Day of Imprisonment

My name is Xu Lin, and I am an actress and a teacher in the performing arts department.

Today, I am teaching the students of the performance class. Initially, everything went smoothly. The impromptu skits tested each student's true abilities, including their on-the-spot reactions, stage movements, body language, facial expression control, and their mastery of lines. Everything was proceeding as planned until one student suddenly went mad during a skit performance and started killing people.

I once thought that would be the most terrifying and despairing scene I would ever witness in my life, but afterward, I discovered that the scene at that time was nothing compared to what I experienced later. It was a mere drop in the bucket.

The male student's eyes were bloodshot, his muscles were bulging, like those bodybuilders on TV. His gaze was fierce, and the sharp teeth in his mouth and the constant low growls from his throat made him look like a wild beast.

Several boys tried to stop him together, but they failed.

Blood splattered on my face.

I was dumbfounded at the time.

My mind was blank, unable to think about anything.

Soon, he found me.

Unsurprisingly, I was killed, and I am very sure that I lost control of my bladder at that time.

But when I woke up again, I found that time had gone back to an earlier point in the day.

For a very brief moment, I couldn't tell if it was a nightmare or a reality that had actually happened.

If it was reality, then all of this was too absurd and bizarre; and if it was a nightmare, why couldn't I wake up?

The funny thing is, after experiencing a lot of suffering and torment, when I finally found an answer, my first reaction wasn't relief, but rather the feeling that I myself had gone crazy.

How could something like the Day of Imprisonment exist?

How could Memory Gatherers exist?

And those melodramatic, chuuni-like amnesiacs and cards...

Heh, they're all a bunch of mentally ill idiots.

The funny thing is, I am also one of them.

At that moment, I really thought I was crazy, or rather, I hoped I was crazy, at least that way, I would still be in a normal world.

But the cruel, bloody, and cold reality almost instantly cured my self-righteousness and unrealistic fantasies.

And this process was faster than any of you can imagine.

Oh, right, I also had another discovery: a person's potential is truly enormous. Those excuses like 'It's too difficult' or 'I'm too stupid' that people used to make during their studies simply don't exist in the Day of Imprisonment. If there really are such people, I dare to guarantee that they will only have one ending.

To die painfully and despairingly, and then become an amnesiac.

I learned how to survive in this terrifying world. To live, one must lie and kill.

Fortunately, I have an extremely strong talent for acting. When I lie, even I myself believe everything I say.

Perhaps this is the only comfort I have in this miserable world.

At least, I still have something I can show off.

Xu Lin felt that this sentence made a lot of sense, even filled with a kind of philosophy.

Unfortunately, these weren't her words.

These were the words of that man, the one who easily saw through her lies.

This man was the most terrifying person Xu Lin had ever encountered.

One day, she and he accidentally met in a certain scenario. That level 'Yin Yang Four' scenario was extremely dangerous. It could be said that it was the most terrifying, bizarre, and dangerous one among the several scenarios she had experienced.

Several powerful veteran Memory Gatherers she knew had died inside. Just when she thought she was going to die here too, that man actually 'cleared' it in a way she still couldn't understand.

She hitched a ride, so to speak, and survived.

The man was several years younger than her.

His name was Luo Xi.

This was an extremely special person.

He wasn't old, but his maturity and seriousness were far more pronounced than those of the professors at school.

In fact, Xu Lin had never heard Luo Xi say even a single word of nonsense.

As for jokes or anything like that, there was none of that either.

This man was cold, meticulous, and when he was focused on something, he was like a ruthless machine.

But this coldness and almost inhuman focus and meticulousness brought her an unimaginable feeling.

A sense of security.

At that time, Luo Xi had many helpers around him, and in Xu Lin's opinion, these people were actually Luo Xi's subordinates, or even pawns.

Including herself.

However, Xu Lin knew that she was different from the other pawns.

She was a 'sleeper agent'.

This wasn't her self-perception or self-positioning, but something Luo Xi had clearly told her.

"If you want to follow me, you must listen to me. No matter what I ask you to do, no matter how unreasonable, unbelievable, or difficult the things I ask you to do are, you must do them without hesitation and do them well. If you can do it, you can follow me; if you can't, it means you're not qualified, and I'll have to ask you to leave."

She remembered the words Luo Xi had said to her alone that night.

The newest novels are first published on 69shu.com!

Xu Lin didn't hesitate too much. She immediately expressed her position.

"I can do it."

That was her answer.

She was already 32 years old and had long passed the age of being arrogant and unrealistic.

What she wanted were very practical things.

Survival, security, and hope.

Relying on her own strength, she could only barely obtain the first one, or rather, it still depended on luck. If she entered a scenario with a very high difficulty, then she would almost certainly die.

But Luo Xi could give her all three of these things.

So, Xu Lin willingly became Luo Xi's 'sleeper agent'.

The things she did for him were all things that couldn't be seen in the light and couldn't be known by others.

Xu Lin wasn't stupid either. She knew very well that the things she was doing would eventually backfire on her.

Even devour her until not even a single bone remained.

But she had no choice.

Or rather, this was the path she had chosen for herself, even knowing the future situation in advance. So, even if this path led to Avici Hell, she could only continue walking.

Until one day, Luo Xi found her and gave her an unbelievable task.

"My name is Xu Lin, and I am an actress!"

As 'Mom' spoke, her appearance began to change, as if there were some strange films attached to her face, which were now automatically changing, and then at a speed visible to the naked eye, transformed from that face that Luo Xi was very familiar with into a woman who looked very young, beautiful, and extremely intellectual.

Luo Xi looked at this 'living transformation' with some surprise. At this moment, he was enduring terrifying negative emotions. The strange whispers of pain and mental confusion, like countless blades and thorns, constantly tore and cut in his mental domain. Any normal person, or rather, even those who had undergone rigorous training, would not be able to withstand this almost cataclysmic mental shock.

They would immediately turn into violent madmen, turning to killing as a panacea to alleviate the pain.

However, Luo Xi was not a normal person.

He himself was a madman, a madman who could suppress countless terrifying personalities in his mental world when he didn't take medicine.

Or rather, he was the ultimate victor among those terrifying and insane personalities.

As a victor, he naturally had his special characteristics.

For example, under 'absolute rationality', even if he took the 'poison' that triggered the Cleaner's transformation, Luo Xi could suppress the massive amount of maddening thoughts in his brain, still allowing his consciousness to dominate and control his soon-to-be-destroyed body.

At this time, Luo Xi stared at Xu Lin opposite him, grinned, and revealed a mouthful of sharp teeth.

The air was filled with the smell of blood and decay.

"Can transform into the appearance of others, oh, is it a characteristic of the card book? Heh, very interesting. So, who sent you here?"

Xu Lin was under tremendous pressure at this time, but she still tried her best to control her collapsing emotions and said, "It's you... Luo Xi, you sent me to carry out this mission!"