Artifact Report

Chapter 242 Mai Minghe: The target becomes two
Blocked by the glass, the dull howling continued for nearly half a minute before gradually dying down from behind the door.

Mai Minghe stood on the sidewalk, three or four steps away from the gate of the tourist information center numbered 07, staring at it.

On the glass door, half of a flattened face appeared for a moment, and then Li Sidan's shoulder appeared; a flesh-colored fist flashed and disappeared on the glass over and over again, which must have made a lot of noise - but the glass door was peaceful and calm, as if the two sides of the glass belonged to two different worlds, and the vibration and sound could not be transmitted to each other.

Apart from Li Sidan's vague howls, Mai Minghe could not hear any vibration, even when the dense bullets hit the glass.

For half a minute she could hardly move; and it was not because she was afraid.

The residents of the nest might be able to disguise themselves as humans—among the information the nest instills into their brains, there's a type of resident called a vulture, who can seamlessly transform into a human appearance—but it's difficult for the residents of the nest to replicate industrial products, like cell phones, fluorescent orange tags, or pistols that can fire bullets.

So the person in the house was probably Li Sidan himself, not a den resident in disguise...

He must have broken the rules and entered the tourist information center, and couldn't get out.

He is still so young, looking no more than thirty years old.

Can he still be rescued? Mai Minghe didn't know.

Everything on this street suggested that she open the door; if she did, she wouldn't know whether Li Sidan could save her or not, and she herself would almost certainly be killed.

"You...if you're still alive, just hold on a little longer and wait for me," Mai Minghe whispered softly, "Wait until I understand the consequences of opening the door...maybe there's a loophole."

Maybe there is a way.

She took a deep breath and tried to collect her thoughts.

The rules poster says not to enter the "Tourist Information Center", which should mean not to enter the "real Tourist Information Center" - just like don't turn your back to the door of the Tourist Information Center.

It would be fine if her back wasn't facing the door of the real information center; she and Aimee had just experienced this firsthand.

Li Sidan entered the information center No. 07, but something went wrong... Does this mean that the information center No. 07 is the real one?
No, there is another possibility.

The Tourist Information Center No. 07 is also not real, but it still trapped Li Sidan - and even killed Li Sidan - in order to make others misunderstand it as the real thing and open its door.

After all, the rules only say that you can't go in, not that you can't open the door; let alone saving people, even if you just want to find clues from the tourist information center, there is a big difference between opening the door and not opening the door - even if people don't go in.

Every door on this street is trying its best to get people to open it.

What happens when you open these doors? What comes out?

Mai Minghe couldn't come up with a clear answer, but an indescribable sense of disharmony emerged, which he couldn't suppress.

Perhaps it was because her mind was in a mess that it was not until a few minutes later that Mai Minghe suddenly realized that the street seemed too quiet... so quiet that something was wrong.

Something that should have happened didn't happen.

She slowly raised her head. Ai Meili at the end of the street was still squatting there, twisting her head and staring at the same gap motionlessly.

If there was any difference, it was that Aimee put one hand into the gap, and the black gap swallowed her up to her shoulder.

She didn't stand up, didn't ask any questions, let alone walk over to take a look - the street was obviously not long; but she seemed not to hear Li Sidan's howling at all.

Ai Meili's hair was spread out on her blue sweatshirt, and her long black hair undulated over the hood of her clothes and fell down her back.

...It's different now.

there is a problem.

Mai Minghe stood there thinking for a few seconds before trying to walk quietly back to the end of the street, which was the direction of the intersection.

Li Sidan leaned against the glass door of Unit 07, hitting the glass with the back of his head, mumbling to himself vaguely, "What should I do? There's no back door, no ventilation duct, and no window that can be smashed open. I really want to get out... Let me think... Hey, if I could turn myself into liquid, I could flow out through the crack in the door. I've always felt that the human body structure is unreasonable, so why not do this - wait."

Mai Minghe didn't even dare to breathe loudly, and just glanced at his back secretly.

At least for now, the back figure still looks like a person.

"Wait... what am I talking about... humans can't turn into liquid... My name is Li Sidan, I'm a human, a hunter, and I live in the Quinn District of Blackmore City..."

Mai Minghe quickened his pace and walked past the Tourist Information Center No. 07.

She had to find out what was going on on this street, at the Tourist Information Centre - before it was too late.

She once again passed the entire upside-down room in the crack in the wall (the sound had disappeared), passed Aimee Li on the poster, and walked all the way to the intersection. She then carefully crossed half the street, stood in the middle of the street, stretched her neck, and tried her best to see Aimee Li's appearance.

The next second, Ai Meili suddenly turned her head towards Mai Minghe.

Mai Minghe involuntarily jumped back a step.

"What's wrong with you?" Aimeili raised an eyebrow, but her face remained expressionless. "Are you looking at me?"

Her facial features, tone of voice and expression were exactly the same as before.

