According to the typical layout of the hotel, exiting through the emergency door would normally lead to a corridor that connects to rooms 311 and 312.
At the end of this corridor, there’s usually a ventilation window, with the elevator diagonally across. Anyone stepping out of the elevator would be able to see the emergency exit door.
But now, instead of a corridor, there’s a wall opposite the emergency door, and the elevator is nowhere to be seen.
Anyone familiar with the hotel’s third-floor layout would notice immediately that the floor plan and room positions here are entirely reversed.
This was the hidden third floor that Cai Yingying had once glimpsed.
Gu Jiu’s guess from yesterday had been correct. The hidden floor only appeared the first time the emergency door was opened each day.
The player who had died in the daytime yesterday was likely the first to open that emergency door, which led them to the hidden third floor. They chose to enter, but unfortunately, they hadn’t survived the game. Thus, they remained within the hotel.
In this game world, as long as one player successfully clears the level, the others can “win by default” and pass as well. However, those who win this way earn fewer points.
The players present held their breaths and cast fearful glances toward the door, apprehensive of what lay beyond.
As the one who opened the door, Cai Yingying was the first to feel that deadly threat, much like the creeping sense of crisis that had lingered over them last night. It weighed on her heart, making her hesitant to move forward.
Without sufficient preparation, she wasn’t about to rush into danger.
Gu Jiu approached.
The players blocking the doorway quickly stepped aside, afraid to obstruct her path and draw the ire of Zhan Shaohong, the “devoted follower” who would stand up for her.
Nervously, Zhan Shaohong whispered, “Gu Jiu, it’s really dangerous in there. You shouldn’t go in. Let Cai Yingying go first.”
Cai Yingying: “…” Damn, she wanted to wring this guy’s neck.
Standing at the door, Gu Jiu peered into the third floor.
It was quiet here. Her view from the doorway was partially obstructed, making it impossible to see the entirety of this hidden floor, but she could feel the same intangible sense of danger that seemed to hold everyone in check.
She took out a paper frog, which leapt from her palm to the ground and hopped inside.
The players’ eyes followed the paper frog as it moved forward, eventually disappearing from view.
After about ten minutes, the frog hadn’t returned.
“Do you think something happened to it?” Wan Xingzhou whispered.
Although Gu Jiu could command the paper frog, she wasn’t its true master and thus couldn’t communicate with it. She looked to Lu Ji, questioning her with her eyes.
Lu Ji responded, “It went through a slightly open door, and then the connection was cut off.”
Gu Jiu understood that the paper frog had likely turned back into paper.
She quickly made her decision: she would enter the hidden third floor.
“I’ll go with you.” Zhan Shaohong stepped forward, seizing the opportunity to show his loyalty while discreetly pulling out a defensive tool.
The lingering feeling of danger made everyone uneasy, but he was willing to take the risk for her. Besides, if the players wanted to clear the level, entering was inevitable. For the sake of his goddess, it was worth it.
Gu Jiu politely thanked him, then advised Wan Xingzhou and Lu Ji, “We’re going in. Be careful. If anything feels off, use your tools.”
The item she was referring to wasn’t just any tool but the “Red Thread of Fate,” one of the items available for purchase in the game’s marketplace upon entering this game world.
The game wouldn’t sell useless items. Over the past few days in this world, even during the direst situations like last night, the Red Thread of Fate had not come into play. Gu Jiu speculated that it would be used here on the hidden floor, though the timing would be up to the players to figure out.
After advising the others, Gu Jiu stepped boldly into the hidden third floor.
Lu Ji followed closely behind.
Although Wan Xingzhou was somewhat scared, he couldn’t just stay behind when the lady herself had gone in, so he quickly followed.
Seeing Gu Jiu march right in, the other players were momentarily stunned. They hadn’t expected her to be so direct, going in without the slightest hesitation.
Zhan Shaohong, trailing behind, called out, “Gu Jiu, wait for me!”
Seeing this, the other players no longer dared to hesitate and hurriedly followed in Zhan Shaohong’s wake.
Gu Jiu led the way, with Lu Ji right behind her, his eyes locked onto her without the slightest lapse. But even so, she vanished right in front of him.
Not only Gu Jiu, but the other players also disappeared.
Lu Ji stopped, standing alone in the eerily silent corridor, his dark eyes gazing calmly forward, his lips pressed slightly together.
The experiences of the other players were similar.
Their companions suddenly vanished, leaving them pale with fear. When they looked around, the environment had changed. Not only was the emergency door gone, but the elevator had also disappeared.
