Chapter 25

"...So, this is probably the situation."

In a blink of an eye, five minutes later.

In the room of 831B, Cube Building.

Xu Ming rubbed his still aching waist, carefully sat on the sofa, and neatly finished his previous story: "In order to help her stay stable and not disappear for the time being, I gave her a work card, so rounding up, she is the first official employee of the Ghost Story Demolition and Relocation Office..."

Of course, in a strict sense, the first group of people who got the work cards were the group trapped in Hongqiang at that time. However, at that time, there was no sign of the Ghost Story Demolition and Relocation Office, so Xu Ming felt that the first official employee should be given to Gu Yunshu.

...Although there is still no sign of the Demolition and Relocation Office now.

Xu Ming thought silently, still a little worried that his explanation was not clear enough. Suddenly, he heard a sound of blowing nose from the side. He turned his head in surprise and found that Qiu Yufei's eyes had been red and she was constantly taking tissues from the coffee table.

Xu Ming: "..."

Very good, it seems that she doesn't have to worry about Qiu Yufei being scared by Gu Yunshu anymore.

"I understand your low tear point, but please restrain yourself, thank you." Xu Ming politely pushed Qiu Yufei, who was crying and snotting, away, turned his head back, and his eyes fell on Gu Yunshu who was sitting obediently opposite.

... His posture was really obedient, with both hands placed on his knees. From time to time, she raised her hand to pull the dust mask on her face, looking a little nervous.

"Well... So, Yunshu, where are you?"

Xu Ming thought for a moment, and then spoke carefully:

"Why did you suddenly come here..."

"To find you." Gu Yunshu said without hesitation.

Xu Ming:... "Yes, I know you are here to find me. So I want to ask, why do you want to find me?" She tried to make her words clearer. This time, Gu Yunshu paused for a moment. The answer she gave was still concise. "Here." She took out a stack of things from her clothes and handed it over, "For you." " ......?" Xu Ming took the stack of papers in surprise, and after seeing the words on it clearly, his face was even more surprised. It was a stack of bound A4 papers and a single sheet of paper. On the outside of the bound booklet were written the four big characters "Employee Code of Conduct"; on the top of the single sheet of paper was written "Notice on the Company's Fire Drill". Xu Ming finally understood: "Are these the rules of Hongqiang Company? You went there specially... just to find these?" "Yes." Gu Yunshu nodded seriously, "I heard you. You need it." The latest skill in Xu Ming's rule book, "Bad Fruit Replacement", the most direct application of which is to collect rules from other strange story areas, extract keywords from them, and establish new rules. The newly established rules will have similar effectiveness to the original ones. Of course, Gu Yunshu didn't quite understand this whole process... But Xu Ming needed rules, she still understood that. But normally she still needs to stay with Xu Ming, lest the mutant root with the dirty bag comes to trouble her again, and she can't go too far. Xu Ming happened to be going away this time, so she said she would take this opportunity to go back to Hongqiang to see if there is anything she can bring back. The good news is that Hongqiang is now shaky and has lost its original strong isolation. She has the work card given by Xu Ming, so there is no problem in going in and out. The bad news is that, precisely because of its weakening, many of the rules that were established before have begun to become invalid and disappear. She tried very hard, but only found these two. "Sorry, it's a little little." Gu Yunshu apologized very bluntly. Xu Ming was stunned for a moment, then shook her head repeatedly: "No, it's already a lot. Just for this matter, you ran back and came all the way here..." She was not a person who showed her emotions, and she didn't know what to say for a moment. She closed her eyes and tried to calm down her surging emotions. She spoke again and thanked Gu Yunshu seriously, then put the two rules into the rule book with great care. Unexpectedly, Gu Yunshu blinked and spoke again neatly: "It's not like that." "......?" Xu Ming paused, "What?" "I didn't come to you specifically for this matter." Gu Yunshu paused for every word. Xu Ming: "..." "So, it's for something else?" Seeing that the other party fell silent again, as if thinking about how to phrase it, she had to ask directly, "Why?" "..." Not sure if it was Xu Ming's illusion, Gu Yunshu, who was sitting opposite, suddenly became more nervous. After a while, she whispered, "Because someone followed me." Xu Ming: "?" "There are many confused souls wandering in Hongqiang now." Gu Yunshu whispered, "They are empty and have no self-awareness. They can leave, but they don't know where to go." When she rushed to Hongqiang, it was already much emptier. Not only because of the loss of roots, but also because of the weakness of the domain master itself. It seems that it has fought with something else and was bitten to pieces. As for "Shun Zhu Shang Sui" who was originally huddled on the fifth floor, it has disappeared. The double decline of the strange story area and the domain master directly led to the escape of a large number of souls in the area. However, there are also many souls who have been tamed too deeply by the strange story and have long become a part of the strange story. At the same time, they have lost all their memories of their previous lives. They are ignorant and blank, and they can't even think of the concept of "leaving". They will only wander aimlessly in the strange story area that is about to collapse. Until Gu Yunshu appears. "This." She pointed to the badge on her chest, "There is a strong aura on it. They can feel it." This vague feeling soon became the rope that led them to move, making them follow Gu Yunshu instinctively and unable to get rid of it. If she didn't want them to follow her, the only way was to kill them all...but Gu Yunshu didn't want to do that. At a loss, she simply led these souls and followed the instructions on her work badges to find them all the way here... "Wait a minute." Xu Ming heard this and suddenly realized a serious problem, "You mean, you not only sneaked in by yourself, but also brought a group of..." She originally wanted to say "A Piao", but then she thought that this statement seemed a bit impolite, so she had to temporarily change the term: "Former employees of Hongqiang Company?" "...Yeah." Gu Yunshu nodded slowly, "They have nowhere to go."

