Chapter 13: The Asylum Pantomime: 12

The thought stirred a rare spark of worry in Nan Lin’s numb senses.

That poor thing… they didn’t actually kill him, did they?

Right next door, separated by a single wall.

The wall behind him was unyielding, digging into his spine until it ached.

Some time later, once his eyes adjusted to the dark, Nan Lin spotted a faint scratch mark on the wall.

He began tracing along the wall in the darkness.

The solitary cell was small, almost claustrophobically so, a perfect square. In this weather, the air inside was far stuffier than outside. The reek of blood was amplified by the heat, churning and seeping into his nostrils.

Nan Lin frowned but kept moving his hands until, following the scratch, he found a raised bump.

He crouched and leaned in to inspect it.

A tiny circular hole. The cut edge was rough and sharp, far from smooth, and it had been plugged with something resembling a wine cork. But there was still some give when he touched it. It hadn’t been pushed in tightly.

Nan Lin pulled out his butterfly knife and worked the sharp blade along the edge, prying bit by bit.

Once the plug was loose enough, he flicked it out with the tip of his blade. Intense light flooded through at once, illuminating a dusty beam that forced Nan Lin to turn his head and squeeze his eyes shut.

His eyes burned with unbearable pain. He raised a hand to wipe away the falling tears.

It was purely a physiological reaction. Nan Lin hadn’t expected the light next door to be so blinding.

After a long while, he opened his reddened eyes and peered through the hole from a distance.

Through the opening, he could see the brightly lit room on the other side. It looked like an interrogation room. The iron torture implements inside were smeared with blood. The restraint ropes had been shredded to pieces. Even the observation window used for watching prey had been shattered, its glass scattered everywhere.

The devastation was severe. The room was completely empty.

Done for, done for, done for. They really killed him!

Nan Lin covered the hole and waited a few seconds before peering through again.

Not a hallucination. There’s really no one in there! And why hasn’t anyone cleaned up?

Could it be… Ruan Yu killed them back?!

Outside the interrogation room at that very moment, Ruan Yu was calmly washing the blood from his hands.

At his feet lay a heap of doctors and monsters. The kills had been so fast that blood was still pooling outward in sluggish rivers.

These useless wastes took up far too much of my time, Ruan Yu thought.

He stood in the draft for a long while, waiting until the wind carried away most of the cloying stench of blood clinging to his body before turning to leave.

Hopefully Brother won’t notice anything.

On the way back, Ruan Yu pressed at the wounds on his body, watching with satisfaction as they began weeping blood again.

He returned to the interrogation room and surveyed the destruction, clearly not the work of human hands. He decided that luring those creatures away had been worth the time after all.

Ruan Yu smiled and bent to pick up a coil of brand-new hemp rope from the wall, a glint of light passing through his eyes.

Every so often, his gaze drifted toward the wall hung with restraints. He knew the interrogation room was directly adjacent to a solitary cell, and he knew exactly who was locked inside.

Hopefully Brother won’t catch any whiff of anything he shouldn’t.

Solitary cell.

Clearly, Ruan Yu had miscalculated on that point.

Nan Lin’s nostrils were saturated with the stench of blood. Though it faded with time, it remained sharp and unbearable.

After an unknown stretch, the door cracked open a sliver.

Light from outside rushed eagerly through the gap. Nan Lin buried his face in the crook of his elbow to keep from being blinded.

Something was shoved inside. The door slammed shut again with a loud bang, and the darkness returned.

Nan Lin felt his way over and saw that most of the water in a dish on the floor had been spilled.

He rubbed his stomach, feeling the pangs of hunger. Judging by that, a fair amount of time had passed.

Under the circumstances, it seemed the patients in solitary were only allowed water.

Or perhaps not even water.

The dish on the floor was large and shallow, and with so much spilled, the already meager supply barely covered a fraction of its bottom.

Nan Lin tried to lift it, only to find the dish astonishingly heavy. In the process of trying, even more water sloshed out.

No wonder it had been shoved in rather than handed over.

He frowned and tentatively poked the dish on the floor with a single finger.

He watched clearly as the dish slid forward under his touch.

Nan Lin said nothing.

The bottom of this thing must have been treated somehow. Easy to push, impossible to lift.

What kind of sadist designed this?

He stared coldly at the dish on the floor. It resembled an enormous water lily pad, the base far too wide and the rim far too low. With so little water inside, a person would have to crawl on hands and knees and lap at it like a dog to reach the last dregs of cool water.

And the room was stiflingly hot. That pitiful bit of water evaporated before long.

Nan Lin licked his lips. Why do these instances feel like they keep getting more…twisted?

He sank back into the corner, his senses foggy and dull, and drifted off again.

