Su Bai only remembered blinking once.
In that brief instant, he had left the Nightmare Tower and fallen into an entirely unfamiliar space.
When he opened his eyes, he was already standing in a dim movie theater.
Not in the audience seating, nor in the entrance aisle, but before the large screen at the very center. A small stage stood in front of the slightly worn screen, and he was standing on it, with no one around him.
Su Bai had a strange feeling. He seemed less like a spectator and more like someone in the story.
Directly ahead of him, neat rows of theater seats stretched into the darkness, but every one of them was empty. There was no audience.
The theater was so silent it seemed frozen in time.
The illuminated screen behind Su Bai wasn't playing any footage. The only image on it was a solitary door.
Another door.
Su Bai instinctively frowned, an uneasy feeling stirring deep inside him, and took a small step back. But a moment later, the screen trembled gently, and the door in the image actually became real. It stood over ten meters tall, forcing Su Bai to tilt his head back to take it in, yet its uppermost section remained lost in shadow.
The door wasn't fully closed, but stood open a narrow crack. Given its exaggerated height, however, that crack was just wide enough for Su Bai to pass through.
Su Bai stopped and stared at the door for several seconds, making no rash move to approach it.
"Wu Heng, can you hear me?" Standing on the small stage, Su Bai called softly, trying to establish contact.
"Yes." The familiar voice soon sounded in his mind, with the tones of the vessel called "Yao." Clearly, Wu Heng's adult form hadn't