NOVEL WEB Chapter 7: THE SURGEON
"It knows your bones. It remembers your guilt. And now it wants your face."
The hallway narrowed.
It didn't collapse. It constricted — like a throat deciding whether to swallow. The walls pressed in with every step Jié took, squelching under his palms when he brushed them, twitching like they were ticklish.
He kept his balance.
Kept his pace measured.
Let the mask stay on.
It gave him no vision. Only sound. Only breath.But somehow… it was better that way.
The floor wanted him to see something.
So he denied it that pleasure.
Ahead, the corridor opened into a chamber.
The floor here was smooth. Cold.
Surgical.
He stepped inside.
The air was different.
Not hot like the rest of the floor. Cold. Sterile. Tight.
Jié's mask shifted — the flesh over his mouth pulsed once, then relaxed.
Something in here wants me to speak.
He didn't.
The lights flared on.
But not real lights.
Veins.
Long, pulsing cords of blood and light lit the room from all angles, casting a sickly red hue over everything.
And in the center…
A table.
White. Stainless.
Bound to the flesh beneath it by tubes and cables like roots burrowed into a corpse.
On the table—
A body.
Skinned. Bound. Eyes stitched open.
Still breathing.
Across the room, standing tall, hands clasped in front of him like a priest about to perform communion…
Was a man in surgical robes made of stolen flesh.
Gloves dripping.
Eyes glassy and too calm.
He wore Jié's face.
[SYSTEM WARNING: FLOOR BOSS ENCOUNTER – THE SURGEON]
Difficulty: AdaptiveWeakness: NoneSpecialty: Guilt / Precision / Memory TheftFloor State: Reaction Level HIGHObserver Influence: Present
"Ah," the Surgeon said in Jié's voice.
"You made it past the masks."
"Fascinating."
Jié said nothing.
The Surgeon smiled. It was the smile he practiced in the mirror when no one was home.
The one he never let Xiǎorú see.
The one that said I could be a monster if I wanted to.
"Do you want to know who that is?" the Surgeon asked, gesturing to the body on the table.
"You do, don't you?"
Jié stepped forward.
Every part of him screamed no.
But he had to look.
The body was—
Him.
Not a clone. Not a copy.
A version of him.
Fatter. Younger. Weaker.The Jié who never got up off the mattress.
The Surgeon touched the body's temple.
"This is the one you left behind when you stepped into the ceiling."
"The boy who might've cried if he thought it would matter."
"He still believes someone's going to save him."
Jié clenched his fists.
"You came here to climb," the Surgeon continued. "But you don't even know what that means."
"You came to survive — but not to change."
"Do you think this place will let you stay the same?"
He turned, gestured to the walls.
Names began to carve themselves into the flesh.
Hundreds. Thousands.
Jié saw his name appear again.
Then again.
Then again.
Each one a slightly different spelling. A slightly different memory.
"Every time you survive a floor, you become a little less real," the Surgeon whispered.
"And when you stop being real… we get to decide who you are."
He stepped forward.
The mask on Jié's face burned.
[TRAIT CHECK: NULL FACE]Active: Suppress IllusionResult: Temporary Clarity Achieved
The mask split open at the eyes — just enough to show Jié the truth.
The Surgeon wasn't human.
His skin peeled in places, revealing tools beneath. Scalpel fingers. Syringe wrists.
His face melted in slow pulses — constantly reforming into versions of Jié's own face.
And behind him…
Observers.
Dozens.
Eyes in the walls.
Watching.
Feeding.
They're learning from me.
They're watching how I react.
This whole floor is a mirror.
"No speeches," Jié muttered.
The Surgeon tilted his head.
"What was that?"
Jié pulled the mask from his face.
The room shuddered.
"I said—"
He threw it at the Surgeon.
It hit the man in the face and screamed.
[SYSTEM GLITCH: MASK REJECTION – WITNESS CLASS INTERFERENCE]
NULL FACE has rebelled.TRAIT: "TRUTH BURNS" Triggered.Bonus Skill Fragment Earned.Bonus Event: FLOOR JUDGEMENT
The room darkened.
The walls closed.
The lights turned black.
And Jié rushed forward.
The fight began.