Chapter Summaries

Shen Ru entered the Upside-Down Mental Hospital Instance and encountered a pig-faced nurse, whom he attacked after deducing that people and animals might have switched places. After he stabbed the nurse in the eye, the scene changed, leaving him back in bed with the clock showing eight.

• Shen Ru woke in a mental hospital ward after the system started the three-day mystery-solving Instance.
• Shen Ru explored the ward and found bloodstained scratches and a hole gouged into the wall.
• A pig-faced nurse entered the ward, and the system identified it as the Strange Nurse anomaly.
• Shen Ru attacked the nurse and stabbed one of its bulging eyes after his first blow failed to incapacitate it.
• A mechanical sound struck Shen Ru with dizziness, and the nurse and his knife disappeared; the scene then shifted, leaving him numb in bed as the clock showed eight.

Shen Ru escaped his ward after the pig-headed monster remembered his earlier attack and pursued him through the hospital. He hid in a storage room with Ruan Ping, a Player who admired him, while the monster searched the corridor.

• After time reset, the pig-headed monster told Shen Ru it remembered being stabbed, and Shen Ru fought it before fleeing his ward.
• Shen Ru discovered that the corridor looked unlike his ward and received a system prompt about the strange environment.
• Shen Ru found an open storage room and threatened Ruan Ping to keep him quiet as the monster passed outside.
• Ruan Ping introduced himself as a B-rank Player and said he had watched Shen Ru's livestream.
• Ruan Ping asked why the monster was chasing Shen Ru, and Shen Ru stayed silent rather than explain what he had done.

Shen Ru and Ruan Ping explored the mental hospital and discovered it was actually a facility for treating livestock. A swollen pig monster attacked them, but Shen Ru subdued it and tied it up.

• Shen Ru told Ruan Ping that killing an NPC turned back time while preserving their memories, and Ruan Ping vowed to protect him.
• Shen Ru and Ruan Ping left the storage room and examined the floor plan, learning they were on the hospital's third floor beneath the intensive care wards.
• At the nurses' station, Shen Ru found records showing that the hospital treated pigs rather than people.
• A swollen pig monster charged from the doctor's office, and Shen Ru knocked it out, restrained it with rope, and bound its hands and feet.

Shen Ru and Ruan Ping searched the nurses’ station and office, where they found staff guidelines suggesting the animal-headed monsters might be hallucinations caused by cognitive infection. Shen Ru inferred that the hospital was originally for livestock and, despite recognizing the fourth-floor warning as a lure, decided they should go there.

• Shen Ru tied up the unconscious pig-headed monster while Ruan Ping, frightened, offered to help.
• Shen Ru and Ruan Ping entered the filthy office and searched its desk for information.
• Ruan Ping found staff guidelines that described animal-headed figures as signs of patients’ cognitive infection and warned that the fourth floor was the treatment destination.
• Shen Ru questioned who had written the guidelines and led Ruan Ping to reinterpret the hospital as a livestock hospital, with the rules intended for staff treating animals.
• Shen Ru announced that he and Ruan Ping would go to the fourth floor, horrifying Ruan Ping, who had expected to hide until the three-day Instance ended.

Shen Ru and Ruan Ping reached the Fourth Floor, where they found a horrific corridor and an impossible octopus corpse. Ruan Ping posed as a nurse to get them into the office, but a soft-bodied monster singled Shen Ru out and ordered him to come along.

• Shen Ru gave Ruan Ping a level 3 Name Badge and told him to claim Shen Ru's condition had worsened, while warning him to prioritize survival if the monsters reacted strangely.
• The elevator opened onto a bloodstained Fourth Floor corridor filled with mangled flesh, and an octopus tentacle wrapped around Ruan Ping's ankle.
• Shen Ru and Ruan Ping discovered that the octopus's suckers held a pair of humanlike eyes, triggering a system notification about an illogical anomaly.
• Finding no one at the Nurses' Station, Shen Ru knocked on the office door, and Ruan Ping claimed to be a nurse bringing a deteriorating patient for treatment.
• A soft-bodied monster opened the door, ordered Ruan Ping to wait in the office, and summoned Shen Ru to come with it.

Shen Ru followed a newly hatched blue-ringed octopus through the Fourth Floor while suspecting the Name Badge and an unseen controller were behind the hospital’s identity contamination. He smashed a python tank to make the monsters attack one another, prompting the person watching through the camera to reveal themself.

