Why is my journey to the world of anime a strange tale of rules?

So he reached out and touched a doorknob, a rusty, dusty doorknob.

squeak-

The gate ahead has been opened.

Cat Brother, ready for battle, held a deck of cards in one hand and prepared to take out paper money with the other. He stepped into the doorway and looked at the dark hall in front of him, and at Xiong Mi with a dark face.

Cat Bro: ?

Hard-crust cake:?

Hayashibe Kenta and Nanakawa Ren, who arrived from the rear: ? ? ?

"So, you're the ones who threw it in, right?"

Xiong Mi didn't use a questioning tone, which clearly meant she already knew the truth and didn't need any more clues.

"Ah, wait a minute, so it was you who kept throwing out strange things? I thought there was some big thing hiding on the other side, but it turns out it was you."

Cat Bro clapped his hands with a look of sudden realization, which was quite professional in terms of acting skills. Unfortunately, none of the players present cooperated with the performance. Everyone's expression was more or less awkward, and no one wanted to say a word.

Cat Bro, equally embarrassed, covered his face with his hands, while Jianbing turned his head away, not daring to look Xiong Mi in the eye.

"Let's not talk about whose problem it is, since we really don't know who the other side is. Anyway, since we're here, let's help out for a bit. We've found some clues, and the lawyers are investigating them right now."

In the end, Xiong Mi sighed and let the misunderstanding pass for the time being.

"So, the alarm I heard on my way here came from here?"

Cat Brother quickly regained his composure, pondered for a moment, and stepped forward to speak.

"That's right. This place changes when the alarm sounds. The lawyer found the source of the alarm and turned it off, which temporarily brought this unknown change under control. However, we can't be sure whether the alarm itself is the source of the change or just a separate entity that reacts to certain special changes. So even if there are no supernatural activities in the hospital right now, we must remain vigilant."

Xiong Mi nodded and gave a brief explanation of the situation. When she mentioned that there were no supernatural activities in the hospital, Xiong Mi's expression became slightly subtle, while Cat Brother's expression remained normal, clearly having completely forgotten about certain things.

Once inside the distorted and chaotic space of the void, returning in a short time is virtually impossible. Acting rashly, no one can be certain where the spatial turbulence will take them. Thus, the players, who had initially decided to split up, unexpectedly reunited, with two additional members joining them.

Of course, after deciding to work together temporarily, Cat immediately informed Bear about the situation at the shelter. After exchanging information, Bear decided that conquering this twisted hospital must be the top priority. Whether it was the bizarre creatures with only black, empty faces, or the abnormal changes occurring in the shelter in the real world, Bear believed that they clearly revealed the unusual nature of this area. Perhaps figuring out the hidden problems here could solve a lot of trouble, and might even cause some trouble for the [hospital].

Tread-

The group moved quickly and soon found the lawyer himself, who was in infusion room number 2.

In this place, the group saw the public address system used to broadcast alarms, which had been smashed by the lawyer with books. There were also rows and rows of seemingly empty hospital beds, yet passersby had a strange feeling that something was hidden within them. These beds in the infusion room were covered with thick white sheets, and nearly half of them had a black, human-shaped stain in the middle, giving the impression that something had melted onto them.

"It seems the case of littering can be solved."

Standing beside the back door of the infusion room, the lawyer, who was looking at the notice board on the wall, glanced back at the group of people who had come over, and then spoke in a calm tone.

"It should be said that they're littering each other, so what's here? A rule sheet?"

By this time, Cat Bro had adjusted his mindset and was completely unconcerned about the previous misunderstanding. He simply walked forward, asking questions while looking at the notice. Unsurprisingly, he discovered that it was a document clearly written by a survivor, not a rule document from the hospital's perspective, but a summary of rules prepared for later arrivals to help those who had mistakenly entered the area.

Although for some reason the text on the notice is blurred in many places, a closer look still reveals a lot of useful information.

[Hospital Regulations for the First Floor of the Outpatient Department]

[Regardless of where you were before, now that you are at [Hospital Name], you need to carefully read and understand these regulations. Only in this way can you interact properly with the doctors and nurses and avoid causing any trouble.]

[1. You are a patient here. Please behave like a patient. Do not go to places where patients should not go, do not try to leave the hospital before your appointment is over, do not disobey the doctor's formal medical orders, and be sure to follow the treatment plan given by the doctor.]

