Kaidan Game Train: Abide Rule or Die!
Chapter 192: Rules Must Be Followed When Riding the Elevator

Therefore, the most likely possibility was that these fifteen people never got off the elevator.

"Hey, if you’re not going to drink your beverage, could you give it to me?" the flower seller approached Xu Huo, interrupting his train of thought with a plea and a smiley face.

Xu Huo glanced at the strong man slumped powerlessly against the wall in the background and casually handed over the drink from his pocket.

The flower seller hadn’t expected him to agree so readily. After thanking him repeatedly, she jogged back to her companion, let him drink it, whispered a few words with the strong man, and then returned to Xu Huo’s side, handing him three capsule-like objects. "I really didn’t mean to hurt you earlier. Consider this as an apology."

Xu Huo took them, and immediately the game provided a prompt:

[Energy Capsules: Legend has it that on a recursive path, travelers will encounter a flower seller (who could also be a young man). If you don’t buy their flowers, you will endlessly walk down this path.]

[Note: Can replenish 1% of energy, limited to one capsule per day.]

Xu Huo stored the capsules and nodded at the flower seller.

The sky outside darkened, and since this floor had no charging facilities, people took turns using flashlights, resulting in poor indoor lighting.

After regrouping, Kang Hong spoke to Xu Huo, "Are we really going to the thirteenth floor later? Anyway, all the spiders on this floor have been killed by someone. Staying here should be the safest, right?"

The flower seller, eyeing a small spider crawling by her feet, suddenly said, "It seems to have grown a bit."

Xu Huo smacked the spider dead with his Sword and calmly said, "Besides the culture tanks, the abdomens of these giant spiders are all filled with eggs. It probably won’t be long before they hatch. If the elevator comes, it’s better to go down."

He didn’t specify another reason: this copy of the level obviously was not as simple as defeating monsters on each floor. Ninety hours, fifteen floors, fifteen elevators, a carrying capacity of thirteen per elevator, and a total of 195 people must correspond to some hidden rules.

There was no danger encountered on the fifteenth floor, which logically should have been the safest, but there were bloodstains on the elevator door that suggested someone had previously returned to the fifteenth floor in another copy of the level. Although the reason was unclear, the elevator and the fifteenth floor were definitely not safe.

Lingering on any particular floor might trigger a trap in the copy.

He glanced towards the elevator, walked up to it, and used his Sword to pry open a gap in the door. He then borrowed two smartphones from Kang Hong and the others, taped them with the flashlights and recording functions activated, and lowered them through the gap while keeping a safe distance from the elevator.

"Bang! Bang!" The Man-Eating Flower in the elevator shaft hit against the elevator door, causing the tape to shake but not break.

Xu Huo continued to lower the tape, but encountered a strange force around the eleventh floor and immediately cut the tape.

"Is there something else down there?" Kang Hong asked nervously, "Should we try again?"

"Let’s try again," Xu Huo nodded.

Kang Hong and the tall woman handed over a smartphone. Xu Huo took just one, applied some spider silk to the phone and tape, and only activated the camera function before lowering the phone again.

This time the phone safely passed the eleventh floor, and Xu Huo continued to lower it, estimating the length to reach the tenth floor before pulling the phone back up.

He removed the tape and played the video.

There was no light in the elevator shaft, and it was almost impossible to see anything in the darkness, but as it passed the eleventh floor, a red light suddenly flashed in front of the camera lens.

"Was there something just now?" Kang Hong hesitantly said.

Xu Huo rewound the video, freezing it on the red light. His brow furrowed slightly—it wasn’t the Man-Eating Flower but some kind of Mutant Beast. Although its shape was not clear, it didn’t seem too big judging by its size.

It moved within the elevator shaft, yet the video didn’t pick up any sound, which indicates that its form is extremely agile.

This kind of creature couldn’t possibly stay in the elevator shaft all the time, so when the elevator isn’t in operation, the elevator doors on other floors might open as well.

If the elevator doors on other floors can open, then the mutant animals should be able to travel between floors from the building’s exterior wall.

More than two hundred people moved from the fifteenth floor to the fourteenth, and that didn’t lure the mutant animals.

"This Mutant Beast has a very high energy value," the flower seller whispered. "A normal person’s energy value generally fluctuates between sixty and eighty, an Evolver can reach three hundred. Those two Man-Eating Flowers just now, one of them had an energy value of only twenty, but the creature in the video reached five hundred."

Xu Huo turned his head to look at her.

The flower seller said sheepishly, "Yours is quite high too."

So trading a bit of energy should be nothing to her, but unfortunately, he didn’t fall for it.

Xu Huo didn’t dwell on the past but rather asked, "Is this your special ability? Can you use it on animals and plants?"

The flower seller was taken aback, "Animals and plants can’t understand human speech, so how could they possibly buy..."

Before she finished, she realized she had been tricked into revealing more than she wanted and quickly changed the subject, "Mr. Xu, I’ve already apologized for what happened before, and you’ve accepted my apology. Can we let bygones be bygones?"

Xu Huo waved his hand dismissively, "I’m just wondering if coercion counts as a trade."

The flower seller fell silent, seemingly pondering this question.

"Creak!" At this moment, Gu Yu, following the same method as Xu Huo, managed to open a small gap in the elevator door on her side to check the condition of the elevator shaft, too. However, her approach was much smarter than Xu Huo’s; one of the players used a handkerchief prop to tie to a strong flashlight and dangle it above the elevator shaft, then used a cellphone to record.

The Man-Eating Flower was not sensitive to light, and when the elevator door first opened, it thrashed a couple of times behind the door but then withdrew.

"There’s nothing there," Zhang Biao looked at the video. The pixel resolution of smartphones these days was quite good; one could even get a rough look at the Man-Eating Flowers below when zooming in.

They were on the same floor and could hear each other’s voices. Gu Yu spoke to the person beside her and then walked towards Xu Huo with her cellphone, "Let’s exchange information."

"Fine by me," Xu Huo handed over his phone as he took hers.

According to the video, the height of the Man-Eating Flower was about ten or so meters, its body resembling a slender pot, with flesh-colored flowers, stems, and leaves. The flowers were connected to thin tubes that would twitch from time to time.

He paused the video and zoomed in on a certain spot on the shaft wall, spotting a row of dot-like marks.

After a pause, he handed the cellphone to the flower seller, "How much energy does this Man-Eating Flower have?"

"Around one hundred and fifty," she replied.

"That’s equivalent to two adults," Xu Huo nodded slightly.

Gu Yu and the others also watched the video Xu Huo had captured. Though they couldn’t see clearly what the fleeting red dots in the video were, this indicated that there was more than one mutant species active in the elevator shaft.

"If there’s something there, then we should record another time," Zheng Liang suggested.

No one objected, and Dai Wenqian added, "Hang the flashlight up there, and place the phone outside to record."