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

"How much of this can you understand?" Zhou Lang asked.

"Most of them." She went a step further than what she had said before, "I've seen similar record formats from other instances of the X Guild."

Which instance?

"I forgot, a long time ago."

Zhou Lang did not pursue the matter further.

He took a picture of the key information on the wall, then turned to Gu Xing: "What do you think?"

"The clues are real," Gu Xing said, "but the fact that someone planned this in advance, whether with good intentions or otherwise, is worth noting."

"understood."

Shen Kuo rummaged through a corner and found a small box containing a stone tablet engraved with runes. The system notification indicated that it was a core item for the dungeon, and finding it would complete the main quest.

The settlement interface appeared. Zhou Lang took one last look at the dense text at the bottom of the well, said nothing, and then disappeared with the interface.

---

After logging off, Han Yingying sat there for a long time.

Her memories had all returned, but this was even more troublesome than when she had amnesia—her current public identity, the "max-level master" revered by the entire gaming community, was herself. Zhou Lang was unaware of this.

She recalled Zhou Lang's demeanor as he reviewed the data in the basement, and his usual casualness when he refused the union's invitation—not out of indifference, but because he genuinely felt the matter wasn't worth the effort.

What would someone like that think if they knew that the person they've been partnering with is one of the biggest variables in the gaming community?

She didn't know the answer, so she didn't say anything. It wasn't because she didn't trust her; it was just that the time wasn't right yet.

My phone vibrated.

"Did he/she go offline?" — Zhou Lang.

"I'm offline."

"Did you write down the contents of that booklet?"

"most."

Send me a copy.

She hesitated for a second, then replied, "Are you going to stay up all night looking at data again?"

There was a brief silence on the other end before a three-word message was sent: "I'm used to it."

Han Yingying organized the document and sent it over.

The light from the streetlights outside the window was a little unstable, flickering twice before settling.

She stared at the ceiling, thinking about the line "It's too late" on the ledger, the dates on the list, and the increasingly frequent bizarre events in reality—everything was accelerating, but the direction was not yet completely clear.

However, there are now more clues.

There were at least more than yesterday, which is a good thing. #Chapter 31

The basement floor was much wider than the stairs suggested.

The green light of the oil lamp swept across the stone chamber, revealing old stone walls soaked in water. Dark brown, aged stains covered the floor, scattered haphazardly, not like an accident, but more like some kind of record. In the very center sat a coffin, its lid closed, with a fist-sized black stone pressing down on each of the four corners. The stones were engraved with runes, very old, so old that even the edges were worn rounded.

Zhou Lang stood on the last step, not in a hurry to go in, but first roughly scanned the stone chamber.

Zhao Qiang followed behind him, his voice low, "There's something inside."

"Coffins are for storing things," Zhou Lang said, holding a lamp as he walked inside.

Han Yingying walked around the coffin, squatted down and looked at the patterns on the black stone. "It's the same rune system as the wronged souls in the corridor. Someone who specializes in this stuff has worked on it."

"What's the use of knowing this?" Zhao Qiang asked.

"I don't know, I just said it offhand."

Zhou Lang placed the oil lamp on the ground and pushed the coffin lid open with both hands. "Come and help."

The three people exerted their strength at the same time, and the coffin lid was pushed open a crack. Black mist seeped out along the crack, like something that had been imprisoned for a long time breathing for the first time. It was hard to describe the smell, but it was old, oppressive, and had an indescribable sense of decay.

Zhao Qiang moved two steps to the side.

After the black mist dissipated, the thing in the coffin sat up. It wasn't struggling to crawl; it sat upright steadily, supporting itself against the coffin wall, just like someone who had woken up. But its appearance was really not suitable to be described as waking up—its skin was severely decayed, its bones were showing, and there were almost no intact muscles below its neck. Yet, its two eyeballs were intact, dark and bright, staring directly at Zhou Lang.

Zhao Qiang let out a very restrained cry and retreated to the stone wall. Han Yingying casually picked up a piece of gravel at her feet, without making a fuss, but took half a step back and held the gravel firmly in her hand.

Zhou Lang didn't move.

They stared at each other in silence for about five seconds. The thing moved its mouth, but no sound came out. However, the flame of the oil lamp on the ground shifted slightly to the right.

"You were the original owner of the manor," Zhou Lang said, not as a question.

The flames stopped moving. Zhou Lang interpreted this as...

"The one outside who killed the butler and sealed you?"

The flame was veering to the right.

"Is there anything in your coffin to counteract it?"

The thing reached out and slowly groped around at the bottom of the coffin for a while, then pulled out a key and handed it over. It was made of silver, a little smaller than a regular key, and engraved with runes identical to those on the black stone; it was clearly a matching set.

Zhou Lang took it, weighed it in his hand, and put it in his pocket.

"Wait, come and unseal it when you're done," he said to the thing in the coffin, then turned and walked towards the stairs. "Go up."

Zhao Qiang chased after it, glancing at the coffin twice along the way to make sure the thing had lay back down before looking away. "When you greet something that crawled out of the coffin, it's like asking for directions on the street."

"It's not a ghost, it's a corpse, two different kinds of things."

"What's the difference!"

"There's a big difference. Corpses can be used, but ghosts might not."

Zhao Qiang: ?

Back in the lobby, Zhou Lang stood in the middle, holding the key, and waited. After about three minutes, Butler Sha appeared out of thin air, walked towards them, and then saw the key.

It stopped.

The skeleton froze for two seconds, then began to disintegrate from the inside out—not shatter, but collapse inwards, as if something had been completely ripped away. The outer shell could no longer hold on and slowly crumbled to the ground. Finally, it landed on the floor as a pile of black ash, without a sound, without any lingering echo.

The lights in the lobby came on.

All the wronged souls in the manor vanished at the same time, the corridors became clean, and only the wind blew in from the open window.

The system then beeped:

[Dungeon "Terrifying Manor" Cleared - Overall Rating: Perfect]

[Zhou Lang: Perfect rating x4, obtained skill fragments x3, gold coins x800]

[Zhao Qiang: Excellent rating x4, Skill Fragment x1, Gold Coins x500]

[Han Yingying: Excellent rating x4, obtained skill fragment x1, gold coins x500]

Settlement complete, teleportation triggered, and the three returned to the starting area.

The starting area is a white rectangular space, always warm and bright. It's impossible to tell what time it is, or whether it's day or night. I always stop here to rest after leaving the dungeon. Usually, there are other players here who have just exited the dungeon.

Today is different. There are three people standing against the wall in the starting area. They don't look like they just came out of the dungeon. Their equipment is complete. They don't look like they are waiting for teleportation. They look like they are waiting for someone.