Chapter 5#
Chapter 5#
Goodnight
As soon as Yu Qing fell asleep, his phone shook. Two more system notifications had come in.
< Tutorial Quest 1: Check in at the hotel’s front desk > complete. Claim Rewards.
Even one who slays ten thousand foes by day must rest in an eight-feet bed by night.
Congratulations on taking your first baby step: in any dungeon, your immediate priority should be to exchange credits for lodging. Room prices vary by type. We know you like to live in style, but for the sake of your balance, be sure to spend within your means!
Unless there are exceptional circumstances, within the dungeon, your accommodation is your only safehouse.
The next one was tagged with a red exclamation mark, containing just one line:
< Error code: 00986716. Player’s accommodation did not cost any credits. >
For now, however, Yu Qing saw neither message.
Mr. Painted Skin had a unique way of sleeping. He neither breathed nor had a heartbeat, resting peacefully with his hands clasped in front of him. Without those rarer-than-rare stirrings, he’d pass for a corpse to the untrained eye.
The mouldy little skeleton was cut from the same cloth as its master. It neither breathed nor had a heartbeat, sprawled out in a ‘大’ shape beside him.
The hotel window wasn’t soundproof. The higher the floor, the more the wind resembled the lament of ghosts. Listen to the wind long enough and one might start to think that it didn’t leak through the window, but from the depths of the pitch-dark corridor… or even from beside the bed.
The howling reverberated relentlessly around the room until it grew hoarse. Meanwhile, one man and one cat were dead to the world, undisturbed by the storm.
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In suite 807 on the eighth floor of the hotel, ThreeKings erected a barrier of pillows and sheets wrapped so tightly around him that only a tuft of red hair showed. After reading the line ‘within the dungeon, your accommodation is your only safehouse’ in the quest completion message, he’d quietly built a blanket fort.
It was a bit of a waste, though. The suite cost six times more than a standard room, totalling three thousand credits. He’d gone for that as it came with an add-on: one free treatment that could restore a player even from the brink of death.
He had it all planned out. It was a Beginner Dungeon. In any game, such dungeons were designed as tutorials to teach players the basics. Many games even started by showing players how to walk, run, and jump, treating them like dummies.Rose Islandshould be no different. The early stages of the dungeon would surely hand-hold them, posing no real danger. Only after the players got the hang of things would the difficulty scale up a little. Then, he’d just have to tide through that little bit of added difficulty, and the dungeon would be over.
The free treatment was effectively an extra life. With that safety net, there was absolutely no way that he’d go in on his feet and be carried out feet-first. Little did he know…
The moment he stepped into the hotel, the extra life that he’d paid three thousand credits for disappeared without a trace. ThreeKings still couldn’t unravel how he suddenly found himself on the brink of death.
He tapped into the ‘System Notifications’ tab again and again, opening that kill message again and again, poring over it, yet he couldn’t make head nor tail of it. It read:
< You have suffered a critical hit. Health: 1.3% >
< Origin of attack: Unknown >
He had no injuries. He hadn’t even felt any pain. After pondering it at length, he could only conclude it was a bug and chalk it down to his bad luck.
On the wall clock, the minute hand ticked, and the familiar hologram popped up again.
< Tutorial Quest 2: Midnight is approaching. Remember to buy a weapon to defend yourself. >
The exclamation mark representing the quest flashed incessantly, but this time it couldn’t bother Yu Qing.
Mr. Painted Skin had made up his mind. Unless ^^ came out, he was determined to sleep like a log.
In the messaging app, the party chat, which had been silent all along, finally saw some activity.
SpicySoupKing: Where do we buy weapons?
JustRude: No idea. This hotel gives me the creeps. Don’t dare to explore.
SpicySoupKing: Man, I miss the days when games had auto-pathing.
JustRude: You think I’d click that even if it were an option?
SpicySoupKing: …
The suite was vast and empty, and ThreeKings was completely unnerved by the howling. He tugged the duvet over his head and tapped away in the party chat.
ThreeKings: There are a few shops in the vicinity. We probably can get the goods there.
SpicySoupKing: Have you gone?
ThreeKings: Not yet…
SpicySoupKing: Wanna go together?
JustRude: Sounds like a plan. I don’t think I can do it alone.
SpicySoupKing: Great. See you at the front desk.
