Chapter 9
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Holding Halloway's hand, who was practically a walking time bomb, I cautiously wandered around in search of a way out.
The soles of my feet throbbed, but I deliberately didn't look for any slippers.
They would only come off while running from the monster anyway, so I walked around barefoot.
Speed mattered here.
"Sister, what exactly are you looking for?"
"Just... seeing if there's any clue to getting out of here. And while I'm at it, trying to find the others too."
I couldn't exactly tell him this was a game, and even if I did, he wasn't the kind of demon who would believe me.
I had to keep it a secret, but what I was doing now could only look suspicious to Halloway, leaving me stuck between a rock and a hard place.
I gave him a vague explanation, but Halloway seemed to accept it.
No window had popped up warning me about a rising danger gauge. That was a relief, at least.
"But why are you looking for the oth—"
Before Halloway could finish speaking, a clear, melodious voice rang out.
"E-Evelyn?"
Click.
The one stepping out from behind the door was none other than Moran.
Her completely disheveled appearance made it painfully obvious that she had barely escaped the monster.
"Moran."
The moment I called her name, Moran burst into tears and threw herself into my arms.
I let go of Halloway's hand and gently patted her back.
Perhaps the comforting gesture eased her tension, because she clung to me even more tightly.
"Evelyn! I-I was so scared...!"
As Moran sobbed uncontrollably, a notification window appeared.
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[“Moran Eleanor” has joined your party. Gather Companions (1/2)]
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Perfect. It was by chance, but at least I'd found one of them.
"Shh. It's alright."
I led Moran into the room first.
Staying in a room wasn't the best choice with the seeker roaming around, but judging by the lack of any nearby noise, it seemed to be quite far away.
I sat the still-trembling Moran down on the sofa and asked what had happened.
"Moran, what happened?"
"W-well..."
She was shaking so badly she could barely speak, her hands clenched around mine and refusing to let go.
She looked so pitiful as she cried that an overwhelming urge to protect her rose up inside me without warning.
So this is the power of the female protagonist.
She really had been incredibly popular in the game.
Not only was she beautiful, but even while trembling in fear, she always stepped forward, determined to protect everyone somehow.
Of course, she even defended frustrating characters, so later on, plenty of people complained that Moran herself had become frustrating and annoying.
But Moran wasn't at fault for defending them...
Beside me, Halloway's gaze rested on Moran for a moment before drifting away.
Did she look beautiful to him too?
If she did, then surely a system window would have popped up notifying me of his favorability increasing at least once.
Or maybe her beauty didn't raise his favorability because she wasn't prettier than he was.
"I tried opening the door leading outside, but just like you said, Evelyn, it wouldn't open. Then suddenly a monster appeared... Sir Werner and Mr. Cleta were trying to protect me when..."
"They died?"
At my question, Moran looked startled and waved her hands frantically in denial.
"What? N-no! I mean, they fell!"
Then why did you trail off like that...
"So no one died?"
"They were all still alive when they fell..."
Still sniffling, Moran wiped away her tears as I calmed her down.
"Then were you on the third floor the whole time?"
"No. I just came up a moment ago. I heard voices and hurriedly hid, but thankfully, it was you, Evelyn!"
Saying how fortunate that was, she pulled me into another hug.
I quietly remained in her embrace as I sank into thought.
If she'd only just come up, then that meant the game system only applied to me.
I couldn't go either up or down, but Moran had easily made it to the third floor. That meant I was the only one trapped, unable to go anywhere.
Why did it have to be me of all people?!
The one saving grace was that the choice windows that had driven me crazy at the beginning weren't appearing anymore.
It did have a habit of popping up in the most ridiculous situations, so I could only pray it stayed away.
My nerves were strung tight with the fear that another maddening choice window might appear at any second, but I pushed it aside and focused on soothing the still-distraught Moran.
"Let's look for the others first."
I couldn't very well say we needed to find an escape route while evading the seeker, so that was the best I could offer.
But Halloway tugged at my sleeve, looking dissatisfied for some reason.
"Sister, do you like having lots of people around? Isn't this woman enough?"
‘This woman’...
Did he have any intention of hiding who he really was at all?
