Buddhist player

As the car slowed down, Wang Hu also saw the true face of the town in front of him.

It was as if they were celebrating a festival; the whole town was brightly decorated with lanterns and colorful lights, and the downpour did not dampen the spirits. It was a scene of revelry and festivity.

Strangely, he couldn't see anyone, and even the wide-open shops on the street were empty, except for the coffee on the bar that was still steaming.

"Is something... off here?"

Looking out the car window, Wang Hu suddenly felt a little hesitant.

For some reason, although the environment here was much better than that of the villa, he felt a strange chill when he was actually in the town.

"Hmm... there must have been a carnival before, and with the heavy rain, it's normal that there was no one around."

He yawned, and the fallen maple leaves, practically curled up in the passenger seat, lazily gave his reply.

"Alright, let's hurry up and find a hotel. These wet clothes are sticking to my body and it's so uncomfortable... Or do you think it's more normal that you found so many people eating, drinking, and having fun as soon as you entered the town?"

"...That's true."

After thinking for a moment, Wang Hu nodded and continued driving forward, the wheels rolling over the scattered balloons and confetti on the ground, making a faint, strange sound.

"...She's back..."

"...Why did you only bring one this time...?"

"...Last time it was five..."

"...She's incredibly lucky, she's managed to snag it three times in a row..."

"...Why didn't you choose me...?"

"……gas……"

………………

In the torrential rain, something unseen seemed to be whispering.

Wang Hu was completely unaware of all of this.

After driving about 100 meters along the street, he found a hotel that was open for business on the side of the road.

He was quite lucky; there happened to be one last vacant room. However, what made Wang Hu slightly uncomfortable was that the hotel receptionist was an old woman with a wrinkled face.

If that were all, it wouldn't be so bad. The key issue was the way the old woman looked at him, which made him extremely uncomfortable. It wasn't the way one would look at a customer; rather, it was as if she were eyeing a delicious meal—eager, greedy, and even drool was unconsciously dripping from the corners of her mouth…

He originally wanted to change hotels, but seeing that the fallen maple leaves were already heading towards the elevator, he had no choice but to hurry up and follow.

However, aside from the unpleasant receptionist, everything else went smoothly. Although the hotel didn't look particularly impressive on the outside, it was exceptionally luxurious. The elevators were enormous, and the corridors were covered with thick, expensive red carpets that felt soft underfoot. There was also a faint, floral fragrance in the air.

Out of gentlemanly spirit, Wang Hu went to the door first and opened it with his room card. However, just as he turned around with a smile, ready to invite Feng Luofengye, the other person beat him to it and went into the room first, taking the room card from his hand and closing the door behind him.

He didn't know how many times the other party had practiced this set of movements; the whole thing was so smooth and fluid that he didn't even have time to react.

Looking at the tightly closed door in front of him, Wang Hu realized that he had been tricked and immediately became furious. However, before he could do anything, he inexplicably stumbled and fell to the ground.

But this time, what he touched was not a soft, expensive carpet, but fresh, damp earth.

……soil?

Subconsciously, Wang Hu turned his head away.

At some unknown time, the red carpet that was originally laid in the corridor was rolled up high like a straw mat, revealing the damp soil underneath and the dense white roots that clung to the grass like mycelium.

The root looked like white, raw flesh, with bright red mouths grinning across it, filled with countless teeth, and hanging from those teeth were people...

—At this moment, Wang Hu suddenly realized why the carpet in the corridor was so red.

In the last second before he lost consciousness, in a daze, he saw another version of himself walk out of the room...

.......................................

"The world of the dead...?"

"Yes, you can think of it as the underworld, or you can think of it as just hell, or something worse."

Bai Chen took a sip of the ginger cola that Yuan Qing had just brewed and nodded, his face showing an indelible weariness.

"We've all been deceived. From the very beginning, when we woke up in this villa, we weren't in the normal world."

"The abnormal world... is it like a place where the dead live?"

The bard quickly understood what was going on.

"Pretty much, it's something like that."

Bai Chen lit another incense stick for himself and forced himself to stay awake.

"In fact, the clues are already quite obvious. Whether it's the lighting that is being constantly suppressed by the environment or the torrential rain outside that shows no signs of letting up, these are all clues. And even if we disregard these things, the strongest evidence has already been laid out before us."

"The strongest evidence... a corpse?"

Subconsciously, Dao Ke Dao Cannot Be Told: The Tao Is Not the Eternal Tao looked at the five corpses neatly arranged over there.

"If this were the normal world within the instance, these five corpses would have been collected and cremated by the police long ago. They shouldn't still be sitting in the same place... Holy crap!!"

Unable to resist, Dao Ke Dao was not the eternal Dao and uttered a curse.

—He had never even considered such a significant anomaly before.

"If that's the case, then our idea of ​​giving them a proper burial is wrong."

Forcibly calming himself, the bard tried his best to maintain his composure.

"Because in the real world of this instance, their entire family of five had already been collected by the forensic doctor and cremated, so..."

"That's not the key point."

Somewhat irritated, the Dao that can be spoken is not the eternal Dao interrupted him.

"Most importantly, if this isn't a world for the living, then our idea of ​​surviving until dawn is utterly absurd, because surviving until dawn presupposes that the sky can lighten, and here, the sky simply can't lighten!!"

"So, we don't have much time left."

Slightly shrugging his shoulders, with incense dangling from his lips, Bai Chen looked at the fire in front of him, which was noticeably dimmer than before.

"When the light is completely consumed, that's when we'll be assimilated into this world of the dead. Even in the most optimistic scenario, we have less than two hours left, maybe even less. If we can't escape before the fire goes out completely, we'll be met with a regiment here..."

"The difficulty of this beginner trial dungeon is completely unreasonable!!"

Before Bai Chen could finish his sentence, the bard seemed to finally lose his composure and began to speak excitedly.

"Cognitive misguidance, an insider, rule traps, a deception about the very nature of the world... Of the nearly one thousand detailed documents about the beginner trial dungeons collected by the official team, none are this ridiculously difficult!! This is clearly someone deliberately trying to kill us!!"

"Well……"

Slightly guilty, the culprit touched his nose and pretended to admire the scenery as he turned his head away... only to meet Yuan Qing's calm eyes.

Bai Chen: "..."