There was a thick fur rug under the sumptuous sofa, and a fireplace not far away was dark and cavernous, as if there were ashes left behind from some burning firewood.

Night had taken over the world and they shouldn't have been able to see this clearly, but the crystal chandelier overhead was still on, refracting the light to cut the visitors in pieces.

The cottage still had electricity running.

"Look around first," said the burly man, withdrawing his gaze from the chandelier, "and stay together, don't split up."

Soon they found a large amount of food in the dining room fridge, including vegetables, rice and pasta, meat and even a few snacks, with a basket of eggs at the far end.

It looked fresh, like it had been put in an hour ago.

But judging by the dust on the floor, that simply wasn't possible.

And the focus of the crowd was clearly not here either, as the strong man looked at the food with a surprisingly unsurprised expression on his face, and after a long time said at least we wouldn't be starved to death.

The sound of clattering water came from behind, Jiangcheng twisted his head and found that the woman with a mole on her lip had unscrewed the tap and had clean water flowing out.

She turned to look at the rest of the group after turning off the tap and said slowly, "Looks like we won't die of thirst either."

Immediately afterwards they found a large quantity of firewood in a small, isolated, storeroom-like room.

The firewood was stacked one on top of the other, neatly palletized.

The first floor was the living quarters, with a master bedroom, a study, and two smaller bedrooms, in addition to a locked room at the end.

It was clear that both the strong man and the woman were interested in the locked room, but both tacitly refrained from offering to break down the door to get inside.

The staircase to the third floor was locked by a black iron door, which the strong man shook but did not budge.

The group retreated to the ground floor living room.

The group had spent most of the day in this world, especially after the crash and the long journey, and were now cold and hungry.

The strong man proposed that he take the middle-aged man to fetch firewood and make a fire, while the woman, Aoiz and the fat man went to cook, leaving the innocent woman and the male clerk to clean up the house.

Aoiz stared at the table of ingredients in a daze, and the woman sneered and left him alone.

Luckily, Fatty was a good cook, and he was good with knives and knives, so in no time at all, he had a fragrant meal on the table, and he even fried an egg for everyone.

The living room was cleaned up near the sofa and everyone was sitting around the closet, eating from bowls.

The fire in the closet was burning brightly and making a crackling sound.

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After dinner, the group gathered to discuss the mission.

But the discussion almost turned into a brawl between the strong man and the woman, which couldn't be helped, after all, the mission had only just begun, there were very few clues, and these two were the most vocal.

Looking at them with a light touch it was clear that they had already succeeded in several missions.

It was late at night.

The strong man advocated that everyone sleep in the living room, but the woman always insisted that everyone should sleep in the first floor bedroom, on the grounds that there might be clues there.

In the end the two men disagreed and the innocent woman chose to join the woman. The two of them headed for the stairs and just as they were about to reach them, the male clerk suddenly ran past.

Aoiz guessed that it was the two slaps from the strong man that had left a psychological shadow on him.

With that, the strong man, the middle-aged balding man, Aoiz and the fat man stayed in the living room for the night, while the other three went to the bedroom upstairs.

"Stupid!" The strong man looked at the backs of a few people leaving and cursed in a low voice.

Sleeping in the living room was less elaborate, and the rest were all men. There were three long sofas, one for each person, and just one man left to keep watch.

The strong man said he would take the first watch, then took a pocket watch out of his pocket, opened the lid and placed it on the small table in the middle.

"It's about 10 p.m. and dawn at 6 p.m. That's eight hours in all, and there are exactly four men here, each keeping watch for two hours so that everyone can have plenty of time to rest."

The burly man was just about to continue when he saw the fat man in front of him staring at the pocket watch on the table with a strange look.

"No need to look, the time is inaccurate," he explained after a pause, "all clock time brought into the dream world gets messed up, the only thing it does now is keep time."

The time shown on the pocket watch was 4:18, which clearly did not match the reality of the situation.

Given that Aoiz and Fatty were both newcomers, the burly man said a few more words, telling them that it was normal for anything to appear in the dream world that defied scientific common sense.

What they needed to do was to go through the various anomalies, find the clues hidden behind the anomalies, and then crack the mission and leave the dream world.

Aoiz raised his hand and the strong man looked at him and asked, "Is there something you want to say?"

"If you have escaped from the Dream Realm, why would you come back?"

"Because there are only 0 times versus countless times in the Dream Realm, and as long as you have ever opened that door, it will stay with you forever until you die. By the way," the burly man looked like he thought of something, "the full name of the Dream Realm is the Nightmare Junction."

"A knotted boundary?"

"That's right, it's like a boundary wall separating reality from illusion, no matter how badly you are injured in the Dream Realm, as long as you still have a breath, you will return to reality intact after the mission," he gave a bitter laugh, "Isn't that an apt name?"

"So how do I get out of this nightmare boundary for good?" It was the balding middle-aged man who spoke, his voice raspy and giving off an uncomfortable feeling.

The burly man glanced at him and spoke, "Don't ask such stupid questions, you're not a newcomer and should understand that this question is as insoluble as our current inability to figure out exactly what point in time this world we're in is."

The middle-aged man grimaced and stopped talking.

Aoiz raised his hand a second time.

The burly man looked at him rather helplessly, "Just ask whatever you want to ask, no need to raise your hand."

"It would be sometime between late March and mid-September 2006," Aoiz said earnestly.

The strong man froze, along with the middle-aged man who had already lowered his head, and the fat man also stared at Aoiz with a suspicious look on his face, wondering what medicine he was selling in his gourd.

"How do you know?" The burly man asked.

Aoiz unhurriedly fished out a small bag from his pocket and handed it to a position closer to the rest of the group, where several people could see that it was a bag of Da Thorn Garden buns.

Aoiz turned the bag over and pointed to a line of small letters on it: Date of manufacture 18 March 2006. Shelf life 6 months.

Then he tore the bag open in full view of everyone, pulled a piece of bread into his mouth, chewed it for a while then swallowed it with a jerk of his neck, thought for a moment and said, "It tastes good, still very fluffy, not damp, and considering it was kept in the fridge in such an environment, I think the presumed date could be further advanced."