After looking at the story cards for Li Mo and Cheng Mu, Xiao Lou felt conflicted and didn't know what to say. He silently shrugged and put the two story cards back in their card holders. Yu Hanjiang also remained silent, and the Personal Space suddenly became extremely quiet.
After a moment, Red Heart A broke the silence with a smile: "As usual, you can rest after clearing the heart room. This time, you will have 8 hours of rest. You can take a shower and go to sleep now. The alarm clock will wake you up at 8 a.m. At that time, please go to the card wall and draw the card for the next level. I won't keep you company any longer. Goodbye, you two."
Xiao Lou nodded to her: "Okay, goodbye."
Red Heart A disappeared before their eyes. Xiao Lou looked at Yu Hanjiang and said, " Captain Yu, take a rest for a while."
Although there were sleeper cars on the train, they didn't sleep well during the few days on the train because they were thinking about the case. The most merciful member of the Guardian, Red Heart A, once again prepared a simple bathroom and two single beds for them. Yu Hanjiang and Xiao Lou took showers one after the other and lay down on the beds.
Xiao Lou recalled a scene from the story card and couldn't fall asleep. Yu Hanjiang also couldn't sleep, so the two started chatting.
Yu Hanjiang said, " The heart room and the Spade Secret Room are like two different worlds."
Xiao Lou quickly understood what he meant: " Captain Yu means that the Heart Room has strict rules, murder is illegal, and the murderer will be arrested and sentenced... But in the Spade Secret Room, in order to pass the level, the challenger can even wantonly kill Freelancers?"
Yu Hanjiang nodded and said in a low voice, "Of the four Guardians, Hearts is the most principled. Zhang Qing, the murderer in the Fenglin High School case, was eventually sentenced to death, and the two murderers in the Express Train case were also arrested by the police. However, in the secret room of Spade 3, Freelancers killed Challengers, and Challengers massacred Indigenous people, and no one cared at all. Some Challengers even released the Zombie Virus directly in the square in order to pass the level."
Xiao Lou pondered for a moment and said, "Perhaps Red Heart A governs a well-ordered world where people abide by morality and laws and live normal lives. But the world governed by Ace of Spades, like Zombie Town and Financial Crisis, is more like an apocalyptic world. In such an environment, people will naturally disregard the constraints of morality, law, and social rules in order to survive, exposing the dark side of human nature."
While the murders in the Heart Room are bloody, the endings always offer hope and warmth. The world of the Spade, however, is incredibly dark; people will stop at nothing to survive, and murder goes unpunished. The rules of the two types of locked rooms are completely different.
Yu Hanjiang frowned and said, "From this perspective, Sun City and Moon City are likely to be orderly worlds as well. The tour groups and groups of girlfriends on the bullet train all departed from Sun City, and there is still a concert in Moon City. The freelancers in the two main cities should be living normal lives."
Xiao Lou speculated, "What if the Challengers arrive in the main city, discover the beauty of this world, and gradually integrate into it? Would they not want to go back? For example, those who can't afford a house in reality might earn money through the Plum Blossom Secret Chamber and buy a big villa here? Those who can't find a partner in reality might get married and have children here? Their will will be gradually worn down, and they will lose the motivation to leave Card World?"
Yu Hanjiang nodded, his expression also somewhat grim: "So, some Challengers, after arriving in the main city, are not incapable of continuing their adventures, but rather they have become accustomed to life here and have no desire to take risks."
When Challenger's will is worn down, when the belief in "going back" in his heart becomes less strong.
Passing through the S -level secret chamber was no longer important to them.
Guardian said that to get back, one must pass through a secret room of SS difficulty. However, he didn't mention that all Challengers must go to the highest-level secret room.
Xiao Lou said with a headache, "If that's really the case, then I can understand why there are over 80 million Challengers but no one has cleared the game."
