Winner

Room 404 on the fourth floor.

The door was closed.

There were three people inside.

Mengmeng, Mian Ruyan, and 87.

Mengmeng was holding her rag doll, tilting her head up.

"Are you really my great-grandmother?"

87 nodded, pointed at the cat ears on Mengmeng's head, and then flicked her own:

"This is the hidden mark of our family. Others think they are just cute accessories, but in reality, it's the natural shape our hair takes after we use our abilities."

Hearing this, Mengmeng believed her a bit more.

Mengmeng's family now consisted only of her. Many of its secrets were unknown to outsiders.

"Great-grandmother, are you going to use me to threaten Yarn Ball?" Mengmeng only looked young; she wasn't stupid.

"Yes. It cares about you very much, and it cares about your [Mengmeng]."

"But what if it doesn't accept the threat? Will you hurt us?"

87 looked at Mengmeng with deep eyes and did not answer.

Silence was an answer in itself.

Shrinking to the side, Mian Ruyan tried her best to minimize her presence. She didn't make a sound, hoping 87 wouldn't notice her.

Mengmeng stepped closer to 87's legs, looking up to observe her great-grandmother.

87 looked down to meet her gaze.

After watching her for a while, Mengmeng started pleading for her friend, "She is my only friend at school. Can you let her go?"

87 pointed at the lunchbox. "Throw it away."

Mian Ruyan complied, dumping the food inside into the toilet.

87 continued, "Although she no longer has the means to make new food on the spot, I still can't let her go."

Mian Ruyan cried out in her heart at the injustice. She had done as told and still wasn't being let off—how ruthless!

87 went on, "If it were only Yarn Ball, I could let her go, but there's also the troublesome Chen Miemie. She is the person Chen Miemie is looking for."

After checking the hotel check-in records, Chen Miemie had come to Room 404 and was discovered by 87, which meant his intention to find Mian Ruyan could no longer be hidden.

Why was he looking for Mian Ruyan instead of Mengmeng? Because on the check-in records, this room was only registered under Mian Ruyan's name.

Mengmeng lowered her head, feeling very guilty.

Earlier, she hadn't opened the door entirely of her own accord.

Even if 87 was her great-grandmother, with Mian Ruyan in the room, she wouldn't have opened the door without permission.

She had accidentally fallen into a trap and was manipulated to a certain extent.

Just now, outside the door, 87 had revealed a family secret known only to Mengmeng's deceased parents and announced that she was her great-grandmother.

87 had used a little trick, making her voice gradually softer.

To hear clearly, Mengmeng unconsciously moved closer to the door.

As a result, when she pressed against the door, she was controlled for less than a second.

In a daze, she opened the door.

Footsteps echoed outside Room 404.

Chen Miemie and Yarn Ball had arrived.

The door wasn't locked; it pushed open easily.

87 had one hand on Mengmeng's shoulder and the other on Mian Ruyan's neck.

87 was quite surprised by the simultaneous arrival of Chen Miemie and Yarn Ball.

In her view, no one could stop Yarn Ball if it wanted to come, but for Chen Miemie to come down from upstairs, he would have had to face the loop on the sixth floor and the blue-and-white porcelain in the fourth-floor corridor, which should have been very difficult.

She secretly raised her estimation of Chen Miemie's strength by another level.

87 ignored Yarn Ball and instead proposed a condition to Chen Miemie.

"You want to take this little girl away, right? I don't need your help. As long as you remain neutral and leave right now, she can walk out of the hotel safely tomorrow."

Chen Miemie glanced at Mian Ruyan. At this moment, the eldest miss of the Mian family was like a quail, completely motionless. "I'll think about it."

After saying he would "think about it," Chen Miemie shifted more than a meter to the side, distancing himself from Yarn Ball. The standoff in the room shifted from a two-sided confrontation to a three-way stalemate.

To be frank, Chen Miemie and Yarn Ball didn't have a deep relationship; they had only dealt with each other once.

When it came to subjugating the Fat Orange Hotel, whether Yarn Ball or 87 was the dominant consciousness didn't affect his ability to form a contract.

He had subtly sided with Yarn Ball earlier simply because the orange cat hadn't attacked him, whereas 87 targeting guests seemed to draw a lot of hostility.

After Chen Miemie made his stance clear.

What remained was between 87 and Yarn Ball.

"Yarn Ball, we've known each other for 88 years. Cut the crap. You know what I want. Satisfy my request, and I won't hurt anyone else."

While making the threat, 87 gently patted Mengmeng's shoulder.

Yarn Ball was a bit angry. "Are you an idiot, meow? Using your own great-granddaughter to threaten me?"

87 ignored the orange cat's bristling fur. "Give me your answer."

The orange cat raged at the air for a long while before finally calming down. "So, from the very beginning, when Mengmeng and [Mengmeng] came to the hotel to play with me, you recognized them?"

"Yes."

"Fine, you win."

From Chen Miemie's perspective, the orange cat yielded way too fast. It practically surrendered directly without putting up any strong resistance.

Moreover, the fact that this hostage situation actually worked was simply outrageous.

Could what it said on the roof be true? Was it really tired and wanting to end this decades-long struggle?

The orange cat jumped to the center of the room.

"I announce that I am now establishing the 88th core rule of the hotel."

As Yarn Ball got serious, the entire Fat Orange Hotel completely "came alive."

All other powers within the hotel—spider webs, looping corpses, porcelain materials, and so on—rapidly vanished like melting snow.

The orange cat radiated golden light all over its body. Its vertical pupils concealed an incredibly sharp edge that made one afraid to look directly at them.

This was the true aura of a major anomaly with a danger level of 7.

87 did not relax her guard. Yarn Ball was doing as she wished, consuming its final power to set the last rule. After this, the weakened Yarn Ball might dissipate on its own without her even having to do anything.

But before that, 87 still needed to take precautions in case this final rule was specifically aimed at her, resulting in mutual destruction.

"Rule 88: The past memories of the Fat Orange Hotel are permanently deleted and cannot be recalled."

87 was stunned.

Chen Miemie was also stunned.

Inside the room, Mengmeng and Mian Ruyan were stunned as well.

What kind of rule was this?

It had absolutely nothing to do with hotel management or guest protection.

It used its final power just to do something so baffling?

After the newest and final rule was promulgated.

The golden light on the orange cat faded, and it instantly lost its strength, struggling even to stand.

Not wanting to show its extreme weakness, it went with the flow of its failing body and assumed a hen-like squat position.

Everything happened too fast. From Yarn Ball agreeing to the conditions and satisfying 87's demands, to the dust settling now, it was so fast that Chen Miemie, as a bystander, couldn't understand the situation at all.

Regardless of whether Chen Miemie understood or not, it had already happened, and a winner and loser had emerged.

The loser, Yarn Ball, lay motionless in the middle of the room. It was estimated that after today, it would be hard to ever see it again.

Chen Miemie looked toward the winner.

He had thought about what 87's reaction might be.

It could have been joyous laughter, smug arrogance, or even a sudden betrayal right after claiming victory.

To my surprise, when I looked over,

87 had slumped to the ground, tears streaming down her face.

She muttered to herself, "You... you liar, you're a liar! I... I remember everything now."