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

Zhao Qiang's smile froze on his face.

"What do you mean?"

"The ghosts didn't enter the room last night, but did you notice how their behavior changed? On the first day, they couldn't even get through the door. On the second day, you heard the water pipes running—that was them testing the water, trying to seep into the room through the pipes and the cracks in the door."

"Wait—" Zhao Qiang's face paled. "Infiltration?"

"Today is the third day. They may appear in the room intact, but they can't attack on their own yet. They'll only lure you into opening the door."

"How did you know?" Han Yingying pressed.

Zhou Lang didn't answer. He didn't "know," he was just speculating. The oil lamp allowed him to see the ghosts' states; last night, the ghosts' forms were clearer than the first night, and their power was increasing. At this rate, they would be able to make their move by the fourth day.

Moreover, he had an even worse feeling—that thing under the manhole cover was the real trouble.

"So we need to figure out how to deal with them before the fourth day." Zhou Lang picked up the keys. "Let's go to 207."

The three went upstairs and came to the end of the corridor.

The door to room 207 was different from the other rooms. Several iron bars were nailed to the door panel, as if someone had reinforced the door from the outside. The lock was new, just as new as the key Han Yingying had found.

But this key isn't for opening the door; it's for opening the cabinet inside.

What to do about the door lock?

Zhou Lang took out the bunch of keys he had picked up from the basement yesterday and tried them one by one. On the fourth try, the lock opened.

The door opened, and the smell inside made all three of them take a step back.

The smell of decay. Not the smell of rotting food, but a stronger, more instinctively terrifying one.

The room was laid out the same as the other guest rooms, but the walls were covered with photos. Not landscape photos, but all of the same person—Chen Hui, the student who worked part-time and studied, as listed in the registration book.

In the classroom, in the cafeteria, while walking, and even while sleeping.

Hundreds of photos covered all four walls.

"Pervert," Zhao Qiang cursed.

There was a suitcase under the bed with a lock on it. Zhou Lang opened it with the key Han Yingying had found.

There are three things in the suitcase.

A bottle of unlabeled pills. A roll of rope. And a notebook.

Zhou Lang opened his notebook.

This is Sun Dacheng's diary. The handwriting is bold and messy, with many parts written and crossed out, and some pages torn out. But the remaining content is enough to piece together a complete story.

He liked Chen Hui. Chen Hui rejected him. He wouldn't accept her.

He sought help from Qian Fugui, the owner of a guesthouse, because the two had a "connection." Qian Fugui agreed on the condition that he help him handle some "domestic affairs"—that is, to cover up the matter of him selling his daughter.

After Chen Hui refused again, Sun Dacheng resorted to violence. He then set a fire.

The entire guesthouse burned down. All seven people perished.

The last page of the diary contained only one sentence:

"Why are you running? Stop moving!"

It's exactly the same as the line of text that was blacked out on the register.

Zhou Lang closed his laptop and glanced back at the corridor. The daytime sunlight shone on the floor; everything seemed normal.

But he knew that things would be different starting tonight.

Zhou Lang spent the rest of the afternoon organizing all the information he had collected.

Seven ghosts, corresponding to seven dead. Their causes of death varied, but they all ultimately perished in that fire. The fire was set by Sun Dacheng; he was the source of everything.

But things aren't that simple.

Qian Fugui sold his daughter and drowned his wife, Zhang Xiulan. These events occurred before the fire. In other words, there were already vengeful spirits in the guesthouse before Sun Dacheng set it on fire.

The fire bound everyone together—the living and the dead, the perpetrators and the victims—trapped in this cycle.

"What about the woman with the lantern?" Zhao Qiang looked at the relationship diagram Zhou Lang had drawn on the paper. "She wasn't mentioned in the police report."

"She was the woman her husband cheated on her with... no, wait." Zhou Lang paused, sorting through his thoughts again. "There's a police report that says a woman reported her husband cheating on her and refusing to divorce her. She was made into a human skin lantern."

"Wait a minute." Han Yingying's voice was a little tense. "Human skin lanterns? Those lanterns hanging in the corridor..."

The three of them fell silent.

"I've had a feeling for a while that the lantern was made of the wrong material," Zhao Qiang said, his voice weak.

Zhou Lang didn't reply. He was thinking about another problem.

Who is the husband of the woman with the human skin lantern? The police report didn't include her name. However, judging from her position in the photo, the woman carrying the lantern isn't an employee of the guesthouse; she's likely a guest.

Was her husband also a guest?

No, that's not right. There are only seven people in the photo. If you exclude Qian Fugui and his wife, the couple Wang Jianguo and Li Xiaoman, the migrant worker Chen Hui, and the perverted Sun Dacheng, there are exactly six. The seventh one is the woman carrying the lantern.

Her husband is not in the photo.

"Is it possible," Zhou Lang slowly began, "that her husband is Qian Fugui?"

Zhao Qiang and Han Yingying both looked at him at the same time.

"Qian Fugui's wife was Zhang Xiulan, the one who drowned. But what if Zhang Xiulan was his second wife? Or what if this woman was one of Qian Fugui's mistresses..."

"That makes sense then," Han Yingying continued. "Qian Fugui had an affair with Zhang Xiulan. His first wife refused to divorce him, so Qian Fugui killed her and made her into lanterns. After that, Qian Fugui married Zhang Xiulan and sold their daughter."

"That scumbag." Zhao Qiang's assessment was accurate.

Zhou Lang completed the relationship diagram.

The core chain of relationships is clear. Qian Fugui is the first layer of evil, and Sun Dacheng is the second. The two protected each other, and in the end, Sun Dacheng set fire to everyone, including himself, killing them all.

But Sun Dacheng's death did not end things. He merged with the guesthouse, becoming the core of controlling the entire instance—an S-level anomaly.

The other six ghosts are trapped in a cycle of reincarnation, reliving their past lives every seven days. Those who drowned are drowned again, those who were burned are burned again. Each reincarnation deepens their resentment, making the ghosts stronger.

This is why the ghosts in this C-rank dungeon are beyond C-rank level. It's not that they were inherently strong; they were made stronger through torture.

"So what's the hidden storyline?" Zhao Qiang asked. "Helping these ghosts cleanse their resentment? How?"

"Change their experiences," Zhou Lang said. "These ghosts relive their most painful memories in reincarnation. If we could change their fate..."

"For example?"

"For example, Zhang Xiulan's biggest resentment is that her daughter was abducted. If we can help her 'find' her daughter..." Zhou Lang took out the pink little shoe from his inventory.

Zhao Qiang was taken aback. "You're planning to fool a ghost with a shoe?"

"It's not about deceiving her, it's about giving her an explanation." Zhou Lang put the shoes away. "However, this is just my guess; we'll have to test it out to see how it works."

"What is the price of trying?" Han Yingying asked a crucial question.

Zhou Lang looked at her but did not answer.

The price could be death, of course. But if we don't try, we'll all die by the fourth day anyway.