Chapter 85
Chapter 85
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 85
Chapter Title: Failure, Wishful Thinking
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“Ugh... I’m fucking exhausted.”
Two straight days of all-nighters.
Seo-ha rubbed her stinging eyelids vigorously before slamming her laptop shut with a thud!
“Ow... shit.”
The aftermath of pulling all-nighters was no joke.
Her fingers, which had been pounding the keyboard for so long, were burning.
The gum she’d been chewing relentlessly to fend off sleep had turned completely hard.
Tap tap.
[Me: Sent you the data, right? Take a look.]
[Head Researcher Lee Chan-seong: Yes! Got it.]
Sigh. Letting out yet another sigh she’d lost count of, Seo-ha flopped straight onto the floor.
“...How long do I have to keep doing this?”
The room floor held no warmth whatsoever.
A chill seeped in through the cracks in the window, sending shivers down her spine—
“Too bothersome, too bothersome...”
But Seo-ha had neither the will to turn on the boiler nor the energy to drag herself to the bedroom and crash on the bed.
The secret underground lab of Hwayeon that had been destroyed in that unexpected accident some time back.
The lab had a self-destruct... well, not quite, but a disposal sequence prepared for emergencies.
“...So how the hell did that happen?”
Whether it was an operational error or just plain bad luck piling up, the lab had ended up a total wreck. Utterly trashed.
Thanks to that, a few monsters had escaped, causing absolute chaos.
“Ugh...”
Just thinking about it still gave her the creeps.
She’d gone through hell cleaning up the mess. She even hated herself for choosing the researcher path in the first place.
Of course, she’d managed to smooth it over somehow.
They’d put out an official statement saying it was monsters kept for use in the underground training arena that had escaped.
‘But who’s gonna buy that?’
Honestly, it was a blatant lie no one believed.
As always, the comment sections on various communities were buzzing, but who knows?
She wasn’t sure if it had any real effect.
Hwayeon had such a shitty reputation in that regard as a company.
Sure, they had their fans, but the haters outnumbered them by a lot. A whole damn lot.
Anyway.
Rebuilding the completely destroyed lab would take some time.
They had to rebuild it deep underground again, even sturdier this time to prevent incidents like this.
But that didn’t mean they could just sit around idle.
This was Hwayeon’s research team, after all—one that competed at the top of the world.
“This goddamn company~ Can’t even give us unpaid leave~”
So they were filling the gap with theoretical research they couldn’t normally do and running virtual simulations on weapons in development—
“But still, thiiiis much? No conscience at all~”
The sheer volume was enough to make her want to puke. She was seriously fed up.
This kind of life would repeat until they could return to the lab. This shitty existence.
But now it was fine!
She could freely rest for the next two days starting today!
She deserved praise for cramming through the work, holding back the disgust.
Thinking of it as a break made the fatigue suddenly melt away.
Tap tap.
Seo-ha quickly tapped her smartphone to access a webpage.
The Molrangmol Gallery.
To reserve tickets for Molrang Park, which opened tomorrow.
She planned to spend her vacation at Molrang Park.
[9:50]
“Still ten minutes left...”
Reservations opened at 10:00.
Currently, 75,000 customers were connected to Molrangmol.
Whew... This might be tougher than expected?
Creak! Click!
In the end, Seo-ha sat back in her chair and turned on her laptop again.
Agh, my back’s gonna break.
Thump thump. She endured the pain with some acupressure and gritted teeth, then click!
To kill time, she read the Molrang Park opening announcement posted the day before.
[Opening D-1 for Molrang Park! Reservation Guide!] [Writer: DragonRaisingDream]
Finally!!!!!
The long-awaited Molrang Park is here!!!
Reservation details are as follows!!
★Special Opening Schedule (3 days during Lunar New Year holidays)★
[General Tickets]
15,000 tickets per day - Max 3 per person.
(Online reservations: 12,000 / On-site: 3,000)
·Adult (19+): 199,000 won
·Teen (13-18): 169,000 won
·Child (under 13): Free (Max 1 per adult. Additional: 50,000 won each)
General Ticket Facilities
1. Lounge and top-floor observatory access (general elevator)
2. Molrang Park entry, monster viewing, and basic interaction experience
3. World’s second-highest ‘Sky Edge Walk’ experience.
“Hmm...”
20 per person.
200,000 won was definitely a hefty price for a day’s entertainment.
“...Not bad?”
Even so, it was totally understandable.
