episode_0016

How long had we been standing there like that?

As we stood there, lost in our thoughts, we suddenly heard the lazy voice of the staff member behind us.

“Alright. Now, let me explain the rules to you…. You must follow them closely, so pay attention. Listen carefully….”

Gulp.

The captivating tone of the voice made us involuntarily focus.

In the quiet room, the sound of the staff member’s footsteps echoed loudly on the floor.

“As you saw in the entrance notice… you must keep the experiences from the escape room cafe a secret…. Especially if you leak the solutions to tricks, puzzles, or codes… you could face legal consequences….”

“And, do not damage the props by trying to solve the puzzles….”

We heard a lot of cautionary instructions about not engaging in any behavior that could cause problems.

Since the escape room cafe is a place where you solve puzzles and quizzes with your mind,

such warnings are definitely necessary.

“Now…. please remove your blindfolds….”

Finally, we could take off our blindfolds and look around.

For a horror-themed room, it was surprisingly well-maintained with an old-fashioned Western-style interior.

I had imagined a room in shambles.

As we looked around the room, the staff member returned to us and handed us a paper with the story of the room written on it.

“This room… used to be a cute girl’s room… she really liked the doll she received as a birthday present….”

The staff member kindly recited the story to us.

Still, his gentle voice had a certain power to it, definitely enhancing our understanding.

“But… the following year, when the girl received another doll as a gift… she abandoned the one she already had and only played with the new doll….”

It was a cliché story, but it had a strong impact.

The story of the abandoned doll turning hostile towards humans.

It felt like a common story we had heard somewhere before.

“But the doll loved the girl too much… loved her, and loved her….”

“The unrequited love of the doll….”

“…led to its destruction.”

As the staff member finished speaking, the room suddenly went dark with a thud, and we couldn’t see anything.

What kind of production is this? I was surprised too.

“Ahh!”

“Eek!”

Startled by a loud noise,

an unknown scream pierced our ears.

As our eyes adjusted to the darkness. Suddenly, the mood changed completely, with a faint red light illuminating the room.

Just the change in color made the atmosphere feel completely different.

The staff member had disappeared without a trace,

and a timer for 60 minutes appeared on the wall.

A voice from the speaker in the corner of the room jolted us out of our daze.

Crackle.

“You are… the six investigators here to uncover the truth of what happened in this room….”

“…60-minute time limit…. Enjoy your time….”

Thud.

As the staff member’s announcement ended, the timer on the wall aggressively started counting down to 59 minutes.

At the same time, eerie music filled the room.

The melody sent shivers down our spines.

This is quite immersive, just like a famous escape room cafe.

I looked around.

First, I removed the Hongyeonseo clinging to my arm.

This guy, for a fitness enthusiast, had a surprisingly soft body, which felt nice… but this was not the time for that.

Ahem. Then, I checked on the others.

Isea was almost back to normal, catching her breath, while Seong Yurin and Lee So-yoon were huddled together, unsure of what to do.

…And, I saw Yoon Ji-woo lying on the floor.

I lifted the guy up.

“If you had gone to the room you first chose, you would have died of a heart attack.”

Looking at me with a bewildered expression, Yoon Jiwoo coughed and grabbed my hand to stand up.

“Ahem.”

After everyone calmed down a bit, about 3 minutes had passed.

“Hey, look at this, there’s a guide here.”

While I was calming everyone down, Lee Saeah found something.

A coated paper was placed on the table in the Western-style room where we were.

The paper contained hints on how to proceed, as well as instructions on how to call for emergency staff.

The hints included procedures for solving puzzles and how to think about things.

“First, we need to understand the structure of the room.”

We looked around.

An old interior room.

A table with a drawer in one corner.

A toy jewelry box on the table.

A large sofa in the center of the room with a table in front of it.

A small single bed in a corner in another direction, presumed to belong to the girl in the story.

And dolls of a girl and a teddy bear on the bed.

A door that seemed to be an exit on the opposite side of the table where the drawer was.

And something… a mechanical device like a rail on the wall.

It was a peculiar room structure to note.

“Um, should we start by examining the room?”

Yoon Jiwoo suggested.

Following his words,

Yoon Jiwoo and Hong Yeonseo went towards the bed, Lee Saeah and I went towards the sofa, and Sung Yurin and Lee Soyun investigated the table.

