In the dead of night, the loud banging of doors and windows opening wide woke Wendell from deep sleep. He got out of bed warily, looking around alertly.
What's happened? Did
He quickly noticed that no wind was blowing in through the wide-open windows, nor was any rain coming in. It was as if he had opened them himself in a sleepwalking state to get some fresh air.
Wendell suddenly thought of the supernatural incidents he had experienced or learned about through case files, and recalled the fear of the unknown that once dominated his mind.
He didn't know what other changes were coming, or what he might face. A chill ran down his back, and he felt it tremble.
Just then, he heard a commotion outside his door. All kinds of sounds assailed his ears.
There was the thumping of running footsteps, the sound of judgments about certain behaviors, the sound of modifications to the current order, and also an unguarded shout: "An abnormality has appeared in the underground seals!"
"Increase alert level!"
Underground seals? Is there something sealed under the Iris Hotel? Wendell listened, both surprised and confused. He couldn't help but walk to the door and look around.
He then saw colleagues from the Military Intelligence Ninth Bureau whom he knew but not well, and saw Colonel Hugh Dilcha, who was on duty tonight.
The Military Intelligence Ninth Bureau found Utopia through me? Are they going to deal with the anomaly here? Just as this thought crossed Wendell's mind, he frowned subconsciously.
He noticed that the layout of the corridor outside was completely different from the Iris Hotel: not only were there gas wall lamps on both sides, but also classical sconces; the floor was very well polished; the ceiling was over three meters high...
T-this isn't the Iris Hotel... Wendell turned abruptly and looked around the room again.
He quickly recognized it as his sleeping quarters in the Military Intelligence Ninth Bureau headquarters, with his suitcase quietly sitting in the corner, showing no signs of having been moved.
Wendell remembered clearly that he had gone to Utopia through the bathroom connected to this room. He hadn't been very certain beforehand, so he hadn't brought any luggage, just taken the letter from the Utopia District Court.
Thump thump thump! He hurried to the window and looked outside.
What met his eyes was the garden and lawn belonging to the Military Intelligence Ninth Bureau headquarters.
I... I'm back in
After a dozen seconds or so, he suddenly jumped up and picked up his coat from the floor.
Then he saw the Utopia court letter quietly lying in the inside pocket of the coat, the same one that should have been left in the drawer.
Wendell fell silent, as if turned into a statue.
........
Monica, a travel column writer, also woke up to the sound of doors and windows banging against the walls.
She sat up abruptly, pulling the blanket up to cover her chest.
Bleary-eyed, her first thought was that robbers had broken into the hotel, and she was about to scream for the police.
But over the next ten or twenty seconds, Monica heard no footsteps entering her room. Instead, more and more people seemed to be gathering in the corridor: "What happened?"
"Doesn't seem like a storm..."
"Somebody playing a prank?"
"Damn clown, if I find out who, I'll kick his ass!"
...
Voices rang out in succession, mixed with all kinds of curses.
At first, Monica didn't think much of it; instead, she followed the conversations and seriously thought about the cause of this strange event, intending to write about it in her travelogue.
But as she listened, she gradually realized something wrong.
The Iris Hotel in Utopia didn't have that many guests!
She remembered very clearly that on her floor, there were at most five rooms occupied, including her own.
At that moment, Monica thought of the ghost stories she had heard and read, and suddenly felt as if the outside of the door was filled with vengeful spirits and shadowy figures.
She had just been about to swing her legs off the bed and go out to join the discussion to gather more details for future writing, but now she pulled her legs back abruptly, curled up, and trembled with fear.
After a few seconds, she heard a male voice saying: "I asked the hotel owner, and he said he didn't know what was going on either; maybe there was a brief storm just now.
"Everyone, go back to your rooms, lock the doors and windows. Yawn... I have to get up early tomorrow to go to the Kingdom's Museum."
The Kingdom's Museum... Monica was taken aback.
As a travel writer and a traveler who had been in Utopia for a long time, she knew that there was no Kingdom's Museum here.
In the
And even if she took the steam train from Utopia to Backlund, it would take many hours. Even if she got up early, she wouldn't make it before the Kingdom's Museum closed.
Monica pulled off the blanket slowly in confusion, hearing the continuous sound of doors and windows closing.