• Ruan Ping searched an office and found Fourth Floor rules warning staff to ignore blue-ringed octopuses, keep treatment areas separate, and evacuate if the rules were broken.
• A giant python crept up behind Ruan Ping as he read the rules.
• Shen Ru noticed that the dead octopus had unmarked yellow tentacles and questioned how it could have produced a blue-ringed offspring.
• The blue-ringed octopus led Shen Ru into a room filled with pythons coiled inside a glass tank.
• Shen Ru used an enhanced iron rod to smash the tank, intending to make the released monsters kill each other.
• A voice from the surveillance camera asked when Shen Ru had figured it out, and he replied that he had just done so.

Shen Ru provoked a monster-filled chase through the hospital while Mo Yu watched him, and Ruan Ping and Meng Yizhi were swept into the escape. The three reached the elevator to the fifth floor, where Meng Yizhi learned Shen Ru had caused the chaos on purpose.

• Shen Ru teased Mo Yu through the monitor, then fled after releasing a mass of pythons and a blue-ringed octopus into the corridor.
• Meng Yizhi ran from the monsters after Shen Ru led them out, while Ruan Ping encountered a giant python that mistook him for a third-floor nurse.
• Ruan Ping escaped the giant python and joined Shen Ru and Meng Yizhi as they raced toward the elevator.
• Ruan Ping opened the elevator, and the three narrowly escaped the pursuing monsters as it rose toward the fifth floor.
• Meng Yizhi recognized Shen Ru and learned he had deliberately caused the dangerous chase for excitement.

Shen Ru and his companions reached the fifth floor, where they suspected the nurse might be a player rather than a monster. That night, Mo Yu appeared in the darkness, restrained Shen Ru, and told him to find him.

• Shen Ru told the fifth-floor nurse that the three men were dizzy, and she arranged for them to stay together until a doctor arrived.
• After they reached their room, Shen Ru explained that the Name Badge caused monsters' cognitive contamination, and the group considered whether the nurse was a player or NPC.
• Meng Yizhi and Ruan Ping fell asleep while Shen Ru watched the camera and wondered whether Mo Yu was the only person observing them.
• Mo Yu appeared in darkness, held Shen Ru immobile, and called him cute despite Shen Ru's protests.
• Mo Yu asked Shen Ru if he knew The Truman Show and said he would wait for Shen Ru to find him before the darkness vanished.

Shen Ru realized that the hospital’s surveillance cameras were likely being used to manipulate relationships between patients and doctors, and he forced Liang Yu to help him return to the dangerous Fourth Floor. The chapter ended with Shen Ru revealing that he needed Liang Yu as bait for a monster.

• Liang Yu entered the elevator intending to reach the Fourth Floor, but the doors opened onto a corridor covered in snakes and a corpse, so she hurriedly shut them.
• A crash trapped Liang Yu in the dark elevator, where Shen Ru called to her from above and revealed that he had seen through her disguise.
• Shen Ru pressured Liang Yu into agreeing to return to the Fourth Floor and trick a monster.
• Shen Ru explained that Mo Yu’s hint suggested someone was deliberately controlling events, and he decided to investigate the Fourth Floor again.
• After letting Liang Yu out of the elevator, Shen Ru said he needed bait, indicating that she would serve that role.

Shen Ru and Liang Yu entered the dangerous Fourth Floor, where Liang Yu used her Fifth Floor status to lead him toward the Treatment Room. There, they discovered rules that their visit had already violated, leaving Shen Ru laughing at their predicament.

• Shen Ru persuaded Liang Yu to accompany him to the Fourth Floor, where they found a bloodstained corridor, a dead Octopus, and pythons.
• Shen Ru deliberately coughed to draw out the Giant Python, and Liang Yu used her authority to convince it to let them reach the Treatment Room alone.
• As they walked, Shen Ru and Liang Yu discovered that the Octopus's eyeballs had slit pupils, triggering a system alert about the Strange Eyeball anomaly.
• Inside the Treatment Room, Shen Ru found rules warning that talking snakes must not be answered, that exactly two employees were on the floor, and that contradictions meant they should evacuate.
• Shen Ru asked Liang Yu which floor she had started on, and her answer, the Fifth Floor, made him realize they had violated every rule.

