Welcome to Dungeon Hotel Chapter 344 - Webtoon Side Story: Welcome to Dungeon Hotel Branch 4 (15)

Webtoon Side Story: Welcome to Dungeon Hotel Branch 4 (15)

 

Player 3

 

—5th Floor End Room

 

Player 3, Matthew, hid in the end room on the fifth floor.

 

He had thought the Liber Castle wouldn’t be mysterious anymore now that it had been cleaned so thoroughly, but he was wrong. Rather, now that the dust and spiderwebs were cleared away, the monastery’s eerie energy was being conveyed even more clearly.

 

Even now, Matthew stood absentmindedly before the tapestry hanging in the fifth-floor end room.

 

The tapestry depicted a massive tree.

 

At the roots of the tree, a newborn baby lay curled up, and as one looked further up, the depiction showed the child growing and aging. 

 

At the same time, the child’s clothing and the surrounding scenery changed little by little.

 

At first the child wore garments like those of ancient Greece, later dressed as a medieval knight, and further still as an elderly man in modern gentleman’s attire.

 

—The calamity of time shall descend upon your heads!

 

Matthew swallowed hard as he stared at the scripture-like phrase embroidered above.

 

Clink.

 

The bell hanging at the nape of his neck rang.

 

Even though it was a sound he had made himself, Matthew flinched and looked around. 

 

At that moment, the sea wind lashed against the corridor windows.

 

It felt as if something were trying to get inside.

 

‘It almost sounds like footsteps…!’

 

Startled, Matthew opened the large wardrobe beside the tapestry.

 

It was because of the thought that the Seeker might be coming.

 

‘It hasn’t even been five minutes yet. I can’t be the first one caught.’

 

Thinking that, he closed the wardrobe door.

 

Or rather, he meant to close it entirely—but he could not bring himself to shut it all the way.

 

With the lights gone from Liber Monastery and the moonlight filling the space, even the air felt eerier somehow.

 

Thump.

 

Thump.

 

His heart pounded wildly.

 

Of course, his heart raced when placed in frightening situations. However, it was because he enjoyed that pounding heart that he had become someone who couldn’t let go of urban legends and ghost stories.

 

Step.

 

Step.

 

This time, it was not the sea wind he heard.

 

It was unmistakably the sound of a person’s footsteps.

 

Judging by the heavy tread of boots, it was Olivia or Chen, both of whom wore combat shoes.

 

‘Come to think of it, who became the Seeker…’ 

 

He imagined someone roaming about as the seeker.

 

Walking through this terrifying old castle in search of people.

 

‘That would be so thrilling!’

 

While Matthew was lost in thought, the footsteps reached the room at the end of the fifth floor.

 

The sound of boots stopped. 

 

Matthew unconsciously licked his dry lips.

 

Through the tiny crack in the wardrobe door, he saw the door to the room open. 

 

‘I-is someone coming in?!’

 

He debated whether to shut the wardrobe door further, or leave it be lest closing it draw attention.

 

But nothing entered through the open doorway.

 

‘That’s strange…?’

 

He was certain the door had opened quite widely, yet no one came in.

 

Had they assumed no one was inside and left?

 

Matthew glanced at the number count floating before him.

 

Time remaining until location adjustment: 1 minute 24 seconds.

 

The time to move to a new location was approaching.

 

If the seeker was still searching the fifth floor, it might be better to slip to another floor while they were checking a different room, rather than remain here when relocation time arrived.

 

Of course, unconsciously, he also wanted to see the other members rather than remain alone on this oppressive and silent floor.

 

Though Matthew himself didn’t realize it.

 

In any case, he opened the wardrobe door and straightened the legs he had been crouching on.

 

At that moment, the bell at his neck rang lightly.

 

“…”

 

He froze in place, startled.

 

Something cold seemed to brush against his leg.

 

What was that?

 

The instant he turned his head—

 

Something black darted beneath the bed.

 

‘Under there…?’

 

It wasn’t a person.

 

 If it were a person, they wouldn’t be able to fit in there.

 

Then at most, it was some kind of insect—

 

‘They say all sorts of ghosts appear in Liber Castle. After midnight, it’s said that a French prince who died after being falsely accused of madness wanders the halls…’ 

 

Why did the words Olivia said during her research have to come to mind now?

 

Thump. Thump. Thump.

 

His heart beat far faster than before.

 

Clutching his pounding chest, he knelt beside the bed.

