The Locked Room

His head felt heavy and muddled, as if everything in his field of vision were veiled by thick gauze. The noise of traffic drifting over from the main road in the distance seemed uncertain, now near, now far, unreal as a dream.

He had no idea how long he walked in that uncomfortable haze before his mind finally recovered a little ability to think. Yu Sheng hesitantly stopped and looked back down the way he had come.

The sky was almost completely dark. The streetlights along the road had long since come on. He was walking down a narrow street near home, with the low, dilapidated apartment buildings on either side resembling two rows of beasts crouching in the night. Yet the little ground-floor shops that residents had illegally converted sent warm light spilling outward, driving away a trace of cold that had settled in his heart.

Cold?

All at once, Yu Sheng seemed to feel that chill piercing into his lungs, organs, and marrow again. He felt freezing rain like blades falling onto his skin, and those two cold, slick gazes—the gaze with which Frog had watched him.

He suddenly suffocated. More than ten seconds passed before he seemed to remember how to breathe again. Gasping desperately, he hurriedly lowered his head to look at his chest.

For a brief instant, he had the illusion that there was still a huge hole in his chest, that his heart was gone, that his chest was as silent and cold as an extinguished furnace. But the next second, he felt his heartbeat again. He could even hear an especially distinct thump beside his ear... Right. Living people had heartbeats.

He was alive. That bizarre giant Frog had not eaten his heart.

Yet fragments of memory surged into his mind like a tsunami, impossible to ignore or force out. Yu Sheng remembered that rain, the door painted on the wall, and that enormous Frog... He tried to tell himself it had all been a hallucination, but that thought was rapidly shaken apart as the memories washed over him again and again, growing clearer each time.

He had died once. Yet for some reason, he was alive now, walking home—already almost there, just two intersections away.

Of all the strange things he had encountered since coming to this cursed city, this was the strangest.

He felt eyes on him from nearby. Yu Sheng noticed that his unusual behavior had apparently drawn the attention of passersby. Someone beside him was hesitantly approaching, perhaps intending to ask whether he needed help. He quickly waved them off, did not speak further with the stranger, and hurried away.

He had no idea what had happened to him, but standing in the street lost in thought was clearly no help at all in solving his confusion.

He hurried through the side streets, leaving the last road near the old residential complex behind and heading toward his "home" in this city.

Though he had crossed only two intersections, the surroundings had clearly become even more desolate and lonely—as if he had entered a forgotten corner of the city. There were fewer and fewer pedestrians on the road, until only the cold streetlights remained to accompany Yu Sheng. After walking a little farther, he saw the old house standing in the night, seemingly set apart from all the buildings around it.

It was an utterly ordinary large house: an old three-story residence with peeling walls and a slanted roof. Its old doors and windows were worn, but still fairly clean and intact. It looked like one of those self-built little buildings illegally added in an urban village decades ago, back when construction oversight was lax—a historical relic that had slipped through the cracks of city planning...

Yu Sheng did not know much about the urban construction regulations of this Boundary City, which differed so greatly from the one in his memories. After all, he had only been here for two months. Setting aside the time he had wasted staying indoors out of caution at first, he had only just adapted to his new life and figured out the surrounding area. But there was one thing he knew clearly.

This large house was the only relatively safe place he had to stay in this dangerous, incongruous city—at least while inside it, he had never seen those uncanny shadows.

Though the house itself also had many things that struck him as bizarre.

Yu Sheng took a soft breath, carrying the supermarket bag still in his hand as he stepped through the chilly light cast by the streetlamp. He reached the door, took out his key, and unlocked it.

The old door creaked open. Yu Sheng went inside and switched on the lights. Though this house was almost entirely different from the "home" in his memories, the instant the lights came on, he still felt a genuine sense of... security.

He turned and shut the door, locking the city's night outside.

Then he casually tossed the things he had bought at the supermarket onto the storage rack outside the kitchen, just to the right of the entrance. He hurried across the somewhat empty living room to the bathroom mirror and yanked open the front of his shirt.

The scene in his memories was far too vivid and deeply etched into his mind. He could not help wanting to check again and again.

