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

"Zhong Yao?" Zhou Lang looked at the woman. "Who are you? A teammate assigned by the system?"

Zhong Yao glanced at him but didn't say anything.

Zhao Qiang leaned closer and whispered, "I know this guy. He's from the Soul Devouring Guild."

Zhou Lang and Han Yingying exchanged a glance.

The Soul Devouring Guild. The system randomly assigned me teammates who happen to be from the Soul Devouring Guild? That's too much of a coincidence.

Han Yingying whispered, "Be careful of her."

A train whistle sounded in the distance. In the darkness, two stark white headlights lit up, and an old-fashioned train slowly pulled into the platform.

The sound of the train entering the station was like fingernails scratching a blackboard, sharp and piercing.

The car door opened. The inside was empty, with white sheets covering the seats, and the interior lights were those old-fashioned incandescent bulbs that flickered.

The four of them boarded the train. Zhong Yao chose a seat in the last row near the door, sitting about half a carriage away from the other three.

Zhao Qiang muttered to himself, "This woman is way too wary."

"Let her be," Zhou Lang said. "Mind your own business."

The train started moving. It was pitch black outside the window; nothing could be seen. Another system notification popped up:

The train has six carriages. At each station, all passengers and crew must disembark to complete the station's tasks. If the task fails, the train will not restart.

The first stop will be reached in fifteen minutes.

A fifteen-minute buffer period. Zhou Lang used this time to observe the carriage. The seats under the white cloth were somewhat damp, and there were old newspapers in the corner, dated 1987.

"The train station in 1987," Han Ying said, flipping through the newspaper. "It reported a train disappearance. A night train carrying forty-seven passengers vanished and was never found."

"Is this the train we're on?" Zhao Qiang asked.

"Probably."

Zhou Lang looked at Zhong Yao at the back of the carriage. She was wiping a dagger, her movements mechanical and practiced.

He walked over.

Zhong Yao looked up at him, and stopped what she was doing.

"Want to chat for a bit?" Zhou Lang said.

"There's nothing to talk about."

"Then let me say a few words from my own perspective." Zhou Lang sat down opposite her. "I don't care what the Soul Eater sent you here for. But if you die in this instance, we can't complete the quest. And vice versa."

Zhong Yao remained silent.

"So no matter what mission you take on," Zhou Lang said, "before leaving the dungeon, I suggest you prioritize staying alive."

Zhong Yao stared at him expressionlessly for three seconds, then lowered her head to continue wiping the knife.

Zhou Lang said nothing more and returned to the front row.

We've arrived at our first stop.

Outside the train carriage appeared a dilapidated little platform with a sign that read "Wangxiang Station." A row of people stood on the platform—no, not people. They were paper dolls, dressed in clothing from the Republican era, with eerie smiles painted on their faces.

Task prompt:

[Homecoming Station Mission: Find the real ghost mixed in with the dolls and eliminate it. Time Limit: 10 minutes.]

"Twelve dolls," Han Ying counted quickly.

The four people got off the car. Zhong Yao finally caught up, keeping her distance from the others, but at least they were in the same area.

"How do you tell the difference?" Zhao Qiang asked.

Zhou Lang walked up to the first doll and examined it closely. The paper-made skin and painted features made it completely lifeless. He checked each one in turn, and by the seventh, he smelled a strange odor.

"Sweet." Han Yingying smelled it too. "A rotten sweetness. That's it."

Without saying a word, Zhou Lang swung the chainsaw at him.

The doll split open, revealing not a bamboo frame and paper inside, but a lump of black flesh. The lump of flesh screamed, transforming into a deformed infant form, and lunged at Zhou Lang's face.

Zhao Qiang swung his steel pipe, sending the thing flying. Han Yingying followed up with a kick.

A dagger flew out from the side and embedded itself in the creature's head.

Zhong Yao.

The dagger she threw from five meters away was terrifyingly accurate.

The deformed baby twitched twice and turned into a puddle of black water.

[Mission complete. Please return to the train.]

The four of them got back on the bus. This time, Zhong Yao moved her seat two rows forward.

Zhao Qiang whispered, "Her throwing knife..."

"The Soul Devouring Guild's second-place ranking didn't come for nothing," Han Yingying said.

The train continued its journey. At the second and third stops, the difficulty of the missions increased, but the four of them cooperated better and better—although Zhong Yao never took the initiative to communicate, her judgment and reaction speed in battle were impeccable.

At the fourth stop, a problem arose.

The mission is to find three keys in an abandoned school. The four split into two groups to search. Zhou Lang and Han Ying are in one group, and Zhao Qiang and Zhong Yao are in the other.

When the second key was found, Zhao Qiang's voice came through the walkie-talkie: "Zhou Lang! This woman—"

The signal is lost.

Zhou Lang and Han Yingying immediately ran towards Zhao Qiang's location. Pushing open the classroom door, they saw Zhao Qiang leaning against the wall, a bloody gash on his neck. Zhong Yao stood opposite him, a blood-dripping dagger in her hand.

"What are you doing?!" Zhou Lang pointed his chainsaw at Zhong Yao.

"It wasn't me," Zhao Qiang spoke first, his voice a little hoarse. "It was a ghost. It disguised itself as her and ambushed me. The real Zhong Yao took a knife for me."

Zhou Lang looked at Zhong Yao. Her left arm was slashed open by a deep claw mark, and blood was flowing down her fingers.

A corpse lay in the corner; it was the ghost from earlier—half-deformed, with Zhong Yao's face and a deformed body.

"so……"

"I shielded him," Zhong Yao said calmly. "He was too slow to react when he stepped in front of me."

Zhao Qiang chuckled awkwardly, "...Thanks."

"Han Yingying," Zhou Lang said.

Han Yingying stepped forward and treated their wounds with her healing hands. When she treated Zhong Yao, Zhong Yao visibly stiffened for a moment, but did not pull away.

"Her healing abilities are very rare," Zhong Yao said, looking at the rapidly healing wound on her arm.

"You're not bad either," Zhao Qiang said, stretching his neck. "That throwing knife was absolutely amazing."

Zhong Yao didn't respond. But her guard had lowered somewhat.

At the next two stops, the four worked much more smoothly together. At the final stop, the train entered a huge underground space. The final stop.

The mission at the final station is to defeat the train conductor—a giant monster formed from the fusion of forty-seven missing passengers.

The battle lasted nearly twenty minutes. Zhao Qiang used his power enhancement three times, Han Yingying exhausted all her healing abilities, and one of Zhong Yao's two daggers broke.

Finally, Zhou Lang's chainsaw severed the core of that thing.

Cleared customs.

Enveloped in white light, the four returned to reality.

It was six o'clock in the morning, just as the sun was rising. Four people stood downstairs at Zhou Lang's rented apartment, covered in injuries and looking exhausted.

System prompts kept popping up.

[Dungeon cleared. Rating: S+.]

The reward has been issued.

Congratulations! You have unlocked SS-level dungeon access.

SS-rank. Zhou Lang stared at these words, unable to describe his feelings. He was stronger, but what awaited him was even more terrifying.

There is one more:

[System Announcement: The Guild Tournament will begin in two weeks. Teams of three or more can register to participate.]

"A guild competition?" Zhao Qiang rubbed his aching shoulders. "What's that?"