Xu Ming: "..." You can't just bring them into someone else's ghost story area.

People who don't know would think you're here to mess things up.

"It doesn't matter. No one saw it." Finally realizing the point of Xu Ming's concern, Gu Yunshu hurriedly said, "They are very light."

...So what kind of strange expression is "very light"?

Xu Ming opened his mouth slightly, not knowing what to say for a moment. But Qiu Yufei next to him, after throwing down another ball of tissues, suddenly spoke with a heavy nasal voice:

"But think about it from another angle, it seems that there is nothing wrong with them coming to you."

...? What kind of nonsense is this?

Xu Ming looked over in disbelief, but Qiu Yufei was confident:

"Think about it, you were the one who demolished Hongqiang Company, right?

"The name you used at the time was the Guitan Demolition Office, that's not wrong, right?

"Then demolition, demolition, in addition to demolition, you must also be responsible for relocation..."

Xu Ming: ...

After a brief silence, she slapped Qiu Yufei on the back of the head.

"Go on crying, why are you butting in?" She said unhappily, and soon turned to Gu Yunshu. After a pause, he sighed:

"So where are those souls you mentioned now?"

"I asked them to wait in a nearby room." Gu Yunshu said immediately, "Rooms where no one lives. They won't scare people."

"It's not about whether it will scare people... Of course, it's best if it doesn't scare people." Xu Ming rubbed his forehead, and felt his brain start to get confused again, "Which room exactly? I'll go and see if I can give them work badges..."

"——8307." The next moment, Gu Yunshu said firmly.

"..." Xu Ming paused rubbing his forehead.

At the same time, Qiu Yufei, who was blowing her nose next to him, also looked up in surprise.

"8307?" Xu Ming heard her say in disbelief, "Isn't that Tang Menglong's room? Are you sure no one lives in it?"

"No." Gu Yunshu's tone was still very firm, "Not only is no one living there, there are a lot of things in the trash can that shouldn't be thrown there. Like keys, cell phones..."

"So I think the person living in it is probably dead."

...

They exchanged surprised glances at the same time, and the two people sitting on the sofa fell into deeper silence.

*

To be honest, Xu Ming was mentally prepared for Tang Menglong's matter.

After all, assuming that Bo He's description was true, his condition was probably not good; but when she really heard this conclusion, she was still stunned.

"Trash can?" Qiu Yufei didn't quite understand and whispered, "What does that mean? Why can we conclude that he is dead based on this?"

"Because dead people will lose things." Xu Ming said softly, "The things they carry with them when they were alive will disappear on their own. And when they are in the ghost story area, these things will disappear and then naturally gather next to the things he had thrown away before..."

When she was in Hongqiang, she relied on this point to determine that Lao Li was a dead person.

The appearance of this phenomenon in Tang Menglong's room means that he is not only dead, but also very likely to have been active in this hotel for a period of time as a dead person.

