Doomsday Wonderland c1-855

by N. Heller

  However, this was the biggest problem that weighed heavily on them: If 12 intentionally leaves Oasis and goes somewhere further, Marcie would disappear once again.

  Once she thought of that, Lin Sanjiu grew restless, “Marcie, I don’t think he went far, why don’t we look for him now? Anyway, the entrance of the factory compound is guarded...“

  Marcie sighed after hearing Lin Sanjiu’s suggestion, “He is still in Oasis. I can sense it.” Looking at Lin Sanjiu, she explained a little impatiently, “For example, if I can move freely within a 100 meters radius from Luther… I would feel a sense of danger when we are about 70 meters apart. However, right now, I don’t feel this feeling at all. This means that he’s not far from us. I am sure of that.”

  Lin Sanjiu frowned, not knowing if it could be considered good news. Even though Marcie didn’t face the risk of disappearing now, that also meant that 12 was nearby, monitoring them secretly.

  [But, where?]

  After she mulled over it for a while, she clapped her hands together and finally made a decision. “Marcie, let’s go. Hear me out, I have an idea,” Lin Sanjiu said with a serious expression.

  “We have already found a Consular Officer. Oasis is a complicated place; furthermore, Chen Jinfeng has an agenda against us. If not for the series of events that happened over the few days, only a fool will continue staying in this place. Since 12 has disappeared, we should make the first move and leave Oasis. If we wait outside Oasis for him, we will get him somehow.

  “Even though Oasis is created by modifying a factory compound, all the other exits are locked for security reasons. Even the plot of land used for farming is surrounded by high walls and metal gates. If 12 wanted to leave, he had to leave officially. Otherwise, he would have to climb over the walls or force his way past the main entrance. No matter what method he chooses, we can just keep watch outside.”

  Even though that was just a vague plan, it sounded quite feasible — Marcie’s face visibly brightened as she listened to Lin Sanjiu. With a less dejected face, she agreed, “Say no more, this is definitely worth a try.”

  For this plan to work, they only had one problem: How were they going to secretly leave with their vehicles?

  It might be easy for them without their vehicles. However, driving their vehicles just to another spot would easily draw attention, let alone blatantly driving all three vehicles out of Oasis.

  “Let’s wait till morning. We can secretly go out of this building and assess the situation.” This was the only unimpressive idea Lin Sanjiu could come up with after thinking for a long time. “Almost everyone is asleep in the morning, so security would be laxer. At the same time, you must stay alert, if you sense that 12 is getting too far from you, you have to tell me.”

  Marcie nodded her head worriedly. In the past, with all twelve personalities in the same body, none of them could hurt each other. However, with the current situation, she could not help recalling the traumatic experience of witnessing the aftermath of what happened to the female doctor at the mental asylum.

  Lin Sanjiu sighed softly when she saw Marcie’s face. After they had discussed about their morning plan, they kept quiet with heavy-laden hearts. Knowing that a homicidal maniac was spying on them, they did not dare to split up. Both squeezed into Lin Sanjiu’s tiny bed and somewhat managed to rest awhile. After some time, they heard the rising volume of people’ voices and various noise coming from the first floor. It was followed by multiple footsteps and the smell of food. Lin Sanjiu knew that the duties for that day had ended and once again it was mealtime.

  When they felt that most of the people were fast asleep, Lin Sanjiu sat up and beckoned for Marcie to follow her. They quietly walked along the corridor, trying to keep their footsteps as light as possible. Fang Dan placed down the charred book she was reading and crooked her head when she noticed two pairs of feet creeping past her curtains.

  “I’m a little worried about Luther,” Marcie confessed quietly after they walked past about 200 over cubicles.

  “Why?”

  “He doesn’t know anything about that incident with the female doctor.” Marcie grimaced, “Another personality took over the body after it happened. The doctors discussed with the ten of us, and we decided to hide the matter from Luther.”

  Marcie sighed and continued, “At that time, Luther was still young, he was just a kid… When you first got to know us, you saw how proud he was that he had multiple personalities. He always felt that it was cool to have this disorder. If he found out that there was a monster hiding in his body, and that he had murdered an innocent woman with his b.a.r.e hands…” Marcie stopped at this point.

