Why is my journey to the world of anime a strange tale of rules?

Turning around, Gao Hai gestured for Hayasaka to be quiet, as Hayasaka was still completely unaware of what was happening.

Then, he slowly bent down, adjusting his posture while keeping his feet still. After adjusting for about two or three seconds, Gao Hai suddenly lifted his foot, lunged forward, and landed face down on the ground, or rather, crashed heavily to the ground, his gaze immediately turning towards the door.

Gao Hai's gaze pierced through the crack in the door and met a pair of eyes peering into the small bedroom.

bang-

The next second, there was a thud outside the door, like something crashing to the ground.

Gao Hai had barely gotten up when he reached out and grabbed the doorknob. A series of hurried footsteps quickly faded away from the doorway of the small bedroom.

"quick!"

Without a moment's hesitation, Gao Hai yanked the door open, grabbed Hayasaka's arm as she caught up, and expertly carried the girl into the corridor with one hand.

The dilapidated corridor was no different from the orphanage Gao Hai had seen in his hallucinations, only it appeared more dilapidated and chaotic. The floor was cracked, the ceiling had collapsed, most of the room doors had disappeared or were only broken fragments, and a foul stench was spreading.

But Gao Hai's attention isn't on those things right now.

He simply looked to one side of the corridor, towards the end of the corridor, at that small figure running frantically, that guy who had been silently peeking through the crack in the door for a long time, and who immediately started to run away after being discovered.

Chiyo Haeiya.

That girl is Chiyo Hachiya.

Gao Hai wouldn't mistake the other person's appearance. Even a brief glance through the crack in the door was enough for him to confirm the girl's identity.

Could I really find them here? Am I finally approaching the moment to crack this dungeon?

During the chase, a sense of excitement subtly surfaced in Gao Hai's heart.

Chapter 57: Teacher, I hate adults like you the most!

The wind whistled past my ears.

Gao Hai's speed had already surpassed the world record for sprinting. In just a few breaths, he reached the end of the corridor and turned in the direction the little girl had run away from.

Or is it the corridor?

Gao Hai remembered that the end of this corridor should be a staircase. In his previous hallucination, he had reached this place after climbing the stairs to the second floor. But now, after turning this corner, he saw another corridor, one that felt completely familiar, as if he had just passed through it.

Has a cycle been formed?

Despite the somewhat ominous impressions from the scene before him, Gao Hai immediately noticed the girl stumbling and running away down the corridor and gave chase.

No matter how this place changes, Chiyo Hachiya's presence in this space remains paramount. Therefore, other issues can be temporarily ignored; we must quickly grasp this girl, ascertain her exact state, and find a way to break free from her core obsession.

Bang!

Heavy steps landed on the ground.

Takami protected Hayasaka, then activated the power of his berserk blessing, and suddenly accelerated towards the girl in front of him.

He could see the little girl who was running away in a panic fall to the ground after hearing the sound behind her, then quickly get up and run into a nearby house.

The next moment, Gao Hai caught up and turned towards the room entrance whose door had been destroyed. He then discovered that the room was still a corridor, no different from the one he was in. It looked exactly the same corridor.

The girl had already escaped into another room.

"Hmm...did you catch it?"

Hayasaka, who was already feeling nauseous from Takami's accelerated movement, asked in a low voice as she watched Takami stop.

"I'm afraid it won't be that easy; the structure of this place is quite complex."

Gao Hai shook his head and put Hayasaka down, then walked into the room. As expected, every door in the corridor led to an identical corridor, and after stepping into these corridors, Gao Hai saw that each door in the corridor led to another identical corridor.

The room he and Hayasaka had just left had now been transformed into a corridor. It seemed that while the orphanage appeared harmless on the surface, it harbored strange forces that were not easily dealt with.

"It wasn't that easy after all. Tsk, I thought I'd finally found a chance to end it all."

Gao Hai sighed. He hadn't forgotten Kaguya's situation, so when he actually discovered a chance to contact her core obsession and figure out what it was, he was somewhat anxious. Now that he realized things weren't so easy to handle, while it wasn't entirely unexpected, it was still quite frustrating.

