First Time in the Detention Center, a Hellish Start
The interrogation room's cold iron door slammed shut behind Lin Feng with a clang, cutting off Zhang Qian's last sharp, disgusted look. It was also like a floodgate, hurling him into an entirely different world, one colder and darker still.
Two tall, expressionless male police officers held him by the arms, one on either side, almost dragging him through several dimly lit corridors. The cold handcuffs had long since been removed from his wrists, but the humiliation of being restrained had been branded even deeper into his heart. Their heavy footsteps echoed through the corridors, along with faint shouts from somewhere in the distance. The air was thick with disinfectant, sweat, and an indescribably oppressive odor, making it hard to breathe.
There was no unnecessary conversation, only cold, procedural instructions.
"Get in."
He was pushed into a brightly lit little room. A somewhat older officer in uniform sat behind a glass window. Without even bothering to raise his eyes, he mechanically handed over several forms.
"Name."
"Lin Feng."
"Age."
"Twenty."
"Suspected offense."
"...molesting and insulting a woman." Lin Feng practically spat the words through clenched teeth.
The officer's pen paused. He finally looked up and glanced at him, his eyes showing no emotion, only the numbness of someone who had seen it all before. Then he lowered his head again and scribbled something down. That look chilled Lin Feng more than outright contempt, as though he were just an item on an assembly line to be dealt with, requiring nothing more than a "molester" label.
Then came fingerprinting. All ten of his fingers were coated in greasy black ink and pressed onto snow-white paper, leaving clear, undeniable marks, like certification of some crime. Then photographs: front and side, against a cold gray wall marked with height measurements. The flash made his eyes ache, capturing an image of him pale and disheveled, though his gaze had already begun to change.
"Your clothes, shoes, socks, and all your personal belongings. Take everything off and put it in this basket." Another guard in charge of the inspection tossed him a plastic basket and gave the order impatiently.
His humiliation reached its peak at that moment. Under the indifferent gaze of a strange man, he took off his clothes one piece at a time, as though stripping away his former identity and dignity along with them. At last, he stood stark naked. The cold air raised goosebumps on his skin, and he instinctively curled in on himself.
"Raise your arms, turn around, open your mouth, lift your feet." The guard's rubber-gloved hands checked him quickly and roughly, every movement carrying an unquestionable invasiveness. After confirming that he had no contraband concealed on him, the guard tossed him a rough blue prison uniform that smelled of bleach and a pair of badly worn plastic slippers.
The uniform was large and old, and the fabric rubbed against his skin, causing an indescribable discomfort. The slippers did not fit at all. They made a comical slap-slap sound when he walked, grating and pitiful in the solemn surroundings.
"Move."
Another curt order. He was led farther inside, through one iron door after another, each requiring an electronic card and a code to open. The heavy metallic crash of each door opening and closing struck his heart like a sledgehammer, reminding him that he was losing his freedom one step at a time, going deeper into this prison cut off from the outside world.
Finally, he was brought to the door of cell 107.
There was a small observation window in the heavy iron door. The guard leading him took out a key and inserted it into the lock. It turned with a teeth-grating click.
"New guy, molestation," the guard called briefly to the people inside. Then he shoved the iron door open and pushed Lin Feng in.
"Clang!"
The iron door slammed shut behind him, and the sound of the lock clicking into place was like a final sentence.
A stench so strong it made him sick hit him in the face: sweat, feet, cheap tobacco, the sour smell of leftover food, and an indescribable, stale body odor belonging to a crowd of men crammed together in an enclosed space for a long time, mixed with the sharp smell of bleach that had failed to mask it.
Lin Feng's stomach churned, and he nearly threw up.
He forced himself to stand steady and quickly surveyed this "home" where he would spend he knew not how long.
It was a long, narrow room of little more than a dozen square meters, with a concrete floor. The upper half of the walls was painted gray, while the lower half was a filthy green. At the far end was a squat toilet with no partition whatsoever, the source of the foul stench. A rudimentary sink stood beside it. Most of the room was occupied by one enormous, continuous concrete sleeping platform, covered in a disarray of dull-colored, stained bedding.
Seven or eight people sat or lay on the platform. Every gaze-curious, indifferent, appraising, but more often openly malicious and contemptuous-turned in unison toward him, the newcomer.
Their gazes pricked him like solid needles.
A burly man with a hideous scar across his face sat sprawled in the middle of the platform, in the best spot. A hand-rolled cigarette dangled from his mouth as he narrowed his eyes and looked Lin Feng up and down. He was clearly the boss of this cell, Scar.
"Well, a new guy?" Scar blew out a smoke ring, his voice raspy and teasing. "What are you in for?"
A skinny, monkey-like man beside him immediately chimed in, fawning, "Brother Scar, didn't the cop just say? Molestation. He got in here for touching some woman's ass!" He let out a lewd cackle, and several others joined in, their laughter full of malice.
The contempt on Scar's face deepened. He sneered. "Fuck, I look down on ball-less cowards like you most of all. If you've got the guts, go rob or swindle someone for real. Groping women? You're a fucking disgrace to us men!"