"Oh my god, I'm dizzy again." Qiu Yufei slapped her forehead, "So he is the 'dead man' we are looking for? But he is 'dead' again now?"

"It's hard to say, there may not be only one dead man in this building." Xu Ming said, exhaling, "We still have to go to the site to take a look."

"..." Qiu Yufei paused in pulling out the tissue and slowly raised her eyes, "What do you mean?"

"He is an 'insider'. He will not come to this place for sightseeing. He will always make some records. And from what he said to Bo He, there may be other insiders coming in later. If I were him, I would definitely try to leave more clues." Xu Ming looked thoughtful. "

It's easy to say." Qiu Yufei was shocked, "How to get in? You can't go to the front desk to grab another room card."

Xu Ming heard this and looked at her in surprise.

"What nonsense are you talking about." She said, raised her hand and pointed at Gu Yunshu across from her, "We have foreign aid now." Why bother

to snatch the room card.

Just break into the empty door!

Just let Gu Yunshu go in and then open the door for them, how convenient!

Qiu Yufei: "..." However, can you not be so confident in saying such an immoral thing!

*

Even so, it still took them a lot of effort to enter 8307.

Xu Ming has always believed that it is better to be early than late. He originally planned to sneak into the room of 8307 that night, but he didn't expect that as soon as he opened the door of his room, he soon found a new problem.

At the end of the corridor, there was an extra person who appeared without knowing when.

A neatly dressed staff member, with a bleak white sunshade on his head, moved a chair from somewhere and sat at the end of the corridor, standing upright at the elevator door, like a zombie guarding a coffin.

From his direction, the entire corridor was in full view. It was impossible to sneak into other rooms under his nose. It

was not impossible to use the same trick to lure people away. However, Xu Ming and the others both felt guilty - they stole the registration book first and attracted outsiders later. Maybe one of these things attracted the surveillance of the hotel staff. Therefore, they did not dare to act too rashly this time. After discussing for a while, they finally went to bed honestly and planned to make plans tomorrow.

The next morning, they saw that the staff member was still standing there, motionless. This made Xu Ming more and more puzzled.

In order to test him, she simply went out and deliberately walked into the elevator in front of him - what made her even more surprised was that during the whole process, he didn't even look at her.

... Could it be that we are overthinking and he is not targeting us?

Xu Ming was too uncertain. However, after taking the elevator downstairs, she noticed another thing -

the spray paint on the inner wall of the exhibition hall changed from "1" to "2" at some point.

What does this count as, is it calculated by the number of days?

Xu Ming stared at the number for a while, and somehow he remembered the number he saw on the registration book yesterday. He felt that something was passing through his mind, but he couldn't really grasp it.

He turned around and walked a few steps outside, his sight fell on the front desk not far away, and saw that the waiter guarding the front desk had changed his dial today. They were still busy, one of them kept operating the computer in front of him, and the other was busy answering the phone that rang from time to time at the service desk. Xu Ming was even more confused.

They looked like they were really dealing with something. But there are only eight registered tenants in total, and at least three of them are sure that they will not call the front desk again... Why do they still look so busy?

Who are they serving?

Xu Ming frowned. At this moment, her cell phone suddenly rang. She took it out and took a look, her eyes moved slightly, and she quickly turned around and walked into the elevator again.

The message was from Qiu Yufei, an inexplicable good morning - of course, this is not important.

- Since it has been confirmed that there is a certain existence in this place that will receive the messages they sent and reply on their behalf, the meaning of the received message naturally becomes meaningless.

But the act of "sending a message" itself can still carry a certain meaning. For example, now, Xu Ming received a message from Qiu Yufei, no matter what this message says, it represents only one meaning:

[The guy guarding the corridor entrance has left, right now, come back quickly! ]

This is the contact method that Xu Ming agreed with her before going out. When she returned to the third floor, she found the corridor empty. The staff who had been guarding there all night had disappeared.

"...He just left a while ago. I don't know why he looked so unhappy when he left."

Qiu Yufei had been waiting at the elevator entrance. When she saw Xu Ming, she went up to him and told him what she had discovered. Xu Ming looked at her strangely: "Why do you look so unhappy?"

