#spirealm

[mihaser]

I really want to watch spirealm but i know i will be shot 57 times

[palehorsemen]

[danmeidiaries]

Ranking ‘The Spirealm’ Doors from Probably Survive to You're Fucked

The Spirealm offered us a variety of fiendish puzzles behind each of the doors that our characters visited so I decided to rank them from Probably Survive to You’re Fucked.

Now, bear in mind, these are all my personal opinions and maybe you disagree and I'm happy to have some friendly discussion down in the comments or reblogs. This isn’t a discussion about how much I liked each door, but rather how likely I think you would be to die inside it.

So with that being said, let's start with what I consider to be the safest and end with the one I think will absolutely kill you.

Oh, and it goes without saying, massive spoilers!

10. Sako

Sako is the Level 4 door that Lanjiu, Li Dongyuan and Zhuang Rujiao complete featuring a high school mystery. Sako is a one legged ghost and if you sing her song, she'll kill you by ripping your leg off and letting you bleed to death.

Despite being a Level 4 door, I think Sako is actually the easiest to survive and pass. As long as you don't sing Sako's song, she can't actually do anything to harm you. Yes, she can psychologically fuck with you by mimicking voices to try and trick you and bombarding you with her classmate puppets to try and force you to sing the song, but if you resist like Ling Jiushi did then you're in the clear.

If you do resist Sako's song and treat her kindly, she pretty much gifts you the answer to her game by revealing the audio of her two classmates fleeing from the scene of her death. If you hadn't already met them, it then wouldn't be hard to track down the names and get information from them afterwards.

There also isn't much opportunity for malicious players to sabotage you as there are in other levels. They can't exactly force you to sing the song.

Sako is therefore a door you can survive and escape from fairly easily.

9. Human Skin Drum

Human Skin Drum is Cheng Qianli's Level 5 door that he is accompanied on by Ling Jiushi and Ruan Lanzhu.

In it, there are two ghosts to contend with. The first, Xu Jin, will pose as a newbie player and blend in with the group by picking a male player to be her A-Hui (a boy she is in love with). The other is the older sister, dressed as a bride and stuck on the roof. Players have to avoid looking at the ceiling of the main building and making loud noises in the watchtower.

Unlike other games in Spirealm, this game doesn't have a time limit. It's only AFTER you give Xu Jin the bone powder and expose her true form that a time limit kicks it. So, you have an awful lot of time to solve the puzzle without needing to worry about an imminent disaster that will kill everyone.

The taboo conditions aren’t ones that malicious players can use against you very easily. The hard part would be realising who you need to use the bone powder on as most players will be initially disgusted by the idea.

However, Xu Jin acts very suspiciously and the Guide NPC completely blanks her existence and won't count her as a player. Once you've solved the story of the sisters, you bring Xu Jin to the older sister and can get the key.

With no time limit, this game gives players plenty of time to find the clues about the two sisters and solve the puzzle. Once Xu Jin is revealed, it doesn't take much to defeat her and bring her to her older sister.

8. River God

This is the Level 3 door that Ling Jiushi completed 'alone' (with Li Dongyuan).

The premise is that during the River God festival, the villagers throw 28 children into the river as sacrifices to the river god. At night, you must sleep with the human oil candle lit or be killed by Madam Yu and her piglets.

The actual mystery of this door is very easy to solve. Players are usually somewhat experienced by the time they get to Level 3 or might be players repeating levels for practice. Once you've worked out that Madame Yu lost a son (from the Family shrine and speaking to the Keeper) you will meet the beggar boy who was kidnapped at a young age.

Experienced players should probably work out the connection fairly quickly especially after realising the babies are actually piglets. The difficulty comes from keeping the candle lit since either the wind or sabotaging players can destroy it.

But if you keep your candle on you and (if you're in a team) take turns watching the candle, you have a high chance to survive.

The actual difficulty of this level in the show came from the sabotaging of other players.

7. Snow Village

A Level 1 door that Ling Jiushi encounters first when he enters Spirealm.

Of the games, this game has the highest kill count % of any of them which is likely due to new and inexperienced players falling for traps. But unless you were one of the unlucky first few, it’s fairly easy to work out that the landlady is lying about the taboos.