  Lin Sanjiu concurred silently. Even though Luther had already lived in different apocalyptic settings for a total of two years, perhaps because he had people around him and because he did not experience anything too cruel, Luther managed to keep a gentle, straightforward personality just like many other teenagers his age. Lin Sanjiu was certain that he wouldn’t be able to accept that something like that happened. She wasn’t even sure if she, herself, could accept such trauma if it happened to her.

  Lin Sanjiu knew that Marcie was very close to Luther, yet she did not know how to console her, so she just patted Marcie’s shoulder lightly. They stopped when they reached the entrance to the stairway. As expected, they saw Xiao Yu sitting on a stool guarding the door. Xiao Yu looked exhausted as she leaned against the wall, closing her eyes, her head was drooping.

  “Why is she so afraid that people would go out during the day?” Lin Sanjiu remarked softly, feeling suspicious. Lin Sanjiu observed Xiao Yu carefully; Xiao Yu was sitting in the middle of the corridor to the door, so it was really quite difficult to sneak past her. Just when Lin Sanjiu was about to try her luck, she had a sudden thought. She used her【School of Higher Consciousness】 and processed what she had just seen. It was hard to believe that her glance which lasted barely half a second held so much information. She couldn’t help feeling that she usually walked around with her eyes closed.

  There was a glass of water and a piece of folded paper beside Xiao Yu. From the back of the paper, she could see the vague outline of the content written in black pen — five days before, Lin Sanjiu also saw a similar piece of paper beside Xiao Yu. She instinctively retrieved the image from five days ago. Once the image was enlarged and the words were reflected, she made out what was written.

  Lin Sanjiu quickly deactivated her ability before she spent too much energy. She paused for a few seconds before she whispered to Marcie, “Be careful, let’s try to slip past her.”

  Marcie nodded and tiptoed forward. She strode over Xiao Yu’s glass of water. She was nimble, so she quickly reached the bas.e.m.e.nt door. She carefully opened the door and mouthed for Lin Sanjiu to follow her. Both slipped out of the door without making a sound. Xiao Yu did not notice anything as she rested her head on her own shoulders and fell asleep fully.

  After they closed the door, a head appeared in the corridor not far from them. The person looked in Xiao Yu’s direction, perplexed and secured her long hair behind her ears. That person was Fang Dan. She followed both women because she suddenly felt curious.

  Fang Dan looked around to check that there was no one; Xiao Yu was also fast asleep. Fang Dan felt as if she was a thief, and her face flushed with excitement. Following Marcie, she pulled out the door stealthily.

  After they left Bas.e.m.e.nt One, both women headed for the main hall. Fang Dan tried to hear their almost soundless footsteps and followed behind them. As there were no lights in the stairways, it was very dark. Fang Dan felt her way upstairs. Suddenly, she staggered as she stumbled and nearly fell due to some broken concrete on the floor. She steadied herself hastily, but she accidentally kicked a piece of concrete down the stairs.

  Thud thud thud.

  It rolled down the stairs and hit the door at Bas.e.m.e.nt One. The sound it made echoed in the stairway, and Fang Dan could even hear some noise from behind the door.

  Fang
Dan’s heart leaped from her c.h.e.s.t. She was so afraid that she ran up three steps with each stride. She rushed into the main hall — even though she did not know how she would return later, she wanted to evade Xiao Yu for now!

  By then, the main hall should have been blazingly hot, but it was much darker than Fang Dan had expected. The vicious daytime sunlight even seemed muted. Fang Dan blinked in confusion, unable to react immediately. Her eyes swept the area, and she spotted the two people. They were standing motionlessly at the entrance of the building. The sunlight which flooded in from the entrance gave them distinctly black shadows. Fang Dan looked behind her and quickly walked toward them.

  There were numerous duoluozhongs in the skies outside. Those duoluozhongs had developed raven black wings and were flying everywhere. There were so many duoluozhongs around that they blocked a lot of the sunlight. The ground was covered by patches of their shadows. There were even ten over duoluozhongs on the roofs of some of the buildings, they walked around without wings but with the familiar long mouthparts.