But no matter how many times he opened his eyes, the dish sat in the same spot, hogging what little room the cell had to offer, looking thoroughly obnoxious.

He gave the wretched thing a disgusted kick and estimated the time. Based on his hunger, he should be getting out soon.

Qiu Xinxin and the others had one extra day. As for Ruan Yu…

The worry in Nan Lin’s eyes flickered and vanished. He returned to the small hole, removed the cork, and waited for his eyes to adjust before looking through again.

“Hm?”

It was the first sound Nan Lin had made all day.

In the interrogation room next door, an unconscious figure had appeared.

Ruan Yu lay sprawled beside the iron table, his dark lashes draped over his cheeks like crow feathers, the rise and fall of his chest barely perceptible.

Nan Lin exhaled in relief. Good. He’s alive. Scared me half to death. I thought that commotion was a murder in progress.

But when he looked again, he noticed details he’d missed at first glance.

The wrists covered in bloody gouges, proof of how much force their owner had exerted to break free. The wounds that had split open and worsened again. And the enormous pool of blood spreading beneath him.

The breath Nan Lin had just released caught in his throat again. That commotion earlier… it very well might have been murder.

But before he could look a third time, the lights in the next room went out.

The beautifully clear and barely breathing figure vanished from view. All Nan Lin could make out was a dark, heaving shape. The smell of dust and blood filled his nose.

He sat up and plugged the hole again.

Someone was coming for him.

Nan Lin shrank back into the corner and narrowed his eyes.

The solitary cell door was kicked open without ceremony. Nan Lin’s narrowed eyes snapped shut.

Someone seized his hand with crushing force, nearly grinding the bone to splinters.

That would definitely leave bruises.

Eyes closed, Nan Lin turned unerringly toward the assailant. Once he had the position, he slowly lowered his head.

[Player Nan Lin’s punishment has ended. Health decreased: 500→450]

“Do you know what you did wrong?” A cold female voice came from in front of him.

Nan Lin was mildly surprised. He slowly opened his eyes to find that the person standing before him was not the male doctor he’d expected, but the female nurse from the very beginning.

The asylum does shift rotations too?

But before he had time to think, the nurse repeated: “Do you know what you did wrong?”

Nan Lin looked up at her. Those eyes held not a shred of emotion, so bleak they were chilling.

He said, “I know.”

But I’ll do it again.

The nurse, satisfied with his answer, waved a hand behind her. Soon, someone else escorted Nan Lin back to the reading room.

He had been confined for a full day. Emerging now, it happened to be the next day’s reading time.

Nan Lin looked up at the top of the bookshelf, suddenly haunted by the illusion that the smell of blood still clung to him.

As his eyes swept quickly through the shelves, he spotted a book that seemed jarringly out of place among the somber historical volumes: I Learned to Slay People at the Asylum.

Nan Lin said nothing.

He reached out and took the book down. The moment he opened it, he was greeted by tiny script covering the title page.

[What does “a good memory is no match for a bad pen” even mean? And why is this nothing like what was agreed on? Wasn’t I supposed to be here to treat patients? Why am I locked in a… hospital room now?]

[So many people have died lately. The roommate next door has been rotting for days and still hasn’t been dragged away.]

…

[The key to the monitoring room went missing. That idiot of a director threw a huge tantrum. I’m thrilled.]

[The director suspects we stole his key. He’s been retaliating one by one. I lost my damn mind.]

[I finally understand what “a good memory is no match for a bad pen” means!]

[Naturally, I can’t leave out the schedule I’m always forgetting —

Breakfast: 7:30-8:30

Reading time: 8:30-10:30 (someone drew a crude little heart)

Free time: 10:30-11:30

Lunch: 11:30-12:00

Nap time: 12:00-14:00

Game time: 14:00-17:15

Cleaning time: 17:15-17:30

Dinner: 17:30-18:30

……]

Reading this, Nan Lin recalled that he’d entered the instance around five in the afternoon two days ago. Since then, they had already walked through the entire schedule.

So there probably wasn’t anything else to note…

[Oh right, I still have to say this. The I Learned to Slay XX at the Asylum series is incredible! Keep ’em coming, love it! Sob!!]

[Wait, who wrote a spoiler?!?!]

Nan Lin closed the book with a deadpan expression.

Sure enough, there was nothing useful past that point.

He patted his pockets. The key Chong Jiu had dropped was still lying there, warmed by his body heat.

Could this thing be the key to the monitoring room?

If so, the next block after reading time was free time…

“Nan Lin.”

A voice called out. Nan Lin reacted almost instantly, turning to look.

Chong Jiu was standing behind a shelf diagonally ahead, watching him.

Why is this guy so relentlessly everywhere?

Chong Jiu spoke again. “Your little pet is dying.”

Huh?

Who is he talking about?