Secret Room

Because of the middle-aged woman's words, everyone present except the fat man became wary of and somewhat hostile toward the other test subjects. Jiang Tian, the somewhat seductive woman, also turned her gaze toward Yu Jing.

Yu Jing simply put both hands in his pockets, pulled up his hood to cover half his face, and remained seated without moving.

During the hour and a half of rest before the test began, everyone passed the time in silence.

Yu Jing was fairly accustomed to this silent environment where everyone suspected one another. After all, he spent much of his time this way at the Potential Institute. The ill-tempered fellow trainee who shared his dorm often made Yu Jing's situation even worse simply because he disliked some of Yu Jing's habits.

What surprised Yu Jing, however, was that the fat man beside him, whose stomach was stuffed full from eating, actually fell fast asleep in such an atmosphere. Before long, the room was filled with his thunderous snoring.

Time passed quickly for Yu Jing amid the silence. There were only twenty minutes left until the test's scheduled start time of eight o'clock, when a wave of exhaustion suddenly swept over his mind.

What's going on?

On the eve of the ability test, Yu Jing had gone to sleep after midnight every night and risen at six in the morning, yet he had remained in good spirits throughout the day. It was only just past eight at night, but for some reason, he was overwhelmed by drowsiness.

At the same time, Yu Jing noticed that among the seven people here, aside from the fat man, Jiang Tian—the woman he had interacted with briefly before—had also fallen asleep with her head on the square table in front of her.

Yu Jing could see exhaustion eating away at everyone's expressions. Only Yu Xiaoxiao behind him appeared normal.

Something's wrong.

Just as Yu Jing prepared to stand and check on the others, a powerful wave of drowsiness swept through his body the moment he rose.

His head felt as heavy as if it had been filled with lead. Yu Jing staggered, fell to the ground, and slipped into sleep. Although he was a good student, Yu Jing did not usually enjoy exercise. His Physical Fitness was average among people his age, and he could not withstand the invading drowsiness. He collapsed onto the floor and fell into a dreamless sleep.

His groggy mind slowly awakened from the darkness.

His blurry eyes made out a rather rundown building. Yu Jing was currently lying on a sofa.

Where is this place? Don't tell me...

Yu Jing's first reaction was to examine his body. He lifted his clothes and confirmed that there were no stitched marks on his abdomen, temporarily determining that his kidneys and other organs had not been stolen.

So it isn't an organ-trafficking ring. But the dinner at the institute was indeed mixed with some kind of nerve-blocking drug, something similar to sleeping pills, which caused all of us to lose consciousness... Is everyone here?

For some reason, Yu Jing felt worried about the maiden named Yu Xiaoxiao. In his eyes, Yu Xiaoxiao looked frailer than the others.

Creak!

As Yu Jing pushed open the old wooden doors in the house, he found nothing but empty rooms. There was no one inside.

Moreover, after searching every room, Yu Jing discovered that the house had three bedrooms and one living room, along with a large bathroom. Every window had been tightly nailed shut with long wooden planks and crooked nails. They were completely airtight, making it impossible to see outside, and even shouting for help brought no response.

The front door was also tightly locked by more than ten rusty iron chains. With Yu Jing's abilities, it was impossible to Open it.

Our phones were confiscated while we were unconscious. Is this within the test site? There aren't any instructions at all. Could they be testing whether we can use the items here to escape this locked room on our own?

The boarded-up windows might be the key to leaving, but the situation probably isn't that simple. If we could just pry off the boards with brute force and escape, this so-called test would be meaningless.

Although Yu Jing analyzed things this way, he still took action. He used the hollow iron rod from a bathroom clothes hanger, stuffing it with solid objects to strengthen it, then slowly pried at the nails holding the boards in place.

Crack! Crack! One board after another was pried loose. The process consumed a great deal of Yu Jing's strength, but the final result filled his heart with despair.

Outside the window was not the city street he had imagined, but a solid cement wall sealing it shut.

Calm down! Yu Jing urged his anxious heart to settle as he tried to analyze the possibility of escape.

Wait. This doesn't look like architecture from our country, but a Western Continent style. The scraps of paper I found in the bedroom drawer had international-language characters on them. If this is a building overseas, could there be ventilation shafts hidden within the walls? Western Continent buildings in movies seem to have designs like that.

Keeping that possibility in mind, Yu Jing began in the living room, tapping the walls with two fingers in an attempt to find hollow sections within.

He went from the living room to the study, then to the bedroom. Finally, when he reached beneath the bathroom sink, his two fingers produced a hollow sound from inside the bathroom wall, indicating that there might truly be a ventilation shaft within it through which he could leave.

Now I need to find something hard enough to smash open the wall and see whether there's a ventilation duct inside.

Yu Jing returned to the bedroom from before, removed a solid copper table lamp from the nightstand, aimed its base at the bathroom wall, and struck with all his strength.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

After three powerful blows, Yu Jing's hands had gone somewhat numb from exertion due to his less-than-ideal Physical Fitness. Still, he finally smashed a large hole through the relatively thin cement wall.

But what lay beyond differed from the ventilation duct Yu Jing had imagined. Inside the hollow wall was no vent at all, but a deep, straight passage with no visible end. The darkness inside limited visibility to five meters. Even after Yu Jing found a table lamp, he could see no more than twenty meters ahead, and still could not see the end.

How could this be...

As he stared into the endless darkness of the passage, a wave of unease flooded Yu Jing's heart.

This is the only exit from this locked room, and my only chance. Maybe the institute's test is a game similar to an "escape room." I've already fulfilled all the requirements. All I need to do next is overcome my fear of the dark and make it through here to pass the test. Then the 3.5 million test bonus will be mine, and Mother's surgery expenses can be paid in full at once.

Yu Jing overcame the fear in his heart. His body could just fit into the damp, dark passage, but whether its end was the end of the test, no one knew...