Forbidden Rules

That night, I sat with my back against the door, clutching a wooden leg I'd broken off a chair. I didn't sleep a wink.

When the six o'clock morning bell chimed, I felt as if I'd been fished out of ice water. I cautiously opened the door. The candles in the corridor were still lit, but a faint, cloying smell of blood hung in the air.

Lily's door was ajar. A dark red, viscous drag mark stained the floor inside, stretching into the deep darkness of the hallway before disappearing.

I didn't dare go look.

Soon, Evelyn and Mike emerged from their respective rooms. Evelyn's face was grim; she had clearly heard last night's commotion as well. Mike looked fierce, but a flicker of unconcealable fear hid deep in his eyes.

"That girl..." Evelyn's voice was hoarse.

"A sacrifice," I summarized succinctly, watching their reactions.

Mike slammed his fist against the wall, sending plaster dust drifting down. "Damn it! What the hell is this place? I'm gonna tear it apart!"

"Don't be rash!" Evelyn immediately stopped him. "Didn't you read the rules? This manor is like a living thing. We have to figure out the truth behind the rules."

"The truth?" Mike sneered. "The truth is we've been played! What damn rules? I think following them is a death sentence!"

My mind stirred. This simple-minded brute had surprisingly sharp instincts at times.

Lily's death kept replaying in my head. She followed Rule 2 but still died. What did that mean? It meant the "Public Edition" of the rules contained lies, or worse, deeper, unseen "prohibitions."

Just then, the butler appeared at the end of the corridor like a phantom. He wore the same stiff smile, as if nothing had happened last night.

"Good morning, my three guests. Breakfast is ready. Please follow me." He didn't even glance at Lily's empty room, as if she had never existed.

In the dining room, a lavish breakfast was spread across a long table. But none of us had any appetite.

The butler personally served each of us a piece of... what looked like some kind of meat patty. It was a deep red, still steaming slightly, and gave off a peculiar aroma.

I stared at the meat, my stomach churning.

Rule 6: No guest may refuse any food served to you by the butler.

Mike slammed his fork on the table with a CLANG, glaring at the butler. "What is this crap? I'm not eating it!"

The butler's smile didn't waver. "Mr. Mike, you must adhere to the rules."

"To hell with your rules!" Mike shot to his feet and flipped the table. Plates, cutlery, and food crashed to the floor. The meat patty fell to the ground and seemed to squirm, as if alive.

"I've had enough!" Mike roared. "I'm going to find that 'Heart of the Manor' and then burn this place to the ground!"

With that, he stormed out of the dining room without looking back.

Evelyn's face was ashen. "He... he violated Rule 6..."

I didn't move. I just stared intently at the butler. His expression hadn't changed at all. He merely bent down, methodically picked up a silver fork from the floor, and carefully wiped it clean with a white handkerchief.

"It is a pity. Mr. Mike has lost his qualification to enjoy breakfast," he said softly.

I wasn't impulsive like Mike. My mind was racing. Did refusing food mean instant death? Apparently not. So, was the manor's punishment delayed? Or did violating different rules have different consequences?

I looked at the meat patty on my plate, then at Evelyn. She was just as pale but hadn't moved.

"Mr. Nick, Ms. Evelyn, please dine," the butler invited again.

I picked up my knife and fork, forcing a sycophantic smile. "Of course, Mr. Butler. Your service is so impeccable, how could we possibly disappoint you?"

I cut off a small piece of meat. Just then, I noticed a detail. When the butler said the words "any food," his eyes had flickered almost imperceptibly, as if he were hiding something.

I put the small piece of meat in my mouth. An indescribable,腥甜 taste instantly flooded my senses. I fought back the urge to vomit, chewed twice with a straight face, and swallowed.

"The taste... is very unique," I commented with a smile. "It has a certain... homey warmth."

Seeing me eat, Evelyn shakily picked up her own knife and fork, closed her eyes, and took a small bite.

The butler nodded in satisfaction. "Please enjoy."

With that, he turned and left the dining room.

The moment he was gone, Evelyn rushed to a nearby decorative planter and began to retch violently. I ran to the other side and dry-heaved, but nothing came out. The meat felt like it had taken root in my stomach, sending waves of burning pain through me.

"What... what did we just eat?" Evelyn asked in terror.

I rinsed my mouth, my face dark enough to drip ink. "I don't know. But we're alive. And Mike... he's in big trouble."

My words had barely faded when we heard Mike's furious roar from outside the dining room, followed by the sound of heavy impacts and shattering glass. We rushed out to see Mike in the library.

He was clearly looking for clues, but his actions at that moment sent a chill of pure dread through us.

He was grabbing a book with a red cover, trying to yank it from the shelf!

Rule 4: Absolutely forbidden to touch, move, or read any book with a red cover.

"Mike, stop!" Evelyn screamed.

But Mike was consumed by rage. He ignored her completely and, with his bull-like strength, ripped the red book from the shelf.

Click.

It was a soft sound. Not the sound of a book tearing, but of a mechanism inside the bookshelf.

