In the wooden house deep within the Qianling Mountains in western An Province, the fire pit held only glowing embers, casting a dim red light.
Yang Asha sat on a small stool, mending clothes by the light of a pine torch.
Her needlework was excellent; the mended clothes showed no traces of repair. Even the most discerning embroiderers in the village would praise her skillful hands.
Thinking of this, Yang Asha sighed.
She was sixteen, and her schooling had ended after junior high.
Poverty alleviation cadres had visited several times, and the lead sister had talked herself hoarse, but her father simply wouldn't let her continue her studies.
Her father always said that girls didn't need an education. It was better to find a husband in a couple of years and collect a bride price.
But Yang Asha didn't want to get married at all.
The poverty alleviation cadres told her about subways built underground outside the mountains, skyscrapers taller than clouds. They told her that girls studying in the city drank milk tea, wore beautiful dresses, and earned their own money.
Yang Asha loved beautiful dresses, lovely clothes, and jewelry.
—The silver ornaments her mother left her had been sold by her father for alcohol.
Yang Asha wanted to go out, to see the subway, to drink milk tea, to earn her own money, and to study.
She had secretly made up her mind: the next time the cadres came, she would steal the household registration book and take the family's chickens and ducks to sell.
After all, her father drank and didn't work; she was the one who cut grass and fed all the chickens and ducks.
Yang Asha rubbed her eyes. The thunderous snoring from next door indicated her father had clearly drunk too much again.
She quietly pulled out a second-hand phone from her sewing basket—it was secretly given to her by a poverty alleviation cadre.
The phone had no SIM card and couldn't connect to the internet, but Yang Asha had arranged with the granddaughter of the house in front to occasionally use their Wi-Fi in secret.
The signal was pitifully weak, only a single bar.
Yet, Yang Asha opened a livestream, her eyes shining as she watched girls her age.
She watched their clothes, their bags, their shoes, and the light in their eyes when they spoke of the world outside.
The next second, the phone screen mysteriously went black and flashed into a somewhat strange livestream room.
“The Wishing Livestream Room,” Yang Asha murmured, squinting as she quietly read the name of the livestream room.
...
In a spacious river-view apartment in the city center, a floor-to-ceiling window overlooked the city's neon nightscape.
Jiang Chen leaned back on the leather sofa, idly scrolling through his phone.
—The lights inside weren't on; the city's glow streamed in, illuminating scattered luxury brand packaging, half-empty champagne bottles, and discarded clothes.
He had just returned from a bar, feeling utterly bored with life.
Sports cars, beautiful women, parties, horse racing, luxury goods, yachts, investments, sailing, abstaining from food, spiritual practices...
He was tired of everything there was to do.
Life felt like a copy-paste job, every day the same, as dull as chewed-up gum.
As for scrolling through his phone, it was nothing but influencers posing or businesses promoting each other, making him sleepy.
“Isn't there anything interesting?” he muttered lazily.
Exciting things were becoming rarer and rarer.
Car racing, skydiving, deep-sea diving, wingsuit flying, rock climbing... he had tried every extreme sport, but they were all just “meh.”
He wanted something more thrilling, something different.
Something that could make his stagnant life splash with big waves.
Ideally... something ordinary people would never encounter.
Jiang Chen smiled, feeling a bit crazy for some reason.
The next second, the livestream room jumped.
...
At 2:17 AM, in the ward area of the Jiangcheng Special Incident Investigation Department.
The sound-activated lights in the corridor were off, leaving only the soft green glow of the emergency exit signs.
“Don't open that door!”
Zhao Weilai shot up from her bed, her pajamas drenched in cold sweat.
She had dreamt of the Jiangcheng University Instance again.
The artificial lake perpetually shrouded in white mist, the foul-smelling restroom stalls, the skinned corpses, the high-pitched female voice in the administration building corridor.
The last scene of her dream was always that grinning human skin.
“Hmph—”
Zhao Weilai raised a hand and wiped her face.
It had been two days since they came out of the Instance.
After she, Deng Ziwen, and Ding Feifan miraculously survived, they were immediately brought to the Special Incident Investigation Department.