Then again, even in the game, despite saying things that should have exposed his true identity, no one ever suspected Halloway because he looked like 'a child.'
People always brushed it off with ‘He's just a kid.’
In this world, there was no reason for an adult to deliberately take on the appearance of a child, and even if they wanted to, magic and technology capable of doing that simply didn't exist.
It would be a different matter if it were a demon, but demons weren't creatures people encountered easily either.
To begin with, even a summoning magic circle to call forth a demon required a considerable sacrifice.
And there wasn't anyone capable of performing it in the first place.
As far as I knew, the Halloway in the game had been a demon from the very beginning and had lived on this island all along.
Nothing had ever been revealed about the island or the hotel.
Except for the game's opening explanation.
"The more people there are, the better our chances of surviving."
"You saw what that man tried to do earlier. He was going to use you as bait, Sister. What if this woman uses you as bait too?"
Halloway... Was he starting to drive a wedge between us already?
"Huh? Sister! I trust you because you protected me even in that desperate situation, but I don't know about this woman. Let's not stay with her. She makes me uneasy, okay?"
...You know, you're the one who makes me the most anxious.
"What are you talking about, Halloway?"
Moran looked briefly flustered, but she recovered quickly, a gentle smile finding its way to her lips as she crouched down to meet Halloway's eyes.
Even in the game, Moran had been the character who looked after Halloway the most.
Kindhearted as she was, she kept young Halloway close by her side and fiercely protected him.
Even so, one of the bad endings showed Halloway personally cutting off Moran's head with a sword.
In that gruesome illustration, Halloway didn't show the slightest trace of pity as he killed her.
He simply looked empty.
It made sense, given that everything had been an act from the beginning, but in every bad ending illustration, Halloway's face never betrayed so much as a flicker of feeling.
"I would never betray anyone. I don't know who that man was, but I would never do something like that, Halloway."
Rejecting Moran's reassurance, Halloway tightly grasped my hand.
I tried to discreetly pull it away, but this small child's grip was unbelievably strong.
I couldn't get free!
Still crouching, Moran looked up at me with a wounded expression.
"I... Just what did Halloway..."
"He's just a child. He must have been terrified."
"Who was that man? Who was he that Halloway distrusts people this much?"
"Ah..."
Should I tell her or not?
As I'd said before, Moran was the kind of female protagonist who kept every companion around, even those who repeatedly put the group in danger.
That included me too, but still.
She was so kind that she hated seeing anyone die, regardless of the circumstances.
Even if it couldn't be helped.
As I hesitated, Halloway answered without the slightest pause.
"A man with khaki-colored hair came upstairs and tried to use me as bait! Sister saved me, and then the man ended up getting targeted and died."
As expected of the hotel's owner, he seemed to know that Friedel had died.
Still, he really had absolutely no intention of hiding any of it in front of me...
As far as he was concerned, I'm supposed to be someone who doesn't know that happened.
"You would have done the same!"
‘You’...? {1}
That was a new one.
"I would never do that! Especially using a child as bait...!"
Moran, who had been on the verge of tears in protest, suddenly froze.
Then her eyes widened as she looked at me.
"Don't tell me... are you talking about Friedel?"
"Ah, yes. Well..."
Just as I was about to explain what had happened, Moran covered her mouth with both hands, her face filled with shock.
Then, with tears welling up in her eyes, she cried out to me.
"Did you just leave him to die? Evelyn, how could you...?"
Wait a second. I'm starting to feel like I'm the villain here.
"Was there truly no way to save Friedel? Even if he shoved Halloway, how could you simply turn your back on someone who had been with us all this time?"
Watching Moran reprimand me, I couldn't help but frown.
"I could never do something like that..."
I knew kindhearted Moran well.
I also knew that, although the wording had been slightly changed, this was a line she had said in the game when Friedel barely survived after using someone else as bait.
Even then, I knew she still couldn't bring herself to abandon Friedel and kept him with her.
I also knew that the world was at least a little more worth living in because there were righteous people like her.
But I wasn't such an exceptionally good-natured person that I could simply tolerate her placing the blame on me like this.
"Then are you saying I should have died instead of the man who tried to kill Halloway and me?"
