Doomsday Wonderland

Four people, holding their breaths in concentration, quietly standing guard by the door, waited for a full five or six minutes, finally slowly relaxing their vigilance. They looked at each other, and it was Abby who finally whispered, "Maybe... it walked away from the door?"

"Yes," Cuining quietly said. "If it walked away from the door, it would be in the forest in a few minutes."

"Apart from the shadow of the head, did you see anything else?" Pence asked.

None of them doubted whether Wu Yiliu had seen something wrong. Wu Yiliu wanted to smile bitterly at the thought. Since he was momentarily dazzled earlier, he had now lost confidence in himself, yet his teammates seemed to trust him so much.

No, on second thought, he probably hadn't seen it wrong. Although he felt like he was constantly carrying a time bomb, even the worst-case scenario wouldn't have caused him to hallucinate a shadow. After all, where he came from, all they could see was...

Wu Yiliu suppressed the thought in time, along with the pale green fear it had momentarily stirred.

"I only saw a shadow, as if someone was standing outside the window looking in," Wu Yiliu said in a low voice, recounting how he had looked back and seen no one outside the window, yet the shadow remained when he looked again. In the dim light, the faces of the other three people grew increasingly tense. Even though they knew that what he saw was not a normal human being, they still took the time to lock all the doors and windows tightly.

"Besides, since the pocket dimension doesn't care if we speak out loud, I have a question to ask."

Wu Yiliu paused, and carefully extended his foot in the dim room, making a few circles around the area. His boot tip bumped against a pair of shoes near the door. Not far from the entrance of this cabin was the back of a sofa, with a long table behind it adorned with decorative items. The shoes were neatly placed in front of the table, as if someone was wearing them, standing there, leaning over to look at the sofa.

"Since none of us took off our shoes, then these shoes..." Wu Yiliu thought of how he had been lost in thought on the sofa earlier, and a chill ran down his spine. "When did they appear here?"

The other three looked down following his indication and fell silent. Wu Yiliu could almost hear their silent shock, just like his own earlier, "Whose shoes are these?"

"I don't remember, but I think they weren't here when we left," Abby said, being the first to speak. "We were busy when we first came in, going in and out, so we would have noticed these shoes earlier... When we came back, I even thought they were your shoes." The last part was directed at Wu Yiliu.

Wu Yiliu remembered that when he had jumped over the sofa to turn off the light, he seemed not to have noticed these shoes. Had they appeared after the lights were turned off?

"This is a newly appeared pocket dimension, so they couldn't have been left by posthumans." Wu Yiliu squatted down, examining the pair of hiking boots, which appeared to be women's shoes from their size. "This means they must be part of this pocket dimension's content."

"Speaking of which," Pence suddenly said, "There's more than just a pair of shoes here."

"What do you mean?" Abby turned sharply, and the cartoon figure on the fireplace's TV screen seemed to be listening to their conversation in silence.

"When I was checking around the room, I found a folded pullover in the bedside table drawer," Pence said. "I shook it open, thinking it was change clothes prepared for us, but there were no other clothes in the wardrobe or drawers."

He went into the room and brought out the pullover; it was clearly a man's, and even on Pence's frame, it would be quite loose.

A solitary pullover lying in a drawer was quite strange. No matter how Wu Yiliu guessed, he couldn't figure out what this pocket dimension was trying to do by placing some clothes and shoes around. They left the clothes and shoes on a chair next to the sofa, untouched for the time being.

The pocket dimension seemed to have forgotten that it had forcefully insisted they all rest just under ten minutes ago. Even though the few of them were standing and talking, there was no response at all. Perhaps encouraged, they discussed for a while longer, deciding to split up and search for any other suspicious objects. They still didn't dare to turn on the light or use a flashlight, so they could only grope around in the dimly lit room.

"Cuining," Wu Yiliu said, trying to steady his voice, "will you come with me and look around?"

Cuining clearly hadn't expected him to suddenly make this request. She paused for a moment, then nodded her head. She seemed to be the soft and accommodating type, especially with small matters. Without even asking "What's wrong?" she followed Wu Yiliu into the kitchen.

As she opened and closed cabinet doors, Wu Yiliu kept an eye on her out of the corner of his eye. Cuining had tied her long hair into a low ponytail, exposing her whole face. No matter the angle, she appeared perfectly normal. Despite her gentle nature, she seemed to have no lack of courage. Even in the dark kitchen, where not even daylight reached, she dared to reach her hand into the black cave-like cabinets to feel around.

The kitchen was small, and other than the essential tableware and kitchenware, there didn't seem to be any extra items. When they returned to the living room, Abby and Pence hadn't come out of the bedroom yet. After a quick glance at the bathroom, the two sat down on the sofa in the living room.

The moment his body sank into the cushion, Wu Yiliu distinctly felt the sofa cushion dip down slightly. This was of course normal, especially since Cuining had sat down next to him, but somehow, he felt something was vaguely unsettling.

"So, I think this pocket dimension is a survival type," Cuining explained softly as he was lost in thought. "Especially now that the pocket dimension has obviously started running, and there are still no rules, it means we have to figure out how to survive in this situation... I think we should stay here until the pocket dimension stops running."

'The house might not be safe either,' Wu Yiliu thought. "Did you find anything when you explored the pocket dimension's boundary earlier?"

"We split up and walked into the forest. I walked for nearly ten minutes, and it was just an ordinary forest. I couldn't distinguish..." Cuining's voice trailed off mid-sentence, as if she had remembered something.

Wu Yiliu turned his head and found her staring at him. Her dark, slender eyes seemed to have dilated like a cat's.

"What are you doing?" she asked quietly.

What?

"What are you doing?" This time, Cuining's voice was even softer, trembling slightly if you listened closely.

Wu Yiliu was confused. As Cuining slightly lowered her eyelids, he followed her gaze and looked down.

He was holding one of the hiking boots in his hand. He didn't know when he had picked it up, and he was now slipping it onto his foot over and over again.

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