I, the screenwriter, have experienced a resurgence of inspiration.

……

……

At four o'clock in the morning, it was time for the second night patrol.

[Daily Quest Triggered: Second Night Patrol]

[Task Requirements: Before 4:44 AM, offer incense in front of the doors of all 52 tenant households in the building.]

[Time Limit: 44 minutes]

[Mission failure penalty: Increased activity level within the building, increased aggression of the ferocious creature.]

……

—From a mysterious perspective, the two teams split into three groups, resembling Lego figures wandering through a dollhouse.

In the corridor, the marks on the walls that looked like paint during the day now looked like human faces.

As planned, Amin led a four-person team to the first floor to ask Uncle Biao for incense and paper money.

The remaining seven people stood at the entrance of the building, waiting for the mixed-race person's instructions.

The stairwell is very narrow, not even wide enough for two people to walk side by side.

The American soldiers walked at the front, trying to see as much as possible even the blind spots at the corners of the stairs.

The group protected the mixed-race child in the center, with the active-duty Navy SEAL bringing up the rear, and headed upstairs.

Since the group had no clear objective, they could only record the anomalies layer by layer.

The mixed-race person deliberately lowered their breathing.

But in the narrow stairwell, her teammate's breathing bounced off the walls, sounding as if someone was deliberately breathing against her back.

No one spoke; only the sound of footsteps echoed in the stairwell.

The footsteps of the seven people blended together, making it impossible to tell who was who.

……

The mixed-race man held a simple map in his hand—it was drawn by a mercenary after entering the instance, based on his memory and internal information from the Lu Clan.

The map also includes a simple cross-sectional view of the building and a label for each floor.

The floors above the seventeenth floor were marked with a large question mark and an exclamation mark.

"...Do you think there might be something wrong with the intelligence provided by China?"

The mixed-race man glanced at the map twice, then put it away, his tone calm and collected:

"Is our target really in this building?"

The priest didn't speak, but a member of the assault team with short, sand-gold hair added in a low voice:

"It's not clear yet, but we can confirm that Chen Xi's team's mission does not conflict with our mission objectives."

The American soldier at the front of the line spoke with a hint of disdain:

"But she only told us four taboos. Why didn't she tell us all of them?"

His English had a very obvious Scandinavian accent:

"We signed a bunch of unequal mission agreements to be allowed in, and if she also needs us alive to help her complete her mission—"

Trust is far more valuable than intelligence.

The mixed-race person spoke softly: "In her eyes, we are no different from the monsters in the dungeon."

She has already shared four taboos with us; if it were me, I probably wouldn't give her a single one for free.

The Chinese people possess a peculiar spirit of a great power; even their soldiers have a natural inclination to protect others.

The priest was silent for a few seconds, then looked at the mixed-race child beside him:

"The Chinese side refused to provide us with specific information about Chen Xi's team. At present, all we know is that one of their teammates was captured by the Black and White Impermanence."

"at this point……"

The mixed-race man suddenly stopped in his tracks—the mercenary at the front of the group stopped, his face quite grim:

"Hey, hasn't anyone noticed how ridiculously long this staircase is?"

……

……

Next to the notice board with its upside-down lettering, there was a densely packed collection of printed "GG"s.

The Cantonese text above has turned yellow.

The talisman paper faded and became brittle, and the cinnabar on it oxidized to resemble old bloodstains.

The seven-person team stood on the stairs between the eighteenth and nineteenth floors, realizing they had encountered a "ghost wall".

"Is it a maze or a misalignment? We've been stuck in the same place."

The American soldier raised his hand, didn't turn around, and said in a low voice, "There are footsteps."

Others heard it too.

The seven people's footsteps overlapped, and each of their boots had soft soles, so their footsteps made almost no sound.

Now, there was an extra footstep.

It sounded like someone was following them barefoot—you could almost picture it just from the sound:

The entire sole of the foot is flat on the step, and then lifted off flat, making a "pat-pat" sound.

