Forbidden Rules

Rick stumbled back to Room 4104 like a ghost, the world swaying beneath his feet. He stripped off his suit, which now felt contaminated, and stood under a stream of freezing water in the shower, scrubbing his skin raw. He was trying to wash away the cloying, coppery smell of blood, but he knew it was futile. The stench had seeped into his very bones.

He finally understood the first terrible truth of the Tower of Bliss: the rules were not static. They were fluid, a living document written in blood. Each new rule was christened with a gruesome "legislation," and the residents were both the audience and the potential sacrifices. They learned how to survive by watching others die. It was the most brutal, efficient form of natural selection he could possibly imagine.

The next morning, a series of soft, rhythmic knocks at his door jolted Rick from a fitful, nightmare-ridden sleep. He sprang up from the sofa, his body instantly rigid with fear, convinced that the "neighbors" had devised some new form of "entertainment" for him.

He crept to the door and peered through the peephole. A cleaning man stood outside, dressed in plain grey coveralls, pushing a standard janitorial cart. He was a middle-aged man, unremarkable in every way, his face a roadmap of weary wrinkles, his eyes cloudy and numb.

A new trap? Rick's mind raced. He didn't dare open the door.

The cleaner seemed to know he was being watched. He showed no impatience. He simply knocked again, gently, then reached into his pocket. He pulled out a small, unlabeled white pill bottle, placed it carefully on the carpet in front of the door, and then, without another glance, pushed his cart silently down the hall.

Rick waited for what felt like an eternity. After confirming the cleaner was gone, he cautiously cracked the door open, snatched the bottle, and darted back inside, locking the deadbolt behind him.

The bottle was blank. Inside were a few plain white tablets.

What is this? Poison? A hint?

He hesitated, his mind a battlefield of paranoia and desperation. He thought of the dancing girl's vacant, smiling corpse and the butler's icy gaze. He was beginning to realize that normal logic was a death sentence in this place. Sometimes, the most dangerous choice was the only path to survival.

With a surge of reckless resolve, he tipped one of the pills into his palm and swallowed it with a glass of tap water.

He waited for his heart to stop, for the poison to burn through his veins. But nothing happened. Instead, after a few minutes, a strange, chemical calm washed over him. The frantic, hysterical fear that had been gnawing at him for days was replaced by an unnatural clarity. His mind felt sharp, cool, like a well-oiled machine.

It was then that he noticed the door wasn't fully closed. Through the narrow crack, he saw the cleaner returning down the hallway, mopping the floor. On impulse, driven by his newfound, drug-induced lucidity, Rick didn't close the door. He watched.

The cleaner stopped his cart in front of Room 4102—Evelyn's room. He knocked softly. The door opened, and Evelyn emerged, her face the same mask of perfect, placid beauty.

The cleaner reached into his cart and handed her a heavy, black biohazard bag. Evelyn accepted it. Then, she unclasped a dazzling diamond bracelet from her wrist—a piece that shimmered even in the dim hallway light—and dropped it into the cleaner's pocket.

It was a silent, seamless transaction.

The cleaner nodded once, his face impassive, and continued on his way. He pushed his cart to the very end of the corridor, stopping before a dark, unmarked door Rick had assumed was a supply closet. The cleaner produced a key, unlocked the door, and revealed not a closet, but a steep, dark staircase leading down into unknown depths. He pushed his cart through the doorway and vanished into the blackness.

The cleaner. The pills. The black bag. The trade. The hidden stairs. The pieces clicked together in Rick's newly clear mind.

He lunged for the Resident Handbook on the table and flipped it open to Part III: Principles of Neighborly Conduct. The text was simple, elegant, perfectly suited for a high-end residence:

3.1: Maintain a quiet environment.

3.2: Respect the privacy of your neighbors.

He had read them before and dismissed them as standard boilerplate. Now, he saw them with blood-red clarity. They weren't principles. They were the Forbidden Rules, disguised in plain sight to lull newcomers like him into a false sense of security. "Maintain a quiet environment"—like in the library. "Respect privacy"—don't approach your neighbors, don't comment on their activities, like in the garden.

And the trade... Evelyn using her immense wealth to acquire that black bag. A horrifying theory bloomed in Rick's mind. He ran back to his door, knelt down, and peered at the gap under Evelyn's door across the hall. He could see a faint, dark stain seeping onto the corridor carpet. A bluish liquid, carrying a heavy, floral scent mixed with the faintest hint of decay.

It was the same as the blue roses.

The second reversal hit him with the force of a physical blow. The residents weren't just victims or an audience; they were players and enforcers in this twisted game. They traded with the cleaner—the 'merchant' who operated outside the rules—to obtain "tools" or "immunities" to survive specific regulations. The price? Their most cherished possessions. The very symbols of the vanity that had brought them here.

Evelyn eating the flower wasn't a punishment. It was a remedy, a 'potion' she had to consume to grant herself immunity from some other rule—perhaps the rule that demanded she treat newcomers with cold indifference. The old man's self-mutilation… perhaps it too was a performance, an act of calculated pain to satisfy the system and earn another day of life.

They weren't madmen. They were lucid, desperate survivors. And the pill the cleaner had given him wasn't poison. It was an invitation. An entrance ticket. It had granted him the clarity to see the truth. The cleaner had chosen him, seeing in him the potential to become a new player, not just another foolish sacrifice.

