Chapter 81

Even so, Xu Ming couldn't really go back to that room.

By now, the skill time limit had almost been used up, and it was impossible for a new big eyeball to appear downstairs to help them take the blame. Moreover, Qiu Yufei was still on the third floor, and it was unknown what her situation was. Therefore, although

Xu Ming was upset, he did not delay the decryption of the code at all. He quickly solved a four-digit code and easily opened the iron door between the second and third floors.

Go through the door and go up. The closer he got to the third floor, the more serious Xu Ming's expression became. His brain was working rapidly. In just a short period of time, he had already drafted several alternative rescue plans, but he rejected them one by one. The lack of information made decision-making more and more difficult.

But no matter what, one thing was certain.

After reaching the third floor platform, he would start a dream simulation first.

At least he had to deal with the induction light first. Don't look back and be hit by the existence summoned by the induction light before you can break into 301. That would be too much of a loss...

Xu Ming pondered silently, and in a blink of an eye, he had already reached the third floor.

——And it was not until then that she realized that she seemed to have thought too much.

There is absolutely no need to start a dream simulation specifically to deal with the induction light.

Because there is no induction light on the third floor.

——Where the induction light should be, it is covered with a kind of white hyphae. Broken bulbs can be seen in the corners of the floor. Next to the bulbs is a bunch of dried dogwood.

Not only that, the electric meter box on the third floor is also covered with that kind of white hyphae. The meter box of 301 was pried open, and the switch was in the closed state. The layers of white fungi pressed on the switch, sticking it like glue; the two meters were in a stagnant state, motionless as if dead.

Seeing this, Xu Ming frowned. He glanced at the closed door of Room 301 next to him, and pursed his lips in suppression.

The puppy's soft whimpering came from the bag. A whale blubber man who had become smaller and had the audacity to crawl into the bag poked his head out and asked Xu Ming in a low voice about his future plans.

"Are you going to Room 301?" It said in an almost inaudible voice, "If you are going, I will make a more suitable shape for the event." "

..." Xu Ming lowered his eyes to look at it, and then looked at the stagnant electric meter in front of him. After a moment of silence, he finally shook his head.

"Something is wrong." She whispered in the same voice, "Let's go to 302 first."

*

302 is the house where the lady who was in charge of guarding 301 originally lived; and according to the whale man, it has temporarily become a refuge for Panpan, the child on the first floor.

302 is also equipped with a very common anti-theft door, with an upside-down Chinese character "Fu" pasted on the door. The whale man changed back into Xu Ming's appearance again, and went up and knocked on the door gently with ease. The door soon opened a small crack; the two pushed the door in carefully, but saw that there was no one behind the door.

The whale man seemed to be used to this, and said to Xu Ming not to worry, then turned around and closed the door - sure enough, as the anti-theft door was closed, the bedroom door in the house, which had been tightly closed, quietly opened again.

In the dim background, a girl who looked to be about ten years old poked her head out alertly. When her eyes caught sight of the whale blubber walking in front of her, she obviously relaxed and then snorted unabashedly. After seeing Xu Ming following behind her, her eyes suddenly widened as if she was frightened by something.

Xu Ming's first reaction was to think that she had seen something from behind him. After a pause, he remembered that his face might be quite scary now, so he quickly said, "Panpan, is it? Don't be nervous, I'm with it, and I don't mean any harm."

"..." The girl looked at her with a flat mouth, then looked away with some resistance, not daring to look at her face, but her expression soon calmed down.

"I know." She still hid behind the bedroom door, lowered her eyes and nodded, "If it's a bad guy, you can't go through this door."

"Oh." In the living room, the whale man who was holding Xu Ming's shell had already found a place to sit down and talked to himself, just like he was at home. He couldn't help but raise his head when he heard it, "Is there still such a saying? Why didn't you tell me before?"

The second half of the sentence was asked to Panpan. The other party just curled his lips and snorted again: "You didn't ask."

"Hey, you kid..." The whale man started to point unhappily, and was soon stopped by Xu Ming. The latter glanced at Panpan standing in the distance, thought for a while, and suddenly said: "Is it because of the blessing character posted on the door?"

After this, the whale man was usually at a loss. Panpan, who was standing behind the bedroom door, said "Huh" and moved slightly out: "How did you know?"

"I guessed." Xu Ming said truthfully, and turned his body slightly while speaking, consciously covering his scarred right face to avoid scaring people again, "The same blessing character is also in Room 101. There is no other room."

And now, the only two rooms on the third floor and below that can be called "safe" are these two houses with the blessing character posted at the same time, and the style is exactly the same - Xu Ming doesn't think this is a coincidence.

Sure enough. The girl was silent for a moment and nodded slightly.

"You two are together, so this guy should have told you, right? 101 is my home..." She said softly, as if she thought of something, paused for a moment, and then let out a breath, "The 'Fu' character on the door of our house was given to us by the former building manager. It is said that as long as it is attached to the door, the house will be safe and bad guys can't get in..."

Xu Ming nodded thoughtfully, carefully observing her expression - to be honest, this action is a bit difficult for her now, because she is leaning sideways at this moment, no matter how hard she tries, it feels like she is looking at people with squinted eyes.

