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

The stairs have reached the bottom.

The oil lamp illuminated a small space, surrounded by stone walls, with pebbles covering the ground. In the very center stood a coffin, pitch black, its cover mostly peeled away.

There was a stone tablet in front of the coffin with inscriptions on it.

Zhou Lang walked over and held up the oil lamp to shine on it.

"Anyone who opens this coffin must exchange their life for it."

Zhao Qiang took two steps back. "What does this mean? Are you trying to kill me?"

"Don't panic." Zhou Lang squatted down and carefully examined the bottom of the stone tablet, where there was a line of small characters.

"Sacrifice a companion to uncover the truth about the manor."

Han Ying's expression changed.

Zhou Lang stood up and dusted off his hands. He was thinking to himself: The designer of this instance is quite interesting. He brought the players here and then used the condition of "sacrificing companions" to create internal conflict. But such explicit rules are not always the only solution.

"Do you think this is believable?" Zhou Lang asked.

Zhao Qiang shook his head. "Anyway, I don't believe it. Not a single word said in this godforsaken place is reliable."

Han Yingying stared at the stone tablet for a while, then suddenly said, "This is fake."

She spoke with absolute certainty, her tone devoid of hesitation.

Zhou Lang glanced at her.

A strange thing happened. The words on the stone tablet began to fade, disappearing stroke by stroke, and after a dozen seconds, the entire stone tablet became blank.

Zhao Qiang rubbed his eyes. "Did I see that right? The words are gone?"

Zhou Lang didn't speak. He stared at Han Yingying, his eyes revealing something.

What did this girl just do?

She said, "This is fake," and then the words disappeared. This is not a coincidence.

Zhou Lang kept this to himself, without making a fuss. His purpose was clear—this instance had exhibited unusual fluctuations, and he had entered using special items to investigate what was wrong. And now, the anomaly surrounding Han Yingying was even more interesting than the instance itself.

"Should we open the coffin or not?" Zhao Qiang asked.

"Open." Zhou Lang walked to the coffin and placed his hands on the lid.

"Wait!" Zhao Qiang exclaimed anxiously, "What if there's something inside?"

"We'll only open it if there's something inside." Zhou Lang pushed the coffin lid open with force.

The coffin lid was heavy, but Zhou Lang's strength was ridiculously great. Zhao Qiang watched as he pushed open the stone lid, which weighed dozens of kilograms, all by himself, his mouth opening and closing again.

He had been Zhou Lang's deskmate for three years and always thought of him as an ordinary person with average grades and a cold personality. But after entering this damn game, Zhao Qiang increasingly felt that he didn't know his deskmate at all.

There was no body in the coffin.

Inside was a mirror, about half a person's height, with a bronze frame that had a greenish tinge. The mirror itself was clean and reflected a person's image.

Zhou Lang looked down at himself in the mirror. He looked exactly like he did in real life—wearing the servant's clothes of the manor and holding an oil lamp.

But he noticed a detail.

The Han Yingying in the mirror is different.

In real life, Han Yingying was dressed in a servant's uniform, her hair in a ponytail, and she looked nervous. But in the mirror, she was wearing a white dress, her hair was down, and her expression was unusually calm.

Moreover, the woman in the mirror was looking at Zhou Lang. Not looking out of the mirror, but directly at Zhou Lang in the mirror.

Han Yingying herself didn't seem to notice the difference; she was looking at the engravings on the inner wall of the coffin.

Zhao Qiang leaned closer to look at the mirror. "What's the use of this mirror? Can I sell it?"

"Don't touch it yet," Zhou Lang stopped him.

He crouched down to examine the edge of the glasses frame and found a note stuck to the back, the handwriting scribbled:

"She doesn't remember. But the mirror does."

Zhou Lang peeled off the note, folded it, and put it in his pocket.

"What did you find?" Han Yingying asked.

"Nothing useful," Zhou Lang said. "Let's look elsewhere."

His heart skipped a beat. "She doesn't remember"—who was he referring to? Han Yingying? What did she not remember?

This dungeon was originally only a C-level difficulty dungeon, which he could easily clear with his true strength. But he wasn't there to clear it; he was there to investigate. The Zhengui Division's monitoring system detected abnormal energy fluctuations in this dungeon, and its level didn't match the dungeon's actual difficulty.

Now he roughly knows where the anomaly is coming from.

There was a small door in the corner of the basement, locked. Zhou Lang walked over and cut the lock with scissors.

Behind the door is a narrower passage, only wide enough for one person to pass through at a time.

"I'll go first." Zhou Lang squeezed in from the side.

The passage was short, leading to a secret room. Inside was a table with a booklet and a wooden box on it.

Zhou Lang opened the booklet, which recorded the names and manners of death of all the servants who had served in the manor.

The last page reads:

"The 101st servant—Hua Ling Shuang. Cause of death: betrayal."

Hua Ling Shuang.

Zhou Lang's finger stopped on the name.

He'd seen that name before. Not in this instance, but in the top-secret files of the Town of Ghosts. The key figure in an S-level bizarre incident, codenamed "Hua Ling Shuang"—said to have once defeated an evil god, after which her whereabouts became unknown.

He turned to look in the direction of the passage. Han Yingying was still outside.

In a C-level beginner dungeon, a bizarre S-level clue appeared. Han Yingying possesses an unknown ability. The woman in the mirror is completely different from the woman in reality.

When these pieces of information are put together, they point to a conclusion that Zhou Lang finds absurd.

But he didn't draw a conclusion. The evidence wasn't sufficient.

He closed the booklet and opened the wooden box. Inside was a key, made of brass, the same material as the picture frame.

"Did you find anything?" Han Yingying's voice came from the passageway.

"Found a key." Zhou Lang put away the wooden box and booklet. "Let's go, that's enough for tonight."

The three returned the way they came. As they passed the coffin, Zhou Lang noticed that "Han Yingying" in the mirror was smiling at him.

He looked away and quickened his pace upstairs.

When I returned to the first floor, there were still just as many ghosts in the corridor. The light from the oil lamp shone on them, and one of them retreated expressionlessly.

"Why are these ghosts so obedient?" Zhao Qiang asked in a low voice.

"The purpose of the oil lamp," Zhou Lang said. But he knew the real reason wasn't just the oil lamp. These ghosts could sense the level of danger; they were afraid of him.

The three parted ways at the top of the stairs and went back to their respective rooms.

Zhou Lang closed the door and laid out what he had obtained that night on the bed: a key, a booklet, and a note.

He leaned against the wall, closing his eyes as he sorted through the information.

Han Yingying, 18 years old, a student, her mother is deceased, and her father has remarried. Her file in the Town of Ghosts indicates she is an ordinary new player with no special background.

But something's wrong with her ability. He'd never seen the term "Trickster" among the new players. And tonight—when she said the words on the stone tablet were fake, they really disappeared. What's the essence of this ability? Making lies come true?

If that's the case, it would be terrifying.

What's even more terrifying is that she herself seems unaware of it.

Zhou Lang opened his eyes and looked at the ceiling.

Tomorrow, he'll have to find a way to test the waters.