Recaps

Xu Huo arrived in District 033’s administrative capital and observed its advanced public transport, widespread machinery, and openness about Dungeons and body modification. He learned about the district’s harsh public punishments before a young woman invited him to join a group Dungeon exploration.

• Xu Huo used a public transport portal to travel from Black Jade Station to District 033’s administrative capital.
• Xu Huo bought a low-altitude flying vehicle and saw how commonplace robots, mechanical prosthetics, and body-modification treatments were.
• Xu Huo noticed that District 033 openly advertised Dungeons and that player organizations recruited ordinary people for group explorations.
• Xu Huo read about District 033’s public executions and learned that a B-class Player had been sentenced to three hours of extreme punishment for accidentally killing three residents.
• A young woman invited Xu Huo to join her research institute’s Dungeon exploration team in exchange for equipment and payment.

Xu Huo explored District 033, survived an ambush by a mechanical monkey, and joined the Zisheng Research Institute’s team to investigate a newly appeared sealed A-class Dungeon. He arrived at the abandoned Medical Research Institute with his teammates and received instructions before their entry.

• Xu Huo learned that Players in District 033 commonly took paid jobs and received ten invitations from local organizations.
• An unseen Player slowed Xu Huo and attacked him with a mechanical monkey, but Xu Huo shattered it and the attacker escaped through a portal.
• Xu Huo agreed to join the Zisheng Research Institute’s exploration of a new sealed Dungeon and chose two teammates.
• Xu Huo arrived at the abandoned Medical Research Institute and listened as the liaison explained the Dungeon’s risks, equipment, and entry schedule.
• A frail female Player questioned the lack of detailed records about the Players who had cleared the Dungeon previously.

Xu Huo prepared to explore the A-class space instance “Small Compartment” with Yue Yan'er and Wang Xin, despite warnings about its dangers. After entering the Medical Research Institute, the players stayed together, and Xu Huo's group joined Shen Ling'er's team before triggering the instance.

• The liaison warned the players that those who had entered the instance earlier had died, and the players discussed its risks and their exploration plans.
• Xu Huo packed equipment and items while Yue Yan'er and other players advised him about the dangers of pioneering an A-class instance.
• A second player organization arrived, and the liaison urged everyone to follow the instance's rules and avoid reckless actions.
• Xu Huo entered the Medical Research Institute with Yue Yan'er and Wang Xin, and the surroundings changed into a gray-black, empty space.
• Wang Xin's group joined Shen Linger's team, and the six players explored the institute's left side until they crossed scorched ground and triggered the “Small Compartment” instance.

Xu Huo and five other Players inspected the He Xin Medical Research Institute, studied its rules, and searched for clues to the Dungeon’s clearance tasks. After finding bone ash and an old work schedule, they descended into the basement and discovered that its deeper levels felt very different.

• Wang Xin, Shen Ling’er, and the other Players discussed the Dungeon rules and agreed to inspect the institute and search for Small Compartments before nightfall.
• Wang Xin found bone ash in the dust, and the group speculated that Players who broke the rules might have been killed and burned.
• Wang Xin warned Xu Huo that A-class Dungeon Bosses hunted Players, while Xu Huo sensed complicated spatial barriers but no immediate danger.
• The group searched the west side, found old documents and part of the institute’s work schedule, and decided to clean between six and eight in the morning.
• The Players explored the first two basement levels, which contained laboratories, then continued down to the third, fourth, and fifth levels, where the surroundings felt different.

Xu Huo and the other Players investigated the research institute and discovered that people were vanishing near the underground laboratory’s Elevator Shaft amid brief spatial fluctuations. The teams suspected the Dungeon’s “Small Compartment” involved the laboratory and planned to wait until night, while a woman suggested letting the Bailin Association face the danger first.

• As Xu Huo’s group left Underground Level 1, a burst of dust swept Leike away, and Yue Yan'er sent a robot to inspect the area.
• Xu Huo and the others learned that Players from two other teams had also vanished near the Elevator Shaft, including one who disappeared after falling into it.
• Xu Huo sensed a brief spatial fluctuation when Leike disappeared, and Wang Xin proposed marking the disappearance sites to look for a pattern.
• A purple-haired man theorized that the Dungeon Boss had limits on where and when it could appear, and the Players suspected the underground laboratory was the “Small Compartment.”
• A woman wearing a Ruby necklace suggested avoiding the Dungeon Boss and letting the Bailin Association take the risk as its members arrived at the main entrance.

