1TWITF[C Chapter 41

Chapter 41

In the elevator stood three figures: two men and one woman.

The numbers on the display outside the elevator car were descending rapidly.

Chu Xiu lowered his head, closing his eyes until there was only a slit. Lu Yanli was no exception; he simply closed his eyes and leaned against the elevator wall.

The metal wall was cold and emitted an unpleasant smell of rust and blood. The two men were close enough to feel each other’s body temperature, which was somewhat reassuring. The elevator descended for an unknown amount of time before finally stopping with a jolt.

Both of them could hear the sound of the elevator doors opening. Then, the woman’s light footsteps faded into the distance.

Had she really left?

Lu Yanli couldn’t open his eyes. He gently nudged Chu Xiu, who was not far away. However, Chu Xiu didn’t speak either, only moving slightly to the side.

Both men were harboring their own secret thoughts, neither speaking nor opening their eyes. Lu Yanli was standing slightly closer to the door. He hesitated for a moment, then slowly moved toward the door.

However, that extremely cold feeling still hadn’t disappeared.

Was the other side of the elevator door… really another world?

Feeling the elevator going up, Chu Xiu breathed a sigh of relief. He slowly opened his eyes and looked around, saying, “Okay, she’s gone.”

Lu Yanli also opened his eyes.

The surrounding environment was as cold as an ice cellar, as if the six walls were emitting a chill, especially the elevator door, where a thin layer of frost was almost visible.

Chu Xiu glanced at the elevator buttons: “You pressed ten?”

“Didn’t you say to reverse it?” Lu Yanli took a step back.

For no other reason than the tenth floor was almost here.

The elevator slowly stopped, remaining still in mid-air for a moment. With a “ding,” the doors slowly opened.

What came into view… was still a dim scene.

“Looks like it really is another world.” Chu Xiu frowned slightly. “Want to go out and take a look?”

He made a shocking invitation.

“You don’t really plan to go out, do you?” Lu Yanli was a little tempted, but he didn’t show it.

What’s more, he currently had no confidence that he could return from this world.

Chu Xiu: “I’m a little tempted, but it’s too dangerous, so I’m asking you.” With that, he pressed the number 9.

In the instant that the elevator doors closed to a gap of less than half a palm’s width, they both clearly saw a figure walking past in that gap!

“Are you sure that by reversing the original rules, we can return to reality?”

“That’s what the rules say. And, if we want to go out and take a look, we can, as long as we can find this original elevator. But I heard that the longer you walk in another world, the easier it is to get lost.”

Another brief silence.

The ninth floor arrived.

Skillfully continuing to press the next button, the eleventh floor, the two continued chatting.

“Do the rules say what the other world is like?”

“Not sure. Some say it’s a mirror world, and others say it’s the world of the dead.”

A split second before the elevator doors closed, another figure quickly walked past. They couldn’t tell if it was male or female. In fact, Lu Yanli and Chu Xiu didn’t dare to look. The moment that figure passed, they immediately turned their heads, pretending they hadn’t seen anything.

After the elevator doors closed, they actually felt a lot more at ease.

“Did you see that shadow clearly?”

Chu Xiu nodded.

Lu Yanli had a guess in his mind, but he couldn’t verify it yet. After the elevator doors reached the next floor, they slowly opened. They continued to stay inside the elevator, not going out, but immediately pressing the button for the 8th floor.

The moment the elevator doors closed, that shadow appeared again.

The two looked at each other, and saw deep apprehension in each other’s eyes.

For no other reason than the distance between that figure and the door… was getting closer and closer.

That thing… wanted to come in!

And if that thing really got in, the consequences would be unpredictable.

The journey from the eleventh floor to the eighth floor was only a few seconds. The two tacitly kept quiet and didn’t speak. After the eighth floor arrived, the two didn’t press the button right away, but waited for a while.

They were both counting seconds in their heads. Unexpectedly, after the time that thing should have appeared, it didn’t appear.

Chu Xiu pressed the 12th floor. Just as the elevator doors were closing, that figure walked past outside the door again.

“Looks like this is forcing us to go out. Do you want to go out and take a look together?”

Lu Yanli casually said “mm.”

Instead of like now…

Lu Yanli’s gaze lightly swept over Chu Xiu’s body, but in his heart, he was thinking: if this person died, what would he become?

Would he be like the previous group of people, happily living here?

Tsk, if that kind of naive smile appeared on this face…

Chu Xiu instantly sensed the danger, and his entire body broke out in goosebumps. However, in just a brief moment, that strong sense of crisis suddenly disappeared without a trace.

He looked toward the door.

He didn’t think it was an illusion.

So… what exactly was outside the door?

The 12th floor had arrived.

Chu Xiu stepped out.

*

“Ding.”

The negative eighteenth floor had arrived.

The woman’s light footsteps sounded, and she slowly walked toward the door. When the elevator doors closed again, the four people remaining in the elevator all breathed a sigh of relief.

Unconsciously, cold sweat flowed out, covering his entire face.

