# Chapter 2367: Pursuit by Instance Props
The middle-aged man was startled. When he actually jumped back, the head fell down, dragging a trail of blood as it rolled to the feet of Xu Huo and the others.
Looking back at the window opening, it was pitch black inside. Although they couldn't see clearly what was there, all three felt as if they were being watched.
"Slap!" The middle-aged man quickly closed the window opening with a flash, then retreated behind Xu Huo. "What the hell is that thing? It's not going to come out, is it?"
Xu Huo ignored his pretentiousness and instead asked, "You've been in the Fish Feast Building for so long—don't you know what's in the hidden space?"
"Just because I've been here a long time means I should know everything?" The middle-aged man retorted with righteous indignation. "There are pocket doors everywhere in the Fish Feast Building. How would I know what's inside each one?"
"Then why did you pull me in?" Xu Huo directly exposed him. "Don't tell me it was an accident."
This middle-aged man had grabbed him twice, and he hadn't avoided it either time—that was enough to prove something was off.
The middle-aged man rolled his eyes, adopting a "dead pig not afraid of scalding water" attitude. "I said it was an accident, so it was an accident. Who told you to stand right there? If you hadn't been standing there, how could I have dragged you in? In the end, it's your own bad luck. Your own bad luck—how can you blame me? If you can't take a shit, do you blame the toilet?"
Xu Huo was speechless. The Painting Woman seized the opportunity to interject, "Are you saying you're the toilet?"
The blustering middle-aged man stopped and looked at her with grievance. "Little sister, although you're beautiful, if you insult me, I'll still get angry. If you want me not to be angry, unless you give me a kiss."
"I'm going to kill him." The Painting Woman expressed her feelings succinctly.
But before the two could start fighting, the window opening that had been closed suddenly burst open. A white thread-like thing shot out from inside, wrapped around the middle-aged man's neck, and began dragging him back!
The window opening was only the size of a human head—how could the middle-aged man possibly fit through? Seeing his shoulders caught on both sides as he struggled and screamed, Xu Huo braced one foot against the wall, grabbed the man's back with one hand, and forcefully pulled him out while simultaneously slashing at the white thread!
He hadn't expected the white thread to be so easily cut, so he dragged the middle-aged man back two quick steps. The Painting Woman beside him swiftly closed the window opening and pressed both hands against it. There were a few banging sounds from inside, then silence.
The middle-aged man touched his neck and craned his head around. "Did it leave, or is it still lurking inside?"
Who knew? Xu Huo signaled to the Painting Woman with his eyes. Once she released the window opening, he quickly dashed toward the front of the corridor.
"Hey, wait for me!" Seeing them run, the middle-aged man followed. But behind him, the white thread came chasing again, as if it wouldn't stop until it caught someone.
After running for quite a while without reaching the end of the corridor, and finding the outer windows unopenable with no escape route, Xu Huo turned back to the person behind him and said, "I think it has to kill someone. Why don't you sacrifice yourself?"
The middle-aged man immediately jumped up. "Why should I? Why should I! Why don't you sacrifice yourself!"
"It wasn't me who opened the window," Xu Huo said. "You were the one with the itchy hands!"
The middle-aged man didn't think he was wrong at all. "I was clearing the way for you! Without me, how would you have known that window was so dangerous? You should thank me!"
"I thank you." Xu Huo suddenly braked, turned around, smashed a bottle of oil on the ground, then grabbed a random ore and threw it at the middle-aged man.
As the middle-aged man dodged the ore, he inevitably slipped, falling forward. Although he narrowly avoided the onrushing white thread, he successfully ended up within its coverage range.
Strangely, the white thread stopped mid-charge and then retracted—it seemed its target was only the middle-aged man.
The middle-aged man cursed under his breath, then threw out a prop that wrapped around Xu Huo, using the leverage to pull himself forward. Then, like a kite, he followed behind Xu Huo, casually greeting the two ahead.
The corridor finally reached its end, but ahead was a dead end. More white threads were almost filling the entire corridor. Xu Huo could only focus all his effort on breaking the outer window. Fortunately, after repeated attacks with various props, the window finally showed cracks. The middle-aged man came up and added a kick, sending himself flying out. "Haha! Heaven never seals off all... HELP!"
The prop wrapped around his waist hadn't been removed, so when the middle-aged man cried for help, Xu Huo was also dragged sliding to the windowsill. Looking down, besides the dangling man, there was only floating clouds.
The layout here was the same as the Fish Feast Building—outside was actually empty!
Not knowing how deep it was below, and fearing that once outside they might be trapped in an unknown space, ordinary people wouldn't choose to go out upon seeing this scene. So when the defense barrier opened, Xu Huo pulled the middle-aged man back.
"Brother, you're a good man. I knew you wouldn't abandon me!" The middle-aged man was all smiles once on the ground, but the smile didn't last long, because the white threads that had filled the corridor kept stacking against the defense barrier, already squeezing cracks into it!
"This shouldn't be happening. Why is it only chasing us? Aren't there other people here?"
Whether by luck or not, as soon as the middle-aged man finished speaking, the threads pressing against each other suddenly paused, then receded like a tide.
The corridor returned to normal.
"Is it really gone this time?" the middle-aged man said uncertainly.
Xu Huo kept his distance from him.
The middle-aged man grinned and sidled up. "Brother, from today on, I'll consider you my brother."
Xu Huo gave him a half-smile, then turned to the left, because a new corridor was forming as power fluctuations appeared on the wall.
"That should be an instance prop raised by the Fish Feast Building." The middle-aged man followed, chattering incessantly. "Don't underestimate these props. They might have been instance bosses from some instance before, brought here only after the instance was forcibly dismantled. Give them a venue, and even if it's not their own instance, they can still kill people."
"So there are quite a few such instance props?" Xu Huo said. "In that case, the pocket doors you mentioned are probably similar to the room doors outside. They connect to rooms in the Fish Feast Building. Besides the entrance portal, the exit should be a numbered room door?"
"There's still a difference," the middle-aged man gestured with his hands. "Pocket doors live up to their name—they're tiny spatial portals. Besides pocket doors, there are also hidden portals and hidden spaces. Many people accidentally enter pocket doors, but I've never heard of anyone being able to exit through an outside room door. And look around—this doesn't seem like a single room at all."
"With space extending infinitely, don't you think this feels more like a special space that combines multiple instance venues?"