The Midnight Owl

Stepping into the night, the four of them ran out of the park in one breath.Outside the park is Andli North Street, whether it is the buildings on both sides or the community, they are all sleeping peacefully, only the faint light of the street lamps reflects the fallen leaves on the ground.

"What should we do now?" Kuang Jinxin wiped his sweat pantingly, because he was wearing a thick coat to keep out the cold and had been "running at night" for a long time, and now his face was flushed.

Wu Sheng looked at the time on the phone and raised his eyes: "It's still three hours before dawn. Find a place to sit down, we need to sort out this matter from beginning to end."

"What are you still sorting out?" Xu Wang has completely switched back to reality from the magical sense of unreality. Now that his feet are on the ground and his head is in the sky, he wished he could wipe out all ghosts and snakes with a stick, "Call the police!"

"It's useless." It was Sun Jiang who spoke, and he touched his pocket while talking, but finally found nothing, so he had to look up at his teammates, "Do you have any cigarettes?"

The answer was two shakes of the head and one "no".

Sun Jiang's already depressed face became a little more irritable.

Xu Wang was still paying attention to what he said earlier: "Brother Sun, what did you mean when you said that calling the police was useless?"

Sun Jiang couldn't restrain his exhaustion and yawned, then pointed at himself and Kuang Jinxin: "We both called the police yesterday, but as soon as the call was connected, we both started to have headaches. I thought my head was going to explode. I haven't seen it in my life. It hurts so much, don't talk, I can't even hold my mother's phone!"

"Are you both like this?" Xu Wang felt that he was listening to a ghost story, and looked at Kuang Jinxin suspiciously, but what he got was a pitiful nod from the other party.

"What about you?" Xu Wang asked Wu Sheng unwillingly, "Are you in pain too?"

Wu Sheng shook his head decisively.

Xu Wang thought he had found a breakthrough, and just as he was about to continue to question, Wu Sheng said naturally, "I didn't call the police."

Xu Wang: "Why?"

Wu Sheng: "Both of them rolled on the ground in pain, and they proved that calling the police is a dead end. Why should I repeat the same mistakes?"

Xu Wang: "..."

Sun Jiang: "..."

Kuang Jinxin: "..."

If everyone still had the luck of "maybe it's just a nightmare, just wake up" in their hearts yesterday, then today's second entry into the snowfield made them clearly understand that this matter is endless.Since it is a protracted battle, it would be a fool to sit still and wait for death.

But where to "chat", this is a problem.

"McDonald's? KTV? Bar?" Xu Wang tried his best to provide a place suitable for "big discussion in the early morning".

Wu Sheng vetoed it all at once: "No way, we need a place that is quiet enough and private enough. Quietness is easy to organize thoughts, and privacy can reduce the risk of leaking secrets."

Xu Wang's eyes widened as if he had heard the Arabian Nights: "Brother, we are the victims, and we have to provide the murderer with a duty of confidentiality?!"

"I can't explain clearly in a few words," Wu Sheng looked around, as if searching for something, and asked casually, "Who do you live with?"

Without thinking, Xu Wang said, "I live by myself."

Wu Sheng withdrew his gaze and nodded in relief: "Go to your house."

Xu Wang: "..."

This is a pit, this is definitely a pit, he must climb out!

Kuang Jinxin: "I live nearby, but I live with someone..."

Sun Jiang: "My house is also nearby, my wife and children are asleep."

Wu Sheng: "I live in the company, not far from here, but if the discussion lasts until dawn and is seen by the employees at work, I can't give a reasonable explanation, which will cause unnecessary gossip and speculation, which is not conducive to maintaining my aloof image .”

Do you have any misunderstanding about your own image? ! !

Xu Wang: "Come on, follow me, it's dark and the road is slippery, watch your step..."

Half an hour later, the group arrived at Xu Wang's house.What Xu Wang rented was a one-bedroom apartment in an old community.Regardless of the old neighborhood, the location is good, the decoration has been renovated, and the rent is not cheap at all, but for Xu Wang, who feeds the whole family and is not hungry, it is not too much pressure to afford.

"Wow, Brother Xu," Kuang Jinxin was the first to come in, and without being polite, he rushed into the bedroom, just stood in the living room and looked around, surprised enough, "Your house is so clean."

Xu Wang was overjoyed by the compliment, and just as he was about to take over, Wu Sheng who came in later sighed: "My God, we're back to 222 again."

"222?" Kuang Jinxin had a rare moment of inspiration, "You and brother Xu's high school dormitory?"

"No," Wu Sheng corrected earnestly, "It's your brother Xu's own. The other three of us are just borrowing, because we littered our clothes, misplaced our things, evaded duty, and always forgot to take the trash downstairs, no' A sense of belief in taking home as home'."

Xu Wang "slapped" the slippers he had just found and threw them at Wu Sheng's feet, and gave them a big white eye: "Do you need to hold grudges like this, did you write down everything I said in the little black book?"

Wu Sheng didn't say a word, just having fun, while changing his slippers, he was so happy that he was refreshed and his eyebrows were flying.

Xu Wang didn't bother to talk to him anymore, turned around and poured four glasses of water, and when he came back with the water, the other three had already sat on the sofa.He put the water on the coffee table and brought a chair from the bedroom.

Boiling water was poured into the cup, and the steam curled up, warm and soothing.

After two days of ordeal, the four of them could finally sit down and talk.

Wu Sheng was the first to speak.Bickering back to bickering, when he really got to the business, he fully focused: "We now know four points. First, the chosen people will enter there at twelve o'clock at night, whether they voluntarily or not; Third, once you want to call the police, you will have a splitting headache; fourth, the location there is in one-to-one correspondence with the location in reality, the distance is equal, and the coordinate system is consistent. There, another two kilometers away from there, then when we return to reality, our position will also be two kilometers away from home..."