...including the ponytail that was pulled tightly against her scalp; her light brown hair lay smooth and perfectly straight against her scalp.

"I...I want to see what you found." Mai Minghe said in a dry throat.

Ai Meili slowly pulled her hand out of the dark crevice. For a moment, Mai Minghe thought she would keep pulling her arm out like this, until it was endless and her wrist would never be visible. Fortunately, her suspicion was ultimately just that.

Ai Meili pulled her hand out, revealing a cell phone. She glanced at the screen before looking up and saying, "I want to see what's going on inside."

"Just put your hand in?"

"The rules don't say you can't reach out, right?" Aimeili shrugged and said, "I felt like there was some movement in the gap, but I couldn't see clearly, so I stuck my phone in and recorded a video."

...Huh? This phone can record videos?
Hai Luwei was careless and didn't teach her how to record it with her mobile phone - wait, that's not the point.

"What did you record?", "Didn't you hear Li Sidan's scream?", "What's wrong with your back?" These three questions were vying to get out of Mai Minghe's throat, but for a moment they were stuck in his vocal tract and he couldn't ask any of them.

Ai Meili lit up her phone screen and said, "Look."

Mai Minghe was still standing on the road, still some distance away; she paused, mustered up her courage, and then moved closer - when she was four or five steps away from Ai Meili, she stopped.

The screen was completely dark, and I could barely make out the smooth walls of the gap. Suddenly, in the depths of the darkness, a shadow rustled and moved.

"Y-Who's there?"

A small voice came from deep within the crevice, recorded on the phone and played back. The voice was unfamiliar, filled with fear.

Ai Meili seemed surprised as well. "Huh? I didn't hear anything when I was recording just now."

"Did you hear 'nothing' when you were recording? Not only this sound, but also on this street—"

Before Mai Minghe could finish his question, the little voice rang out again on the phone.

"I'm a hunter. I've been harmed by the nest. Where am I? Who can save me? I have to keep looking for rules, I have to keep looking for rules... But the rules on this street are not fair at all. They're so weird—"

The next moment, Ai Meili's voice rang out from the phone: "What's wrong with you? Are you looking at me?"

Then the dim light on the screen swayed and gradually became brighter. It was the cell phone that she took out from the gap.

"It states the rules, doesn't it?"

Ai Meili glanced at Mai Minghe and tapped on her phone: "I'll continue recording and see what else it says. If I had known it was recording the sound, I wouldn't have taken out my phone."

It seems like he is blaming Mai Minghe for coming at the wrong time.

...She looked fine. Could it be that I was just dazzled?

Mai Minghe herself didn't know what she said. She seemed to agree with a few words and went to check again, and walked away from Ai Meili - after all, the first rule was not to walk with acquaintances, so she didn't dare to get too close to Ai Meili.

When she returned to the other side of the street, she turned around and took another look.

Ai Meili's black hair has grown longer, winding down her back like vines.

...I always feel that the longer time passes, the more likely things will become irreversible.

Whether it is the location of Anne's warehouse or the lives of these two young people, Mai Minghe wants to get and keep them - is she too greedy?
This time, she walked quickly and looked around rapidly, not only at the distorted "Tourist Information Center", but also at the road, the sky, and the power lines - but in fact, she couldn't tell what she was looking for.

It wasn't until she found it that she realized what her goal was.

The yellow rules poster with the upper half torn off was rolled up into a ball and stuffed into the top of the already full trash can; the word "door" exposed from the corner immediately caught Mai Minghe's attention.

The broken edge of the re-unrolled regular poster matched exactly with the half poster in the phone photo - however, the bottom part of the rolled-up poster was also torn off.

That is to say, a rules poster was torn into at least three pieces and hidden separately?

No wonder that voice said it was so unfair.

3. If you see someone you know in a play (or a show poster), no, you don’t recognize him/her/it.

4. Sometimes you may receive a call for help from within the Tourist Information Center.

Please do not take any action on your own. Please ask him/her/it, "Have you called the police?"

If the other party answers, "The police have been called," leave immediately.

If the other party responds with anything other than "the police have been called," do not assume that the next action he/she/it asks you to take is harmless.

5. Be sure to follow the rules on this warning poster and do not trust other codes of conduct.

Mai Minghe originally wanted to show the rules poster to Ai Meili and ask Li Sidan whether he had called the police - she thought this might be a way to test whether he was still alive - but she didn't move.

That strange feeling is getting stronger and stronger and can no longer be ignored...especially after seeing the second poster.

If she didn't get to the bottom of it quickly, she might be making a big mistake.

　I decided to take a day off on New Year's Eve, but I haven't decided whether to take one on New Year's Day. It depends on whether I am tired the day before, right?
　　During the Chinese New Year, I plan to make a HUGE pile of dumplings, so we can eat them until September.

　　Everyone is welcome to post their own New Year’s Eve dinner, but I will never read it.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)