Chapter Twenty-One: The Place of Illusions and Departure

"Hey, I'm back." Chen Qing smiled gently, waving his blood-stained fingers in greeting to Jiang Wan.

He glanced at the crimson covering his fingertips, the bullet clamped between his teeth causing his body to tremble.

"I was wondering where that metallic smell was coming from." Chen Qing shook his head and spat the bullet from his mouth.

The moment he escaped the illusion, pain surged through his nerves.

He felt the sting radiating from his fingertips, the itch of muscle regeneration doubling the agony.

After their brief exchange, his mind gradually cooled, sharpened by the pain.

He gazed at Jiang Wan, drew a deep breath, his expression grave. "It was unexpected."

But Jiang Wan's face was pale; she stared at Chen Qing's wound, her fingers clenched tightly around her sleeve.

"Your wound..." She fell silent for a moment, as if blaming herself.

If she hadn't pushed Chen Qing away, if she hadn't trusted the illusion so easily, perhaps he wouldn't have suffered these injuries.

"The wound isn't the main issue," he said, showing her his nearly healed injury and continuing to explain, "What I told you before... that the adversary could only control one person. What I didn't anticipate was its ability to split a person's senses."

He shook his head, continuing, "If you consider a person's world to be composed of five senses, it divided them between two people. Through different influences, it created an effect greater than the sum of its parts.

Think about it carefully. If the person who just lost their vision was you, and you also lost your hearing. In your illusion, I would become the one who left. Would you dare follow me?

Or when dawn truly arrives and you see me leave the classroom, would you dare follow? Would you dare step outside with me?"

He smiled, and Jiang Wan's expression became serious.

Yes, if you never know when the illusion will end... no, perhaps even this moment is an illusion?

She stared at Chen Qing's face, her complexion drained of color.

Perhaps at this very moment she was already standing at the doorway, perhaps he was already dead in the corridor.

So many possibilities... coexisting in this paradox.

She took a deep breath, pinched her arm, and Chen Qing watched, eyes widened in confusion.

"What are you doing?"

"Uh... testing whether I'm still in an illusion?"

He paused for half a second, then shook his head. "No need to worry so much... After all, the Backrooms don't inherently lead to fatal outcomes."

He smiled gently, continuing his explanation, "Rules are rules—they keep you safe as long as you follow them.

From what we've seen, each Backroom is an isolated space; they can't overcome spatial barriers to know what's happening outside.

Moreover, if an entity wants to create a convincing illusion, most of its content must be 'orderly'; it will also place most of the altered senses onto a single individual.

But this gives us an opportunity, doesn't it? In a properly ordered world, someone affected by their senses can't act strangely or say peculiar things."

Jiang Wan paused, pondering what would qualify as strange words.

It only took a moment for her to understand what he meant.

If Chen Qing suddenly asked her what she'd eat tomorrow night, she'd just be puzzled and answer. But in an illusion, why would Chen Qing ask her such a question?

Because that's the "rule."

The "rule" requires these entities: their goal is to kill two people.

In the illusion, he wouldn't suddenly make bizarre requests of Jiang Wan, nor would he be unable to answer questions only the two of them knew.

"The illusion brings victory and defeat," she sighed, and Chen Qing finally grinned. "Exactly. The limitations of the illusion are significant; it's ultimately a fabrication. It can alter what we hear, or what we say, but it can't let us hear 'real' sounds."

As he finished speaking, the darkness in the classroom was dispelled. They gazed out the window, where the old man with an upturned mouth grew grotesque.

They huddled in the corner by the windowsill, clutching the window with their slender arms, watching the two inside.

They bared their teeth, scraping the sill with their shriveled fingertips.

But whatever they did, however long they lingered, whether or not they appeared in Chen Qing's line of sight, they could no longer pose any threat.

All they could do was reveal their faces, praying these two young people wouldn't dare take another step forward.

Yet Chen Qing watched them, his grin lopsided.

"Did you ever squash spiders as a kid?" Chen Qing didn't look back, already striding toward the corridor.

"Squash spiders?"

"Yes, the kind with long legs, frail bodies."

He grabbed a nearby stool and, amid Jiang Wan's stunned gaze, hurled it at the old man outside the door.

"Hey! You're really doing it!"

The elder's wail was piercing, but after a few cries, Chen Qing's stool slammed down again.