The authorities said they were important witnesses, needing protection and cooperation with the investigation.
So they were housed in this heavily guarded witness ward building.
Armed police stood guard here twenty-four hours a day, rooms had private bathrooms, and meals were delivered.
Even their phones were uniformly issued encrypted devices, and there was a call bell by the bed.
By all accounts, this should have been the safest place on earth.
Yet, Zhao Weilai still couldn't sleep well.
Weng Yang and Liu Guilan were recovering well, at least that's what Zhao Weilai thought when she saw them in the dining room.
As for Deng Ziwen and Ding Feifan, neither of them seemed to have any psychological trauma.
Now, every time Zhao Weilai closed her eyes, the scenes from the Instance played out in her dreams.
She was especially afraid of opening doors.
Whether it was a room door, a bathroom door, or the main entrance, as soon as her hand touched the doorknob, she would instinctively hold her breath, her body stiffening.
Zhao Weilai feared she hadn't truly escaped the illusion.
Post-traumatic stress disorder.
The team's psychologist had told her this, advising her to relax and recover gradually.
But it wasn't that easy.
Zhao Weilai threw off her blanket and got out of bed, a shiver running through her as her feet touched the cold floor.
She walked to the window, pulling back a corner of the curtain to look down.
Searchlights swept across the courtyard, barbed wire was strung along the high walls, and the sentries at the gate stood ramrod straight.
An impregnable fortress.
But for some reason, she still felt uneasy.
The last room on this floor was occupied by Lin Hao, who was said to be a Player who had emerged from another Instance.
That person was strange; he rarely went out, staying cooped up in his room all day.
Even if she occasionally ran into him in the corridor, he would have a gloomy face and frighteningly dark eyes.
The most noticeable thing was that even in the height of summer, with temperatures nearing thirty-eight degrees Celsius, he would wear a scarf.
As for the room next door, it belonged to a girl named Su Ya, who had a very cheerful personality and smiled at everyone.
Perhaps because Zhao Weilai had a Class, she received a bit more information than others.
—Someone like Zhou Shengsheng, who was still alive with only his upper body remaining, was not an isolated case.
In the top floor's intensive care unit, there was a Player whose body had half turned into paper effigy, but no one except Su Ya and her companions had ever seen him.
Buzz, buzz—buzz, buzz—
A sudden vibration rang out simultaneously.
Zhao Weilai almost dropped the mineral water bottle in her hand.
The officially issued encrypted phone was vibrating.
Zhao Weilai blinked in confusion.
This phone was an internal encrypted device, only capable of making internal calls, and couldn't access the internet... At this hour, who would be sending her a message?
She pulled it out to look; the screen was lit, and a hazy page had popped up out of nowhere, occupying the entire screen.
Zhao Weilai's sixth sense screamed a warning.
...
【What the hell? In the middle of the night, I was watching a game livestream, and now I'm here? Is this even in China??】
【My tablet suddenly jumped in too. What is this, viral marketing? Is Douyin that bold?】
【Douyin? I came in from Kuaishou...】
【Huh? I'm from Bilibili—so whose new livestream is this? A forced pop-up across all platforms?】
【The Wishing Livestream Room... What does that mean? Does it grant wishes? What a chuunibyou name.】
【This is insane, I can't even turn off my phone, nor can I exit.】
Dozens of bullet comments scrolled rapidly, and the viewer count in the upper left corner of the livestream room was slowly increasing.
The entire livestream room was very strange.
The center of the screen was a thick darkness, like a smudge of ink, making it impossible to see anything clearly.
In the background, a blurry silhouette was pressed against the lens, as if something was sitting upright.
At the top of the screen were five grey-black characters:
【The Wishing Livestream Room.】
—There was no avatar, no ID, no follow button, and no gift-giving section.
The entire page was incredibly clean.
Aside from the five characters and the darkness, there was only a tiny line of grey numbers in the upper left corner of the screen:
Current Viewers: 327.
The number was still slowly ticking up, occasionally increasing by one or two, as if people were continuously joining.
Zhao Weilai's heart skipped a beat.
...
Suddenly, the screen moved.