  Lin Sanjiu had a very tense expression. She placed a finger over her lips signaling for Fang Dan to keep quiet. Fang Dan’s forehead was covered in cold sweat as she nodded repeatedly. Suddenly, an ear-piercing scream tore through the silence. At that moment, their blood froze.

  Xiao Yu had managed to chase after them, but she now sat limply on the ground. Her face was pale, and tears streaked down her face. Her lips quivered a few times, and she finally let out a sharp meaningless scream again: “Ahhhhh… Ahhhhhh… Ahhhhhh!”

  Before Lin Sanjiu could say “Sh*t!”, the duoluozhongs started landing on the ground outside their building, stirring up a cloud of dust.

  Chapter 60 - Broadcast

  【Planar World，Lin Sanjiu’s card deck】

  Police Baton ×1

  Description: It’s almost out of battery. Please take note of the instructions.

  Small knives ×3

  Description: Cheap fruit knives. If you are cut by one of these, you can stop the bleeding with a single band-aid.

  Brick ×1

  Description: Building material. Gangsters from Northeast China and Beijing enjoy using this to scare people, supposedly.

  Pygmalion Choker | Cooldown time left: 8 hours 9 mins

  Gentle word of advice: Please take care of your own safety.

  “You gotta be f*cking kidding me!” Lin Sanjiu exploded, she pulled Xiao Yu up and ran like crazy. Without a second of delay, Fang Dan and Marcie followed behind Lin Sanjiu swiftly. They ran for the stairway. Usually, that distance was not that far, but today they seemed to take forever — Before they even got close, a black shadow flew above their heads.

  Deep cracks appeared on the portions of the ceiling where the black shadow brushed past, and concrete and sawdust fell like rain. Covering their heads and faces and avoid the falling debris slowed them down significantly.

  The black shadow landed with a thump in front of the women. It retracted its shiny raven black wings. Lin Sanjiu looked behind her and found that there were another five other winged duoluozhongs rushing toward them. A normal duoluozhong was outside, but it left the moment it saw the back of those winged duoluozhongs.

  The winged duoluozhongs were very tall; they reminded Lin Sanjiu of the two duoluozhongs she met in the public security bureau. Their skin on their body and wings were not wrinkly and sticky, neither did they have a smooth, human-like skin. Instead, their skins had a dark brown glossy surface, a little like a beetle’s carapace.

  If not for their human-like torsos, they looked like gigantic c.o.c.kroaches from behind.

  “Sob…” Xiao Yu fell to the ground weakly with unfocused eyes, she was too afraid to even move. Lin Sanjiu couldn’t help cursing inwardly when she saw Xiao Yu.

  “Fight! Let’s fight!” Fang Dan’s voice trembled when she said that. “Do all of you have a weapon?”

  Lin Sanjiu stared at one of the duoluozhong while cold sweat covered her entire body. That duoluozhong blinked at her as if showing its delight. At that moment, she smelt a familiar scent. They usually have an unpleasant stench, but this duoluozhong was emanating a faint fragrance. It was so familiar...

  As water was a precious resource, in the entire Oasis, only the Executives’ building had washing powder as they were the only ones with the privilege to wash their clothes.

  This duoluozhong was wearing an Executive’s shirt. Or rather, its clothes had been washed, just like the Executives’. Lin Sanjiu gritted her teeth tightly as the horrifying speculations which filled her mind all pointed to very shocking conclusions. The main hall was very quiet, other than Xiao Yu’s sobbing voice, the duoluozhongs did not make the unique buzzing noise that they usually had. It was as if they intentionally controlled themselves.

  In fact, if they listened carefully, they would’ve noticed that even with the alarming number of duoluozhongs flying in the sky, there were silent. It was just like watching an old film with animation but no sound.

  Before the duoluozhongs could attack, Lin Sanjiu suddenly took action. She kicked Xiao Yu toward Fang Dan and shouted, “Blow your whistle! Alert everyone! Marcie and I will hold them back here!”

  Once she moved, the duoluozhongs surrounding them also reacted. Some extended their wings, others swung their mouthparts, but they all maintained their silence when they attacked. Marcie had full confidence in Lin Sanjiu. Once Lin Sanjiu said that, Marcie rushed over to Fang Dan’s side and swung an impactful kick, pushing back a duoluozhong which attempted to attack Fang Dan.