Shen Ru realized the Fourth Floor’s snakes and eyes had contaminated their perception, then gambled that destroying the source would end it. After he shattered the eyes and restored the corridor, Liang Yu was left shaken by both his combat prowess and his decision to keep her safe.

• Shen Ru deduced that the pythons’ eyes had contaminated their perception and that no one else was on the Fourth Floor.
• As snakes gathered outside, Shen Ru told Liang Yu that killing NPCs could reset the game and suspected that destroying the original source might end the contamination.
• Shen Ru charged into the corridor, blinded the giant python, and then destroyed the two eyes with his dagger.
• The corridor returned to a clean, well-lit state, and Liang Yu emerged to find Shen Ru alive and still protecting her.
• Liang Yu felt belated fear as she realized Shen Ru had kept his promise of absolute safety despite risking his life on an uncertain gamble.

Shen Ru and Liang Yu confronted the Fourth Floor’s octopus administrator, who revealed that a strange voice had been controlling it. After the administrator died, Shen Ru suspected players could also be controlled and chose to leave the Fourth Floor with Liang Yu.

• Soft tentacles emerged from an office door, and Shen Ru startled them into retreating before confronting the creature inside.
• Shen Ru found an enormous octopus and threatened it with a Curved Knife, exposing its act of incompetence.
• The octopus revealed that it had come down from the Fifth Floor, then claimed that its watchers had been observing Shen Ru and would judge him.
• The system announced that Shen Ru and Liang Yu had discovered the Strange Voice anomaly, and the octopus died as its controlling force vanished.
• Shen Ru wondered whether players could be controlled too, then urged Liang Yu to return upstairs and prioritize staying alive.

Liang Yu returned with Shen Ru to the Fifth Floor, where she realized that its complete lack of danger was suspicious. Shen Ru woke in Mo Yu’s operating room, uncovered the monsters hidden from him by the drugs, and faced the truth that Mo Yu had been seeing them all along.

• Liang Yu gave up struggling and returned to the Fifth Floor with Shen Ru, then admitted that everything there had seemed normal.
• Shen Ru woke restrained in a medical room, where Mo Yu explained that he had been sedated and began electroconvulsive therapy.
• Shen Ru noticed Mo Yu glancing toward something unseen and reasoned that drugs were preventing him from perceiving the room as it really was.
• Shen Ru cut his wrist to clear the drugs from his system, tore off the electrodes, and revealed several grotesque monsters in the room.
• Shen Ru realized that Mo Yu had been seeing the monsters all along and wondered whether Mo Yu was the real lunatic.

Shen Ru turned Mo Yu into a patient to escape the operating room, then fled with him and the others as a horde of strange, rotting figures pursued them. The group ran through the corridor, with Meng Yizhi realizing Shen Ru had triggered the danger.

• Shen Ru discovered that strange, decaying figures had appeared in the operating room and were moving toward him.
• Shen Ru put his hospital gown on Mo Yu, causing the system to change Mo Yu's role from doctor to patient.
• Mo Yu carried Shen Ru out of the operating room, where they encountered Ruan Ping, Meng Yizhi, and Liang Yu.
• Ruan Ping mistook Shen Ru and Mo Yu's situation for a romance before Shen Ru warned everyone to run.
• Meng Yizhi looked back, saw the crowd of rotting figures chasing them, and recognized that Shen Ru had caused the trouble.

Mo Yu led Shen Ru and the others to the hospital basement, where they hoped to uncover the source of the monsters and drug effects. After unlocking the entrance, they found a primitive, graffiti-covered room, and Meng Yizhi recoiled in terror at what he saw.

• As monsters pursued them, Shen Ru asked Mo Yu for help, and Mo Yu revealed that the elevator could take them to the first floor and the basement stairs.
• In the elevator, Mo Yu explained that the patients' drugs made them see mutated monsters, while he tended Shen Ru's wounded wrist.
• The group found that the first-floor clock was moving rapidly and followed Mo Yu through an emergency passage to the basement entrance.
• Shen Ru picked the rusty basement lock with a thin wire, then the group entered a large room lined with human-sized glass jars and covered in graffiti.
• Meng Yizhi rushed to inspect the wall drawings, then staggered backward in terror at what he saw.