"I don't know." Qiu Yufei said honestly, pointing to the room 8301 they passed by, "He was sitting there quietly, but somehow, he suddenly stood up and knocked on the door of 8301. After knocking for a while, no one opened the door, so he used the spare room card to swipe the door directly. Then he stood stupidly at the door for a while and left." "He looked

very gloomy when he left."

"......?" Xu Ming paused, "In other words, he was not staring at us last night? Was it 8301?"

Why?

"How should I know." Qiu Yufei said casually, followed Xu Ming's stop, stretched out her hand and pushed forward, "Maybe 8301 is a little more unkind than us..."

In front of them was the room 8307 where Tang Menglong had been. Gu Yunshu had already gone in and turned the doorknob. With Qiu Yufei's push, the door slowly opened.

The next second, Qiu Yufei's eyes widened and she froze in place.

"What happened again?" Xu Ming looked inside with a puzzled look on his face, but he saw nothing except Gu Yunshu standing at the door.

Qiu Yufei was still staring straight into the room, her pupils wide open, and she couldn't make a sound for a long time.

Fearing that she would be discovered, Xu Ming had to push her in quickly. She closed the door with her backhand, glanced at the empty room in front of her again, and couldn't help but wave her hand in front of Qiu Yufei.

"Hey, are you okay?" She asked worriedly, "What did you see?"

This time, Qiu Yufei finally responded. His mouth was slightly open, and his voice was so ethereal that half of his soul was floating away: "...your future employee."

"..." Xu Ming was stunned for a moment, and subconsciously looked around again.

"Terrible?" She hesitated.

"A lot." Qiu Yufei's tone was still erratic.

Xu Ming: ...I understand.

It seems there are eight or nine.

She specifically asked Gu Yunshu about this yesterday. It's just that Gu Yunshu didn't seem to specifically count the number of people who were following him. He tilted his head and thought for a while, but couldn't give an exact number.

Xu Ming had no choice but to ask her to estimate and ask her if it was within the range that she could count with two hands. As soon as these words came out, Gu Yunshu nodded without hesitation.

Looking at Qiu Yufei's reaction...

maybe eight or nine are optimistic. I’m not optimistic, maybe there are more than ten.

Xu Ming pondered secretly, nodded in self-affirmation, and then looked around the room. Qiu Yufei was left alone, and she stayed there for a long time, and finally she came to her senses.

"...Hey, Sister Yun." She waved weakly, trying to talk to Gu Yunshu, "Excuse me, how did you get here last night?"

Gu Yunshu looked at her, tilted his head and recalled: "I came here by the highway."

"..." Qiu Yufei pointed at the air in front of her, as if she was afraid of poking something, and then retracted her finger and said in disbelief, "So many people...did you come here by bus?" "

No." Gu Yunshu shook her head seriously, "I said. We came here by the highway."

Qiu Yufei: "..."

"She means that they walked along the highway." Xu Ming, who was rummaging through the trash can, didn't even raise his head, and looked at Gu Yunshu curiously, "No one saw it, did they?"

Otherwise, it would be too scary.

"I saw it." Gu Yunshu said, "but there was nothing I could do."

"In the area, it's very easy to be seen."

"..." Xu Ming stopped getting up.

"What do you mean?" She frowned and raised her head, "You mean, the highway you came from is also a strange story area?"

"Not 'also'." Gu Yunshu said slowly, "It is connected to this place."

The highway itself is part of this strange story area. Just like the corridor outside Hongqiang and the space downstairs, they are also part of Hongqiang's strange story.

It's just that the domain master of this strange story area has a stronger control than Hongqiang. Hongqiang can't control the place below the fifth floor, and can only let the opposing force grow in it; and here, Gu Yunshu can clearly feel that at least the highway is also under the control of the domain master.

"There are still many people on that road." Gu Yunshu continued, "both living and dead. They drove their cars around and around on the road. The exit was right in front of them, but they seemed to be unable to see it."

As she walked down the ramp, she waved at the passing cars, trying to show them the way, but they all drove past quickly as if they hadn't seen her.

Qiu Yufei: "..."

To be honest, when I was speeding on the highway, I suddenly saw a woman in strange clothes standing on the side of the road and waving at me. There was a group of people following behind her...

Only those who dared to stop the car were weird, right?

On the other side, Xu Ming seemed to realize something. He slowly stood up and his face became more and more weird.

