Chapter 58
Chapter 58
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 58
Chapter Title: Mi-Go's Laboratory (2)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
But there's no way I can meet Mi-Go today anyway.
Mi-Go had already fled this lab by the time Je Mu-kyeong and his friends started their uprising.
Instead, I can meet something else.
- Wh……o……?
A creepy voice echoes out.
“Who’s there!?”
“Hold on, Curtain Call.”
- Who…… are you……?
- Why…… is it…… so dark……?
“Kim Shin-hwa, what the hell is that……?”
“That’s…… Mi-Go’s assistant.”
Mi-Go’s assistant is the sole surviving researcher from this hospital.
Though I’m not sure if you can really call it “surviving.”
I don’t even know its name. In the game, it was just displayed as “Mi-Go’s Assistant.”
Mi-Go’s assistant speaks to me.
- What…… the hell…… happened……?
“You got screwed over by Mi-Go.”
*Bubble…… bubble……*
There’s nothing humanoid left in this room.
Just a large glass tank sitting on the desk, hooked up to some avant-garde machinery.
Inside the glass tank floats a living human brain.
The kind you hear about in jokes all the time…… a “brain in a vat.”
This is “Mi-Go’s Assistant.”
[System: Exclusive trait ‘Abyssal Madness’ activated. Mental disturbances nullified.]
*Bubble……*
Bubbling sounds emanate from the glass tank.
A strangely modulated human voice leaks from the speaker connected to the machinery.
An emotionless voice keeps hurling questions at me.
- Why…… won’t my body…… move……?
- Where…… are the others……?
- I want…… to go…… home……
Mi-Go often indulges in these sick hobbies for the sake of their research.
They crack open a human’s skull, pull out the brain, and lock it in a [Mi-Go Brain Canister].
It’s not something they do to just anyone…… usually, it’s their twisted act of “kindness” toward humans they take a liking to.
They call it a gift from Mi-Go.
Why is this kindness? A gift?
How the hell should I know?
With a culture and mindset completely alien to humanity, it’s impossible to understand no matter how hard you try.
If I tell this brain about its own condition here, it’ll go completely insane—but in exchange, it’ll share Cthulhu mythos madness and wisdom with me.
If I play my cards right with this brain, I might even uncover the truth behind what happened here.
Either way, I don’t really need any of it. I’ve already experienced both routes in the game.
“Kim Shin-hwa, kill that thing!”
Curtain Call suddenly yells.
“Hold on.”
“Ugh, just kill it already!”
“Wait.”
Instead, I unplug the life support device under the glass tank.
- Are you…… still…… nearby?
- Hey……? Hey……? Hey……?
- Say…… something……
- I can’t…… see anything……
- It’s dark…… It’s dark……
- It’s cold…… It’s cold…… It’s cold……
- It’s cold……
- It’s cold……
- It’s co……
The [Mi-Go Brain Canister] falls silent soon after.
“Ha, is it dead?”
“Yeah, it’s dead.”
“That was some nasty bullshit.”
Sigh…… Yeah, tell me about it. Not a great feeling. If I end up in an event hostile to Helistic, I’ll get more chances to face off against Mi-Go. Then I can shake off this gross vibe.
Curtain Call and I move deeper into Mi-Go’s lab and soon discover a special room.
The first thing that catches the eye is a massive surgical table.
It’s no ordinary surgical table.
Restraints for binding hands, feet, and torso are installed on each section.
And at the head of the table are menacing rotating saw blades, drills, and mechanical arms whose purposes are hard to guess.
“What the hell is this creepy thing?”
“If you lie down here, those mechanical arms automatically activate, decapitate you, and extract your brain. Pretty neat surgical table, huh?”
How many heads got taken here, I wonder?
“Is there nothing here but this X-rated crap?”
“I brought you because you wanted to come, and now you’re complaining nonstop.”
“I thought there’d be more stuff I could kill.”
What the hell is she talking about?
“I’m bored now, so I’ll wait by the elevator. Grab what you need and hurry up, Kim Shin-hwa.”
“Hmm, sure, whatever.”
There’s nothing here that’d interest Curtain Call anyway. What I need is the book that drove Je Mu-kyeong insane.
Je Mu-kyeong had acted and spoken in ways totally different from the game.
It had to be because of that book.
‘I need to escape this world.’
It’s not weird for me—someone from outside this world—to think that, but why would Je Mu-kyeong, a being native to this world, think the same?
And that final telepathic message from the Mi-Go researcher.
The clues to all these mysteries are in that grimoire.
‘Found it.’
I spot a worn tome with a red cover on a nearby avant-garde bookshelf.
[Mongni Mundomil Manggyeong (夢裏聞道謐忘經)]
Classification: Grimoire
Author: Unknown
Publication Year: 16th Century
Language: Tibetan
A book dealing with the principles of life and death and the secrets of reincarnation. It vividly describes the afterlife and the dream world, and outlines methods to achieve enlightenment.
Research is required to assess its true value.
The tooltip displays normally.
Normally, hitting [Research] would auto-process it…… but now I guess I have to do it manually.
The paper’s extremely brittle from age.
The cover’s in pretty good shape by comparison, so someone in later generations must’ve rebound it.
I carefully open the book, mindful not to tear the pages.
The thin, hole-riddled sheets spread out……
Huh? The yellowish stuff is paper, the black stuff is text.
‘I can’t read the text……?’
[Mongni Mundomil Manggyeong (夢裏聞道謐忘經)]
Language: Tibetan
No matter how high my intelligence is, I can’t instantly read a language I’ve never seen before in my life.
How did Je Mu-kyeong read this? Does that bastard know Tibetan?
I soon find the answer.
I discover an artifact that provides language decryption abilities.
But it’s not something I can use.
I pick up a small flask from the shelf.