It was the world’s one-and-only monster interaction theme park—
‘And it includes the top-floor observatory.’
Plus, kids free?
You could even argue it was a bargain.
It was similar to or slightly cheaper than famous theme parks around the world.
[Additional Content Purchases (General ticket holders only / On-site available)]
·Pudding Slime Circus: 30,000 won per person
(20 min / 5 times a day / 200 per session) - See schedule
·
.
.
·Dragon Riding: 350,000 won per person
(10 min / 40 times a day / 16 per session) - See schedule
→More content to be added later.
“Ah, that’s why...”
Additional content was à la carte, so they priced it that way.
On top of that, they’d sell dragon meat and souvenirs inside the park.
They’d rake in plenty from that.
No, they’d make a killing.
Seo-ha absentmindedly calculated rough profits in her head as she scrolled down.
[VIP Tickets]
(Sold out via membership pre-sale.)
·799,000 won (all ages)
·All Molrang Park content (priority queue), VIP elevator access.
·One free dragon meat serving per person.
·Free souvenirs (choose 2 of 10).
·(Opening limited event) Selfie and autograph with exclusive model Han Sae-byeok.
“...Should’ve gone for VIP originally.”
Seo-ha swallowed her regret upon confirming they were sold out. For her, time was way more valuable than money.
If she’d known, she would’ve signed up for membership in advance.
She had no reason to buy Molrangmol products, so she’d brushed it off—that was her mistake.
Well, whatever. As long as she could reserve, she’d be happy.
It’d been ages since a family outing.
They were all civilians, so they were really looking forward to meeting monsters.
Especially her much younger siblings... The kids had nagged so much about going that she was sick of it.
Anyway, Molrangmol was killing it in business.
Word was, it was hugely popular among kids.
Whatever.
It was out of the question to just visit a competitor’s place for fun.
‘Anyway, it’s like covert reconnaissance~’
Having rationalized it, Seo-ha returned to the reservation page.
[9:59]
[Concurrent users: 139,481]
“No way, this is insane.”
Max 3 per person...
That meant she had to squeeze into the top 3-4,000 out of that crowd.
Her head spun, but she somehow pulled herself together...
Click!
[Queue number: 2,501]
“Yessssss!”
Miraculously, she made it into the safe zone.
From there, it was smooth sailing!
Numbers dropping steadily, shoulders swaying happily!
Click.
Seo-ha added three tickets—the max—to her cart.
Perfect fit.
Just Mom, Dad, and the siblings.
“Let’s goooo!”
Elation surging. Seo-ha let out an uncharacteristic cheer as she hit reserve.
She entered her Awakener ID for verification, and all that was left was payment...
Ding!
[Sorry. Reservations unavailable for Hwayeon Guild members.]
“Uh... Huh?”
Wait, wait, wait!
No way this was a crisis.
Nah... No, it couldn’t be.
Seo-ha desperately spun her wishful thinking, trying to reserve using her parents’ names instead. But...
[Returning to previous page.]
[Queue number: 92,501]
“......”
Oh, fuck.
What a shitty company.
**
Hell yeah!
“Muhuhu...”
In a whopping 5 minutes!
Molrang Park tickets sold out in 5 minutes of reservations opening!
How could anyone not laugh at that?
“Where, where... How much did we make~”
I gazed at the sold-out log, roughly calculating profits in my head.
I used to hate numbers with a passion, but lately they felt so welcoming.
Occupational hazard?
The tiered pricing made exact math annoying...
‘Rough estimate’s fine.’
Using conservative ratios, the result:
“Whoa... This is nuts.”
A whopping 3.2 billion won in admission fees for one day.
Nearly 10 billion over three days!
At six days a week, that’s close to a trillion won a year from admissions alone.
Of course, this was the maximum wishful thinking scenario.
‘Reality will be way lower.’
We planned to fine-tune optimal capacity based on these three days.
15,000 was basically the max for test operations.
We’d ramped up monster production accordingly...
‘But it’ll still fall short, I bet.’
Probably 8-9,000 for regular days.
Once Quant finishes the rides and hot springs resort, 15,000 should be doable.
Even so, profitability was solid.
JH Bank and Baekya estimated around 800 billion in annual revenue from admissions and content.
Add lounge and in-park facilities?
‘A trillion’s not a pipe dream.’
On par with the world’s top theme parks.
Anyway, prep on prep to nail tomorrow’s opening.
Tomorrow...
Somehow, a special guest was visiting too.