Players from the Bailin Association recruited three Super Evolvers while the others investigated the research institute and waited for the Dungeon’s spaces to intersect. Two pursued players burst from the basement, and the black-haired woman ran to Xu Huo for help.

• The Bailin Association declined to explore the buildings in person and invited Spatial Evolution users to join its strategy team, prompting three Super Evolvers to leave the Zisheng Research Institute group.
• A powerful spatial fluctuation erupted from the central building, drawing players toward its basement.
• The black-haired woman and a blond man rushed out of the atrium while the Ruby necklace and other players pursued them for an item.
• The Zisheng Research Institute players intervened, but the pursuers captured the blond man and cornered the black-haired woman.
• The black-haired woman spotted Xu Huo, changed direction, and called, "Brother, save me!"

Xu Huo tested a Space Artifact called Knock If You Need Something, which strengthened the destructive force of Spatial Evolution but could only open passages in unstable spaces. After the Bailin Association killed the blond man, Xu Huo questioned the black-haired woman about the Dungeon and learned that its other space was nearly identical.

• The black-haired woman offered Xu Huo a finger cot Space Artifact in exchange for protection, and the blond man revealed that it had helped them escape through a passage between spaces.
• Shen Ling'er stopped Xing Xiaoyu from taking the finger cot, and the silver-armored woman forced the blond man to give it up before Xu Huo put it on.
• Xu Huo tested the artifact and found that it amplified his Space Power but could not open a passage from a sealed space to the outside.
• The silver-armored woman’s group killed the blond man and returned to the east-side building, while Xing Xiaoyu complained that Xu Huo had received the artifact for free.
• Xu Huo asked the black-haired woman about the Dungeon, and she said she had entered half a day earlier and that the other space looked exactly like this one.

The players debated the Hexin Research Institute’s history and how to stop it operating, but they found no clear plan for clearing the Dungeon. They agreed to keep the idea of staying outside the Small Compartment as a backup and took Xu Huo’s passage-opening item from him for safekeeping.

• Wang Xin explained that players had ransacked the Hexin Research Institute, forcing its owner to sell the remaining assets and leave the land vacant.
• Shen Ling'er suggested that the Research Institute might stop operating if everyone who had entered the Small Compartment were killed, and the buzz-cut, middle-aged man proposed gathering players from other spaces to test the idea.
• Xing Xiaoyu warned that staying outside the Small Compartment could be dangerous, and the purple-haired man recommended keeping the proposal as a backup plan.
• Xing Xiaoyu said Xu Huo might take his item and leave, so Wang Xin asked him to hand it over for safekeeping.
• Xu Huo gave Wang Xin the finger guard, and the black-haired woman asked Yue Yan'er whether she knew how to use her equipment.

As the research institute’s spaces rippled at eight o’clock, players rushed to hide in Small Compartments, and Xu Huo discovered that the Dungeon’s boss could erase people with an unstoppable spatial attack. He led his group into the basement, where a stranger warned them that anyone who entered could never leave.

• Que Niao joined Xu Huo’s group and told him that an old man from their train had entered the Dungeon, too.
• At eight o’clock, Space Power sealed rooms into Small Compartments, trapping anyone inside and forcing players to scramble for shelter.
• Xu Huo’s group fought Bailin Association players over an empty room, but an unfamiliar player pushed them away and shut himself inside.
• Xu Huo sensed a player being reduced to dust by the Dungeon’s spatial power and decided to lead his group to the basement.
• On the fifth basement level, an unfamiliar player appeared and warned Xu Huo’s group that once they entered, they could never leave.

Xu Huo and the others sealed themselves inside a Small Compartment and discussed why Players might be targeted at the Research Institute. While searching the room, they heard unexplained footsteps pass their door twice and head toward the Elevator Shaft.

• Yue Yan'er, Wang Xin, and Xu Huo stopped an unfamiliar Player from entering the room, allowing Sparrow and the others to get inside before the Player left.
• Xu Huo, Wang Xin, Yue Yan'er, and Sparrow debated whether the Small Compartments were safe and whether reducing the number of Players could stop the Research Institute from operating.
• Xu Huo placed the Cube Space by a wall while searching for newly formed items in the compartment.
• The group heard deliberate footsteps approach, pass their door, and return before heading toward the Elevator Shaft.
• Wang Xin speculated that the footsteps belonged to someone inspecting the Research Institute's human test subjects.

Xu Huo used the finger cot to open portals in the Small Compartment wall, finding a one-time item and briefly connecting to another space. After midnight, the compartment doors opened, and Players began exploring and marking doors.

