After a race against the wind, or rather, Xiaolang possessing my body to parkour across high-rise rooftops, we finally land at the location marked in bright red on the map. I pant heavily, smoothing down my messy hair, then look up.

  Immediately, all three of us freeze.

  It isn't a gloomy abandoned house, nor is it a dark alley where criminals usually lurk. It is the Keio Plaza Hotel, one of the symbols of luxury in Shinjuku. Warm yellow lights radiate from the grand lobby, expensive cars queue up at the entrance, and uniformed staff bow politely to guests.

  "What the hell is this?" Xiaolang blurts out a curse.

  "A Sensitive is in danger... in this luxurious place? Did they choke on caviar or something?" Nanao chimes in.

  Xiaolang, who has exited my body and appeared in his gray spirit wolf form, sniffs the air with his keen nose. His ears twitch repeatedly, and his confusion is visible.

  "Strange," Xiaolang mutters. "I don't smell blood, nor do I smell fear or the evil aura of an Anomaly. Just the scent of expensive perfume and human money. Do you feel anything, Nanao?"

  Nanao, currently perched on a stone railing, flicks his calico tail in annoyance.

  "No. Clean as a whistle. It is as if nothing ever happened here."

  The cat god narrows his eyes, his tone full of skepticism.

  "Just as Itsuki-san said, those Takama-ga-hara guys always dump the gnarly bones on us. They probably gave up, so they passed this ticking time bomb over to the Jade Palace Conglomerate."

  "I don't think they are playing dirty," Xiaolang muses, his wolf eyes scanning the massive building. "Maybe they lost the victim's trace too. The biological signal is so weak that long-range scanners miss it, and up close, it gets drowned out by too many living people."

  "Standing here guessing won't help," I declare, my detective instincts kicking in. "Let's go inside, guys!"

  We choose the "traditional" infiltration method, entering from the balcony. We land on a third-floor balcony that leads into a long corridor carpeted in red.

  Once inside, Xiaolang slips out of my body again.

  "I'm coming out. Staying inside your body for too long is stuffy. Let's split up to search, it's faster."

  But search for what? The hallway is empty, with only rows of silent, closed doors. Every clue leading to the victim seems to have evaporated completely. We scoured our way from the third to the fifth floor, peeking into door cracks, and Nanao even presses his ear against the walls, but the result remains a big fat zero

  "Hopeless," Nanao sighs, leaning his back against the wall. "This hotel has over a thousand rooms. Are we going to search until New Year's Eve?"

  I stand with hands on my hips, my brain rummaging through my short but "quality" experiences in the spiritual world. Suddenly, the image of the secret door at Yuen Bettei Daita pops up.

  "Wait!" I snap my fingers. "Do you guys remember the Sensitive Hub in Setagaya? The door looked exactly like a normal door, but we had to scan it with the phone to see the path. Maybe there is a similar mechanism here? A secret passage for VIP guests... or for kidnapping victims?"

  Xiaolang's eyes light up. "Smart kid! That makes sense! Let's try it!"

  So, all three of us simultaneously pull out our spirit phones, open the Camera app, and begin the weirdest "treasure hunt" in history. We split up, each taking a corner of the hallway, pointing phones at everything, vases, wall paintings, door handles, even fire extinguishers.

  I tip-toe down the hallway, eyes glued to the phone screen, hoping for a divine Ding! notification to appear.

  "This ceramic vase looks suspicious..." I mumble, pressing the camera close to a massive vase at the corner. "Come on, reveal your true form..."

  "Hey, you there!"

  A booming voice erupts behind me, making me jump and almost throw the phone away. Luckily, it is a spirit object, so it stayed attached to my hand.

  I spin around. A burly security guard, baton in hand, stares at me with eyes like daggers.

  "What are you doing there? Wait... how did you get in here? I didn't see you check in!"

  The blood in my veins freezes solid.

  Oh crap.

  In the middle of playing detective, my two guardian gods... FORGOT TO CAST INVISIBILITY ON ME!

  "Uh... I... I..." I stammer, sweat pouring down like rain. "I'm... catching ghosts!"

  "What ghosts at this hour! You're a thief, aren't you? Stand right there!"

  The guard charges like a rhino. Survival instincts kick in, and I turn and run for my life.

  "SAVE ME, GUYS!!!" I scream, sprinting down the hallway, the guard's heavy boots thudding behind me. "Xiaolang! NANAO! WHERE ARE YOU HIDING?!"

  Just as the guard reaches out to grab my collar, a blast of cold wind hits me. The familiar sensation invades my body. Xiaolang has taken over!

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  "Tch, so troublesome," Xiaolang's voice echoes in my head, sounding annoyed. "Sorry, I got too caught up in searching and forgot you are just a mortal."

  My body slams the brakes, spinning 180 degrees to face the charging guard.

  "Sleep!" Xiaolang shouts.

  I see my right arm swing decisively. Not a magic spell, not a talisman.

  WHAM!

  A clean uppercut, precise and powerful, lands straight on the poor guard's chin. His eyes roll back, his body goes limp, and he collapses to the floor with a thud.

  Xiaolang exits my body, dusting off his hands with a proud look. "Done. Goodnight."

  Nanao strolls over from the other turn. Seeing the guard lying sprawled out and me rubbing my aching fist, the cat god puts a hand to his face, letting out a long, weary sigh.

  "Are you crazy, you wolf?" Nanao groans. "I thought you would use a lullaby or something more subtle! That kind of 'anesthesia' is no different from a street thug!"

