The blood quickly stopped flowing, but the acting manager’s body still couldn’t move.

He had intended to squeeze into the hotel after the manager’s death, planning to use the monsters within the hotel as materials for some harmless entertainment projects and to test the virtual and real aspects of the system.

Unfortunately, the body of the real acting manager was too weak to withstand his strength and was horribly sluggish.

“That expression of yours…” Xie Qing pinched the acting manager’s chin and lifted it. “I thought you didn’t care about the hotel’s KPI of recruiting sacrifices, yet why do you look a bit displeased?”

As the acting manager’s flesh began to heal, Xie Qing noticed that his neck wound had partially closed, so he roughly yanked off the tie around his neck and tightly wrapped it around the wound, pulling it hard.

“You heal too quickly. I can’t let you move around just yet, so I’ll have to artificially slow you down a bit. You won’t blame me, will you?”

The pain was nothing to the acting manager. What stirred within him was something else. His pupils dilated slightly, and his dark golden irises darkened quickly, as if they had absorbed the deepest night.

He narrowed his eyes and spoke softly, “Xie Qing, if you don’t kill me, once I—”

Xie Qing pinched his mouth shut, his index finger nearing his lips: “Shh—”

“Threats will only excite me.”

His face, neck, collarbone, and the thin layer of skin over his chest were splattered with the acting manager’s blood.

The bright red bloodstains didn’t detract from Xie Qing’s beauty, instead they spread onto his skin like a deliberate decoration, adding an enchanting charm.

Xie Qing wrapped the tie around his right hand and gently touched his wound with his thumb. He frowned slightly, then he raised his head and asked, “Does it hurt?”

The manager looked at Xie Qing with cold eyes. It was Xie Qing who cut off his blood vessels, twisted his neck, and tied the tie into the wound, preventing it from healing.

It was also Xie Qing who looked at him worriedly, his tone extremely gentle, as if he really cared whether he was in pain or not.

What exactly was Xie Qing planning?

The acting manager quietly asked, “What use is it to trap me? I can’t figure out your reason for doing this.”

Xie Qing didn’t answer. He leisurely wiped the blood on his hands onto the acting manager’s collar. “Still curious how I plan to get out of here?”

The acting manager squinted. His intuition told him that Xie Qing wouldn’t speak the truth. Xie Qing was a puzzle, and he had yet to find the solution.

Xie Qing smiled. “I’ll sacrifice the most important person to me, obtain the hotel’s VIP status, and leave the hotel in plain sight.”

As soon as the words left his mouth, his hand was grabbed by the acting manager and brought to his lips. Instantly, Xie Qing felt a wet sensation in his palm. He swiftly pulled his hand away, his disgust evident. “Are you a dog?”

The acting manager released his grip on Xie Qing’s hand and licked his lower lip, his expression subtly changing.

Xie Qing loosened his grip on the tie, steadying himself against the desk as he stood up.

The acting manager grabbed his ankle, causing Xie Qing to falter for a moment. But just as quickly, he let go, almost as if he didn’t understand why he had tried to stop him in the first place.

Xie Qing lowered his eyes, a brief smile crossing his lips. He spoke softly, “We’ll see each other again soon.”

He limped out of the door, not looking back.

As soon as Xie Qing stepped out of the door, two black-clad security personnel from the security department appeared at the door, one on each side, quickly seizing Xie Qing’s arms.

He didn’t resist.

The footsteps gradually faded away.

The acting manager ripped off the tie from his neck, and his wound healed instantly. The broken vertebrae and nerves that Xie Qing had twisted also regenerated.

He licked his lips, his voice barely audible as he muttered, “Liar.”

When Xie Qing said he would sacrifice the person most important to him, the acting manager had tasted a rich sweetness on Xie Qing’s palm—sweet, with a faint trace of bitterness.

He liked it very much.

It was the taste of a lie.

Xie Qing’s statement made the livestream chat explode like a supernova, with viewers unable to believe what they had just heard.

“Did I hear that right? He’s going to sacrifice Qin Shen?”

“I’m speechless lol.”