The priest's prayer rope stopped on his wrist.

He looked at the mixed-race man and shook his head, while the latter turned his head to bring his ear closer to the wall of the stairwell.

Cement walls can transmit vibrations. If something is moving on the floor above or below, the wall will transmit the vibration waves before the air.

But when they stopped, the sound disappeared.

"Jefferson, watch out for the last one."

The soldier in charge gestured for everyone to retreat to the corner of the stairs. The seven of them squeezed onto the narrow corner platform, shoulder to shoulder and back to back.

He made a gesture—flipping his palm twice and then making a fist—meaning to adjust the formation, switch to a single file, and pass the next corner one by one.

Several people protected the mixed-race child, and one by one they stepped onto the stairwell platform.

The first one, then the second one, then the third and the fourth one.

But with each step they took, an unknown eighth footstep echoed in unison.

The mixed-race person held their breath as they walked by.

The sound came from right beside her right foot, so close it felt like someone was walking alongside her.

She looked down sharply—there was nothing but her own shadow at her feet.

"That thing isn't behind us."

The commando's voice came from behind her. She leaned against the corridor wall, her expression grave: "Not in front, not up there, it's—"

She didn't finish speaking because everyone caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of their eyes:

The stairwell light flickered suddenly, and in the instant the light went out, the persistence of vision caused everyone's retina to retain a single frame of the image:

Seven people, eight shadows cast on the wall.

The eighth shadow was much taller than the shadow of an ordinary person, as thin as a stretched noodle, with its head almost touching the ceiling, hanging down in a bent position, like an overstretched rubber band shrinking back.

The posture is a person bending over, bending over to look at something on the floor—that is, the top of their head.

That thing was above their heads.

He was looking down at them.

……

……

The mixed-race woman's teeth chattered slightly, but she didn't cry out; she simply continued giving orders:

"Thomas, keep going upstairs, don't stop."

The mixed-race woman could feel every inch of the skin on the back of her neck tingling; a primal sense of alertness overwhelmed her.

—A bioelectrical response caused by the contraction of subcutaneous capillaries when prey senses the gaze of a predator.

"It's watching us. Don't look directly at it, don't scream, don't make any of the reactions a predator would make to a predator..."

Before the words were finished, a strange noise came from the stairwell around the corner.

First came the muffled sound of the cervical joint capsule rupturing, then something wet and heavy brushed against the wall and slowly slid down, and finally, the dull thud of someone falling to the ground.

Their gazes shifted to the corner in that instant, only to see a slender white shadow recede from the ceiling.

Player "Jefferson Pritchett" has died.

A familiar name appeared in their field of vision as a system notification. Everyone was startled and turned around, only to see the feet of a corpse quickly disappear into the wall.

"Jefferson!"

The American soldier stared wide-eyed, not understanding what was happening. But just as everyone's attention shifted, another sound of bones breaking rang out from the ranks!

"Hehehehe..."

The mercenary, who had just been alive, now had his head embedded in the ceiling, as if it were a natural decoration.

"Thomas?!"

The American soldier, who had just been grieving, was now like an onion that had been plunged headfirst into the ground, his limbs going limp as he swayed in the air.

Blood dripped down, and the mixed-race child felt nauseous, but quickly took over the command position and shouted:

"Everyone, calm down!"

"Five people, from five directions, quickly surround me!"

The five surviving people instantly huddled together back to back, their five pairs of eyes simultaneously facing five different directions, covering a 360-degree field of vision with no blind spots.

But everyone knows that there are bound to be blind spots.

Human vision has blind spots—the clear field of vision directly in front of the eye is only ten degrees.

The area below the nose is a blind spot, the back of the head is a blind spot, and the area covered by the shoulders is a blind spot.

Five people standing back to back can cover all directions, but there will always be a small diamond-shaped gap in the middle:

That is the area where everyone's gaze intersects, and also the blind spot for everyone's gaze.

And now, that thing is in that area.