Plague—these are all new to me. And a world without the moon? It's an unimaginable thing.

“Rather than the whole world changing suddenly, it's more likely that you alone have gone mad. You’ve mentioned that your memory is incomplete, haven’t you? You might have encountered a strange Being of Chaos during a mission."

"That makes me curious. According to your data, what was I doing?"

"Good question. Before you came in, I looked into your current mission. The result was surprising. It said I don't have the security clearance to access it."

"Even with your clearance?"

"The fact that I can't access it means that only the World Council knows the true nature of your mission on Earth."

Was I on a special secret mission and lost my mind because of it?

I shook my head.

…That's not the main issue.

"Assume everything I've said is true, this whole world is fake! I'm not just saying that. I've felt for a while that this entire world is a fake."

"The 13th reincarnated Jesus we caught today also firmly believed he was the resurrected Jesus."

"It's not just my thoughts. Even 'Mom's' reaction was strange. It was like she was encouraging me to follow my own path!"

"That's the kind of reaction parents show when their child enters puberty and starts wandering."

"Who even is my mom by the Administration's standards? Her appearance is too extraordinary! And given your reaction and my vague memories, isn't my age also a mystery in itself? How old is my mom? Isn't that strange?"

"Your mother is a former Administration agent. Although she's currently on a break, she's older than the both of us combined."

Just a brief conversation with him drained my energy.

Finding the logical contradictions in this world was more challenging than I thought.

Even someone as enigmatic as Mom was part of this perfectly implemented world.

There were many strange things in this world, but this short conversation made me realize.

They all had their own logic.

Director Park could likely logically explain any point I raise, thus proving this world is “real”.

...Could I really be the one who's crazy?

Did I encounter a strange Being of Chaos on a secret mission that twisted my mind?

Seeing my puzzled expression, the director spoke again, "Let's look at it from another perspective."

"Another perspective?"

"Assume this whole world is entirely fake as you say. Conventionally, the power to handle illusions collapses rapidly when the person trapped in the illusion starts to doubt it. Why is that?"

"I don't know. I feel like I would have known before."

"An illusion is, simply put, a process of inputting simulated information about the world into a person's brain."

This explanation felt familiar. I think I've heard it before.

"The problem is, continuously injecting simulated information about the world is much more challenging than it seems. It consumes immense computational power. Usually, the illusion caster borrows the imagination of the person experiencing the illusion to implement it because the caster's computational power alone is insufficient.

“In simpler terms, the caster only needs to input a message like, 'You are going to school now,' and the person's mind imagines themselves going to school. That's the essence of the power to handle illusions. Understand?"

"I understand. It feels like something I already knew."

"In that sense, an illusion is similar to making a person dream with a clear mind. So when the person starts doubting it, it usually collapses. After all, the person experiencing the illusion created it themselves."

"But why doesn't this illusion collapse even though I'm doubting it?"

"There are two possibilities. First, the theory I mentioned applies only when the illusion caster lacks computational power. If the caster is a transcendental being, they can endlessly input perfectly simulated information about the real world regardless of the victim's imagination, then there's no way to wake up.

“Think of VR devices as a similar case. Although the technology is still immature, the visual information shown by VR devices is all generated by the device itself, unrelated to the user's imagination. If you shout, 'This is all fake!' while wearing a VR device, does anything change?"

"In that case, there's no way for me to wake up at all..."

"Honestly, it's a hopeless case. If the caster is that transcendent, they could crush you with a flick of a finger even if you wake up."

"Let's exclude that possibility since it offers no solution. What's the second assumption?"

"The second assumption is that you're not yet fully convinced. The human mind is complex. Part of your mind may have awakened and started doubting this reality, but deep down, you might still believe this place is real.

“Or you might wish it to be real. Based on your description, the real world seems utterly hopeless, heading towards the apocalypse, so you have plenty of reasons not to want to wake up."

Have I truly not fully awakened?

Or is there still a part of me that wants to stay here?

Ultimately, it seems like a matter of convincing myself.

I quietly stood and looked out the window.

The director, observing me, spoke again, "I have an idea."

"An idea?"

"If this world is truly the ideal, happy place you imagine, it wouldn't be able to properly implement something you can't imagine. The more horrible and twisted the imagination, the harder it would be to implement."

A horrible and twisted imagination.

An answer came to mind easily.

I asked one last question, "Aren't you afraid? If this whole world is fake, then you're just a fake too."

"What is there to fear? There are two possibilities: you are crazy, or the world is really your dream or illusion. If you're crazy, I have no reason to be afraid. If the world is your dream, then I am also a part of you.

“Didn't Descartes say, 'I think, therefore I am?' If this whole world is fake, only you are real. If I’m simply a product of your imagination, then there’s nothing to fear."

He's truly hard to understand.

I felt it vaguely.

If this whole world is a creation of my mind, then there must be a real version of Director Park outside who inspired this imagination.

The real Director Park must have also been someone very hard to understand.

But I understood something.

Through this long conversation in this place, I learned the real way to wake up.

Something terrible and unfortunate that I could never imagine couldn’t be properly implemented in this world.

I figured out the answer to that “something”.