Chapter 5 The Fifth Floor

Following the werewolf's instructions, the four quickly found the location of the attic and climbed up the ladder outside the skylight.

The corridor outside the room had a fork, perhaps indeed a way to the middle of the castle. But Brother Jue and the others didn't explore it, because the werewolf's clues indicated: first, Little Red Riding Hood was strong and unfriendly; second, she could return to the castle at any time.

From a game perspective, if an NPC gives you such clear information and you still do something contrary to it, you will definitely face great danger, even trigger an instant-death scenario, so they decided not to linger.

The four climbed the ladder for more than five minutes, and after passing through a patch of stationary clouds, they saw the end of the ladder. There was a round, black hole, with the top of the ladder resting on the edge of it.

This hole was "painted" in the sky, like the kind that can be drawn out of thin air in a Warner Bros. cartoon.

Upon closer inspection, the hole wasn't actually that narrow, as long as someone wasn't too overweight, they could get through.

Of course, the werewolf still couldn't get through. Due to the forward curvature of his neck joint, the gigantification of his torso, and the posture when climbing the ladder, he was destined to be confined to the space below the fifth floor.

"Hmm...another dark floor." Feng Bujue was the first to step onto the fifth floor, picking up the broom (he had thrown it up to test the way as he reached the top of the ladder) as he spoke.

Honghu, Qiufeng, and Ji Chang followed closely behind, entering the fifth floor in turn.

"Now we know that this building...if it can still be called a building, only has seven floors in total," Honghu said. "Which means...so far, four-sevenths of this script has passed, right?"

"I beg to differ." Ji Chang was a very patient and absolutely rational person. He responded, "As the saying goes...the last half of a hundred-mile journey is the hardest. The closer you get to the end of anything, the less impatient you should be. It's like injury time in a soccer match; if the whole team is thinking, 'It'll be over soon,' the risk of conceding a goal increases dramatically."

"I agree with that," Feng Bujue said. "In many horror movies, it's the surviving characters' carelessness in the last few minutes that leads to total annihilation."

As he spoke, Brother Jue took out his flashlight again and turned it on.

Feng Bujue hadn't asked for the flashlight he gave to Honghu back. After reaching the fourth floor, the item had remained with the other man. So at this moment, Honghu also took out his own flashlight from his pocket and switched it on.

The first thing both of them did was the same: they first swept the surrounding area with the light, and then immediately shone it directly above.

The ceiling and floor of this level had returned to the same state as on the first floor. The floor was tiled, and the ceiling was only a little over four meters high. With just the light of the flashlights, they couldn't see the surrounding walls yet; it seemed that this was also a fairly spacious area.

"How about...the same old rules, I'll go explore the surroundings alone first..." Feng Bujue hadn't finished speaking when a voice interrupted him from the darkness.

"Gentlemen," a childish, little girl's voice rang out.

These words startled all three players, their fear levels rising to over 50%. Although Feng Bujue wasn't scared, he knew something was wrong. He thought, Could Little Red Riding Hood be waiting for us here?

嚓—

With a soft sound, a spark suddenly appeared in the darkness.

The flame was initially only the size of a grain of rice, but for some reason, it rapidly expanded in a matter of seconds, until it lit up the entire floor...

In the crowd's vision, a short figure wearing a brown cloak appeared. Her cheeks were flushed, her clothes looked old and thin, and she was barefoot.

At this moment, the little girl was holding a basket in her left hand, and in her right hand...she was holding a burning match.

"This doesn't seem like Little Red Riding Hood, but..." Qiufeng lowered his voice, wanting to state his deduction.

"Ah...I see it now," Feng Bujue interrupted. From the looks in his, Honghu's, and Ji Chang's eyes, they naturally knew who this was.

"Would you like to buy some matches?" the little girl asked as she took a few steps closer to the players.

The four players looked at each other, unsure how to respond.

"Please buy a box of my matches," she repeated in a pleading tone.

At this moment, Qiufeng seemed to have thought of something. He stepped forward and took out the magic shoes from his pocket: "Can I exchange these shoes for a box of matches?"

The little girl looked at the silver magic shoes that he handed over, hesitating for a moment. "Really? Sir, these shoes look like they're worth a lot of money." It seemed she was an honest child.

"It's okay, I think it's a fair trade," Qiufeng replied.

"Alright then, thank you, sir," the little girl responded.

Just then, the match in her hand went out, and the entire floor returned to darkness.

