Ch 10: I Run a Food Shop in an Escape Game

Endless Stairway (5)

【Current instance exploration progress: 90%.】

The 4 rooms, plus the corridor stretching from the 6th floor down to Floor -20, added up to exactly 90%.

And as for the remaining 10%, Yi Han now already knew what it was.

It was the rooftop that had just finally revealed its path.

He calmed himself, inserted the key into the old rooftop door, and gave it a gentle twist.

The door opened.

Earlier, on Floor -18, when facing the window, he had kept his eyes shut and therefore never saw what lay outside. But now, standing atop the normal 6th-floor rooftop, he suddenly recalled that bone-chilling coldness that had made every hair on his body stand on end back then.

As the rooftop of a ghost building inside an escape game…

Would the scenery up there really look normal?

Yi Han exhaled slowly, slipped his hand into the virtual system inventory to ensure he could pull out the iron pot at any moment, and only then pushed the door open completely.

Unexpectedly, the first thing he saw really was a starry sky exactly like one from the normal world.

The night was not gloomy at all. Instead, it looked as though rain had just washed it clean. Without the smog of a large city, the sky was filled with stars, and the moonlight was bright and beautiful.

Aside from a thin layer of standing water, there was nothing special on the rooftop. No people either. The atmosphere was peaceful and quiet, with the lingering scent of recent rain drifting through the air.

Farther away stood several other buildings of similar style.

If not for the fact that every single window was pitch black without a single light on, one might genuinely mistake this place for the real world.

“There’s nothing up here… so where exactly is the escape route?” Yi Han swept his gaze around once more. Not to mention anything resembling a door, there was not even any trash lying around.

But the system had indeed stated that the rooftop key was the “key to survival.”

No matter how twisted the system was, it should not lie about something like this here.

As Yi Han pondered, he approached the low wall at the rooftop’s edge and glanced downward.

Around the base of the ghost building, the ground was also covered in patches of rainwater. The water clearly reflected the building itself, along with the star-filled night sky.

…Something felt wrong.

Yi Han frowned slightly, sensing something. Suddenly, he leaned his entire upper body over the wall, finally bringing the full structure of the building beneath him into view.

Inside this ghost building, there had been three ghost NPCs, located respectively in Rooms -2001, -1801, and -1802.

All the other rooms, including those from Floors 1 through 6 above ground, had been empty.

And what Yi Han saw now was exactly that: a residential building where every window was completely dark.

Yet even though the distance made things somewhat blurry, Yi Han was absolutely certain that in one of the windows reflected in the water earlier, a light had clearly been on!

Was the building reflected on the water’s surface… truly a reflection?!

Inside the building, only the rooms containing ghost NPCs had their lights on. But all their windows had originally been covered by curtains. Only Room -1802 had its curtains opened because Yi Han had lost the Truth or Dare challenge and pulled them open with his eyes closed.

So the illuminated window reflected in the water had to be Room -1802.

And the reflected floors and rooms were those that had inexplicably appeared beneath the first floor, the rooms of the inner world marked with negative floor numbers.

…But even knowing this, how would it help them escape the ghost building?

Yi Han still remembered the instinctive shiver he had felt while standing before that window. Even relying purely on intuition, he knew that the standing water was definitely not something good.

And now, although the water downstairs was shallow, patch after patch connected together, surrounding the entire building.

For no reason at all, Yi Han suddenly felt that this level might not actually possess an escape route.

Because under normal circumstances, if players wanted to leave the ghost building, whether by door or window, they would inevitably have to step into that water.

There had to still be some clue they had not discovered.

Yi Han’s gaze darkened as thoughts raced through his mind.

Finally, after changing angles several times, he saw it.

The one patch of water that was different.

“It’s almost midnight… huh? This water…” Jian Lin spoke halfway before following Yi Han’s line of sight, immediately noticing the strange nature of the puddles below.

“All the other puddles reflect the underground floors. Only this one is different. Is that the exit?” Jian Lin murmured. “But… the system said the rooftop was the correct path to survival. So how are we supposed to go directly from the rooftop into that puddle?”

Yi Han did not answer.

He only stared at the puddle for a moment before suddenly curling his lips into a smile.

Without realizing it, several hours had already passed in this instance. Having roughly figured things out, Yi Han relaxed slightly.

And then, suddenly, he felt hungry.

Checking the time, he saw it was 23:30. Only half an hour remained before the final deadline.

