The moment I opened the door and stepped through, a huge table blocked my body.
It was a banquet table, long and large enough to fill the entire space.
"What is this."
Looking at the countless dishes laid out on the table, I burst into a helpless laugh.
It slipped out by accident, but the situation was so absurd I wondered if laughing was even allowed.
'Is it all right to serve seafood dishes in the Dragon Palace?'
Grilled fish, clam soup, parboiled seafood slices — every single dish on the table was made from creatures of the sea.
Even so, at the sight of food steaming piping hot, my mouth watered despite myself.
Well — there was no need to demand narrative consistency inside this museum anyway.
"Ah, h-hello!"
While my attention was lost in the food, someone spoke to me.
A man was sitting at the far end of the long table.
I walked toward him, hesitant step by hesitant step.
"You finally came! I've been waiting — really, I have."
"Excuse me — are you a visitor?"
"Yes! Introductions later, hehe. You must be hungry, right? Come, over here!"
The man, dressed in a tank-top undershirt and pajama pants, grinned with all his teeth showing.
An outfit every bit as out of place here as mine.
Before I knew it, I was sitting in the seat beside him.
'Who is this man? Not an NPC... I don't think. Someone who cleared the first floor's quest before us?'
Wary of the unidentifiable man, I looked him up and down.
'Wait — they saw that outfit and said it was similar to mine?'
I'm at least wearing a shirt — a respectably casual look. Nowhere near that level of loungewear.
Though to the fish of this era, I suppose all of it would look equally bizarre.
"Try some. It's fine, whatever it looks like."
"...?"
"I just ate some myself, and my health didn't go up or down at all."
The man pointed at the crisp grilled fish.
There were marks where chopsticks had picked at it.
'Eating the Dragon Palace's own subjects shouldn't do me any harm... right?'
The ministers had prepared it themselves; it wouldn't be food meant to hurt us.
And I was terribly hungry, besides.
Then — perhaps to reassure me — the man picked up his chopsticks and began eating again.
Truly, nothing happened.
'But if this food is also made from eliminated visitors. That is — from components-'
"A component is a component, and a feast is merely a feast — so worry not, and eat!"
As if it had heard the voice inside my heart, an unseen minister called out to me from somewhere far off.
'Well, in that case, maybe it's fine....'
After much deliberation, I picked up a piece of grilled fish with my chopsticks and put it in my mouth.
Crisp skin, tender and lightly salted flesh — it was exquisite.
"It's delicious."
"Right?!"
The man beamed again, teeth on full display.
With the food he'd been eating stuck in every gap of them.
But I didn't particularly want to point that out to a man who'd kindly urged me to eat.
I turned my gaze from him and buried my face in the clam soup.
"By any chance, are you a participant like me — a visitor?"
"That I am."
"Really? What a relief, meeting a fellow visitor. Truth be told, I was getting a little scared."
It didn't sound like a lie.
The odds that the museum would seat someone this completely detached from the concept here as an NPC were slim.
"Oh, you were scared. It didn't show on your face at all, so I thought you were fine...."
"If someone isn't scared in a place like this, wouldn't that make them the odd one?"
"True enough."
The man pushed up his glasses and scrunched his nose.
'Is he not that scared?'
"By the way, how long have you been staying here?"
"Not long for me either."
"......."
An unsatisfying answer.
The man's manner of speaking was dopey to begin with, but this wasn't about his manner.
He was being deliberately opaque.
"Oh, right! Big bro, how did you end up entering the tower?"
Big bro, now.
A dubious stranger closing the distance however he pleased — it was a little much.
'It never felt like this when Mr. Go called me young Kim.'
"I just thought the shabby building near my home was holding an art exhibition, went in, and one thing led to another."
"So that's why your clothes are on the comfortable side, big bro?"
You're not so easily outdone yourself, I see.
"I came here from a comic café."
"A comic café?"
