“Run!” Lian barked, low and sharp, and bolted with me in tow.

  He hauled me by the collar, my feet barely touching the ground, legs kicking uselessly while sparks practically flew over my head and the monsters shrieked behind us.

  Hua flicked his folding fan, its ribs slicing across the centipede-thing’s head with a clean snap. In a blink, the creature was cut into several writhing chunks that slammed into the stone wall with a series of cracking thuds.

  I barely had time to breathe before three or four bird-headed fiends swooped in, shedding feathers all over my face.

  “Bloody hell—don’t dive at my face!” I yelped, on the verge of tears. “I’m not the damn sacrifice!”

  The system offered its usual cold appraisal. “At the moment, you look more like an offering than the actual offering.”

  “Shut up!” I shouted at the air.

  The passage was narrow. Lian carried me in one hand and swung his soft rope with the other, hacking out a path with a precision that made my head spin. His steps never faltered.

  Hua stayed behind to cover us, his fan spinning like a flash of silver, each strike followed by a monster’s dying wail—only for the beasts to crawl back up, impossible to kill cleanly.

  We were driven forward, chased like prey. More than once I felt fur or cold scales brush my cheek as the creatures lunged past. The stench of their breath hit my neck like a cold slap, and my scalp tingled in terror.

  At one turn, I nearly slammed into a deer-shaped creature with a human face. It stuck out a long, reeking red tongue and gave me a slow, greasy smile.

  My knees buckled. “I can’t— I really can’t anymore!”

  Lian snapped, “Bite your tongue.”

  I obeyed on instinct. The sting cleared my head just enough to keep moving.

  We ran who knew how long, looping through three different passageways, nearly pinned down four times. The monsters were tireless; their shrieks echoed in five directions at once, rattling whatever courage I had left.

  “System—” I gasped, nearly collapsing. “Are these things real or not?! Is this still Fang Mei’s illusion?!”

  The system paused two seconds, as if rifling through files. “I recall the author of this abandoned draft enjoys horror and suspense fiction. However, I don’t remember any horror-genre notes being uploaded…”

  “The point!” I screamed.

  “So—it might be worth testing.”

  “Testing what?!”

  “Testing whether they’re real.”

  “…Are you telling me to use myself as the test subject?!”

  “You said it, not me.”

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Fine. I ended up yelling at Hua, “Hua! Do you think these things are real?! What if it’s all illusions again?! We’ve already been tricked so many times—”

  Hua scoffed mid-swing. “Did you imagine how hard you hit the ground earlier?”

  I was about to argue when Lian suddenly stopped and turned back.

  “Lian—wait, wait, don’t be impulsive!” I grabbed his sleeve. “If it’s an illusion, fine! But if they’re real—”

  Before I could finish, a bird-headed monster slashed past. Its wings cut across Lian’s cheek like a pair of sickles, leaving two clean lines of blood.

  The moment the blood rolled down, something exploded in my skull. “Oh hell—these things are REAL!”

  Pain stabbed my chest. “Lian! Your face! It cut your face!”

  Lian ignored me, shook off the creature with a flick of his blade, and said flatly, “Follow me.”

  I wanted to howl, but he had already yanked me in a different direction.

  We tore through several corridors and finally looped back to the original chamber. That corpse in the gold crown and gold belt still lay on the stone bed, serene and untouched, as if everything tearing through the tomb had nothing to do with him.

  “Why are we back HERE?!” I wheezed, nearly collapsing. “The monsters are about to break in!”

  Lian stared at the stone bed, his expression cold. “I thought something was wrong… Look. The crown and belt are too clean.”

  I blinked, panting. “And so what? You want to say someone’s been doing his laundry?”

  Hua let out a short laugh, then his face hardened. He tapped the edge of the golden belt, voice unhurried. “Not just clean. Not a speck of dust.”

  “And?!” I almost cried. “Can you stop talking in riddles!”

  The monsters outside were drawing closer. The centipede-thing hissed in the corridor, loud enough to feel the vibrations in my teeth.

  Lian suddenly crouched and reached beneath the corpse’s belt. Something clicked. The stone bed trembled and began sinking.

  “Holy— You actually touched the corpse?!” I clutched my turtle shells, trembling. “Aren’t you afraid it’ll sit up and grab you?!”

  The system murmured, “You’ve seen worse than corpses sitting up.”

  “Shut up!” I almost hurled a shell at it.

  The stone bed lowered too slowly. The monsters were already at the chamber entrance, screeching, ready to swarm.

  Hua grabbed my collar. He and Lian practically threw me onto the sinking platform. “Stop whining. Stand still.”

  The next instant, the stone platform dropped like a bucket into a well. I staggered and instinctively latched onto Lian’s thigh. “AAAAH—I’m done, I’m done— put me down—no, put me UP!”

  “Silence,” Lian said, cold as ever.

  Boom.

  The stone gate slammed shut just as the monsters lunged. The impact shook my ears, but it sealed them out.

  I nearly collapsed on the bed, panting. “God— I almost became monster chow…”

  The platform settled. In the darkness, we heard the lock snap, leaving us in a silence broken only by our breathing.

  I wiped my sweat and complained, “You two aren’t worried this mechanism might bury us alive?!”

  Hua flicked his sleeve, eyes still on the corpse. “If we’re buried alive, at least it’s more dignified than being chewed apart.”

  “Dignified my ass— I don’t want to share a tomb with this guy!” I scooted away. “He’s still wearing a crown! What if he sits up at midnight?!”

  Lian spoke calmly. “Precisely because the crown and belt are too clean, I tested the mechanism.”

  I froze. “Huh?”

  Hua raised a brow. “You suspect someone’s been here?”

  Lian nodded. “This place is ancient, yet only his adornments are spotless. It means someone visits regularly… or the stone bed is moved often enough to keep dust off.”

  Hua clapped my shoulder. “Don’t relax. This is just the beginning.”

  “Wha—what do you mean just the beginning?!” I almost broke. “There are more?!”

  The sunken bed revealed a new passage. A cold draft surged out, shoving us into deeper darkness.

  Lian simply said, “Move. The exit should be in here.”

  I held the wall, legs shaking. “Why do I feel like this is worse than the monsters…”

  A chill swept down the tunnel. After a short walk, the space ahead opened suddenly.

  I nearly dropped my turtle shells. “Wh—what the hell… Is this a coffin warehouse?!”

  The underground hall was enormous, the walls soaring so high they vanished into darkness. The floor was littered—like scattered chess pieces—with coffins.

  They were everywhere, tossed like dice. Some tilted, some toppled, some half-buried, some just left wherever they fell. Otherwise, they were ordinary coffins, nothing fancy.

  My scalp prickled. “How many bodies does it take to fill all these coffins?! Seriously—this tomb owner had some twisted hobbies…”