Or to put it more literary. Looking down on others.

"So that's why you chose to hide in this room?" She asked tentatively, still not completely letting down her guard against the girl in front of her, "Because there's also a word 'Fu' on this door?"

"Just one reason." The girl muttered, lowering her head and kicking the ground with her toes, "The main reason was that I didn't have time to run back home."

It just so happened that the aunt who used to live in 302 had once given her the key to her own house, saying that if something happened to her family and she couldn't live there anymore, she could consider hiding in her place; it just so happened that she had the key with her at the time, so she hid in there in a panic and has been hiding there until now.

Xu Ming: "..." So that's it.

She had thought it was strange when she heard the whale man mention this before. If the original resident of 302 was no longer there, how did this girl get in? This made sense.

"...Okay, have you finished asking questions?" On the other end, the girl saw that Xu Ming stopped talking, and finally mustered up the courage to raise her head and said, "Now that you have finished asking questions, it's my turn!"

"First of all, it's you. Didn't you go down? Why are you coming up again? And you brought one more person with you... What on earth do you want to do?

" "Also, from what you said, you have been to my house before, right?"

The girl's voice involuntarily became a little higher when she said this, and she even took a few steps forward. Facing Xu Ming's "arrogant" eyes, she quietly stepped back a little, but still forced herself to finish the last sentence:

"Where's my mother? How is my mother?"

"..." Xu Ming had no say in this, so he had to look at the whale fat man. The latter was rarely reliable, and his tone was unusually calm: "Don't worry, I've seen it. I've been with her these days, and she can't be better."

"Go to bed on time and eat well. The only thing I miss is you. I always ask you why you haven't come home yet. "

...Nonsense." The girl couldn't

help curling her lips again when she heard it, "I'm not at home, how could she have the mind to cook..." Before she finished speaking, she couldn't help looking at the closed door and bit her lip angrily:

"It's all the fault of that guy in 301. It's so annoying. I can't even go back! Psycho!"

"If you want to go home, maybe we can help." Xu Ming spoke at the right time, attracting the girl's attention, "One of our companions is now trapped in 301. We are trying to find a way to rescue her. In the process, if you can successfully delay or trap the people in 301 opposite, you can take the opportunity to go downstairs and find your mother. "

She spoke softly, not missing the girl's eyes that lit up instantly. The next second, she saw the other party frowned, and her shoulders slumped again.

"Come on, I know what you are planning. You want to deal with the psychopath across the street, but you have no idea, so you want to come to me for help."

The girl crossed her arms, trying to straighten her small body, looking like a little adult, and speaking word by word: "I'm sorry, I also hope I can help in this regard. But I really love, love... I can't help. If I knew how to deal with that guy, I would have left long ago, why would I wait until now. "

"Don't be so harsh. We didn't expect that there would be someone so powerful that he could hide under the nose of 301 for so long, didn't you do it? "Xu Ming said casually, "Besides, sometimes, the solution is to try it out little by little. If you try, you may still have a chance to go home. If you don't try, you will have nothing."

Also, I guess what you want to say is that there is nothing you can do.

Considering the child's self-esteem, Xu Ming wisely swallowed the last sentence.

Facts have proved that she still has a way to coax children. After these words came out, the girl was obviously stunned, and the fingers that had been tightly grasping the seam of her pants finally loosened a little quietly.

Seeing this, Xu Ming also breathed a sigh of relief, and then turned his gaze to the surrounding furnishings, wanting to see if the original owner had left any clues here. After thinking about it, he took the opportunity to inquire:

"By the way. I saw some dried dogwood in the corridor before. Which door was it originally inserted on?"

"Dogwood...?" "The girl paused when she heard that, and then she reacted, "Oh, you mean the grass hanging on the door?"

"I don't know whose house it belongs to. It was thrown there when I came up. But I think it belongs to 301." The girl said seriously. "

?" Xu Ming's heart moved, "Why do you think it is 301?"

"Because only dangerous families have grass hanging on the door." The girl said immediately, "The aunt on the floor said when she gave us the blessing character, never touch the doors with grass hanging on them."

"Dangerous?" Xu Ming frowned again, and the whale man next to him interrupted, "But 102 is also dangerous, there is no dogwood in front of its door."

"There was one before, but it was knocked off. "The girl said bluntly, "The old man in Room 102 could get out without opening the door, he just removed the grass. I saw it with my own eyes. I also told the aunt on the floor, but she said it's not a big deal."

Xu Ming: "......?" "What did she say?"

"I forgot the details... Anyway, the grass is not used to seal the door, but to remind people who go out to go home. She said that the old man on the first floor can no longer leave the room, so it doesn't matter whether the grass is hung or not. "The girl said as she recalled.

Remind me to go home?

Xu Ming pondered over this sentence and blinked in sudden realization.

In other words, the people on the building manager's side used at least four methods to deal with the residents who had already undergone abnormalities in the building -

the meter box continued to "supply electricity" to the room, and used lights to control the movements of the monsters in the room to help them "maintain a stable mood."