So he casually took out the “Honey-Glazed Chicken Leg” he had prepared earlier from his system inventory, set it atop the low wall, and slowly began eating.

Jian Lin… though shocked by how relaxed he was acting, only looked at him a few times as though wanting to speak before leaning against the wall again and continuing to rack his brains for an escape method.

After Yi Han finished eating and felt the enhancement effect begin to activate, he stood up.

“Let’s go,” he said.

“You thought of something?” Jian Lin froze. “…There’s no door on the first floor, and we can’t get out through the windows either. The rooftop’s this high. How are we supposed to get there?”

“Jump down,” Yi Han replied.

Jian Lin immediately sucked in a cold breath.

“D-Don’t act impulsively. There should be another way. And even though that puddle is suspicious, we still can’t be sure it’s definitely the exit…” What if the system intentionally placed it there to mislead them?

Yi Han understood what he meant.

Actually, Yi Han also felt that given how devious the system was… pulling something like that was entirely possible.

But Yi Han likewise did not believe the building’s doors or windows were viable escape routes.

Sometimes overthinking things only led people into traps where cleverness backfired upon itself. The game system seemed especially fond of tricks like that.

So Yi Han chose to trust only his own judgment.

Since no other escape route had been discovered, then the only remaining possibility must be the real one.

Jian Lin was still hesitating, but Yi Han had never intended to persuade him in the first place. Original translation at HololoNovels dot com. So without further explanation, he climbed onto the low wall alone, facing directly toward the only puddle that appeared normal.

From this angle, the moon reflected perfectly upon the water’s surface.

The summer night breeze brushed gently against his face, warm and comfortable.

“I’m going with you.”

Unexpectedly, once Jian Lin realized Yi Han was serious, he gritted his teeth and climbed onto the wall as well, standing shoulder to shoulder beside him.

This genuinely surprised Yi Han. Almost unconsciously, he reminded him:

“…You know the system broadcasts notices whether players clear the game or die, right?”

The implication being: since you’re still uncertain, just obediently stay behind and let your teammate scout ahead for you. Once Yi Han jumped, whether the route was real or fake would become obvious. Wouldn’t it be smarter for Jian Lin to jump afterward? Coming out now was just stupid.

But Jian Lin had clearly already thought of that.

“…I know. But I can’t let a girl take the risk first while I hide behind waiting for a free carry. If we’re clearing the game together, then we should bear the risk together.”

Yi Han: …

For a moment, he genuinely did not know what to say.

He focused his gaze on the mirror-like puddle below.

The puddle actually lay a slight distance away from the building. Under normal circumstances, an adult trying hard enough could probably make the jump.

But now they were leaping from a six-story rooftop. Yi Han had never jumped from a building before and had no idea whether there was some special trick to landing accurately. Eating the Honey-Glazed Chicken Leg had merely been because the level was about to end anyway. He honestly did not even know whether it would help.

As for Jian Lin, his smaller, weaker build suggested he was probably not the athletic type. The distance might actually be difficult for him.

“Jumping.”

Yi Han grabbed Jian Lin’s arm.

Without saying anything more, he pulled him forward and leapt toward the puddle.

In an instant, the feeling of weightlessness crashed over them.

Heartbeat accelerating. Cold wind rushing against their faces.

Many people had probably experienced something similar before. In moments of excitement, fear, or extreme tension, the heart races, the senses sharpen, and time itself seems to slow.

Falling from over twenty meters in the air should have taken only two or three seconds before impact.

Yet time seemed endlessly stretched.

The scenery before them, the smells around them, even the sensation of wind scraping against their skin all became incomparably vivid.

Yi Han stared fixedly at the puddle that formed their path to survival, judging the exact landing point.

After the long descent, their bodies finally passed through a gentle curtain of water.

In the blink of an eye, the two of them found themselves standing before an entirely ordinary residential building.

The standing water on the ground had disappeared.

Behind them stood the now-normal apartment entrance.

Looking upward, they could still see the windows remaining completely dark.

But now, the impossible staircases beneath the building’s first floor should have vanished.

“A world inside another world. And this difficulty was only a one-star instance.”

Yi Han inwardly scoffed.

Then he heard the system prompt.

【Instance complete. Debuff: Soft and Adorable Crossdressing Illusion has expired.】

【Congratulations. You have successfully escaped the instance: Endless Stairway (One-Star)!】

── ⋆⋅🖤⋅⋆ ──

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