Seeing that her expression was wrong, Qiu Yufei asked hurriedly. Xu Ming pondered for a long time, but finally shook his head blankly.

"Highway...loop road." She raised her hand and knocked on her head, "I definitely have an impression of these two concepts."

It's a pity that it's still like before, I have a feeling, but I can't grasp it. I can only let that kind of weird feeling float in my mind, grabbing my heart and lungs.

Anyway, I can't think of anything now. Xu Ming was silent for a while, and decisively decided to give up this problem, turning around to study the current room.

Speaking of which, the layout of this room really doesn't look like it is uninhabited - the quilt is messy, and there are coats hanging on the hangers. The trash can is full, and there is a laptop that is charging on the table. At first glance, the atmosphere of life is clearly very strong.

But looking at the trash can again, you can feel a distinct sense of weirdness: there is everything in it. In addition to the mobile phone and keys that Gu Yunshu mentioned, Xu Ming even found the room card for this room and a bag of white chess candies in it.

There are a total of three white chess candies, all of which are fragmented, as if someone had squeezed them hard.

The phone still has 10% of the power, and there is no lock screen password, so it can be easily opened. It's just that he seemed to have cleared the contents in advance. The chat records and pictures were deleted completely, and there was nothing valuable to find.

Xu Ming had no choice but to shift his attention to the laptop on the table. It started up smoothly, but he still had to enter the boot password. Xu Ming tried to enter the pinyin of Tang Menglong's name, but failed to unlock it, and a password prompt popped up on the screen.

[What are we in? ]

Xu Ming:...

How should I answer this? Mystery group? Hotel? Ghost story area?

With the mood of giving it a try, Xu Ming entered the pinyin of "Magic Cube Building". With a beep, it showed that the password was wrong again. If the

computer password is entered incorrectly three times in a row, it will be locked for thirty minutes. Xu Ming didn't dare to try again for the time being, so he turned around and started searching somewhere else, thinking that maybe he could find some clues somewhere else.

At this moment, Qiu Yufei suddenly called out in a low voice. Xu Ming looked in the direction of the sound, and saw that she had held the coat on the hanger in her arms without knowing when, and was carefully taking something out of the coat.

It was a notebook, about the size of a palm, hidden in the inner pocket of the coat.

"...I just accidentally knocked the clothes off, so I wanted to pick it up." Staring at the notebook in her hand, Qiu Yufei herself looked a little confused.

Xu Ming looked like he was used to it. He habitually stretched out his hand and rubbed Qiu Yufei's body twice to absorb the European energy, then took the notebook from her hand, sat down at the table, and carefully flipped through it.

Turning to the first page, what caught my eye was a very beautiful handwriting, but what was written made me speechless.

It was all the records of the owner's expenses for the day.

Turning to the back, there was information on vegetable prices. Turning to the back, there was a shopping list for going abroad and discount information for shopping festivals...

Xu Ming was not in a hurry, and patiently turned the pages one by one. After turning five or six pages, he finally found the message he expected -

[Hello, Tang Wenhao. Or, Tang Menglong]

This was written on the first line of that page.

The second line was:

[Please believe me, I am you. If you don't believe it, you can copy the records on the previous pages with your right hand to see if the handwriting is the same.

[For some reasons, I - or you, have a job of a special nature. And this job has certain risks, which may sometimes cause problems with my cognition or memory. In order to clarify my identity and position as soon as possible when encountering such a situation, I decided to leave such a record in advance.

[Now, in the form of a conversation, I will reiterate to you again. You are Tang Wenhao, and sometimes you use the pseudonym [Tang Menglong]. The reason for this name is because Menglong is delicious.

[You are a field staff member of Anxin Gardening Co., Ltd., and your job is to deal with the dead wandering on the road, and collect as much ghost story information from them as possible; and try to enter various ghost story areas, observe the conditions therein, collect the rules therein, and transmit the collected intelligence back to the unit through special means.

[If you encounter living people who accidentally enter during the exploration, it is also your obligation to protect them and take them out.

[As for the method of sending back information, if you are sure that you have forgotten it, then don't worry about it. Leakage of this kind of information will be very troublesome, so I will not leave any written records. If there are people around you who claim to be your colleagues at this time, don't ask. If they are real, they will arrange things by themselves; if they are fake, you will only ask for trouble.

