Breaking Through the Barriers

"You know Chen Miemie? Are these spiderwebs related to him?" 87 turned around.

"We've barely spoken. The hallway outside his door is covered with these kinds of spiderwebs."

"Do you know what these webs do?"

"I don't know. They don't affect normal movement, so they probably don't attack people?"

Wouldn't attack people? 87 didn't believe a single punctuation mark of that statement.

If she had plenty of time, 87 would have tested it little by little to gather information, but she didn't have the patience for that right now.

She walked directly into the spiderwebs.

She failed to push through and was quickly wrapped up like a dumpling, unable to move.

Hong's [Mystery] stat was as high as 6.8; her spiderwebs were not something 87, a mere consciousness inhabiting someone else's body, could force her way through.

The pre-laid webs were like set traps. If an opponent couldn't avoid them and tried to force their way through, they would naturally suffer a great disadvantage.

Not only did 87 fail to push through, but she couldn't even retreat.

That wasn't even the worst part. Because she was wrapped tighter and tighter, eventually even her hands were bound, making suicide impossible.

If she was merely tied up without suffering a fatal injury, she had no way to respawn at the front desk.

"Driver, kill me," 87 shouted to the man not far away.

A flying dagger struck but failed to pierce through the multiple layers of spider silk around 87.

"Aim for the parts that aren't covered, hurry!"

The driver didn't hesitate. He threw a second knife, slitting 87's exposed neck.

Soon, 87 rushed up again from the front desk downstairs.

To her surprise, this spider silk was extremely troublesome.

If her path was blocked by mountains of blades, seas of fire, or iron walls, she wouldn't be afraid. She could manipulate the hallway to undergo minor deformations, destroying any hard barriers.

But once the spider silk latched on, it had a way of using softness to conquer strength. No matter how the building vibrated and stretched, the silk simply couldn't be shaken off.

The spider silk wasn't invincible; it had an obvious weakness—it was afraid of fire.

However, the [Fat Orange Hotel] had once been ravaged by a severe fire, so it had a core rule: open flames were strictly prohibited everywhere except the kitchen stove.

Just as 87 was in a difficult spot.

The driver placed his hands in front of his mouth, his cheeks puffed up a few times, and then he spat out a high-pressure jet of water.

The water jet blasted into the spiderweb, opening up a small passage.

"I'll help you push through."

Just like that, 87 and the driver ventured deeper into the upward stairs, one behind the other.

The driver ignored the spiderwebs getting on his own body and focused entirely on clearing the way for 87.

In his final moments before being completely wrapped up, he successfully watched 87 rush out of the staircase.

After pulling free, 87 glanced back at the trapped driver and walked straight away.

They had a tacit understanding; neither said a word.

87 wouldn't spend a huge price to rescue the driver at this time, and the driver didn't want to travel together anyway, so he simply stayed in the web.

Fourth floor.

As soon as 87 reached the room corridor, she froze.

Was this the 4th floor of the [Fat Orange Hotel]?

The entire corridor, from the carpet to the walls to the ceiling, was completely unrecognizable.

Stepping on it produced a crisp and slightly grating friction sound.

The whole corridor had been turned into porcelain, and there was even an extra pair of large porcelain vases at the entrance.

On the vases was an elegant beauty, so vivid and lifelike that 87 even felt the beauty was blinking at her.

"Guest, please show yourself so we can talk," 87 shouted into the air.

The beauty on the porcelain vase walked out.

"My name is Qinghua. I just managed to finish the renovations here. If this floor shakes around randomly like the ones below and ruins my tiles, I'll be angry."

Aside from the spiderwebs, 87 didn't connect the anomalies she was currently encountering with Chen Miemie.

She just felt that tonight had started off badly, nothing was going right, and she had run into too many wild anomalies.

87 treated the attacks or disruptive behaviors of these anomalies as their passive traits.

She felt like she had entered a level-clearing game where she had to fight a boss on every floor she went up.

While 87 was clearing levels downstairs.

7th floor.

Chen Miemie came out of the room.

The [Fat Orange Hotel] had a total of 7 floors.

But in the hallway of the 7th floor, there were still stairs going further up.

Chen Miemie followed them up, reached the end, pushed open a trapdoor overhead, and climbed out.

The [Fat Orange Hotel] wasn't a regularly shaped cube. The roof was the head of an orange cat, curved on top, with the highest points being the tips of the two cat ears.

Chen Miemie climbed onto the tip of one ear and called out to the tip of the other ear.

"Yarn Ball, you really are here."

The orange cat that had been lying there lazily got up. "How did you know, meow?"

"I guessed. You're weak right now and need to hide from 87. But inside the hotel, she can go anywhere you can go, and you can't leave the hotel.

Thinking about it, I figured the only difference between you two is that 87 can only stay inside the body of the [Fat Orange Hotel], while you are just unable to leave. Staying outside doesn't count as leaving. She's at the very bottom, so you would probably choose the very top."

"You are already half as smart as this Yarn Ball."

"You missed the 'meow' again."

"So annoying, meow~"

"Tell me, your friend brought recovery food to Room 404. Why didn't you go get it?"

"If I went in, I would bring danger. Cat Ear, which is 87, set that place up as a trap to catch me. As long as I don't go, she won't hurt the bait in the trap."

"I didn't feel like 87 was very strong. You're the boss of this hotel; can you really not beat her at all?"

"87 isn't strong because I'm holding her back, preventing her from unleashing the power of the entire hotel, meow. Otherwise, she could casually crush a room, or even a whole floor, into a compressed biscuit. Of course, meow, by holding her back, I can't do anything else either."

"Your own authority is higher than hers. Why are you trading one-for-one with her like this?"

"Do you know what authority specifically means, meow? Making rules is authority; using power for personal gain is not. I can do the former, but she's better at the latter."

"You seem very pessimistic. If you do nothing, you'll probably lose in the end."

"It's been many years, and this Yarn Ball is a bit tired. I just want to bask in the sun and have a full stomach every day. Seeing her work so hard, it wouldn't be completely unacceptable to just give it to her in the end, meow."

As they chatted, Yarn Ball's fur suddenly stood on end. "She actually went in!"

Qinghua also quickly climbed up from the building to the roof. "I couldn't stop her. 87 has entered Room 404."

Chen Miemie was very surprised. "Yarn Ball restricted her from using the hotel's power. She shouldn't be that strong right now, so how did she force her way in?"

Qinghua organized her words a bit. "She didn't force her way in. The person inside opened the door themselves."

"No way, who opened the door?"

"Mengmeng."

"Why?"

"If I didn't hear wrong just now, 87 is Mengmeng's great-grandmother."