The induction light can identify suspicious existences in the corridor and suppress and attack them. It seems to be controlled by the assistant of the building manager, and it is currently a little out of control, but it has a great impact on the residents of the building. It is still a great threat to the monsters in the house.

There is one staircase door on each floor from the third floor onwards. Only living people and residents who still retain their sanity can go upstairs through the door. Monsters will be blocked by the door and cannot go up. The relevant rules are suspected to have been modified by people who are not the owners of the building, but at present, it should still have a certain interception effect...

Finally, it is the "dogwood" they just confirmed. It can exert an influence on monsters that leave the room and make them return to the original house... As for whether it still has an effect, it is not certain now.

...But no matter what, one thing is certain.

Recalling the various signs he saw in the corridor not long ago, Xu Ming's face sank slightly.

——For 301 alone, the three restraints, the meter box, the induction light and the dogwood, have all been abandoned. There is only one staircase door left, and I don’t know if it is still useful...

Thinking of this, she couldn’t help but look around again, but just like Po Haitang said before - this house has become very clean, so clean that only a few pieces of ordinary furniture are left, and there is no trace of the previous owner.

Xu Ming still didn’t give up, his eyes were still wandering around the corners, following She continued to ask Panpan, asking whether the original owner of 302 had left anything behind - she thought, since the lady living in 302 came to deal with 301 in the first place, there must be some records left after such a long period of surveillance, so it wouldn't be that there is nothing left at all.

The girl frowned when she heard that. After frowning and thinking for a long time, she said "Ah" with sudden realization, turned around and ran into the bedroom, and soon ran out with a small box in her hand.

"This, I found it before! "She originally wanted to hand the box over, but accidentally saw Xu Ming's face and stopped hesitantly. In the end, she just put the box on the table in the living room, saying, "I wanted to find something here that could be used as a weapon, but I didn't find anything. I only found this under the bed... But I tried, and I couldn't open it at all."

As she spoke, she pushed the box in the direction of Xu Ming, and quickly stepped aside. Xu Ming looked at her with mixed feelings, and without saying much, he walked over and stared at the box for a while, but his heart suddenly moved.

- It was a metal box, the size of two palms, and it looked very delicate and sturdy, with the upper and lower parts tightly fastened. In the middle was a fingerprint lock, and there was no other way to open it... This should be the reason why Panpan said "it can't be opened".

However, what caught Xu Ming's attention the most were not these. What

she really cared about was the pattern printed on the box.

- It was a pattern composed of leaves.

A green leaf pattern that is very similar to the Anxin Gardening logo, but not exactly the same

.

What Xu Ming didn't know was that while she was thinking about the familiar pattern on the box, the same pattern was placed on a desk in the distance.

Anxin Gardening, the office of the director of the field department.

The capable middle-aged woman pointed at the paper on the table, raised her eyes and looked at Ling Guang and Fang Xueqing standing in front of the table:

"Do you recognize this pattern?"

"Hmm..." Fang Xueqing leaned over and took a closer look, not hiding the question mark in her eyes; Ling Guang, who entered the unit earlier than her, reacted immediately, dragged the paper over and took a closer look, and tentatively asked:

"This seems to be the previous logo of our unit?"

"Strictly speaking, it is the logo of the predecessor unit." The minister nodded affirmatively.

The predecessor of Anxin Gardening was a special official group affiliated with a certain government office. Because of the crazy evolution of strange stories in recent years and the emergence of rule books, it has gradually evolved into the current large-scale "Anxin Gardening" and has separated out a brother unit "Da Da Weeding". This is something that all internal employees know.

However, the former unit actually had its own representative logo, which is not known to everyone.

"It's called a logo, but it's more like a symbol." The director said leisurely, with a bit of nostalgia in his tone, "At that time, there were actually very few psychics directly affiliated with the unit. This symbol, rather than representing the official, is more like representing the human side. If you see this logo in a ghost story, it basically means that the records and clues related to it are very reliable, and it is necessary to protect and spread it."

"Hmm..." Fang Xueqing nodded, not quite understanding, "Then why don't you use this now?"

"Because there are more monsters in ghost stories that can modify records now." Ling Guang spoke consciously, and was immediately glared at by Fang Xueqing. The director smiled lightly and shook his head again.

"Yes, but not entirely."

"The bigger reason is that, due to a certain accident, there are suddenly fewer people who know how to use this sign. As a result, the sign itself is not used much."

"......?" Fang Xueqing looked up in confusion and frowned slightly, "Minister, what do you mean?"

The minister did not answer further, but let out a breath again.

"By the way, have you all read the information that Shi Mian just submitted?" She confirmed with the two people, "It was the information shared by the intern from the Demolition Office about the strange story about the Basket Bridge in the east of the city."

The two nodded without hesitation, and the minister also nodded slightly: "Okay, then I won't repeat this part.

"It's just that regarding this strange story, I still have some things to supplement. "

She said, and suddenly reached out and put a file on the table.

"Remember the 'accident' I just mentioned? Coincidentally, these two things happen to be somewhat related.

"And this connection is very important, so I hope that before you take any action, no matter what, you must first clarify these. Or the same sentence, don't act rashly, understand?"