The screen glitched right before I passed out.
One second, I was staring at my laptop, rereading a cursed comment thread about Threads of Dread—the horror infinite flow WebNovel I'd been hate-binging for weeks. The next, everything went black. Not just dark. Black. A complete sensory blackout, like my brain had been shut off and rebooted without permission.
When I opened my eyes again, I was staring at a filthy ceiling with cracks like spiderwebs.
The air smelled of damp wood and iron. My back ached against rough, cold flooring. Something wet clung to my shirt, and my vision blurred at the edges. I blinked hard. Once. Twice. The world sharpened just enough for panic to set in.
I was not in my apartment.
I sat up fast. A wave of nausea hit me, but adrenaline pushed it aside. My fingers touched the floor. Concrete. Grimy. The light overhead flickered—dim, yellow, and sickly. And then I looked down at myself.
My hoodie was gone. Instead, I wore a threadbare t-shirt stained with something dark and crusted. Blood?
A name tag was sewn into the fabric. I read it once. Then again.
Lin Yusheng.
No. No way.
I scrambled to my feet, nearly slipping on the damp floor. I rushed to the wall and pressed my hands against the peeling paint like I could force it to tell me something, anything that made sense. I remembered that name. I knew it.
Lin Yusheng was a side character in Threads of Dread. A forgettable player, comic relief, good-natured and emotional. He cried in the first arc and died in the third. That Lin Yusheng.
And now… I was him.
A screech of static erupted above. I flinched as a hidden speaker crackled to life, and a voice like an automated announcer boomed across the room:
"Welcome, player Lin Yusheng. First Trial initializing."
"No, no, no," I whispered. "This isn't happening. This isn't—"
"Survive three nights in the House That Hates You."
"Failure to complete the trial will result in elimination."
I backed away from the speaker, my pulse hammering in my throat. The room began to shift—the walls elongated, the corners deepened, and shadows pooled like ink. A wooden door appeared on the far side, aged and cracked, like it hadn't opened in decades.
Then I heard it.
Footsteps.
Measured. Calm. Deliberate.
They echoed down a hallway I hadn't noticed until now. I turned sharply—and froze.
A tall figure stepped into view, half-lit by the flickering overhead light. Dark boots. Black cargo pants. A tattered coat that hung open like a warning. Eyes sharp enough to cut glass. He looked at me with all the warmth of a guillotine.
Ren Hanyuan.
The antagonist of the early arcs. The "villain" rival to the original protagonist. The fan-favorite psychopath who played the system like a chessboard. I'd read his arcs more than once, half in awe, half in horror. He'd slit a teammate's throat in one game, burned down an entire ritual village in another, and still had readers swooning over him because he was tragic. I never bought it.
Now he was walking straight toward me.
And I was the weakest, softest character in the story.
"Why are you staring at me like that?" he asked, his voice low and dry like sandpaper.
I swallowed. "You're… here."
Ren tilted his head. "Of course I'm here. Don't tell me you're another one of those players who expected to coast through the first trial."
I opened my mouth, then closed it. I had no script. No clue what Lin Yusheng would say, and no idea if the system would punish me for being out of character.
Ren's eyes narrowed. "Something's off about you."
I took a step back. He stepped forward.
"You're not scared of me," he said quietly. "Lin Yusheng always was."
I tried to steady my voice. "Should I be?"
Ren's mouth curved—not into a smile. Into something sharper. "You're not him."
"What are you talking about?"
"You're in his body. But you're not him." He reached out, almost touching my chest, then stopped. "I've seen enough people lie. You're new."
I couldn't breathe.
Ren dropped his hand. "Whatever. I don't care. If you're faking it, good. That means you might actually survive this."
He turned away, walking toward the door.
I stayed frozen, heart pounding.
"Move," he called over his shoulder. "Unless you'd prefer to be eaten by the wallpaper."
"The what?"
Ren didn't answer. He pulled open the door, and a blast of cold air rushed in. Shadows poured across the floor like smoke.
I followed him before I could think twice.
*******
The hallway stretched impossibly far. More doors lined the walls—some cracked open, some nailed shut, others breathing.
Yes. Breathing. I saw the slow inhale and exhale of one warped wooden door, and my knees almost buckled.
This wasn't just a haunted house. It was alive.
Ren walked ahead like none of it fazed him. Like the flickering shadows, the distant sobbing, the blood that slowly seeped from beneath Door 7—they were just background noise.
"How do you stay calm in this?" I whispered.
"I don't," he replied. "I calculate."
"Calculate what?"
"Who dies first. Where the exits might be. How long until the house loses interest."
"And me?"
He glanced at me. "You're unpredictable. I don't like that."
We reached a staircase. It spiraled down into blackness. A plaque nailed to the wall read:
"DOWNSTAIRS IS DINNER."
"Cute," Ren muttered.
"Does that mean we're dinner?" I asked.
"Probably."
I was shaking. I didn't want to go down. Every instinct screamed to run the other way. But Ren started descending, and something told me staying behind would be worse.
I followed.
Step by step, the shadows deepened. The air thickened. Whispers curled against my ears, saying things I'd never said out loud.
You shouldn't be here.
You don't belong.
You'll die like the rest.
But even as terror clawed at my throat, a part of me burned hotter. If I was really inside Threads of Dread—then I knew things. I'd read nearly every arc. I knew which rooms were traps, what the side characters missed, what the system never explained.
This wasn't just a nightmare.
It was an opportunity.
If I played it right… I could survive. Maybe even win.
If Ren didn't kill me first.