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

"Rule-based interference." Zhou Lang fiddled with the chainsaw switch in his hand, but didn't press it. "The more you pay attention to the things on this vehicle, the more they act up. Just pretend you can't see them."

Han Yingying put away the talisman and returned to her original position. Sure enough, after the middle-aged man struggled for a while, the dark figure, seeing that no one was paying attention, boredly released its grip and turned into a puddle of black water that seeped into the carriage floor. The middle-aged man coughed twice, changed his position, and continued to sleep.

Zhao Qiang swallowed hard and moved closer to Zhou Lang: "Brother Lang, have we been dragged into a nested doll scenario? There's a bus hidden under the manor, this doesn't make sense."

"What logic do horror games need?" Zhou Lang found an empty seat and sat down. "Save your energy, we'll be busy when we get to our stop."

The car wound its way along the mountain road for what seemed like an eternity before finally stopping in front of a Japanese-style wooden building. Aoki Guesthouse.

The three got out of the car. A night breeze blew by, and the red lanterns in front of the guesthouse swayed and creaked.

"Welcome." An elderly woman in a kimono stood at the door, her face so wrinkled it could trap a mosquito. She carried a white paper lantern. "Three guests, the room is ready."

Upon entering the guesthouse, the wooden floorboards creaked underfoot, a sound that made your teeth ache. Han Yingying was assigned to a room at the far end of the corridor on the second floor. Zhou Lang and Zhao Qiang were on the first floor.

"Be careful, everyone." Zhou Lang left those words and led Zhao Qiang into the house.

Han Yingying returned to her room and put down her drawing board. Her skill "Trickster" had finished cooling down. This skill allowed her to exchange false information for real intelligence when communicating with the supernatural.

At midnight, soft footsteps echoed in the hallway. They stopped outside her door.

Without hesitation, Han Yingying opened the sliding door. Standing outside was a woman with no facial features, dressed in a white kimono, holding a wooden box in her hands.

"Can you see my face?" The woman's voice came from her abdomen, deep and eerie.

Han Yingying didn't back down, staring directly at the blank face: "I saw it. Your face was in the dry well in the backyard, taken away by a man dressed in black."

The Fraudster skill is activated.

The faceless woman paused, then her voice grew sharper from her abdomen: "The man in black... he took my face. In exchange, I'll tell you a secret. The owner of this guesthouse feeds that painting every night in the basement."

As soon as she finished speaking, the faceless woman's body suddenly swelled up, and dozens of tentacles covered with barbs extended from beneath her white kimono, heading straight for Han Yingying's face.

The intelligence was extracted, but a bizarre attack followed. This went beyond the bounds of normal rules.

Han Yingying took a half step back, using the easel as a shield. The tentacle pierced through the easel, only centimeters from her eyes.

The piercing sound of machinery shattered the tranquility of the corridor.

The chainsaw's chain gleamed coldly as it sliced ​​through from the side, severing the tentacles. Black blood splattered onto the wooden floor, hissing and corroding.

Zhou Lang stood at the corner of the corridor, carrying a chainsaw. He wasn't wearing a coat, only a thin shirt, and the outline of bandages was faintly visible on his shoulders.

"Plain talk is fine, but don't get yourself into trouble." Zhou Lang turned off the chainsaw and walked up to Han Yingying.

The faceless woman let out a piercing scream and vanished in a puff of black smoke.

"How did you get up here?" Han Yingying asked, looking at the broken limb on the ground.

"The first floor is too boring. Even Zhao Qiang wasn't scared by those ghosts." Zhou Lang kicked the wooden box on the ground. "Besides, I smelled an S-class eerie odor."

Han Yingying straightened her clothes: "I just got some information out of her. The landlady is feeding a painting in the basement. This should be the core of the dungeon."

"Let's form an alliance," Zhou Lang said, looking at her. "You'll handle the extracting of information, and I'll handle the killing. We each get what we need."

Han Yingying nodded in agreement. The two walked side by side downstairs.

Zhou Lang's style of doing things was unconventional. He didn't look for hidden keys; if he encountered a locked door, he would simply break it down with scissors or a chainsaw. This simple and brutal method, in turn, avoided many carefully laid traps.

The entrance to the basement was covered by a heavy tatami mat. Zhou Lang lifted the tatami mat, and a strong smell of blood hit him.

As you descend, the space suddenly opens up. The walls are covered with all sorts of eerie paintings, and the eyes of the figures in the paintings seem to move with your movements.

On the easel in the very center lay an unfinished oil painting. The painting depicted a huge black vortex, with a blood-red eye at its center.

The proprietress was kneeling in front of the painting, cutting her wrists and dripping blood into a wooden bowl. Then she used a paintbrush to smear the blood onto the canvas.

"Excuse me." Zhou Lang stepped forward, holding a chainsaw directly to the proprietress's neck. "This painting is quite unique, are you selling it?"

The proprietress turned around, her wrinkled face contorted in shock: "You've disturbed the master's meal!"

She lunged at Zhou Lang, her fingers transforming into sharp claws.

Instead of retreating, Zhou Lang advanced, his left hand suddenly waving, and the power of the bandage ghost erupted, a blood-stained bandage tightly wrapped around the landlady's neck.

"Yingying!" Zhou Lang called out.

Han Yingying understood immediately and activated her trickster skills again: "Your master has abandoned you. He just told me that your blood tastes terrible."

The proprietress froze, a desperate madness flashing in her eyes. In that brief opening, Zhou Lang's chainsaw pierced straight through her chest.

Without a scream, the proprietress's body quickly withered and turned into a human skin.

The red eyes in the painting suddenly turned and stared intently at Zhou Lang. An immense pressure descended, a hallmark of the eerie S-rank.

Zhou Lang did not back down. He stepped forward and took out the lighter full of gasoline from his pocket.

"What are you looking at? Haven't you ever seen an arsonist before?"

Flames shot up, and Zhou Lang threw the lighter directly at the canvas. The fire spread, and a piercing scream came from within the painting as the vortex began to collapse.

A system notification sounded: [Congratulations to the player for completing the dungeon "Aoki Inn," rating: Perfect.]

[Anomaly detected data stream... Triggered a dungeon bug, additional reward awarded: Eye of Truth (Fragment).]

Zhou Lang stared thoughtfully at the prompts on the panel. The source of the S-rank anomaly hadn't been completely eliminated; it was merely a projection. What exactly was the bug in the dungeon? He hadn't found the answer.

A flash of light, and Han Yingying opened her eyes.

The ceiling was painted with familiar white latex paint, and the alarm clock on the bedside table showed 7:30 in the morning. The sounds of rush hour traffic drifted in from outside the window, and sunlight streamed through the gaps in the curtains onto the floor.

came back?

She sat up and touched her face. No blood, no smell of gunpowder. Everything was outrageously normal. If the system panel hadn't been lying quietly on the edge of her retina, she would have truly thought it was just a bizarre dream.

The rewards have been credited to your account. Your Trickster skill proficiency has increased, and you've also obtained a defensive item called "Substitute Strawman".