GRMFBS CH255

In the evening, Zhan Yan found some time to continue restoring the puzzle of Di Ting. After finishing, he went to bed early. Tomorrow they were going to play the “Eighteen Scenes of the Underworld,” and clearing eighteen stages sounded like a physically demanding task.

The next morning, Zhan Yan and Gu Jiancheng got up and went to eat breakfast.
Gu Jiancheng was in a great mood. Up until now, Wan Yan hadn’t shown up, heh~
Although he could easily beat up the cat, not having to deal with that psycho was obviously for the best.

The two held hands and headed to the entrance of the town. The Eighteen Scenes of the Underworld were divided into two parts: one part consisted purely of scenic sets for sightseeing, while the other part was designed as an escape room-style game. Zhan Yan and Gu Jiancheng planned to play the game first and then go sightseeing.

After their tickets were checked, the staff first led them to a preparation room.
Playing this required a group of 10 people, and before starting, they had to draw identity cards. There were three boxes for drawing identities: a black one, a white one, and a red one.

“Is there any difference between these three boxes?” Zhan Yan asked curiously.
“The white box contains single-player identities, the black box has identities with connections to multiple people, and the red box…” The staff member blinked and smiled, “It contains couple identities, but they might not necessarily be in a sweet relationship. Hmm, in this box, you might even draw enemy identities.”

Zhan Yan held onto Gu Jiancheng’s hand: “We’ll draw from the red box.”
He heard a lowered voice from behind him: “Ah, I knew the handsome guys were a couple!”
Zhan Yan turned his head to look at Gu Jiancheng, whose lips were curving upwards into a smile.

“Do you want to draw or should I?” Zhan Yan asked.
Gu Jiancheng: “Hmm… you draw. My luck has never been very good.”
“It’s okay, I’ll lend you my luck.” Zhan Yan hooked his finger and whispered softly, “Your luck will be very good from now on.”

Gu Jiancheng didn’t say anything, only feeling the tickle in his palm spread all the way to his heart. Subconsciously, he wrapped his hand around all of Zhan Yan’s fingers, but the tickle in his heart didn’t stop. He gave a low “Mhm,” reached into the box, and pulled out a ball. The ball was made of two halves twisted together—one half red, one half blue.

The staff member said: “You need to choose a color again. Different colors represent different identities.”
Gu Jiancheng turned to Zhan Yan: “You go first this time?”
“Then I’ll choose red,” Zhan Yan said.

After twisting the ball open, it revealed a metal tag about half the size of a phone, attached to a rubber band so it could be worn on the wrist to prevent losing it. The front of the tag was engraved with the event’s logo and three small flame-shaped lights; the back had a QR code.

The staff member introduced: “Scan the QR code on your identity tag, and it will give you an introduction to your identity.”
Zhan Yan scanned the QR code, and a brief description popped up on his phone:

“You are the CEO of a well-known company, young, handsome, and extremely wealthy. The biggest setback in your life is that your lover wants to leave you. He/she has constantly tried to run away from your side. You tried your best, but he/she still rejected you, to the point where you had to resort to coercive measures. During one pursuit, your car accidentally rolled off a cliff. Your heart is filled with regret and remorse. If you were given one more chance…”

Zhan Yan couldn’t help but burst into loud laughter.
The tips of Gu Jiancheng’s ears turned completely red.

The staff member dutifully continued to explain: “The first paragraph is a preliminary introduction; you can set the details yourselves. The second paragraph provides some examples you can use as references. Try your best not to act OOC (out of character), because it will affect the later stages.”

“Got it, got it,” Zhan Yan solemnly tested out a line. “‘No! I will not allow you to leave me!’ How’s that? Do you think that’s OOC?”
Gu Jiancheng started glaring at him, blushing from his neck all the way to his forehead. He had absolutely zero intimidation factor; instead, he just looked aggrieved.

After everyone had drawn their identity cards, they introduced their basic backgrounds to each other.
Among their group of ten, besides Zhan Yan and Gu Jiancheng, there was a young straight couple, three female best friends, a middle-aged married couple, and a single young man.

