These realistic details sent a chill down to her very core.

Calm down.

Lily Bennett told herself not to pay attention to those details and to keep moving forward—the hiking backpack was just ahead.

But it all felt far too real.

On the wooden table were leftovers from a meal. She couldn’t tell what they had eaten, but a pungent, fishy stench assaulted her nose, smelling like raw meat beginning to rot.

Old newspapers were spread out on the floor, soaked with dark, greasy stains, and three animal traps coated in grease were laid out to dry.

It was the first time Lily Bennett realized that animal traps could be so big and heavy—longer than her arm—and, like guns, needed to be maintained with grease.

If she hadn’t truly traveled here, she would never have known these details.

This realization sent another wave of chills through her.

Lily Bennett took a deep breath, forced herself to focus, and moved forward without looking back.

She didn’t know if it was because her back was to the guards, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that if she turned around, she’d see them wide awake, staring straight at her.

...Darkness and the unknown make it all too easy for the imagination to run wild.

Lily Bennett struggled to suppress her wild thoughts, walked up to the hiking backpack, found the hidden latch, and pressed it gently—

With a soft “click,” the latch opened.

She couldn’t help but glance back—the group was still asleep, not awake.

Even though they were sleeping soundly, she felt an intense sense of being watched.

It was as if, in the darkness, someone else was staring at her, their gaze cold and invasive.

Lily Bennett felt her hair stand on end, deeply unsettled, but having come this far, there was no turning back. She could only grit her teeth, open the backpack, and find the first aid kit.

She didn’t take anything else—there was nowhere to put it, and it would only add unnecessary risk.

Lily Bennett gripped the first aid kit in her teeth, quickly closed the backpack and put it back in place, then hurried toward Eric Carter’s tent.

One step, two steps.

The distance grew smaller and smaller.

She was almost there!

Yet that cold, watchful feeling didn’t fade—instead, it seemed to draw closer.

It felt like someone was following her, their steps limping but calm and methodical.

Lily Bennett’s heart pounded wildly, her palms slick with cold, clammy sweat—she nearly lost her grip on the first aid kit.

But just as she bent down to crawl into the tent, a hand suddenly shot out, grabbing her wrist and forcefully pinning her to the ground.

With a dull thud, Lily Bennett’s back slammed hard against the floor.

She gritted her teeth against the pain and looked up. The first thing she saw was a white mask, with two eye holes cut out, from which empty, indifferent eyes stared out.

—“Only he wears a mask here.”

The one following her was Eric Carter!

Lily Bennett gasped, trying to struggle up, but he held her wrist and forced her back down.

He stared at her in silence, his thumb pressing against the artery on the side of her neck, suddenly increasing the pressure, then abruptly relaxing, as if weighing whether or not to strangle her.

There was no time to wonder how he could track her or overpower her with one hand despite his injuries—Lily Bennett blurted out anxiously, “—I’m here to save you!”

No response.

The air was terrifyingly still.

He stared at her, unblinking.

Lily Bennett wanted to study his eyes, but the white mask was just too eerie—the two eye holes looked cold and vacant.

After a while, it even gave her a strange sense of alienation, as if the person before her wasn’t human, but some entirely unknown species.

She swallowed hard, trying to keep her voice sincere. “I really want to help you... I didn’t expect Mike Harris and the others to go so far...”

She thought these words might get a reaction, but instead, he tilted his head and drew a knife—a sharp, double-edged knife!

Lily Bennett’s mind went blank.

For a few seconds, the back of her head felt icy cold, blood roaring in her ears, her throat so tight she couldn’t speak.

She’d spent some time as an actress in Los Angeles—a comedy actress, a horror movie actress, a musical actress. As long as there was money to be made, she’d even play a corpse in a crime show’s morgue.

She’d seen scenes like this before.

But the knives on set were always fake.

And the corpses in the morgue never fought back.

Right now, she felt frozen, completely at a loss for what to do.

As the blade inched closer, the hairs on her arms stood up one by one, her back drenched in cold sweat, even her teeth chattering.

Was he going to kill her?

Or rather, how would he kill her—stab her straight through the throat?

The blade drew nearer and nearer.

Her whole body was rigid, her cheek closest to the knife even starting to go numb.

At that moment, Eric Carter’s thumb suddenly slid up to her jaw, and he forcibly pried her mouth open.

—He really was going to stab her through the throat!

She was so terrified she couldn’t even scream, only able to watch as he forced her jaws apart and then... tapped her teeth with the blade?

He wasn’t planning to kill her.

Then what was he doing?