Chapter 1. Frightening Changes In a Rented Apartment

“Curse it! What the hell is this?”

Wei Xiaobei woke up in dazed; felt weak and sore all over his body, a slight ache in his head, and stupidly staring at the ceiling; tried to recall and comprehend all the events before he passed out.

He was gone drinking with some of his close friends, fell asleep, and the instant moment he opened his eyes, some kind of attribute information panel appeared in his mind.

Was this related with something that emitted from The Classic Shan Hai Jing in his hand? As Wei Xiaobei recalled, there was blinding light emitted from The Classic Shan Hai Jing before he fainted from drinking.

Just as Wei Xiaobei’s finger touched the edge of the pillow, the Shan Hai Jing classic scripture suddenly vanished from his sight.

A dim sun light penetrating through the crack on windows glass was getting dimmer, as if the night has slowly come.

Wei Xiaobei ignored the attribute information panel that popped up within his head, and quickly stood on his barefooted feet; as his fingers touched his hair, he felt like as if he hasn’t took a bath for a week. The cuckoo sounds emitted out from his belly reminded him that he hadn’t had something to eat for whole day.

As he tried to walk, he felt his head was so heavy as if it was pressed by mountain, and his mouth was reek of liquor smell. Wei Xiaobei gently shook his head with his hands, took a long deep breath; and spittle smelled of alcohol spat out from his mouth. He remembered that he has nothing to eat, and slowly walked toward the kitchen.

As he walked for 2-3 steps, Wei Xiabei suddenly stopped and stunned.

“What the hell is this, what the hell had happened here?”

“Only a night passed by, just why and when did this house become so dilapidated?”

The floor and the table had all been covered by dust; the newly posted Zhan Liangying poster on the wall had been tattered and fully worn-out. “Why and when did his charming handsome face transformed into an old monster? Even his laughing face sent the chills down the spine”.

Cobwebs scattered and covered the wall like a mist. A withered orange and blackened rotten apple covered by mildew lay motionlessly on small table in the corner of the room, covered by filth as if it was taken from the mud; the aluminum frame windows glass grayed out as it was covered by thick ash; while layer of lights penetrated silk-sized small cracks on windows glass.

A monitor screen on the table next to the bed had all been covered by cobwebs, accompanied with a dirty cup filled with filth covering a withered insect body inside…

The air filled with a slightly choking smelly dust.

Everything seemed so grayed out as if it was in black and white old movies.

A night had gone by, and everything aged as if a century had passed.

“Mother… is this dream?”

“It must be a dream!!!”

Wei Xiaobei hurriedly walked back to his bed and closed his eyes.

Maybe after he was fully awake, he will return to his former normal self.

After his body turned over and back several times, Wei Xiaobei finally realized that he wasn’t in a dream, he was fully awake; and it seemed that everything was real.

He turned up and slowly sitting on the bed; as he roughly fast rubbed his face, his mind quickly sobered and started to analyze everything.

“What the hell was happening here?”

“Wasn’t I gone drinking last night?”

“How could this happen?”

“Was this caused by some ghosts? Or was it only a prank?”

But he quickly ruled out the possibility that it was a prank, since he still could see the light from attribute information panel in his head. It was impossible to manipulate things like this.

We Xiaobei felt his throat was parched dry and let out some misty breath reek with liquor smell. He recalled and fully remembered that he was really dead drunk last night.

After realizing that something huge has changed his room interior, his mind was in a mess for a while, and slowly, after he come to his senses, Xiaobei was somewhat felt restless and slightly panicked.

He raised the thermos bottle, but it was empty.

Wei Xiaobei shook his head; it seemed that he must go out to buy some water to drink.

However, when he touched his pants he found out that his wallet had disappeared; he turned over and walked toward the bathroom only to find the already torn and tattered clothes hanging on the wardrobe, no different with trashes from garbage can.

Fortunately his cloth on the bed was still in good shape, though it was reek with sweat and liquor.

Wei Xiaobei unhurriedly got dressed, combed his hair with his two hands and opened the door to outside.

The scene in the narrow small corridor in front him made his heart immediately got colder; shabby torn wallpaper and an almost wrecked wall lamp confirmed his suspicion that there really was something happened both inside and outside his room.

Wei Xiaobei hurriedly walked to the next room, and knocking hard at the door with a slight hope that there would someone responded.

The room was Zhou Lijun’s, a sophomore, who moved out from the dormitory since he was a freshman to this rented apartment. Zhou Lijun was famous as a die-hard otaku, and most of his time was spent in his room, playing games day and night. He was said as pretty much successful in his otaku career and made a lot of money from gaming.

Wei Xiaobei continue knocking the door for a while only to find that no one responded even nothing can be heard from inside the room

Xiaobei bit his lips, and gritted his teeth, after hesitated for a little while he forcefully kicked Zhou Lijun door.

The landlord of this apartment was well-known as a miser, all door locks he bought for this apartment’s room were cheap and its quality were bad enough; and coupled with the door that had become dilapidated, the door immediately broken and knocked open after being hit by We Xiaobei twice.

Xiaobei’s heart became more restless and his face became tense as he saw the interior in Zhou Lijun room.

The floor, desk, and coffee table at the corner were covered by lime, even all of it seemed like it were aged so much, not much different with all properties inside his room

Wei Xiaobei gritted his teeth and quickly turned over and hurriedly rushed from the rental apartment and looked toward the outside.

Xiaobei room was in the first floor, and usually there was flower bed outside the apartment of which the landlord comprehensively used it. It was planted with garlic, green onions and other variety of vegetables.

But what he was seeing right now, much adding to his suspicions and he became more nervous as the flower bed was also became dilapidated, all the plants had withered without any slightest greenery could be seen as those yellowed and withered leaves covered the floor. A few broken rusty bikes were leaning on the wall next to the flower bed.

It was as if there was a nuclear war occurred and hit the city since the sky was grayed out coupled with the looming ruined building like it had long been deserted.

Curse it… It was a true hell,

It took more than 10 minutes for Xiaobei to set his mind back in order and realized what he should do.

There was no way anyone could maintain his calmness when they saw all the phenomena around him now. Even the soldier who recently got back from the battlefield would have been felt overwhelmed by this kind of strange, frightening scenery.

“How should he live to continue living in such a damned place?”

Even he didn’t know if other places would have the same occurrence or not.

Xiaobei was a veteran soldier, who just got retired and recently came back from a battlefield, he had no worries for his constitution and his body has always been in a good shape; moreover he was also famous as one of the most mentally and psychologically stable among the soldiers in his division. Even the attribute information panel that popped up within his head showed that his willpower attribute of 12 points was the highest of all his attributes.