"It hurts, it hurts, it hurts..." Fatty's screams echoed all around the seventh and eighth floors, mixing with a distinct scent of roasting meat.

The smell of meat was strongest in Room 708.

By now, the corpse in Room 708 had happily put its face back on. Not far away lay Fatty, continuously wailing in pain on the ground.

His back wound had been carefully cauterized by 007 and Keke. Some parts were even charred. Luckily, this was no barbecue joint; being overcooked here didn't affect much.

"The bleeding's almost stopped." 007 shook her hands, which had turned bright red from the heat. The axe head, now scalding hot, had unavoidably burned her where she'd had to handle it, causing several large blisters.

Keke nearby was no better off; her hands were similarly scalded.

At that moment, Keke was tying strips of cloth, cut from Fatty's discarded clothing, around his wound. "There's still a bit of blood seeping out, but not too much," she said. "It's not life-threatening once it's bandaged."

The blisters on her hand were bothersome, so 007 reached out to pop them. She then looked at Fatty, who was writhing in pain on the ground. "Cauterizing the wound this way runs the risk of infection and death," she said, "but we only have a few more hours before we can exit the instance. Even if you do get infected, it wouldn't kill you that quickly."

A large patch of skin had been torn from Fatty's back, and the exposed meat was then cauterized. The excruciating pain made him wish he were dead.

While he was moaning in agony, a message on the nearby screen announced that the players on the fifth and sixth floors had completed another task.

[Mr. Room 504 warmly hosted and issued a challenge to the players of this floor. Amidst the proceedings, the players' courage, wisdom, and strength wholly won him over, thereby unlocking access to four corpse locations for all the players on that floor.]

"The players on the lower floors have completed another task. This is the third one they've managed to solve," 007 said, covering her palms with her clothes.

The newly unlocked four corpse locations appeared after the previous message vanished from the screen.

These were the Drowned Corpse in Room 605, the Headless Corpse in Room 804, the Binge-eating Ghost in Room 408... and the Dismembered Ghost in Room 604.

"There it is!" Fatty also spotted the Dismembered Ghost in Room 604, the very type they needed on their floor.

He excitedly tried to raise himself for a closer look, but the pain from his wound made him scream aloud.

"The Dismembered Ghost for the lower floors has already appeared. We need to let the people downstairs know that we need this type of corpse." Keke finished bandaging Fatty's wound and tied a tight knot to prevent it from unwrapping.

The bandage was tight, and Fatty inhaled sharply. "However, the Dismembered Ghost on our floor hasn't been unlocked on the screen yet. If it were, we could parade our corpse around to indicate what we need. Since it hasn't been unlocked, it's going to be difficult..."

Suddenly, a crude plan popped into his head. "Four corpse locations have been revealed on our floor! We can place all four of those corpses in the room directly above Room 604, right over their Dismembered Ghost. Perhaps if we move them around a lot up there, the people downstairs will understand."

"We'll move the existing corpse out of Room 704 and place our floor's Dismembered Ghost in there, to line it up vertically with the one in Room 604 below. And then..."

"No." 007 interrupted Fatty before he could finish.

Fatty looked up at her, puzzled.

007 stared intently at the unlocked corpse locations displayed on the large screen. "We only know that there's a Dismembered Ghost in Room 604 downstairs, but we don't know the corpse type in Room 504, which is below Room 604. What if the corpse there also happens to be a Dismembered Ghost?"

Fatty blinked in surprise. "Then, once we drag our Dismembered Ghost into Room 704, it will form a vertical three-in-a-row, and the three corpses will be eliminated simultaneously!"

"But there might be more than two Dismembered Ghosts downstairs; there could be three or four. If we directly eliminate two of them, they might be left with extra corpses they can't eliminate themselves. We can't be absolutely sure that it's Gu Mian downstairs. If it's someone else, they would be in danger," 007 said.

After staring at the screen for a moment longer, 007 continued, "We'll place our Dismembered Ghost in Room 804. Then, we'll move the four corpses whose locations are already unlocked on our floor into Room 704. We'll continuously move these four corpses between Room 704 and Room 703, waiting for the people downstairs to respond."

Of course, responding by shouting was out of the question.

In fact, when they first entered the instance, Fatty had tried calling out to the people downstairs, testing if his voice could penetrate the floorboards that seemed to block even ghostly sounds. After several minutes of shouting with no response, he had given up.