Wan Xingzhou rushed to the ventilation window at the end of the corridor, only to find it securely locked. No matter how he tried, he couldn’t pry it open. He even used his “Demon-Slaying Red Sword” to smash or cut the seemingly fragile glass, which proved to be unbreakable and invulnerable.
He surveyed his surroundings, realizing that they were now in a closed-off world, a place where players could only enter but not exit.
Understanding this, Wan Xingzhou resigned himself to his misfortune. It looked like he’d have to rely on himself again. He slipped on the “Six Spirit Resentment Beads” bracelet and began exploring his surroundings.
—
Gu Jiu turned around, seeing the empty corridor behind her with no trace of the other players, but she wasn’t surprised.
Calmly, she continued forward, still holding her notebook. Her gaze swept across the surrounding rooms until she reached a room at the end of the corridor with a door left slightly ajar.
This was where her paper frog had vanished.
Looking up at the door, she saw a plaque that read “Manager’s Office.”
She smiled; it turned out that the elusive manager’s office was here.
Pushing open the slightly ajar door, she found the room dimly lit, with the curtains drawn.
Gu Jiu fumbled to switch on the lights and then crossed the room to pull open the curtains, letting in the bright daylight from outside, and finally took a good look at the office.
The office was modestly sized, equipped with a small resting area and a restroom.
There wasn’t much in the room: a desk with a computer and other equipment, although the computer was off; opposite the desk, there was a set of sofas, and along the left wall was a filing cabinet. Through the glass doors of the cabinet, she could see some documents and a few scattered knick-knacks inside.
Gu Jiu first went to turn on the computer.
After a while, the computer still didn’t turn on, whether due to it being broken or for some other reason.
She had no choice but to give up on the computer and moved to the filing cabinet, pulling out the documents within to examine them. Most of the documents were hotel-related: construction records, management details, employee information, and procurement lists.
Gu Jiu glanced at each briefly before discarding them, flipping to the next file. All she found were routine expense reports, with little of practical value.
Then, at the very bottom of the cabinet, she discovered a file folder.
Opening it, she found only one item inside: a black leather notebook with a blood-stained cover.
Raising her eyebrows slightly, she opened the notebook, realizing it was the hotel manager’s log, used to record hotel affairs.
The entries began normally, detailing routine matters like employee performance, payroll, and financial reports. But one day, a note mentioned the hiring of a new receptionist.
The receptionist was a beautiful young woman who had come to the city from a rural village. Her entire family back home relied on her income. She was diligent and meticulous, putting great effort into her job. Though her Mandarin wasn’t perfect, she was determined to improve, and her warm, honest nature quickly won her the admiration and kindness of her coworkers.
One of the hotel guests took an interest in her and hinted as much to the hotel manager.
The guest was influential, and to curry favor with him, the hotel manager didn’t hesitate for long before making a decision.
One night, as the receptionist was working overtime, the hotel manager offered her a drink. She drank it, and, after losing consciousness, was sent to the guest’s room…
At this point, Gu Jiu’s expression turned cold.
As she continued flipping through, she found several pages had been torn out, leaving no record of what happened afterward.
She closed the notebook. Although the story was left incomplete, connecting it with what she knew about the current state of the Ai Hui Hotel, she could guess the general outcome. Otherwise, the Ai Hui Hotel wouldn’t have become a mission world within the vast game universe, a place where players were sent to complete challenges.
She recalled the human remains buried outside the hotel and the elderly face and youthful body of the waitress they encountered on the first day in the game.
No matter how polished the hotel appeared by day, its true nature was dark and vile.
Suddenly, Gu Jiu looked up at the window and noticed that the sky had grown dark without her realizing it.
It had clearly been morning when she entered, and it shouldn’t have gotten dark so quickly.
She allowed herself a faint smile; changes were good.
After thoroughly searching the entire office and finding nothing more of value, she pocketed the guest register and the black notebook before leaving the office.
Starting with the first room to the left of the office, Gu Jiu began searching each room on this floor.
The doors weren’t locked and opened easily.
As she opened the door to the first room, she was hit by the putrid stench of blood and rot, so intense it nearly made her gag. Quickly, she donned a gas mask and stepped inside.
On the large bed lay the body of a corpulent man, his abdomen brutally split open, soaking the sheets beneath him in blood.
Though the body and wounds looked disturbingly fresh, with blood still dripping, the stains on the sheets had already congealed and turned black.
