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

At the end of the passage was a rusty security door. There were four bullet holes in the door panel. Lu Chen stepped forward. He pulled out a data cable from the side of the terminal. He peeled back the plastic casing of the electronic lock on the iron door, revealing copper wires. The metal contacts of the data cable were connected to the copper wires.

Lu Chen typed in the brute-force program with his left hand. Three seconds later, a click sounded from inside the electronic lock. The bolt snapped back. The door opened.

Behind the door was a massive, hollow industrial building. There was no roof. Above, the sky was a hazy gray, cloudless. Suspended in the center of the building were hundreds of metal gears, each over five meters in diameter. The gears meshed together, rotating clockwise and counter-clockwise alternately. The metal surfaces rubbed together, producing a sharp, grating noise.

Interspersed among the gear train are suspended concrete slabs, arranged in a stepped pattern. These slabs extend all the way to the control tower opposite the factory building. The control tower is fifty meters high, its exterior walls covered with thick, black cables. The cables rhythmically contract and expand.

"The past," Lin Qi said.

Wang Hu stood by the door, motionless. He tightly bandaged the severed part of his left arm. His face was pale. Zhao Qiang and Sun Fei's teams stood behind him, their gazes shifting between the gears and the abyss. Below was black mist, bottomless. The rangefinder indicated unknown depth.

Lin Qi didn't wait for them. She walked to the edge of the cliff, spotted a moving stone slab covered in moss, bent her knees, and jumped, leaping two meters through the air before landing in the center. Her boots slid half a centimeter across the moss before she stopped. The slab wobbled slightly. Lin Qi lowered her center of gravity, letting her arms hang naturally to maintain her balance.

Lu Chen put away the data cable. He took two running steps and jumped onto the same stone slab, standing to Lin Qi's right.

Dazhuang took a deep breath. His chest expanded. He gripped the fire axe with both hands. He jumped over. Glasses followed closely behind. He landed on the edge of the stone slab. His hands flailed wildly. Dazhuang reached out and grabbed the back of Glasses' collar. He pulled him to the middle.

Wang Hu shouted from behind, "Keep up. Let them step on the landmines ahead."

The remaining people jumped one after another. The twelve people were scattered on five adjacent stone slabs. The stone slabs rose up as the gears turned.

A whooshing sound came from above. The sound wave frequency was very high.

A mechanical bird swooped down from the sky. Its wingspan was one meter. The edges of its wings were sharpened razor blades, reflecting light. Its speed reached thirty meters per second. Its target was the pair of glasses standing on the edge of a stone slab.

The man with the glasses was looking down into the abyss. A mechanical bird flew past his back. A blade sliced ​​through the bulletproof fibers of his combat suit. It cut into the epidermis. The fat layer. The muscle tissue. Finally, it severed the thoracic vertebrae.

The glasses made no sound. The body lost its support. It broke in two. It fell backward. It plunged into the black mist. A few seconds later, the echo of a heavy object hitting the ground was heard.

Dazhuang raised the fire axe and swung it to the right.

More mechanical birds emerged from all directions. Their numbers exceeded two hundred. Their feathers were entirely made of thin metal sheets, rustling as they rubbed against each other.

Lin Qi stood on the stone slab. The slab was two square meters in size. She drew the long sword from her back with a backhand motion. She gripped the hilt with both hands. She took a half step forward with her left foot, assuming a lunge stance.

Three mechanical birds charged at him from the front. Lin Qi swung his sword. The long sword slashed diagonally from right to left. The blade struck the mechanical birds' wings. A sound of shattering metal rang out. The three birds were cut in half at the waist. The cut surfaces were smooth. Sparks flew as the internal wiring short-circuited. The remains fell into the abyss.

Lin Qi flicked his wrist. The blade faced upwards. He deflected a bird that was attacking from above. The movement was fluid, without any unnecessary force.

A mechanical bird circled behind him from his blind spot. A blade sliced ​​across Lin Qi's right waist. A twenty-centimeter-long gash was cut in his combat uniform. The black fabric rolled up, exposing his fair skin to the air. His skin was torn, and red blood seeped out. The blood formed a line, flowing down his waistline and into his trousers.

