Chapter 23 Don’t disturb the neighbors downstairs
After a dreamless night, the next morning, the same story unfolded. As the family of four prepared to leave, Lin Xi reached out to her mother.
Her mother's smile faltered, and Lin Xi knew she was planning to shirk responsibility. If Lin Xi hadn't asked her for the key, wouldn't she have been able to pretend she didn't know? But how could Lin Xi let her go?
Lin Xi smiled sweetly: "Mom, the key."
She stretched out her hand, just like she did yesterday, and her mother's eye twitched. Lin Xi was certain at that moment that if she couldn't beat her wife, she would definitely rush over and tear her to pieces.
The mother had no choice but to take out the key. Her hand hovered over Lin Xi's hand, and the key fell from her palm into Lin Xi's palm. The key was very cold. It had just fallen from the mother's hand, so it should still have the temperature of the human body, but the key was so cold that Lin Xi almost shivered.
She tightened her grip, grasped the key, and then pulled it back.
"Thank you, Mom." She even thanked her mother, and her mother's face was a little distorted: "You're welcome." She pulled the corners of her mouth, took the children out the door, and the family of three officially went out.
Lin Xi didn't rush to open the master bedroom door. To her, her wife was more important than passing the level. What was he thinking? His wife hadn't eaten yet. How could she skip breakfast when she was always hungry? However, all the innocent ghosts in this building that could be summoned had already been eaten. Only those who huddled in their rooms, oblivious to the world outside, remained.
For example, Room 303 downstairs and Room 404 next door, no matter how hard Lin Xi knocked yesterday, they ignored her. But it didn't matter, one of them had to come out today to serve breakfast to Chen Sang Ning.
Lin Xi still remembered the living room rule: "Keep quiet and don't disturb the neighbors downstairs." Although the rule book didn't specify what would happen if she broke this rule, judging by the past few days, it was likely that the neighbors would rush over to her and get revenge.
Lin Xi was 70% sure that the neighbor would come up.
You can tell from their family situation that even though they hate her so much that they want to kill her on the spot, they still have to express their concern for her when she refuses to eat. When she asks for the key, they can only obey.
In other words, the rules not only restrict the humans who are the hosts, but also restrict the ghosts to a certain extent. In this case, it is feasible to use the rules to make the ghosts act according to their own ideas.
Lin Xi started to act up. She turned on the TV and found a workout program. She dragged Shen Sang Ning along and started exercising in the living room. To make her voice more audible to the neighbors downstairs, Lin Xi even pulled up the carpet.
It just so happened that Lin Xi hadn't exercised for several days. Although her exercise intensity has decreased a lot now, she still has regular exercise every day.
Shen Sangning stood beside her, exercising obediently along with her. However, when she was exercising, her pure white dress would flutter, so Lin Xi pressed her down on the sofa: "No! Ningning doesn't need to exercise today! Just look at me!"
Shen Sangning was particularly well-behaved. She nodded and sat aside, watching Lin Xi exercising over there.
Lin Xi began to jump up and down. The host of the TV program looked at Lin Xi, then shifted his gaze to look at Chen Sang Ning. There was nothing he could do, completely outmatched. He could only demonstrate his dedication to his job and sit down to exercise. Lin Xi's jumping movements were very large, and his feet made a thumping sound on the floor.
She'd been dancing for about twenty minutes when the security door to Room 403 started banging. Lin Xi realized that Chen Sangning's breakfast had arrived, so she stopped. Twenty minutes was just a warm-up for her. She breathed a sigh of relief, calmed her heartbeat, and led Chen Sangning to the door.
Lin Xi peeked outside through the peephole. Standing at the door was a man who looked to be about thirty-five. He had an ordinary appearance, though his expression was a bit painful. He exuded the frustration of wanting to escape but unable to. He raised his hand and knocked on the door, shouting, "What's going on in your house? You're not even letting anyone rest! You're so loud! Don't be so excessive!"
But his eyes kept glancing outside, and his body language showed that he wanted to go home more.
But Lin Xi didn't give him the chance. She flung open the door and greeted the neighbor with Shen Sangning. "Oh, sorry, sorry, we just moved in. When we went to visit downstairs yesterday, no one answered the door. I thought no one lived downstairs."
When she said the word "yesterday", she emphasized it more, obviously she was still a little upset about him not opening the door yesterday.
Lin Xi took a step back and extended his hand in a gesture of "inviting you in." The downstairs neighbor clearly didn't want to come in, but Shen Sangning stood beside Lin Xi, staring at him with deep, dark eyes. An invisible force pushed the downstairs neighbor, forcing him to walk deeper into 403.