[2. The patient is definitely sick. Please register and see a doctor as soon as possible. Remember your illness and do not give incorrect answers when the nurses ask you questions. They will know whether your answers are correct or not. You cannot fool the nurses; you must answer them correctly.]

[3. Those electronic locks will not be opened for patients. Those are areas for doctors and nurses, and patients will not go there. Patients' belongings may be allowed inside, and the locked doors may open then, but [patients] should not enter areas that do not belong to patients. Please stay where patients should be.]

[4. You may only go to other floors after receiving confirmation from a doctor, and you can only go to the floors you, as a patient, should go to. Do not attempt to go to other places, as patients cannot go to other places. ■■■■■■■■■■]

[5, The hole is there, but it's not there, there's no hole here, you have to jump down]

[6. The doctors and nurses may not be here, and it will be very quiet then, but you cannot leave. You are still a patient; you don't know what illness you have, so you cannot leave. Hide, hide in every place that will definitely be visited, but none will be willing to be seen, until you see the doctor appear.]

7. An alarm will sound, but the alarm is unrelated to the patient.

Don't pay attention to the alarm; that's irrelevant to patients like us. Don't worry about the doctors' and nurses' reactions; their anxiety has nothing to do with you or patients like us.

Do not use the elevator at this time, do not enter an elevator with the lights on at this time, do not enter the elevator, do not tell anyone you saw the hole, ■■■■■■■■■■■■■ (The content after this sentence is almost unrecognizable)

【■■■Healed■■■■■Pain No More■■■■■Jump In■■

The players present did not spend much time reading the notice posted on the wall and memorizing it.

The lawyer's gaze lingered on the seventh rule for a long time. As the last relatively complete and identifiable rule in the notice, and the only one that mentioned "alarm," the lawyer suspected that the dangerous act of entering the elevator mentioned in this rule might be a shortcut to a certain core obsession that could help them find their mission objective.

However, regardless of the circumstances, deliberately breaking the rules is always a risky act. But... judging from these rules, even just the issue of identity verification is extremely troublesome. After all, the doctors and nurses in the hospital have already been kicked out of the instance, and even if you wanted to obtain patient status, there are no monster doctors here to treat everyone. Furthermore, considering the [hospital] that controls everything after the instance, the act of seeking medical treatment might itself trigger something else, making it a double bind in a sense.

"Just write it down first. No matter how true or false these rules are, or how useful they are, it won't hurt to write them down."

As Xiong Mi spoke casually, she noticed that Qi Chuanlian of the Red Society next to her was turning her head to look at the side door next to the infusion room and then at the room across the corridor outside the door.

That place is... the nurses' station?

"Just now, I thought I heard a sound coming from that place. It didn't sound like a ghost, but like the voice of a living person."

It was at this moment that Qi Chuanlian, seemingly sensing something, turned around and, seeing Xiong Mi looking over, explained in a low voice. However, she herself was somewhat unsure of her judgment, so her voice sounded hesitant.

"A living person? In this place?"

Cat Brother quickly turned to look at the tightly closed door of the nurses' station, and just as he looked over, the door suddenly opened a crack, letting in a bit of cold air. Immediately afterwards, faint gasps and hurried whispers came from inside.

There seems to be more than one person inside?

Chapter Twenty: The Unusual Survivors and the Rescue Team's Way of Protecting Them.

"We are all human! We are human! We are not monsters! None of us are monsters!"

When Xiong Mi and Mao Ge opened the door to the nurses' station and rushed in, the people hiding inside were startled, probably because Xiong Mi was holding a short-barreled shotgun. Then, they probably thought the players were police officers or something similar, and they all stood up abruptly, waving their hands and shouting nervously.

living people.

At a glance, the players could tell that the dozen or so people hiding here were all living, breathing human beings.

It's neither a disguise of some strange creature nor a phantom of the past. Players at the Red Moon level possess incredibly strong perception abilities. At this near-face-to-face distance, if they can't tell whether someone is alive or a strange creature, they might as well be dead.

However, the living are precisely the problem.

"How come there are living people here? And they're all ordinary people? Are you from the shelter?"

Xiong Mi frowned and asked in Japanese.

Despite having learned from Cat Brother about the disappearance of everyone in the shelter, Xiong Mi didn't believe ordinary people could survive in the dungeon. After all, this was a chaotic mix of seven dungeons and thirty Red Moon-level core obsessions, arguably the most dangerous dungeon ever. Ordinary people, even if a Red Moon-level grunt just passed by without harming them, could easily be killed by the mental pollution emitted by that grunt. How could they possibly survive in such a place?