Armed with this knowledge, Rick began to perform. He stopped hiding. He became a resident. He dressed in his finest suits and appeared in the sky garden, where he would stare at a single plant for an hour without expression, just as Evelyn did. He went to the library and sat in silence, pretending to read, until the very last minute.

His performance was flawless. The neighbors' gazes shifted from scrutiny to a silent, knowing acceptance. He was becoming one of them. And his vanity, which he thought had been extinguished, roared back to life in a new, more pathological form. He wasn't just surviving; he was excelling. He was mastering the system.

One day, the cleaner appeared at his door again. This time, he handed Rick a simple, folded note.

It read: The Penthouse. Midnight.

This was it. The final test. The ultimate interview.

At midnight, Rick took the elevator to the top floor, an area previously sealed off from residents. The doors opened onto a vast, empty space beneath a massive glass dome, revealing the star-dusted sky. In the exact center of the room stood a single, ornate, and horrifying throne, constructed from some unknown black metal and pale, polished bone.

The butler stood silently beside it. The cleaner stood in the shadows.

"Mr. Rick Chen," the butler began, his voice strangely warm. "Congratulations. you have passed all the tests."

"Tests?" Rick asked, his voice steady.

"Yes," the butler smiled. "Every person worthy of entering the Tower of Bliss must be tested. We need to see which quality is most dominant in them. Fear? Intellect? Or... something else?"

"And me?" Rick asked, a tremor of anticipation in his voice.

"You, Mr. Chen," the butler's smile widened. "You are special. In you, we have found the purest, most powerful quality this Tower requires." He extended a hand toward the throne.

"Vanity."

Rick froze.

"You crave recognition," the butler continued, his voice hypnotic. "You yearn to be superior. That desire is stronger than your fear, more enduring than your intellect. It's what drove you not to flee, but to conquer. You weren't trying to survive, Mr. Chen. You were competing for a higher status."

The butler's words dissected him with surgical precision. He was right.

"The Tower of Bliss is not a residence, nor is it a prison," the butler purred. "It is a stage. A stage built for the most extreme expressions of human nature. And every stage needs a director."

The third reversal. The butler wasn't the lawmaker; he was the recruiter. The cleaner wasn't a merchant; he was the guide. They were both servants of the building itself, searching for a new core.

"The previous 'director' grew weary," the butler said. "His performance is over. The position is now vacant."

Rick stared at the throne, his breathing shallow. He understood. "Why me?"

"Because your vanity is a perfect match for the Tower's essence," the butler gestured to the throne. "It was built from vanity, and it feeds on it. You have the potential to be the one who appreciates the performances, who sets the stage for new games."

"You mean... the Forbidden Rules..."

"Will be yours to write," the butler said with a final, inviting gesture. "Take your seat, Mr. Chen. You will no longer be an actor. You will become the audience. You will have the power you've always dreamed of. You will be the new god of the Tower of Bliss."

Reason, fear, and instinct screamed at Rick that it was a trap. But his vanity, the monster he had fed his entire life, roared louder. To be a god? To rule over those who had terrified him? It was the ultimate victory.

He smiled, a genuine, triumphant smile. He straightened his tie and walked with a king's stride toward the throne.

He sat down.

The moment he did, a cold, irresistible power surged from the throne into his body. The lights of the entire building flickered. He saw everything: the bloodstain on the 42nd-floor lounge, the broken glasses in the library, the blue roses in the garden. He saw his neighbors, all looking up, their faces filled not with empty smiles, but with genuine, reverent awe.

He had won.

But as he leaned back to savor his victory, he realized something was wrong.

He couldn't move.

Invisible vines of energy were binding him to the chair, fusing his flesh with the bone and metal. The power wasn't liberating him; it was imprisoning him. He tried to speak, but he had no voice.

He looked at the butler in panic. For the first time, the butler's smile seemed real, tinged with... pity.

"Welcome, our new Core," he said softly. "Please begin your work."

The cleaner rolled a large, ornate mirror in front of the throne. Rick saw his reflection: a man in an expensive suit, a triumphant, idiotic smile frozen on his face. But his body was becoming translucent, his flesh and blood merging with the steel and concrete of the building. His consciousness was being stretched, woven into every wall, every wire, every fiber of the Tower.

The final, ultimate reversal. There was no director, no god. The "Core" was the building's new battery, its central processing unit. The Tower of Bliss was a sentient entity that fed on vanity, and it required a soul of supreme vanity to act as its nerve center—to feel the residents' fear and despair, and convert it into the energy that sustained the system. Rick wasn't its god; he was its heart. He would be trapped here forever, a conscious observer in a prison of his own making, until his vanity was consumed and the system needed a new fool to take his place.

The handbook and pen placed in his hands weren't tools of power; they were I/O devices. He couldn't write rules, but every throb of his now-imprisoned vanity would be interpreted by the building and projected as new, more sadistic "Forbidden Rules" for the residents below. He had become the rules themselves.

In the mirror, Rick's body faded completely into the throne, leaving only the ghost of an outline and his eternal, triumphant, foolish smile.

The butler picked up a new handbook and walked to the elevator, his professional smile back in place. The doors opened, revealing a young, ambitious man in a sharp suit, his eyes burning with greed and desire.

"Welcome to the Tower of Bliss," the butler said, handing him the handbook. "We have very few rules here."

He paused, glancing up at the dome, at the faint, smiling ghost that was now a part of the architecture.

"As for the ones that truly matter... those are all forbidden."