Yu Hanjiang paused for a moment, then said firmly, "Don't worry, I will definitely go back. This world, whether good or bad, is as unreal as a dream. If we stay here and are assimilated, we might gradually lose our humanity over time."
"That's right." Xiao Lou smiled slightly and said, "There's no need to be too pessimistic. There must be many people in the main city who are just as determined as us to go back. Those who can pass the fourth level are not weak. We might be able to find some even more powerful partners."
"I hope so," Yu Hanjiang said softly. "Let's rest first. We'll go to Diamonds next."
Outside the Personal Space, it was completely dark. A wave of drowsiness washed over them, and Xiao Lou and Yu Hanjiang quickly fell asleep.
I slept without any dreams.
The alarm clock at 8 a.m. wakes them up on time.
The two quickly washed up and then went to the card wall, drawing the next card – the diamond 4.
After the familiar dizziness subsided, when they opened their eyes again, they found themselves in an unfamiliar space.
The enclosed room, about 4 square meters in size, has white marble walls and floors with patterns. There is a stone table in front of it, with a Balance on the table and a delicate little wooden box next to it.
A notification popped up simultaneously in the floating box in front of both of them—
Welcome Xiao Lou and Yu Hanjiang to the Diamond 4 secret room [Balanced World].
Unlock the mechanisms in the secret room, find the exit, and escape within 30 minutes. Failure to do so will result in failure.
This secret room contains no hidden mechanisms, and there is only one exit. Good luck to you both.
After the notification swiped, a clock appeared above both of their heads. The time then indicated morning.
At 8:00 sharp, the second hand began to tick. There was a red mark at 8:30, which meant that if you couldn't leave the room by 8:30, you would fail the challenge.
Escape rooms with mechanisms are Yu Hanjiang's weakest point. He glanced at the clock, followed behind Xiao Lou, and said, "Is the mechanism in this room the Balance on the table?"
Xiao Lou stepped forward, opened the exquisite wooden box next to him, and sure enough, saw some silver metal weights about the size of a fingernail. The cube-shaped weights were all the same size and were marked with numbers 1g, 2g, 3g, 4g, 5g, 6g, 7g, and 8g respectively.
Xiao Lou weighed it in his hand, and indeed the weight was different. He smiled and said, "Balance World, this mechanism is gravity-controlled. As long as the weight is placed on it and reaches the specified weight, it should be able to open the door to the secret room."
He looked down at the numbers on the weights carefully and said, "There are 8 weights in total, ranging from 1 gram to 8 grams. If you put 2 and 3 on one side and 1 and 4 on the other, the total weight will be 5g… But I don't think it's that simple. The more likely solution is to put all 8 weights on and make the weights on both sides of the balance exactly equal."
Although Yu Hanjiang is terrible at physics, he still knows how to use Balance.
In physics, balance is similar to the most primitive scale. The object to be weighed is placed on one side, and weights of different weights are placed on the other side. When balance is in a completely horizontal position, it proves that the weights on both sides are equal. The weight of the object is the sum of the weights of all the weights.
As Professor Xiao said, since the escape room provided eight weights, all eight must be used.
Otherwise, it would be too easy to just put 2+3 on one side and 1+4 on the other.
How should these eight weights, ranging from 1g to 8g, be arranged to achieve perfect balance?
Yu Hanjiang frowned, deep in thought, his mind racing with addition. Before he could finish, Xiao Lou stepped forward and carefully placed five weights—1g, 2g, 3g, 5g, and 7g—on the left and three weights—4g, 6g, and 8g—on the right.
The sum of the weights on the left and right sides of the Balance is 18 grams.
After a slight shake, Balance achieved perfect equilibrium, with the pointer pointing to the red mark in the very center.
A loud rumbling sound rang in their ears, and the stone wall in front of the table suddenly opened a door wide enough for them to pass side by side.
Xiao Lou's eyes lit up: "It's done."
Yu Hanjiang: "..."
