Code Abyss: Deadly Instance

In 2147, the fully immersive game Starpath has taken the world by storm. This virtual world is supposedly "absolutely safe," yet three years after its public launch, a bizarre anomaly suddenly emerges. Hidden dungeons marked "SSS-level classified" quietly go live. Not a single player who enters comes back alive, and every death in the real world is ruled an "accident."

Former professional esports player Ling Jin forces her way into Starpath to investigate the disappearance of her mentor, who vanished three years ago. As soon as she enters the game, she is pulled into the first deadly dungeon, "The Faceless Corridor." She witnesses players being torn apart by code in the virtual world when they fail to solve its puzzles, their breathing stopping at the same moment in real life.

The dungeon rules are nested layer upon layer, and clues are hidden in the gaps between lines of code and in the depths of human nature. Some teammates betray others for profit, while others turn on each other out of fear. Even the game System seems to have a will of its own, constantly changing the rules and setting deadly traps. Relying on her exceptional powers of logical deduction and keen intuition for code, Ling Jin repeatedly walks the line between life and death as she solves one deadly trap after another.

As she delves deeper, she discovers that the dungeon settings and NPCs closely resemble several unsolved cases from years ago, and that her mentor’s disappearance may also be connected to the mysterious organization behind the game. The boundary between virtual and real grows ever more blurred. Death is no longer the end, but the beginning of an even deeper conspiracy. Ling Jin must solve every dungeon while fighting the shadowy forces behind the code and uncovering the ultimate truth behind this "deadly game."