/
XĂź Beijin stands there, stunned, before exhaling heavily.
He finally landed on such a conclusion.
Or rather, he is finally able to grasp onto this concept in his mind.
Whatever Lin Qin was, it would not affect Lin Qin’s place in his mind.
The brash little apple is already firmly latched onto him. XĂź Beijin, though, is still worried about his past, worried that those unknown memories would affect him.
He always thought Lin Qin has amnesia… But what if, he simply never had any memories in the first place?
What if he doesn’t even belong to Earth? But Lin Qin now says he has some strange feelings about his past…
Xü Beijin’s mind is starting to produce guesses and hypotheses. None of them are really friendly, so to speak.
He knits his brows, falling deep into thought.
Lin Qin extends his hand then, and smoothes out Xü Beijin’s furrowed brows. He says, “you don’t have to overthink this. If only I knew, I’d not tell you about the weird feelings I felt.”
Xü Beijin “…”
Man, Lin Qin being Lin Qin again.
Then Lin Qin looks at him and shrugs, saying, “you said that earlier, too.”
Xü Beijin, speechless, says, “I didn’t say anything like that.”
“You were thinking that just now.”
“How do you know what I’m thinking about?”
“I just know,” Lin Qin seems proud of himself, adding, “my instincts tell me so.”
Xü Beijin “…”
The little apple is getting less and less likeable by the minute.
Lin Qin then looks at him and thinks some more, before softening his tone to say, “really, stop overthinking about things.”
Xü Beijin doesn’t answer him, though, and just says, “let’s enter the labyrinth first.”
The entrance to the labyrinth is right in front of them now.
Standing up close, the walls of the labyrinth are more than 5 metres tall. Two storeys, basically. The electronic screens producing the colours are extremely smooth, too, too slippery to climb up on.
Well, people can still pile on one another, but A-One, noticing everyone observing the walls of the labyrinth with the eye-bleaching colours, reminds them, “you can’t climb this. There’s a net of electricity up there. Your bodies will be incinerated… and then the place would probably restart.”
The Missiontakers quickly look up, but they can’t see anything different about it.
This really doesn’t look like Earth at all. In fact, it more closely seems like what A-Two said, being some representation of a mental patient’s inner world.
Surrounding the labyrinth is just abyssal darkness. Above them is some kind of black, hemispherical dome that merely reflects the dancing colours below.
In such a disorienting environment, the Missiontakers find their heads throbbing soon enough. All they can do is look away from the walls, and look back down at the road in the labyrinth.
Well, not that that’d help much, as the ground is also formed by distinct, changing blobs of colour. Taking steps in here really doesn’t feel like walking on reliable, solid ground at all.
Mu Jiashi asks, “so, all we can do now is explore this labyrinth?”
“Looks that way,” Fei replies, “are there others in the labyrinth?”
A-One replies, “yes, there are. We met some people already in our exploration, but they’re spread out in different locations across the labyrinth. They’re all looking pretty insane, too, hard to communicate with; however…”
He looks hesitantly at A-Two, who thinks and says, “I think they also probably know something. Something about the old Earth. It is just that, we didn’t know anything in the past. So we didn’t understand what they were talking about.”
Fei quickly asks, “do you remember what they said?”
“Something like…” A-Two replies, “well, it’s a mess, but just phrases like ‘they’re coming,’ ‘save us,’ ‘it’s going to fail,’ and similar stuff. We don’t know what is ‘coming’ either.”
“’They’re coming’?!”
Shen YĂźnjĂź and Ye Lan both exclaim.
“What’s wrong?” Mu Jiashi asks, “do you know what that means?”
Ye Lan explains what happened to them before, and says, “is there… some kind of relationship between them? Although we still have to figure out exactly what is coming first…”
Mu Jiashi nods solemnly.
He tries to work it out himself, while thinking about the ‘game design document.’ Was it something that could be related to the Tower itself, too?
Although he realises soon enough that this is largely useless at this moment. They won’t just figure out the truth standing here. The more they think about it, the more they’re just torturing themselves.
So he leaves the thoughts aside. He says, “this will be our first foray into the labyrinth. Staying safe is our topmost priority. Try to collect information on top of that, and try to communicate with the people inside.”
A-Two chimes in to tell them about their exploration progress.
This labyrinth really is gargantuan. They’ve ran in circles inside for four, five hours in total now, without being able to find an exit.
Maybe the labyrinth is just difficult, so they end up walking in the same place without actually moving anywhere.
Regardless, the first intersection they encounter in the labyrinth is a four-way intersection.
So the Missiontakers split in three again.
When everyone is inside the labyrinth, the entrance suddenly seals shut, like a mouth closing its maw, having acquired adequate food. It shuts quietly to start chewing on the food within.
Everyone can’t help but look behind them.
Then, before they depart, A-Two explains, “the road to the left leads to someone alive by making a right turn at the very end of this path; we’ve not yet run into anyone in the middle path; while the right path, turn left three times successively at the second intersection, will lead you into some hidden spiralling road that leads to someone else.”
The Missiontakers all nod.
There are eleven people here. Mu Jiashi, Fei, Wu Jian and Mystic are going left. He ShujĂźn, Ye Lan, Shen YĂźnjĂź and A-One are going right, and finally, XĂź Beijin, Lin Qin and A-Two are going through the middle path.
A-Two looks at Lin Qin and XĂź Beijin. While he seems hesitant, he goes along without question.
Though he decides to stay as far away from this little couple as he can on the way later.
After splitting up, they confirm what they know once more, and head off.
The left group heads right for the person A-Two talked about. Soon enough, they find him inside of this labyrinth with disorienting, reflecting, glitchy blocks of colour.
Well, it’s not that easy to call the person a ‘person’ anymore.
Because all his arms and legs have been cut off. All he can do is lie there on the ground, flat, staring blankly into the sky.
He is also entirely naked, and dirty. He lies there at the corner of the wall, murmuring something.
Mu Jiashi listens closely, but it’s difficult to make out any words.
Fei looks at the person for a little while before looking away, possibly out of pity.
She murmurs, “what happened here? Why did he… end up like this?”
“Was he possibly tortured, or…” Wu Jian sounds like he’s in doubt, too, “gone insane, or something else?”
Fei’s tone is drifting away, “who knows…”
Mystic, though, sniffs a little and then speaks in riddles again, “I can smell it. It smells of grudges.”
“Grudges?”
Both Fei and Wu Jian are surprised.
Wu Jian wonders, “so someone tortured him and made him end up like this?”
They both rather reflexively believe in what Mystic said, but Mu Jiashi doesn’t draw any hasty conclusions.
He is still trying to figure out what the person is murmuring. He leans even closer.
The person doesn’t react to him getting closer and closer at all. He just continues producing broken, incomplete phrases.
After listening for a bit, Mu Jiashi says with an uncertain tone, “he seems to be saying… ‘exercise in futility’?”
boilpoil's notes:
This part of the chapter shows the Missiontakers + XĂź Beijin split into three groups to explore, and then leaves us with a cliffhanger. What happened to this person? What follows next? Stick around to find out.