The sky above Chengdu hadn't seen the sun in over a week. It was the kind of grey that made everything else look tired—buildings, sidewalks, the curled-up dog by the fruit stall down the alley. Even the steam that drifted from the manhole near the street corner looked bored, as if rising only out of obligation.
Inside a cramped one-room apartment on the sixth floor of a worn-out building, Yu Liang blinked himself awake to the shrill 5:45 AM alarm.
The room was silent, save for the quiet tick of a wall clock and the occasional groan of plumbing from above. He turned over, pulled the thin duvet off his bare chest, and sat up slowly, scratching his neck. His phone lay on the floor beside the mattress, cracked screen glowing faintly. The date flashed: Monday, January 3rd.
Liang pushed open the narrow window beside the bed. The morning air slapped him awake—cold and damp, filled with a faint metallic smell of rain and old smoke. Down below, bicycles rushed past, and someone shouted at a delivery guy to double-check their order.
He padded barefoot to the electric kettle and flicked it on. The kitchen—if it could be called that—was just a small counter wedged beside the bed, with one hotplate, a knife, and a rack of mismatched bowls.
He opened the top cabinet. Inside: two packs of instant noodles, a half-eaten bag of dry peanuts, and a bottle of soy sauce so old its label had peeled off.
He picked the spicier noodles and dropped them into a chipped bowl.
As the kettle hissed, Liang leaned against the wall, listening.
From the unit next door, a low moan filtered through the peeling drywall. Then another. Female, soft, rhythmic. His jaw tensed.
This wasn't new.
It always happened around this hour.
A sharp gasp followed by a thud—then giggles, then the unmistakable sound of a bed creaking unevenly.
Liang stared at the bowl in front of him. His hands didn't move. His heart ticked a little faster—not with arousal, but with something sadder, heavier.
Jealousy was too strong a word. But emptiness? That fit.
The kettle clicked off.
He poured the hot water slowly and stirred. The noodles swam in red oil and powder, releasing steam and the scent of artificial chili.
As he sat at the edge of his bed and took the first bite, Liang's phone buzzed. He ignored it. Probably a work update from Xiao Min.
Instead, he tapped open his WeChat wallet.
Balance: ¥13.60.
He stared at the number, then at the noodles, then back. He was out of rice. Rent had been paid two days ago—barely. The last of his utilities bill would auto-deduct tomorrow.
He shoved another bite into his mouth.
The office was a thirty-minute metro ride and a twenty-minute bus trip away. Liang wore his usual grey windbreaker, black slacks, and worn sneakers that had started to separate at the soles. It wasn't fashion, but it was clean. It was passable.
In the mirror by the stairwell, he caught his reflection. His hair was slightly too long. Eyes a little sunken. But the thing that bothered him most was his smile—or rather, the lack of it.
His face in neutral looked distant. Cold. Like someone who didn't know what warmth even felt like.
He took the stairs down instead of the lift.
It was cheaper.
At work, no one really noticed him. He was a data entry clerk for a mid-sized company dealing with logistics—packing, scanning, timestamping. The kind of job you could replace with an app if the manager ever cared enough to try.
At 10:45 AM, his stomach growled audibly.
He had skipped breakfast after the noodles. Xiao Min from HR leaned over, her ponytail swaying.
"You okay, Liang? You want the other half of my bread?"
He nodded quickly. "Thanks."
She handed it to him—a sweet red bean bun, slightly squashed.
He bit into it, trying not to moan. The sweetness hit him hard. He hadn't had anything sugary in two weeks.
"You should take better care of yourself," she said. "You look pale."
He just smiled politely.
Smiling felt like wearing someone else's clothes.
By 8:00 PM, he was back in the apartment. Rain had started falling heavily. The plumbing made that wet gurgling sound again.
He peeled off his jacket, hung it behind the door, and sat on the edge of the bed, exhausted.
He didn't turn on the light. The room was already dim with street glow filtering through the broken curtains.
Liang picked up his sketchbook. A few rough pencil drawings of hands, legs, streets, train tickets—quiet things. He flipped to a blank page and stared.
Suddenly, a faint pulse of static hit his ears. Then a voice—not quite a voice—like a thought speaking just behind his brain:
"DreamNode successfully installed."
He blinked. Stood up. Looked around.
Nothing.
The static vanished. But something was… off. The air felt thicker. Time slower. Like something invisible had been placed into the room and was just watching.
He looked down.
There—faintly, on the back of his hand—words shimmered briefly in a glowing digital font before fading out.
"Mission 1: Smile for 30 seconds — genuinely."
He spent the next 10 minutes in front of the mirror, trying.
It looked wrong. Each attempt was worse than the last. Lips curved, eyes remained dead. He gave up halfway, laughing awkwardly.
"Am I going crazy?"
But something in him didn't feel afraid. Just… intrigued.
For the first time in months, he didn't feel alone. Not really.
As he lay back in bed, a single thought came to him:
If this is a dream, I don't want to wake up.
The rain whispered against the window. The walls were quiet. Even the moans had stopped.
He closed his eyes.
And the word DreamNode echoed one last time in the stillness.