5: Chapter 5 The Mansion's Butler

The real world, Jiang City.

In the Pei family's living room, the elderly couple stared fixedly at the screen. In the image, that red-clothed fierce ghost who was supposed to be slaughtering everyone was currently facing their daughter—no, facing that broken jade pendant bought for two yuan—and slamming her head against the floor with earth-shattering thuds.

"Feier..." Father Pei's lips trembled, his old eyes filled with disbelief. "That rascal... is he really working for the First Emperor of Qin down there?"

"How is this just working for the First Emperor of Qin!" Mother Pei slapped the table, crying and laughing at once, her whole being instantly revitalized. "Our Feier has made something of himself! He must have passed the civil service exam in the Underworld! And it's a permanent position with authority, the kind that manages things!"

Inside the dungeon, the first-floor lobby.

The Red Matchmaker didn't even dare to wait for Pei Duo to put away the black key.

The moment Pei Duo's fingertips touched the key, this S-rank fierce ghost seemed to sense an impending great terror. She didn't even dare to lift her forehead, which had been smashed bloody from kowtowing.

"Sizzle—"

A scalp-numbing sound of corrosion rang out. The Red Matchmaker actually turned directly into a pool of foul-smelling black water, frantically seeping down through the cracks in the floorboards.

Her escape speed was so fast it was as if being even a second slower would result in her soul being scattered, losing even the chance for reincarnation.

Dead silence returned to the lobby.

Only that pool of blood, still emitting black smoke, remained to prove that everything that had just happened was not an illusion.

"This... this isn't right..."

Glasses Man pushed up the gold-rimmed glasses that had slipped to the tip of his nose.

The brass key can only open ordinary guest rooms; it's a 'Path of Life'.

The one Pei Duo has opens the core hidden area; it's a 'Privilege'.

At this moment, a crack appeared in the 'puzzle-solving' worldview that Glasses Man had constructed over three years.

What IQ suppression? What logical closed-loop?

In the face of an absolute 'connected person,' the clown was actually me!

But he was, after all, a veteran strategist-type player. After being shocked for only two seconds, his brain began to work rapidly.

The Red Matchmaker retreating didn't mean they were safe.

"Miss Pei."

Glasses Man didn't grovel like an ordinary newcomer. Instead, he quickly retracted his previous cold arrogance, his tone becoming calm and swift. He took two steps to Pei Duo's side, using his body to block the greedy or prying gazes of the other newcomers.

"Put the key away, don't show it off."

Then, he looked at Lin Sa nearby, and the two exchanged an extremely complex look.

That was the tacit understanding between high-level players—clinging to a powerful person, and doing so with technical finesse.

Lin Sa's fingers, which had been playing with a coin, also stopped. She silently stood on Pei Duo's other side, forming a protective angle, and whispered, "Although the Red Matchmaker ran away, she isn't the only ghost in this mansion. Since she abandoned her post, the mansion's butler will definitely notice. We have to leave immediately!"

At this time, only seven people remained in the lobby.

Besides the three of them, there were four newcomers shivering in the corner, looking at Pei Duo as if she were a deity, wanting to approach but not daring to.

"Go to the second floor."

Glasses Man made a prompt decision, analyzing at high speed, "The Red Matchmaker was the first floor's watchdog. Now that the watchdog has run away, we must enter the safety zone on the second floor before the real butcher arrives! Miss Pei, your key can open the Count's Study; that place is definitely safer than the guest rooms!"

Pei Duo was still a bit dazed; the scene just now had been too much of a shock. But since Lin Sa had saved her before, she had a good impression of these two. She instinctively gripped the jade pendant and the key in her hand and nodded.

"I'll listen to you."

Like startled birds, the seven people crowded around Pei Duo and ran toward the spiral staircase at the end of the lobby.

The stairs were covered with a thick red carpet. Every step they took caused dark red liquid to seep out, as if they were stepping on the slimy tongue of some giant beast.

At the entrance to the second floor was a massive carved iron gate.

A large, rusted lock hung on the gate, separating life and death by a thin line.

"Quick! Hurry!"

The newcomers behind them scrambled up, their rapid breathing sounding like bellows in the deathly silent corridor.