"When you live alone there's nothing to do, so I scraped some money together and went to a comic café — and the bookshelf just, like, swung open. And, well, here we are. Haha."
Just as the Curator had said, it seemed the entry routes were many, so long as the conditions were met.
[That is correct.]
[This museum permits entry to any visitor who prays a desperate wish.]
Right then, an uninvited guest cut into our meal.
"So you came after all."
"Gah!"
When the Curator had appeared, I couldn't say — but it was seated directly across from me.
The man was so startled by the Curator's sudden entrance that he even dropped his chopsticks.
[Visitors — have you been enjoying the feast we prepared?]
"......."
[I shall take that as a yes.]
At my lukewarm response, the Curator asked and answered its own question.
[You have labored greatly, have you not, calling all those works of art to mind?]
"Hehe, felt like my head was going to burst."
The man offered the Curator that same simple-hearted smile of his.
Unlike me, he seemed to hold no particular feelings toward the Curator.
[For our weary visitors, this third floor has been prepared with a very simple quest.]
'A simple quest?'
I was certain there was no way that was true.
Still, I decided to hear the Curator out first.
[The visitor who sang Sugungga on the second floor.]
The Curator gestured toward my side of the table.
Strictly speaking, I hadn't sung Sugungga — Go Gyu-min had.
[And the visitor who summoned the tiger with a pop song, and thus never heard Sugungga.]
"...?"
This time the Curator extended its remaining arm toward the man.
Sing in your own way, it had said — so a pop song really had worked.
'Even without knowing Sugungga, you could guess your way to the house-sized beast. And the magpie could lead you to the jakhodo.'
The man tilted his head, failing to follow the Curator's words.
[In any case — you have both arrived at the Dragon Palace of Sugungga; that is, of Byeoljubujeon; that is, of the Tale of the Rabbit.]
This time, the Curator named the works outright.
Of course, from the murmuring ministers' lines and the palace setting, I'd already guessed it was the Tale of the Rabbit.
Still, for it to spoon-feed us everything like this....
'The claim that this quest runs simple might actually be true.'
Slowly, I began to be swayed by the Curator's words.
[Do you know the story of the Tale of the Rabbit?]
"Uh.... The rabbit and the turtle have a race, and-"
[Incorrect.]
The moment the man's voice shrank timidly, the Curator cut him off.
[The Dragon King contracted a grave illness, and his life hung by a thread.]
RUMBLE-
Suddenly, the palace shook violently.
Dust and splinters of wood dropped from the rotted pillars.
I shot to my feet and shielded my head with both arms.
Shouldn't we be getting out of here this instant- I thought.
"Wh-what was that?!"
[It is fine. Please, sit.]
The Curator, unmoving in its seat as if nothing had happened, flicked its gaze toward the floor.
The tremor did settle quickly, but....
'This place is decayed enough to collapse at any moment. Can the Curator's word really be trusted?'
But if I left now, only the Curator and the man would remain here.
The one who administers the museum's quests is the Curator.
Distasteful as it was, striking out alone away from this thing would gain me nothing.
Frowning, I sat back down without protest.
[When the physician examined him, it was found that to cure the Dragon King's illness, he must eat the liver of a rabbit.]
[And so his vassal, the Byeoljubu — that is, the terrapin — went up onto the land to catch a rabbit.]
"Ah, right. Now I remember."
The man pushed up his fogged glasses out of habit.
"So in the end the terrapin sweet-talks the rabbit and brings him down to the sea. And the rabbit tricks the Dragon King, saying he left his liver hidden on a rock!!"
RUMBLE-!!
Once more, the ground shook hard enough to rock our bodies.
The laid-out food tumbled from its dishes, fouling the table.
[Just so. And with that sly trick, the rabbit returned to land, mocked the terrapin, and fled.]
[Then... did this tale end happily?]
"?"
What was it talking about?
The rabbit, moments from death, used his cleverness to escape danger. Of course it's a happy ending.
But the Curator swung its neck firmly from side to side.
