Dimensional Store: Welcome to the Apocalypse Apartment - Chapter 243

Chapter 243

They went upstairs and arrived at the VIP private hot spring rooms on the top floor.

The last time Gu Huaiwei had come, she had only taken a quick look around Hot Spring Mansion. They had followed the signs inside the mansion and found the large hot spring below.

The private hot spring rooms had never appeared on any of the signs.

Only after reaching the top floor this time did she discover that behind the mansion’s understated decor were luxurious private hot spring rooms.

There were eight doors in total up here.

When they opened the first room, warm, soft yellow light spilled out. A faint sandalwood fragrance filled the room, and steam rushed toward them. The pool water was clear, glowing with a pale blue sheen.

Outside the floor-to-ceiling window was a small courtyard paved with white gravel. Rockeries stood in staggered arrangements, cherry blossoms were in full bloom, and a few fallen petals drifted in through the window, landing on the stone slabs beside the pool.

When they opened the second room, there were no lights inside, but the scenery was the same.

When they opened the third room, it was very cold, and the fragrance was gone.

In the fourth room, the cherry blossoms outside the window had withered, leaving only dead branches.

In the fifth room, the water in the hot spring pool was cold.

In the sixth room, the room had begun to decay. The hot spring pool was full of moss and black mud.

In the seventh room, everything beyond the floor-to-ceiling window was pitch-black. The stone slabs beside the hot spring pool had been smashed apart, and dark red bloodstains still marked their surface.

The final private hot spring room, however, had returned to the appearance of the first room.

A bamboo towel rack stood beside the pool, stacked with snow-white bath towels. On a small wooden table next to the hot spring were fresh fruit and pastries, along with an unopened bottle of red wine.

Bai Miemie scratched their exposed wrist. “Sister Gu, this room is so dirty. It’s not even as good as that red wine pool in the basement. I don’t want to wash up with this filthy water.”

After Gu Huaiwei stepped into the room, she also sensed that something was off.

Although this room looked no different from the first one on the surface, it felt completely different to her.

She took her sister’s mirror from her pocket and aimed it at the room, only to find that this place was actually even more horrifying than the seventh room.

The wooden floor had been soaked through and warped by black water. The bottom of the hot spring pool was filled with dark brown sludge, and a layer of rotting fallen leaves floated on the surface. A few mosquitoes could be vaguely seen circling above the stinking water.

The towel rack and small table were broken and missing pieces. The fruit and pastries placed on top had long since rotted. Their surfaces were covered in grayish-white mold, shriveled and hardened, and white maggots writhed in the decayed parts.

The air was full of dust. No wonder Bai Miemie’s skin was itching.

“Once we’re done handling this, we’ll go soak in the first private hot spring room.”

“Mm-hmm. The first room smells much nicer than this one,” Bai Miemie said, nodding repeatedly.

“Shh. Something’s coming up.”

Gu Huaiwei heard movement outside in the Corridor, so she pulled Bai Miemie behind the towel rack to hide.

As the footsteps drew closer, the lights in the private hot spring room dimmed.

In the darkness, Gu Huaiwei seemed to hear a sigh.

There should only be her and Bai Miemie in this room.

Gu Huaiwei stared at the doorway.

After a while, she heard a phone notification and the sound of friction. Gu Huaiwei glanced at her phone. The network signal inside the Instance had been cut off.

The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion was the first to push open the door.

He turned on the lights, and the strange noises in the room disappeared.

The director was dressed in a suit and leather shoes. His black dress shoes were polished to a mirror shine, and a white silk ribbon was tied neatly around his neck. Beneath the ribbon was a clearly visible circle of Red Thread. If one ignored his reddened eyeballs and the tongue that was longer than that of an ordinary Anomaly, he could pass as a promising young man.

As he entered, the dampness in the room grew heavier. Steam suddenly rose, making the place look a little like a dream of paradise.

