Awakening

Chapter 1 - Awakening

Li You opened his eyes. The first thing he saw were vines coiling around the ceiling, emitting a faint blue-green glow. They spread across most of the room's walls, making the place feel like the interior of some giant plant.

He sat up from the bed in a daze, looking around. After a moment, he recalled that he had been delivering food on an electric motorcycle and, while turning a corner, a Hundred-Ton King had suddenly appeared in front of him...

Uh, by that logic, had he been sent to another world?

No, he might have been in a coma for a long time and was transferred here... He needed to check his condition first!

Above him, the glowing vines, whether plant or artificial, were dim, barely illuminating the outlines of tables, chairs, and cabinets. To check for injuries, Li You immediately jumped off the bed. Unable to find slippers, he walked barefoot to the faintly glowing wall and began to meticulously examine his body for any wounds.

But...

This examination was unnecessary. As soon as he started checking, Li You felt something was terribly wrong!

Why were his hands so small? Why were his arms and legs so thin? Had he shrunk? What was this white dress? Who put him in women's clothing?!

Wait, could this be... Sensing a horrifying possibility, Li You quickly reached down to his lower half and gasped.

It was gone!

It was really gone!

So this was indeed transmigration, and he had transmigrated into a little girl!

Such a shocking fact left Li You's mind blank for a moment. He slumped back onto the small bed beside him. After waiting for a long time, he noticed footprints on the floor in the dim light. The ground here seemed covered in a thick layer of dust, stepping on it felt like walking on snow, leaving clear tracks.

Why was it so dirty... Had this room been uncleaned for a long time?

He couldn't help but frown, wanting to find something to wipe his feet. Then his pupils contracted, realizing something – Wait, with this much dust, this place hadn't been lived in for at least several weeks. Why would the original owner be lying here?

He then examined the room more closely and found no signs of activity between the open doorway and the bed. This meant that before he transmigrated, the original owner had been lying in bed the entire time, never getting up, for at least weeks, maybe even months!

So...

Had he transmigrated into a dead person?

But why wasn't the body decaying? Was it also because of the transmigration?

Since he didn't inherit the original owner's memories, Li You could only make simple speculations. He then shifted his attention to the most conspicuous vines in the room.

By now, he had realized that these vines were spreading in from outside the room, covering the ceiling, walls, and many areas of the floor.

This made Li You dismiss the idea of them being ambient lighting... What kind of ambient lighting would be so exaggerated and realistic? Could this actually be a type of glowing plant?

However, since he had transmigrated, anything was possible...

Li You took a deep breath, got out of bed, and opened the cabinet in the room, but found nothing useful. She then left the room and went outside.

Outside the room was a curved corridor, not straight, wide and long, branching into narrower paths. Li You cautiously advanced along the wide path until, after a few minutes, the space before her suddenly opened up.

What entered his sight was a huge, spacious circular area, presumably the central hall on this floor of the building. Above the hall was a dome, and tens of thousands of vines poured down from the central ventilation shaft, forming a waterfall of light over 20 meters high. It resembled a giant, cold-glowing jellyfish, enveloping the entire space in a beautiful yet eerie atmosphere.

Li You was momentarily stunned by the sight before beginning to observe everything in the hall.

He found the floor here scattered with a large amount of debris: rotten fabric scraps, broken glass containers, overturned or dismantled sofas and tables, and a considerable number of human or animal skeletons, existing as scattered bones in various corners of the room.

It was clear that some major disaster had occurred here, hence the mess and the scattered bones.

Staring at the human skeletons on the ground for a few more moments, Li You's eyelids twitched. He quickly took several deep breaths, forcing himself to calm down. This was the first time in his life he had seen human remains. Combined with the gloomy, confined, and lonely environment, it was like a horror movie, making him feel uneasy.

After calming down for several minutes and finally regaining some spirit, Li You frowned slightly, a small confusion arising in his mind.

Whether it was a disaster, incident, or accident, after so much time had passed, the police or military should have come to deal with it, right? Even just to collect the bodies of the deceased.

Why was this place completely unmanaged?

Had it never been discovered by the outside world?

However, this place didn't even have a window. It was either completely sealed or underground, so it might indeed be some illegal hidden facility...

Thinking this, he lowered his head, using the relatively bright blue-green fluorescence here to try and find some clues.

To his regret, most of the papers on the ground had severely rotted, showing large patches of dark brown. A few hardcover books, likely made of high-quality, durable acid-free paper, were relatively intact, but he couldn't understand a single word on them.

This was the downside of transmigrating without inheriting memories; he had become illiterate... he thought helplessly. Then he put down the books and wandered around the hall, picking up a long metal object.

This thing looked like a slender, sci-fi-styled gun. It had a white exterior, and the barrel and body were covered in intricate carvings, exceptionally exquisite. Considering it felt sturdy and seemed to be made of some special plastic, Li You decided to treat it as a "baseball bat" for self-defense.

Finally, after wandering for over ten minutes, in a corner of the hall, Li You found an abandoned elevator shaft and the entrance to a safety passage next to it.

So he immediately went inside.

Honestly, he should have been more cautious, at least testing if there were any unknown threats in the stairwell. But the environment here was truly eerie, like a claustrophobic underground tomb. Even with the glowing vines providing light, he didn't want to stay in this damned place for another second.

He went up the metal stairs, floor by floor, trying to control the force of his steps to make his footsteps less noticeable. He felt like he was walking in a horror movie, with terrifying monsters potentially rushing out from the entrances to other floors at any moment to pounce on him.

The reason he chose to go up was that he felt this place had no windows and felt more like it was underground. But it wouldn't matter if he went the wrong way; the top floor might have a rooftop or something, allowing him to gain a vantage point and survey the entire area.

He climbed the stairs diligently, uninterested in exploring the interiors of any floors along the way. After climbing eight floors, Li You finally reached the ninth floor, which was the last one.

Clutching his "baseball bat," he cautiously stepped into the floor and, using the faint glow of the glowing vines, saw a wide corridor.

On both sides of the corridor were rooms or forks. At the end was a huge metal door, and next to it was a small, unclosed door emitting a faint light.

Was that... sunlight?

Sensing the flowing air, he subconsciously quickened his pace. He reached the entrance of the small door, pulled it open, and saw a staircase tunnel leading upwards. Looking up, the exit of the tunnel had become a bright spot. Golden light poured in, making the scene before him look like a staircase to heaven, beautiful and sacred.

Finally, I can leave this hellhole!

His heart blazed with excitement. He jogged all the way and rushed straight through the portal.

However, the next moment, as his eyes adjusted to the surrounding light, he was stunned to discover that outside wasn't land, but a small platform supported on the water.

Looking around, the platform was surrounded by deep, dark lake water, hundreds of meters deep, and certainly two to three kilometers wide. At the far end of the lake, no shore was visible. Instead, towering, smooth rock walls without any gaps rose up like a giant wall, completely confining this vast lake.

For a moment, Li You froze in place, only one thought remaining in his mind.

How am I supposed to get out of here?