But now it seems that humans can be surprisingly resilient at times, and luck between people is truly difficult to measure. Things that seem impossible by any standard sometimes actually happen.

"We were all from XX Vault. We were fine after being brought there, but then suddenly the power went out and the lights went out. Then all sorts of strange things started happening. The players who helped us take refuge told us not to wander around and that they would check the situation, so we stayed where we were and didn't wander around like the other survivors. Later, when things got chaotic, we remembered the safety door at the deepest part of the vault that the other players had mentioned, so we went in and hid. But then we were swallowed up by a hole that suddenly appeared out of the ground."

A 200-pound fat man wearing glasses, who looked like a seasoned otaku, swallowed hard and carefully explained the situation to Xiong Mi and the others, and also helped Cat Brother and the others reconstruct the process of the shelter's fall.

The otaku's name is Ikemoto Gozo. When the disaster first occurred, he was playing games all night, so he noticed the abnormality immediately. After receiving the warning message, he decisively closed the doors and windows, thus surviving the first wave of the outbreak and waiting for the players to rescue him.

Throughout the journey, Gozo Ikemoto diligently communicated with the other players, hoping to gather as many crucial clues as possible for survival. He silently summarized these clues in his mind, and during this process, he also met other players who had proactively come to seek help and learn about the situation. He then formed a group with these people, sharing information and clues with each other. After entering the shelter, they acted in unison, which is why they were able to avoid problems at the very beginning of the anomaly outbreak.

"Many survivors had no idea what had happened and were unwilling to find out. When players came to rescue them, they even thought the players were there to harm them, and they kept shouting and resisting. As a result, they were caught and killed by the monsters before they even got on the vehicle, and they almost killed a player as well. It was the same when they got to the shelter. Some people would complain that they were hungry and asked the administrator for food, and they would complain that there was no hot water. They would ask for all sorts of other things. It was unbearable."

"After the power outage, strange noises started coming from the entrance to the basement. The players went to investigate, and before they left, they specifically told us not to wander around. As a result, some people started saying that we were going to be abandoned, while others thought that it wouldn't matter if they wandered around because someone would come to rescue them. Then, when something really happened, everyone panicked. Many of the safety passages that were originally reserved could actually be used for evacuation, but because everyone was crammed together, we died even faster."

"I used to think the ridiculous plots in the horror movies I watched were ridiculous, but after this actually happened, I saw all of them, and it was unbearable. So I knew from the beginning that this wouldn't work. How could I act with this kind of mentality when the whole city was haunted? So I tried my best to find out the specific situation from the players, and I also tried to find people I could communicate with and who had similar ideas to act together. That's how I barely survived."

The second survivor to explain the situation was Kikue, a film producer and a huge fan of horror movies, who claimed to have watched over a thousand. Therefore, she was very aware of the impending disaster and took proactive measures, actively seeking out like-minded and intelligent individuals to join her.

She explained the situation to the players in more detail. After the initial power outage, the first anomaly was at the entrance to the shelter on the first basement level. The survivors didn't know the specifics of the anomaly; Kikue only vaguely heard the players discussing that the security cameras at the entrance were malfunctioning, and that there seemed to be some kind of spatial anomaly. At the time, the survivors were all gathered on the second and third basement levels, so after closing the passage between the second and third basement levels, the players went to investigate, having warned the survivors beforehand not to open the door under any circumstances.

As soon as the players in charge of management left, the ordinary people started to panic. First, someone opened the passageways leading to some small shelters, which were supposed to be opened in times of crisis. Then, someone broke into the areas where food and other supplies were stored. Finally, someone directly opened the door to the underground level. Incidentally, this door had been locked from the outside by the players, but when the survivors found it couldn't be opened, they started causing a ruckus and eventually managed to get tools from the supply area to force the door open.

It was at this moment that the survivors, including Gozo Ikemoto and Kikue Kudo, who had banded together, became certain that, following the pacing of classic horror movies, it was almost time for people to die. They quickly notified their hastily assembled companions, who, having already stockpiled some food and water, had been trying to conceal the entrance to a small underground shelter on the third basement level. Now that they were certain something was about to happen, they sprang into action, hiding inside, locking the door, and concealing themselves in the deepest part of the shelter, remaining completely silent and awaiting the crisis.