“We have important guests coming today. Keep a close eye on those part-time students. If they have any issues, make them resolve them outside the mansion. Don’t let them come upstairs and cause trouble.” The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion stood slightly to the side, giving instructions to the person beside him.
“Those children are young and hot-blooded… clack, clack, clack… hard to discipline,” the staff member beside him complained, carrying a large ring of keys. “A few of them seem to have contracted pneumoconiosis too. If the guests see them, we’ll get complaints.”

“It doesn’t matter. If the guests see them, we only need to take the guests to my younger brother. Once they eat my brother’s braised pork rice, they won’t be able to complain anymore.”

His younger brother would chop those customers up and turn them into braised pork rice.

“As for those students, have them clean the hot springs in the basement right now. The water in the red wine pool needs to be changed, and the drain is clogged with hair. Find a student to go down and clear it.”

The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion was a famous philanthropist in Gray Mist Town. He would hire the children of sick Miner families to work part-time at the mansion, then use them to solicit sponsorships and accept donations from the public.

Hypocritical, greedy, and guilty of every evil deed imaginable, yet obsessed with his reputation. On the surface, he was upright and noble. In reality, he was doing the same sort of business as the Library Director.

“Clack, clack, clack… Should we bring up two of them to keep the guests company? We have leverage over them. They wouldn’t dare disobey.”

“No need. The infectious disease has been severe lately. I heard the Library Director was exposed by a Reporter, so we need to keep a low profile on our end and maintain our image.” He straightened his suit. “When you’re out in the world, this face is the most important thing. If my skin were ever torn off, I’d rather hang myself.”

The staff member weighed the keys in his hand, answered in a low voice, and went downstairs according to the Director of the Hot Spring Mansion’s orders.

To keep the part-time students from causing trouble, after he brought them into the basement, he locked the door from the outside.

Before long, Gray Mist Town’s infamous Black-hearted Merchant finally appeared. He looked somewhat bloated, with sunken eyes. Two Gold Coin tokens were embedded over his eyes. He seemed to be blind, but his sense of smell was extremely sharp.

After entering the room, the merchant’s nose and ears kept twitching.

The Black-Skinned Bandit from the Mine Instance followed behind the Black-hearted Merchant.

Gu Huaiwei watched as the staff helped them undress.

Oh no. She was about to see something filthy.

Aside from his abs, there was nothing worth looking at on the Hot Spring Mansion Director’s body. The Black-hearted Merchant, on the other hand, had glittering crystals growing from his skin. If they were scraped off and sold, they would probably be worth a lot.

They soaked in the pool.

Gu Huaiwei watched through the mirror and saw them chewing on those rotten fruits with their unsealed, decaying teeth. The merchant bit through the maggots inside an apple with his large front teeth, then swallowed with a wet, crunching sound.

The Hot Spring Mansion Director, meanwhile, smeared sludge all over his body as he discussed business with the Black-hearted Merchant.

“The families from the chemical plant are still making trouble. A few of them found a lawyer and tried to leave town to report us to the higher-ups. They took the bus I sponsored, and I stopped them in time.”

The Black-hearted Merchant chuckled. “Little brother, you’re still the reliable one.”

“The few of us are one entity to begin with. If one of us goes down, the rest of us won’t have an easy time either.”

…

Gu Huaiwei’s hand was still resting on Bai Miemie’s head. Bai Miemie whispered, “Sister Gu, there’s someone in that pool too.”

“Hm?” Because there was a strange odor in the room masking the distinctive scent of a human body, Gu Huaiwei had not noticed right away.

“Someone got here before us.” Bai Miemie’s pupils were rectangular, allowing her to see the view behind her head. When they turned around earlier to hide behind the towel rack, Bai Miemie had seen two bubbles rise from the private hot spring pool.

“Is it a Trial-taker?”

In the Hot Spring Mansion Instance, there had originally been three Trial-takers in total. One of them, a young man, was already dead, made into braised pork at the braised pork stall. Another, a girl, was missing. There was a good chance she was the person hiding in the private hot spring right now.

She was pretty good at holding her breath.