Alternate Dimension Game: Happiness is all that matters!
Chapter 202 - 186 The Rule of the Elevator Hall

Chapter 202: Chapter 186 The Rule of the Elevator Hall

Wang Hao glanced at the girl in the short skirt.

The khaki skirt just exposed her knees. Han Xiaoyue’s figure and looks truly pleasing to the eye.

But, she was his cousin.

Could that be a bad thing, or perhaps a good thing?

Han Xiaoyue was still holding a thick copy of "New Concept English," still so diligent during summer break, truly a representative of the town’s studious types.

Wang Hao liked intelligent, hardworking girls, just as he admired a certain literary description by Simone de Beauvoir.

"...a man’s greatest fortune is that, whether in adulthood or childhood, he must embark on a difficult path, but it is a dependable one; whereas a woman’s misfortune lies in being surrounded by irresistible temptations, she is not encouraged to strive upward but rather to slide down to bliss, and by the time she realizes that she’s been fooled by a mirage, it is often too late, her strength already spent on futile adventures."

Struggle and hard work, that’s what everyone should do.

Girls who don’t work hard, lack an attraction at the level of the soul. After all, Wang Hao was quite face-blind; he thought Xiaoyue was pretty and the Immortal Bean girl was pretty too, none of which was unrelated to the girls’ diligence and efforts.

Immortal Bean is a top student, so is Xiaoyue.

"Cough cough... this puzzle, how would you fill in the blanks?" Wang Hao pointed to two lines of text on a piece of paper and asked.

"You’re the one who’s stuck, aren’t you?" Han Xiaoyue tilted her head, her heart actually feeling anxious, afraid that she’d see something she shouldn’t.

Then, if she became entangled by some inexplicable strangeness, she would be unable to defend herself.

To avoid suspicion, she read the several words out loud, "There are only ▇▇ ▇▇▇▇..."

"Right, you don’t need to emphasize it again," Wang Hao urged.

"The first blank, it’s definitely a number, like 123456. Since the measure word is ’individuals’, the blanks after must be a two-character noun, like apples, oranges, or whatever.

If it’s a puzzle from a game... nouns like ’murderer’ would probably make more sense. ’There are only 6 murderers’, how about that?"

"That’s right, and watermelon too! It’s July now, just the season for eating watermelons... I really want to eat watermelon," Han Xiaoyue saw that Wang Hao was calm, showing no signs of an outburst, found an excuse, and wanted to slip away.

"Buy it yourself, I’m not stopping you," Wang Hao said, gruffly, "How much does a watermelon cost, can’t you afford one?"

"But I want to have it on public expense..."

"Fine, would 100 bucks be enough?" Wang Hao rolled his eyes, still unable to resist the desire to indulge her, "That’s enough for several watermelons."

He already knew the answer to the puzzle, of course, he figured it out with his own abilities!

"There are only ▇▇ ▇▇▇▇—only four spots!"

There are only four spots in the elevator!

If there are too many people, it will be overloaded!

Here "people" refers not just to humans, but also... to the strange!

So in the first Reincarnation, when the Box Monster entered the elevator and there were 5 passengers, it was immediately overloaded.

During the second Reincarnation, the elevator was filled with two security guards, a lady in red, a mass of Black Fog, plus "me," making a total of 5 people; there was no need for the Box Monster to enter, it was already overloaded.

Overloaded, the elevator halts operation, and one has to be eliminated!

These oddities, seemingly by agreement, showed their aggressiveness, selecting the weakest— "me"!

"This logic is very coherent."

Wang Hao took a deep breath, 70% confident that "only four spots" was the correct guess.

Uncertain if the brother who ventured in to record this information had lost his life...

"The humans of that world, they are really pitiful."

As for the phrase "It despises ▇▇▇," the options were indeed numerous.

Han Xiaoyue analyzed, "This blank definitely needs a noun too, it’s hard to guess without context."

"Men, women, cats, dogs, any of them could fit; the range is too broad, hard to filter."

Wang Hao smiled, "If you want to hear a ghost story, I could tell you about the context. The story is a bit scary, you need to prepare yourself mentally."

Han Xiaoyue immediately shook her head like a rattle-drum and plugged her ears with two fingers, "No way! I don’t want to hear your ghost stories!"

Suddenly, she saw the game helmet beside her flash a couple of times, that soul-stirring blue light as if it shone into the depths of her spirit.

Her little heart turned cold.

What does that mean?

Big Cousin is clearly stable of mind, does this need comforting too?

However, her tone softened a bit, "I’m a bit scared of that game you play. I... I don’t want to play it!"

One should never know what they shouldn’t, that’s her ultimate survival rule.

After all, she’s quite the little bum.

There are too many mysterious phenomena in the world, even this internet cafe is hiding many unknown secrets. That Ling Pingzhi could easily kill her.