Under normal circumstances, everyone around us would have taken Moran's side, but there was no one here to do that.
Besides, the ones who had nearly died were Halloway and me.
Yet instead of worrying about us, Moran was fretting over Friedel and scolding me as though I had personally killed him. It wasn't exactly easy to look kindly on her for that.
When she said those same lines to Friedel in the game, I hadn't thought much of it. But hearing them directed at me in person didn't feel good at all.
Perhaps she hadn't expected me to respond that way, because Moran looked slightly taken aback.
Before I regained the memories of my past life, I had been quiet and meek by nature. Even after finding myself here, I had complained and whined, but I had never even been able to argue back when someone criticized me.
After silently moving her lips for a moment, Moran seemed to calm herself down a little.
Then she gently took both of my hands and tried to reason with me.
"Evelyn, that's not what I meant. No matter what, someone died."
"If I'd saved that man, I would have died instead. That's what I'm asking. Is that what you wanted?"
"No, of course not! Why are you twisting my words like that?"
Because you'd already gotten on my nerves!
I didn't have a good image with the group anyway, so I pressed Moran without holding back.
"You're the one who made it sound that way. How do you think you would have felt if I'd said the exact same thing to you?"
"I would have realized my wrongdoing and apologized."
...What?
Watching Moran display the sort of virtue a saint might possess, I realized something.
At this rate, Moran and I were bound to keep clashing over our opinions.
And every single time, I would be the one feeling frustrated and irritated.
Because everyone else would side with Moran.
In that case, Cynthia or Werner would be better choices for the sub-quest.
They were pragmatically self-interested, and while they did everything they could to survive, they never used other people as bait.
On the other hand, if someone crossed them, they paid them back in kind.
Cynthia was difficult to predict because of her jealousy toward Moran, but as long as Moran wasn't involved, she was someone who could assess situations with a cool head.
I only needed to gather two companions, so I'd choose Cynthia and Werner.
Werner disliked me, but the fact that he hadn't abandoned me and had brought me here showed that he was a man with a strong sense of responsibility.
Besides, once the quest was over, we'd part ways anyway.
"I suppose it can't be helped, Moran."
"...What do you mean?"
I couldn't exactly say that leaving someone to die had been the right thing to do, but in that situation, there was nothing else I could have done.
I had to survive, even if it was only me.
And on top of everything, the final boss was standing right beside me.
"You and I don't see eye to eye, Moran. I can't promise something like this won't happen again. And I'd rather not have to listen to criticism every time it does."
Moran looked at me the way one looks at a child who doesn't yet know better, and reproved me sternly.
"Evelyn, I'm not trying to blame you. But you've already set a bad example for young Halloway. Running away while letting someone die right in front of a child. That was wrong of you."
If he had actually been a child, do you think I would have let him watch all that...?
Of course, Moran only said that because she didn't know the truth.
"Sister."
Halloway's irritated voice reached my ears.
I drew in a long breath and was about to open my mouth when—
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[Halloway wants to kill Moran.]
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[Moran says Friedel's death is your fault.]
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I can see that myself...
I was momentarily dumbfounded by the system window that suddenly popped up just to explain the obvious, but then a chill ran down my spine.
Wait... don't tell me...
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[The situation is taking a turn for the worse.]
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[➤What should you say?]
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N-no...
No, no!
But there was no stopping the window once it had appeared.
I could only pray that the choices wouldn't be as idiotic as usual.
But I already knew.
This game system hated me.
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[1. That's exactly the kind of person I am! (Pound your chest proudly!)
2. Fine. Then next time I'll abandon Halloway too and run away. That'll make it fair, won't it? Will you forgive me then? (With the gentlest smile in the world.)
3. Halloway! You're just going to stand there while your big sister gets talked to like this? You heartless child! (With a face more terrifying than a goblin's.)]
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Staring at the disastrously awful choices, I muttered in despair.
"...Isn't there an option to choose nothing?"
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TL Note:
1. ‘You’...? - 댁 (you) is a polite but distant second-person pronoun in Korean. Compared to the ordinary 너 ("you"), it creates emotional distance and can sound formal, cold, or subtly confrontational depending on the situation.
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