However, even with the abnormal changes in space, he still felt no sense of crisis, no urgency like one would feel in a dangerous area. It seemed that this orphanage, the fourth depth of the Early Elementary School instance, was indeed a relatively safe depth. Of course, this "safety" was predicated on not doing anything reckless. His earlier act of chasing the girl was likely a bad one, so he needed to carefully consider his next move.

"That girl just now, she's the same one we met before..."

Hayasaka didn't understand why Takami was chasing the little girl, but she noticed the similarity between the girl and Chiyo Hachiya, who was carrying a machete in the Deep Space. So after hesitating for a moment, she couldn't help but ask.

"Yes, that's right. But this one doesn't seem as dangerous as the other one. If we want to crack this dungeon, we need to find her first. Regardless of the danger, we should at least make contact with her. However, it seems we're being treated like bad guys, so talking to her might not be so easy."

As Gao Hai spoke, he carefully observed each corridor, trying to find any differences, but he couldn't find anything noteworthy.

Bad guys? Us?

Hayasaka couldn't help but recall the scene where Takami was stabbed in the stomach by that girl's blade, and her expression faltered slightly. Logically speaking, shouldn't the girl covered in blood, wielding a machete and teleporting in front of him in the blink of an eye, be the more like the bad guy? How come she and Mr. Takami are the bad guys?

However, the girl wouldn't say these things aloud. Now that Gao Hai wanted to find that girl, she had to find a way to help him.

Well, if it's about tracking, I do know some methods, but I don't know if they'll be useful.

"Should we go to the place where we lost track of her before? I'll try to find some clues. I've learned some tracking and tracing techniques, maybe I can find traces of that girl."

Thinking of this, although she was very afraid of the girl who had recently severely injured Takahashi, Hayasaka still mustered up her courage, raised her hand, and volunteered to Takahashi.

"Tracking? Okay, I'm willing to trust your tracking skills."

Upon hearing this, Gao Hai immediately recalled Hayasaka Ai, who would frequently discover his presence during his dates with Maki Chika. That girl had indeed followed him a considerable number of times, and he genuinely couldn't catch her every time; she was truly skilled at it. Hmm, if only I had Hayasaka's skill when I was taking photos of those bosses' wives and mistresses. You know, I was caught several times back then, and a few times I even had to fight with those adulterers and mistresses.

Recalling the strange and messy jobs he took after graduating from high school, Gao Hai couldn't help but sigh inwardly.

"I...I'm sorry, I didn't know much about Mr. Gao at the time, and I didn't know how to approach you, so that's why I did this. Anyway, let's go to the place where you lost track of Mr. Gao before, and I'll try to find some traces."

Hayasaka felt a little embarrassed by what Takami said, but she was thick-skinned enough to laugh it off and change the subject.

The two started walking and quickly returned to where they had started.

Hayasaka tied her messy hair into a side ponytail, then squatted down, her brows furrowed, her eyes carefully observing the ground.

The corridor floor itself is made of wood, and the walls on both sides have many bare areas with noticeably different colors, suggesting that cabinets and portraits were once placed there. The floor itself has some bumps and depressions from dampness, and some parts of the floor are cracked, but there is very little dust. The little dust that is there is mostly paint that has peeled off the walls, so it is concentrated on the sides of the corridor against the walls.

Initial observation revealed no obvious footprints. This was not surprising, as Hayasaka knew that Takami had a keen eye for detail; if a mark was obvious, he would have noticed it.

However, as long as the girl is real and not an illusion or something without substance, and there's no mechanism in this place that refreshes the area after someone has been there, then she will inevitably leave traces. No matter how well she hides them, it's impossible for her to leave absolutely nothing behind.

The girl's gaze quickly fell on a spot on the ground on one side of the wall, a slightly thinner patch of dust that was almost indistinguishable from the dust in other areas.

Footsteps passed by, and because they were running quickly, their footsteps were heavy. So even though no one stepped on them, a little dust was still kicked up, resulting in slight differences in the distribution of the dust.