SpicySoupKing: Come to think of it, where are the last two in the party? @SliceIntoSashimi @^^ have you guys done the quest yet? Wanna join?
The chat went silent for one minute. Neither of the two mentioned individuals responded.
SpicySoupKing: Don’t tell me they’re asleep.
JustRude: …Can anyone get any sleep in this hotel?????
Sure they could. In 1811, that guy was sleeping just fine. But it was a completely different story in suite 807.
ThreeKings tugged his quilt a little tighter around him, then typed: Do we have to go now? I’d rather wait a bit.
SpicySoupKing: Why?
ThreeKings: I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something outside my door.
SpicySoupKing: Nah man. I’m already out the door on the way to the lift. Everything feels freaky, but the coast is clear.
ThreeKings: There’s something out there. For real.
After sending that, he clutched his phone, listening closely. He wasn’t imagining it. There really were noises outside the door…
It was as if someone were lightly scraping the door with their fingernails. Correction, it didn’t seem to be scraping the door, but against something softer, like fabric or something. It didn’t sound like it was from the corridor either. Rather, it sounded like it came from somewhere a little closer…
Taking a deep breath, ThreeKings strained his ears, but his heart was hammering so loudly in his chest that he couldn’t be sure of what he heard. So, he gingerly pulled back the quilt a little, exposing one ear.
Now he could hear it clearly.
The sound was definitely fabric being scraped, and it was impossibly close—so close that… it was practically right by the bed!
ThreeKings yanked the quilt down and opened his eyes.
A contorted humanoid form clung to the ceiling like a spider, its jet-black eyes staring unblinkingly at him. Its face was ashen, and its hair was dripping wet. Its long arm reached down and grabbed hold of his quilt. ThreeKings: “…”
“Aaaaaaaargh! Get lost!” He kipped up and made a break for the door.
Minutes later, SpicySoupKing and JustRude who had gathered at the front desk were just about to leave when a black whirlwind blew past them.
“What was that???” SpicySoupKing exclaimed.
“Li Kui?” JustRude mused.(fictional character, nicknamed Black Whirlwind)
“Does Li Kui have red hair?”
Before they could work it out, a whispering sound came from behind them, as if something were crawling at breakneck speed.
JustRude looked back.
And so he saw deathly pale ghosts pour down from the ceiling and the staircase. Crawling around corners, their heads twisted upside down—mouths above, eyes below—they writhed as they searched for the living.
JustRude blinked. Then, two more “AAAAAH!” shrieks joined ThreeKings’s, and the trio bolted out of the hotel.
Meanwhile, in 1814, one man and one cat were still dead asleep.
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Three poorly lit shops stood beside the hotel. Shrieking, they swept into the first one like a whirlwind. It sold accessories for the beach, its walls lined with surfboards and swimsuits and trunks. They burst out. Shrieking, they swept into the second one. It was a general shop, its shelves piled high with instant meals, sodas, and a few basic potions. Finally, they swept into the third, shrieking at the top of their lungs.
Covering his ears, the shopkeeper looked at them, shut the door, and yelled, “Cut it out! Pick your stuff and pay up!”
The trio then slowly sagged down on the counter. “Anything will do. We’ll take whatever.”
“Put your money where your mouth is.” The shopkeeper smacked three items down onto the counter. “Automatic crossbow going for one grand. Maximum range twenty metres. Arrows sold separately at fifty each.
“Adjustable switchblade goes for seven hundred. The shortest it can extend is ten cm, and forty at the longest. Pretty decent spring action.
“Talismans that have been professionally consecrated. These go for eight hundred each, and they are single-use only.”
JustRude bought five talismans without batting an eyelid, nearly going bankrupt. SpicySoupKing didn’t think that the talismans were worth it; he picked the crossbow instead. ThreeKings, who had blown everything on the suite, ended up as the lucky recipient of a switchblade.
As soon as they made the purchases, their phones vibrated, all of them receiving a system notification at the same time.
< Tutorial Quest 2: Midnight is approaching. Remember to buy a weapon to defend yourself > complete. Claim Rewards.
Congratulations on mastering step two of Essential Beginner Skills: acquiring a weapon for self-defence. Every player only has one chance to buy a weapon per dungeon. Once selected, no returns or exchanges will be accepted after that. You will be barred from the weapon shop. Thrift is a virtue, but do not skimp on buying a weapon.
