Chapter 343: Pinokangni Chapter 32

The two quickly gathered the fragments, repaired the painting, and the door ahead slowly opened.

After passing through the dark corridor, the two arrived at a spacious room; the room was pitch black, except for a shaft of light from the ceiling shining on an ornate treasure chest, which looked very suspicious.

Xing slowly opened the chest, hearing a 'click'—the whole room suddenly brightened, countless lights from all directions shone beams, illuminating every corner of the previously dark room in detail.

The light came too suddenly; Xing instinctively narrowed her eyes. After her vision adjusted, she saw that the room was piled with countless discarded televisions, as well as six doors leading in different directions.

"What the hell?! How did all the lights turn on? It's so scary…" Liuying took a deep breath, instinctively moving closer to Xing, "But there are so many doors here… we should be able to leave through one of them."

Xing pushed open one of them and soon arrived at a room almost identical, but here the piled televisions flickered with static, and a boy's terrified voice appeared on the wall:

"Help… help…!"

"Save me…"

—

JOJO's Bizarre Adventure Golden Wind.

Something's not right.

Qiao Lu Nu suddenly spoke, his fingers lightly tapping the chair's armrest; the rhythmic 'pat-pat' sound was like the nervous heartbeats of the two in the sky curtain, so tight that Te Li Xiu also felt somewhat at a loss.

"This, this is exactly the atmosphere of a horror movie…" Te Li Xiu's nails dug deep into the leather armrest, "I don't want to watch… what if something like a ghost suddenly pops out from behind the door…"

In the sky curtain, Xing and Liuying had already pushed open the third door; the scenery behind it was no different from behind the first door—piled televisions, the boy's voice, and white words continually appearing on the wall…

…

"Could it be that twin-tailed little girl who did this?"

Fu Ge lowered his head, thought for a moment, then speculated.

"No. She should only be responsible for bringing Xing and Liuying to this creepy place." Qiao Lu Nu lightly furrowed his brows, "They can never reach the 'truth' of getting out of here… In other words, someone wants to trap them here."

"Are they from the family?"

"I'm not sure, but I guess they probably offended someone's interests." Qiao Lu Nu looked up at the two girls in the sky curtain, his eyes seeming to carry a hint of regret, "In Shajin's mouth, Xing is someone strong enough to overturn the whole table—but I don't think so."

"Pinokangni is too full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers; many lie in wait, waiting for others to make a move, then counter—Harmony in front, Preservation behind; in the gap between these two forces, the power of the Star Core may be special, but it's not enough to shake the overall situation. Unless—"

"—Unless someone behind the scenes wants her to shake the overall situation." Fu Ge took over the boy's words.

—

Xing and Liuying pushed open another door, and as expected—the room had the same layout.

Liuying felt a hint of unease: "Again like this… no, could it be…"

A harsh piece of music suddenly sounded in the room, the upbeat beat carrying the exaggerated sound effects typical of cartoons, as if someone had deliberately pressed the play button on an old children's program. This sudden noise, mixed with the boy's frightened hoarse voice, gave Xing goosebumps on the back of her neck.

The voice from the wall trembled in fear: "██ said ████ not ██ able ███████ open box ███……"

After pushing open the next door, the two could no longer tell which was the original door; in this door, everywhere were sobbing and whimpering sounds, making the scalp tingle.

"██ please ██ you █████ me ████████████ afraid ██……"

The two continued toward the next door; this time those sounds had become completely indistinct, and the televisions' flickering grew even stronger.

"The televisions' flicker is blinding… careful, it feels like there's something…" Liuying instinctively tugged at Xing's coat.

Accompanied by a blinding flash of strong light, a purple giant eye suddenly appeared!

That pupil moved and blinked like a living thing; even more terrifying, its image spread at viral speed across the other televisions in the room—almost in the blink of an eye, the whole room was filled with purple eyes, the focal points forming an invisible net that tightly ensnared them.

At some point, the ceiling had gathered a sheet of purple clouds; a disturbing red light poured down, accompanied by a grating metal sound that made the teeth ache, as a twisted colossal creature slowly emerged from the purple clouds——

It resembled a monster piled from countless eyeballs, its serpentine body ending in sharp bone blades, and its most striking head resembled the sharp claws of some creature.

—

fate.

In the Emiya household's living room, the crimson light in the monster's eye in the sky curtain shone on the four people's differing expressions.

Splash——

Rin Tohsaka accidentally knocked over the tea cup on the table, tea spilling and dripping onto her skirt, yet she was oblivious, merely widening her eyes in terror, staring fixedly at the twisted monster composed of countless eyeballs.

"This, this isn't a beautiful dream, is it?! Why is there this… this…"

Rin momentarily couldn't find a suitable word to describe it, her fingers flailing in the air. She felt the monster resembled nothing, indescribable, ineffable, as if it were merely the embodiment of the concept of a "nightmare."

"Master, from the moment they stepped into this dream, you should have prepared to be frightened." Lancer let out a light sigh, "Pinokangni's beautiful dream… although I thought it wouldn't be that simple, I never imagined the family would secretly keep such a big guy."

"How interesting… if we caught this monster and threw it onto Pinokangni's main street, what would happen? It would probably be fun, right?" Lancer said intriguingly, "What would those hounds do if they saw it? They'd probably tuck their tails and run."

"That would only increase casualties." Saber frowned, "But in Pinokangni's dream, there should be no death—so why raise this monster?"

"Maybe it's a blade the family has been honing for a long time?" A flash of sharpness passed through Lancer's eyes. "Anyone who blocks the family's path gets tossed into this dreamscape for the monster to slaughter. 【Harmony】……Kill everyone who makes discordant sounds, and the remaining sounds will be harmonious, right? Maybe that's the core belief of the 【Harmony】 family."