But out of habit, she stared into his eyes, trying to look fierce. "If I find out you're lying to me, you know what will happen!"

"If I lie to you, may I become an orphan!" Jiang Cheng raised his right hand, his expression very serious.

After tossing and turning for so long, Chen Xiaomeng was also tired. She held the rope in her hand, pointed at Jiang Cheng, and said, "You, get off the bed."

"Tsk," Jiang Cheng moved his mouth, revealing a pitiful look of being extremely unwilling, but ultimately having to succumb to the other party's power.

He slowly, slowly got out of bed.

"Why are you acting like this?" Chen Xiaomeng felt annoyed just looking at his face, and a slight anger rose in her heart. "I didn't say I was going to do anything to you!"

Jiang Cheng looked up and thought for a few seconds, then looked at Chen Xiaomeng with an indescribable gaze. After a long while, he twisted his body and said, "Be bolder, I'm actually more delicate than you think."

Chen Xiaomeng: "......Do you have to be kicked out to be happy?"

"I don't care," Jiang Cheng said, as if he had regained his courage, "There's only one bed here, why should only you get to sleep on it? I want to sleep on the bed too."

"My body is very delicate. If I get cold sleeping on the floor, my adoring little sisters won't let you off the hook, you should think carefully!" he threatened.

"I've thought it through very clearly," Chen Xiaomeng turned around, pointed in the direction of the door, and said simply, "I'll give you two choices now. One is to shut your mouth and sleep on the floor, and the other is to get out of here immediately!"

"If you let me sleep on the bed, I can reveal some information to you," Jiang Cheng changed his tone in a subtle way. He raised his eyebrows, hinting, "About this mission."

Hearing this, Chen Xiaomeng's expression suddenly became subtle. She sized Jiang Cheng up and down, and after a few seconds, she nodded, "Okay, but I warn you, don't try to lie to me."

Jiang Cheng acted like a lackey and approached Chen Xiaomeng, but after realizing that the latter's eyes were unfriendly, he rationally kept his distance.

"I feel like Li Lu is acting strangely," he whispered.

Chen Xiaomeng glanced at him, clearly signaling for him to continue.

"Li Lu said that she is just an ordinary housewife with a civil servant husband who leaves early and returns late, and a 3-year-old daughter. Her life is trivial and ordinary, which is also similar to the personality she shows," Jiang Cheng added, "In our previous discussions, she never actively expressed her opinions. She showed more of a dependent personality, which is often said to be echoing others."

"But when facing the question of whether to go to Xiaoshijian Village tomorrow, she acted unusually, showing a very positive, even forceful attitude," Jiang Cheng glanced in the direction of the door, and then said, "This is inconsistent with her basic persona. She should support the conservative Pei Qian, not Zhou Rong."

Chen Xiaomeng nodded, her expression also becoming cautious, "So... you suspect that she has some kind of clue, which is why she made this decision."

"Mhm."

When Chen Xiaomeng looked at the place where Jiang Cheng had been standing again, she realized that he was gone, and the quilt on the bed vaguely bulged in the shape of a person.

"Let's hurry up and go to sleep," Jiang Cheng poked his head out of the quilt, and greeted Chen Xiaomeng very enthusiastically, "It's bad for your skin if you stay up late."

Chen Xiaomeng walked over, forcibly suppressing the urge to drag Jiang Cheng out of the warm quilt, and asked in a low voice, "Do you think the thing is on her?"

"I'm not sure about that, I just think it's strange," Jiang Cheng moved around in the quilt, as if he was doing something.

Then, under Chen Xiaomeng's shocked gaze, he reached out and took out the clothes and pants he had taken off from the quilt, and neatly placed them on the chair next to the bed.

Then he turned to look at Chen Xiaomeng, his eyes full of expectation.

Chen Xiaomeng's face was cold, and she raised her leg.

Before being kicked, Jiang Cheng consciously rolled to the side of the bed. Chen Xiaomeng didn't even take off her clothes and lay down just like that, in Jiang Cheng's previous position.

The flame of the kerosene lamp gradually dimmed.

Just as Chen Xiaomeng was half-asleep, she noticed that the person next to her suddenly moved, a very violent movement, and the whole bed trembled.

She immediately sat up and glared at Jiang Cheng on the other side of the bed and asked, "What are you doing?!"

"It's nothing," Jiang Cheng's head was buried in the quilt, and the voice was muffled, "I just had a nightmare, a very scary one."

Having a nightmare within a nightmare, I wonder if you'll be drawn into an even deeper layer of nightmares, just like in sci-fi movies like Inception.

Chen Xiaomeng thought unconsciously, and suddenly felt that this idea was very terrifying.

But then she thought that it was Jiang Cheng who was experiencing this, so she couldn't help but feel a little expectant.

She slowly closed her eyes, but unexpectedly—

"Bang—"

"Creak—, creak—"

"Bang—"

"Creak—, creak—"

Jiang Cheng began to twitch violently like he was having an epileptic fit. This scared Chen Xiaomeng, even though they had not yet gone to the main location, Xiaoshijian Village, the mission had already begun unknowingly.

Without a doubt... the first abnormality appeared on Jiang Cheng.

In an instant, Chen Xiaomeng rolled off the bed, her movements swift and precise, as if she had rehearsed them.

In this situation, the actions shown by novices and veterans in response to crises are completely different. After leaving the bed, Chen Xiaomeng moved towards the door as quickly as possible, tightening her lips and not saying a word.

Her first reaction was that her idea had been confirmed. At least in this Nightmare Assault mission, it would be very dangerous to have a nightmare while sleeping.

Just like Jiang Cheng now.

He shrank into the quilt, his body rising and falling heavily from time to time, like a fish out of water, desperately slapping its body.

The already old bed boards made bursts of harsh creaking sounds as he moved.

She suspected that it would collapse in the next second.

About a minute, or a little shorter, just as Chen Xiaomeng's heartstrings tightened and she was about to run away, the violently shaking Jiang Cheng on the bed suddenly stopped moving.

The whole room instantly fell silent.

The faint light of the fire flickered, and the dust stirred up by Jiang Cheng could be seen in the air.

"Hoo—"

Jiang Cheng's sigh came from the bed. He stretched out a hand, scratched his hair, then turned over, his expression very serene, as if what happened just now was just a simple exercise, or... a game.

Chen Xiaomeng's pupils shrank suddenly, as if she realized that she had been tricked by Jiang Cheng again. The anger in her heart could no longer be suppressed. She walked forward a few steps and kicked the human-shaped object in the quilt.

This kick was extremely solid, kicking Jiang Cheng to the ground, making a "thump" sound.

And then... there was no then. Jiang Cheng slept on the floor wrapped in a quilt that night, without a pillow, and used his clothes and pants to pile up a pillow shape.