Plenty of players in this level were willing to tell rookies the rules about taboos and once you've worked out that the landlady is lying, you can put the pieces together to solve the puzzle. There also isn't really a time limit on this level either. The only one that appears is that the carpenter will take 3 days to build the coffin with the key no matter what.

I think this level is more difficult than the other 3 because most of the people playing it will be new to the game and have a high risk of falling for other players' schemes or blindly believing the landlady. Not everyone will be as lucky as Ling Jiushi in meeting a Ruan Lanzhu who can safely guide them.

6. Waverley Sanatorium

Tan Zaozao's Level 4 door.

In an American Sanatorium, players must find the exit of the hospital without being killed by the ghosts.

The taboo conditions of this game are fairly straightforward;

don't be in room 502 at night

don't eat outside food

don't touch the switch

However, this game gives scheming players a much higher chance of meddling with you. Players with ill intent can easily move the 502 door sign to get you killed by the nurse and, if they brought in outside food, can spike your meals.

The Director ghost can then wear the skin of dead players to further trick you as the game goes on.

Finding the underground passage will also be difficult and if some idiot or the Director pulls the switch, the hospital is immediatley flooded with gas and kills everyone. It's unclear what the jumping things do to people, but if they're dangerous, you need the crying doll to freeze them and sneak past.

All in all, a tricky level.

5. Sunny Dolls

The level Ruan Lanzhu and Ling Jiushi go into with the White Deer.

Unlike others, this is a game that NEEDS players to die for there to be any progress. There is only one umbrella and players won't know where it is until they see the old man with it at night after a player is killed and turned into a Sunny Doll.

Without an umbrella or a Sunny Doll, there's no way to get to the school and find the door.

If no-one can find the umbrella, or it breaks, then desperate players might resort to shoving others into the rain in order to create more sunny dolls.

You could also get trapped in the rain accidentally if you don't make it back to the house in time since other than the house and the school there's nowhere to shelter.

You’re very likely to be murdered by other players in this game and without the umbrella, it’s impossible to get the key.

4. Lady in the Rain

Tan Zaozao's Level 5 door.

Solving the mystery of this door is a little trickier than the others. There is also the picture frame which players might use to try and get you killed by Wu.

The reason I think that this level is so difficult compared to others, is that it seems you need to enter the painted realm to get the key and there's only two ways of doing that:

Have a cheat code like Ke who can bring you into the realm

Be pulled in by Wu, escape from her, and get the key.

There didn't seem to be any other choice in the matter and without Ke, you would very likely be killed in any attempt to get the key.

3. Fitcher's Bird

Ling Jiushi and Tan Zaozao's Level 2 door.

Canonically it’s the most difficult low level game since no one survived it. Though I think the mystery can be solved, having to protect eggs is very tricky. It also has one of the shortest time limits - 3 days and then the fog poisons you - to pass you have to beat the serial killer in 2010 - who could kill you - and the 7th floor actively ages you which would probably cause players to avoid crossing the timelines.

Without Ling Jiushi’s hearing, you might not even realise there are people on the fourth or first floor to interact with and that means you’d be left searching every room on every floor.

No wonder so many people died.

2. Door 11: Virtual Reality

The final door. Technically, I wasn’t sure whether to count it as a game or not but I decided to in the end.

Theoretically, this door can only be solved by Ling Jiushi so escaping is really hard. But you’re not totally screwed in this door and even if you’re stuck in it for ages, you might not be killed.

Unless you got Gao Dawei's clue about the moon or realise that it’s connected to Ling Jiushi, there is no way to get out of this door. Any player who died in the game becomes an NPC and will either help you or try to murder you depending on how much they liked or resented you in the game.

This is a pain to deal with, but if you had friends in the game, they can protect you from the others. Especially if you treated the previous Door Ghosts kindly then they will become your powerful allies.

Finding the key is tricky, but there’s no time limit and if you realise the door is for Ling Jiushi, you can find his house and find the backwards clock - which is a pretty obvious hint that you should look at it closely even if you don’t know the reflected moon hint.

But if you are Ling Jiushi, this level should be extremely easy. The game dropped him off in his apartment right opposite the key.

