A bizarre and terrifying experience; I messed up the dungeon world.

[Background: This shopping mall was built on abandoned cable car tracks. The cable car company's shoddy construction led to a serious accident, and to cover it up, they poured concrete on the site, built the mall, and buried all the victims underground.]

Mission Objective: Investigate the entire truth behind the cable car accident within 24 hours.

[Instance Rules: Every two hours, the mall will release a victim who will then launch a relentless pursuit. While evading the pursuers, search for clues.]

"What a joke!" The middle-aged man loosened his tie, pointed at the ceiling, and cursed, "I make hundreds of thousands a minute, who has time to play these kinds of pranks! Where's the exit?"

He glanced around, his eyes landing on the tightly closed roller shutter door in the distance, and strode over. The boxer snorted and followed, clearly disdainful of this so-called "copy."

Zhou Lang ignored the group of newcomers. He walked straight to the mall's floor plan and wiped the dust off with his sleeve.

"B1 is a supermarket and restaurants, and B2 is an underground parking lot." Han Yingying leaned closer to him, her eyes scanning the blueprints. "If the mall is built on the cable car tracks, then the tracks and debris are most likely below B2."

"Smart." Zhou Lang took out an oil lamp from his inventory and hung it on his belt. "Let's find the entrance to B2 first. The layout of this place has been altered, and there are no downward stairs marked on the map."

Zhao Qiang clung tightly to Zhou Lang, warily scanning the dark corners around them: "Brother Lang, if we release one ghost every two hours, are there enough of us eight people to go?"

"If we don't have enough, we'll use you to make up the numbers," Zhou Lang casually retorted, then turned and walked deeper into B1. The doctor pushed up his glasses, glanced at the middle-aged man and the boxer still wasting their energy in front of the roller shutter, and decisively chose to follow Zhou Lang's trio. Seeing this, the female teacher also pulled the little girl along, following closely behind.

The space on the B1 level of the mall is surprisingly large. Abandoned shelves, like the walls of a maze, fragment the view.

Zhou Lang walked in front, his steps very light. The doctor followed behind Han Yingying, tentatively striking up a conversation: "Friends, judging from your reactions, this isn't the first time you've encountered something like this, is it? My name is Dr. Lin, a surgeon. I can provide medical assistance in emergencies."

"Just mind your own business." Zhou Lang didn't even turn his head. He never had much patience for people he didn't know well.

The female teacher held the little girl's hand, walking unsteadily. One of the button eyes on the teddy bear in the little girl's arms had fallen off; the remaining eye stared intently at Zhao Qiang, who was walking ahead, sending chills down Zhao Qiang's spine.

"Brother Lang, this little girl is a bit strange." Zhao Qiang whispered in Zhou Lang's ear.

"Mind your own business. Look for clues." Zhou Lang stopped in front of a row of collapsed freezers. A layer of dark red, viscous substance had accumulated in the drain at the bottom of the freezers, emitting a nauseating rusty smell.

Han Yingying squatted down and used a wooden stick to pry aside a pile of waste paper next to the freezer. It was an old newspaper from ten years ago, with the headline in bold black font: "AEON Department Store Grand Opening Today, Turning Wasteland into Treasure Land, Creating a New City Landmark."

"From wasteland to treasure." Han Yingying pointed to this line of text. "The article mentioned that this piece of land had been abandoned for a long time due to geological problems, and was later bought by developers at a low price. The geological problems were probably the mess left behind by the cable car accident."

"Click".

A muffled mechanical clicking sound suddenly came from deep inside the mall.

Zhou Lang raised his wrist and glanced at his digital watch. The countdown had just reached 22:00 PM. Two hours had passed.

The fluorescent lights overhead went out in unison. The instant darkness fell, the oil lamp at their waist automatically lit up with a green flame.

The floor tiles beneath our feet began to tremble violently. Accompanied by a piercing metallic scraping sound, the floor in the center of the supermarket suddenly cracked open, and a cable car track covered in rust rose abruptly from the ground, breaking through the shelves and ceiling.

"Clang—Clang—"

The old cable car's arrival bell echoed through the empty shopping mall. A cable car, its carriage severely deformed and its windows shattered, glided slowly along the tracks and finally stopped less than ten meters away from them.

The car doors slid open to the sides with a creak.

A figure dressed in tattered overalls stepped out of the carriage. Half of its head was sunken, brain matter and blood smeared on its face, and its eyeballs dangled from their sockets. The eerie pressure of the Class A aura caused the surrounding air temperature to plummet, and its exhaled breath turned into white mist.

"Ah—!" The female teacher screamed, her legs went weak, and she collapsed to the ground.

The creature twisted its broken head eerily, its single eye locking onto the female teacher who had spoken. Its legs bent, like a giant toad, and it leaped across seven or eight meters, lunging at the teacher.

Dr. Lin backed away repeatedly, showing no intention of helping. Zhao Qiang was so frightened that he closed his eyes.

Zhou Lang moved. Instead of retreating, he charged towards the strange creature. The bandages on his arms instantly came undone, like several thick, giant pythons that arrived first and tightly wrapped around the strange creature's body in mid-air.

"If you're that ugly, you shouldn't be out shopping." Zhou Lang picked up the chainsaw with one hand, started the engine, and slammed the saw teeth directly into the grotesque's rotten face, sparks mixed with black blood splattering everywhere.

The eerie creature let out a piercing scream and struggled desperately. The A-level eerie creature possessed immense strength, stretching the bandages taut and making a tearing sound as it could not bear the strain.

[Ding! Player 'Langligelang' has been detected to have strangely startled an A-level passenger.]

[Rewards: Strength +5. Clue Fragment: Bloodstained Inspection Report.]

The startle assessment took effect, and the strange creature momentarily froze. But its A-level ferocity was fully unleashed. It suddenly tore off the bandages wrapped around its body, using the recoil to twist its body in mid-air, avoiding the chainsaw's direct cut, and its sharp claws stabbed directly at the female teacher beside it.

Zhou Lang twitched the corner of his mouth, making no further attempt to salvage the situation. His purpose in intervening was merely to rack up the scare reward; rescuing people was not within his scope of duty.

The sound of bones breaking was crisp and piercing. A bizarre arm pierced through the female teacher's chest, lifting her into the air. Red and white liquid splattered onto the floor tiles. The female teacher didn't even have time to let out a second scream before she died.

Weirdly flung the corpse aside, glanced warily at the chainsaw in Zhou Lang's hand and the still-waving bandages, then turned and leaped back into the cable car. The doors closed, and the cable car sank back into the ground along the tracks, the cracked ground closing up again, leaving only a pool of glaring blood and a corpse.

Dr. Lin leaned against the wall and began to gag. The little girl stood beside the pool of blood, clutching her teddy bear tightly, her eyes fixed on the corpse on the ground, her face devoid of any fear befitting a child.

"Why didn't you save her just now?!"