Congratulations on Your Successful Escape

For some reason, I confused this story for Escape the Infinite Chamber…

—

Like a dying fish, Mo Yi bounced on the bed fiercely, gasping for breath, greedily drawing in air.

The dilated pupils stared at the ceiling without focusing and he didn’t even know where he was.

The first thing he noticed was the thick bloody smell remaining between his lips and teeth, which eroded his senses aggressively. Mo Yi couldn’t help lying on the bedside and retching but he couldn’t vomit anything in his stomach. It made his internal organs tumble and he couldn’t help himself.

He propped up his upper body blankly with his elbows and the scene in his mind slowly withdrew.

Mo Yi’s face was pale and he couldn’t recover for a long while – did the previous experience really happen or is it just a really scary dream?

He turned his head stiffly and hurriedly looked around his room: the same furniture, the same decoration, everything is familiar, as if nothing had happened. The warm sunlight came in through the untightened curtains, and fell on the edge of his bed, looking pure and dreamlike.

Mo Yi was in a daze, and explored his palm. Seeing the light wandering between his thin and pale fingertips and between his fingers, for a moment he felt like…he was a world away.

He reached out and touched the corner of his forehead. It seemed that there was still a faint pain, but the skin under his fingers was smooth and even, without any trace of injury. Mo Yi took a long sigh and threw himself back on the pillow but after the while, he glanced at the bedside cabinet, noticing something that did not belong to this room.

His body suddenly stiffened. He took a few deep breaths, then slowly stretched out his hand and picked it up.

It was an ordinary piece of paper, with no patterns on the plain white paper, only a line of low-key bold words:

“Congratulations on your successful escape. Thank you for your participation and wish you a happy life.”

Mo Yi: “…”

The words look familiar, definitely look familiar.

He turned the note over, and saw another line written there: The next game starts seven days later, please be prepared.

Everything was exactly the same as what Jiang Yuanbai said. The only difference was that at the bottom of the note, there was an extra line of small characters:

Congratulations on finding the hidden branch. You can receive the branch mission reward next time you enter the game. I wish you a happy game.

Mo Yi was in a state of confusion, with countless questions entangled in his brain, but no one could answer him. This feeling was really uncomfortable.

He could only take a deep breath, trying to calm himself down.

At this time, Mo Yi realized that he was sticky and his thin shirt stuck to his back, which was extremely uncomfortable.

He wiped his face, stopped torturing his brain, got up, and stepped into his slippers to go into the bathroom.

The spray from the shower poured down and the hot mist instantly evaporated, blurring the mirror on the side.

Mo Yi took off his clothes and stood in the spraying hot water, the warm water slid down his body, dispelling some of the coldness of the body and mind. He raised his head towards the water, closed his eyes, and pushed the wet black hair to the back of his forehead, trying to ignore the bad associations the white mist brought to him.

He just refused to think back, but now the scenes appeared in his mind uncontrollably.

At the end of the game…

The memory of that time is like looking out through a layer of foggy glass. Even if he still remembered the general situation, the details have been blurred.

That crazy, desperate, desire for control and destruction was definitely not him.

What Mo Yi understood was his rational and indifferent self. He always placed himself in the position of a bystander and used absolute reason to manipulate his behavior.

It is precisely because of this that he was able to survive that escape game.

But now… Mo Yi felt that he hardly knew himself.

He clearly remembered that at that time, he was sane and sober but he seemed to be dominated by something deeper and terrifying, breaking through the barriers of reason and overriding it, and even more terrifying, it made him almost feel…that’s how he was.

This reminded him of some very unpleasant memories.

Mo Yi reached out his hand to turn off the shower, shook his wet black hair, and pulled down the bathrobe that was sitting next to him.

When he turned his head, his eyes swept to the side mirror.

In the mirror, the damp mist… seemed to be slowly condensing into a human form——

Mo Yi was shocked!

He straightened, turned his head quickly, and looked vigilantly across the small bathroom.

The steaming bathroom was empty. There was no one except him. Only the white mist condensed into water droplets on the mirror surface, and then slowly slipped down, leaving a watermark like tears on the mirror surface.

Mo Yi frowned suspiciously.

Is it because he was too nervous?

Suddenly, at this moment, the door bell rang untimely.

Mo Yi dispelled the weird thoughts, hurriedly put on the t-shirt placed aside, opened the bathroom door, and walked towards the door.

He wiped his hair casually, stretched out his hand to open the door, and the man standing outside gave him a bright smile.

Mo Yi was stunned.

Dream and reality finally merged at this moment, and he no longer doubted that he had had a long nightmare – after all, there is no evidence that is more real than a living person.

Mo Yi curled up the corners of his lips and revealed a slight smile:

“Are you not dead?”

Jiang Yuanbai’s smile drooped and a little bit of sadness appeared in his eyes: “Hey, is this how you treat your comrade! It is unlucky to say that unless you are immortal!”

Mo Yi raised his eyebrows, shifted his body, and let Jiang Yuanbai come in.

“To be honest, I really thought I was going to be finished!” Jiang Yuanbai continued as he walked: “When I was in the fantasy world, that monster turned into you to lie to me. To be honest, I don’t know when he was. It turned you off – my god it was really thrilling!”

Jiang Yuanbai sat on the sofa without seeing any other spot and continued with lingering fear: “Later, my consciousness became blurred. It should be controlled by that thing, but I remember…”

He frowned uncertainly: “It seems that there was a little girl. She seemed to…protect me? Then I heard the sound of the task being completed.”

After that, Jiang Yuanbai took out a piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to Mo Yi. The material of that piece of paper was as simple as his. Mo Yi turned to the back and saw it read: “Next time the game starts. After 9 days, please be prepared.”

The time of the two is different, and Mo Yi was not surprised.

What caught his attention was the following line of small words: “Congratulations for helping other players find the hidden branch. You can receive the corresponding reward when you enter the game next time. I wish you a happy game.”

Mo Yi frowned, thinking.

Survival was the main goal of this escape game. There will be no rewards after reaching it. The next thing waiting for the player was an endless world of horror.

And opening the branch route or just assisting in reaching the branch route, there will be rewards – perhaps, this will be the key to escape this terrible cycle?

Suddenly, Mo Yi remembered something, narrowed his eyes to look at Jiang Yuanbai, and asked in a deep voice:

“Wait, how did you find me?”

Hearing this, Jiang Yuanbai suddenly jumped up from his sofa and said anxiously:

“Oh, I have forgotten the serious things about coming here! I just remembered it when you said that! In short-oh, it’s hard to say, I will take you to meet someone! You will know when you go!”

Mo Yi shook his head slowly: “No.”

Obviously he didn’t expect that he would refuse so decisively, Jiang Yuanbai was stunned, staring at him blankly, not knowing what to say for a while.

“I have to go to the gym downstairs to get a life membership.”

…

Jiang Yuanbai: ? ? ?