And just like that, while he was still reviewing the question, Professor Xiao had already written down the answer.
Out of habit, Yu Hanjiang still thought that four weights should be placed on each side of the Balance. He was also thinking about how to place weights of 1 to 8g to make the weights on both sides equal.
As a result, Professor Xiao placed 5 on the left and 3 on the right, making a total of 18 grams on both sides...
Professor Xiao, with his quick thinking, is far more adept at solving these kinds of puzzles than anyone else.
Yu Hanjiang decided to abandon his thought and followed Xiao Lou with a serious expression.
After leaving the first secret room, a stone wall stood before them, with a straight passage on each of the left and right sides.
Xiao Lou went to the left first, and when he reached the end, he saw a secret room of about 4 square meters. There was a Balance on the table, but this time, the chips in the box were not weights marked with grams, but some Chinese character cubes.
A 5cm x 5cm x 5cm cube, with twelve Chinese characters written on it.
Jade, sand, sky, wind, butterfly, wave, partridge, drunk, spring, quail, wash, butterfly.
Yu Hanjiang thought these characters looked familiar and that they could be used to form a poem. Xiao Lou quickly realized and said, "Twelve characters, when combined, form four ci (lyric poetry) titles."
He took the characters out of the wooden box, rearranged them, and created four different poetic forms—
Jade Butterfly, Partridge Sky, Waves Washing Sand, Drunken Spring Breeze.
Yu Hanjiang couldn't help but admire Xiao Lou's reaction. He looked at the poem titles in front of him and said, "What does the poem title have to do with weight? These character cubes are all the same size, so their weight should be about the same, right?"
Xiao Lou thought carefully, picked up a complex character "鹧" and a simple character "天", weighed them in his left and right hands respectively, and said: "The difference is very small, but the complex character is obviously heavier than the simple character. The weight of Chinese characters should be related to the number of strokes."
He then verified two more characters by comparing "淘" (táo) and "玉" (yù), and found that the former was significantly heavier than the latter.
Xiao Lou, having confirmed his idea, pointed to the two ci (a type of Chinese calligraphy) tablets on the table and said, " Captain Yu, please count the number of strokes in these six characters. I'll count the remaining six."
Yu Hanjiang nodded, quickly writing characters in his palm while silently counting the strokes. Soon, he came to a conclusion and whispered, "Jade has 5 strokes, butterfly and swan both have 15 strokes, totaling 30 strokes. Wave has 10 strokes, wash has 11 strokes, and sand has 7 strokes, totaling 28 strokes."
Xiao Lou said, "The character '鹧鸪天' has 30 strokes, and '醉春风' has exactly 28 strokes."
The two exchanged a glance and, quite tacitly, placed the three character blocks with 30 strokes (玉, 蝴蝶, 蝶) and the three character blocks with 28 strokes (浪, 淘, 沙) on the left side of Balance, and placed the remaining six characters (鹧, 鸪, 天, 醉, 春, 风) on the right side of Balance.
Sure enough, after swinging for a moment, the Balance pointer pointed to the middle, proving that the two men's analysis was correct.
Yu Hanjiang mentally gave Xiao Lou a thumbs up.
This question isn't actually difficult. First, assemble the jumbled characters into a poem title, then analyze the strokes of the title. You'll find a balance point—the strokes of the four titles add up to exactly 30 and 28.
30 and 28 are exactly equal when placed on both sides.
All the mechanisms in Diamond 4 are based on balance. Since the theme of the escape room is a balanced world, as long as you find this balance, you can solve the puzzles.
...
After the mechanism in the small room on the left was unlocked, the wall in front of the two did not change, but a rumbling sound came from behind them, as if a wall somewhere was rotating.
Xiao Lou and Yu Hanjiang quickly turned around and went back.
Halfway there, they saw a stone door appear in the wall that had blocked their path. But the door was closed. Xiao Lou said as they walked, "We need to unlock the mechanism in the room on the right before this stone door will open."
