Duosheng Danyuan

Tick-tock, time slips away with the back and forth of the pendulum; moment by moment, butterflies flutter their wings amidst the hesitant waves.

Feeling somewhat annoyed, I glanced at the clock on the wall for the umpteenth time, watching the hands about to slip past 8:30.

Just half a minute past 8:30, Lin Xu's door was finally opened.

"Huff...ha...huff..." Panting heavily, Lin Xu walked out in a disheveled state, looking as if he had just experienced something terrible, and had run out without even changing out of his pajamas.

"You ran into her too?" I asked, sitting on the sofa and looking in Lin Xu's direction.

"It's you. As expected, it's not so easy to leave here." After I spoke to him, Lin Xu finally noticed me sitting on the living room sofa. Upon seeing me, his tense mood visibly eased, and he revealed a relieved smile.

"It's still early, it's 8:30 now. Why don't you change your clothes?" I glanced at the clock again and then reminded Lin Xu.

"Okay." Lin Xu breathed a sigh of relief, his expression relaxing a bit. He left the door open and went back inside to change his clothes.

About three minutes later, Lin Xu came out of the room.

"I need to use the restroom."

"Um."

Two or three minutes later, Lin Xu came out of the toilet. He was no longer flustered. His disheveled hair and haggard face had returned to their original state.

I washed up.

"Um."

"Su Wanqing hasn't come out yet?"

"If she hasn't made a sound by 8:40, I plan to knock on the door."

"Does knocking...do it work?"

"I don't know," I said, spreading my hands helplessly.

Did you knock on my door?

"No. If you hadn't come out by 8:40, I was planning to knock anyway."

"..."

A moment of silence.

"What happened to you?" I asked.

"...family," Lin Xu finally spoke after a long pause.

"Oh, I see. Me too."

"..."

Another silence followed.

"Don't you miss them?" Finally, Lin Xuxian couldn't help but ask me.

"What's there to think or not think?" I chuckled self-deprecatingly, sighed, looked at Lin Xu, and said, "I just know that they can only be the fantasies of Jingxi Lodge, nothing more."

"...Why?"

"Isn't it clearly stated in the rules of Jingxi Lodge? Family members are not allowed here." I glanced at Lin Xu with some surprise, never expecting him to ask such a question that even Su Wanqing wouldn't ask.

"Um..."

"What exactly happened to you?" I asked, noticing that something was wrong with Lin Xu.

"Let's talk when Su Wanqing comes out." Forcing a smile, Lin Xu stood up and beckoned me to go knock on Su Wanqing's door together.

In the time it took to say just a few words, it was already 8:40.

So, the two of us arrived at Su Wanqing's door one after the other.

"Knock knock knock." Lin Xu knocked three times, but there was no response.

We looked at each other, exchanged a glance, nodded, and Lin Xu grasped Su Wanqing's doorknob.

With a muffled click, the door locked, both unexpectedly and unsurprisingly.

Lin Xu turned around and looked at me with a puzzled expression.

"Su Wanqing wouldn't lock the door. I could tell from our conversation yesterday that she's not stupid," I said after thinking for a moment.

"I think so too." Lin Xu nodded, but his brows furrowed even more.

After witnessing Elder Jianchen's ability to ride the wind and Elder Jianshan's ability to teleport in the black mist, anyone who isn't a fool should know that in this high-level martial arts world where cultivators exist, a lock on a door can't stop anyone who truly wants to harm others; it can only keep out ordinary people like us, their fellow teammates.

Therefore, it's impossible that Su Wanqing locked this lock; she's just timid, not stupid.

But this situation is even worse. The door is locked, but it wasn't Su Wanqing who locked it. So who could it be? It can only be the will of this strange and supernatural world. If it follows the settings of those supernatural novels, then it is the very essence of the bizarre.

"It seems this world won't allow us to get involved and help," I said after a moment's thought.

"..." Lin Xu's expression worsened even further.

A moment of silence followed. I lowered my head and began to pray silently for Su Wanqing, and for myself as well.

"Break down the door."

"Huh?" I looked up blankly, staring at Lin Xu in disbelief.

"Break down the door." Lin Xu repeated his words, his eyes resolute and determined.

"What's the use of this?"

"I don't know." Lin Xu shook his head, bit his lower lip, and said in a deep voice, "But we can't just do nothing, can we?"

"I know you're anxious, but wait a minute," I said, rubbing my forehead. "Since the door is locked by an unknown force, it naturally blocks out all outside noise, right? I'm also worried about Su Wanqing's situation, but ramming the door is really..."

"Do you have any other ideas?" Lin Xu asked incisively.

"I..." Indeed, according to the rules, there's absolutely nothing they can do in this situation. But ramming the door is just too desperate...

"I know you have no other choice. If you did, you wouldn't have waited for me to suggest the stupidest solution: ramming the door," Lin Xu said with a wry smile.

"Sigh..." I sighed and shook my head helplessly. "Fine, then let's break down the door. Although I don't have any expectations."

"There's always a way out, what if?"

So, the two of us gestured in front of Su Wanqing's door to confirm the position where we could both bang on the door at the same time without hitting each other, and prepared to make this futile struggle.

