Nightmare Despair

Chapter 7 Lighting the Fireplace
Staggering out of the study, Zhou Kai leaned against the cold wall of the corridor, his heart pounding.

He stared intently at the small square window behind the bookshelf, which was empty, as if nothing had ever happened.

But her eyes were still twitching uncontrollably, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, as if that pale, swollen face was still pressed against the glass, staring at him with lifeless eyes.

That was definitely not a hallucination.

The numbness in his body had not completely subsided when Zhou Kai recalled his moment of distraction, and a chill ran from his tailbone straight to the top of his head.

If it weren't for the fact that his Mixed Martial Arts skill level had increased to 2, causing a surge in his strength that elevated his control over his body to a new level and freed him from those strange constraints, he wouldn't have been able to break free.

Just now, he probably really did act like a puppet, walking step by step to the window, personally opening the door for that monster to enter its "home"...

"It...shouldn't get in."

Zhou Kai's heart sank as the so-called residence permit notice resurfaced in his mind.

Obtaining a notarized residence permit will deter other residents from easily encroaching on your territory.

Looking at it now, this short sentence is full of traps.

Zhou Kai sneered inwardly.

【easily】?
In other words, it only takes a little effort.

【resident】?
Does that thing outside the window count as a "resident"?
The so-called home, the refuge it can provide in a nightmare, seems to be just that—nothing special.

He picked up the broken door panel, still covered in splinters, and used it to block the doorway to the study. Then he went to the oil lamp and turned the flame to its lowest setting.

In an instant, the shadows inside the room grew even thicker and deeper, as if they could swallow up all the light.

Danger lurks everywhere here...

The house was far less safe than he had imagined.

Without searching every inch, he would never know which corner still had a window that hadn't been sealed off.

And outside the window, is there a pale, lifeless face, like fermenting dough, constantly watching you from the darkness?

"Hopefully they didn't come in."

Zhou Kai's footsteps were almost silent as he moved quickly along the wall on the first floor.

Every time he inspected a corner, he would suddenly turn around, as if afraid that if he turned around, he would get a cheek kiss with that face.

The exploration yielded nothing.

There is no information about the fuel.

Zhou Kai had been in the dream for more than half an hour, and the cold air felt like steel needles, seeping into his body through every pore.

My joints were so stiff from the cold that with every step I took, I could almost hear the bones grinding together.

He had to abandon the idea of ​​exploring the dark corridor ahead.

On the other side of the corridor, there should be an entrance to the basement.

He retreated to the fireplace, the most likely place on the entire floor to hide clues.

[A hero who voluntarily enters the nightmare can leave at any time...]

[A coward who is passively drawn into a nightmare must erect a tombstone... or possess a flame sufficient to keep watch...]

Characters slowly appeared on the cold stone of the fireplace, as if urging him to leave.

"Erecting a tombstone means you can only leave this world after dying once..."

"The Flame of the Night Watch?"

Zhou Kai had no clue, but the good news was that he came in on his own initiative.

But soon, his eyes narrowed: "No... we can't leave yet!"

In nightmares, despair can fester.

The longer it drags on, the more unimaginable the horrors that will eventually be faced.

He had to solve the pressing problem of keeping warm before he was passively entering the dream state a few days later.

"But... what exactly is fuel?"

Anxiety rose in his heart like a flame.

Just then, his gaze drifted past the cold furnace to the grotesque outline of the monster's corpse in the corner, illuminated by the dim light of the oil lamp.

He remembered the stark white bones hidden in the ashes, besides the broken pieces of wood.

I remembered the inexplicable word "repentance" on the letter.

A crazy yet perfectly reasonable idea exploded in his mind.

Without further hesitation, Zhou Kai abruptly stood up, and with a muffled whistling sound, the axe viciously cleaved into the corpse's shoulder blade.

After a dull thud as it entered flesh, he dragged the thing toward the fireplace as if it were a heavy bag of garbage, leaving a wide, sticky, dark red drag mark on the floor.

A home should look like a home.

……

A warm fireplace keeps you company through the long night.

A chat box appeared in the flickering firelight.

The fireplace was finally lit.

Zhou Kai's eyes shone brightly in the flames.

Inside the furnace, crackling and popping along with the wood, were one of the monster's legs and one of its arms.

"Repentance? Is it because you burned the outsider with Lanze?"