There was no particular pattern to the character settings—there were men, women, old, and young. However, every single person’s setting included a similar line:
“Your heart is filled with regret and remorse. If you were given one more chance…”

The staff member held a small megaphone and began to brief everyone.
They were all newly deceased souls about to be taken to the underworld by the Black and White Guards. During the game, there would be props that restricted physical freedom, such as chains, coffins, and the like. These props all had emergency release buttons. For small props, it was usually located on the bottom left; for coffins, it was usually on the top left inside. If they encountered an emergency, they could get out on their own.

The game was played in groups of ten, but they wouldn’t wait for one group to finish before letting the next group in. Groups would basically be let in every 15 minutes, so if they cleared stages too quickly or too slowly, they might run into other tourists.
The three small flame lights on the identity tags represented their three souls. If all three souls were lost, it meant game over. If they lost two souls, they wouldn’t be able to resurrect.

After introducing all the basic rules, the staff members playing the Black and White Guards came out and led everyone to the Gates of Hell.
In front of the Gates of Hell stood a screen wall, with two lines of text carved into it:
“If you cross the Gates of Hell, ten go and nine never return.”

Zhan Yan quietly poked Gu Jiancheng: “Hey, they said groups of ten. Do you think that means only one person in our group can clear it?”
Gu Jiancheng turned his head away and ignored him. That was because during the introductions earlier, Zhan Yan had once again repeated that silly “bossy CEO quote” he had said before.

He hadn’t kept his head turned away for even two seconds before he whispered back: “I bet it is.”

After everyone stepped through the Gates of Hell, the Black Guard counted the number of people and suddenly looked shocked: “Oh no! Weren’t there supposed to be twelve souls? How come we’re missing two?”

White Guard: “They must have accidentally run away on the road. Let’s quickly go chase them!”

Black Guard: “But what about these souls?”

White Guard: “Don’t worry about them, since they’ve already stepped through the Gates of Hell, they can’t run away. Let’s go catch those two escaped souls first, otherwise it’d be terrible if they resurrected…”

The Black Guard glanced at them: “But it’s not like it’s impossible for them to resurrect either…”

White Guard: “If they want to resurrect, they have to clear all eighteen stages. No one has managed to clear them in thousands of years, what are you afraid of? It’ll be much easier for those two escapees to resurrect than them.”

The Black Guard sighed: “I guess that’s all we can do. Let’s go, let’s go catch those two escaped souls.”

The Black and White Guards exited the stage, leaving the ten tourists behind.

Oh, so their main quest was to take advantage of the Black and White Guards’ absence to clear the eighteen stages, resurrect, and make up for the regrets on their identity cards.
This was basically a massive open-world escape room.

The first stage, the Gates of Hell, presented a small difficulty: the exit was on the other side of the screen wall. There were doors on both sides of the wall, but it cost one soul flame to open a door once.
“Ah, doesn’t that mean everyone has to extinguish a soul flame if they want to pass this stage?”
“Is the first stage really this hard?”
“Probably not, I’m guessing there’s a prop like a ladder on the other side, so we only need to spend one soul flame.”

The guess was reasonable. Extinguishing one soul flame wouldn’t prevent them from clearing the game, but who was going to offer up this soul flame?

“There might be stages later on that also require soul flames. How about we decide an order and take turns?”

Gu Jiancheng and Zhan Yan put their heads together and murmured.
“I visually estimate this screen wall is about 2.3 meters tall,” Zhan Yan said. “It’s not impossible to forcefully vault over it.”

Right, there were five men among the ten of them. The middle-aged man had a herniated disc and couldn’t participate. Of the remaining four young men, three could easily boost one person up.
“I’m a little afraid of heights, if I go up I probably wouldn’t dare jump down, so I’ll be the base. Who wants to go up?” the single young man said.