Just after the woman went out, Wen Zhengxin quietly raised his head, wanting to see what was outside the door. The scene he glimpsed from the crack in the door caused him to widen his eyes in disbelief.

Outside the door… above, flowed an inverted pool of blood, and on the ground, there was a raging fire. In just this instant, he seemed to see the scene of the eighteenth level of hell as described by humans.

He stood there in a daze. Ye Shengke accidentally bumped into him, knocking him to the ground.

This startled Ye Shengke: “Hey, what are you doing?”

Shi Yan turned her head: “What’s wrong with him?”

Nie Yunzhen: “He probably saw something he shouldn’t have seen.”

Ye Shengke: “Do we still want to keep him now?”

The woman had already left. According to the rules, they pressed the elevator buttons in reverse, trying to return to the original world. They didn’t plan to go to another world to take a look.

“No need.” A voice sounded.

“Okay.” Nie Yunzhen replied. He and Ye Shengke reluctantly, and after the elevator doors opened again, without looking at the pitch-black outside, they immediately pushed him out fiercely.

The elevator doors closed again.

Nie Yunzhen and Ye Shengke hadn’t noticed anything yet and breathed a sigh of relief, but Shi Yan suddenly broke out in a cold sweat.

“Chu… Chu Ge.” Her voice was trembling. “Did you just tell them to throw him out?”

Chu Xiu paused, and shook his head.

The faces of Ye Shengke and Nie Yunzhen also turned pale with fright.

Since it wasn’t Chu Xiu who spoke, then whose voice was it that answered them just now…

Chu Xiu, as always, didn’t reveal too many expressions. He only carefully stared at the crack in the elevator door.

Just now, what the elevator passed… seemed to be a normal world?

Wen Zhengxin staggered and was pushed into a strange corridor. However, he didn’t feel anything, only smiling foolishly. After laughing for a while, he hugged his head and cried loudly again.

Forcibly touching a realm that humans cannot touch, even if it was just seen by the naked eye for an instant, the price was definitely not something humans could bear.

Like him, who was just confused and delirious, was already considered lucky.

The four people in the elevator never expected that just by casually pushing the other party out, they would actually return him to the original world. And they were still trying to return according to the rules.

However, the situation inside the hotel was not much better.

An extremely cold, terrifying, and twisted aura was emerging from the depths of the ground.

“It’s coming, it’s coming. The technician said there’s a problem with the circuit.”

“Okay, no one’s taking the elevator, right?”

“No, I was just downstairs. The elevator hasn’t moved.”

The four people still in the elevator had no idea about the sudden power outage in the hotel. The lights inside the elevator they were riding were still bright and still operating normally.

Perhaps… they would never have the chance to know, because that elevator had already taken them to another world.

The manager was startled: “What’s going on? What’s wrong with him?” With that, he squatted down and waved his hand: “Mr. Wen? Old Brother Wen?”

“I don’t know. We found Mr. Wen when we went upstairs to check. When we found him, he was already like this.” One of them said anxiously, “Manager, what can we do?”

“Die… hahaha, everyone will die here.” Wen Zhengxin suddenly burst into a frantic laugh. “Let’s all die, can’t find it… we’re all dead!”

The hall was still without power, and everyone was relying on candles and flashlights. Wen Zhengxin suddenly broke out, his face in the candlelight being both gleeful and twisted, completely scaring the manager.

He… he’s really crazy?

What’s going on?

“Manager, look at this…” Many people were frightened by what he just said.

“Speaking of… it’s really a bit scary. I feel that Mr. Wen was a bit mumbling and mumbling originally, and also his what… lost idol? Do you think it will…?”

“Don’t you think it’s scary? What if there really are ghosts in this world?”

As they spoke, they had reached Wen Zhengxin’s room. They swiped the room card and helped the man onto the bed. Wen Zhengxin was much better, no longer crying or making trouble, shrinking in the corner of the bed, constantly mumbling, saying he wanted his daughter.

At this time, the hotel had not yet restored power. Wen Zhengxin sat on the head of the bed, only a dark shadow. The two of them felt that the task was completed, and walked out of the room back.

“No, I still feel very scared. You don’t know that my intuition has been accurate since I was a child. I always feel flustered in my heart today.” One of them grabbed the arm of the other, and couldn’t help but shiver.

“……Is it because of me?”

The other person looked down at her.

At this moment, the hotel’s power was restored, and the corridor lights came on. The two looked at each other.

That person saw the owner of the arm she was holding, her expression froze on her face, and then, little by little, turned into a fearful and unbelievable expression.

She had been holding this faceless person all the way!

She was stunned, standing there motionless, almost forgetting to run.

A faint scream sounded, and the corridor returned to peace.

In the depths of the elevator shaft, a girl in a school uniform skirt was desperately climbing up.

Compared with the girl in the elevator above, she was more cruel, her eyes more resentful, and her entire beautiful face had been distorted to the point that she could not recognize her appearance, making people shudder.

The four remained in the elevator.