There are things Big Cousin can take lightly, but... she, she mustn’t seek to understand them proactively.

"Alright then." Wang Hao didn’t insist, "Go buy your watermelon."

Playing games is all about mutual willingness. Han Xiaoyue has never been very courageous, fitting the character of a soft girl. I think it’s really fun, but to you, it might be torture. He still understands the principle of not imposing on others what you wouldn’t want for yourself.

So he chuckled and said, "How about we play ’Double Trouble’ later? After I clear this stage, that game is perfect for two people."

"Yeah, yeah... I heard it was last year’s ’Game of the Year’, I’ve wanted to play it for a long time!" Han Xiaoyue beamed with a smile. Seeing the constantly flashing blue light on the helmet, she bravely said, "But I feel like, with how stuck you are right now, even if you stayed up all night, you wouldn’t finish this stage of the game."

"How could that be?" Wang Hao knew she was deliberately provoking him, but he got a bit anxious.

Being looked down upon by a girl, agitated! Agitated!

"How about we make a bet?" Wang Hao suggested.

"What kind of bet? Tell me!"

Wang Hao said with a smile, "If I haven’t beaten this level by 12 o’clock tonight, you can draw a turtle on my face! Otherwise, you’ll have a turtle on yours. What do you say, bet or not?"

Han Xiaoyue’s heart skipped a beat, drawing a turtle on my big cousin’s face!

Is this what they call dancing on graves? What would happen if I drew a turtle? I’m so curious.

She glanced again at the helmet; the flickering blue light had disappeared.

"But, I don’t know whether you’ve cleared it or not..." Han Xiaoyue stubbornly said, "I really don’t want to watch your horrifying game, not one bit!"

Wang Hao hurriedly cried injustice, claiming he had taste: "Do you think I can’t handle losing? I won’t deny it if I lose!"

"Then... okay then. If you lose, you’ll have a turtle on your face. If I lose... you can also draw a turtle on my face. I’m off to buy watermelons, bye." Han Xiaoyue could only accept with a smile, this feeling of skirting the edge of danger, not "in the slightest" thinking she would lose.

"Going to spend your money on watermelons right now!!!"

Descending the stairs, the girl couldn’t stop cursing in her heart: Damn game! It just knows how to scare me! Damn game!

She suddenly saw Ling Pingzhi, a shut-in, crawling out of his booth.

Spotting the angry girl, Ling Pingzhi was struck by social anxiety, shivered, and hurried back inside.

Han Xiaoyue rolled her eyes, muttering "damn game" to herself, and then went to buy watermelons.

...

Having got rid of the provocative sister, Wang Hao was filled with passion and drive, immersing himself back into his puzzle-solving.

It was now 9 p.m., only a short 3 hours left until midnight.

There should still be enough time!

Another brainstorming session began!

He took a water pen and wrote a list of clues on a piece of paper.

"...From a power level perspective, the ’elevator’ that can travel through Parallel Worlds should be the strongest, no doubt about that. However, the elevator’s aggressiveness is relatively low. It detests something, and only after a certain condition is triggered will it attack."

"The thing it detests is the key to solving the puzzle."

"Next is the Black Fog, with a very high power level, seemingly unaffected by a woman’s crying. The fog becomes highly aggressive at the sight of blood."

"Then there’s that woman, who causes death through the resonance of her cries, the woman’s killing Rule... could it be triggered by running out of medicine, or something else... An elevator overload might provoke its attack?"

"Finally, those two good-for-nothing security guards are affected by the woman’s crying... the guards could be the elevator’s operators."

"But even so, the guards are not something I can confront."

But even if I deduce the power hierarchy, it’s no use.

Do I really have to bring a Strange Object to directly confront these oddities?

Wang Hao pondered deeply, struggling to come to a solid conclusion for a while.

He owned a number of Strange Objects.

But a young girl whose Spiritual Strength wasn’t even a thousand would have to carry an immensely powerful Strange Object, something like "Holy Water Rune·Extreme", to have the capital to fight against so many oddities.

He was a bit reluctant to do so.

He tried hard to recall everything that happened during the two loops...

These memories played back and forth like a movie.

Only one mystery left: "It detests something."

Blood had been mostly ruled out.

Suddenly, an epiphany struck!

In the second loop’s last moment, there were five "passengers" in the elevator.

"I" was attacked by several oddities, and as the elevator became a mess and I was about to lose my life, "I" was unexpectedly grabbed by two guards and flung out of the elevator door!

"Did the two guards do it out of kindness?"

"Of course... not."

It was because, during the chaos, the elevator emitted a repetitive electronic sound, seemingly undergoing some kind of change!

"That is, ’I’ inadvertently triggered the elevator’s Rule at that moment and was detested by the elevator."

"The elevator started to go berserk, threatening to kill everyone inside."