Fifth Floor

Back in the room, he picked up the candle and walked out the door for the third time.

The Bone Cleaver, Meat Grinder, and Electric Soldering Iron lay right before him, but he still didn't think to touch them—since he hadn't been to the Fifth Floor yet, he planned to scout it out first.

After all, unless absolutely necessary, no one in this world would willingly cut open their own body.

Fumbling around on himself for a while, Zhou You pulled a box of matches from his coat pocket, relit the candle, and then stepped toward the stairs.

One step, two steps, three steps, four steps... all the way to the Fourth Floor, the candle showed no change. But just as he set foot on the stairs leading to the Fifth Floor, the ever-gentle flame suddenly flickered, then, as if doused in accelerant, began to burn fiercely!

Yet Zhou You didn't rush to run. Instead, he turned around first and glanced behind him.

The deformed hands and faces had already emerged from the Couplets, but unlike last time, they seemed utterly unable to see Zhou You, who was right beside them, drifting aimlessly and helplessly back and forth.

"Looks like this thing takes effect instantly and can completely block the perception of those Couplets on the Fourth Floor. I just don't know if it'll work on the Landlady... Whatever, I'll think about that later. For now, the main thing is—"

Zhou You stared at that hollow face, took a deep breath, filling his lungs with dust-laden air, and then, abandoning his earlier calm, sprinted full force toward the Fifth Floor!

The ten-meter staircase was crossed in an instant. The Fifth Floor was the Attic of this residential building, with only one door, secured by a heavy old-fashioned padlock.

Zhou You shoved the key he'd swiped from the Landlady—no, wait, picked up from the Landlady—into the lock, trying several times before he managed to force the nearly rusted-shut latch open.

The lock hit the floor with a dull thud. Zhou You didn't care whether the noise would attract the Landlady—by the time it got here, the candle would be almost burned out anyway, and whether he got killed by the Fourth Floor or by it wouldn't make much difference—then he shoved the old wooden door open with all his strength.

Accompanied by a piercing creak, the escape route finally unfolded before him!

But then, Zhou You abruptly froze.

No, it wasn't that he'd seen some hopeless scene, like no exit at all—in fact, if it were a dead end, his personality would just spit once, flip the book page the bird, and find another way. The reason he froze was something else.

He saw corpses.

And not just one.

A whole lot of corpses.

Right before Zhou You's eyes, layers upon layers of human bodies hung from the Attic's ceiling. At first glance, there had to be at least a hundred—and every single corpse had its chest cavity completely gouged open, all internal organs gone, leaving only withered, tree-bark-like flesh and bone beams.

And somehow, despite whatever treatment they'd undergone, hardly any of these corpses had rotted. Nearly every face was frozen in the moment of death: fear, pleading, despair, rage, collapse...

Even with Zhou You's mental fortitude, under the gaze of so many dead eyes, every hair on his body stood on end.

Without a doubt, these were all tenants—tenants who, unable to pay rent, had been vivisected, dismembered, and sold off by that "Landlady."

Among the corpses, Zhou You even spotted a few figures noticeably shorter than the others, with youthful faces.

What kind of...

Zhou You closed his eyes and silently bit his lip.

But soon, he pushed aside the excess thoughts and continued his actions.

—The candle was nearly spent; now he needed to hurry.

Zhou You stepped into the Attic, but the moment he crossed the threshold, his expression shifted again.

A strange smell flooded his nostrils, like rotten eggs left under the scorching sun for three days, accompanied by a slight dizziness and a sense of oxygen deprivation.

Growing up in the countryside, Zhou You quickly identified what it was.

Methane—and at a fairly high concentration.

—Looks like it's accumulated from some of the rotting corpses, but still barely within tolerable range.

Noting this, Zhou You used the faint light filtering through the roof to look around.

Corpses occupied most of the space, but he could still make out various clutter piled in the corners. At the far end was the exit he'd been waiting for—a broken Skylight set into the Attic's ceiling. Unfortunately, there was no ladder or anything beneath it; the only way to reach it was to pile up the clutter and corpses bit by bit, building a path to escape.

By Zhou You's estimate, this project would take about eight minutes. That might seem short, but factoring in "only having one arm" and "needing to come out for air every so often," the time stretched to over twenty minutes.

...Exactly the time it took for him to sprint here and burn through three candles.

Suddenly, Zhou You laughed.

"I guess this really is worthy of being called a 'Novice Dungeon.' The way to clear it is simple and straightforward enough, and it doesn't deviate at all from what I deduced earlier."

He didn't say anything else. Instead, he glanced at the candle, now just a stub, and without waiting for it to burn out completely, he blew it out.

The next moment, a piercing roar erupted from the Fourth Floor.

In just a few seconds, the deformed hands had climbed into the Attic, and as if enraged, they grabbed Zhou You, whose face remained calm, and dragged him down.

Bang!

Blood and flesh splattered.

"You died."

"It was a worthwhile death."

"The path of escape has been revealed to you. Leave this ghost building constructed by the Landlady, and you will receive your reward."

"Since the player is still in the novice period, you may use 10 points to—"

But this time, before the female voice could finish, Zhou You simply waved his hand, silencing her.

Then, without another word, he chose to enter the dungeon again.

Whether by coincidence or not, when he teleported to the save point this time, the first thing he saw was precisely that self-mutilation trio.

Now that the story had been explored thoroughly enough, it seemed the only way to clear the stage under normal circumstances was this path—cut off your own arm, cauterize the wound with a branding iron, endure the agony to make two candles, then escape through the Skylight...

Generally speaking, that was how games worked. No matter how you played or tried to cut corners, you'd ultimately have to follow the writer's script to reach the ending.

But well.

Zhou You never liked playing by the rules when he gamed.

Besides, compared to meticulously plotted schemes and calculations, he actually preferred straightforward, brutal door-kicking tactics.

So he suddenly looked up and asked toward the empty space: "Excuse me, I'd like to ask—if I cut off my arm here and clear the stage, will my injury carry over into reality?"

A few seconds later, the female voice sounded in his ear.

"Dear player, all damage and losses you sustain in the game will be restored upon completion. Please don't worry about pain or disability, and enjoy playing according to your own ideas."

A clear explanation and hint, but Zhou You didn't reach for that self-mutilation trio as she expected. Instead, he picked up a candle and suddenly said with a smile.

"Is that so? Then as you wish, I'll start 'enjoying' myself according to my own ideas."