I’d originally planned to pretend to sleep—

  Blanket over my head, lifeless as a corpse—

  so that when the woman came back, I could act unconscious and save myself a long interrogation.

  But the bed was actually warm.

  And I was actually tired.

  My eyelids slipped shut, and before I knew it…

  I fell into a deep sleep.

  I didn’t know how long I slept before a faint sound seeped under the door.

  It sounded like someone pushing the door open—

  or something sliding across the floor.

  The sound crept closer, inch by inch.

  The hair on my body stood straight up.

  Only one thought remained in my mind—

  A monster coming to eat me at midnight!

  I tried to curl tighter under the blanket, a sensible turtle awaiting fate.

  Just then, the system chose that moment to murmur in my mind:

  【Host, we discussed this. You’re supposed to fix your cowardly persona.】

  I ground my teeth under the blanket.

  “Fix your ass! Survival comes first!”

  【If you don’t take the initiative, your chance of survival will only drop.】

  …This system really had a cursed tongue.

  I held my breath and listened.

  The sound grew closer—so close I could feel the faint vibration of the floor under the side of the bed.

  Fine. To hell with it!

  I jerked forward, headbutting the blanket and charging out, planning to ram whatever-it-was before they reacted.

  But the moment my head hit something warm, before I could even apply force—

  that “something” shifted lightly aside, absorbed my momentum, and with a swift tug—

  My blanket was snatched clean off me.

  I blinked at the person standing above me—

  And nearly burst into tears.

  “Big Brother?!”

  He looked at me calmly, as if he’d just returned from visiting a neighbor.

  My mind buzzed loud as thunder.

  Twice now—twice!—I’d valiantly fought back, only to attack my own people.

  What was this?

  Destined reunion by accidental assault?

  I opened my mouth to demand why he was sneaking around in the middle of the night scaring people.

  But he spoke first, voice low:

  “You slept quite soundly. I nearly lost my soul searching for you.”

  His tone wasn’t harsh, but it was like a gust of wind, blowing straight through me and sweeping my sleepiness away.

  I blinked, struggling to recover from the shame of “nearly headbutting my own brother to death,” and whispered:

  “How did you even find this place?”

  With the room quiet, I spilled everything—

  my guesses, my wild theories,

  including my earnest suspicion that the man of this house was a legendary boar demon.

  At the end, I clutched my brother’s hand, pleading:

  “Please take me away before the boar demon realizes I’m gone!”

  Big Brother frowned as he listened. After a long moment, he said slowly:

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “I saw you entering the city with a few people and followed. Then I watched you fall into the secret passage… After the two groups fighting above scattered, I managed to track the trail here. As I thought—you’d been locked away.”

  I froze.

  A sudden memory flashed.

  “Huh? So the thing following me halfway really was you? I thought it was a dog!”

  He gave me a look and smacked me lightly on the head.

  “Who are you calling a dog?”

  I rubbed the spot, muttering under my breath:

  “Well, we did think someone was following us, but what we saw was a dog…”

  “There was a dog!” I hissed.

  “A big yellow one, smart eyes, followed me for a long way—

  Looked just like the one in this room…”

  “When I came in, there was no dog,” Big Brother said firmly, without a trace of doubt.

  I froze.

  Da Huang’s eerily intelligent stare flashed through my mind.

  A cold shiver crawled down my spine.

  Don’t tell me…

  I really encountered a spirit?

  A low, amused voice suddenly drifted from outside the door, like claws scraping iron—cool and chilling:

  “Such a lively chat. In that case, stay. Both of you. Talk as long as you want.”

  My heart dropped.

  It was that man!

  Before I could react, the door slammed shut.

  A heavy bar dropped.

  Iron chains clattered.

  Just like that—

  my brother and I were locked together inside.

  Footsteps faded.

  Silence swallowed the room.

  My heart still thundered wildly, ringing in my ears.

  “We’re finished… He’s gonna cook us together…” I muttered, palms sweating as I scanned the room.

  In the dim lamp light, the walls were stone—cold and sharp as blades.

  The only door was barred shut, sealed tight enough that not even wind could slip through.

  I swallowed hard.

  That man’s voice still echoed in my skull—

  as if he’d already measured the size of the pot

  and only needed to light the fire.

  I clutched my clothes, panic knotting my insides.

  “Big Brother… are we… are we not getting out of here?”

  The moment I said it, I felt like a crab already sitting in the steamer basket—

  struggling only for formality.

  But Big Brother walked a slow circle around the room.

  His fingers brushed the walls lightly, as if testing something.

  “Calm down,” he said, voice as steady as still water.

  “These walls were built recently. They haven’t settled or breathed yet.”

  “So… so it’s a newly built prison room?” I whispered.

  He shot me a look—

  the kind that meant: Shut up.

  He moved to a corner, crouched, studying the floor.

  He tapped the stone with his knuckles. The sound was dull, thick.

  I tiptoed after him, nerves tangled—

  Was he searching for a secret passage?

  Or the best place to bury bodies?

  “You keep watch on the door,” he said suddenly.

  I blinked, but obeyed, pressing my ear to the cold wood.

  Not a sound.

  Only my own breathing, loud enough to deafen.

  Holding my breath, I peeked at Big Brother.

  He was half-squatting, fingertips gliding along a stone slab as if confirming something.

  A spark of hope burst in my chest.

  The way he moved—

  Yes! He must have found a mechanism!

  He was going to unlock a hidden tunnel and take me away!

  I leaned closer, eyes practically glued to the stone slab.

  Then—

  Big Brother merely pushed it twice.

  The slab didn’t budge.

  He lifted his head, expression calm:

  “The builder of this room… seems quite skilled.”

  I nearly spat blood.

  “You weren’t digging for an escape route?!”

  “I was.” He sounded righteous.

  “I just didn’t find one.”

  I squatted down, clutching my head, wailing,

  “A boar demon IS stronger than humans!”

  Big Brother frowned, sounding every bit like an elder lecturing a junior.

  “Don’t go doubting this and fearing that—seeing gods and ghosts everywhere. Didn’t you also claim you saw a ghost when you were little?”

  I stiffened, remembering that humiliating incident.

  That summer, I got up in the middle of the night to use the chamber pot. As I passed the back courtyard, the moonlight fell just right on a sheet of yellowing window paper.

  Suddenly, a hunched, limping silhouette appeared on it—stooped back, crooked gait, and something round and bulging dangling at his side… like he was carrying a severed head.

  He shuffled forward, wobbling with each step, and with every movement the “head” swayed along, as if nodding to me.

  My scalp exploded; cold sweat shot from my spine down to my soles. I didn’t wait to see any more—I just turned and bolted.

  The next day, I told everyone the Nangong estate was haunted, that a head-carrying ghost wandered about at midnight.

  It wasn’t until later that I learned the “ghost” was just Uncle Wang, the lame groundskeeper, going out at night to dump the chamber pot.

  And that “head”… was an old, battered urine bucket.

  My brother even comforted me with a straight face:

  “That wasn’t a ghost, it was your future father-in-law.”

  —Of course, that turned out to be absolute nonsense, since Uncle Wang only had a daughter and no son, and as for me… well, I’ve only ever liked men.

  Thinking of all this, I covered my face and groaned,

  “But this time I really might’ve run into a demon!”