"Let's try this way."

Hayasaka spoke as he slowly walked forward, his eyes fixed on any possible clues.

Gao Hai followed the girl silently, carefully observing the surrounding situation, prepared to send rescue team members to their deaths at any time.

The police officer who was originally left in the underground research base had entered a cooling-off period. It was probably after Chiyo Hachiya, unable to follow directly down after taking the butcher's body and entering a deeper area, found it in her monster form and killed it. Unfortunately, Chiyo was unconscious at the time and couldn't see how the police officer was destroyed, otherwise, she might have been able to figure out more patterns.

But right now, that's not important. What's done is done, and it can't be changed. It's better to protect this little maid. Her tracking skills are extremely important in this situation, and we can't afford any mistakes.

The dark corridor fell silent, leaving only the sound of their footsteps and breathing.

Hayasaka Ai was now completely focused, constantly searching for every subtle clue, slowly piecing together the little girl's whereabouts.

Go forward, turn right and enter the third door, turn left and enter the fifth door, walk to the end and turn left again, then enter the first door on the right...

Although every corridor looked the same to Takahashi, Hayasaka led Takahashi step by step by observing and deducing the details and by using the tracking skills he had learned from his family.

Tread-tap-

Faintly, one could hear hurried footsteps coming from somewhere ahead.

Hayasaka continued to move forward at a leisurely pace, while Takami patiently followed beside her, neither disturbing her rashly nor chasing after her without hearing a sound.

After going around a few more corners, we went in and out through several doors.

Just as Gao Hai was certain that he would never be able to get back to the starting point without directions, a little girl's panicked figure flashed past in the distance and quickly ran away. After nearly an hour, Hayasaka's tracking successfully found the girl.

"Haeiya Chiyo!"

Gao Hai called out the girl's name, but did not hear her footsteps stop.

He reached out and grabbed Hayasaka to chase after him, but he couldn't keep up with the figure that looked like an ordinary child. After chasing him through a few corridors, the distance between them was widened again.

Tsk, no way. This girl looks like a child, but her running speed is definitely beyond human capabilities. Even with the Berserk Blessing activated, I would have a hard time catching up with her, not to mention that this place is so complicated that it's easy to get lost.

"Chiyo, we're here to help you!"

Gao Hai shouted again, trying to get the other person to stop by communicating with him.

But the little girl just kept running and didn't try to communicate at all.

"Chiyo, we're not from Hayate Elementary School. We're here to help you!"

Gao Hai chased after them, shouting again, but to no avail.

“We know about your brother Ryohei Hachiya, and we also know about your family. We can help you find them!”

Gao Hai called out again, but still received no response.

Tsk, this guy...

"Your friend is in my hands. I've caught that dog-eating butcher. If you run again, I won't be so lenient with him!"

Seeing that kind words had no effect, Gao Hai had no choice but to try the villain route to see if it would work.

The running figure in front of them fell to the ground the next moment.

Getting to her feet, the girl turned around, revealing a child's face, clearly injured, unlike the grotesque and distorted expression of her monster form. After hesitating for a moment, the cowering girl stopped running away and simply stood there silently waiting for Takami and Hayasaka to come forward.

It looks like I'm the bad guy bullying her, even though I was the one who got stabbed earlier...

Seeing the girl's reaction, Gao Hai mentally complained, slowed down, put Hayasaka down, and walked step by step to the girl.

“We’re not bad people, Chiyo. We just want to talk to you. I won’t hurt your friends. Believe me, I just want to help you. I’m sincere.”

Gao Hai spoke as softly as possible as he slowed his pace to approach.

【…】

The girl stood there silently, staring at Gao Hai with unreadable emotions in her dark brown eyes, as if she were just an empty shell devoid of life.

The situation seems to be different from what was expected.

Chiyo Hachiya, who had shown clear emotional reactions when she was running away, was now standing still as if she had crashed, which made Takami, who was cautiously approaching, realize that something was wrong.