Gu Jiancheng swept his gaze over them. Looking at their physical fitness, he estimated it would take at least two people to boost one up. He or Yanyan would have to participate.
He didn’t want to make physical contact with them.
He didn’t reply, took a few steps back, took a running start, jumped, vaulted off the wall, and flipped over.

Gu Jiancheng disappeared over the top of the wall like an agile big cat.
“Holy crap!”
“That was badass!”
“Does your partner practice parkour?”

A ladder was placed down from the other side of the screen wall. As soon as Gu Jiancheng stepped onto the ladder and showed his head, he saw Zhan Yan clapping like a little seal: “Yep. That’s exactly how my little canary vaulted over the wall to run away, otherwise, I wouldn’t have gotten into a car crash chasing him, sigh.”
Gu Jiancheng: …

Zhan Yan climbed over, taking advantage of the others climbing the ladder to whisper in Gu Jiancheng’s ear: “What’s wrong? Didn’t they say we can’t act OOC?”
Gu Jiancheng: “I’m not being OOC. According to the setting, I should be hiding far, far away from you right now.”
Yet he grumbled while holding tightly onto the other’s arm, refusing to let go.

Zhan Yan smiled and slipped back into his bossy CEO persona: “It doesn’t matter. No matter where you escape to, I will find you.”

The subsequent stages were more complex than the Gates of Hell. There were not only physical requirements but also puzzle-solving stages, and some stages even tested their background stories.

With a powerhouse on the team, all the physically demanding parts were swiftly solved by Gu Jiancheng taking the lead.
As the group got more familiar with each other, they started joking around.
“You’re too fierce, did you two draw your identity cards backwards?”

Zhan Yan solemnly nodded: “Right, he’s totally suited for the bossy CEO persona.”

Gu Jiancheng: “…Mhm, if I had your identity card, you wouldn’t have any chance to run away, and we wouldn’t have ended up in this godforsaken place.”
Zhan Yan blinked.
Oh my, Xiao Gu has been teased so much that he’s built up an immunity.

Next, they needed to pass the Forgotten River Road stage. The set was beautiful, with red spider lilies blooming on both sides.
However, this stage had a special penalty for couples. If they couldn’t retrieve the “Tears of Lovesickness” prop, the couple would be forced to take different routes in the upcoming stages.

Zhan Yan had already solved the puzzle to find the location of the “Tears of Lovesickness.” The problem was that the prop was placed in a rather tricky spot—they had to climb the Matchmaking Tree.
The Matchmaking Tree was a fake tree covered in red wishing plaques, and the plaque containing the Tears of Lovesickness was hidden among them. Climbing the tree was only the first hurdle; the hard part was finding the specific plaque engraved with ‘Tears of Lovesickness’ among a whole bunch of plaques.

There was a large ring of trampolines under the tree, so falling wouldn’t hurt, but it would deduct one soul flame. There were also no ladders; if you couldn’t climb it, you just couldn’t climb it.

Gu Jiancheng wanted to climb, but was stopped by the staff member playing the Tree God: “You even lost your life while trying to run away from him. Why are you now trying to fetch the Tears of Lovesickness for him?”
Gu Jiancheng: …
Ah, I really hate this character setting!

Zhan Yan pinched his chin and smiled domineeringly: “Unhappy? Being unhappy is useless; I won’t give you any chance to leave me. Since I was little, I took my sister to vault walls and climb trees. There is nothing in this world a domineering CEO isn’t good at!”
The bossy CEO kissed his canary, who didn’t want to run away at all, rolled up his sleeves, and prepared to climb the tree.

Ah… Yanyan used to take Rong Sui to vault walls and climb trees when they were little? He was that wild? So cute…

Zhan Yan had just reached the base of the tree and was preparing to climb when a plaque suddenly smacked him on the head. Zhan Yan picked up the plaque; it had the three large characters “Tears of Lovesickness” engraved on it.
He got it just like that?

Zhan Yan looked up in bewilderment.
The enraged Little Cat Wan Yan was lying on the tree trunk, puffing with anger.
Meow-dammit, you came out to play without me!