The man’s face was twisted in terror, his eyes bulging as if about to pop from their sockets, veins streaked with red, as though he’d witnessed something unimaginably horrifying in his final moments.
After a quick study of the corpse, Gu Jiu turned to leave.
She then opened the door to the second room.
Upon entering, she saw someone lying prone on the floor, neck twisted at an unnatural angle, facing the door. The eyes, wide open and fixated, seemed to stare straight at Gu Jiu, as though meeting her gaze or perhaps witnessing some horrific sight. The face was contorted in terror.
The person was thin, dressed in a suit, with a pool of dark, nearly coagulated blood spreading beneath him.
Even without smelling, it was clear that the air was thick with the stench of decaying blood. Fortunately, she was wearing a gas mask, sparing her from the nauseating odor.
Gu Jiu picked up a wooden stick and turned the body over, noticing a name tag on the suit’s chest.
This was the hotel manager.
She wasn’t surprised by his identity.
The identity of the obese man in the first room was also easy to deduce. He was likely the guest from the notebook, the one who had harassed the receptionist—perhaps even the one who had killed her.
Then, Gu Jiu opened the third room, where she found another man lying in a pool of blood in the bathroom, eyes wide open in death. Judging by his clothes, he was likely a hotel employee.
The fourth room, the fifth, the sixth…
Besides the manager’s office, there were eleven rooms on this floor, and in each, there was a dead body.
Gu Jiu took a deep breath, realizing that all the dead were either hotel guests or employees. Their deaths mirrored what Wan Xingzhou had been seeing in her hallucinations these past days.
No, it would be more accurate to say that Wan Xingzhou’s visions were glimpses of these people’s final moments.
For days, Gu Jiu had taken Wan Xingzhou and Lu Ji to examine the rooms where players had died at night. Each time they entered a room, Wan Xingzhou would have a vision, each one bloodier than the last.
At the time, the visions had shown her how each person had died.
Gu Jiu noticed that one person was still missing: the receptionist.
So, could it be that the receptionist had slaughtered all these people? Did she bury them outside the hotel afterward?
Gu Jiu quickly shook her head, dismissing the thought as too simple.
She hadn’t encountered the receptionist so far. Even if she’d turned into a ghost, wouldn’t she have appeared by now, haunting the players to leave some trace of her presence?
As Gu Jiu backed out of the room, she suddenly noticed that the vanished elevator had reappeared.
Looking around, she confirmed that the floor’s layout and orientation were still reversed, meaning she was still on the hidden floor and hadn’t left. So why had the elevator returned?
She didn’t hesitate long and pressed the button.
The elevator door chimed open, breaking the eerie silence of the night with surprising clarity.
Gu Jiu stepped inside and pressed the button for the first floor.
The elevator quickly arrived. As the doors opened, Gu Jiu immediately noticed a slender figure by the reception desk, back turned toward her. The figure’s long, black hair was neatly tied, and her silhouette was graceful and captivating.
Gu Jiu walked out of the elevator and approached the desk.
The person behind the counter seemed busy searching for something. As Gu Jiu drew closer, a sweet voice rang out, “Have you seen the registry? I can’t find it, and the manager will scold me if it’s missing.”
Gu Jiu responded, “Are you looking for this?”
The figure paused slightly, then slowly turned around, revealing a young, beautiful face with a gentle, sweet smile.
Her eyes lit up as she spotted the registry in Gu Jiu’s hand. A delighted smile spread across her face, “Yes, that’s it. Could you give it back to me?”
Gu Jiu silently handed over the registration book.
“Thank you,” the waitress said with a sweet smile, adding politely, “Is there anything else I can help you with, guest?”
Gu Jiu smiled slightly and said, “I can’t find my companions. Could you bring them over here?”
The waitress looked surprised and hesitated. “You only want to find your companions?”
“Yes,” Gu Jiu replied calmly. “I’m a bit worried about them and afraid something might happen. I’d feel better if I could keep an eye on them right in front of me.”
The waitress fixed her beautiful eyes on Gu Jiu, and as Gu Jiu returned her gaze with a smile, she softly said, “Actually, you could make other requests, and I would fulfill them.”
“Better not,” Gu Jiu replied, looking at her with a trace of pity in her eyes. “I don’t want to add to your workload. You’re a good girl—responsible and diligent with your work.”
The waitress stared at her, a look on her face hovering between a smile and tears. “Then… can you help me?”
Gu Jiu chuckled, “I might not be able to do it alone, but my companions can help you.”
As always, first get her companions out, then take it from there.