Chapter 1
Dragging my heavy, mottled corpse, I crawled slowly across the ceiling.
My thick black hair hung all the way down behind my boyfriend’s head, its ends brushing his neck.
He swatted at it a few times, then suddenly looked back, suspicious.
There was nothing there.
Instead of relaxing, he stiffened further.
The flame above his head had already gone out from fright. I could touch him briefly now.
No wonder ghosts put on such elaborate displays to scare people before attacking them.
People had three protective flames: one above the head, one on each shoulder.
Each fright put out a flame.
Once all three were extinguished, ghosts could do whatever they liked to you.
With a cold smile, I rose onto my toes and draped myself over his back.
Thinking he hadn’t slept well, my boyfriend went to the bathroom to wash his face.
As he wiped away the water and opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was my hideous, hate-filled face.
“Aaaah!”
His scream was deafening.
I had died in a beginner dungeon in the infinite game world.
My boyfriend had entered it with me, stolen my clearing item, and used me as a shield, leaving swarms of vicious ghosts to bite and tear me apart.
What he hadn’t expected was that I would follow him back to the player service area, where spirits weren’t supposed to exist.
Staring through eyes that could not close in death, I dragged my screaming boyfriend into the mirror, inch by inch, like a python clinging to its prey.
In the dark space inside the mirror, he shook his head in terror. Tears even leaked from the corners of his eyes.
My pale, rigid hands clamped around his throat like iron bands. Rasping sounds came from his mouth, and his legs began to kick wildly.
I knew he would gradually run out of oxygen. Breathing would grow difficult; dizziness would come, then blurred vision.
Finally, blood would pool in his head and his eyes would bulge. His tongue would protrude as he begged Death for a breath—
I couldn’t help laughing with pleasure.
Strangling was a very particular way to kill.
Through skin-to-skin contact, the murderer could feel the life beneath them drain away, little by little.
They could feel their prey tremble and struggle, feel the spasms turn from violent to still.
I knew he was almost dead. Just a few more seconds. A few more…
Suddenly, a pair of fair hands covered the backs of mine, stopping me.
I turned my empty, bloody eye sockets and found myself looking into a pair of utterly familiar eyes.
My own.
Another me crouched in front of me, wearing beige casual clothes. She had no fatal wounds, no sticky dark-red blood, no hatred etched into her bones.
She asked me calmly,
“Would you kill someone, Xu Yuan?”
Someone’s answer rang in my ears.
“Of course not. I have basic morals and respect for the law.”
“What if you had someone you hated, a lethal weapon, sufficient reason, and absolute certainty that no one would ever find out?”
“Say someone murdered you, and you became a vengeful ghost. Faced with your helpless killer, could you still guarantee that you would never kill?”
“…I—I don’t know…”
I released the man’s throat and stumbled half a step back, confused and afraid.
In the real world, I had seen examples of psychiatric episodes. Hallucinations were an important factor in some patients’ attacks on others.
Some shouted that they were killing monsters, when the people they were beating were innocent friends and family.
How could I prove I had really become a vengeful ghost after death, rather than imagining it all in a fit of madness?
How could I prove this horror-game dungeon world was real, rather than another of Zhuang Zhou‘s butterfly dreams?
Once doubt took hold, the revenge began to feel too easy. So easy it seemed false.
Everything was a little too convenient, wasn’t it?
How convenient that I had become a ghost powerful enough to avenge myself.
How convenient that I could ignore the infinite dungeon’s rules and appear as a spirit in the player service area.
The power to take revenge. The moral high ground that let me overcome my scruples and kill without hesitation. A perfectly safe identity beyond the reach of the law…
Time, place, circumstance—everything seemed arranged by some unseen hand to make my revenge easier.
As though everything…was coaxing me to kill.