443 What to Enter on the Input Fields
With everyone in the group putting their heads together, the code was cracked quickly.
The string of numbers was formed with the numbers 0, 1, and 2. What's more, 0 did not appear more than once at a time. One could see it as a separator. Naturally, people thought of the Morse code.
Taking the 0's as the separators, the 1's as dots, and the 2's as dashes, one would be able to form a Morse code.
—.-..-…-…..-..-.-…—..-.-..-.-…..-.-…..-…-.-.-…
This could be converted to a string of English alphabets.
GDBBEAICEADCECHCHBCB.
This could be converted to numbers, in the same way as the string of alphabets in The Lonely Desert Road.
74225193514353838232.
Compare those numbers to the keypad on a cell phone.
SBJYJILVUE.
Its double pinyin was 'soujingjilvshe'.
It didn't take long for the gamers in the group to reach this stage because they had already gotten the right answer for the previous code. Moreover, the Morse code used for this string of alphabets was a common method of encryption. Thus, it had not been difficult.
Qiao Liang's heart raced. It was very exciting to work on the riddle together with so many other people who were in the same situation as he was.
"There are only two additional steps for the second code. The other encryption methods did not change. You still have to convert the alphabets to numbers, use the cell phone keypad, and then derive the double pinyin.
"Why didn't he try to use more encryption methods?
"Is it because Boss Pei has limited knowledge and he only knows about those few encryption methods? Or is it because he was lazy?
"Oh… no, no, no… it seems overboard to think that way.
"Boss Pei must have shown everyone mercy by reducing the difficulty of this code, given that it was hard enough to obtain the code from Game Designer, right?
"Was this a form of grace towards gamers as they tried hard to crack the code?
"Yes! It must be!"
Qiao Liang did not overthink. He quickly opened TPDb and located the search bar.
Putting the two codes together, he got 'pingfendewangzhan, soujinjilvshe'.
Thus, Qiao Liang typed 'jingjilvshe' in TPDb's search bar, and then hit 'enter'.
There were no results.
He typed 'jyjilvue' and still got no results.
"It looks like… I have to type the Mandarin characters."
After some thought, Qiao Liang realized that the double pinyin could have been pointing to different Mandarin characters. Each one of them had the same double pinyin.
Of course, Qiao Liang could have tried all the possibilities, but that would have been stupid.
At that moment, Qiao Liang recalled the poster that he had seen earlier.
There was a special, red logo behind the bloody handprint. It was an obtuse, triangular steeple with the words 'Thriller Hostel' at the bottom!
'Thriller's double pinyin was 'xinji'. That made the name of this hotel clear; its double pinyin would be jingjilvshe!
'Thriller' implied 'being frightened without cause or reason' or 'a heart suddenly racing'. In other words, the fear might not come from jumpscares or a horrifying atmosphere. Instead, it would arise out of an unknown ominous feeling invoked by an ordinary-looking environment!
Qiao Liang was elated. He was a few steps away from cracking this code!
He quickly entered the Mandarin words for Thriller Hostel into the search bar. Indeed, the webpage changed at once!
All of the information that had been on TPDb's website disappeared. Black circles appeared one by one… until the entire website was dyed black.
After that, two input fields appeared in the center of the screen, at eye-level.
There were no hints around the input fields—just two empty rectangles.
Qiao Liang typed both answers to the codes into the fields and then clicked 'enter'. However, there was no reaction.
After some thought, he typed his Tengda account username and password and clicked 'enter' again.
Still no reaction!
Qiao Liang, "…"
He tried many other things such as the two earliest series of alphabets, the two double pinyin, the Mandarin words, and the like. Yet, nothing happened.
Thinking that he should not have clicked 'enter', he tried the spacebar, CTRL, Tab, Shift, and other keys… but to no avail!
He typed his account's username and password in reverse, but that didn't work either!
After half an hour of trying, Qiao Liang felt lightheaded.
He had tried so many combinations, but the two input fields remained on the website. No matter how hard he tried, he could not get past them!
Qiao Liang calmed down and read through his fan's chat group. Indeed, no one else could find the right answers as well. Everyone was stuck at the two input fields.
Nobody knew what to type there!
Qiao Liang stopped trying and pondered hard instead.
Obviously, until now, everyone was on the right track.
However, they were stuck at this point because they were still missing some critical information. As for what exactly they should enter, no one had any clear direction.
Qiao Liang frowned, thinking about all of the possibilities.
"Are there more clues hidden in other games? Are there clear instructions for what we should type into the input fields?
"Or am I missing something?
"Until now, not a single gamer has passed this step. Obviously, this is another puzzle for everyone to solve…"
…
At that moment, Pei Qian sat in his office, reading forums about how far the gamers had gone in solving the riddle.