Wang Hu stood on a stone slab behind Lin Qi. He saw that Lin Qi's clothes were torn, revealing skin and blood on his waist. He swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing. He wanted the knife in Lin Qi's hand, and he wanted Lin Qi himself. His gaze darted between Lin Qi's waist and the back of his neck, calculating the distance and angle. He planned to take advantage of the chaos to push Lin Qi down.

The stone slab where Zhao Qiang's team was positioned was surrounded by ten mechanical birds. Zhao Qiang swung his iron rod. He missed. A mechanical bird's blade sliced ​​off half of his head. Brain matter and blood sprayed onto the stone slab. The remaining two men, terrified, retreated. They lost their footing and fell.

Two members of Sun Fei's team were sliced ​​into pieces by the mechanical bird and fell to the ground. Only Sun Fei remained. She crouched in the middle of the stone slab, her hands covering her head, screaming with her eyes closed, her vocal cords strained.

Lin Qi seized the opportunity. Two meters ahead was a huge horizontal gear. There was space to stand on at the center of the gear's axle. She used her legs to propel herself across and landed steadily on the metal cap of the axle.

Dazhuang jumped after him. Not enough distance. His toes hit the edge of the gear. His body slid down. He clung desperately to the gear's teeth. His fingernails snapped. Blood flowed onto the metal.

"Seventh Sister, pull me!" Da Zhuang shouted, his neck veins bulging.

Lin Qi walked over. A mechanical bird swooped towards Da Zhuang's hand. Lin Qi swung her longsword, precisely severing the bird's head. She reached out her left hand, grabbed Da Zhuang's right wrist, and prepared to pull him up.

Wang Hu leaped just behind the gear. He was behind Lin Qi, raising his large cleaver with one hand, aiming at the back of Lin Qi's neck. His muscles contracted, ready to strike.

Lu Chen stood on the stone slab to the right, holding a terminal in his left hand. His right index finger repeatedly pressed the Enter key ten times. The code for the gear control system had been rewritten.

The gears beneath Lin Qi's feet suddenly tripled in speed. The centrifugal force increased dramatically.

Wang Hu slipped, his body tilting to the left. The trajectory of his cleaver veered, grazing Lin Qi's left shoulder before striking the metal cap and leaving a dent.

Lin Qi loosened his grip on Da Zhuang's wrist with his left hand. Da Zhuang lost his grip. His fingers slipped. He fell into the abyss. The screams ceased three seconds later.

Lin Qi turned to the right, using the centrifugal force. His right hand had already drawn the short knife. He gripped the knife in a reverse grip, straightened his arm, and thrust the tip into Wang Hu's heart, piercing through the gap between the ribs and breaking through the right ventricle. The entire blade was submerged, leaving only the hilt exposed.

Wang Hu's eyes widened, bulging as he stared at Lin Qi. He couldn't understand Lin Qi's reaction speed, nor could he understand why she could release her grip and kill the moment she pulled her teammate back.

"If you pull him, you'll fall down yourself," Lin Qi said, stating a physical law.

She drew her dagger. She bent her right knee and kicked Wang Hu hard in the stomach with her heel. Wang Hu's body flew backward, over the edge of the gears, and fell.

Wang Hu's two remaining teammates raised their guns. Fingers on the triggers. Before they could pull them, two mechanical birds swooped down from behind, severing their carotid arteries. The two men collapsed onto the stone slabs, blood flowing everywhere.

Sun Fei was on the stone slab behind. The mechanical bird destroyed the slab's levitation device. The slab shattered. Sun Fei fell along with the rubble.

Only Lin Qi and Lu Chen remained in the factory. The flock of mechanical birds lost their target and flew back into the gray fog high in the sky.

"The core is at the top of the tower." Lu Chen looked at the terminal screen. The red dot was flashing fifty meters high.

Lin Qi sheathed her long sword. She held the short sword in her right hand, her fingers turning the hilt. "Let's go." She strode towards the last stone slab connecting to the control tower.