After that, the neighbor downstairs never returned to 303 and became Chen Sang Ning's food.
After a while, Lin Xi took Shen Sang Ning downstairs to throw away the garbage. When she closed the door, she and Shen Sang Ning looked at room 404 next door.
There was still no sound in room 404, as quiet as if no one lived there, but Lin Xi knew that a special room number like 404 must have a ghost living in it, otherwise it would be such a pity.
But it wouldn't come out, and Lin Xi didn't know how to get in. There was no rush anyway. Room 404 was right next door. As long as she found a way, it would be delivered to Shen Sangning's doorstep like Room 303 downstairs. Lin Xi took Shen Sangning down the elevator. Unfortunately, no ghosts spawned in this elevator. Once a ghost was eaten, it was gone. This made Lin Xi feel a little sad.
Alas, why can’t it be like a game and automatically refresh when the time comes?
Lin Xi threw the garbage bag into the trash can and did not go home directly. Instead, like the community owners, she took Shen Sang Ning to stroll around the community. Shen Sang Ning was wearing slippers and holding Lin Xi's hand. Her walking posture was much better than when she just came out yesterday. This community is not good, it's really not good. Even when we got to the activity center in the middle, where the children would play on the slide, there was no one there.
Lin Xi even wandered around to the security booth, but it was also empty, with no one in charge of property management. The community wall was different from the iron fences you see in the real world; it was a solid wall. Standing inside, you couldn't see outside at all. Only at the security booth could you see outside.
It was just so foggy outside that Lin Xi had forgotten what he had seen from upstairs. Standing here, he couldn't see the specific scenery outside, only the fog. In the end, Lin Xi didn't choose to go outside. What if there was an air wall or a bug map outside? Stepping in would immediately result in a death sentence. That would be like asking for death.
Although Lin Xi was reckless in playing games, that was a virtual world, and her characters had countless lives. But now she only had one life, her own. The most important thing was that she had such a big wife beside her.
If he died, he would die, but he couldn't let his wife die with him, right? So Lin Xi had to be careful.
In the end, Lin Xi didn't even step out of the community. She simply walked around the entire community and found that there were fourteen buildings in total, and their building was the fourteenth and the last one. After Lin Xi finished touring the community, she took Shen Sang Ning back home. After Lin Xi finished making lunch and disposing of the garbage, she remembered the scene she had seen at the security booth and turned back to the balcony in front.
She leaned over the balcony window and looked out, only to see a completely different scene. It wasn't foggy and obscure, but a perfectly normal scene. The streets were completely empty, devoid of people or cars, just a typical street scene. From their perspective, they could even see the traffic lights outside, not far from their building.
As well as the bus platform on the roadside and a row of electric vehicles parked on the roadside.
There's no one in sight, but other than that everything is normal.
When I just went down, it was clearly foggy outside and I couldn't see anything, but when I reached the third floor, I could see everything clearly. Lin Xi didn't think it was because of the perspective. How could it be possible to see clearly on the third floor when there was such thick fog just now in the security booth?
In other words, there is something else at work.
Is this the world of strange stories? Lin Xi felt that this was unnecessary in a strange story world. What difference did it make whether she saw a hazy world or a clear one? Was it... this family playing tricks? Why was it doing this?
Lin Xi frowned, feeling as if she'd forgotten something. She spread out all the rules she'd written down, but couldn't see any relationships she'd missed. After being prompted by a kind person, she felt like she had a pretty good grasp of the rules. She could guess a few of them, but the ninth rule of "Sweet Home"—that row of horizontal lines—still left her baffled.
Her eyes fell on Rule 6 in "Sister's Room": "Haven't decided yet, talk about it later." Clearly, rules can be changed later. Could the same be said for Rule 9? Or perhaps, was it hidden?
Lin Xi scratched her head, feeling that thinking was still too difficult for her. She was a useless little thing to begin with, so it was too difficult for her to figure it out. But now that all her opportunities had run out, she couldn't rely on anyone else. Lin Xi turned her head and glanced at Shen Sang Ning, who was standing beside her, hunched over with a look of curiosity about what she was doing.
She suddenly felt a little discouraged. Originally, this should be what Shen Sangning was best at. With her intelligence, she would definitely know the answer quickly. But now... she couldn't rely on Shen Sangning.
Lin Xi shook her head, shaking out the thoughts in her mind. She couldn't always rely on her wife. Now she could only rely on herself to take them both out together! Lin Xi grabbed the key her mother left her this morning and prepared to explore the last room.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