Inside the flask wriggles a grotesque, thumb-sized creature with tiny cilia.
Even trying to describe it nicely, the best I can say is it vaguely resembles a grimma—its shape is that horrific.
[Language Assistance Parasite (B-Grade Implant): An implant that assists in fluently using other languages. Stores 78 Earth languages and 8 extraterrestrial languages currently in use.
A parasitic organism created via Mi-Go technology. Can be surgically implanted directly into the brain using a dedicated device.]
It has side effects like outbreaks of madness or drastic loss of humanity midway through, but it’s a highly efficient artifact that lets you master dozens of languages with ease.
If I stick my head in that surgical table over there, I could implant this alien grimma into my brain.
In the game, it wasn’t my life, so I’d shove it in sometimes…… but fuck that.
My head’s already a mess; no way I’m implanting a grimma on top of it.
“Tch, guess I’ll have to manually translate the Tibetan somehow?”
It’ll take time, but with my current intelligence, it’s not impossible.
In the end, I give up on examining the Mongni Mundomil Manggyeong right now and stuff it into my backpack.
It sucks not getting answers immediately, but this isn’t the only thing worth grabbing here.
I check a few more books on the shelf.
If there were Mi-Go research logs left behind, they’d be a huge help, but no dice.
Maybe because their physiology differs so much from humans, they don’t bother with personal logs.
“And yet they had no problem collaborating with humans to create test subjects……”
Mi-Go have immense pride in their technology.
Sharing it with another species like humans is outright taboo.
If anyone tries to steal their tech, they dispatch assassins immediately.
And yet they collaborated with a human corporation…… which means they had some massive goal big enough to override Mi-Go taboos.
Mi-Go didn’t leave any documents directly, but there are helpful books.
“These must be from the human researchers?”
Handwritten notes detailing experiments on test subjects…… especially those on Je Mu-kyeong.
The people who wrote these probably got killed by the test subjects or had their brains yanked by Mi-Go.
Not grimoire-tier, but still useful books even in the game.
I toss those experiment notes into the cart and browse the others.
The rest are mostly on biology or human body modification.
Getting tangled with Helistic means I keep stacking this crap.
Combine these with the [Secret Knowledge: Life Creation] trait I got last time, and I could do some insane shit.
Knowledge on life creation is something I never got even once while playing [Cthulhu World], so it’s hard to judge how to use it yet.
I grab all the decent books.
‘Oh, right—one more thing.’
You know those gamers who have to rub every wall and open every box to feel satisfied? I’m one of them. It’s time-consuming, but that personality uncovers hidden stuff too.
‘It was around here somewhere……’
I slide my hand into a small hidden slot amid ordinary machinery…… and pull.
*Click.*
‘There we go.’
There’s a tiny secret box here. More like a hidden shelf, really, but I reach inside and pull out a minuscule stone.
A smooth, glossy stone about 5cm in diameter.
One side has an engraved star-shaped magic circle in the center of an emerald-glowing body. Less like technological craft, more like shamanistic vibes.
[Ancient God’s Amulet (B-Grade Magic Tool): A protective talisman that repels unclean forces and weakens abyssal entities. Blessed by an Ancient God.]
Fancy description about weakening abyssal entities, but this amulet series has huge gaps between grades. B-grade only repels their minions rather than affecting the entities directly.
Still harmful to Mi-Go, at least.
But Mi-Go had human researchers embed this into machinery to extract the Ancient God’s energy stored within.
Which drained its magic power, so it probably can’t perform at full capacity.
‘Better than nothing by a mile.’
Worst case, I can use it as material or catalyst for other artifacts.
I pack up my loot and head back toward the elevator.
“Guess we can head out now.”
Curtain Call’s leaning against the wall by the elevator. Her gaze is fixed on…… the brain canister of Mi-Go’s assistant we killed earlier.
‘That’s a scene that’s hard to put into words.’
What’s she thinking?
“Curtain Call, let’s go.”
“You killed a lot, Kim Shin-hwa.”
“Huh?”
“About fifty, right?”
There were 58 test subjects here including Je Mu-kyeong. I took down a few myself, so yeah, roughly that many probably died by her hand.
“What’re you getting at?”
“We need to kill more…… that’s how I’ll fulfill my wish.”
Wish? What is this psychopath bullshit?
Jang Hyun-deok from before and the [Yellow King’s Garb] come to mind. We talked about wishes then. In [Cthulhu World], mentioning “wish” never means anything good.
Something’s broken, someone’s dying, somewhere’s gone weird—or already has. It’s a word that only comes up in those situations.
I step closer to Curtain Call and say,
“What wish gets fulfilled?”
“Who knows? Doesn’t matter. Just that it gets fulfilled.”
“Curtain Call, I’m not following what you’re saying……”
“Did you kill them for no reason, Kim Shin-hwa?”
“No, there were reasons.”
Or rather, no reasons not to kill them.
“No, didn’t you hear the voice?”
“What?”
“The revelation telling me to kill them. You killed without that?”
“Who…… said that?”
Curtain Call stares at me with her huge eyes and grins.
“The [Mother of All Things], obviously.”
“Oh.”
A familiar name.
The abyssal entity that turned Lee Chang-hyuk into a mutant—the epithet of the [Black Goat that Births Madness].
Now I know the source of Curtain Call’s superhuman strength, bizarre madness, and surreal powers that can only be called mutations. Curtain Call is a cultist blessed by the [Black Goat that Births Madness].
A dangerous, horrific cultist who praises her Great Goddess by slaughtering repeatedly at her divine command.
But…… for some reason, her blade only seems aimed at beings tied to the corporation Helistic.
For now…… and the foreseeable future, I decide to keep watching her a bit longer…… and that day, I part ways with Curtain Call without further talk.