ThreeKings wondered, “What does ‘you will be barred from the weapon shop’ mean?”
The shopkeeper answered, “Means this shop is going to vanish.”
The trio: “?”
SpicySoupKing zeroed in on something. “Going to vanish? What about you?”
“Me?” The shopkeeper grinned from ear to ear. “I’ll stay behind to keep you company, of course.” His grin grew and kept growing.
Suddenly, he cocked his head to the side, and it rolled off.
“AAAAAAH!” ThreeKings had never screamed so loudly, not even at a concert. He hit the button on his switchblade, and a forty-centimetre blade sprang out with a click. However, when he plunged the blade down, not a drop of blood emerged from the blanched skin. Worse yet, the shopkeeper was still writhing and crawling towards them.
“What’s the point of buying the weapon?!” he screeched.
“To prove that we’re idiots!” JustRude screeched back. “AAAAAH!”
With a ding, another hologram appeared.
< Tutorial 3: Run! When you encounter a monster you can’t defeat right now, return straight to your room! That’s your only safehouse in the dungeon! >
The trio scampered back towards the hotel.
SpicySoupKing was a little more gutsy—enough to still think while running. “Stop being wimps! Don’t forget this is a tutorial quest! Tutorials are meant to ease us in. Haven’t y’all played games before? You don’t usually die in situations like this. The point is to teach you, not kill you.”
“I get it!” ThreeKings yelled. “I’m a hardcore gamer myself! But the game immersion is way too intense! Tell me how not to be scared! AAAAH!”
“I can’t take this any more! I’ll test it! Here’s how!” SpicySoupKing came to an abrupt halt, stood his ground, and spread his arms wide, waiting for the ghastly figures crawling after them to catch up. “Watch this! By right, at this stage, you won’t die even if you take a couple of hits—”
Before he could finish, three ghosts pounced on him. One of them opened its crimson maw, sank teeth into his neck, and tossed its head. SpicySoupKing’s expression froze, then fresh blood gushed from his severed neck, spraying far and wide.
The warm blood splattered across ThreeKings’s face. His mind went blank. A hologram popped up just then.
< Regretfully, Player SpicySoupKing was attacked by a ghost, decapitated, and died instantly. Party 4/5 members remaining. >
Whatever happened to tutorials not being deadly? ThreeKings and JustRude froze for a beat, dumbfounded. Before fear could register, instinct kicked in—they tore back to their respective rooms.Bang!The door slammed shut, keeping the stench of blood out.
Both of them huddled in the corner furthest from the door. Some monsters phased through the door, but those could only scare them, not touch them.
After an eternity, the whispering sounds faded into the distance. The ghosts crawled slowly along the corridor’s ceiling, having already devoured the man who had died earlier, leaving nothing. They licked their lips, craving more.
Where else could they go? Head tilted, they craned their necks, searching floor by floor. When they crawled up to the eighteenth floor, their eyes lit up.
They had smelt another scent.
Five minutes later, in room 1811, Mr. Painted Skin hadn’t even turned once. His hands clasped in front of him, he slept on, as peacefully as ever.
Yet the ceiling, windowsill, floor, and bedside were swarming with ghosts with their necks stretched out, salivating at the scent. Finally, the white kitten sprawled on the bed opened its eyes.
After a long and wide yawn, it tilted its head, only to come face to face with a room full of ghosts. “?”
It jumped out of its skin, pounced onto its master, and hopped up and down. His master remained dead to the world. Xiaomi: “…”
It mewled and yowled into its master’s ear, to no avail. Xiaomi: “…”
The ghost closest to the bed was the first to snap. There was another smell in the room. In the other two rooms, it could only scare the people in bed but not touch them. However, that didn’t apply here.
In this room, it might just be allowed… The ghost greedily reached out, trying to touch the man in bed.
Alarmed, Xiaomi leapt high, ready to chomp down on that finger. It was going to try its usual trick of biting down and sucking hard, reducing those things to nothing but skin, when a hand shot out and caught it by the scruff.
“You can take such punchy flavours, little one? If that mysophobic friend of ours finds out, won’t he count it as another strike against me?” The voice carried a lazy drawl.
The little skeleton was tossed aside, mouth covered. It looked up, peeking at its master’s profile past the swarming ghosts. He looked just as he had before falling asleep, with his fringe falling across his forehead, yet his lips were alight with a smile that he had never worn before.