Then, unsurprisingly, things really started going wrong. The survivors began to hear screams coming from outside, and people would occasionally knock on or even bang on the doors. But everyone remained unmoved, even covering their ears to avoid hearing anything they shouldn't. Using this strategy, the survivors held out for about an hour, until the ground beneath their feet inexplicably turned into a deep pit, forcing them to embark on a new round of survival adventures because they had fallen into a dungeon.

"I think we were much luckier than the others, probably because we were all in the same place. After falling into the hole, we ended up in the same place. At first, we were in a small hotel room. We tried to find the rulebook, but we didn't find it. However, we saw a map of the hotel outside the room. After we went out, we looked for the emergency exit on the map. After exiting from that exit, we arrived at this hospital. Then we found a note at the registration desk in the lobby, and then we found a rulebook in the infusion room. So we hid here and have been here ever since."

The third person to explain the situation was Tazui Yu, a sixty-year-old man who enjoyed fitness and health, thus maintaining a muscular physique at his age. He also kept abreast of what young people liked, striving to stay on trend. Therefore, when the anomaly occurred, he quickly noticed a group of young people huddled together. After observing them and recognizing from the players' reactions that their behavior was acceptable to the players and that following them would increase their chances of survival, he proactively joined them.

Because of his love for outdoor sports and his experience in surviving in remote mountains and forests and dealing with wild animals in his youth, Tajii Yu possesses considerable knowledge of hunting and first aid, as well as some handicraft skills. Previously, during the survivors' escape from the inn, he created a warning device by combining bells and fine yarn, allowing everyone to detect the approaching monster in advance and successfully avoid a deadly threat without alerting it.

He was the one who first discovered the note placed at the registration desk. The reason for the discovery was simple: the old man noticed that the dust thickness in some places on the registration desk platform was slightly different from that in other places. Then he found a slightly loose tile, pried it up, and found the note hidden inside.

[The first floor is currently a confirmed safe zone]

[Psychological Examination Room]

[24/7 security (this item has been crossed out)]

It is relatively safe when the lights are on; do not close the door when the lights are off, and do not stay there for extended periods.

【Security Room】

[Safety when lights are off]

[Note: You must check if there are any smoldering cigarette butts in the ashtray. If you find any still-smoking cigarette butts, you must leave the security room.]

[First Floor Nurse Station]

[If no nurse is inside after opening the door, it is safe at this time.]

If you see a nurse after opening the door, simply communicate with them as a patient; they will not come out.

If you find someone other than a nurse occupying the room after opening it, immediately close the door and go to any other examination room. Once you've closed the door, the other person won't immediately follow. After entering the examination room, do not open the door until it automatically opens. No matter who is outside, you will not see them after opening the door.

[Medical Records Room (This item has been crossed out)]

Safety when lights are on (this item has been crossed out)

It is never safe behind electronically locked doors; any area behind an electronically locked door is never safe.

That place is no longer safe; they already know it.

After explaining the situation, Tazui Yu handed the note to Cat Brother. Cat Brother opened the note and examined it, confirming that it was a record left by survivors who had been in the hospital. It was a very important note containing information about the safe zone. It was hard to imagine that an ordinary person without any blessings or obsessions could discover its location through observation and actually lead everyone to the nurses' station, the safe zone, where it had remained hidden until now.

These survivors can be considered to be high-quality player reserves.

After finally confirming the actions of these players, the Red Moon-level players present felt a mix of emotions.

Instead of panicking when danger struck, they immediately began gathering clues and seeking out people to work together. Even in the face of crisis, they remained calm and successfully found a safe zone to hide in until now. Even when Xiong Mi and the others were throwing trash at each other and making a huge commotion, they didn't make a move, stubbornly staying in the nurses' station without any intention of coming out to watch the commotion.

Hmm... to be honest, if they had actually gone out to look for the players back then, they might have died instead. Because at that time, Xiong Mi and the lawyer were using their full abilities to deal with those monsters; a single attack could generate a mental shockwave that could kill someone. They might not have even noticed the innocent people affected until after they were finished fighting, and if that had happened, it would have been too late.

If they encountered these survivors elsewhere, such as in a Dark Night-level dungeon, Xiong Mi and the others would certainly cherish their talent and do their best to protect these self-aware and gifted survivors. However, the fact that they are here, at this time, has created some trouble.