Xu Wang suddenly realized, and this can explain why he was at the intersection downstairs when he jumped out yesterday, but today he has arrived at Qingnian Lake Park, which is farther away, because they ran for a while in a sled today.

"What's the use of knowing this? I want to know what the hell kind of place it is? Who is playing tricks on us!" Sun Jiang interrupted Wu Sheng, asking the question he desperately wanted answered.

Isn't this what Xu Wang, Kuang Jinxin and even Wu Sheng wanted to figure out.

But "want" and "can" are two different things.

"I don't know. Based on the experience and clues we have accumulated at this stage, there is no way to answer these questions. But if you ignore it and let nature take its course, you will never be able to find the answer." Wu Sheng's tone remained unchanged, his expression calm It was as natural as asking, do you want to have porridge today?

Sun Jiang leaned back on the sofa dejectedly, looking up at the ceiling, his eyes were bloodshot and exhausted after two nights of sleeplessness.

Xu Wang knew, and he also knew that he couldn't find an answer, but if he didn't vent like this, he would feel uncomfortable.

In fact, everyone is the same, including Wu Sheng who seems to be fine now, it is not really that he is not depressed. If he is not depressed, why bother to show the momentum of fighting to the death with the last super difficult problem of the mock exam paper.

Xu Wang could see that he was competing.

To put it bluntly, this kind of indiscriminate disaster makes everyone angry.

"What can be determined are these four points, and there are still four points to be determined." Wu Sheng continued to peel off cocoons, his train of thought was not disturbed by Sun Jiang's interference, "One, is it really possible to control people's minds there, such as Prevent the police from calling the police; second, whether there is some kind of protection mechanism there, when the people involved encounter great danger, they will directly bounce them back to reality like when Xu Wang was attacked by a bear, minimizing the damage; third, When I re-entered today, both Sun Jiang and Kuang Jinxin's pencil cases were empty, and the unused 'Fishnado' and 'Jingle Bells' disappeared. Is this a punishment for their attempt to call the police, or is there another reason? Four, is there anyone else who was involved in the same way we were."

"That...hand in the test paper," Kuang Jinxin said hesitantly, "Did you hear someone say congratulations on passing the test and handing in the test paper before it popped up?"

Xu Wang nodded quickly: "Not only did I hear it today, but I also saw a message in the report card yesterday that another team handed in the paper." When the new message popped up yesterday, Xu Wang was still at a loss. After thinking about it today, he connected it. up.

"Yes, that's right, I saw that too!" Kuang Jinxin's face showed joy, but he restrained himself instinctively. At first glance, he looked like an honest child, not used to publicity, but his mind was absolutely clear. "I remember that the team in the report card is 3 /23 Hand in the paper, it seems to be called Yue Shuai... what else is there about Anan..."

Xu Wang looked at Wu Sheng: "As for the fourth question to be determined, I think it can be included in the determination, yes."

Wu Sheng picked up the water glass and blew twice, took a sip, and shook his head slightly: "It's not enough. They may be human or not, they may be forced like us, or they may be voluntary, and they may share the place with us. We will meet at any time, or there may be a parallel independent space there, and we will never meet." Putting down his teacup, he sighed quietly, "If you can't be sure of these, you can't classify them."

Xu Wang looked at him for a long while, before admitting defeat: "After so many years, I'm convinced by your rigor."

Wu Sheng frowned, unbelievably sincere: "Only rigorous?"

Xu Wang resisted the urge to punch the past, and asked the last question: "The team that handed in the test yesterday was 3/23, and today we passed the test and handed in 1/23, what do you think?"

"It's the same as you think." Wu Sheng shrugged, as if he had already accepted the reality, "This means that there are still 22 levels waiting for us."

Sun Jiang sat up straight suddenly, he could not hold back his growl, but the astonishment and despair on his face clearly conveyed his mood.

The discussion continued until 05:30 in the morning, and Xu Wang also learned later that after he was ejected early on the first night, the remaining three used Wu Sheng's <Fish Twister> and <Jingle Bells> to deal with the bear After arriving at the coordinate point, because the icefall was not triggered, I had to flee down the mountain. Before reaching the foot of the mountain, I was bounced back to reality. The time was exactly five o'clock in the morning.

Calculating in this way, there was an hour's difference between the time they returned to reality, and Xu Wang had already disappeared long ago, so Wu Sheng was saddened to search for people all over Beijing the next day.

And that night, Wu Sheng, who had been running for a day with Kuang Jinxin, simply parked the car at the last stop of the missing person, the West Fifth Ring Road. Sun Jiang found an excuse to leave home and hid in a room he had never been to before. KTV.As a result, as soon as twelve o'clock arrived, weird entrances still appeared, one was in the back seat of the car, and the other was on the wall of the KTV private room. Two minutes later, the three people who fought hard to resist were dragged in just like Xu Wang that night.

What happened to his teammates made Xu Wang cold, and he completely gave up the idea of ​​"running away".

At the end of the discussion, Kuang Jinxin said: "It's always awkward to say 'there' and 'there', why don't we give it a name."

Sun Jiang was speechless: "Are you living in a house, and you even named that poor place?!"

Wu Sheng and Xu Wang had no objections, to be exact, the name was already clearly in front of them——

Xu Wang: "Isn't there such a big word written under the owl's head, that's probably its name, so we'll call it..."

Wu Sheng: "Owl."

Xu Wang: "Yes, no, yes, no, grab, answer."

Wu Sheng: "Start again. Isn't there such a big word written under the owl's head, that's probably its name, so we'll call it from now on..."

Xu Wang: "Owl!"