novelraw Chapter 188 Floor - 42
Chapter 188 Floor - 42
“Come on, brother—if we don’t have three people, there’s no way we can set up the big ladder!”
Inside the foul, reeking sewer, Jiang Ran and Sang Biao hurried forward.
“Relax, this is the right route. That skinny monkey lackey of yours will double back to report in. We’ll run into him on the way.”
Sure enough, after only two more turns, they ran straight into Skinny Monkey Number Two.
“Holy shit!”
Sang Biao blurted out in shock. “Brother, are you some kind of immortal or what!? How do you know everything!?”
But his guard immediately went up, hand pressing against the pistol at his waist. “Still, just like we agreed earlier, Puppe’s treasure is mine! Once I become the king of the digital world, I’ll put an entire continent under your control!”
“Sure, sure. Thanks, Your Digital Majesty.” Jiang Ran couldn’t be bothered to humor him.
The three of them tore ahead at full speed.
But in a muddy, winding sewer like this, there was a hard limit to how fast anyone could move.By the time the three of them entered the elevator, Jiang Ran glanced at the clock on the display.
10:25 AM.
“…Damn.”
He let out a sigh.
Even after compressing the time as much as possible, it had still taken 25 minutes to get here. With only 14 minutes left, would it be enough for him to investigate Floor -42?
He pressed the button.
The elevator began accelerating downward.
“Quick warning for you two. Don’t start screaming later.”
Jiang Ran looked at Sang Biao and Skinny Monkey. “Once the elevator doors open, there’ll be a lot of Caimaos outside. Don’t panic. They might look terrifying, but they probably won’t hurt anyone.”
“What a joke!”
Sang Biao spat, a thick wad of phlegm sticking to the elevator wall. “You think I’m scared of cats? Who the hell are you looking down on?”
“They’re not normal cats.”
Jiang Ran tried to explain. “You know Hellkiy, right? They look kind of like that. Sort of girl-shaped—standing upright and—”
“Even if they were flying in the sky, I still wouldn’t be scared!”
Sang Biao waved a huge hand, cutting off the explanation. “Shut up already! I don’t care if they’re black cats or white cats! If I let out even one scream later, I’ll take your damn surname!”
Ding.
Floor -42.
The elevator doors slid open.
Sang Biao clicked his tongue and strode out with Skinny Monkey.
“OH SHIT MOMMY—” “AAAGH GWAHWAHWAHWAH!”
The two let out exactly the screams Jiang Ran had expected.
Jiang Ran followed them out.
The first thing he saw was a group of lively, girl-like Caimaos running toward them hand in hand, singing and dancing. They stopped in front of them, bowed deeply, and chirped:
“Welcome to~~~~~ Hang City Paradise!”
“Back back back back back!”
Sang Biao spread both arms, forcing the other two to retreat. “What the hell are these giant-faced cats!?”
Jiang Ran took a deep breath.
Even after mentally preparing himself, the bizarre Caimao girl group still hit him with serious psychological damage.
Honestly, Sang Biao calling them giant-faced cats wasn’t unfair at all.
Caimao itself was designed as a chibi three-head-tall cartoon mascot, with a cat face even wider than its shoulders. As a plush toy, it was undeniably adorable.
But in real life, with that exact proportion?
The only word for it was horrifying.
“That’s Caimao. Don’t you recognize them?”
“They’re actually fucking alive!”
Sang Biao’s worldview was collapsing in real time as he stared, dumbstruck, at the singing, dancing Caimaos showering them in flower petals.
Fortunately, these living Caimaos showed no hostile intent. They merely treated the three of them like the eighth audience group there to watch a performance.
“What kind of insane place is this?”
Sang Biao ground his teeth. “Puppe had this kind of sick hobby too? Is this where he hid the treasure?”
After confirming there was no danger, the three of them advanced under the Caimaos’ cheerful escort.
Very quickly, they arrived at the amusement park’s main gate.
Multicolored lights above formed four glowing words:
Hang City Paradise.
Jiang Ran narrowed his eyes.
He was absolutely certain this was not what the real Hang City Paradise entrance looked like.
The rides inside were equally nonsensical.
This felt more like—
[…] a Hang City Paradise imagined by someone who had never actually been there.
“Could this fantastical fake Hang City Paradise have been built by Cheng Mengxue?”
As Jiang Ran walked forward, he sank into thought.
At the very least, Cheng Mengxue really had never been to Hang City Paradise. She wouldn’t know what the real one looked like.
