Congratulations on Your Successful Escape

Chapter 28，Part 1

Mo Yi was falling into an abyss.

He was ice-cold from head to toe, the sleepiness vanishing in a split second, and a feeling of pure terror enshrouded his senses. A chill of fear burst from the tailbone, scurrying upwards and ruthlessly seized his heart.

His eyes were tightly closed as he stiffly lay on the bed, slowly adjusting his trembling breathing.

Fear seeped through each and every one of his pores, loudly clamouring in his mind:

Don’t open your eyes! Don’t open your eyes!

Under the thin quivering eyelids, the eyes trembled uncontrollably along with the rate of breathing.

Just then, a very small ice-cold hand grasped Mo Yi’s hand dangling by his side.

The extremely cold touch along the skin penetrated into the marrows of his bone, causing Mo Yi to uncontrollably shiver.

The ice-cold breath moved closer to his ear, stirring up small chills along his skin. The fear was like a small, congealed tuft of wool, blocking the breath in his throat, making it almost impossible to gasp for breath.

The small and soft child’s voice sounded in Mo Yi’s ear once again, “It’s your turn to find me next.”

After that, a small, round, and hard object was stuffed into Mo Yi’s palm.

The ice-cold breath and the child’s tiny hand left.

Mo Yi was still tense all over, and the small round thing was laying in the center of his ice-cold sweaty palm. The slight chill almost made him unable to hold onto it, the iciness scalding his hand.

He controlled his breathing, forcing his chest to rise and fall in a slow withdrawn manner.

The silence and darkness made Mo Yi’s senses all the more sharp. He warily waited for the next thing to happen, heartstrings stretched taught.

The boundless darkness was like an abyss that swallowed all sounds.

Continuously spreading and expanding, like a sponge, absorbing all sounds of movement and light.

Unaware of how long it had been —

Excessive tension and fatigue unexpectedly caused Mo Yi to unwittingly fall asleep silently.

When he opened his eyes once more, all the lights had already been turned on again.

Mo Yi was laying on the narrow bed in a slight daze. Even the noisy ringing of the metal bell piercing and echoing in his ears couldn’t rouse his attention.

He stared straight at the stained and old-fashioned ceiling, and only gradually came to after a very long time.

Last night… passed just like that?

Mo Yi blinked, feeling like he still hadn’t woken up.

Successfully survived the night in such a way?

Suddenly, Mo Yi seemed to have thought of something and quickly sat up, spreading open his right hand —

There was a hard object pressing painfully against the center of his palm, leaving an uneven horizontal red mark across his fair palm, looking particularly striking.

And the thing that was stuffed into his palm was still there.

A round, jet-black and shiny ball lay still in his palm. It resembled a button, except it didn’t have a buttonhole.

Mo Yi stared at it blankly, and because he hadn’t moved his fingers for a long time, they were a little stiff, and little by little grasped it again.

Suddenly, a familiar voice rang out from the door, rousing Mo Yi from his train of thoughts, “Are you awake?”

Mo Yi began to raise his head when he heard what was said, looking over to where the voice came from.

Song Qi was standing, leaning against the door. A pair of light smokey gray pupils watched him, his face half illuminated by the light outside the door, slightly blurring the contours of his face. “It’s 5 o’clock. According to the schedule, it should be morning.”

Mo Yi looked down at his watch in afterthought: A quarter past 5.

He stood up in a hurry, and casually placed the hard object that was stuffed into his hand last night into his pocket.

Due to falling asleep last night with all of his clothes on, Mo Yi’s clothes became wrinkled even though he barely moved, having slept very peacefully.

Mo Yi subconsciously adjusted his clothes, then quickly walked to the doorway and whispered to Song Qi who was standing waiting for him, “Let’s go.”

The two men walked along the still dim corridor. Mo Yi opened his mouth, about to tell Song Qi about his experience last night, but just as he started to speak, Song Qi happened to interrupt what he was about to say, “Are your hands okay?”

Mo Yi was temporarily at a loss, and later realized that Song Qi was asking about his injured hand.

He lowered his head and looked down at his left hand which was still wrapped like a zongzi, and tried to move his fingers. A sore and dull ache instantly travelled up from the wound.

Mo Yi answered without changing his face, “It’s much better.”

Just then, the two ran into other players who had emerged from their rooms, and it seemed as though they were preparing to go to the dining room.

Several people walked in groups.

Mo Yi had to swallow the words he was about to speak back into his stomach.

When they reached the dining room, there were already several people waiting there.

Mo Yi looked around the room without changing his expression, and silently counted the number of people in his mind: There was still eight people, no difference from last night.

It seemed that everyone got through the night without any mishaps.

Seeing that everyone was present, Zhao Yicheng stood up and said, “That’s great. Everyone made it through the first night. Let’s get breakfast, ba.”

Mo Yi and Song Qi followed the crowd and arrived at the dining table.

On the dining table this time was still a large bowl of dry black bread, however the pot next to it no longer held water, but warm soup — calling it soup was a rather big compliment. Floating atop the dirty yellow surface was a thin layer of grease, emitting an unpleasant odour of sewage. It was thin and had dried things in it. The only value it had was its heat.

Only then did Mo Yi understand why the several people in front of them just now left with sorrowful expressions after receiving the meal, and some even only took the black bread.

The expression on his face didn’t change. He bowed his head and ladled a bowl of soup, placed two pieces of black bread in his pocket, and followed after Song Qi. Together, they found a place and sat down.