It sounded like a human cough, an old one, with a hint of phlegm.
The darkness on the screen slowly dispersed like mist.
First, an old rattan lounge chair appeared, its dark brown wicker worn smooth and shiny, with a missing piece on one armrest.
Then, all the viewers saw what was sitting on the lounge chair.
It was a rat. An absurdly large, unimaginably huge rat.
It was over a person's height, covered in sleek, oily black fur, sitting perfectly upright on the lounge chair, its two hind paws on the ground, and its front paws resting on the armrests.
Its posture was exactly like a human's.
If a person had animal features like beast ears, fur, or a tail, many people would find it cute.
But if human organs appeared on an animal, and that animal skillfully performed actions only humans could—that would be terrifying.
Most bizarrely, this rat was wearing a drab, homespun burial shroud.
The fabric was dark, and the frog buttons were fastened all the way up to its chin; the third button on the left seemed to be misaligned, fastened crookedly.
It also wore a black velvet melon cap on its head, its brim pulled low, making it look out of place.
But what truly sent shivers down one's spine was the rat's face.
The face still had a rat's outline—a pointed snout, whiskers—but where the eyes should be, there were human eyes.
The outer corners of the eyes drooped, the pupils were dark brown, and it even had eyelids.
Human eyes, on the face of a giant rat.
The uncanny valley effect was instantly maxed out.
The livestream viewers felt a sudden cold sweat break out on their backs, goosebumps spreading from the nape of their necks down to their arms.
An indescribable mix of revulsion and chill surged up their throats: a giant rat wearing a burial shroud and a melon cap, with human eyes, sitting like a person on a lounge chair.
The image was too jarring, so jarring it made one's skin crawl.
“Greetings, human. I am your faithful Mouse Servant.”
The rat raised a front paw, its claws black, sharp, and long:
“Welcome to The Wishing Livestream Room.”
The first sentence fell, and the livestream was filled with scrolling bullet comments:
【No, I'm gonna puke, ugh—】
【This is too bizarre, which alchemist went crazy and created this thing?】
【A human and a rat... ugh... Which modeling company is so disgusting, creating this to spite society?】
【How do I turn it off? I smashed my phone but still can't exit!】
【It's so gross, and I can't even lower the volume. Call the police, this is already an act of revenge against society.】
【To be fair, the special effects are pretty good, looks quite real.】
In just a few sentences, the viewer count had already risen to over five hundred.
The number was still rising.
The large rat on the screen, the Mouse Servant, leaned forward slightly. Its melon cap slipped, and it raised a paw to steady it.
Its human eyes stared directly into the camera, as if looking at everyone in front of their screens:
“I am the Guide Mouse.”
Its voice was slow, enunciating each word, with the pauses of a child just learning to speak:
“Here, as long as you can pay the price, anything you desire is within your grasp.”
“Wealth, fame, health, longevity, affection, beauty...”
It paused, then lightly tapped the rattan chair's armrest, making soft “thump-thump” sounds, and spoke with an alluring tone:
“Even power beyond mortals, you have a chance to obtain.”
Outside the screen, Zhao Weilai's eyebrows shot up. She turned and pressed the call bell.
Power beyond mortals. Wasn't the Class awakening in the Instances exactly what was meant by “power beyond mortals”?
She'd bet anything this thing was connected to the Instances!
...
The viewer count had already jumped to 1287.
The livestream room was silent for a long time, then suddenly, a bullet comment slowly drifted across:
【You can get anything? Then I want five hundred thousand, no, I want a million. Can you give it to me?】
“The first one.”
The Mouse Servant in the darkness tilted its head, its melon cap slipping to the side. It bared its sharp teeth, as if it had found an interesting toy:
“The first one.”
The next second, outside the screen, Yang Hexuan vanished from his spot, leaving only his chair swaying slightly.
The passerby playing a game next to him screamed and jumped three feet high in terror:
“Holy crap!!!! The person is gone! The person is gone!!”
“This guy's gone! Call the police!!”
“Holy crap, holy crap, holy crap! You're crazy from being online too much! A living person, gone! Gone! Just like that! If I'm lying, may my whole family die!”
Rate on N.U.