The instant Mike pulled the book free, the entire bookshelf suddenly retracted into the wall, revealing a pitch-black cavity behind it. Inside the darkness, pairs of crimson eyes snapped open, dense as a spider's web.

Mike didn't even have time to react. Countless long, emaciated arms shot out from the opening like hungry vines, wrapping around his body.

"AARGH—!"

He let out a scream that was no longer human as he was dragged instantly into the darkness behind the wall. The wall slowly sealed, the bookshelf sliding back into place as if nothing had happened.

All that remained was the red book he had thrown to the floor. Its pages fluttered open in a non-existent wind, landing on a page where a judgment was written in the same bloody script:

"The gluttonous shall, in the end, be devoured."

Evelyn and I stood frozen, ice-cold to the core.

It was over. Mike was dead. For violating two rules. Refusing breakfast was a form of mental "gluttony"—being picky, unsatisfied. Then his rage led him to touch the forbidden book.

I suddenly understood. These rules were a precision-engineered, interlocking web. Violate one, and you might not die immediately. But you would be pushed into a more dangerous situation, driven by fear and anger to violate the next, until you triggered a fatal trap.

And Lily... what she heard last night must have been the "children's laughter" from Rule 5! She didn't cover her ears, and may have even tried to find the source out of fear. That's why she died.

These public rules weren't a code of protection at all. They were... death inducements.

Follow them, and you'd be slowly boiled to death like a frog in warming water, unaware of the true danger. Violate them, and you'd trigger an instant-death trap.

This game had no escape!

No. There had to be a way. I, Nick, never believe in an unsolvable game. If there was a "Public Edition" of the rules, there had to be a hidden, "true" set of rules.

I called them—the Crimson Prohibitions.

The rules we weren't allowed to know, or even think about, were the key to survival.

And to find them, someone had to make the mistakes. Lily and Mike, with their lives, had eliminated two wrong answers for us.

Now, it was just me and Evelyn.

I looked at the woman beside me. Though terrified, her eyes held the tenacity and composure of a scholar. She was analyzing the judgment in the red book.

"'The gluttonous shall be devoured'... It's like a... karmic judgment," she murmured.

"Exactly," I cut in. "Lily's curiosity, Mike's rage, they both led to their deaths. This manor is like a tribunal. Our every action is being judged."

"Then what do we do?" Evelyn looked at me, and for the first time, there was reliance in her eyes.

I took a deep breath, my mind working at an unprecedented speed. Fear and greed intertwined inside me, creating a strange kind of fuel.

"We have to think in reverse," I said. "If both following and breaking the rules lead to death, it means our understanding of the rules is fundamentally flawed."

I pointed to the rule board in the hall. "Take Rule 1: 'Always maintain courtesy and respect towards the butler.' Why? Because he has information? No. I think the true meaning of this rule is—never believe a single word the butler says."

Evelyn was stunned. "What do you mean?"

"He's a liar!" I asserted. "He seems to be answering our questions, but every sentence is a trap. Lily wanted to quit, he 'agreed,' and the result was the door being sealed shut. He 'graciously invited' us to breakfast, and that meat nearly killed us. His courtesy is sugar-coating on poison!"

"What about Rule 2? The midnight curfew."

"That's a lie too!" My thoughts were becoming clearer. "Think about it. The 'Heart of the Manor' is hidden somewhere on the estate. If we're all locked in our rooms, how are we supposed to find it? So, after midnight is precisely the best time to search for clues! The only catch is, you have to be able to evade whatever is roaming the corridors."

"And the candles!" Evelyn seemed to be catching on. "Rule 3 says not to blow them out because they are 'light.' But in a place like this, sometimes light isn't a guide, it's an exposure! True safety might be in the darkness!"

"Exactly!" I snapped my fingers. "And the red books in the library. We're forbidden to touch them. Why? Because they contain critical clues! Mike died, but he proved with his life that moving those books triggers a trap, but it also opens a new path!"

We looked at each other, and in each other's eyes, we saw shock and a flicker of... morbid excitement.

We had found the real way to play the game.

The First Crimson Prohibition: Doubt all public rules.

The Second Crimson Prohibition: Execute the reverse of all public rules, but you must find the correct way to do it.

"So, the 'Heart of the Manor' is likely in a forbidden area, or only appears at a forbidden time," Evelyn concluded.

"Correct," I nodded, but another calculation was running in my mind.

Evelyn and I were partners now, but there was only one winner in this game. She was smart and could help me solve the puzzles. But the moment we found the "Heart of the Manor," she would turn from a partner into a competitor.

I needed her, but I also had to guard against her.

"Alright, let's split up," I said. "It's daytime, relatively safe. You go to the library, try to find a way to check those red books without triggering the trap. I'll search the manor for any other hidden clues. Remember, be careful of the butler."

Evelyn nodded and walked towards the deadly library.

As for me, I turned my attention elsewhere. My goal was clear—money.

The Endless Treasury was the grand prize, but I didn't mind grabbing an appetizer along the way. A manor this luxurious had to be filled with valuable antiques. My creed: money you can trade your life for is even better money. With my life on the line, it would be a huge loss not to pocket something.

I slipped into a room that looked like the master's study.