Every player stared at the food in front of them with wronged expressions. Everyone refused to swallow the rough black bread in their mouth, and some players with squeamish stomachs even pushed the bowl away and stopped eating.

However, some senior players were clearly more relaxed than the newcomers with wrinkled and sour expressions. They already had game experience and knew to bring their own food into the copy. Despite this, due to the limited number of things they could bring, their food resources were not considered sufficient.

Therefore, they clearly understood the principle of not revealing their wealth, and slowly took their time chewing the bread, not at all showing off their food.

Mo Yi’s face was calm, his head lowered as he gnawed at the black bread in his hand, wondering whether or not to go back to open a pack of compressed biscuits.

However, water still needed to be replenished.

Mo Yi clearly knew in his heart that since the game copy supplied water, he would rarely think about carrying water despite bringing food — After all, filling the backpack to the brim and excessive weight were fatal flaws.

However, people could go hungry for three days and live, but the same couldn’t be said about being thirsty for three days.

While calmly thinking, Mo Yi held the bowl of soup that was still warm and poured it down his throat.

He put down the bowl, his complexion slightly ugly.

The strange bitter, salty, and sour taste permeated the mouth, and the greasy feeling of the soup seemed to linger on surface of the tongue. Mo Yi took a deep breath and tried to suppress the sense of nausea surging up in his throat,

After all, it could be said that he had lived a comfortable and pampered life for so many years. Even if he could once again bear hardships, he was not yet accustomed to doing so.

Mo Yi’s brows were furrowed, and his stomach was like an overturning sea and river.

At this moment, something hard was pressed against his soft lips, and then at an opportune time, was forcefully pushed inside, tapping against his hard teeth and slipping into his mouth.

The sweet and fragrant fruit flavour instantly spread out, overpowering the sickeningly strange taste in his mouth and in between his lips.

Mo Yi was sucking on a fruit candy, one side of his cheeks slightly bulged out, and he foolishly looked over to his side.

Song Qi was sitting upright, eyes lowered as he closely examined his fingers placed on his knees, as if the person who had moved just now was not him.

Mo Yi couldn’t help his eyes from curving and said in a low voice, “Thank you very much. It’s very sweet.”

After speaking, he turned his head, reached out and picked up the black bread on the side, lowered his eyes, and continued to gnaw it with earnest.

Seeing Mo Yi shifting his gaze, Song Qi also raised his eyes. A pair of light-coloured eyes closely watched the side of Mo Yi’s face, his expression secretive.

He lifted the finger that had just touched Mo Yi’s lips. There was still the sweet fragrance of fruit candy lingering on it. The soft and somewhat rough sensation due to dehydration seemed to remain on his fingertips.

Song Qi brought his fingertips to his lips and gently licked.

The thin lips silently curved into a slight arc.

Yes, it was very sweet.

The morning period quickly ended.

Mo Yi got up from the low bench and walked out of the dining room with the rest of the players.

According to the schedule, the next period should be to attend classes at the Orphanage.

Following the directions of the worn-out and incomplete map, everyone passed through the circular hall towards the depths of a long corridor.

Mo Yi stayed at the back of the team, silently walking while sketching a rough outline of the entire orphanage deep within his heart: The first corridor was the longest one, and inside were the resting rooms and bathrooms for the orphans. All the players were distributed in one room after another.

The second corridor next to it was the shortest with only room. It was the dining room located at the end of the corridor where the orphans ate meals.

The third corridor was arranged with a library and playroom. The library and classroom were placed together: the exact destination they were heading towards.

On the map, the labels for the fourth corridor were very dirty and blurred, and some were even torn. The only thing that could be clearly seen was the Dean’s Room on the outermost side. The labels in other areas were damaged and completely unrecognizable.

Mo Yi was immersed in his thoughts and walked forward with his head down.

The fruit candy in his mouth had almost completely dissolved so he crunched and ate the remaining broken candy pieces. The extremely rich fruit flavour burst in his mouth, causing him to gently squint his eyes without leaving a trace.

In fact, Mo Yi had always been fond of sweets. However, he had always been exceptionally good at concealing his true preferences, erasing all traces of his personal characteristics as to not expose his weaknesses. Thus, few people knew of his taste for sweets.

Since entering the copy, Song Qi had given him sweets.

Mo Yi pensively pursed his lips and quickly reviewed his performance since entering the copy — ensuring that he hadn’t revealed his preferences for sweets.

And Song Qi himself said that he did not like to eat sweets.

Then why did he bring so many sweets into the copy? Was it because it was high in calories and easy to carry?

It seemed to make sense…?

At this moment, the team came to a stop.

Mo Yi blinked, casting aside all the messy speculations in his mind, and raised his head to look at the front of the team.

They had already arrived at the door of the library.

The dark corridor was long and winding, and behind the hall, a distant place glowed with a small faint halo of light. Before them was a door half immersed in the ambiguous darkness. A part of the sign on the door was falling off while the remaining half was covered in dirt from long ago. The small letters, “Library”, could barely be made out.

The person at the front of the group was slightly hesitant.

After all, last time a man was hanged here.

He took a deep breath, turned his head and looked at the numerous people behind him, gathered his courage, and put his hand on the doorknob.

With just a light twist, the door noiselessly opened.

Translator’s Note: In the future, I’ll try to post the longer chapters without splitting them.

Thank you for reading and for the comments!