Maybe, in her memory, it was still the peak-reputation amusement park from childhood.
But—
This was underground, beneath the Museum of Human Civilization.
If someone really wanted to build an amusement park, why not build it in the outside world?
Why put it here, on Floor -42 underground, where no one could come play?
And those living Caimaos were genuinely terrifying. These things absolutely had to be fake. Mascots and costumes were cute.
If they were really alive, it became straight-up Shanghai horror movie material.
“HELP! HELP! I DON’T WANNA PLAY ANYMORE!”
Suddenly, cries rang out from the distance.
Sang Biao turned toward the sound and spotted a figure being chased by more than a dozen Caimaos.
He sucked in a breath.
“Third Brother!?”
Jiang Ran frowned. “That’s another one of your guys? Why is he here?”
“The hell if I know!”
Sang Biao sprinted over with his gun raised. “Save him first!”
“Big brother!”
The short, chubby man called Third Brother came running over in tears and snot, throwing himself at Sang Biao.
“Big brother, save me! I never want to ride anything ever again!”
Sang Biao immediately pointed his gun at the bouncing Caimaos. “Nobody move!”
And yet—
The meowing mascots were completely unfazed.
Still smiling with squinted eyes, they pulled petals from their apron pockets and tossed them everywhere.
“Come play~ come play~ the roller coaster is soooo fun!”
“And the Ferris wheel! The Ferris wheel!”
“The giant pendulum ride is super thrilling too! Come on, come on~”
Jiang Ran stepped forward and pressed down Sang Biao’s arm.
“Calm down, Sang Biao. They don’t seem malicious. They’re just… enthusiastic solicitors. Ask Third Brother what happened first.”
“Oh. Right.”
Sang Biao looked at the fat little man in confusion. “What happened to you? Didn’t you go scout that ventilation duct? How did you get here before us?”
“Big brother, I was scared to death!”
Third Brother cried bitterly. “Wasn’t there an access wall in the vent before? Last time we stepped onto that transparent air and no matter what, we couldn’t fall.”
“I got careless this time! While scouting inside, I forgot all about that, slipped up, and fell straight down! I slid all the way through the duct and ended up here!”
“Before you got here, I’d already been trapped here for more than ten minutes! These cats are alive! I’ve never seen cats this huge in my life! And they can talk!”
“They kept dragging me onto all kinds of rides! That drop tower and the roller coaster were so terrifying my soul almost left my body!”
“I said I wouldn’t ride anything anymore, but they kept pestering me, trying to drag me onto the giant pendulum and all that!”
Jiang Ran couldn’t help laughing helplessly.
He truly didn’t know how to judge this amusement park disaster.
But he had sharply caught one critical piece of information—
If sliding down the ventilation shaft led directly to Floor -42, then compared to crawling through the sewer, it saved a huge amount of time.
“Big brother! What kind of place even is this!? It’s way too creepy!”
Third Brother stared at the singing Caimaos behind him, pale-faced and weak-kneed.
“I have no damn clue either!”
Sang Biao was equally lost. “Who the hell would’ve guessed it’s this huge down here!? If Puppe hid the treasure in some random corner, how are we supposed to find it!?”
[…]
Suddenly.
As if reminded by those words, Third Brother stopped crying and stood up straight.
“Big brother—just now, those giant cats shoved me onto the roller coaster for a lap…”
“At the very end of the amusement park, I saw a silver door as tall as the sky itself! There was even a line of English written on it! But that roller coaster was so terrifying I couldn’t read it clearly!”
Sang Biao slapped his thigh.
“That’s definitely it!”
He turned, fists clenched, and let out a cold laugh at Jiang Ran.
“Trying to scare us off with this little trick? Puppe really underestimated us.”
“Says the guy who screamed for his mommy earlier—” Jiang Ran muttered.
“That’s not important!”
Sang Biao waved it off grandly. “What matters is we finally found where Puppe’s treasure is hidden! I believe that behind that door lies the most core secret in the entire digital world!”
“And now that every access wall has failed, that means even the room Puppe himself couldn’t enter can finally be entered! Boys, let’s move! I’m about to ascend the throne as the new king of the digital world!”
With that, he grabbed Third Brother and forced him to lead the way.
“No. Running there will be too slow.”
Jiang Ran knew the time was probably already around 10:30.
This amusement park was far too huge.
There was no way they could make it to the far end in 9 minutes on foot.
They needed the fastest transportation available.
He raised his head.
