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

"I'm fine," Zhou Lang said, but his voice was very weak.

Emily walked over, looked at Zhou Lang, and for the first time, a complex emotion appeared in her eyes.

"Why?" she asked. "Why did you save me?"

"Because you helped me," Zhou Lang said, "and...you're also a victim."

Emily fell silent.

"Thank you," she finally said.

She reached out and placed her hand on Zhou Lang's wound. A warm energy flowed into Zhou Lang's body, and the wound began to heal.

"This is the last thing I can do," Emily said. "Edward is dead, and it's time for me to go too."

"Go?" Han Yingying asked, puzzled.

"My soul was imprisoned by him for over a hundred years, but now that he's dead, I'm finally free." Emily smiled, a genuine smile. "I can go where I belong now."

Her body began to become transparent.

"Goodbye," she said. "Thank you."

Then she disappeared, as if she had never existed.

Only Zhou Lang, Zhao Qiang, and Han Yingying remained in the room.

"Is it over?" Zhao Qiang asked cautiously.

Zhou Lang stood up and walked to the window.

It was already daylight.

Sunlight streamed into the room, dispelling all the darkness.

"It's over," Zhou Lang said.

Congratulations to the player for completing the dungeon: Horror Manor!

[Rating: SSS]

[Rewards: 5000 game coins, 1 special item, 3 skill points]

[Bonus Reward: Defeat the final boss of the dungeon to obtain the title "Godslayer"]

All three people heard the system notification at the same time.

"SSS rating!" Zhao Qiang jumped up excitedly, "We got an SSS rating!"

Han Yingying also breathed a sigh of relief and a smile appeared on her face.

Only Zhou Lang remained expressionless, staring at the system panel.

[Special Item: Edward's Diary]

[Note: This record documents the entire process of Edward's immortality ritual and a secret he discovers.]

Zhou Lang opened the diary and turned to the last page.

The text above reads:

"I finally understand, this world is fake. We are all toys of some being, trapped in this game, never to escape. Unless..."

The writing at the end was blurry and illegible, making it impossible to decipher what it said.

Zhou Lang stared at the line of text, his brows furrowed.

"Zhou Lang?" Han Yingying noticed his expression. "What's wrong?"

"It's nothing." Zhou Lang closed the diary, put it into his inventory, and said, "Let's go."

The three people walked out of the room, down the stairs, and out of the manor.

The sunlight felt warm and real on my skin.

But a chill ran through Zhou Lang's heart.

Edward's words echoed in his mind: This world is fake.

If this is true, then what is the point of everything they are doing now?

"Zhou Lang, what are you thinking about?" Han Yingying asked.

"It's nothing." Zhou Lang shook his head. "Let's go, it's time to go back."

A flash of white light, and the three people disappeared at the manor gate.

---

Back in the real world, Zhou Lang opened his eyes and found himself lying in bed.

Outside the window is the familiar city, bustling with traffic and people coming and going.

He sat up and looked at his phone.

Time displayed: March 15, 2024, 8:3 AM.

Only one night had passed since he entered the game.

Zhou Lang walked to the window and looked down at the street.

Everything was normal, as if nothing had happened.

But he knew that everything had changed.

My phone suddenly rang.

Zhou Lang picked it up; it was an unfamiliar number.

"Feed?"

"Hello, Mr. Zhou Lang." A female voice came from the other end of the phone. "I am a recruitment specialist from the Apocalypse Guild. I would like to invite you to join our guild."

"Sorry, I'm not interested." Zhou Lang prepared to hang up the phone.

"Please wait a moment!" the woman said hurriedly, "We can offer very favorable terms, including..."

"I told you, I'm not interested." Zhou Lang hung up the phone.

The phone rang again.

This time it's a different guild.

Zhou Lang hung up immediately.

Then came the third, the fourth, the fifth...

Throughout the morning, Zhou Lang received more than a dozen phone calls, all of them recruitment invitations from various guilds.

He refused them all.

At noon, Han Yingying called.

"Zhou Lang, you've received a lot of invitations from guilds, haven't you?"

"Um."

"I refused them all," Han Yingying said. "I don't think joining a guild is a good idea."

Why?

"Because..." Han Yingying paused, "I always felt that those guilds had ulterior motives. Besides, I prefer to act with you guys."

Zhou Lang paused for a moment, then said, "Me too."

"Then it's settled." Han Yingying's voice was filled with laughter. "Next time, we'll do it together again."

"it is good."

After hanging up the phone, Zhou Lang lay back down on the bed.

He closed his eyes, and the sentence from Edward's diary came to mind: This world is fake.

If this is true...

Zhou Lang opened his eyes and looked at the ceiling.

Then he must find out the truth.

No matter the cost.

When the dungeon settlement interface popped up, Zhou Lang was squatting in a corner of the basement studying a ceramic cat.

The cat sat in the corner, covered in dust, but its base had fresh scratches—not from wear and tear, but deliberately engraved with dates. He memorized the dates before turning his attention to the interface suspended in mid-air.

Congratulations to player "浪里个浪" for completing the "Deep Mansion" dungeon!

Overall Rating: S+

[Rewards: 2000 Game Coins, 1 Special Item, SS-Rank Dungeon Unlock Access]

He took two extra seconds to look at the last line.

SS level.

This level isn't entirely unknown within the player community; the only information available is: "Already unlocked by a player, no survival records." The logic behind the second half is self-evident—it's not that no one remembers, it's that no one has survived to come back and record it.

"Does your checkout screen have any extra items?" he asked.

Han Yingying glanced at her screen: "SS-level dungeon unlock permission".

After listening for a moment, Zhao Qiang paused and asked, "What's the survival rate?"

"question mark."

What does the question mark mean?

"No data available."

"What does it mean if there's no data?"

Zhou Lang glanced at him but didn't reply. Zhao Qiang deduced the logic himself, and once he did, his expression turned sour. He stammered and stopped asking questions.

At this moment, the system pushed a new notification: Guild Competition, starting in thirty days, where guilds will compete based on points, and the annual ranking will determine the allocation of resources for the next round of dungeons. The rules were long, but Zhou Lang only focused on two key points—players without a guild were high-value recruitment targets, and the top-ranked guilds had absolute first-mover advantage in the annual dungeon.

Plain language translation: The big fish are about to start taking over territory.

Less than five minutes after leaving the instance, I received seven recruitment invitations.

Zhou Lang casually flipped through the pages and noticed something: the Second Union was not among them.

Having self-awareness is indeed a sign of intelligence.

The other major guilds weren't so polite; guild invitations poured into Han Yingying's influx. Her method for handling those messages was simple: scan each one for no more than three seconds, then decline, and move on to the next. The recruitment manager of the Seventh Guild followed up with a message: "Ms. Han, solo players are in a very passive position during the competition, and we are very sincere..."