“If it were someone else doing this, I’d let it slide—but Xie Qing? I’m so disappointed. And yet, I still can’t bring myself to curse him, ughhh.”

“You shameless people deserve each other. I’m off to watch Qin Shen. Xie Qing’s a traitor; you pathetic simps can stay locked in with him forever.”

“People are selfish by nature—especially in nightmares, where the darkest parts of humanity get magnified. Xie Qing has it tough too. Maybe some of you should watch your mouths.”

“Isn’t it cold up there on your moral high ground? It’s easy to snack on chips while watching a stream and judging people. But who knows what you’d do if you were the one trapped in a nightmare?”

The comment section was in chaos, with many viewers disappointed in Xie Qing and attempting to exit the livestream—only to realize they couldn’t.

“What’s going on? Why can’t I leave the stream?”

“Don’t tell me it’s another Nightmare breach! Don’t scare me like that!”

009 pressed the mic button and explained in a low, steady voice:

“Temporarily being unable to exit the stream is due to Xie Qing entering a special space. Once he exits, things will return to normal.”

He paused, then added,

“All viewers, please closely monitor your Invasion Index. Nightmares don’t just threaten players. If your index reaches contamination level and Xie Qing still hasn’t exited the special space, please do not forget to press the emergency disengage button.”

The viewers quickly checked their Invasion Indexes and were alarmed to find that the numbers had increased significantly without them noticing. Those with more fragile mental states immediately began to panic.

009’s voice came through calmly once again:

“Everyone, there’s no need to panic. You must trust in your own resilience—and trust in the player you’ve chosen to support. Remember, our observation is one of the most effective ways to suppress Nightmare expansion.”

“Please stay relaxed, stay alert, and stay observant.”

009’s steady, reassuring tone calmed the panic. The audience gradually refocused their attention on the screen.

Xie Qing was being held firmly between two security department staff members as they escorted him down the corridor. They passed Room 101 and continued toward the very end of the hallway—a place that, even in daylight, remained shrouded in darkness.

He had seen two other employees be taken away by the security department’s men in black—both of whom ultimately vanished at the end of this very hallway.

Darkness temporarily overtook Xie Qing’s vision; he couldn’t see a thing, but he could hear something—sounds like elevator doors opening and closing.

After walking what felt like over a hundred steps, light returned. Xie Qing blinked to adjust to the sudden brightness and saw it: the towering red hotel building, the thick Angela flower wall winding along the fence—the very same view outside Room 101’s window.

This was undoubtedly the hidden back area of the hotel, a section never shown on any of the layout maps.

The weather was gloomy. In the distance, the mountains loomed like slumbering beasts, and the dark gray clouds pressed low overhead. The cold wind howled, resembling a low whisper.

One end of the flower wall was attached to the hotel’s red facade, while the other extended into a green hedge maze.

The security department staff escorted Xie Qing to the center of the maze, where a strange pattern was drawn on the ground. The coiling lines resembled the manager’s aesthetic—a grotesque blend of octopus tentacles and gluttonous beast motifs, a fusion of mythological nightmares.

Within the circular walls of the hedge stood an altar. The wind—its origin unclear—blew through the space, making the candle flames sway, yet they didn’t go out. The candle wax dripped in long trails, pooling at the base like rolling hills or like the flowing skirts of Tang dynasty noblewomen in classical paintings.

At the very center of the altar rested three memorial tablets.

The left tablet read, Spirit Tablet of the Heavenly Venerable.

The right tablet read: Spirit Tablet of the Honored Lord of Chaos.

The center tablet read, Spirit Tablet of the Honored Lord of Darkness.

A man with an orange-peel colored face and a square-jawed man stood upright, their hands pressed flat against the sides of their thighs, standing in solemn reverence:

“The Divine Empress Sheng Yan Wujiao, the goddess who governs Darkness and Abundance.”

“The Gluttonous Mother who birthed millions of offspring.”

“When the stars align in their rightful positions, she shall awaken to the wails of her faithful and, with absolute fairness, devour all living beings in a single bite.”

