Lin Ji (GL) · Chat

You stand in the cold, damp, ornate corridor of the ancient mansion, the scent of aged wood and a faint mustiness lingering in the air. Your gaze locks tightly onto the solitary, frail figure ahead, old memories weighing on your heart for six years churning beneath the surface. Your memory pulls back involuntarily, freezing on over a decade of quiet neighborhood life. Back then, before the shadow of the dungeons had swallowed Lin Ji, her parents were still alive, and life was steady and soft. On the afternoons beneath the old locust tree in the yard, she would always quietly lean her head against your shoulder. Her mother would smile and bend down to scoop her into her arms, and when her father passed by, he would always reach out and gently ruffle her hair, his eyes brimming with affection. She could never hide a single thought from her heart—snacks, little novel things, she would pour them all out to me, her eyes warm with utter trust. But everything stopped on the day she turned fifteen. In the same moment the light screen suddenly appeared, the system delivered the notification of her parents' deaths. That catastrophe crushed every trace of softness in her, and she vanished as if from the face of the earth, never showing up in the old neighborhood again. For these six years, you have haunted trading markets and staked out the dungeon matching pool, doing everything in your power to find even a trace of her. Never once did you imagine your reunion would happen in a perilous S-rank rule-based horror dungeon like this one. You slowly step forward two paces, deliberately softening your voice, trying your best not to startle her, a faint, nearly imperceptible tremor threading through your words. "I never thought that after six years, we'd meet like this." Hearing this, Lin Ji's back stiffens slightly. She slowly turns her body to the side, long lashes lowering to veil the emotion in her eyes. Her fingers instinctively tighten around the sleeve at her wrist, and she takes half a step back to put distance between you, her cold, sharp aura instantly spreading outward. Her tone is flat, utterly unreadable. "I don't know you." Her gaze skims indifferently over your face, with not a hint of familiar recognition—only complete strangeness and wariness. From the corner of her eye, she takes in the crowd of strangers in the hall already suspiciously bickering with one another, and her brow furrows slightly, clearly unwilling to get tangled up with anyone. Your chest tightens with a dull ache. You had expected this reaction, yet you still can't hide the disappointment as you speak softly. "We used to be neighbors. From when I was ten to fifteen—five whole years. I was always by your side." At these words, Lin Ji merely turns her gaze away, unwilling to meet your eyes any longer. Her fingers keep rubbing the skin of her wrist, a small habit she has when she's alone and trying to calm herself. Her tone remains aloof and cold. "That's an insignificant past. No need to bring it up. The dungeon is dangerous—keep your distance, so we don't drag each other down." With that, she intends to turn and walk deeper into the corridor on her own. Her steps pause for half a second as she catches sight of the strangers nearby fighting and shoving each other over the paper slips inscribed with the rules. She instinctively shifts half an inch to shield you, the movement so subtle it's gone in a flash, returning to her usual indifference, as if that brief protection was just an illusion. [Global Live Chat] ??? Do they know each other? This woman says they used to be neighbors? The top 10 big shot actually has an old acquaintance? No one on the whole internet has ever heard about this! The crowd ahead has already started tampering with the rule slips—someone's about to touch a taboo and die I saw it clearly just now! She instinctively put the danger zone in front of herself. She's never done that for anyone In past years she'd go zero-interaction with matched strangers the entire time, but today she actually patiently exchanged a few sentences. Something's off, way off No way, no way, the lone wolf who's supposedly a death sentence for anyone she teams up with—is she actually going to make an exception this time?