[The above information is used to help you identify yourself in a state of amnesia. And if you are in a chaotic state where you still have memories but don’t know what to do, then focus on the following content. Maybe they can help you, at least it can stabilize your thinking:

[1. If there are multiple versions of rules in the environment you are in, and there are clear conflicts and contradictions between the rules:

[First, try to confirm whether the creator of the rules is the tree or the dodder. There will only be one Domain Master in a Monster Tales Area, and only trees can be Domain Masters. The rules established by the Domain Master must occupy the main part. The simplest way to identify is: the first set of rules you see after entering the Monster Tales Area, note that it is rules, which are definitely established by the Domain Master.

[On this basis, continue to judge. The conflicting rules may be a deception set by the Domain Master himself, or it may be a rule invasion. If it is a rule invasion, it means that there is a high probability that there are still dodders in the current Monster Tales Area, and they will use the conflicting rules to trick you away from the Domain Master and eat you.

[Compared to the Domain Master, the hunting of dodders is often more rapid, because they are snatching food from the Domain Master and do not have time to take it slow. This also means that if you choose to follow the rules of the dodder, you will have less room to struggle, and one careless move may lead to your death.

[Therefore, when there is an obvious conflict between the rules, follow the rules of the domain master first, and consider other things after ensuring that you can survive temporarily. ]

[2. If you confirm that there are dead people among the living people around you, but you cannot tell for the time being:

[Please remember that there are two kinds of dead people, dandelions or cang'er. Dandelions do not know that they are dead, and cang'er knows that they are not alive. Dandelions can be saved by mistake, but cang'er cannot be saved by mistake, so it is necessary to judge the identity of human beings. The dead will gradually lose the things that belonged to them in their lifetime, but cang'er will try to hide this. These can be used as judgment criteria. 3.

If you feel my colleagues can no longer be trusted:

【Then don't trust. Because when you have such a thought, one of you must have a problem. The safest way is to immediately distance yourself from each other.

【4. If you feel that you can no longer hold on and are about to die:

【First, confirm your physical condition. If there are no obvious wounds or diseases on your body, it means that your mind has been affected. The solution is very simple. Go out immediately and grab the first living person you meet and ask him if vegetables can live without a heart, can people die without a heart? - If he says that people can live without a heart, then you will definitely survive.

【...Okay, just kidding. The serious way to deal with it is to try your best to tell yourself that you can survive, you can definitely survive.

【Then try your best to survive.

【...Sorry, I can't give more suggestions. If you have memory at this moment, you should understand what I mean. Some risks and endings have been destined as early as when we made the choice. The only thing we can do is to be mentally prepared.

[Finally, although it is a bit cruel - but if it really comes to the point where you have no choice, please make sure that you will not leave any roots, nor will you become a seed.]

"..."

- So far, the first note in the notebook has ended.

Xu Ming slowly handed the notebook to Qiu Yufei, who had not finished reading it, but his expression became more serious.

I don't know if it was because of the content in it, or because of the more confusion generated after reading it through.

On the other side, Qiu Yufei quickly finished reading all the contents. She obviously didn't understand a lot of places. She tilted her head to think for a moment, and couldn't help looking at Xu Ming.

"Teacher Mingming." She whispered, "The 'tree' and 'dodder' mentioned here..."

"I have some guesses, but I'm not sure." Xu Ming shook his head, "This should be their internal terminology, I haven't come into contact with it."

After saying that, he looked at Gu Yunshu again. The latter sat on the edge of the bed with his back straight. Hearing Xu Ming's question, he just shook his head in confusion.

There is nothing we can do.

"Okay..." Qiu Yufei nodded slowly and pointed to the notebook again, "Then, continue reading?"

Xu Ming thought about it, nodded, and got together with Qiu Yufei again, and turned the notebook in front of him to the back.

After that note, there were several blank pages and income and expenditure records. Xu Ming initially suspected that this was a way to deceive people, but the more he read, the more he felt that this might have been a ledger, and recording clues was its part-time job.

After turning more than ten pages, new pieces of handwriting finally appeared.

This time the record was in the form of a diary. The date was at the top, and the tone was also in the first person -

[April 2X, 202X

[Smoothly entered the strange story [Butterfly Building], the entrants were Tang Menglong and Zhang Wenjian. From today on, the relevant observation records will officially begin.

