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

"The next game, we bring in a different group, and the game after that, we bring in another group," she said. "The whole schedule is the problem, not just one game."

Zhou Lang didn't respond; there was no need to respond. He was stating the truth, and everyone knew it.

The second guild was disqualified directly due to its use of prohibited weapons, allowing the X guild to advance to the next round without a fight.

Chen Bo stayed in the medical ward for a week. His wound was treated very cleanly, but a puncture wound that deep takes time to heal; it can't be rushed. The day he came out, the first thing he did upon opening the door was to ask Zhao Ran, "What are we eating today?"

Zhao Ran held up a lunchbox. "Chicken soup."

"I want to eat meat."

"There's meat down there."

"...Okay, I'll reluctantly."

Zhao Qiang moved a chair over and sat down next to him. "Why didn't you dodge then?"

Chen Bo picked up a piece of meat, "If you dodge, Sister Han will get hit."

"But you yourself—"

"No buts." Chen Bo put down his chopsticks and looked at Zhao Qiang seriously. "That's it. There's no other reason. It's only right to stand in front. If I were Sister Han, I would have stood in front too. You would have done the same. It's all the same."

Zhao Qiang remained silent.

"Don't make that face," Chen Bo picked up his chopsticks again. "You're still alive, isn't it better to live well?"

In the next two matches, the tournament organizers made perfect arrangements. The opponents were better prepared than ever, and their underhanded tactics off the field were endless. On one occasion, they even attacked Zhao Ran directly outside the arena. Zhao Ran blocked their attack, but he was left with a cut on his face.

None of the six players lost a single game.

Zhou Lang and Han Yingying entered the arena through a special channel. Together with Chen Bo and the other two, they played steadily in every match, without gambling or taking risks, taking one point at a time. Even if they played slowly, they never gave the opponent any real opportunities.

On the day the notification for the final round came down, Chen Bo had just had his bandages removed. He looked at his profile through the window of the conference room and said, "I look kind of imposing like this."

Zhao Ran glanced in his direction. "Scarface."

"The Mark of a Hero".

"Whatever."

The X Guild is on the final list, along with three other teams from different regions. All three are the best teams to qualify from the tournament, and none of them are easy to beat.

But something came before the final.

The notification for the SSS-level dungeon entrance was sent out on the same day the finalists were announced. A blue system panel popped up in front of all the finalists, and the format was unlike any previous notification. The borders were heavy, carrying an inexplicable sense of oppression.

Zhou Lang stared at the notice for a long time.

Han Yingying was next to him. After reading the notification, she put the panel away without saying a word.

Both of them knew that the guild competition had come to an end, but what was truly to come was only just beginning. #Chapter Six

At the end of the stairs, a stone door was half-open, with a dark red light leaking from the crack.

It wasn't like fire, but more like something seeping out of the stone itself, carrying a kind of inexplicable rotten smell.

Zhou Lang raised the oil lamp higher, the green and dark red light overlapping, finally making the things on the wall clear—not murals, but carvings, densely packed from the floor to the ceiling, each one looking as if someone had painstakingly dug them out with fingernails. Zhou Lang leaned closer to look; there were words within the carvings, crooked and barely legible:

"On the first day, I thought it was just a nightmare."

"On the seventh day, the door could not be opened."

"On the fifteenth day, do not trust the housekeeper."

The handwriting became increasingly messy as it went on, with the strokes falling apart. The last few lines turned into scratches, and then there was nothing at all.

"Who wrote this?" Zhao Qiang stood against the other wall, his legs trembling slightly.

"Former tenant," Zhou Lang said, turning his gaze away, "or rather, former employee."

Zhao Qiang: "...Can you be serious for once?"

"I'm very serious."

As the two were talking, Han Yingying pushed open the stone door, glanced inside, and said, "Come on in."

Behind the stone gate was a large, circular hall with a high ceiling, spanning two stories. In the center of the hall stood a stone pillar, something wrapped around it, motionless in the dim red light. Zhou Lang raised the oil lamp in that direction—the moment the green light shone upon it, the thing moved.

It's not a ghost, it's a person.

To be precise, it was a mummified corpse. Its hands were chained behind a pillar, its head drooping, its hair covering most of its face, and its clothes were tattered into shreds, but the style of the collar was still recognizable—a butler's uniform.

"This is..." Zhao Qiang took a half step back.

"The former butler," Zhou Lang circled the pillar, where there was a circle of runes on the ground radiating outwards from the base of the pillar, with dark red light flowing outwards from within, "was tied here to maintain the operation of the manor. The butler was parasitic on the manor, and this corpse was the host. It died, but the manor still exists, and the butler continues to use it as fuel."

Han Yingying looked up. In the center of the dome was a structure resembling an altar, corresponding to the pillars above and below. "What will happen to the manor if we get rid of this?"

"It's collapsed."

"Kill the butler?"

"Losing its foundation, it's gone." Zhou Lang took out a chainsaw from his pocket.

Zhao Qiang stared at him warily. "What are you going to do?"

"Cut the chain."

"...Could you have given me a heads-up beforehand?"

With a whirring start, the question remained unanswered. The sawing echoed through the rotunda, shaking down the spiderwebs on the ceiling. The desiccated corpse's hair billowed in the air, revealing its withered face—mouth agape, eyebrows furrowed, frozen in the moment of its scream.

Zhao Qiang jumped back two steps, yelling, "Damn!"

Han Yingying covered her ears. "Is it really that hard to say hello?!"

Zhou Lang's chainsaw sliced ​​along the chain, and with a snap, the chain broke in two and fell to the ground with a thud. He instinctively braced the dried corpse, allowing it to slide down slowly instead of shattering.

The dark red light began to fade. The rune circles went out from the outer edge inwards, dimming one by one, until only a single point of light remained in the center, which trembled and then went out.

The hall fell completely silent; even Zhao Qiang's breathing could be clearly heard.

A system notification sound followed—

[Player detected damaging the core node of the manor.]

[Hidden Quest Triggered: The End. Quest Rating: Perfect.]

[Reward: 600 Weird Coins, 2 random items, 3 attribute points.]

[WARNING: The manor owner has sensed something amiss. Players are advised to evacuate immediately.]

"This warning is serious," Zhou Lang swiped away from the system interface, "Run."

"What—"

"The butler is here, run!"

The three of them rushed towards the stairwell at the same time. Zhao Qiang ran first, his pace unexpectedly fast. Han Yingying followed behind, shouting, "Zhao Qiang, wait for us!"

"You have long legs, so run faster yourself—"

There was movement behind him, not like human footsteps, but a low, rumbling sound, like something enormous moving. Zhou Lang glanced back—

The butler appeared at the entrance of the hall. His humanoid shell collapsed from the cracks, and black liquid seeped out along the cracks. The whole thing began to expand and deform, swelling into an irregular black mass. The pair of empty eyes hung above, and something was flowing inside them.