“Oh, you can enter a 4-digit password on the teddy bear’s body.”

“The drawers on the table are all locked with keys.”

Reports from Hong Yeonseo and Sung Yurin came from the bed and table sides.

While examining under the sofa, I found a small notebook that looked like a girl’s diary.

“This is… looks like a diary.”

“Hey, come here, everyone.”

At Lee Saeah’s call, we gathered around the sofa to look at the diary I found.

“October 3rd, XX year.”

“Dad gave me a cute bear doll as a gift. I named it Bear! Isn’t it common but cute?”

“October 7th, XX year.”

“I hugged Bear too tightly and it got hurt. Dad fixed it, but I feel sorry for Bear. I won’t hug it too tightly anymore.”

“October 13th, XX year.”

“I felt something hard inside Bear and took it out. It was a pretty stone. When did this get inside? I showed it to Dad, and he put it in my jewelry box.”

“October 17th, XX year.”

“These days, I sleep without hugging Bear. But when I wake up, Bear is in my arms. Strange, right?”

“October 3rd, XY year.”

“Dad gave me a new doll! Your name is now Ivy. Isn’t it a pretty name?”

“October 9th, XY year.”

“I woke up and Ivy was in Bear’s arms. I had put Bear on the bed. Strange, right?”

“October 13th, XY year.”

“Ivy got broken. Dad fixed it, but there’s a scar.”

※Hint. ㅇㅓㅇㅣ

The story of this room was written in the diary we found earlier.

“Hmm.”

Sung Yurin pondered with her arms crossed. She turned her gaze away from the wide heart of the guy.

“There’s a hint here too? Huh?”

Yoon Jiwoo pointed to the end of the diary.

“It’s not just a hint, it’s separated into pieces.”

As I finished speaking, Sung Yurin, who was lost in thought, moved towards the bed and said,

“Probably, this hint is related to the password on the teddy bear.”

Sung Yurin lifted the teddy bear and showed us.

A small number pad with four empty digits was displayed along with it.

Why did they give us this state-of-the-art safe teddy bear.

…I felt puzzled about the likelihood of having such a thing inside the teddy bear’s belly, but it seemed like only an ugly person like me felt that way.

“Well, that makes sense. Since there’s no other clue to enter right now.”

As Ise-a mentioned, it seems like there is another clue locked with a key, so maybe that teddy bear is the first puzzle.

The hint probably represents a four-digit number.

“What could it be….”

While everyone was pondering deeply.

“Hmm~ What a puzzling situation?”

“……”

Yoon Jiwu’s sarcastic imitation silenced us all.

Hong Yeonseo’s puzzled expression as she looked at Yoon Jiwu was unsettling.

Fortunately, realizing that she might be going too far, she quietly stepped back to contemplate the problem.

“Huh?”

Then, Hong Yeonseo made a sound.

“Why, did you figure it out?”

“No. Um, there. The ceiling.”

“The ceiling?”

We all looked up at once.

“What about the ceiling.”

“That… the ceiling, it’s coming down…?”

“….What?”

At Hong Yeonseo’s words, we froze.

“The ceiling is coming down, what are you talking about.”

“It’s the rail on the wall. It seems like it’s being used to gradually lower the ceiling.”

“…Really?”

Isu Yun’s face turned pale as she asked.

No wonder. The walls were solid, the timer was also attached to the wall, and there was no decoration on the wall for no reason.

“…Are they trying to scare the customers at the escape room cafe?”

“It’s just a production. Haha….”

“Right? Hehe.”

We laughed without much substance.

Within that laughter, there was a slight sense of confusion that couldn’t be hidden.

It was evidence that we were quite immersed in the current situation despite knowing it was a production.

The quiet yet eerie atmosphere created by the music and lighting was suffocating us.

“….Let’s solve it quickly.”

“Y-yeah.”

Time has already passed 50 minutes.

No matter how easy the difficulty level is, it might be dangerous to take more than 10 minutes to reach the first problem.

Most of the time was spent comforting the scared ones….

For a moment, everyone fell into silence, lost in thought, with only the music filling the room.

“Ah. I got it.”

As I blankly stared at the diary with hints, I had a moment of realization and approached Sung Yurin.

Everyone’s gaze gathered on me.

There’s a sense of satisfaction in being the first to solve it. Is this why people come to escape room cafes?

Of course, if the answer is correct.