【In order to avoid problems with the records due to observers’ abnormality or cognitive errors, Lao Zhang and I [crossed out], and each observer needs to make observation records separately, and they cannot write or borrow each other’s records.

【Okay, then let’s officially start:

【The way to enter is the same as before. After getting the approximate time and location from a colleague with predictive ability, we will wait at the designated location on time. It’s just that the location we arranged is not very good. It is at the entrance of the highway ramp, and we almost got a ticket from the police.

【At 4 p.m., we drove to the designated location. At 8 p.m., we saw a vehicle that was obviously not a living person driving on the highway, and quickly drove up to bump into it [crossed out] and make contact. Thirty minutes later, we entered the circular road, and we couldn’t see the end or exit.

[The onboard equipment showed that the loop time on the road was 86 hours. During this period, Lao Zhang and I took turns driving forward. There were no other vehicles on the road, and no strange phenomena were found.

[…But to be honest, that feeling is really crazy.

[After 86 hours, a ramp suddenly appeared on the right side of the road. I drove down the ramp and had a clear sense of entering. Ten minutes later, my consciousness began to blur. After waking up, I found myself in a bus. There was no one else on the bus except Lao Zhang and me. There was a clear deviation in cognition, and I completely lost the memory of looping on the highway. I relied on the voice records and prompts I left before to barely remember.

[Leaving the bus, officially entering the core area of ​​the ghost story. The core area is in the form of a hotel, and there is no obvious abnormality.

[Registered at the front desk, and the number of days registered was five. This seems to be the default value.

[Found [Guest Instructions] in the room, transcribed it into the computer and transmitted it.

[The following is a record of hotel facilities and room facilities...

[Encountered an abnormal being in the room, with obvious animal features on the face. Tried to use the white chess candy distributed by the hotel to exorcise it, and succeeded.

[The abnormal being showed an obvious trance state after taking the candy, and retreated into the darkness on its own. The specific effect cannot be determined for the time being...

[I made work assignments with Lao Zhang. I am responsible for contacting others and collecting intelligence, and he is responsible for exploring the hotel and collecting more rules.

[At 7 p.m., entered the restaurant and tried to use some of the food. The texture is loose and dry, like a napkin that has been wet and squeezed dry. It is initially determined to be a fictitious food simulated by a strange story, with little or no contamination effect.

[At 21:00, we met the tenant E who checked in at the same time as us in the showroom. During the conversation, the other party had clear ideas and normal behavior, and there was no obvious logical problem in his expression. It is temporarily impossible to determine whether the other party is a dead person who leads the way.

[It has been confirmed that there are a total of six guests in the hotel. It is expected that they will be contacted in batches within the next three days. ]

[April 2X, 202X

[At 6 pm, communicated with the staff. The other party seems to have a normal level of thinking, has not shown obvious malice, and has a certain degree of human nature.

[Specifically, he would roll his eyes at me.

[It's a bit aggrieved.

【At 8 o'clock in the evening, I took the opportunity of dinner to communicate with Miss A who lives on the second floor. Her memory also started from the bus, and the check-in time was the morning of the day we arrived.

【According to her, Mr. B, who also lives on the second floor, also checked in in the morning. Mr. C who lives in 8304 completed the check-in procedures in the morning.

【Based on the time period, the current six guests can be roughly divided into three batches. The reason and meaning of the batch division are still uncertain.

【… Tried to go to the front desk to borrow the check-in registration book, and the staff rolled their eyes again. It was a bit aggrieved.

【Communicated with Lao Zhang. Lao Zhang said that he has not found more written rules so far, and there seems to be no cognitive impact and strong intimidation in the current rules.

[[Friendly enough to give me goosebumps] - These are Lao Zhang's original words. ]

[April 2X, 202X

[At six in the morning, I encountered an abnormal existence in the room again. This time, I did not use candy directly, but tried to negotiate. The other party showed a certain threat, but the behavior was very slow, and there was no clear attack.

[After a detailed observation, I called the front desk and let them handle it.

[In addition, just from my personal perspective, there is something that I am a little concerned about.

[My characteristic is [Fencehead], that is, after entering the strange story area, I can switch the characteristics to other characteristics I have seen as needed. And this time, considering that the appearance of abnormal existence is irregular, the characteristic I switched to is [Coward], that is, the predictor of danger.