007 looked away from the screen. "Voice transmission won't work, and special items are disabled. The only way to communicate is through this screen. We'll use the corpse locations to send messages, and I expect the people downstairs will do the same."

"If the people downstairs also start moving the Dismembered Ghost in Room 604 back and forth, then they've likely understood what we mean and are prepared for the elimination. At that point, we'll move our Dismembered Ghost into Room 704 and clear the other corpses from the room."

"If there's no response from downstairs, we'll hold off for now and see what happens when more corpse locations are unlocked."

"Let's go and move the corpses then..." Fatty struggled to get up.

Keke held him down. "Your back wound could split open if you move. Just lie here for the remaining few hours. 007 and I will go."

「Meanwhile, Gu Mian」

Gu Mian was wandering from room to room, waiting for the next task. I didn't expect the challenge mechanism in this instance to be so lenient, he thought. He had just secretly thrown most of the food under the table. The moment he discarded the last roast goose, the instance immediately judged him the winner of the match—even while the ghost across from him was still gnawing on a piece of goose skin.

While he was waiting for the next task, he suddenly noticed that the adjacent screen was continuously changing. He looked up.

There were originally four unlocked corpse locations on the seventh and eighth floors, each in a different room.

But now, these four corpses had all been dragged into Room 704. Moreover, one of them was still being moved back and forth between Rooms 704 and 705.

At first glance, one might think the players upstairs had gone insane, dragging corpses around for fun. But Gu Mian quickly understood their true intention.

The people upstairs have piled all the corpses visible on their floor into Room 704, aligning them with the Dismembered Ghost in my Room 604. Are they hinting that they lack a Dismembered Ghost?

This approach is certainly wild, just like Fatty, he mused.

Gu Mian recalled that Room 603, right next to Room 604, also contained a Dismembered Ghost. He had a total of four Dismembered Ghosts on his floor. I wonder if the team upstairs is short one or two.

If they only need one, I could actually place two of my extra Dismembered Ghosts in the room directly above 604, which would eliminate them directly. However, the people upstairs are probably being considerate. They might be worried that a direct elimination could leave an excess of Dismembered Ghosts on the fifth and sixth floors, so they moved their corpses in advance as a signal. I should first figure out how many they're short.

Of course, Gu Mian couldn't just shout upstairs to ask; he could only communicate by moving corpses.

He thought carefully. Then, he packed up the Dismembered Ghost in Room 604, moved it back and forth a few times between Rooms 604 and 605, and finally returned it to Room 604. This was his way of signaling to the people upstairs that he understood.

After Gu Mian moved the Dismembered Ghost, the corpse in the upstairs room stopped moving, seemingly understanding his message.

Soon, the people upstairs cleared Room 704, presumably to drag in their Dismembered Ghost. However, since the location of the upstairs Dismembered Ghost hadn't been unlocked on the screen, Gu Mian wouldn't be able to see it even if they moved it into the room above. He could only wait silently.

After about seven or eight minutes, the Dismembered Ghost in Room 604 had yet to be eliminated.

If they had two Dismembered Ghosts upstairs, this waiting period would have been enough time for them to place both into the rooms above, Gu Mian reasoned. Since there's been no activity for so long, they probably only have one Dismembered Ghost. They likely need me to move another one of mine to help them achieve an elimination.

Gu Mian went directly to Room 603 next door, which also housed a Dismembered Ghost.

He packed up the corpse in Room 603 and moved it into Room 504. This formed a vertical three-in-a-row of the same type in Rooms 504, 604, and 704. However, Room 504 still contained its original Binge-eating Ghost, so he had to drag that extra corpse away.

The moment Gu Mian finished dragging the two-hundred-jin Binge-eating Ghost out of Room 504, the Dismembered Ghosts in Rooms 504, 604, and 704 all vanished simultaneously.

"It's eliminated!" Fatty, who had been closely watching the large screen, exclaimed excitedly, his eyes wide open.

The extra Dismembered Ghost had been their only threat. They couldn't believe it had been eliminated so easily, leaving them in no danger at all. It felt like a dream.

"Now, the remaining corpses on our floor are all in sets of three, so they can be eliminated automatically!" Fatty exclaimed. He felt his backache lessen slightly now that the Dismembered Ghost was gone.

However, they didn't immediately eliminate all the remaining corpses, deciding instead to wait and see if the floors below would need their help.

But before the lower floors could make a move, the players on the third and fourth floors initiated a new action.