Recalling the contents of the letter, Zhou Kai finally understood.

The fireplaces here are fueled by the flesh and blood of monsters and even humans.

Without real fuel, this fire can't even be lit! Zhou Kai exhaled a long puff of white smoke and sat down wearily by the fireplace.

The long-lost warmth slowly spread from his side, dispelling the chill that had seeped into his bones and gradually easing the exhaustion that was almost crushing him.

A few minutes later.

As Zhou Kai looked on, lines of text floated by.

The fatigue has disappeared.

The weakened state has disappeared.

The erosion you have been subjected to is being dispelled.

The newly acquired fatigue and the weakness that had plagued him for several days vanished, while the four-ninths of the erosion state flickered uncertainly in the firelight.

Perhaps if it bakes for another hour or two, the number on the molecule will decrease by one.

Wouldn't that give us another chance to be resurrected?

After weighing the options, it was far more worthwhile to leave the body to burn slowly than to burn it all at once.

But the benefits of a burning fireplace go far beyond that.

After Zhou Kai regained some strength, he threw the remaining remains into the fireplace, trying to maximize the burning time.

A new chat box suddenly appeared on the fireplace.

[The tainted flesh and blasphemous soul dissolved in the flames... You received Lanze Soraka's gift.]

You have gained 3 points in Spearmanship, 1 point in Horsemanship, and 1 point in Soraka's Family Swordsmanship.

Since you know nothing, you ultimately gained: 1 General Experience Point.

……

"This corpse isn't that bearded bald guy, it's my younger brother Lanze?"

Zhou Kai was quite surprised that burning corpses actually gave him experience points.

However, the various conversion rates of specialized experience points into general experience points made him feel like he had been ripped off.

Five to one!

This guy is even more ruthless than capitalists!
But there's nothing we can do about it; he doesn't know anything and has nowhere to learn...

Being able to exchange it for general experience points is already a stroke of luck amidst misfortune; it's better than getting nothing at all.

In the end, Zhou Kai extracted four general experience points from a complete corpse.

Furthermore, erosion progress -1 equals resurrection count +1.

The fireplace timer shows one hour and forty minutes remaining.

This means that if Zhou Kai leaves now, when he enters again, he will have a "spring" that lasts for more than an hour.

So, should we continue exploring, or return to reality to rest?

After a moment's thought, Zhou Kai decisively chose the latter. The longer he stayed in the nightmare, the more variables would arise.

He carefully collected his spoils and silently murmured before the fireplace, "Detachment."

……

"Xiao Kai, did you have another nightmare?"

Back to reality, the nightlight by the bed was on.

Zhou Qing was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking tenderly at her younger brother.

Zhou Kai's expression was stiff, his throat was dry, and he shook his head slightly.

Zhou Qing explained, "My workplace is changing dormitories, so I need to go home to stay for the next few days."

"You go to sleep," she said softly, but her voice seemed to come from a great distance. "I'll just sleep on the floor."

Zhou Kai felt the temperature in the room being slowly drained away; his sister's smile held no warmth whatsoever, like a face painted on ice.

Her shadow was stretched and distorted on the wall, her posture like that of a baby just learning to walk.

The two fell into silence.

About two minutes later, Zhou Kai suddenly shivered, his body trembled violently, and he subconsciously opened his eyes.

All I could see was pitch black.

"Was that... also a dream?"

He tried to erase his sister's sinister face from his mind, but a chill ran down his spine.

I struggled to get out of bed and reached out to turn on the light.

He found himself drenched in cold sweat, with a wet, human-shaped stain on the sheets.

My life is irresistibly sliding into a bizarre abyss.

Zhou Kai suppressed a sigh, silently got up and washed his face with cold water, then sat down at his desk and took out his laptop from the drawer.

The Red Star Republic's technological style pursues a retro-futuristic feel.

For example, this laptop was designed to look like an old-fashioned handicraft.

The screen is only a finger's width thick, but the bezels are so sharp they can hurt your fingers.

The body is about two fingers thick, and the keyboard on it makes a crisp, clicking sound, like a typewriter in an old movie.

Zhou Kai bought this phone during his junior year of college. Its performance was top-notch at the time, and it's not too outdated even now.

He opened a webpage and typed a few keywords into the search box.

[Soraka - Soraka Town - Family - Church]

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(End of this chapter)