  Fang Dan’s calf grew a little weak. She looked down and saw the whistle in front of Xiao Yu’s c.h.e.s.t. She recognized that whistle, it was used every night to wake everyone in their building. She scrambled for the whistle and pulled it off Xiao Yu. She did not even pause to question Lin Sanjiu, she just blew the whistle — The main hall was filled with a sharp whistle which reverberated through the building.

  The duoluozhongs were undoubtedly a little startled, but they attacked with more persistence. It was very obvious that they wanted to kill all of them before they made any more noise. They were much more powerful that the normal duoluozhongs. Their mouthparts moved so quickly that they were even a little hard to track. In just a short time, Lin Sanjiu was covered with bleeding wounds. She pulled out her police baton and made no attempt to use its shock function sparingly. Her counterattack was accompanied by the cackling sound of electricity as she managed to defend herself against the combined attack of two duoluozhongs.

  The sharp shrills from the whistle rang out a few times. Then, Fang Dan released the whistle and held her throat. With the loudest voice she could summon, she shouted, “DUOLUOZHONGS INVADED OASIS! DUOLUOZHONGS INVADED OASIS!”

  Despite being in a difficult battle, Lin Sanjiu could clearly hear the disturbance from beneath them. Very quickly, they heard a flurry of footsteps from the two bas.e.m.e.nt floors rushing toward the stairway. The first person who swung open the door to the main hall was a man.

  Just as his eyes grew wide, witnessing the scene in the main hall, a duoluozhong suddenly whipped toward him. It flung its mouthpart, and a human head flew into mid air.

  A row of dense sharp teeth grew around the rim of its mouthpart. They had never seen such a thing before. The headless body fell lifelessly to the ground. Just then, a series of fearful screams erupted from behind him. With that, the crowd which only half believed the warning became uncontrollable. Some of them ran away, some of them jostle their way through crying, others hollered that they wanted to get out… The wave after wave of noise flooded into the spacious hall which amplified their voices. The noise traveled throughout the building.

  While the duoluozhongs attacked the crowd, Lin Sanjiu shot a glance at Marcie and Fang Dan. The three of them ran to the windows to the side of the main hall. “Crash!” Lin Sanjiu broke a window as she turned to look at the duoluozhongs chasing after them. “Fang Dan, go! Go and wake the people from the other buildings! Quick!”

  Fang Dan clench
ed her teeth and leaped out of the window. Lin Sanjiu waved her left hand, and two cards flew behind her. She heard a painful shriek when her two cheap fruit knives dug deep into a duoluozhong’s pair of eyes.

  Meanwhile, two duoluozhongs chased after the people going down to Bas.e.m.e.nt One, leaving a bloody mess as blood and limbs flew everywhere. Two other duoluozhong in the main hall made a low growl when they saw their injured companion, and both rushed toward Lin Sanjiu.

  Just then, Lin Sanjiu heard Fang Dan’s screaming: “Wake up and fight! Duoluozhongs have invaded Oasis!” her thunderous screams woke the people in Oasis like an explosion. It took only a few seconds for the bewildered people to wake up, realize the situation they were in, and collapse with fears and tears.

  “What’s the use of waking them?” Marcie used her long nails to block a mouthpart coming at her, “Wouldn’t those normal people die for nothing?”

  “These duoluozhongs live within Oasis!” Lin Sanjiu blocked an attack. Next, she leaped and swung her police baton so that it hit one of the fruit knives, pushing that knife further into the duoluozhong’s brain. The duoluozhong swayed for a second, crashed on the floor and stopped moving. Lin Sanjiu never had any martial arts training, but from the way she fought, she did have some talent for it.

  “I think they’ve been hiding here for some time.” Lin Sanjiu touched the duoluozhong’s corpse and converted it into a card and held it in her hands. “There must be a reason why they refuse to reveal themselves to the people living in Oasis. I just want to prevent them from doing anything worse!”

  Even though she said that, Lin Sanjiu did not expect that it would cause so many fatalities.