Illusion Report

Walking in broad daylight did nothing to ease even a sliver of her tension and suspicion.

It might not have made sense, but Mai Mingle felt that the daylight in the Nest actually intensified her feelings of insecurity. There were many things on the road she would rather not see.

’It’s so inconvenient that human eyes only face forward.’ Her sides, her back, the sky above, the ground below... all were unlit blind spots.

As Mai Mingle turned her head to the left, a finger from her right side gently slid into the hair at the back of her head.

She jolted, leaping away and whipping her body to the right. In her peripheral vision, she caught a shadow slowly shrinking back behind her—but when she turned around, the road was empty.

Of course, to say it was completely empty wasn’t quite right.

About a hundred meters away, a completely naked person was squatting behind a dumpster, revealing only a section of a flesh-colored back and buttocks. Their spine rose high from their back, each vertebra protruding.

From a distance, it looked as if a giant, flesh-colored, hooked nose covered in a row of warts was peeking out from behind the dumpster.

No matter how far she walked, how long she walked, or how many circles she made, that naked back remained, neither near nor far, forever squatting behind the same dumpster, forever a hundred meters away from her.

She couldn’t get any closer to it, and the thing didn’t close the distance either.

...This was the Nest.

Mai Mingle tightly clutched a pistol from Kai Jiafa, realizing its uselessness. ’For someone who has never touched a gun in her life,’ she thought, ’the only person this pistol can possibly threaten is probably me.’

These hallucinatory, paranoia-inducing disturbances weren’t even the most unsettling part.

Ever since she had "captured" that one road sign, the sidewalk and the street ahead of her were now completely filled with them.

The signs were packed densely together, one jostling against the next, desperately crowding in front of her. Their hot breath blasted her face and ears, clawing at her vision.

Every sign tried to seize her line of sight, then grab it and pull her along. It sounded like something a psychiatric patient would say, but Mai Mingle had indeed nearly been led down the wrong road by the signs several times.

’Don’t look,’ she quickly realized. ’Don’t look closely at the signs.’

The moment she read the words on a sign, her feet would unconsciously start walking in the direction it pointed. Only when the next sign successfully hijacked her attention and twisted her path in another direction would she snap back to her senses, realizing she had gone far astray again.

It was a journey of just over two hundred meters, yet it took Mai Mingle half an hour to finally cover half the distance in the right direction—or at least what she had initially determined to be the "right direction."

The forest of road signs vanished without warning, as if uprooted in an instant by a giant, invisible hand. When her vision suddenly cleared, Mai Mingle stopped in her tracks and blinked hard a few times.

A woman turned from a glass window and glanced at her.

Under a sky heavy with somber clouds, the fluorescent orange tag on the woman’s chest was practically the only splash of color in the entire environment.

Mai Mingle subconsciously touched her own chest—her own orange tag, which she had recovered with great difficulty, echoed the color of the one across from her.

"So you found your way here, too," the woman said, nodding at her.

It was all thanks to Sha Xue, who had forced them to study and memorize every person’s appearance and attire.

Everyone had introduced themselves to each other long before setting out, including the woman standing before her, whose name was Emily.

Emily wore her hair in a tight ponytail, pulled so taut against her skull that one worried it might rip away from her hairline. Her name didn’t suit her in the slightest; her face was long and narrow, her brow bone severe, and her thin lips were always pressed together—she would never have to worry about developing smile lines, no matter how old she got.

’She looks exactly like I remember, and she has the tag. It must be her, right?’

"I thought I was the only one who didn’t know where Annie’s Warehouse was,"

Mai Mingle said, sizing up the large door next to Emily that read "Information." "Looks like we had the same idea. Is this the Tourist Information Center? They should have info on Annie’s Warehouse inside—"

"Don’t come any closer," Emily said.

Mai Mingle froze.

Like her, Emily had also drawn her gun, but instead of holding it, she had it tucked into her waistband. Unlike her, Emily seemed perfectly familiar and at ease with the weapon.

"I’m not a resident..."

The words had no sooner left her mouth than she felt foolish. ’A resident wouldn’t admit it anyway,’ she thought.

"I know you’re not," Emily said. "But the thing standing behind you is."

Before she had even finished her last word, Mai Mingle was already spinning around. She turned so fast her vision couldn’t seem to keep up with her head, blurring into a dizzying smear.

There was nothing behind her.

A hundred meters away, the same dumpster was still there, but the giant "nose" formed by the naked back and buttocks was shrinking back behind it. It vanished just like that, right under Mai Mingle’s stunned gaze.

’What did Emily see just now?’

As the thought surfaced, Mai Mingle froze in place as if she had been turned to ice.

The urge to ask Emily what was going on vanished completely. She already knew the answer.

She didn’t know how she could have missed such a conspicuous poster on her way here.

It wasn’t a promotion for a theater troupe or an ad for a product, but a warning poster put up by the Old Port police precinct.

A Reminder from the Nest Police:

In light of recent crimes targeting tourists, please remember the following rules to ensure your personal safety and the security of your property:

1. Do not go with people you know or are familiar with.

Be extremely wary of family and friends!

These two groups are notoriously dangerous. According to a summary of police cases, incidents of harm from family and friends are frequent, with a staggering 85.4% of various injuries originating from these two sources. When a friend from back home suddenly appears and invites you to the port to take a souvenir photo for them, or when your parents, who have already eaten their fill, suggest trying a certain restaurant, please be on high alert and try to discern their ulterior motives!

Stay away from family and acquaintances to ensure your personal safety.

2. Resist the temptation of the "Tourist Information Center."

You must calmly say no to the "Tourist Information Center."

Do not accept the playbills it hands you. Do not look at the playbills it hands you. Do not listen to its directions. No matter how it promises you a wonderful memory, do not buy souvenir products. Do not carefully compare the differences between each "Tourist Information Center." Do not go inside. Do not turn your back to its main entrance.

The bottom half of the poster had been torn away.

But that last sentence made every pore on Mai Mingle’s body clench shut. Her sensation of her own body seemed to blur, except for her back, which felt unnaturally distinct and hot, as if blood were rushing just beneath the skin in a tingling wave.

"...Why did you try to harm me?"

She forced the words from her dry throat. "What happens now?"