【This trait allows me to sense danger two to three seconds before it comes, and I can also be alerted when facing abnormal beings that are disguised as peaceful but may pose a threat. However, from the time I checked into the hotel until now, whether facing those abnormal beings called [Special Effects] or facing hotel staff, my [Coward] trait has never been triggered.

【Those [Special Effects] are needless to say. Excuse me, let alone special humans with abnormal characteristics, once they overcome the severe impact brought about by their appearance and behavior, even ordinary people can cope with it.

【But why don't those staff members trigger [Coward]?

【I think this is a point worth exploring. I will continue to pay close attention in the future. 】

【April 2X, 202X

【It has been confirmed that Mr. E is dead, and it was estimated to be a dandelion.

【At 8 o'clock in the evening, I took the opportunity of dinner to communicate with Mr. B who lives on the second floor. The other party spoke normally, but in some aspects he showed obvious memory confusion, which was very worrying.

【I have not communicated with Mr. C yet. I only got some indirect information from Mr. B. According to him, Mr. C's mental state seems to be unstable. He will stare at the air and observe, or mutter to himself. And Mr. B said that Mr. C is no longer living in 8304.

【He witnessed with his own eyes that the staff took Mr. C to the depths of the corridor on the first floor.

【I tried to communicate with Mr. B about the [special effects] events he encountered. The types he encountered seemed to be more single than me and Lao Zhang. He said that he had only encountered monsters with rat characteristics so far.

[As I write this, I suddenly realize that although the monsters that Lao Zhang and I have encountered generally have animal characteristics, none of them are related to rats.

[Is this a special setting? It makes people pay attention.

[In addition, there is one thing that makes me feel a little strange.

[In order to contact other guests as much as possible, I go downstairs every day during meal times. But only at dinner time do I meet Miss A and Mr. B, and according to them, they have never used the meal delivery service.

[…Then why didn’t I meet them during other meal times? ]

[April 2X, 202X

[This is our fifth day of stay, and it is also the day required by the rules to check out.

[Tried to apply for an extension of stay, but was rolled his eyes by the front desk. It was a bit aggrieved.

[When checking out, I met Mr. E who came with me. Miss A and Mr. B were late. Mr. E told me that he had seen them last night - they were running along the corridor on the second floor, as if they were being chased by something, and then they ran into the showroom at the end of the second floor.

[[They ran in hand in hand, and I could see their backs. I was sure that they did not reach out to close the door, but the door closed by itself, and I don’t know if it was because of the reflection of the mirror, but when the door closed, I seemed to see the little ugly statue inside move a little, which was scary.] - This is how Mr. E described it.

[Under the pretext of forgetting something, I went up to the second floor and entered the room that Mr. E mentioned. I found a scalp with long hair and Mr. B’s clothing fragments in that room.

[There was no mirror or little ugly statue in that showroom.

[…It seems that the peace and quiet of the past five days has made me a little numb. I should have thought of it earlier. All the ghost stories have their own places where people eat each other.

[After returning downstairs, I was forced to leave the hotel by the staff.

[[The following part is deduced later through mobile phone recordings and personal recollections] After walking out the door, my consciousness began to blur. Strong hallucinations appeared in front of my eyes. The hallucinations all had obvious animal characteristics. After a few seconds, all the animal characteristics turned into mice. Then I woke up and was on the bus.

[It was confirmed that the information we collected was correct.

[It seems that the situation is worse than we thought. In order to prevent the records from being eavesdropped or modified, I should use a laptop for the next record. ]

After that, there is no more record.

"...No way?" Qiu Yufei was immersed in her diary when it suddenly stopped, leaving her confused for a moment.

Xu Ming seemed to realize something, and slowly let go of the notebook in his hand, his expression gradually becoming ugly.

"Teacher Mingming?" Noticing her discomfort, Qiu Yufei stopped complaining in a low voice and looked over with some worry. Xu Ming waved his hand without saying a word, still immersed in his own thoughts.

After a moment, her eyes slowly moved and moved to the laptop again.

After pressing the power button, the password page popped up again, with the same obvious prompt at the bottom:

[What are we in? 】

"..." Xu Ming pursed her lips, and felt her heartbeat suddenly become extremely clear, each beat was deafening.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, and slowly typed two words on the keyboard:

[Loop. ]

Press Enter.

The computer started.