His eyes landed on the roller coaster winding like a giant dragon—
Apparently, the fastest thing in this entire amusement park was that.
“Hello.”
With a why not ask mindset, Jiang Ran greeted the Caimaos.
“Could you use this roller coaster to send us to the end of the amusement park? Right in front of that silver door?”
“Of course we can, meow!”
The moment they heard someone was finally willing to ride, the adorable Caimaos jumped excitedly, clapping in pairs. Several even pulled confetti cannons from their aprons and blasted streamers into the air.
“You can play however you want!”
“This is fine too! Hang City Paradise puts customers first!”
“We’ll definitely get you there at the fastest speed possible!”
“Fastest speed, meow~ engineer meows prepare~ target: park terminus!”
It really seemed this amusement park had never had visitors before.
The ecstatic Caimaos swarmed forward, countless soft little paws lifting all four men bodily off the ground.
“Fuck! I’m not riding this!”
Sang Biao kicked wildly in midair. “Put me down!”
“You’re riding whether you want to or not!”
Jiang Ran grinned at him. “Think about it, Sang Biao! Now that the access walls are gone, every road leads here! If you don’t hurry, someone else is absolutely going to beat you there! For all you know, someone’s already standing at the silver door!”
“I’ve been scared of rides since I was a kid!” Sang Biao still struggled desperately.
“You still want Puppe’s treasure or not!? If you’re a real man, stop being a coward and get on!”
“AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!” x3.5
Jiang Ran had originally thought a roller coaster’s limit was just that.
But in this completely irrational amusement park, apparently everything was irrational.
This wasn’t a roller coaster.
This was a rocket launched sideways.
Earlier he had joked that on roller coasters the body flies ahead while the soul chases from behind.
But now—
He felt like his soul had completely lost track.
Under the immense wind pressure, he couldn’t even turn his head.
Otherwise, he truly wanted to look back and see whether a supersonic Mach ring had formed behind the rear cars.
The reason it was now 3.5 people screaming was because Third Brother, who had been forced onto this ride for the second time, was already foaming at the mouth, bubbling incoherently in total delirium.
In the blink of an eye, Jiang Ran glimpsed several engineer-uniform Caimaos adjusting the rail direction.
Finally.
After only a few dozen seconds.
He saw it.
At the farthest edge of the amusement park stood the silver door, towering between heaven and earth.
Screeeeech—
The roller coaster sprayed sparks into the sky as it slammed to an intensely unpleasant stop.
“Third Brother! Third Brother!”
Sang Biao’s physical toughness was no joke.
The moment he jumped off the ride, he grabbed Third Brother by the shoulders and shook him back and forth.
But clearly the other man had already blacked out.
“Sorry—”
Jiang Ran staggered down on trembling legs. “I admit it. I really was acting tougher than I should’ve.”
“You’re not tough. You’re just hard to kill!”
There was no time to waste.
Who knew when 39 minutes and 11 seconds would arrive?
Jiang Ran hurried to the silver door.
Tilting his head back to stare at the skyless upper reaches, he felt as tiny as an ant before it.
He quickly spotted the line of English Third Brother had mentioned, engraved in striking letters across the gate.
Central Control Zone
“Central Control Zone—”
Jiang Ran read it aloud instantly.
His English was excellent.
He stepped forward and placed a hand against the silver door.
RUMBLE—
The twin doors, as high as the dome itself, swung open to both sides with a speed so light and impossible it defied belief.
Jiang Ran looked inside—
There was nothing.
Still only that absolute white.
But!
Suspended in midair was a short-haired girl in a school uniform.
Countless streams of silver light peeled away from above her head, extending upward into some unknowable place. Layer upon layer, dense beyond counting, yet perfectly orderly—every strand distinct, never crossing, stretching out toward the entire world.
Jiang Ran’s eyes widened.
That was—
Hangzhou No. 1 High School’s uniform!
The uniform he himself had worn for three whole years!
And that short-haired girl—
He had known her since childhood.
Seen her morning and night.
Never apart.
“Xiaoxue!!!”
Unable to suppress the emotion surging in his chest, he broke into a run toward that figure he had longed for day and night.
“Xiaoxue!!!!!!!!”
In midair—
Like a sleeping beauty, the girl slowly opened her eyes amid the increasingly radiant millions of silver strands.
She looked down at the man rushing straight toward her.
“Jiang—”
Her lips moved softly, her voice light.
As if separated by countless years, yet also as if it were only yesterday:
“Jiang… Ran?”