• Xu Huo opened a portal in the wall and retrieved the Despair Armor, a one-time item, while Sparrow and the others agreed he should keep it.
• Xu Huo opened another portal, kicked a short old man who tried to squeeze through, and let the portal close.
• After midnight, the Players' perception expanded and the Small Compartment door opened.
• Players began leaving their rooms, and Xu Huo saw one mark doors before two Bailin Association Players noticed the scratches and wondered what they meant.

Xu Huo and his companions pieced together how the research institute’s spaces and compartments behaved at night while reviewing their recordings. They stayed hidden on the first night, but learned that the Dungeon Boss could appear unpredictably and that players were dying even before its footsteps began.

• Wang Xin, Yue Yan'er, Sparrow, and Xu Huo concluded that compartments overlapped across at least three spaces and that players could cross between them through portals after midnight.
• Yue Yan'er reviewed footage showing the Dungeon Boss patrolling the west-side building, while devices failed after capturing footsteps and players moving between spaces.
• Xu Huo advised the group to stay in their compartment rather than risk meeting the Dungeon Boss outside, and Yue Yan'er sent out more Flying Devices.
• Yue Yan'er asked a Zisheng Research Institute player about a dead player's belongings, and he said his biological detector recorded the death at 10:13, before the footsteps began around 10:30.
• Sparrow noted that the times when devices were destroyed could provide clues, but the middle-aged man with the crew cut said spatial fluctuations could also break devices.

Xu Huo and his companions investigated how Space Portals connected the Small Compartments, then emerged at dawn to find seven Players missing and signs that the Dungeon Boss had killed at least ten. The short old man tried to turn the other Players against Xu Huo’s group, and the bird warned that he was a powerful Mental Evolver.

• Yue Yan'er’s device was destroyed by Space Power after two Players entered another space through a Fourth Floor fire door.
• Xu Huo and the others discussed how Space Portals worked and decided to ask the other Players what they had discovered.
• At dawn, Xu Huo observed the Players leaving their Small Compartments and noticed that seven Players were missing.
• The Zisheng Research Institute and the Bailin Association found at least six piles of dust that appeared to be dead Players’ remains.
• The short old man told Shen Ling'er’s group that Xu Huo’s companions had opened a Space Portal but refused to let him through, turning other Players’ hostility toward them.
• The bird warned Xu Huo’s group that the old man was a powerful Mental Evolver who had previously incited conflicts between Player groups.

Players fought over the Artifact in Xu Huo’s possession while he and Yue Yan’er battled the Ruby necklace, Xing Xiaoyu, and the tall white-haired man. Xu Huo lured Xing Xiaoyu into the basement, where she found him waiting in a dark corridor.

• The Ruby necklace demanded that Xu Huo share the Artifact, and the Players split into opposing sides as the Bailin Association watched from a nearby building.
• Xing Xiaoyu, the Ruby necklace, and the tall white-haired man attacked Xu Huo and Yue Yan’er, who fought back with Artifacts and spatial abilities.
• The Ruby necklace trapped Yue Yan’er in a kneeling position and sealed her inside barriers filled with poisonous smoke, but Xu Huo wounded the tall white-haired man and freed her.
• Xing Xiaoyu ambushed Xu Huo with spatial attacks and a cursed doll, but he blocked her assault and retreated into the building.
• Xing Xiaoyu pursued Xu Huo through the Elevator Shaft to the third basement level, where she found him waiting at the end of a dim corridor.

Xu Huo killed Xing Xiaoyu during the fight over the item, and the surviving Players exchanged what little they knew about the Dungeon. Xu Huo concluded that the earliest Players had likely all been killed, leaving the Dungeon’s true dangers and rules unresolved.

• Xu Huo used mental force, Time Power, and Spatial Cutline to kill Xing Xiaoyu after she pursued him.
• The battle near the Dungeon ended in a truce after the Bailin Association intervened, and Xu Huo claimed Xing Xiaoyu had fallen into another space.
• The Players reconsidered Xu Huo’s strength, while the Bailin Association watched him and the Zisheng Research Institute sought information from its members.
• Shen Ling'er and Wang Xin questioned the Bailin Association about the Dungeon’s spaces, its deaths, and how to clear it, but learned few concrete clues.
• Xu Huo reasoned that the Dungeon had been open for about a month and that the earliest Players had probably already died.

Xu Huo and the other players endured another night in the Small Compartments as the mysterious footsteps patrolled the corridor. The footsteps stopped briefly outside one room, leaving the players unsure whether the pause signaled danger as they emerged at midnight to retrieve their damaged devices.

