Chapter 82: Don’t Eat! Don’t Drink Water!

Chapter 82: Don't Eat! Don't Drink!

A faint bell echoed through the corridor outside the hotel guest rooms, as if someone were leisurely strolling from the second to the fifth floor, bell in hand. The sound was soft, sometimes near, sometimes distant.

Even if mechanical watches and electronic devices from the real world somehow made it into the nightmare world, they typically malfunctioned in various ways. Therefore, if players wished to know the precise time in their current space, they had to locate a clock or other time-telling device within that environment.

At the Luolimasi Hotel, simple clocks adorned the lobby, the dining hall, and the end of every corridor.

As the bell chimed in the hallway, the clocks on all floors neared six o'clock.

Although the guest room doors at the Luolimasi Hotel featured peepholes, for some unknown reason, all had been sealed shut with thick iron plates. Thus, even if players inside pressed their ears to the doors to listen for outside activity, they could only faintly discern soft movements across the thick carpet of the hotel corridor.

Everything remained unknown, and "unknown" was the most terrifying.

Though all players had retreated into their rooms, those with any experience were now on high alert. After all, the rule about staying in rooms after six o'clock didn't originate from the administrator but from a suddenly appearing printed sheet. Under Peng Zhen's guidance, they had chosen to err on the side of caution, but if those three rules proved false, they would need to make a decision before danger struck, such as leaping from a window to escape.

Moreover, despite each hotel floor having roughly twenty rooms, the lobby's key cabinet held far fewer keys. A mere dozen or so scattered keys forced players, when forming their own teams, to disperse across different floors. Even if danger truly arose, there might not be enough players available to offer assistance.

Ding—ling—ding—

The hotel's public areas were so quiet that only the drifting bell seemed to remain. Only the faint footsteps of a few uniformed servers moving through the corridors and lobby could be heard beyond the ringing. Curiously, despite there being only eight servers in the hotel, most with fixed posts, the number of servers seen walking in the corridors appeared to be far greater than it should have been.

Such an environment, however, was ideal for Su Bai.

Still clad in a black maid's long dress and a white ruffled apron, Su Bai controlled his pace, walking slowly through the hotel. A beautiful black kitten followed behind him, sometimes vanishing around corners, other times reappearing by his side. The guest floor corridors, with their richly colored decorations and carpets, combined with soft, dim lighting, made it quite difficult to notice such a small creature accompanying Su Bai.

Su Bai did not immediately head to the hotel's sixth floor. Knowing it was a locked area, he saw no need to cause a stir right away. Instead, he descended the stairs, intending to revisit the first-floor lobby.

The first-floor lobby could be considered where everything began.

Whether it was the "administrator's" voice that players heard or the assignment Su Bai received from the administrator, both seemed to confirm Su Bai's suspicion: something had, by some means, broken free from the omnipresent administrator's control.

But now, that same entity had brought the players to the Luolimasi Hotel lobby. Perhaps it was because the space was sufficiently wide, or perhaps... there were other reasons.

To uncover more clues, Su Bai had to return to the hotel lobby.

With no elevator, the staircase served as the hotel's main thoroughfare. As Su Bai slowly descended from the fifth to the first floor, he encountered two humanoid servers ascending. Even with his ordinary memory, he could confirm that the faces of these two servers were entirely unfamiliar.

The two ascending servers had hollow eyes, completely oblivious to Su Bai as he passed them. Su Bai, in turn, ignored these servers, who seemed to lack any superfluous awareness.

Server No. 1 at the front desk had stated that the eight servers each had their own duties, even cautioning other players not to approach unfamiliar servers. Yet, at least in Su Bai's estimation, those two unfamiliar, hollow-eyed humanoid servers were not significantly different from the other seven.

Could it be because Su Bai's current identity was also that of a server?

The lighting in the first-floor lobby was considerably brighter than in the upstairs corridors and stairwells. As Su Bai entered the lobby, he felt a gaze from behind him. Turning to look, he saw only the motionless, hollow-eyed Server No. 1 standing at the hotel's front desk.

Eyes are intangible, and Su Bai did not possess the intuition of a beast. But perhaps from prolonged exposure under the red moon, Su Bai from his previous life had already developed the ability to sense peculiar things, such as gazes or killing intent.

Of course, sometimes it might simply be an illusion caused by a gust of wind.

In the windless hotel lobby, Su Bai cast a meaningful glance at Server No. 1 at the front desk. The server, resembling an old butler, stood rigidly still, his eyes no longer directed at Su Bai.

Su Bai quickly dismissed that gaze from his mind, turning instead to examine the sculptures lining both sides of the lobby.

The sculptures on either side of the lobby were all ordinary-looking white plaster statues, seemingly mass-produced on some factory assembly line. Most depicted delicate female figures, appearing somewhat crude upon closer inspection.

The printed paper Shen Dong'er had found originated from behind one of the plaster statues on the right.

Su Bai specifically located that plaster statue, running his fingertips over the spot where the A4 paper had been attached. There was no sticky residue, giving the impression that the printed paper had been affixed to the statue not long before Shen Dong'er discovered it.

After circling the lobby, Su Bai also found identical printed papers behind two opposing plaster statues, each bearing the same three rules.

Hiding so many printed sheets with rules seemed almost as if someone feared players wouldn't discover them.

The empty lobby was filled only with Su Bai's footsteps, and a small black kitten occasionally appeared on the heads of nearby plaster statues. Just as Su Bai thought he wouldn't find any other clues beyond the two papers with identical rules, the black kitten suddenly leaped down from the head of a nearby statue and paused beside the base of another.

"Meow."

The cat's cry led Su Bai to look at the base of the plaster statue, where he could faintly discern a corner of a folded printed paper peeking out.

Without employing his puzzle-solving abilities, Su Bai struggled to lift the heavy plaster statue slightly. In that instant, the black kitten used its paw to pull out the white paper from beneath the statue's base.

Su Bai bent down, gently stroked the kitten's soft head, and then, with one hand, unfolded the printed paper that had been inexplicably pressed under the plaster statue.

"Huh?"

Similar to the previous ones, the white paper also bore the three rules.

But unlike before...

The first rule, "Must return to the room after 6 p.m., and must not leave upon hearing any sound," had been crossed out with blood, and the scrawled words "Help!" were written in blood behind it.

The second rule, "Do not approach the sixth floor, the deceased Luolimasi is crying," though not crossed out with blood, also had the words "Help!" written in large blood letters behind it!

Most importantly, the third rule, "Must enjoy three meals a day and drink at least ten cups of water," was also crossed out with blood. With almost carving force, someone had written seven characters in blood below it—

"Don't Eat! Don't Drink!"