Jiang Yan had just wanted to ask what this thing was for and why it had appeared here, but a strange and inexplicable sense of dread pulled his gaze back to the sky that was still collapsing. He saw that as the players poured in their strength, the golden web grew far tougher, yet the collapse of the dungeon remained irreversible, and chunks of data glowing a ghostly blue continued to fall from the sky. As more and larger data blocks fell, the golden web holding up the sky gradually tightened. The threads, under extreme pressure, grew thinner and thinner, lighter and lighter in color. It was clear it was reaching its limit. “No…” Jiang Yan instinctively looked toward the [Divine System] on his personal system panel. It was a primal instinct embedded in his DNA, prompting him to draw on the players’ power of belief. At this moment, the players floating beneath the golden web were arguing in the flurry of falling rose petals about why Jiang Yan, who should have already become par...
Since entering the instance, their sanity values had fluctuated without a moment’s rest.
Now that they could finally catch a breather, everyone barely made it to the sofa before collapsing on the floor.
Gu Zhan walked over to the sofa, picked up the teapot on the table, and poured water for several people.
An He Yan took the cup of water from Gu Zhan, sipped it, and squinted, “I really feel like we’ve been taken for a ride. Who knows how many rewards this instance offers, but we sure have suffered enough.”
Sang Yue lay beside him and gave a shy smile, “I’ve dragged everyone down with me.”
An He Yan shook his head; he wasn’t complaining—he just felt that the atmosphere was too heavy and needed to say something.
After they exchanged those words, their strength was completely drained.
They sprawled out on the floor, silent.
They had slept in the instance, but physically and mentally, it felt as if they hadn’t rested at all.
Before long, the room was filled with the sound of soft, rhythmic breathing as everyone fell asleep.
Gu Zhan also sat on the sofa and dozed off for a moment.
He dreamed that someone was knocking on the door outside the room.
In the dream, Gu Zhan was acutely aware that he was dreaming because this white room had no doors.
Yet he still got up because the person outside was relentless, with knocking that varied in intensity and rhythm, making it impossible to rest peacefully in the dream.
Upon standing, he suddenly saw a door appear in front of him. He approached and opened it to find darkness outside.
In the shadows stood an unexpected person.
It was Mo Tuo.
He wore a pure black long robe that did not resemble the style of any nation, a loose outer garment enveloping tight-fitting pants that highlighted his beautiful figure. His features had also completely escaped the constraints of Kripper, appearing more like himself.
Gu Zhan noticed that Mo Tuo had a mischievous smile, always seeming to revel in the chaos.
Frowning, Gu Zhan did not believe this dream was coincidental.
“What do you want from me?” Gu Zhan asked bluntly.
Mo Tuo raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you think it’s you who is dreaming, wanting to dream of me?”
Gu Zhan did not take the bait and simply regarded him coldly.
Mo Tuo, the kind of person who thrived on witty banter and nonsense, was also the most afraid of being ignored—such an interaction would be utterly boring!
He quickly shifted to a pitiful expression and said, “I just missed you and came to see you.”
Gu Zhan did not take his words seriously; believing a monster was more implausible than believing that this game genuinely wished them well.
He noticed that Mo Tuo’s movements were minimal; he remained in the shadows without stepping forward.
A faint sound came from him; upon closer inspection, it seemed to be the sound of chains.
As Gu Zhan adjusted to the darkness outside, he saw that Mo Tuo was bound by fine chains, his hands seemingly hanging freely at his sides, but in reality, they were restrained, suspended above him.
He was completely immobilized.
Mo Tuo noticed that Gu Zhan had seen the chains and, instead of feeling embarrassed, smiled at him. “What are you looking at? It’s all your fault.”
“My fault?” Gu Zhan was taken aback.
Mo Tuo replied, bored, “Because you broke the rules in the instance. I really wanted to kill you, but it seems the system likes you a lot. The moment I came out of the instance, I was locked up. It’s so boring, so I wanted to come chat with you.”
Gu Zhan maintained a nonchalant expression, unfazed.
Mo Tuo couldn’t move either; Gu Zhan’s indifference left him feeling unfulfilled.
“Oh, I can’t do anything to you right now, so why not chat? After all, we’ve shared life and death. If it weren’t for me helping you in that instance, you wouldn’t have made it through.”
Gu Zhan replied, “You were supposed to help me; your role in the instance was one of the ways to clear it.”
“Okay, okay.” Being exposed by Gu Zhan didn’t faze Mo Tuo. He began to act petulant, “I’m already locked up; what do you want me to do?”
Gu Zhan raised an eyebrow.
Letting a monster go free? Unless he was insane.
But talking to a monster was still an option.
Gu Zhan said, “What do you want to talk about?”
Mo Tuo seemed genuinely lonely, and at Gu Zhan’s words, his eyes lit up. “Anything! What do you want to ask? I can tell you anything.”
Gu Zhan said, "You can freely enter and exit my space?"
"Of course, you’ve seen me in there before, haven’t you?" Mo Tuo replied.
"Then why don’t you go?" Gu Zhan asked.
Mo Tuo replied lazily, "Aren’t I being punished? I can’t move freely."
"So when you can move freely, you can enter my space?" Gu Zhan frowned, suddenly feeling that his situation was quite dangerous.