• The purple-haired man suggested that players could complete the first clearance task by killing enough people to force the research institute to stop operating.
• The short old man tried to plant a mental suggestion in Xu Huo's mind while he slept, but Xu Huo pretended not to notice.
• At eight o'clock, Xu Huo, Wang Xin, and Yue Yan'er secured a first-floor Small Compartment, and three Bailin Association players crowded inside with them.
• The footsteps returned less than twenty minutes after the door closed, passed the players' room, and briefly stopped before continuing their patrol.
• After the Small Compartment doors opened at midnight, Yue Yan'er retrieved three nearby devices and complained that her camera had been ruined.

Xu Huo and the others found that every surveillance device had been destroyed after recording events up to 8:30, so he resumed investigating the Dungeon in person. A Space Portal then separated Xu Huo and several Players, leaving Sparrow and two Bailin Association members together before Xu Huo called to them from outside their compartment.

• Yue Yan'er showed Xu Huo and the others instant-camera photos and footage that all ended at 8:30, after which every device had been damaged.
• Xu Huo concluded that equipment could not reveal more and searched the Dungeon, finding unfamiliar Players and learning that Players sometimes killed others by making noise outside Small Compartments.
• A Space Portal appeared on Underground Level 4, and the older of two Players vanished after grabbing its shard of glass.
• Space Power fluctuations caused Xu Huo to disappear, and the nearby Players entered a Small Compartment but became separated across different spaces.
• Xu Huo knocked on the compartment door and told Sparrow and the two Bailin Association members that it was him.

Xu Huo weighed the Dungeon Boss’s hunting rules while the group searched the research institute for items. After a Player made noise and was reduced to ash, the Dungeon Boss attacked nearby Players, leaving the survivors scrambling for Small Compartments.

• Xu Huo reunited with Sparrow, Wang Xin, and Yue Yan'er after several members of Sparrow’s group vanished into different spaces.
• Xu Huo argued that group size alone did not determine who the Dungeon Boss hunted, while privately reasoning that Small Compartments must have a limit on how many people they could protect.
• Xu Huo considered making noise to test the Dungeon Boss’s rules, but a scream rang out from the east building and the institute shook as Space Power surged.
• The Player who had made the noise crumbled to ash in front of everyone.
• Two Players who fell behind while fleeing to the Small Compartments were killed in quick succession.

After the Dungeon Boss killed seven Players, the survivors learned that breaking the dungeon’s rules could disrupt its usual activity and put anyone nearby in danger. Xu Huo urged his group to split up the next night, while the Bailin Association revealed one of the Boss’s patterns in exchange for an item.

• The Dungeon Boss killed seven Players in a Small Compartment, and the survivors realized that having too many people in a room could trigger an attack.
• Yue Yan'er sent her mini robot through the west building, but its video feed cut out near a glass marble that seemed to be an item.
• After the Small Compartments opened at six in the morning, Xu Huo said his group would have to split up that night.
• Players argued with the Bailin Association over its test of the dungeon rules, and the silver-armored woman traded the Boss’s activity pattern for a door knocker.
• The silver-armored woman said the Dungeon Boss usually patrolled outside from eight at night to midnight and from four to six in the morning, but rule-breaking could override that pattern.

The Players analyzed the Dungeon Boss’s hunting patterns and debated how to clear the Dungeon. Xu Huo proposed reducing the number of Players until the Dungeon was cleared, but the group had not yet tested the theory.

• The Players ranked noise, overcrowding the Small Compartment, and leaving it at night as risks, and Shen Ling’er warned that the Dungeon Boss might have no limit on how many Players it could kill.
• Wang Xin invited Xu Huo to explore the building, but the bearded man from the Bailin Association demanded that Xu Huo hand over his item for entering other spaces before leaving.
• Xu Huo suggested keeping everyone out of Small Compartments after midnight and killing Players in other spaces who had entered one, but the nose-pierced woman objected that those outside would be trapped during the sealed hours.
• Xu Huo proposed destroying the Dungeon grounds as another possible way to stop the Institute, but the silver-armored woman warned that it could collapse the unstable space and kill them all.
• Xu Huo argued that the Dungeon’s clear condition was likely tied to reducing the number of Players below the ten that had remained inside since it opened, and he said they should keep reducing the number until they cleared it.

Xu Huo proposed reducing the Dungeon’s population to test more rules, then gathered a group to search the central building and prepare experiments involving the Dungeon Boss. He left the group planning to use small items to attract the Boss and test its behavior, despite the risks of provoking the Bailin Association.