"one two three!"

"one two three!"

"one two three!"

......

"Ha...hoo...ha..."

Before long, Lin Xu and I were both panting heavily. Our bodies were only those of twelve or thirteen-year-old children; after bumping around for a while, we were exhausted.

I wiped the sweat from my forehead and glanced at the clock in the living room; it was already 8:50.

"Continue?" I asked Lin Xu.

"Take a break, then continue..." Lin Xu replied, panting heavily.

Tick-tock, tick-tock, the clock's sound wasn't loud, but it felt louder than our breathing in my ears.

—Su Wanqing's Room, 6:00 AM—

"Late Qing Dynasty, time to eat!"

"Huh, why isn't she responding? Did she stay up all night again last night? Honestly, Hao Hao, go wake up your sister. We need to leave early today; she can't skip breakfast."

"Received, received."

Still groggy and with her head spinning, Su Wanqing opened her sleepy eyes, sensed the movement outside the door, and her consciousness gradually cleared.

"Hmm...is it a dream?"

Sitting up halfway, Su Wanqing scratched her slightly disheveled hair and yawned heavily: "It's only six o'clock? Six o'clock!?"

Her previously dizzy mind instantly cleared up, and looking at the mechanical alarm clock that Lin Xu had given her yesterday on the bedside table, Su Wanqing could hardly believe her eyes.

She had never gotten up this early before.

"Sister, wake up!"

Before she could recover from the shock, Su Wanqing discovered that her bedroom door was now wide open. Although she hadn't locked it, she definitely hadn't left it ajar; she had checked the lock and door handle several times before going to bed last night.

Before she could think any further, her beloved and obedient younger brother, whom she remembered as a child, was standing at the door, fiddling with the doorknob and looking at her.

"Haohao!?"

"Hey? You're already awake? That's strange," Hao Hao said, looking at the flustered Su Wanqing from the doorway. "Mom's calling you for breakfast. Come on, or you'll get scolded."

"Mother?"

Upon hearing this, Su Wanqing froze, while Hao Hao had already run away from the door and returned to the living room, leaving only the slightly ajar bedroom door. He knew that Su Wanqing didn't like her younger brother lingering outside her bedroom door for too long.

Looking at the scene before her, Su Wanqing swallowed hard, completely losing her sleepiness. She slipped on her slippers and shakily got out of bed.

"Is it a dream? Is this a dream, or... was yesterday a dream?" Su Wanqing pursed her lips, her heart pounding uncontrollably.

If yesterday was a dream, that would be great; if this is a dream, then what were Hao Hao and the "mom" he was talking about?

Thinking of this, Su Wanqing shuddered inexplicably, an overwhelming chill spreading through her heart.

After a long pause, she took a few deep breaths, trying to calm herself down. At this moment, she neither felt that yesterday's experience was a dream, nor did she want her return to be just a pipe dream. Looking at Hao Hao's half-closed door, Su Wanqing's eyes were already a little moist.

Wiping away the tears from the corners of her eyes, Su Wanqing suddenly remembered the fifth rule of Jingxi Lodge—strictly adhering to the eight-hour sleep system. It was only six in the morning, and she would absolutely not violate the rule of "getting up before 9:00 to 11:00".

"If all of this is fake, then why?" Su Wanqing thought to herself, beginning to doubt whether she had really slept eight hours enough.

According to Su Wanqing's biological clock, she would never get up before eight in the morning, but now she woke up at six. Coupled with the third rule in her memory, "Jingxi Lodge provides disciples with warm, home-like rooms, but not for family members," she gradually pulled herself out of the joy of reuniting with her family and began to doubt her current situation.

"Could it be because I didn't get eight hours of sleep?" Thinking this, Su Wanqing became even more certain that everything she had seen before was just an illusion.

Just then, the voices of Mom and my younger brother came from outside the door again.

"Why aren't you out yet?! Hurry up and eat, or your little brother will show off all your favorite potstickers!"

"Mom ate more!"

This familiar voice felt so real, not at all like an illusion.

For Su Wanqing at this moment, the existence of her family was a falsifiable proposition. Rather than a series of interconnected logical proofs, her immediate priority was to find the unreality in these so-called "family members."

However, Su Wanqing couldn't find it. Her vision was filled with too many subjective desires. Just as Gu Changfeng said, all her speculations, following her logic, would only lead to the fact she wanted—that her family really existed.

When Su Wanqing disregards the rules themselves and seeks evidence from other directions that her family does not actually exist, she has already gone in the opposite direction from safety.

"Gu Changfeng, Lin Xu... Lin Xu!" In her confusion and helplessness, a glimmer of light suddenly appeared in Su Wanqing's eyes.

In her memory, there was an alarm clock that Lin Xu had lent her in her bedroom! As long as that alarm clock was still on her bedside table, everything here must be a lie.

Thinking this, Su Wanqing returned to bed and picked up the alarm clock that Lin Xu had lent her.

"H-How could this be?" The mechanical alarm clock with battery function in her memory did not appear. Even though it looked somewhat similar, the alarm clock in Su Wanqing's hand at this moment was just a rechargeable electronic clock with a Type-C interface.

Su Wanqing fell into even deeper confusion.