Shen Ru and the others discovered that the hospital’s experiments had created monsters, then lured the patients and creatures into the basement and destroyed them with a Demolition Card. As the Upside-Down Mental Hospital instance ended, Mo Yu approached Shen Ru and hinted at something interesting.

• Shen Ru and the others read the octopus’s illustrated account of the experiments that had created the monsters, while cracks appeared in the glass tanks.
• Shen Ru persuaded Ruan Ping to help lure the patients and monsters toward the basement, and the players handled the floors one by one.
• After the last crowd was trapped in the basement, Shen Ru detonated the Demolition Card, causing an explosion behind the sealed door.
• Mo Yu praised Shen Ru and stroked his neck, saying he had thought of something interesting that Shen Ru would like.
• The system announced that the Upside-Down Mental Hospital instance had ended and would close in 30 seconds.

After clearing the Upside-Down Mental Hospital, Shen Ru earned enough Points to advance to A-rank and obtained a cognitive-contamination Card. He agreed to visit the Blue Chronicle Guild with Qin Yu, and the chapter ended with Sheng Ziyao telling Mo Yu that Qin Yu had kidnapped Shen Ru.

• Shen Ru received 42,500 Points for clearing the Instance, reached the threshold for A-rank, and acquired an A-rank cognitive-contamination Card.
• Shen Ru extended his stay in the Presidential Suite and went to the hotel restaurant, where Qin Yu invited him to visit the Blue Chronicle Guild.
• Shen Ru agreed to go with Qin Yu and asked Qin Yu's two men to support him, leading bystanders to mistake the departure for a kidnapping.
• Sheng Ziyao rushed into Mo Yu's office and warned him that Qin Yu had taken Shen Ru and left him at their mercy.

Mo Yu decided to answer rumors about Shen Ru by publicly calling him his lover and traveled to Lanji to bring him home. Shen Ru tried to deny their relationship, but Mo Yu calmly insisted that he now knew the truth.

• Sheng Ziyao realized Shen Ru had used the rumors to pressure Mo Yu, and Mo Yu chose to go along with them and make the lover rumor official.
• Mo Yu ordered Gu Changming and Sheng Ziyao to arrange a trip to Lanji.
• At the Blue Chronicle Guild, Qin Yu apologized to Shen Ru for concealing his motives and showed him Mo Yu’s messages calling him his lover.
• Shen Ru tried to leave after learning Mo Yu was coming, but a messenger announced that the Dark Night Guild had arrived.
• In Lanji’s reception room, Shen Ru challenged Mo Yu’s claim that he had a lover, and Mo Yu replied that Shen Ru now knew.

Mo Yu took Shen Ru from Lanji in a public display that strengthened rumors about their relationship, then invited him to compete in the Guild League for a two-person trip. Shen Ru agreed to go with Mo Yu only if Mo Yu pleased him in the instance, and assigned Sheng Ziyao to fill the guild’s remaining spot.

• Shen Ru agreed to leave with Mo Yu after Mo Yu revealed that Sheng Ziyao was waiting outside.
• Before leaving the villa, Mo Yu nearly suffocated Qin Yu and warned him not to forget how Guan Wenyue died.
• Sheng Ziyao greeted Shen Ru as “Sister-in-law,” and Shen Ru teased him before Mo Yu sent him to drive.
• Mo Yu explained that the Guild League’s first-place prize was a one-day trip for two to any destination, including an instance or their former home.
• Shen Ru told Mo Yu to take Sheng Ziyao as the guild’s other competitor and said Mo Yu would have to please him in the instance if he wanted to travel together.

Shen Ru entered the role-playing Instance Absurd World and found himself transformed into a girl trapped in an oppressive student life. After meeting Sheng Ziyao on the way to school, Shen Ru hinted that the Instance might also be his rank-up challenge and wondered how that would affect everyone’s difficulty.

• The league Instance opened with a seven-day role-playing challenge, and Shen Ru woke in a pink bedroom with waist-length hair and a girl’s appearance.
• Shen Ru discovered that the Instance cast him as a student and that his faceless mother demanded he get ready and leave for school on time.
• Shen Ru put on a girls’ uniform, grabbed books, and left home with his mother.
• Shen Ru met Sheng Ziyao, who excitedly called him “Sister-in-law” while their faceless mothers talked.
• Shen Ru told Sheng Ziyao that his rank-up Instance overlapped with the league Instance and wondered whether it would raise the game’s difficulty.