Lin Feng pressed his lips together and said nothing. He knew that here, any defense would be feeble and might even bring more trouble. Both the original owner's memories and the cold reality before him told him that enduring in silence was his only choice.
"What? Cat got your tongue?" Another brawny man with a brutish face abruptly rose beside Scar and walked up to Lin Feng. Almost a head taller, he cast an oppressively looming shadow. "Brother Scar asked you a question!"
Lin Feng remained silent, merely lowering his head slightly to avoid the man's gaze.
"Fuck! A tight-lipped one, too!" Scar lost interest and waved impatiently. "Same rules as always. The new guy sleeps by the toilet and is responsible for scrubbing it clean. It hasn't been scrubbed today, so good timing. There's work to do."
The skinny man immediately jumped down from the platform and pointed to a narrow spot closest to the squat toilet. The most ragged, thinnest sleeping mat lay there, and the stench in the air was strongest there too. "There, your 'VIP seat.' What are you standing around for? Scrub the toilet first! Use that brush and scrub it inside and out until I can see my reflection in it!"
A badly worn plastic brush and a filthy plastic bucket sat in the corner.
Lin Feng's heart felt as though it had been gripped by an icy hand. Humiliation, anger, disgust... all kinds of emotions surged up, but he clenched his teeth hard. He silently walked over, picked up the brush and bucket, filled the bucket with a little water, and went to the filthy squat toilet, stained with unidentifiable grime.
The stench nearly suffocated him. Fighting the urge to vomit, he squatted down and began scrubbing mechanically.
Unrestrained mockery and chatter came from behind him.
"Look at that coward!"
"Fuck, I'd better stay away from him tonight. Don't want his bad luck rubbing off on me!"
"We'll inspect it in a bit. If it's not clean, he'll get what's coming to him!"
Icy, dirty water splashed onto his hands and uniform. Every stroke of the brush seemed to wash away what little dignity he had left. He stared fixedly at the murky water swirling in the toilet, while deep in his eyes, a small, icy flame burned silently and fiercely.
He did not know how long he scrubbed, until his fingers turned pale and wrinkled from the water, until the stench seemed to have numbed his sense of smell.
It was time for dinner.
A guard wheeled a food cart to the door and passed several plastic meal trays through the small window. They contained cabbage stalks boiled to mush in plain water, a few pieces of greasy pork skin, and rice as hard as pebbles.
The trays were brought inside and set on the sleeping platform. Scar naturally picked out the few slices of fatty meat first. The others followed, snatching at the pitifully small portions.
When Lin Feng's turn came, the skinny man deliberately scraped the last bit of vegetable broth and a few thoroughly rotted cabbage leaves from a tray into his bowl. Then, grinning, he reached into Lin Feng's bowl, grabbed the only few pieces of pork skin that still looked edible, and tossed them into his own mouth, chewing with loud smacks.
"What are you looking at?" Skinny Monkey glared at him provocatively. "Someone like you should be grateful to have anything to eat. You want meat too?"
Lin Feng held the battered plastic bowl, which contained almost nothing but plain rice. His fingers trembled slightly from the force of his grip. His stomach burned with hunger, but greater still was the anger of being deprived and trampled upon.
In the end, he said nothing. He silently went to his "VIP seat," squatted on the floor, and swallowed the flavorless, slightly sour rice one mouthful at a time. Each bite was like swallowing a portion of icy hatred.
Night finally fell.
The lights in the cells were all switched off, leaving only the dim light from the corridor filtering through the small window and casting blurry shadows inside. Soon, snores, grinding teeth, and sleep talking rang out.
Lin Feng curled up on the cold, musty-smelling thin mat, his body pressed against the equally cold wall. The occasional drip from the toilet and the lingering stench made it impossible for him to sleep.
His body still ached all over-the mental torment of the interrogation, the pain in his back from scrubbing the toilet, and the bruises from being shoved and beaten. Hunger still burned in his stomach.
But worse than the physical pain were the humiliation and oppression weighing on his mind. They were like an invisible hand clamped tightly around his throat, pressing him down into the filthy depths, where not a glimmer of light could be seen.
Yet in this utter darkness and despair, his eyes were unusually clear, reflecting a cold glint in the faint light.
He had not forgotten the system in his mind.
Nor had he forgotten the "daily summoning" mentioned by that cold mechanical voice.
He clenched his fists tightly, his nails digging deep into his palms. The sharp pain helped him hold on to the last of his clarity.
He was waiting.
Like the most patient of hunters, and also like a traveler about to freeze to death on a cold night, waiting for the one match that might save his life, however pitifully faint its flame might be.
Time passed minute by minute, second by second, each second as long as a century.
Finally-
When the light filtering in from outside the window had dimmed to its utmost, when the snoring in the cell was at its loudest, when time slipped quietly past midnight.
[Ding! Daily Deathsworn Summoning has refreshed.] [Summon now?]
The cold yet wonderful notification sounded right on time, clear in his deathly silent mind.
The person summoned last time had only been a factory worker and had not even been in the same province as Lin Feng. This time, he desperately hoped to summon a deathsworn who could change his current situation.
Lin Feng barely hesitated. Amid that endless darkness and humiliation, he used all his mental strength to issue a command like a roar:
"Summon!"