Players, Please Board the Train

For players who have been in the game for a long time, they will definitely find ways to overcome the disadvantage of not being able to see in the dark. If conditions are roughly equal, the confrontation between ”human” and ”ghost” is essentially a confrontation between players. Based on this, there are certainly players who share the same idea as Chu Yuan and will act tonight.

More cautious players will observe whether there is anything else in this laboratory.

Unclear about the exact lights-out time, Chu Yuan hurriedly stuffed the food he brought into his mouth, and even asked Xu Huo with feigned concern if he was hungry.

”I have my own,” Xu Huo said, his gaze flicking to the observation window, his expression changing slightly.

”What are you looking at?” Chu Yuan asked curiously, following his line of sight. The corridor was empty.

Xu Huo didn’t answer his question directly, instead asking, ”Aren’t you worried about needing the bathroom after drinking so much water?”

Chu Yuan chuckled, patting the bottle in his hand. ”For a guy, it’s easy to solve... I see there are no light switches anywhere, don’t know when the lights will go out...”

As if on cue, the lights in the laboratory turned off in the reverse order they were turned on. When the lights in their corridor outside went out, Chu Yuan suddenly dropped the bottle in his hand, turning to ask Xu Huo, ”Did you see that?”

Xu Huo only had time to glance at him before the surroundings plunged into darkness. After adjusting for two seconds, he turned towards the observation window. ”See what?”

”I just saw a head float past...” Chu Yuan lowered his voice, as if afraid of disturbing something. ”Just a blurry head, a bit like a shadow.””Probably just your eyes playing tricks,” Xu Huo said calmly. ”The observation window in this lab is high. If someone shorter walks outside, just their head might be visible. Probably just another player passing by.”

”Is that so?” Chu Yuan’s voice paused briefly before he continued quickly. ”Did you forget we only have four female players this time? Besides Miao Yu, the others all have long hair. The one I saw seemed to have short hair, and Miao Yu is very tall! Damn it, the ’ghost’ the game said would appear after lights-out isn’t a player, it’s a real ghost!”

”Calm down,” Xu Huo said. ”Have you encountered dungeons with ghosts before?”

”Of course not!” Chu Yuan replied. ”But that doesn’t mean they don’t exist! After evolution, what can’t happen? I’ve even seen someone use a small stone to destroy an entire city!”

He paced in front of Xu Huo a couple of times, then looked up. ”I should have bought those talismans from Wan Yunrong after all!”

Xu Huo remained quite calm. ”It might not necessarily be something from this dungeon. Creating a projection of a person is very simple. It might be a decoy released by another player. If we panic, wouldn’t that be exactly what they want?”

”Right, right,” Chu Yuan nodded repeatedly. ”If we get scared and run out, we might really get ambushed. Maybe this is the effect of drawing the ghost slip? Using fake shadows to disturb players?”

Xu Huo wasn’t sure if it was a player’s doing, but he was certain that before the lights went out, he had caught a glimpse of a shadow flashing past from the direction of the elevator out of the corner of his eye. It had very long hair. Because it was too fast, he couldn’t see it clearly. It somewhat matched Chu Yuan’s description—not like a real human head, but a blurry outline.

”Can you see in the dark?” he asked instead.

”No... Can you?”

Xu Huo paused. ”Then turn around and look. What’s outside the window?”

Chu Yuan flinched, freezing with his back to the window. ”Bro, you can scare someone to death. Don’t mess with me.”

”I’m telling you to look and see there’s nothing outside,” Xu Huo said. ”Everywhere is pitch black, and you can’t see anyway. Unless that ghost is fluorescent, you wouldn’t know even if it passed right in front of you.”

Hearing this, Chu Yuan’s face twitched even more violently. He instinctively bent down to pick up the bottle from the floor.

Xu Huo gave the rope a tug. ”Don’t chicken out. I’m counting on you to cover me.”

Chu Yuan stood still for a moment before forcing a relaxed tone. ”You have a point. Let’s just rest first. We’ll settle the score with them tomorrow.”

The possibility of it being a player couldn’t be ruled out, but this laboratory might genuinely be a bit abnormal.

The lab had been emptied. It was unclear what experiments were conducted here before. But if some radioactive elements remained, it was possible they could affect people.

The two found a corner to rest. Not long after, Chu Yuan initiated conversation again. ”Don’t you think it’s a bit cold?”

”It’s normal to be cold. This is under the island. On the other side of the wall might be seawater,” Xu Huo said, taking out two sleeping bags and handing him one. ”Get some sleep early.”

Chu Yuan took the sleeping bag but didn’t open it, saying instead, ”I’ll move a cabinet to block the door.”

”If it’s really a ghost, blocking the door is useless. If it’s a person, there’s no need to block the door either,” Xu Huo said.

Chu Yuan fell completely silent. After Xu Huo lay down, he moved to the side closer to the wall, simply spreading the sleeping bag on the floor and lying down on it.

Xu Huo’s breathing was steady, as if he had quickly fallen asleep. Chu Yuan, however, tossed and turned restlessly, his arm occasionally pulling sharply on Xu Huo’s hand.

As time passed, the originally silent laboratory gradually gained some sounds.

At first, it was just the sound of running water. Soon, cracking sounds that only occur when objects expand and compress appeared, followed by the sounds of tables, chairs moving, and footsteps. It seemed as if the entire laboratory had become lively.

”Hey, do you hear that?” Chu Yuan, who hadn’t managed to fall asleep, reached out to push Xu Huo. ”There are sounds of many people.”

Xu Huo turned to look out the window. ”Just hallucinations. There’s nothing outside. If you’re worried, I can go out with you to check.”

”No, no need,” Chu Yuan quickly refused, then tilted his head to listen again. ”Seems like the sounds disappeared again.”

Silence fell once more, and the two continued trying to sleep. This time, Chu Yuan couldn’t hold out either. After struggling for an hour, his eyelids grew heavy and were about to close when a scream of indistinguishable gender suddenly erupted from outside.

”Holy shit!” He sat up with a jolt.

Xu Huo also opened his eyes, clearly sensing two people passing nearby and heading in different directions, but unable to pinpoint their approximate locations.

The spot Chu Yuan chose was like a small hub. To the right was the elevator; to the left, past two rooms, was a longitudinal corridor.

However, this laboratory was arranged in a grid with corridors as the dividing lines. Apart from the blocked corridor seen earlier at the end of the first floor, the interior here was entirely divided into small sections. Rooms not on the edge were back-to-back, and different directions could also lead to the same room.

”This time it wasn’t my auditory hallucination, right? Did something happen to a player?” Chu Yuan panted, pricking up his ears to listen for a while before adding, ”These people are really composed. Not a single one came out.”

With the situation unclear, anyone who went out would be a fool.

Xu Huo said, ”Wait until tomorrow morning.”