[What of the terrapin's heart? A loyal vassal who gave his utmost in service to his king — yet in the end, he was reduced to an incompetent one.]
The Curator was interpreting the terrapin's heart — something I had never once considered.
[And what of the Dragon King? In an age when offering everything to the king, that absolute sovereign, was simply the way of things — what of the heart betrayed by a subject of the land?]
"What is it you're trying to say?"
[Visitors.]
Like a stage actor, the Curator pointed at the door, force gathered in its hand.
[It is now your turn to help these poor subjects of the sea, and their Dragon King.]
[Let us go.]
Creeeak-
The moment the door opened, the Curator vanished.
And the delicious food arrayed on the table transformed, in an instant, into something else entirely.
...The reek of rot rolled thick off the decayed seafood.
"Hurghk...!!"
The grilled fish I'd picked at earlier had become rotten fish as well.
On land, flies would have swarmed black over it.
I couldn't hold it down — I vomited up everything I'd eaten.
"Are you all right?!"
"Yes.... Urgh-"
The man patted my back for me.
At the stench stabbing my nose, I threw up once more.
"Whew.... I'm the only one making a spectacle of myself...."
"Come on~ it happens. I've got a strong stomach, so I can bear it, that's all."
The man had certainly eaten the same food.
Watching him stay so composed compared to me, I could only feel respect.
Any more retching and I'd become a burden, so I forced myself upright.
"The door's open — shall we head out this way, then?"
"Yes. Let's."
I nodded and followed the man, moving my feet.
Just then, the fish carcasses sprawled across the table caught my eye again.
'I'm not sure I want this in my item window..., but it might prove useful someday.'
Fwish-
[Material Acquired]
Name: Fully Rotten Fish.
Description: Long dead and foul of stench — yet this, too, was once a life.
I put the rotten fish into the leaflet.
Then I hurried after the man, who had gotten some distance ahead.
'It said we must help the sea subjects and the Dragon King, didn't it? A simple quest, and yet it still talks in riddles. Some things never change.'
We went out through the door and walked straight on.
I half expected us to circle back toward the stairs.
But walk and walk as we might, no stairs appeared.
"Nothing but strange things happen in this place, really. Sugungga, the Tale of the Rabbit — it's all just difficult."
As I'd guessed earlier, the man was not particularly rich in artistic knowledge.
In a way, wasn't it all the more impressive that he'd made it to the third floor on wits and instinct?
"Big bro, what's your exclusive perk?"
"My perk...?"
Wait.
At the sudden chill washing over me, I stopped talking and closed my mouth.
The man was still maintaining that good-natured attitude toward me.
"Climbing the tower is just so hard, you know. I was thinking, wouldn't it be great if we cooperated...."
"...Ah, cooperation. Cooperation is good."
"I'm sorry. I know I look unreliable, but I'm actually not bad in the head."
"No — you've done nothing wrong, so there's nothing to be sorry for."
My lukewarm reaction must have shown.
His self-deprecation flustered me more than anything, and I waved both hands.
At that, the man laughed awkwardly and scratched his head.
"I've tried talking to other participants along the way too, but — maybe it's my looks, or the way I'm dressed — they avoid me, and they never really let me in."
"......."
"Getting to the third floor was really hard."
It's absolutely not that I look down on the man, but....
With that sagging tank top, bare feet, and slippers, his combat effectiveness did look low.
But the reason I couldn't accept his proposal of cooperation lay elsewhere.
Something. Something was-
'Ah.'
At last I caught the source of this strange resistance.
The things that had snagged at me like thorns clicked into place, one after another.
'He's the visitor I'll share the third floor with — I'd hoped we'd build a friendly relationship, like with Si-woon and Mr. Go.'
"So — how about we stick together from here on out? Big bro!"
The man smiled a smile bright enough for a public-service poster.
And he extended his hand toward me, offering a handshake.
I smiled along with him and answered, enunciating every syllable.
"I refuse."