Yu Hanjiang nodded and quickly followed him.
The two walked to the end of the corridor on the right, into a small room of about 4 square meters. There was a table on the room, with a Balance token on it and a box next to it containing chips—but this time they weren't numbers or characters, but several strange flat shapes.
Xiao Lou picked up the geometric shapes, looked at them carefully, and said, "Square, rhombus, triangle... there are only two side lengths, 5. Assuming that a 5cm line segment weighs 5g and a 10cm line segment weighs 10g, we just need to make the line segments at both ends of Balance equal in weight."
Upon hearing this, Yu Hanjiang also found it particularly simple and quickly worked with Professor Xiao to convert the line segments of several figures.
The rectangle is 10cm long and 5cm wide, and its weight can be calculated as 10+5+10+5=30g.
Rhombus and square shapes, all four sides are 5cm long, and the weight is converted to 20g.
Two equilateral triangles, each with a side length of 5cm, weigh 15g.
Xiao Lou placed the rectangle and square on the left Balance, and the rhombus and two equilateral triangles on the right Balance, with the weight on both sides being 50g. The Balance pointer pointed precisely to the middle.
Hearing the sound of the walls turning, Xiao Lou smiled and said, "It's a success."
Yu Hanjiang thought to himself: Professor Xiao is really amazing. He actually thought of converting the length of a line segment into weight. If he were to come to Diamond 4 alone, he would definitely be completely confused and wouldn't know how to arrange these messy geometric shapes.
The two turned and went back into the corridor.
The stone door in the corridor had indeed opened. Xiao Lou and Yu Hanjiang exchanged a glance and entered through the stone door.
As soon as they stepped inside, the stone door suddenly closed behind them.
The two were trapped in a sealed room.
Xiao Lou quickly looked around. The room was spacious, about 20 square meters, with the same white marble brick pattern on the floor and walls. Unlike the other rooms, which had tables and balances, this room was empty, without any tools or mechanisms.
However, as the two entered the room, two huge round stones, each about 2 meters in diameter, suddenly rose from the ground.
One stone is red, and the other is blue. Both of them have markings similar to those on an electronic scale.
Xiao Lou walked over to the stones and examined them closely. Yu Hanjiang followed and said, "It seems that the only way to get out of this secret chamber is through these two large stones. The markings on them must be for weight, right?"
Xiao Lou nodded and said, "The theme of this level is 'Balance World.' The three mechanisms we encountered before were all related to ' Balance.' The first one had number chips, the second had Chinese character blocks, the third had geometric shapes, and the fourth... There's nothing in this room. Are we supposed to stand on them ourselves?"
Yu Hanjiang said, "Give it a try."
He walked over and stood on the blue stone. The pointer under his feet immediately spun and finally stopped at: 75kg.
Xiao Lou also turned around and stood on the red stone, with the pointer under his feet fixed on the number 65kg.
There was no reaction from the four walls, and the room was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
The two looked at each other, then stared at each other in bewilderment.
Xiao Lou said, "We are not the same weight, so the mechanism cannot be opened."
Yu Hanjiang turned around and said, " Professor Xiao, you only weigh 65 kilograms? For someone who is 1.8 meters tall, that's a bit too thin. You should eat more in the future."
Xiao Lou laughed and said, "I can eat as much as I want and not gain weight. It's probably a matter of my constitution."
Yu Hanjiang looked at the markings on the ground and frowned. "I'm taller and heavier than you, and there's nothing else in the room. How about... I take off my clothes and let you wear them?"
Xiao Lou shook his head: "The clothes don't weigh 10kg, so this method shouldn't work. If a man and a woman entered this room, the weight difference would be even greater, right? There's no way the electronic scale could be balanced by weight and clothes alone."
The room was completely empty; there were no tools except for the Challenger.
How do I balance an electronic scale?
Xiao Lou stroked his chin, lost in thought.