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

The same sound.

Zhou Lang reached out and grasped the oil lamp.

The sounds outside the door stopped.

The dark red light flickered under the door crack for a moment, then quickly retreated, as if startled by something.

The footsteps faded quickly into the distance, and then they ran up to the third floor.

Zhou Langsong turned on the oil lamp and flexed his fingers.

The human skin lantern can sense the presence of the oil lamp. This lamp has a deterrent effect on eerie entities—at least on those with less intense resentment.

But this is only the first wave.

At 9:30, the sound of water came.

It wasn't dripping water. It was the sound of a large amount of water surging, coming from inside the walls, approaching from afar, like a tide passing by. As the sound of water passed over the walls of room 201, the entire wall vibrated slightly, and water stains appeared on the wallpaper, spreading from the corner of the ceiling like a slowly opening mouth.

Zhou Lang took two steps back.

At the center of the water stain, the wall began to bulge. It wasn't large, about the size of a fist, but it was expanding. The wallpaper was stretched taut, and the pattern on it was distorted.

Then the bulge cracked.

A hand reached out from the wall.

The woman's hands. The skin was pale, the nails were long, and seaweed and mud clung between the fingers. There was a deep mark on her wrist—a mark of being bound with rope.

The proprietress.

The hand groped in the air a few times, as if searching for something. The fingertips touched the table, paused for a second, and then gripped the edge of the table tightly.

Zhou Lang didn't move.

Another hand reached out. Two hands gripped the crack in the wall and began to pull. The wall creaked, and grayish-white cement debris fell in a rustling sound. A face emerged from behind the crack—sunken eyes, purple lips, and wet hair plastered to its face, water seeping from every pore.

Her mouth opened and closed, emitting indistinct sounds. It was as if she were speaking underwater, bubbles gurgling up, each bubble containing the same word—

"My child...my child..."

Zhou Lang retreated to the doorway.

The proprietress's body had squeezed halfway out of the wall. Her upper body was suspended in mid-air, while her lower body was still embedded in the cement. Her head slowly turned, scanning every corner of the room, finally stopping on Zhou Lang.

There were no eyeballs in her sunken eye sockets. But Zhou Lang could feel that she was looking at him.

"Have you... seen my child?"

The sound seemed to come from a very far place, with each word trailing off with a long echo.

Zhou Lang stared at her for three seconds.

"I've never seen him," he said, "but I know who sold your child."

The proprietress stopped what she was doing.

"Ma Defa," Zhou Lang said, uttering the name.

A scream suddenly erupted in the corridor—a sound no human could make. It was the sound of cracking cement, twisting steel bars, and the entire building trembling. The proprietress was abruptly pulled back into the wall, the wall closed, the water stains disappeared, and everything returned to normal.

But the building continued to shake.

Dust fell from the ceiling, and the floor undulated underfoot, like a giant skin twitching.

The mastermind behind the scenes sensed the landlady's unusual behavior. It was suppressing her.

The inn is its body, and all the strange occurrences are within its control. The landlady can be active at night, but she cannot cross the line. Zhou Lang's mention of Ma Defa's name just now triggered the landlady's resentment and alerted the boss.

The vibration lasted for about half a minute before stopping.

Zhou Lang leaned against the door, going over what had just happened in his mind.

The landlady is searching for her child. Her greatest obsession isn't murder, but finding her daughter who was sold. If she could exploit this—

There was another knock on the door.

This time it's Han Yingying.

"I'm fine," her voice came from the other side of the door. "How about you over there?"

"It's alright." Zhou Lang thought for a moment, "Is there any water seepage in the walls of your room?"

"No, but there's a sound coming from under the floor. It sounds like something is crawling."

sewer.

Zhou Lang frowned. The boss's range of activity covered the entire building's plumbing system; it could emerge from any drain, any wall, or any floorboard. This was the biggest threat after the safe period ended—you never knew when or from which direction it would appear.

"Go back to your room and stay there. Don't open the door. No matter who calls you, don't open it," Zhou Lang said.

"And you?"

I'm going out for a bit.

"Are you crazy?"

"Maybe."

Zhou Lang took out an oil lamp and a chainsaw from his inventory, took a deep breath—no, that's too old-fashioned. He stretched his neck and turned the lock.

The corridor was pitch black.

He lit the oil lamp.

Green light spread out, illuminating the entire corridor. The walls of the corridor were covered with water stains, and there were wet footprints on the floor—barefoot footprints that stretched from the first floor up and stopped in front of every room.

Zhou Lang carried the lamp and walked downstairs.

As he passed 203, he heard whispers behind the door. It was Tiezhu speaking, his voice dazed and confused, as if he were sleepwalking.

"Su Yan... Su Yan, what did you say... Okay, I'll go..."

The charm skill was still active at night. Su Yan was controlling the iron pillar.

Zhou Lang ignored it. He didn't have time to deal with it right now.

Upon reaching the first floor, the sight in the lobby made him stop in his tracks.

The lantern hanging by the door, made of human skin, was glowing. A dark red light emanated from inside the lantern, illuminating the entire porch. The surface of the lantern—that layer of "paper"—was undulating slightly, like human skin breathing.

A woman was standing under the lantern.

She stood with her back to Zhou Lang, wearing a burnt apron, her hair piled up behind her head, her posture resembling that of a housewife busy in the kitchen. But she was less than 1.5 meters tall—because she had no feet. Below her calves was nothingness, her body floating in the halo of lantern light.

The lantern itself is made of human skin.

She seemed to sense Zhou Lang's presence and turned her body slightly.

Zhou Lang raised the oil lamp high.

Green and red light collided in the air. The woman with the human skin lantern turned her head—only half her face was visible. The other half had been peeled off, revealing deep red muscle tissue and white bone underneath. On the remaining half of her face, one eye looked at Zhou Lang.

That eye wasn't angry.

It is sad.

"Your husband turned you into a lantern," Zhou Lang said.

The woman's body trembled slightly.

"The arsonist killed your husband. But your husband harmed you first. So you hate not only the arsonist, but also him."

The lantern's light flickered a few times, sometimes bright and sometimes dim.

Zhou Lang took out the clipping from the old newspaper—which he had gotten from Su Yan that afternoon—from his pocket and unfolded it in front of the woman.

"Ma Defa is still alive," he said, "at least during the day."

The woman's eye was fixed on the contents of the newspaper, her pupil shrinking to the size of a pinhead.

The lantern's light suddenly changed color—from dark red to deathly white. The temperature in the entire hall plummeted, and Zhou Lang's breath turned into white mist.

The woman opened her mouth.