 

That was the truth.

 

He could not help it—he was built for ghost stories.

 

Whenever he encountered something mysterious, he wanted to uncover its identity.

 

That was why he had joined the club.

 

He bent down deliberately to peer under the bed.

 

In that instant, a pale hand reached out from beneath the bed and grabbed him.

 

“Aaaaahhhhh!”

 

No matter how much he liked ghost stories, he couldn’t help but scream.

 

Player 3 has been caught by the seeker.

 

And with Matthew’s scream, a notice declaring Player 3’s elimination appeared before everyone’s eyes.

 

* * *

 

“Aaaaahhhhh!”

 

At the sound of that scream, Olivia and Lloyd looked at each other.

 

Olivia’s face was flushed bright red, while Lloyd’s had gone pale.

 

The two of them were inside what appeared to be a prayer room on the third floor.

 

There were few places to hide there, but it allowed easy movement to other rooms on the third floor, making relocation convenient.

 

The two had planned to hide together here and then split up after five minutes.

 

1 minute remaining until location adjustment.

Players must move outside a 5m radius from their current location.

 

Right on time, the location adjustment notification popped up before Olivia and Lloyd.

 

Just as Olivia, excited, took a step toward another room on the third floor—

 

“…?”

 

She stopped.

 

She turned around.

 

Lloyd was crouching in a corner of the prayer room.

 

“Lloyd. Didn’t you see the message? We have to move.”

 

“I—I saw it.”

 

“Then why?”

 

“I—I don’t know…”

 

Lloyd curled himself further inward, his face still pale.

 

Olivia tilted her head at the sight.

 

She glanced up at the steadily decreasing countdown.

 

Time remaining until location adjustment: 55 seconds.

 

Then she sat down beside him with a thud.

 

Lloyd frowned.

 

“At least you should hurry and move somewhere else. I…”

 

I’m too scared to keep going.

 

Lloyd could not bring himself to say such a thing before the girl he liked, so his sentence trailed off.

 

But Olivia seemed uninterested in whatever he failed to finish, abruptly changing the subject.

 

“This reminds me of the play we did at the school festival.”

 

“The play…?”

 

Lloyd recalled the day Olivia mentioned.

 

Even then, he had been shivering like this backstage.

 

Because he didn’t want Olivia to see him trembling, he had hidden huddled in a corner then too.

 

Stacy had found him and suddenly kissed him to calm his nausea—only for him to gag in front of her, leaving him trembling even more as he went on stage.

 

It had been the worst memory of a first kiss.

 

If he were to have his first kiss, he had always assumed it would naturally be with Olivia—

 

“That day, I was trembling so much.”

 

“…You were?”

 

Lloyd’s eyes widened in surprise.

 

Olivia might have had eccentric tendencies, but she was not a coward.

 

Her joining the folklore club proved as much.

 

She wasn’t afraid to wander through dark thickets, and she bravely enjoyed all the sights in a haunted house at an amusement park.

 

Lloyd had liked that about her—that unlike him, she was fearless.

 

But to think Olivia had been shaking that day too. 

 

Lloyd hadn’t noticed at all.

 

“That day, we were performing <Romeo and Juliet>. We never really kissed during rehearsals, but… um… Ms. Helen said we had to kiss on stage, and…”

 

Olivia’s face flushed bright red.

 

This time, Lloyd could tell it was not from curiosity about ghost stories.

 

“…I thought it might become my first kiss…. Of course, we never actually managed to kiss properly that day!”

 

Olivia laughed a little too brightly and bit her lip.

 

At that moment, Lloyd felt as though someone had struck him from behind.

 

How had he failed to notice?

 

That on the day he was trembling over the thought of kissing Olivia, she had been trembling too.

 

Perhaps he could have easily seen her fear—if he had not fled alone to the backstage corner, if he had stayed by her side.

 

If he had sat like this, together.

 

“Ah, time’s almost up. If this keeps up, we’ll…”

 

Both be eliminated.

 

Just as Olivia was about to say that—

 

Lloyd’s lips pressed over hers.

 

Chu.

 

With a short sound of contact, a window popped up.

 

Players 5 and 6 have been eliminated.

 

The faces of the two turned red, and near the prayer room door, a small shadow moved stealthily.

 

That shadow muttered,

 

“Humans… I cannot understand them…. Is this really helpful to the mission…? They should just be drinking wine…”