"Sigh, when I entered the instance before, I was always with the Doctor and we were barely ever separated... Now that they've suddenly taken me away from him, I feel completely adrift," Fatty said, looking a little hesitant. "I wonder if Brother Chu is on the same floor as the Doctor."

"Aside from the three of us, the remaining people are probably split into three groups: one on the first and second floors, one on the third and fourth floors, and one on the fifth and sixth floors. No matter how the remaining five people are divided, one person will end up alone," Keke said, examining the chart that showed the locations of two corpses.

She felt that the person who ended up alone was probably Gu Mian. After all, if he were assigned to the same floor, the difficulty of the instance would greatly decrease, and they could just coast through it.

The instance certainly didn't want the other players to have an easy time. The likelihood of Gu Mian being alone was extremely high.

"Just now, the players on the fifth and sixth floors completed their task. That means the players on the floor below us completed their task," 007 said, pausing for a moment as if in thought. "It seems the people below us are quite efficient. Could it be Gu Mian?"

"That's not necessarily true. From what I saw, the task seemed rather simple," Fatty said, recalling the text he had seen on the screen earlier. "It was about helping a girl find a necklace. It didn't look very dangerous."

However, it was indeed difficult to gauge the level of danger just by looking at the task description. Who knew? Maybe that necklace could eat people.

Just as Fatty was letting his imagination wander, the large screen beside them suddenly changed.

All three of them noticed and turned their heads to look at the screen.

A new task appeared on the screen—

[Some time ago, the gentleman corpse in Room 708 developed a secret crush on a lady. However, she disliked him for his plain appearance. In a fit of rage, he tore off his own face and threw it away...]

Reading this, Fatty shivered involuntarily. What kind of terrifying and bloody love story is this?

He touched the goosebumps on his arm and continued reading.

[Due to the absence of his face, the gentleman in Room 708 is experiencing great inconvenience in his daily life. He deeply regrets his actions and has commissioned you to help him find his missing face.]

[If you successfully help Mr. 708 find his face, he will unlock the locations of two more corpses in the building for all players.]

The corpse in Room 708 was the extra dismembered one on their floor.

"When we passed Room 708 earlier, did that corpse have a face?" Keke asked, trying to recall, though she wasn't sure.

"The corpse in that room was too fragmented. Back then, I saw its head facing the wall in the corner. I didn't have the guts to go near it or try to move it. It probably lost its face while it was facing the wall." Fatty figured it might have been too embarrassed about losing its face, which was why it kept its head turned to the wall, hidden from their sight.

"Since the task has been issued, let's head to Room 708 first and see if we can find any clues," Keke suggested.

The other two nodded, and the three of them headed towards Room 708 together.

While walking, Fatty said, "By the way, the two tasks we know about so far both involve helping corpses find things. Will the other tasks in the future be like this as well?"

Meanwhile, Gu Mian was browsing the second task he had received.

He had barely finished the first task when the instance hurriedly issued him a second one. They were probably afraid he would get bored and start wrecking the place.

The second task he received was "Jigsaw Puzzle."

Well, it could be considered a jigsaw puzzle... I guess.

[The gentleman corpse in Room 603 heard that a new guest has arrived on this floor. He is quite excited and has issued you a challenge. Just moments ago, he hid the various parts of his own body. Please find all the parts and piece him back together completely.]

[If you win the challenge, Mr. 603 will unlock the locations of three more corpses in the building for all the players.]

Gu Mian had previously thought that a single task unlocking only two corpse locations was rather stingy. He hadn't expected this one to unlock three. Perhaps as time went on, each task would unlock an increasing number of locations.

As he pondered, he continued to read. There was another line below.

[If the challenge isn't completed within ten minutes, you will receive a punishment from Mr. 603. After that, Mr. 603 will issue a punishment every ten minutes until the challenge is completed.]

There's a punishment, too?

When I was helping that lady on the ground find her necklace earlier, there was no mention of a penalty for failure. This corpse in Room 603 really isn't considerate at all!

He remembered the corpse in Room 603 being quite fragmented, with its arms and legs strewn all over the place. Its body was in many pieces.

On the floor Gu Mian was on, the other corpses were in groups of three. Only this dismembered one consisted of four parts. He guessed that the floors above or below might be short of this type of corpse and needed one from his floor to make a set of three.

I should go to Room 603 first and see if there are any pieces of the corpse left in there.

With this thought, Gu Mian headed towards Room 603.

Before leaving, he casually pulled the strawberry necklace from the neck of the corpse at his feet. Female ghosts love this kind of necklace; Xiao Hong should be pleased if I give it to her.

When Gu Mian yanked off the necklace, the charred corpse on the ground seemed to twitch slightly. It probably wanted to jump up and furiously denounce Gu Mian for his shamelessness. However, likely concerned for her own safety, Miss Jiao didn't voice any wild accusations and could only silently express her resentment towards him.

Gu Mian soon arrived at Room 603, where the task had been issued. The axe he carried was from this very room. The corpse here probably felt its axe had been taken and, determined to get revenge on me, didn't leave a single fragment behind. The room is completely clean.

Every ten minutes, this corpse will issue a punishment. I wonder what kind of punishment it will be.

Gu Mian had noted that when he received the task, the countdown showed four hours and twenty-one minutes remaining. That means if I don't complete the challenge by the time it's down to four hours and eleven minutes, I'll receive the first punishment.

There's no telling how many pieces the corpse dismembered itself into. It's highly likely I won't be able to find them all by myself within ten minutes. The punishment already seems to be beckoning me.

Come to think of it...

Gu Mian suddenly felt a strange sense of familiarity with the current situation. It felt as if he'd encountered something like this somewhere before.

At this thought, Gu Mian stopped in his tracks to think seriously. A few seconds later, he suddenly understood why the situation felt somewhat familiar.

"The programmer's manual!" Gu Mian thought, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small booklet. This was the work manual he had snatched from an NPC in the previous instance.

That NPC had claimed to be a programmer for a small game and had even shown him this booklet to prove his identity. At the time, Gu Mian had casually glanced through it and seen it was full of bug fix records.

He had pocketed the booklet back then, thinking of using it as a notepad.

He flipped open the booklet. The first two lines on the first page read: "Fixed the bug where player clothing would be eliminated during gameplay." "Fixed the bug where multiple corpses in the same room would get stuck and become unable to move."

He had skimmed this page before. Now, he flipped to the next page to see what he hadn't paid close attention to.

"Fixed the bug where players utilized special items like 'Speak of X, X Appears' and 'The Little Pony That Only Hops on Sun-Character Grids' or similar displacement-type special items to directly glitch out of the building."

"Fixed the bug where players utilized special items like 'Gu Mian's Cell Phone Chat History' and 'The Irresistible Restroom Reader for Ghosts and Monsters' or similar spirit-attracting special items to glitch corpses out of the building."

"Due to the excessive number of loopholes caused by special items, after obtaining approval, we borrowed the 'High-Power Special Item Shielding Instrument' from the neighboring 'Ghost Painting Analysis and Art Exam Instance'. Henceforth, all special items are prohibited in this instance."

Wait a minute, what on earth is 'Gu Mian's Cell Phone Chat History'?!