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

The staircase was actually a stone door, much thicker than the iron door above it. There was no lock on the door, only a small groove the size of a palm.

Zhou Lang brought the oil lamp closer; the groove was carved with the shape of a hand, its five fingers spread wide apart.

Zhao Qiang stood behind him, his hand gripping Zhou Lang's clothes tightly. "This... requires a fingerprint?"

"It looks like it." Zhou Lang stretched out his hand and compared it. His hand was a size smaller than the groove.

"Something's not right." Han Yingying squatted down to look. "This hand is too big; it's not human."

Zhou Lang remained silent. He recalled the words the butler had spoken when he paid him during the day: "Don't leave your room at night," and the look it had given him. The rules of this manor, from beginning to end, all told the player one thing—don't move around.

But the more this is the case, the more it suggests that there is something in the basement.

"I'll go up and try to kill the butler." Zhou Lang handed the oil lamp to Han Yingying. "You guys guard the door."

"Are you crazy?" Zhao Qiang's voice cracked. "It's a ghost!"

"It's a butler," Zhou Lang corrected. "A butler can't harm guests on its own initiative; that's its rule. Zhao Qiang, you bumped into it during the day, and it didn't hurt you."

Zhao Qiang was stunned for a moment. That day, he was turning around with the tray when he bumped right into the butler's arms, scaring him half to death. But the thing just stood there, unresponsive. He thought it was just luck at the time.

"You figured it out a long time ago?" Han Yingying asked.

"I figured it out halfway," Zhou Lang said, walking up the stairs. "The other half was a gamble."

He went up to the lobby on the first floor, and it was very quiet. The butler was nowhere to be seen. Zhou Lang lit a spare candle he had brought and walked around the lobby, finally finding it in the shadows at the corner of the stairs.

It stood there, motionless, its eye sockets empty.

Zhou Lang stopped, pondering. This thing was like a normal servant during the day, but became a decoration at night. The key question was whether it was a guard of the manor or part of it. If it was a guard, it would stop him; if it was a component, he could use it.

He tentatively took two steps forward.

The butler wasn't killed.

Two more steps.

Still nothing.

Zhou Lang reached out and grasped the hand that hung by its side. It was cold, hard, and the fingers were long. He felt a sense of relief—he'd made the right bet; this was the spare part.

Without lingering, he dragged the butler down the stairs. The thing was ridiculously light, like dragging a clothes rack.

Zhao Qiang, seeing Zhou Lang dragging the butler down from below, nearly fainted. "You...how did you get him down here?!"

"Use its hand." Zhou Lang dragged the butler to the stone gate and grabbed its hand, pressing it into the groove.

Perfectly fitted.

A muffled thud came from inside the stone gate, which slowly parted to both sides.

Behind the door was a room. In the center of the room was a bed, and on the bed lay a person—a real person, whose chest was still rising and falling.

None of the three spoke.

He was a middle-aged man, well-dressed, with his eyes closed, as if asleep. He wore a chain around his neck, the end of which was attached to an iron ring at the head of the bed.

"Is this... the owner of the manor?" Han Yingying asked in a low voice.

Zhou Lang stared at the man for a while. He suddenly understood the intricacies of this manor. The butler wasn't the master, but a servant. The real master was locked here, asleep, or rather, trapped. All the evaluations, salaries, and rules in the manor were set by this sleeping man, yet he himself couldn't change them.

"Interesting." Zhou Lang squatted down and looked at the chain around the man's neck. There was also a lock on the chain, which was more exquisite than the previous two.

This is the third lock.

"Zhou Lang," Zhao Qiang swallowed hard, "should we let him go?"

"Don't rush," Zhou Lang waved his hand. He was thinking about something—he didn't enter this instance to be a good person. He came to find clues. His sister's last words before she disappeared were related to this kind of "being trapped in self-made rules."

He leaned down, getting closer to the sleeping person. "Hey, wake up."

The person's eyelashes fluttered, but their eyes remained closed.

Zhou Lang patted his face again. "Your manor's butler is taking good care of the guests. It's just that you're locked up here."

The man made a sound in his throat, as if he hadn't spoken in a long time.

"Do you want to go out, or do you want to continue sleeping?" Zhou Lang asked directly.

Han Ying watched Zhou Lang from the side, feeling a little apprehensive. Not afraid of the sleeping person, but afraid of Zhou Lang himself. Other players entering the dungeon would avoid anything eerie, but he, on the other hand, actively dragged the manor owner out for a chat. She had met Zhou Lang a few times, and each time she felt that the twists and turns in his mind were more convoluted than the dungeon itself.

The person on the bed finally opened their eyes.

The pupils were cloudy and grayish-white.

He looked at Zhou Lang, his lips moved for a long time before he finally managed to squeeze out a few words: "The...key...is...in the butler's...stomach."

Zhao Qiang cried out "Oh my god!" and retreated to the corner.

Zhou Lang glanced back at the butler he had dragged down, then at the chainsaw in his hand.

He stood up and picked up the chainsaw.

"Then take it out."

Chapter Two: What's in the Butler's Stomach

The moment the chainsaw went off, Zhao Qiang covered his ears.

Without hesitation, Zhou Lang sawed into the butler's abdomen. There was no blood, and the cut surface was grayish-black, filled with all sorts of random things—rags, hay, a few copper coins, and a brass key.

"It really is inside." Han Yingying leaned closer, somewhat surprised.

Zhou Lang pried the key out and wiped it on his clothes. He hadn't held back at all when he sawed it off, but he had been on edge the whole time. He wasn't sure if killing the butler would trigger any punishment. Once he finished sawing, the manor hadn't collapsed, and no ghosts had rushed in; only then did he finally breathe a sigh of relief.

"Just as I thought," he muttered to himself.

"What do you mean, 'as expected'?" Zhao Qiang asked, leaning closer.

"The manor owner is locked up himself, and the butler is someone he created, with the key hidden inside the butler's stomach—he's protecting himself from this." Zhou Lang inserted the key into the lock on the man's neck. "He doesn't want to be released, yet he's provided a way for him to be released. It's very contradictory."

The person on the bed moved their cloudy eyes upon hearing this.

The lock is open.

The chain clattered to the ground.

The man didn't get up immediately. He lay there, staring at the ceiling, and after a long while, he spoke. His voice was clearer than before.

"I built this estate for my daughter."

None of the three interrupted him.

"She's gone. From illness. I don't want to live anymore, but I can't bear to leave this house." The man's hand touched the edge of the bed. "I've turned myself into this—a housekeeper, rules, judgments… I want the house to always be inhabited, always lively. Even if it's not her who moves in."

Zhao Qiang's eyes welled up with tears. He was a soft-hearted person, and he couldn't hold back his emotions once he got involved in other people's stories.

Zhou Lang stood to the side, his face expressionless. He listened, but his mind was racing with another thought—this man said he had transformed himself "like this." In other words, the owner of the manor could change. Then, could the control of the manor also change?

"What do you want now?" Zhou Lang asked.