• Xu Huo proposed that the Players reduce the Dungeon’s population and suggested using items that could open passages between spaces to exploit the Dungeon Boss’s absence.
• Xu Huo invited Sparrow and the bearded man to search the central building, but the bearded man stayed behind as Xu Huo walked past his followers; Wang Xin, Yue Yan'er, Sparrow, and others followed him inside.
• Xu Huo found that someone had taken the robot and glass-bead item he had left at a Space Power hotspot the previous day.
• Xu Huo told Sparrow they shared a goal in opposing the bearded man and asked Yue Yan'er for small items that could attract the Dungeon Boss or help test the rules.
• Yue Yan'er proposed using the items to lure the Boss and test whether it would attack people in a Small Compartment when no one broke a rule.

Xu Huo discovered a hidden notebook in the Hexin Research Institute that linked the test subjects’ disappearances to the Dungeon Boss’s patrol schedule. After a hostile player attacked him, Xu Huo restrained him and warned him against trying to escape.

• Wang Xin said the Zisheng Research Institute players should avoid the Bailin Association rather than risk weakening their group or provoking retaliation.
• Xu Huo found a large Space Portal in the east-side building and fell through with Yue Yan'er, the sparrow, and the silver-armored woman, but they landed in different places.
• Xu Huo used Space Rays to retrieve a hidden notebook describing numbered test subjects, their routines, and their nighttime disappearances.
• Xu Huo concluded that the notebook’s records matched the Dungeon Boss’s patrol schedule and suggested that players became test subjects when they entered the instance.
• When Xu Huo asked a nearby player how long he had been in the instance, the player attacked and fled, so Xu Huo broke through his barriers and suppressed the players with gravity.
• Xu Huo cornered the hostile player inside a spatial construct and warned that forcing his way out could injure him in the A-class instance.

Xu Huo questioned the trapped Players about the Dungeon’s rules and survival patterns, then learned that no one had found a reliable way to clear it. A new Player organization arrived to investigate the space, and its members opened a portal to what they believed was a second layer.

• Xu Huo forced six Players out of hiding by threatening to release his spatial power, then asked how long they had been inside and what they knew about the Dungeon.
• The six Players explained that older arrivals were more likely to be targeted, while Xu Huo reasoned that rule violations mattered more than time spent inside and that Players in different spaces could interact.
• A tall, thin Player claimed the only way to clear the Dungeon was to kill everyone, but the others doubted that was possible as more Players kept arriving.
• Players from another organization entered the research facility with instruments to measure spatial fluctuations, and one invited Cong Lei to join their operation.
• The newcomers used a Space Artifact to open a Space Portal and announced they had found a second layer of space.

Xu Huo, Cong Lei, and Black Eye entered another layer of the Dungeon, where they discovered discarded objects and evidence of the Hexin Research Institute’s experiments. A recovered terminal revealed Dr. He’s abuse of child test subjects, while the group found part of his remains; the layer’s connection to the institute’s hidden history remained unclear.

• Xu Huo invited Cong Lei and Black Eye to leave with him, and they agreed while the other four stayed behind.
• Xu Huo opened a portal in the eastern building and led Cong Lei and Black Eye into a layer filled with discarded equipment, daily necessities, and human remains.
• Cong Lei recovered a working terminal and played a recording of a boy apologizing to Dr. He for speaking with Subject 0234 and promising to give the children medicine.
• The terminal showed Dr. He describing the boy as his greatest masterpiece after 131 drug trials and boasting that the boy would become part of medical history.
• Cong Lei identified Dr. He as a former Hexin Research Institute researcher who had died during an attack, and Black Eye recognized the nearby half-skeleton as the rest of his remains.

Xu Huo, Cong Lei, and Black Eye entered a hidden layer of the Zisheng Research Institute and encountered the Dungeon Boss, a cloud of dust that hunted intruders. They escaped through a Space Portal, and Xu Huo decided to keep searching the other layers for missing people.

• Xu Huo and the others explored the basement, where they found human remains and ash from a player killed by the Dungeon Boss.
• A pile of ash became a dust shadow that began destroying objects and moving through the building, but a bell in the basement interrupted it and triggered its patrol.
• Xu Huo tried to retrieve the bell, but the Dungeon Boss reached it first; he used the Dungeon Owner Coupon to halt its advance and retreated to a Space Portal.
• Cong Lei, Black Eye, and Xu Huo escaped the hidden layer and met Yue Yan'er, Sparrow, and the silver-armored group in the deserted research institute.
• Xu Huo confirmed that the Dungeon had at least three layers of space and said he would continue searching for other people.