"…What the f*ck? They've found the clue in Game Designer so quickly?"
It was a huge blow for him.
He had thought that he had hidden the clue in Game Designer well enough. He had thought it would take a long time for the gamers to find it.
That was because there were many endings in Game Designer. Few people ended up losing everything. Most would only have to make a few right choices to avoid it altogether.
Coincidentally, that was the ending that Pei Qian liked and looked forward to the most. That was why he hid the second series of codes in the corner of the second last scene of that ending.
Yet, not long after the first series of codes had been solved, the second had been found and cracked at the speed of light!
Of course, that was mainly because Pei Qian had not used other encryption methods. There was only one additional step that was relatively simpler to solve—the Morse code.
Gamers who cracked the first code would just have to apply what they had learned to the second code.
Pei Qian had wanted to make it more complicated at first, but time had been too tight and Pei Qian had not had enough knowledge. Since he refused to ask for help, he had decided to slack off, in the hopes that people would not find the second series of codes so quickly.
However, he had ended up slapping himself in the face. The gamers were too crazy!
On the bright side, there was still one-third of the riddle left. That was the last line of defense.
"It has to hang on!"
Pei Qian glanced at the calendar. There were still three weeks to settlement. It would be impossible to stop all gamers from buying Be Quiet, but as long as the riddle could prevent some gamers from purchasing the game before settlement, Pei Qian's work would not be wasted!
After that, Pei Qian went online to see what the public had to say about Otto E1.
Two days had passed since the news conference. The first batch of reviewers' videos and reports had been published, and the news conference's popularity hit its peak yesterday.
The long script that Chang You had recited had become a hot topic of discussion. Many netizens were challenging themselves to recite the same script, and a good number had also recorded themselves and uploaded their videos on Aili Island. They had many views.
The original video of the news conference had also been uploaded on Aili Island. Now, it was already among the top three videos in the digital channel and had also risen through the homepage.
Ordinarily, news conferences by tech brands would not make it to the top of the charts.
That was because the content of other brands' news conferences normally had low information density, regardless of whether they were releasing computers, cell phones, or other digital products. Most of what was said in the news conference was part of marketing and could be summarized in just a couple of sentences.
What's more, huge manufacturers would livestream their news conferences. Those who were interested would already have watched it live and would not need to watch the video again.
Thus, videos of news conferences normally had very few views.
On the other hand, diss-type videos that could summarize the content in news conferences in three to five minutes were more popular.
Yet, the situation was entirely different for Otto Technologies' news conference.
Firstly, the news conference had been very brief. Everything had been condensed into an hour. What's more, it was funny and entertaining and had high-information density.
On top of that, many people online had not even paid attention to the news conference. They had only found out about it after Chang You's recitation became a hot search. Then, they watched the video to find out what the fuss was all about.
Thus, the news conference's video gained many views. The problems of low interest during the livestream and low visibility online had been solved!
Additionally, none of the huge manufacturers had held news conferences lately. UP Masters in the digital products channel could create videos reviewing Otto E1. Thus, the cell phone became the center of attention of a lot of lovers of digital products!
Pei Qian carefully watched all the reviews of Otto E1. He had mixed feelings about it.
The downside was that the reviewers had said a lot of good things about the cell phone!
While recommending the cell phone, many reviewers explained its merits in full detail. They said that the cell phone had 'solid hardware' and then went on to explain all the advantages mentioned.
Those were probably withdrawal symptoms of Tengda providing them with food, lodging, and gifts during the news conference.
The upside was that the cell phone's popularity was inducing effects of reverse psychology on netizens!
Although reviewers had good things to say about the cell phone, its bad points had also surfaced: it was expensive, heavy, and difficult to snatch!
Its price and weight went without saying. The cell phone was undoubtedly worthy of being called 'a 250-gram machine'. At the same time, it was being referred to as a 'cell phone for the rich' and a 'product with an IQ tax'. Although it was a misunderstanding, it still confused some bystanders.
However, Chang You had already fully and comprehensively explained both of those problems during the news conference. Thus, the dissing taking place online was insignificant now.
Neither of those points caused much of a reaction. Instead, it led to Otto E1 being labeled as a 'very <anno data-annotation-id="5288b15a-569c-46ec-99f1-449158c51506">valuable</anno> product'.
The most important flaw was that it was hard to snatch. Many netizens took this as a sign that the sales event had an ulterior motive!
<annotations style="display: none;"><ol class="tinymce-annotation-container"><li data-annotation-id="5288b15a-569c-46ec-99f1-449158c51506">The word 'valuable' combines the words 'expensive' and 'heavy' in Mandarin.</li></ol></annotations>",