Glasses Man rushed to the gate and pulled out the brass key.

As long as they opened this gate, they could temporarily escape the suffocating smell of blood on the first floor.

The tip of the key aligned with the keyhole.

"Click."

A crisp sound of metal clashing rang out.

Just as Glasses Man was about to turn the key.

"Strange, why is the lobby so quiet?"

A low, elegant, yet eerily puzzled male voice abruptly came from deep within the shadows at the second-floor landing.

The voice wasn't loud, but it was like a cold hand instantly gripping everyone's hearts.

Glasses Man's hand froze violently. The key was stuck in the lock, and no matter what, it wouldn't turn.

Everyone looked up in terror.

Deep in the dim corridor of the second floor, a pair of polished black leather shoes, untainted by a single speck of dust, slowly stepped out of the shadows.

Then came straight black trousers, an exquisite tailcoat, and a pair of dazzlingly white gloves.

A thin middle-aged man with meticulously combed hair was standing behind the iron gate, looking down at the seven people outside.

He was the butler here.

But he didn't immediately start killing like the Red Matchmaker, and he didn't even have that nauseating smell of blood on him. He was too clean, so clean that he seemed out of place in this filth-ridden dungeon.

He merely frowned slightly, his gaze passing over everyone's heads to look at the empty first-floor lobby.

"Although the Red Matchmaker is a madwoman, she has never missed work during 'hunting' hours."

The butler pulled a gold pocket watch from his jacket pocket, flicked open the cover to take a look, and said with a hint of genuine confusion in his tone: "It's only been a short while, so why are there no screams at all? There are no signs of a struggle, and even that loathsome ghostly aura has vanished completely..."

This kind of confusion was even more hair-raising than direct murderous intent.

In this monster's logic, dead people were normal, and screams were pleasant to the ear.

The current silence was an unforgivable 'violation'.

Cold sweat on Glasses Man's forehead slid down his glasses frame and dripped onto the back of his hand.

He could feel that the pressure emanating from this NPC was more than ten times stronger than the Red Matchmaker's!

If the Red Matchmaker was a mad dog, then this butler was an emotionless meat grinder.

The butler closed his pocket watch, and his gaze, which had been looking at the air, finally slowly shifted down to land on these seven shivering humans at the gate.

His eyes were terrifyingly calm.

It was just like looking at several bags of trash that had been accidentally left at the door due to a cleaner's negligence.

"So there are a few fish that slipped through the net."

The butler didn't fly into a rage; instead, he elegantly straightened his white gloves and curled his lips into an apologetic smile. "Dear guests, how unfortunate. The Count prefers quiet, and it is currently his nap time. The mansion does not receive outside guests. Since the Red Matchmaker is absent, I shall have to take it upon myself to clean up."

The moment those words fell.

"Vroom—"

An invisible force field of extreme terror suddenly descended. The surrounding air seemed to be sucked dry, making it impossible to breathe.

"It's over..." Glasses Man's face turned ashen, and he slumped against the iron gate.

There was no time to solve the puzzle at all. With the ghost butler blocking the gate in front and no way back, this was truly a dead end!

This time, it was truly a hopeless situation!

"So as not to disturb my master's rest, please... die quietly."

The smile on the butler's face remained elegant. He slowly raised his white-gloved right hand and made a light slashing motion with his fingertips toward everyone's necks.

The breath of death instantly closed in!

At this critical juncture.

"Wait a minute!!"

A tremulous shout rang out.

Not knowing where she got the strength, Pei Duo suddenly shoved aside Glasses Man who was blocking her. Holding up that cracked, dirty black jade pendant with both hands, she closed her eyes and, with a desperate resolve, thrust it directly against the iron bars!

"Butler! Does... does this work!!"

The butler's hand, which was already about to fall, froze in mid-air as if he had been struck by lightning the moment he saw that black jade pendant.

In his eyes, which were usually as calm as an old well, an emotion called 'shock and suspicion' appeared for the first time.

His elegant movements ceased.

He stared fixedly at that jade pendant, which looked like it had been picked out of a trash heap. The hand that had been prepared to harvest lives was slowly, slowly lowered.

"This thing..."