"Hey! Seriously, show some respect!"

She shouted, but Chen Qing's movements only grew faster.

Wielding the stool, he was like a war god—his swings lacked any technique, yet he moved with a warrior's might.

Those old men with thin arms and legs couldn't even raise a hand to block the blows.

They tried to use their phones as shields, but as soon as they lifted them, the stool smashed them, breaking the phones and landing again.

Under the violent strikes, their limbs shattered and broke; the skin that should have joined their bones tore like paper, and in half a second, their broken limbs detached from their bodies.

They had no time to run—their stunted bodies fell, and Chen Qing stomped them, blood splattering everywhere.

"Hey... hey! Chen Qing!"

Inside the classroom, Jiang Wan was stunned, hesitating to follow as the horror slowed her steps.

But Chen Qing wouldn't wait. He chased the entities all the way to the corner at the corridor's end. At that dead-end where they couldn't escape, a smile appeared on his face.

"You're quite brave," he said, patting the stool handle, while the old man pressed himself against the wall, too scared to move.

He raised the stick, about to strike, when the old man dropped to his knees, emitting a nauseating whimper.

He knocked his head, then stabbed his skeletal hand into his own skull, digging until he pulled out a transparent crystal coated in mucus.

Chen Qing paused, surprised that the old man was still alive, still deferentially offering the crystal.

"Oh? Trading this for your life?" He chuckled, and Jiang Wan caught up.

"What... is going on?"

Chen Qing didn't answer, muttering to himself, "I suppose their bodies don't matter much."

He examined the crystal, hesitated only a moment, then pocketed it. Immediately, the old man tried to slip past them.

Seeing its body shift, Chen Qing laughed and followed.

Blocking the passage that should have been empty, the old man wasn't angry—he simply nodded, a smile on his twisted face.

He took Chen Qing's hand, leading them to the corridor's far end, where two more classrooms stood. Unlike before, these rooms had no blackboards, nor any traces left by the old men.

"It seems... the students came here for food convenience and never ventured inside..."

He was speaking when he noticed a faint mark on the doorway.

A triangle...

The old man pushed open the door, pointing to a dark vent in the southwest corner of the room, gesturing and squeaking.

Jiang Wan couldn't understand, but Chen Qing smiled mysteriously.

"Oh? We can leave through here, right?"

It nodded, gesturing repeatedly, urging Chen Qing to enter.

He ignored it, but his steps led him steadily toward the vent.

"If we go through here, we can leave?" Jiang Wan asked.

"I think so." He turned, and the old man's smile grew gentler.

Despite its twisted features, despite its fearsome form.

Chen Qing looked at the old man and smiled in return.

He strode over, stood respectfully before the old man, and thanked him, "You can go now, truly grateful for your help."

She listened, but something felt off.

Thanking someone... even here?

She was puzzled when she saw Chen Qing pull the blood-stained stick from his pocket.

She watched the old man turn, saw blood splatter across the doorway.

The transparent fluid, mixed with blood and brain matter, stained the ceiling red, and Jiang Wan's face changed suddenly.

No matter how inhuman it looked, its form was still human.

She trembled, hesitating as she asked, "Weren't you going to let him go?"

Chen Qing turned, with a half-smile, "No, when did I ever promise to grant its request? From start to finish, I never said a word."

He muttered, ignoring the twitching limbs breaking beneath his feet, paying no heed to Jiang Wan, and entered the ventilation duct ahead.

As soon as he entered, his eyes adjusted immediately to the darkness.

It was a peculiar sensation—normally, human eyes take time to adapt from bright light to darkness.

But here, he could see at once.

"This place's rules?" he frowned, crawling forward several steps, and soon bits of food debris appeared in the duct.

Instant noodle wrappers, bread packets, and some rotting food that hadn't attracted flies.

They piled up along the edges, leaving a clear path.

"Oh? Zhang Lan and the others must have sheltered here once."

He muttered quietly, and Jiang Wan followed behind.

Though uneasy, in times of danger, words could wait until safety.

Silent, they crawled through a bend and, after four or five minutes, finally reached the end.

At the duct's terminus, Chen Qing pushed aside the panel, and sunlight, with the scent of grass, brushed their noses.

"This is..." he whispered, gazing at the transformed world before him.