There was not a single wound on his chest, nor any bloodstain, as if "death" had never happened at all.

Yu Sheng frowned. He checked whether his clothes were intact, then pressed the place where Frog had torn out his heart and lungs in his memories. Only then did he truly confirm that he was not, in fact, open-hearted.

"What the hell..."

He muttered softly, leaving the bathroom and turning back toward the living room.

Behind him, cracks silently spread across the mirror above the sink, then swiftly and soundlessly closed again...

Sitting on the sofa in the living room, Yu Sheng sorted through his chaotic thoughts. He did not know how long it took, but his utterly exhausted mind finally sank into a groggy calm.

Sleep enveloped him.

The haze lasted for a very, very long time, until a sudden thud exploded in his mind. It sounded as though someone were striking a rock above his head with an iron shovel, jolting Yu Sheng awake from his deep sleep.

He opened his eyes in the dark. It took him a moment to realize—the living room lights had somehow gone out.

He clearly remembered leaving the lights on before falling asleep!

A warning flared in his heart. Almost instinctively, Yu Sheng reached for the telescopic baton beside him. After arriving in this unfamiliar, bizarre city, the first thing he had done was prepare this weapon for self-defense. So far, it had not seemed to be of much use, but as a terrifying upright ape, holding a stick at least offered some psychological comfort. Only then did he cautiously rise to his feet, keeping watch on every sound and movement in the darkness.

In a remote and desolate place like this, having a thief break into his house was not unimaginable. In fact, Yu Sheng would much rather a thief had broken in right now. At least a thief could be beaten to death with a baton. A Frog over a meter tall could not.

But the living room was utterly silent. There were no signs of an intruder, nor any sound from a burglar.

The good news was that there was no sound from Frog, either.

Using the faint streetlight filtering in through the window, Yu Sheng crouched low as he moved, making out his surroundings. He slowly felt his way to the switch on the wall and raised his hand to turn on the lights.

His eyes instantly shone brightly, sweeping through the living room in the darkness.

Yu Sheng blinked. Something in his field of vision felt strange, though he could not say what was wrong. Still, no matter what, the area was lit now. He could see the state of the living room clearly.

Slightly hunched over, baton in hand, he began checking every part of the house.

The first floor contained only the living room, kitchen and dining room, as well as an unused empty room. Everything was normal.

He hesitated at the foot of the stairs leading to the second floor, then started up.

There were three rooms on the second floor. One was now his bedroom, one was piled with miscellaneous junk, and the last room at the end of the hall was locked.

That room had been locked when Yu Sheng first came here. He had searched every corner of the house but never found its key.

He checked his bedroom and the storage room across from it first, then came to the locked room.

As always, the door was tightly shut.

In fact, Yu Sheng had tried using various technical means to deal with the lock, including but not limited to an impact drill and a handheld electric saw. Yet every attempt had failed. The drill and saw had thrown sparks before that seemingly fragile wooden door, but even after the drill bit and saw teeth had been ground smooth, they had not left so much as a mark.

Naturally, he had also tried seeking more advanced technical means, such as hiring locksmiths. He had hired three in succession. The first two got lost as soon as they entered the old district, wandering around for half a day without finding No. 66 Wutong Road. The third was hit by a motorcycle just after crossing the intersection and had only been discharged from the hospital last week...

It was as though some mysterious force was preventing Yu Sheng from opening this locked room in his own home.

Yes. Though this large house was his only relatively safe foothold in this city, even the house itself had many... "wrong" things about it.

Yu Sheng reached out and gripped the doorknob before him, trying to turn it. As expected, it would not budge.

None of the expected "accidents" happened. It was still locked.

But perhaps it was only an illusion. As he futilely twisted the handle... he seemed to hear a faint, soft laugh.

The laughter came from the other side of the door. It sounded like a young woman's voice, as though she were mocking his helplessness before a door.

Yu Sheng's hair instantly stood on end!

Inside the only safe foothold he had in this city, the house where he had lived for two months, inside this room that had always been locked... there was someone hiding!

...How the hell hadn't she starved to death?