  "Well, he fainted, didn't he?" Xiaolang shrugs, his wolf ears twitching innocently. "Results matter more than methods, man. Besides, I don't know how to sing lullabies."

  I stand between the two gods, looking down at my hand, then at the guard.

  "I... I just assaulted a security guard?" I whimper. "I can no longer be a good citizen..."

  After we manage to drag the poor (and surprisingly heavy) security guard and stuff him into a nook behind a giant potted plant, I clasp my hands together and apologize profusely, even though the unconscious man hears nothing. I hope he just thinks his blood pressure dropped.

  "Alright, let's do this properly this time," Nanao sighs, waving a paw. A silver light envelops me. I look down at my feet and see my body slowly become transparent, blending into the air. "There, you are invisible now. Try not to cause any more trouble."

  Meanwhile, Xiaolang vanishes and reappears in the blink of an eye, giving a confident thumbs up. "I've handled the security cameras. Wiped the last ten minutes clean. No one will know we were here."

  But even with the mortal problem solved, the lead on our victim remains a solid zero. We have already scoured the wedding hall, the kitchen, and even the gym, but this hotel is suspiciously "clean."

  Finally, Nanao gives up. He slumps onto the hallway carpet and pulls out his Solak phone.

  "Time to call for backup. I am out of ideas."

  A three dimensional screen materializes, connecting a video call to Itsuki-sama. When his face appears, all three of us jump.

  Itsuki sama looks... miserable. His usually immaculate white fox fur is a tangled mess, standing on end as if he has been electrocuted. There is a black smudge on his cheek, and his tie is askew.

  "Damn..." Itsuki-sama groans, his voice hoarse.

  "I just finished a war of words, and almost a physical one, with the enforcers from the Four Immortals Syndicate. Those guys are so stubborn, insisting our Security Team breached the agreement..."

  "Itsuki-san, we can talk about that later!" Nanao cuts off his superior's lament, his face a mask of misery. "We are stuck at the Keio Plaza. We cannot find the victim, no energy traces, nothing! It is like the person just evaporated from this world!"

  Itsuki-sama rubs his temples, trying to regain his composure.

  "Have you guys used any Spatial Disruption Laws? Subsonic scans? The God's Eye?"

  "We've used everything!" both Nanao and Xiaolang shout in unison. "We have scanned this hotel to pieces and still found nothing!"

  Itsuki-sama strokes his chin, his violet eyes narrowing in thought.

  "Strange... If you have used specialized Arts and still see nothing, there is only one possibility. The perpetrator is extremely skilled. They are not using their power to hide, but using a Law to reinforce a low level human or Anomaly's magic."

  "Get moving," he commands. "Take the phone on a tour and show me the structure of this place."

  And so, I once again become the unwilling cameraman, holding the phone while chasing after two gods, climbing up and down dozens of floors in five minutes. Itsuki-sama stares intently at the screen, analyzing every nook and cranny, but the result is still a weary shake of his head.

  We stop to catch our breath in the 10th floor lobby. I lean against the wall, staring at the bank of elevators that are constantly in motion.

  "Hey guys..." I ask impulsively. "Why don't we check the elevators? We have been running up stairs and climbing balconies this whole time."

  Xiaolang is about to dismiss the idea. "What is there to check in an eleva..."

  But on the screen, Itsuki-sama's eyes suddenly widen. He slams his paw down on his desk with a thud.

  "THAT'S IT! THE ELEVATORS!"

  His shout makes the three of us jump.

  "Of course! Why didn't I think of it sooner!" Itsuki-sama exclaims, his face lit up like he has just solved a complex equation. "It is the Elevator Game! The diety behind this is using that urban legend!"

  The three of us rush over to the elevator area. I point the camera at the control panel. There is nothing unusual, just a normal hotel elevator.

  "Seeing nothing is the right sign," Itsuki-sama's voice rings out, full of excitement. "The perpetrator has used a small amount of Divine Power to 'grease' the rules of this urban legend, turning it into a perfect spatial trap. It doesn't emit any evil aura because it fundamentally operates on the rules of the human world, but it is reinforced so it cannot be broken from the outside."

  "To get into the space where the victim is trapped, you cannot use brute force to break the door. The only way... is to play the game."

  Xiaolang scratches his head, his wolf ears drooping in confusion. "The Elevator Game? What is that? Do we just go up and down until we get dizzy?"

  I take a deep breath and step forward. This is it, the moment for the knowledge of a horror story and creepypasta "expert" to shine.

  "Let me explain," I say, my voice filled with gravity. "The Elevator Game, also known as the 'Elevator to Another World,' is an extremely famous ritual in the world of urban legends."

  I point to the button panel.

  "To perform it, the player must enter the elevator of a building with at least 10 floors, alone. And they must press the floors in this exact sequence, with absolutely no mistakes."

  "First, go to the 4th floor."

  "Then, down to the 2nd."

  "Continue up to the 6th."

  "Back down to the 2nd."

  "Then up to the 10th."

  "And finally, down to the 5th."

  I swallow hard, a chill running down my spine as I mention the next part.

  "When you reach the 5th floor, the elevator doors will open. At this point, a woman might step in. But the absolute rule for survival is: Do not look at her, do not speak to her. She is not human."

  "After she gets in, or if no one does, you must press the button for the 1st floor. If the elevator goes down to the 1st floor, the ritual has failed, and you must run. But if... the elevator does not go down, but instead goes up to the 10th floor..."

  I look directly into the eyes of Xiaolang and Nanao.

  "...then congratulations, you have left this world. When the doors open on the 10th floor, what you see will no longer be the hotel hallway."