What will likely kill you is the double doors. It gives you a 50/50 chance of making it out. You need another player to open the other door and you have to choose which one to go out of and one of them will kill you.

BUT, since Gao Dawei only wanted Ling Jiushi and Ruan Lanzhu to get to this level, I think the preceeding one is more difficult and designed to get rid of anyone else before they can get there.

1. Box Demon

The Level 10 door.

You’re so fucked it’s not even funny.

Based on a board game of the same name, this Level will absolutely murder you. You need a group of people you can trust, cannon fodder and an insane degree of luck in order to survive the door.

You have to open boxes to find the key and items, but if you find the hair you'll be killed. If you find all the Box Demon body parts, you'll all be killed. If you find a body part, the Box Demon can activate an ability.

Killed players will become Box Slaves who can also kill you.

Not only do you have to hope that you don't open a bad box, you have to hope that the other players don't open the boxes containing all the body parts.

If you decide not to risk it with box opening, the game won't allow you to eat and you will starve to death.

Oh, and then there's the informants. 1-2 players who are actively helping the Box Demon and trying to screw everyone over by hiding key items, the exit, and tricking you into opening dangerous boxes.

The torso ability could also wipe out a massive amount of players. In the show's case, Ruan Lanzhu knew he was the target of the Box Demon and sent everyone away from him. But if he hadn't, when midnight hit, the Box Demon could have killed a huge group if they’d stuck together.

Essentially, to survive this, you need to be like Yan Balang's team and have an informant with you who won't betray you to the Box Demon.

Even finding items that can kill the Box Demon like the red comb can get you killed if the Eye is found afterwards. And if the player holding the key is killed the key is gone and it’s unclear whether it’s gone forever or if you’ll have to find a new password and open the safe again.

Oh, and there’s a finite number of boxes so your chances of being killed by a Box Slave or the hair go up every day and if the informants hide the door or the password from you, they’ll eventually open all of them and free the box demon.

Unless you have Yixie’s sense of smell or Jiushi’s hearing there’s no way to know what’s in a box unless you can find an item.

Pretty sure this game was specifically designed to kill as many people as possible to stop people from entering Door 11. Even experienced players would struggle against informants and the luck based element.

So that’s my ranking! Do you agree or disagree? Reminder, this isn’t a ranking of how much I liked each door or which one is the best, just a ranking of how likely I think it is that you would die.

[pursuecrazylife]

This scene lives rent free in my head. The juxtaposition of Lingling being absolutely adorable, living his best life

Meanwhile, Ruan Nanzhu: 40k slow burn, brooding, major pining hours, starcrossed lovers, doomed by the narrative

Meanwhile, my brain short-circuited during this scene. I was convinced they would kiss, a scene transcending Chinese censorship

[sombredancer]

The Spirealm appreciation Frames as pictures:

[thesinglelogbridge]

Can I offer you some spirealm memes in this trying time? Part one here

[howlingmoonrise]

nameless - the spirealm/kaleidoscope of death

FINALLY IT'S DONE!!!! short-term amnesia au nanqiu for @sunriseverse as a VERY very belated birthday gift, i hope you forgive the lateness of it through the sheer length of this monster 🙏

based on this post

--

This Ruan Nanzhu is too pretty?, says a note in this handwriting, maybe also an actor like Tan Zaozao? Very intense, says another one. Won't stop staring at me. Kinda looks like he wants to eat us. And yet another comment, on an arrow pointing above: do we owe him money? We don't work at the company anymore and we're living in his house. Are we his sugar something? Another: dude we're not even into guys. We're recognizing him by the description of 'the most handsome man in the world', don't you think that says something about us? A few more arrows point up towards that one. Doubt, says one. Another says, somewhat confirmed by Cheng Qianli, followed by another going we're trusting the kid that keeps talking about some dog's butt? And then, Li Dongyuan kinda confirmed it also, but I couldn't ask directly, and once again underlined, we are NOT gay. The one after that just says: but wouldn't you put out for that guy anyway, if he asked nicely?

-- Or: Lin Qiushi's amnesia struggles.

Read on AO3

[candidsoup]

I could go back and take a proper screenshot but it's funnier this way