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

The basement was much larger than I had imagined.

The green light from the oil lamp barely illuminated an area of ​​three to five meters, beyond which lay pure darkness. A pungent, sweet, rotten smell permeated the air, mixed with the scent of damp earth. Han Yingying covered her nose.

"This place... is much darker than up here," Zhao Qiang whispered, clutching Zhou Lang's clothes tightly with one hand.

Zhou Lang ignored him and took a few steps forward, holding the oil lamp. The green light swept across the ground, which was not paved with stone slabs but with mud. It was soft and saggy, and the soles of his shoes sank up to his ankles.

"Wait a moment."

Zhou Lang stopped and crouched down to look at the ground. There were marks on the muddy ground—not footprints, but drag marks, two parallel long grooves that stretched from the stairwell into the darkness.

"Something was dragged in," he said.

Zhao Qiang's hands trembled even more violently: "What is it?"

"I don't know, but it's quite heavy." Zhou Lang stood up. "Let's go."

The three followed the drag marks deeper into the basement. The layout gradually became clearer—it wasn't a room, but a passageway with rough stone walls covered in black mold. Every few meters, an iron ring was embedded in the wall, from which hung rusted chains.

Han Yingying noticed dark brown marks at the end of the chain. She didn't say anything, but her feet unconsciously moved closer to Zhou Lang.

After walking about two hundred meters through the passageway, a wooden door appeared ahead.

The wooden door was old, half of its edges rotten, and a yellowed note was nailed to the door panel. Zhou Lang leaned closer to look; the note had a few words written on it—

"Housekeeper's Diary, Page 7".

He peeled off the note, turned it over, and saw densely packed small characters on the back:

"Day 47. Another servant tried to escape and was taken to the basement by the master. I heard screams for three hours. The next day, a new rose bush was planted in the garden. The master said that blood is the best fertilizer."

"Day 52. ​​Another new item has been added to the master's collection. I dare not look, but I know what it is. The faces of those servants... they are still moving."

"Day 58. I've decided to record everything. If anyone ever comes here, please do me a favor—open the innermost cabinet in the collection room. It holds the owner's secret, and the only way to destroy this manor."

Day 59 —

The writing at the end was blurred, as if it had been soaked in some liquid.

"The butler's log." Zhou Lang put the note away. "This killing of the butler... might have been normal before."

"You mean it was originally a person?" Zhao Qiang asked.

"The butler's log is on page seven, which means there are at least seven pages. I don't know where the first six pages are, but the log mentions 'master' and 'collection room'." Zhou Lang looked at the wooden door. "The collection room is probably behind that door."

He pushed the door, but it didn't budge.

It wasn't a problem with the lock—although the door panel was rotten, there was a ring of pale red light flowing on the door frame, which was some kind of eerie seal.

"Do you need a key?" Han Yingying asked.

Zhou Lang shook his head and took out a chainsaw from his pocket.

Zhao Qiang took two steps back: "You're not going to—"

Rumble!

The sound of the chainsaw starting up was amplified several times in the underground tunnel, causing the mold on the walls to flake off. Zhou Lang aimed at the stone wall next to the door panel and sawed down.

The door can't be opened, but the wall can be demolished.

Stone bricks are no different from tofu in front of a chainsaw; in less than three minutes, a hole big enough to drill through was made in the wall.

Zhao Qiang watched this scene, his lips twitching: "Your line of thinking..."

"It saves time and effort." Zhou Lang turned off the chainsaw and was the first to crawl inside.

Collection room.

To be precise, this place is more like an altar.

The room is circular, about fifteen meters in diameter, and the dome is painted with a huge mural—countless distorted human faces are densely pieced together, each face with a different expression, some laughing, some crying, and some with their mouths wide open, in a screaming posture.

Han Yingying immediately looked away.

The room was surrounded by a dozen glass cabinets, each filled with various items. Zhou Lang approached, holding an oil lamp, and took a closer look—

Human skin.

Each cabinet contained a complete human skin, its color faded to white, but the facial features were still clearly discernible. Even more terrifying, those skins were actually moving. Their mouths opened and closed, silently uttering something.

Zhao Qiang took one look and then vomited.

"These are the 'collections' mentioned in the housekeeper's log," Zhou Lang said calmly. It wasn't that he wasn't afraid, but in this environment, fear wouldn't solve anything.

"The innermost cabinet," Han Yingying pointed in a direction, "The log says there's a secret in the innermost cabinet."

At the deepest part of the circular room stood a single black cabinet, twice the size of the others. It had no glass panel; it was a completely enclosed metal structure, its surface covered with eerie runes.

There is a lock on the cabinet.

This lock is different from the one on the basement iron door—it's made of bone, white and stark, as if it were carved from the bones of something.

Zhou Lang took out the scissors and tried to cut them, but he couldn't.

"Too hard." He put away the scissors, looked around the cabinet, and noticed a line of small print on the bottom of the cabinet.

"Offer three drops of blood, and the lock will open."

Zhao Qiang had just finished vomiting and walked over, wiping his mouth: "What the hell was that?"

"I need blood." Without saying a word, Zhou Lang took the scissors and made a cut on his index finger, three drops of blood falling onto his collarbone.

The blood droplet was absorbed by the bone lock, and the white bone lock slowly turned red, then popped open with a "click".

The cabinet door slowly opened.

There was no human skin inside, only one thing—a black booklet with three words written on the cover.

"Servant's Record"

Zhou Lang turned to the first page, which contained a name, a date, and a note.

"Zhang San, Date of Joining: Day 1 of the Manor Era, Status: Added to Favorites"

"Li Si, Date of Joining: Day 3 of the Manor Era, Status: Added to Favorites"

Page after page, all filled with the servants' records. "Collected" means turned into a human skin in a glass cabinet.

Zhou Lang quickly flipped to the last few pages, and on the second to last page it read—

"Zhao Qiang, Date of Joining: Day 2047 of the Manor Era, Status: Currently Employed".

"Han Yingying, date of employment: day 2047 of the Manor Era, status: employed."

"Xiong Batian, Date of Joining: Day 2047 of the Manor Era, Status: Currently Employed".

The last name made Zhou Lang stop.

"Wandering Waves, Date of Joining: Day 2047 of the Manor Era, Status: Employed. Notes: Special."

Special? What's special about it?

He turned to the last page. The last page wasn't the servant's record, but a passage—

"All servants have only two fates: to be collected or to become the new butler. When the old butler is destroyed, the highest-rated servant will automatically inherit the position. This is the secret to the manor's perpetual operation."

"Servant → Butler → Servant → Butler, in an endless cycle, forever."