Translator: CinderTL
It was too quiet.
The surroundings were too quiet.
The elevator had arrived at the lobby on the first floor, where people were coming and going, and there was almost always someone waiting for the elevator. They had been arguing for so long, yet there was no response from outside.
It was as if everyone had died.
This was absolutely abnormal.
Gradually, everyone seemed to realize this, and the atmosphere began to shift toward an extreme.
"The phone... the phone isn't working," a young voice spoke up, sounding like a girl. "There's no signal here."
The emergency button inside the elevator was also useless, as if it had been broken long ago.
Darkness, silence, pressing down on everyone's hearts.
Finally, someone couldn't hold back and turned on the flashlight on their phone. The person who turned it on didn't shine it directly at anyone but pointed it downward, toward the ground.
The brightness was enough.
Everyone analyzed the current situation, while Jiang Cheng remained deep in thought, not interjecting. He vaguely felt that something was off.
As if something was missing.
His gaze began to wander around the elevator. Everyone was scattered, and soon, Jiang Cheng realized what the problem was—the janitor was gone.
This discovery sent a chill down his spine.
In the dim and noisy environment, no one had noticed this yet. Jiang Cheng first ensured Lin Wan'er's safety, then gently pulled her arm and slowly retreated to a corner, the one farthest from where the janitor had disappeared.
He then positioned himself in front of Lin Wan'er.
At that moment, the elevator shook slightly.
Then, it began to rise slowly.
This ascent felt different from before. It wasn't the smooth sensation of mechanical operation but rather as if some eerie force was pulling it upward bit by bit.
The speed fluctuated, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. No one dared to make a sound.
Especially the girl who looked like a college student. Her eyes were filled with terror, and her teeth were chattering.
The small screen inside the elevator was still displaying the floor numbers.
The characters, in the dim environment, were as bright red as blood.
5th floor.
10th floor.
15th floor... The elevator began to slow down, and even the noise of metal cables rubbing against each other could be heard from above. The scene was eerily bizarre.
Finally, the elevator stopped at the 17th floor.
The moment they saw this number, Weiwei and Du Feng's faces turned pale.
Jiang Cheng was slightly better off. After noticing the elevator was ascending, he had a premonition.
The elevator was probably going to take them back to the 17th floor.
Not the current 17th floor.
But the 17th floor from when Nan Huaili had disappeared.
"Creak—"
A strange, indescribable friction sound rang out.
The elevator doors opened.
Everyone instinctively stepped back, wanting to stay as far away from the doors as possible.
It was as if a monster would burst in once the doors opened.
"How... how could this be?" Weiwei exclaimed in shock.
The scene outside had changed.
It was completely different from what they had seen before.
The corridors on both sides had disappeared, and the office space that had been separated by frosted glass was also gone.
Now, what lay before them was only a deep, tunnel-like corridor.
Directly facing the elevator doors.
The depths of the corridor were pitch black, without a single trace of light, making one doubt if there was even an end to it.
Just staring into the depths of the corridor was enough to send shivers down one's spine.
"What kind of Ghost place is this?" a woman in her 40s spoke up. It was clear that even though she was terrified, she didn't dare to scream.
Afraid of drawing out something lurking in the darkness.
"Everyone... everyone, don't go out," a relatively young man stared into the darkness before him, his throat bobbing as he spoke, "Let's just wait in the elevator."
"Later, we'll follow the elevator again..."
As if in response to his words, the elevator suddenly shook violently. The woman in her forties lost her balance and fell inside the elevator.
After falling, her face was directly facing everyone behind her.
Immediately after, a piercing scream shattered the silence. It was unclear what she had discovered, but the woman frantically scrambled out of the elevator on all fours.
She ran headlong into the darkness.
Soon, her figure was swallowed by the darkness, and only the sound of stumbling footsteps echoed from deep within the corridor.
This completely ignited everyone's emotions.
It was dangerous outside, and now, the elevator didn't feel safe either.
Moreover, after the shaking, strange friction sounds occasionally came from above the elevator, giving everyone the feeling that it could plummet at any moment.
Falling from the 17th floor—just thinking about it was enough to know the consequences.
Without anyone organizing it, everyone quickly left the elevator.
And just as everyone had exited, the elevator doors eerily closed, and the elevator slowly descended.
At that moment, there was no better option, so everyone had no choice but to brace themselves and grope their way deeper into the corridor.
Fortunately, their phones could still be used as flashlights.
The woman's voice had already disappeared. As they ventured further, they discovered more and more peculiarities.
The corridor seemed to have been around for quite some time.
It definitely wasn't built within the last 20 years.
The lower parts of the walls on both sides were coated with dark green waterproof paint, and the walls were covered in mottled stains, with some areas already cracked.
From the cracks, large patches of black mold had spread.
Under the beam of the flashlight, tiny particles of dust floated in the air, as if this place had been sealed off for a long time, and they were the first to arrive here recently.
Taking a breath, the stale air filled their nostrils.
Scanning the surroundings, Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone. Unlike everyone else who was focused on what was ahead, he was more concerned about what was above and behind him.
He was now certain that this was the Nightmare.
Or rather, a world similar to the Nightmare.
What wasn't clear was why the mechanism had changed. Could it really be, as the middle-aged man had said, that this world was being eroded by the Nightmare?
A similar feeling had occurred not long ago.
That taxi that shouldn't have existed.
And the missing driver.
Who had inexplicably appeared before him and Fatty.
Even more terrifying was that he had actually gotten into the taxi.
He had a suspicion: if he hadn't realized it at the time and had let the taxi driver continue driving, would he have ended up being taken to a place like this? After thinking it over, he felt it was highly possible.
Lin Wan'er stayed close to him. He had her walk in the middle of the group, while he stayed on the far right, next to the wall.
This position offered a relatively better view.
There were no obstructions in front or behind.
"Look!" As they turned a corner, the delivery guy at the front pointed ahead. The corridor had finally come to an end.
There was a door.
But it wasn't the black iron door Jiang Cheng had imagined.
It was just an ordinary, double-leaf iron gate painted in light blue.
The style and color scheme of the gate looked familiar to Jiang Cheng.
But for the moment, he couldn't recall where he had seen it before.
The group walked closer with uneasy hearts, and faint sounds began to emerge from behind the gate.
Human voices.
The voices weren't loud, but they were chaotic and sounded quite intense.
(End of the Chapter)
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