Mo Tuo smiled, "What are you so nervous about? We can’t kill each other in places outside the copy... Oh, and even inside the copy, we can’t just kill at will. Although we do kill often, we actually don’t like killing that much."
"..." Gu Zhan really wanted to ask Mo Tuo if he knew what he was talking about.
Mo Tuo laughed, "So don’t worry, even if I can enter your space, it’s still your territory; I can’t do anything."
Gu Zhan said, "Your sculpture is in my space; I can summon Xiao Xiu, so is that mean I can summon you?"
Mo Tuo’s expression froze.
He didn’t say anything, but Gu Zhan could tell something from his expression.
"You can be summoned by me, right?"
Mo Tuo’s gaze wandered, and after a moment, he smiled, "Yes, I can be summoned by you, but just like summoning Xiao Xiu, there are conditions to summon me."
He seemed quite happy: "You don’t know the conditions, do you?"
Gu Zhan raised an eyebrow; this sounded both challenging and tempting.
He asked directly, "How can I get your summoning conditions?"
Mo Tuo said, "Then you’ll have to come to my copy."
"Your copy? Isn’t Kripper your copy?"
Mo Tuo laughed, "How could it be? That silly copy, each monster has its own birth copy. Your space's original mental hospital is Sun Jingqiu’s birth copy, and the Black Raven Mansion is Xiao Xiu’s birth copy. As for my birth copy..."
He smiled mysteriously, his eyes becoming increasingly dangerous: "It hasn’t been opened yet."
What Mo Tuo said contradicted what Xiao Xiu had told Gu Zhan.
Xiao Xiu said that some initial sequence monsters had existed from the start and didn’t have their own exclusive copies.
But Mo Tuo said there were, just not opened.
Gu Zhan said, "Give me a ticket."
Gu Zhan's words surprised Mo Tuo, but at the same time, he felt a sense of ease and pleasure.
Mo Tuo laughed, "Wait until you get out of here."
His smile held a hint of meaning; although he didn’t say anything, Gu Zhan suddenly sensed something was wrong. He turned around and found that the door of the white room was still opening toward him.
The room was bright, and all his companions were resting inside.
They were sleeping deeply, seemingly unaware that Gu Zhan had walked out of the room.
No, this is a dream.
He saw everything in reality while dreaming?
Gu Zhan turned to look at Mo Tuo again. The shadow surrounding him seemed to deepen, his features indistinct, only that malicious smile visible.
He seemed to be waiting for Gu Zhan to make a fool of himself, his eyes full of anticipation.
Gu Zhan paused for a moment, looked back again, and suddenly felt something was wrong. He widened his eyes.
At that moment, the dream disappeared, and he sat up straight from the sofa.
"Tick-tock... tick-tock..."
The sound of time passing echoed in his ears; nothing existed, yet it slowly left a mark on Gu Zhan’s heart.
Something was off.
No matter how he thought about it, it felt wrong.
Gu Zhan suddenly realized, opened his personal panel, and found that his sanity value had dropped significantly.
No!
This wasn’t a rest time at all! That system had deceived them!
"Wake up!"
Gu Zhan hurried to Yu Yezhou’s side and patted his face. Yu Yezhou was in a deep sleep; no matter how loudly Gu Zhan called, he showed no sign of waking.
Gu Zhan had to find Sang Yue beside him. Sang Yue was a lighter sleeper; when Gu Zhan disturbed him, he barely opened his eyes and mumbled, "What’s wrong?"
Gu Zhan dropped a "Wake up!" and went to find others.
Sang Yue lay on the ground for a while, feeling like his eyes were filled with lead and could barely open.
Before falling asleep, he had clearly thought about taking a short nap; how did he end up in such deep sleep?
He was someone who usually slept lightly; lying on the ground in such a strange place with so many people around, it should have been impossible to fall asleep!
Realizing this, Sang Yue refused to close his eyes again, straining to open them wide, trying to regain his alertness.
Meanwhile, Gu Zhan had already woken An Heyan.
He understood the situation more quickly than Sang Yue. He struggled to sit up and groggily patted Xu Ke beside him. Xu Ke opened his eyes, and a trace of sleepiness was visible even in his usually indifferent gaze.
Nearby, Xu Yu woke up to the commotion. Seeing Yu Yezhou still asleep, he went forward to wake him up.
Once everyone was awake, Gu Zhan stood in the center of the room and said, "Wake up, we’ve been tricked."
"What?" The others were still confused, sitting on the ground, staring blankly at Gu Zhan.
Gu Zhan said, "That system told us the rest time doesn’t exist; while we were sleeping, our sanity values kept dropping. We’re trapped in this room!"
Hearing this, a sense of crisis emerged in everyone’s hearts, and they finally started to wake up a bit.
The first to wake up, Sang Yue shook his head, "Trapped in a room? This situation feels oddly familiar..."
"It’s like that drug-addicted father from the first loop," An Heyan said softly, having been forcefully awakened from sleep, his head pounding.
Though he hadn’t checked his personal panel, he knew his sanity must have dropped significantly.
Gu Zhan said, "Yes, it’s that father. According to our previous storyline, he should be locked up in the female teacher's home at this time. Our current situation is very similar, so in this third loop, we must be playing the role of that father."
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