“Remember, we can’t go out early, we must go through all the procedures before we can, otherwise we are likely to stay in a virtual world.” Shi Yan repeatedly warned them.

Saying that, the elevator doors opened, and unlike the previous dark corridors, this time when opened, there was a familiar hotel corridor in front of them, and a man was waiting outside the door.

They were immediately stunned.

The man was also stunned, and muttered to choose to close the elevator again, waiting for the next trip. Before closing the door, everyone heard the man muttering and talking: “Strange, in the middle of the night, why are so many people taking the elevator?”

After hearing this sentence clearly, for a time, the people in the elevator couldn’t help but tremble.

There are clearly not many people in the elevator… what did he see?

On the other side of the city, Chu Xiu also introduced Lu Yanli in this way.

They had tentatively stepped out of the elevator door. Unexpectedly, they did not see anyone, as if the figure that had been flashing past the door before did not exist.

“So don’t run around casually, it’s best for the two of us to act together.” To prevent them from getting lost, Chu Xiu suggested.

Lu Yanli said “mm”, of course he would not run around.

But the next second, Chu Xiu was slapped in the face.

Where they were was a dim and winding corridor. The walls were covered with many oil paintings piled with thick dust. The ground was piled with debris. The walls were yellowing, and the wall skin was falling off, revealing mottled marks and cracks that looked uncomfortable, and there were also many childlike graffiti-like simple strokes.

The two were originally walking side by side, until the back, the various piles on the ground were too difficult to provide parallel roads, and they were afraid of touching any taboos if they stepped on it, so they had to go one after the other.

Chu Xiu was walking a little ahead, and just turned a corner, he came to an unfamiliar place. The eyes in front of him were dark, as if all the light had been swallowed.

Where is this?

Just then, he heard a very light footstep, which was coming towards him.

What is it? Where did he arrive?

Chu Xiu instantly tightened his strings.

That person was getting closer and closer, Chu Xiu could even sense the other party’s emotions. When that person came to the front, he was nervous, and his whole person was a little panicked.

Could it be… this is really a living person?

Chu Xiu was not sure.

That figure got closer and closer, and finally stopped in front of him.

*

The man in front disappeared after just turning a corner. This incident made Lu Yanli nervous.

The most bizarre thing to date is that he still does not understand the laws of the ghost’s attack, or even how many ghosts there are.

Where did Chu Xiu go?

Does he still want to continue exploring?

Lu Yanli looked back at the elevator, which was still wide open, as if waiting for him to go back. The display screen at the door projected a faint green light, but the number had become a blur of green light, and he didn’t know what floor it was.

Lu Yanli stabilized his mind, put his footsteps lighter, but Chu Xiu’s disappearance gave him a trace of worry after all, he paused, turned around, and walked in the opposite direction.

If Chu Xiu can come back alive, he can ask him again later.

No, no, he can’t determine whether the person who comes back is the real Chu Xiu.

Even the spiders were less, indicating that there were fewer surviving creatures on the road ahead.

At the end of the corridor, he saw a staircase.

Lu Yanli hesitated for a while, looked back again at the direction where the elevator was, and decided to go down.

Never mind, no matter where he goes, he always has to live.

It is enough to just live, what does it matter which world he lives in?

And when he reached the first floor, Lu Yanli’s eyes widened suddenly.

This… why does this scene appear?

Why did he come to his former home?

“Mom?” Lu Yanli spit out a word uncertainly.

“Hey, what’s wrong today?”

“Is there anything going on today?” Lu Yanli looked around the house, he suddenly didn’t know what to do, and stammered.

Everything was normal, sunshine, flowers, clean and tidy houses, the little bear that his mother liked the most was placed on the sofa, and the puppy they kept in their house was running around happily.

Is this all his illusion? Could it be that… all the weird imaginations were just a dream he had while sleeping in the attic?

Which is real, which is fake?

Have his last few years been fake?

“Dad is coming back?” Lu Yanli asked again.

He looked at the calendar.

He still remembered very clearly that his father should be out on a mission at this time. His father was the most serious and couldn’t stand his “hooligan” appearance.

And what was he like at that time…?

He looked down at his body.

Wearing torn jeans, he reached out and grabbed a handful of hair and pulled it to his eyes, and sure enough, it was dyed red.

Completely different from his later style.

In the past, every time he was afraid of his father coming back, because his father would beat him when he saw him, not really hitting him hard, but the kind of beating that hated iron could not become steel. Even so, the relationship between father and son was not good.

Everything is so real.

But……

“Is everything real?” Lu Yanli suddenly asked.

“Ah, what’s real and fake? What’s wrong with you today, why are you so strange?” The woman was puzzled.

“Nothing.”

Lu Yanli looked at the woman’s face.

He personally watched the other party put on gasoline and set himself on fire.

This home… also exploded, and turned into ruins in front of him.

Even though in a few days, this home, along with the woman in front of him, returned to him completely, he knew that a person who had died once and came back would never be the same.

“It’s all fake.”

He resolutely turned around, went back, and walked upstairs.