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

Han Ying nodded, feigning acceptance. At the same time, the passive effect of the "Con artist" attribute was quietly activated—every word she spoke would have a subtle psychological effect on the target.

"Mr. Chen, how many sketching classes have you taught before?"

"It's been three times."

"So you're very familiar with this guesthouse?"

"Of course, I know every corner."

"What about the basement? I heard there's a basement in this building. Some students went in before, but no one has mentioned it since."

She made that up. It was completely fabricated. But the con artist's suggestive effect is that when you say a false message in a sufficiently natural tone, the other person will subconsciously follow along with that message.

Chen Mo's smile paused for a fraction of a second.

"The basement..." He tilted his head. "That's not a place for students."

Why?

"Because it's painted there."

Han Yingying's heart skipped a beat, but she kept applying paint, maintaining a composed expression. "What painting?"

Chen Mo didn't answer, but a smile returned to his face. "Han, go ahead and draw your artwork. Submit it before dark."

He turned and left.

This time, Han Yingying clearly saw that as he walked past others, no one looked up at him. The easels were spaced very close together, but no one made way for him.

He walked through the middle of one person's easel.

"Through" literally.

Han Yingying's fingers, which were holding the paintbrush, trembled slightly.

She received a crucial piece of information: there was a painting in the basement.

But what was the price? Chen Mo's smile before he left sent chills down her spine. That eerie memory stayed with her.

As dusk fell, Han Yingying quickly finished her painting—a fairly standard sketch of a bamboo forest—and handed it to the pale woman at the front desk.

When she returned to the second floor, she ran into Zhou Lang in the corridor.

"What did you find out?" she asked.

"There are twenty-three paintings in this building, twelve of which depict human figures covered up in paint," Zhou Lang said, leaning against the wall and twirling a craft knife in his hand. "They correspond exactly to the twelve of us."

Han Yingying felt a chill run down her spine.

"And another thing," Zhou Lang looked at her, "you talked to that weirdo."

It's not a question.

"You saw it?"

"I watched from outside the studio for a while." He put away his craft knife. "Your method of getting information out of me was good, but that thing wasn't an ordinary copy; it was strange."

"What do you mean?"

"Its grade is at least S."

Han Yingying was stunned. An S-rank anomaly appeared in an A-rank dungeon? That didn't make sense. According to the game rules, the dungeon difficulty and the anomaly's level should match.

"It might be a bug," Zhou Lang said, something she hadn't expected at all. "There have been similar issues in several recent dungeons, with high-level monsters appearing in incompatible dungeons. I'm investigating this."

"Did you come here specifically to investigate this?"

Zhou Lang didn't give a direct answer. "Let's get through tonight first. After dark, the figures in those paintings will come out."

Night fell quickly.

It gets dark early in the mountains; just after six o'clock, it was already pitch black outside the window. Han Yingying returned to room 206, locked the door, and placed a chair under the doorknob.

A system notification popped up:

[Day 1 - Nighttime Phase Begins]

[WARNING: Do not stare at any painting for more than three seconds at night]

Han Yingying glanced around the room—there were no paintings on the walls. She had already checked that beforehand. But just to be on the safe side, she still turned the sketching textbook on the desk face down.

There were sounds coming from the hallway.

It wasn't footsteps. It was the soft, continuous rustling of a brush across the canvas, like someone painting outside the door.

Han Yingying held her breath.

The rustling sound lingered in front of her door for about ten seconds, then moved to the next door. It stopped briefly in front of door 205, then continued forward.

All night long.

The sound echoed back and forth in the corridor until the first rays of grayish-white light pierced through the window. Han Yingying barely slept all night, only managing to doze off for about ten minutes as dawn broke.

The next morning, one person was missing from the studio.

The bald, muscular man was gone.

The pale woman at the front desk stood at the studio door, her expression unwavering, and said, "One student has withdrawn from the sketching class due to health reasons. The remaining students are requested to continue creating."

Han Ying noticed that the painting with the words "Bamboo" on it that the bald man had used yesterday was gone. In its place was a beautiful painting of a bamboo forest, with a person standing in the lower right corner of the painting.

Bald.

He was drawn into the picture.

"Damn it." The plaid-shirted programmer cursed when he saw the painting, his face turning pale.

With eleven people present, the atmosphere suddenly became tense.

When Han Yingying found Zhou Lang, he was squatting at the end of the first-floor corridor, scraping something against the corner of the wall with a utility knife.

"What are you doing?"

"There's another layer beneath this wall." Zhou Lang used the tip of his knife to lift a piece of plaster, revealing another color underneath—not the wall surface, but paint. "The walls of the entire building are canvases."

Han Yingying squatted down to take a look. There was indeed a thick layer of oil paint under the wall, with a dark brown hue, like part of a huge painting.

"So we're not staying in a guesthouse," she said.

"We live inside a painting."

This conclusion is absurd, but in the context of the copy, it makes a terrifyingly reasonable sense.

"Then how do we get out?"

"The painting has boundaries." Zhou Lang stood up, brushing the debris off his hands. "I walked around the outer wall last night, and everything within fifty meters of the guesthouse is flat. Trees, stones, roads—it's all painted on."

"Are we trapped inside a painting?"

"To be more precise, he was drawn into the picture." Zhou Lang looked at her. "After you spoke to Chen Mo yesterday, did he remember your face?"

Han Yingying nodded.

"He might come and draw you tonight."

These words were spoken casually, but Han Ying understood their weight. That's how the bald, burly man met his end—he was painted into that bamboo forest.

"I have a plan," Han Yingying said, "but I need your cooperation."

"explain."

"I'll use my trickster skill to contact Chen Mo again and find out the details about the painting in the basement. That painting is most likely the core of the entire dungeon—as long as we destroy it or rewrite it, we can clear the dungeon."

Zhou Lang remained silent for a few seconds.

"Too risky. His level is too high; your hints will be less effective. And the fact that he's contacting you tonight means he's already marked you."

"So I need you to provide backup. If he makes a move, you interrupt him."

Zhou Lang tilted his head to look at her. This gesture reminded Han Yingying of a cat assessing its prey—though the analogy wasn't quite right, since she was the one who was to be the bait.

"Okay," he said, "but on one condition."

"What?"

"If the situation gets out of control, run immediately. Don't worry about whether you've gotten all the information you need, don't hesitate."

Han Yingying responded.