Qiufeng's eyes were instantly plunged into darkness, but fortunately, his teammates quickly ran over. The flashlights illuminated the area around Qiufeng, but the little girl had disappeared, and the shoes in Qiufeng's hand were also gone.

"Over there." Feng Bujue still had sharp eyes and quickly discovered a clue.

In the place where the little girl first appeared, there was a box of matches placed. On the floor tile, there was also a line of text that seemed to be smoked onto it. It looked like Latin, and the system translated it as: [Sincere acts of kindness are done without expecting anything in return.]

After reading it, Ji Chang said, "I see...the magic shoes were used here. I originally thought there would be a 'Cinderella' type of plot."

Qiufeng picked up the matches on the ground. "I just had a flash of inspiration. I saw that she didn't have any shoes, so I thought of it."

"Loli and ankle fetishist, huh..." Feng Bujue said, stroking his chin.

"Why does everything you say get twisted into something completely depraved..." Qiufeng said.

"Did you guys observe the environment during those few seconds when everything was lit up?" Honghu brought the topic back on track.

Ji Chang said, "Ah, I saw it. The whole floor is empty, except over there..." He raised his arm and pointed in a direction, "There's a door."

"Hmm...that's the same as what I observed," Honghu responded. "So...should we go straight over there?"

"How about I light a match so we can take another look?" Qiufeng said, opening the matchbox.

Unexpectedly, there were only four matches inside...

"Ha! No need to say anything, let's each take one," Feng Bujue said directly after glancing at the contents of the matchbox.

The other three didn't say anything either. They all understood what it meant when the number of the same type of plot item was equal to the number of players.

Since that was the case, they wouldn't waste the limited items to illuminate the surrounding environment. Relying on the light of the flashlights, the four walked in the direction that Ji Chang had pointed, and soon arrived in front of the door.

"An elevator?" Ji Chang said, looking at the metal door.

From the appearance, this door was exactly the same as the elevator door in the login space. There was only one button next to the door, and its function was self-evident.

Ding—

After Honghu pressed the button, the elevator door opened to both sides.

The four entered in single file. After entering, they discovered that there was nothing to operate inside the elevator.

After waiting for five or six seconds, the door closed automatically. Then, the elevator began to move upwards. It was unknown whether it was remotely controlled or operated automatically based on the internal load. In this fantastical script, it wouldn't be surprising if the elevator had its own consciousness.

It didn't run for long, only about one floor's height, before the elevator stopped and the door opened automatically again.

The players safely stepped into the area of the sixth floor.

"Speaking of which...my initial guess about the odd and even floors seems to have been completely wrong..." Honghu said as he walked out of the elevator.

"That's true, but..." Qiufeng continued, "From the first floor to here, the difficulty seems to have been very low all along. Apart from the ***-233, there haven't been any particularly difficult puzzles, and there haven't even been any battles."

"Not necessarily," Feng Bujue refuted. "We may have already encountered several 'instant-death' traps, but we just didn't trigger them, which is why you think it's simple." He said, "Leaving aside the ***, the werewolf from before was clearly a monster that could lead to a total party wipe; also...now we know that we should give the shoes to the little match girl. But...what if we had done the wrong thing at the time, such as giving the wrong item, or not responding to her plea before the match burned out..."

"That makes sense..." Ji Chang responded. "In a script that seems almost risk-free, there may be many instant-kill settings hidden. We can't be careless next time..."

As the four spoke, they had all observed the full appearance of the sixth floor.

The setting of this floor was similar to that of the fourth floor, but the environment was very different.

The floor of the sixth floor was a muddy swamp, with very limited places to stand. On the murals on the four walls were black forests and heavy mountain shadows. And on the ceiling directly above was painted a night sky, with sparse, long clouds and many twinkling stars.

In the corner between the ceiling and the two walls hung a paper mache full moon, and the cold moonlight scattered across the swamp.

The path leading upwards on this floor was relatively clear; it was on the wall directly opposite the elevator. There was a winding stone staircase painted there, and the bottom five or six steps extended out from the wall, connecting with the three-dimensional space.

On this floor, the areas where the players could walk were limited, and there were not many choices. They could only step on the relatively dry spots and advance towards the stone steps on the opposite wall.

"Watch your step," Honghu, who was walking in the front, reminded. "We don't have any items now. If we fall horizontally into the middle of the swamp, it'll be very difficult to pull people out."

"Hey...did you guys hear that?" Feng Bujue suddenly said, tilting his head up at the same time.