“May the Gluttonous Mother accept this offering from Your humble servant. May his sins be redeemed through Your merciful consumption. May his soul find peace within the warmth of Your body.”

‘O Gluttonous Mother of Darkness and Abundance—Yan Wujiao!’

After finishing the incantation, both the orange-peel-faced man and the square-jawed man turned their heads—only to see that Xie Qing, utterly disrespectful toward the goddess, was wildly taking photos of the altar with his phone.

The wind grew stronger—practically a demonic gale. The green tree walls rippled like waves, the trees themselves writhing, and Xie Qing could hear them whispering among themselves. Then, as if obeying a command, they parted from the center.

The orange-peel-faced and square-jawed men remained silent. They didn’t scold or punish Xie Qing in any way. Compared to the other departments with their passive-aggressive and eccentric hotel staff, the security division employees were like soulless automatons.

Xie Qing was forcibly lifted from the ground, held firmly between the two as they carried him through the opening in the tree wall.

And just in that brief moment, the exploration progress bar jumped up by 3%.

The livestream viewers suddenly realized the truth—no wonder Xie Qing had let himself be taken by the security guards. His real aim was exploration progress.

Thinking about it carefully, it made perfect sense.

Sacrifices clearly held major significance in this hotel, so naturally, the process of sacrifice would yield considerable exploration value.

The tree wall suddenly parted with a loud crash, and a strong sulfur smell, along with a rush of hot air, surged toward him, almost suffocating him.

Behind the tree wall, strange trees and wild grass grew wildly. Several hot spring pools of varying sizes emitted steaming hot vapor. The edges were piled with random rocks, and the rough, artificial feel made it seem pretentious.

The hot springs at the health spa hotel were finally revealed to Xie Qing.

At a glance, Xie Qing noticed something black floating in the largest hot spring at the center. It drifted with the waves, resembling water plants, but its color was darker than any water plant.

As he approached, Xie Qing saw more clearly—it was a skeleton wrapped in hair. The bones were snow-white and barely noticeable in the boiling, pale hot spring. The hair was several meters long, some tangled around the skeleton like a black silkworm cocoon, the rest floating in the water, rising and falling with the waves.

Xie Qing looked at the water pump not far away and wondered if the hair in the bathtub faucet came from there.

The orange-peel-faced and square-faced men from the security department escorted him forward step by step. There was a red circle on the ground beside the pool, with a picture of a Taotie with long tentacles on it. They asked Xie Qing to stand in the circle.

The hot spring water rolled up white foam and accumulated at the edge of the pool. Under the foam were corpses at the bottom of the pool. Xie Qing counted more than a dozen heads at a glance.

The employees who were sacrificed were probably all here.

Xie Qing thought that this sacrificial ceremony was too crude. They just recited a few words and sent him to the hot spring, and that was it. It wasn’t solemn at all.

The health-preserving hot spring had been boiled into a pot of aged black hair and white bone soup. He wondered if drinking it could supplement calcium.

The security guards with the orange peel-colored face and square jaw spoke in unison: “Oh! Goddess of Darkness and Abundance, mother of the gluttonous beast who breeds thousands of hatreds, please accept the offerings of your humble disciple!”

The scalding hot steam hit Xie Qing’s cool face, and his long lashes gathered tiny droplets of dew.

The skeleton seemed to hear the voices of the security guards, and floated toward him with the flowing spring water. It extended from the water, wrapping around Xie Qing’s ankle and immediately leaving a red mark from the heat.

The black hair wound upward around his ankle, and a strong pulling force came from it, as if trying to drag Xie Qing into the hot spring.

Xie Qing lowered his gaze, his lips twitching: “Can’t your hotel worship something decent? This mess of hair is supposed to be an evil god?”

[Ding—]

[Player Xie Qing, please note that your exploration level has reached the required threshold. It has been detected that your identity has changed, and the task cannot be submitted. Please attempt to resubmit the task after restoring your traveler identity.]

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TN:

Update is super late, but I double updated and I’ll try to update frequently. Thanks for reading ❤️