Chapter 262

Chapter 263: Crossing the Mirror

The window reflected only the ordinary street. After the emergency lockdown, the avenue was empty. Nothing looked strange.

Yu Sheng took out his phone and tried to call back the number that had reached him before. As expected, there was no service.

Communication blocked by an Otherworld does not get better just because you stand near its “entrance.” So far there has been no exception, except for the special case of Wutong Road 66 and its linked spaces.

Yu Sheng turned and asked Little Red Riding Hood: “See anything?”

Little Red Riding Hood shook her head, face tense: “The entrance is closed. The biggest problem is we can’t tell which Otherworld it is, so we can’t know the entry conditions. It’s so strange. How can it leave no trace at all? In theory there should be lingering aura. My wolves should sense it.”

“What’s the usual process when someone gets swallowed by an unknown Otherworld? Is there a rescue playbook?” Yu Sheng asked.

“First we identify the exact Otherworld the victim fell into, then we figure out the entry and exit rules and where the current entrance is,” Little Red Riding Hood said. “If the entrance is fixed, like the Museum we went to before, we meet the conditions and go straight in. If the entrance keeps shifting, we track it. I have the Wolf Pack, but most Spirit Realm Detectives and Investigators are not that lucky. They really have to rely on investigation. As for the Special Affairs Bureau…”

She hesitated. Liu Bing picked up the thread: “It’s similar for us. If we face a shifting Otherworld, we must first trace the entrance. We can use Monitoring Devices across the whole Borderland to find unstable Rifts faster, and the Deep Diving Unit can use special tech to force its way into Otherworlds that don’t yet meet the open conditions.”

He frowned.

“But this time we have a problem. Like Little Red Riding Hood just said, there’s no trace at all. We asked for a full-domain scan, and not a single Monitoring Device anywhere in the Borderland has found that entrance. It truly existed for just one second, then evaporated from the world.”

Yu Sheng said nothing. He looked at the window again, face growing more serious.

The next second, his eyes tightened.

In the street reflected by the glass, he saw a figure flicker past. A young man, tense and afraid, ran across the empty road and vanished into a corner where the window could not reflect.

The Doll on his shoulder spoke at once: “Hey hey hey, Yu Sheng, a guy just ran through in there.”

“I saw him,” Yu Sheng said in a low voice. “It’s him.”

Little Red Riding Hood turned automatically to glance at the real street behind them, then quickly realized and looked back at the glass: “He’s trapped in the mirror image?”

Yu Sheng opened his mouth, but before he could answer, his phone rang sharp and loud.

He answered at once and put it on speaker. Static hissed first, then the young man’s voice came through between quick breaths, broken up: “Brother Yu… I ran out of the mall… The fog outside is thick! Why is there no one on the street… My calls won’t connec-”

“Come back. Come to the mall’s Doors, the big window here,” Yu Sheng cut in fast while there was still a signal. “Don’t run around over there.”

“Come…? Okay, I’ll… zz-”

The signal cut off again.

“It sounds like he’s hovering near L-1 depth,” Little Red Riding Hood said, frowning. “Is that mirror Otherworld heaving up and down?”

Liu Bing stepped aside and spoke quickly into his radio to a support team somewhere else. He seemed to be adjusting how the Monitoring Devices would scan based on what had just happened.

Yu Sheng kept his eyes on the wide window.

A few minutes later, the figure appeared again.

The young man looked tired from running. He was breathing hard and his clothes were rumpled. He jogged across the street, came up to the window, and kept glancing around like something over there might pop out of thin air at any second.

Foxy stepped up and smacked the glass.

The young man in the mirror did not react, as if he had not heard it.

Foxy knocked harder.

Irene warned: “Silly Fox, take it easy. Don’t break it.”

Right as Irene finished, the reflected young man turned his head. He seemed to hear a faint tapping from the glass. He walked closer, nervous, and stopped half a meter from the window, then raised his hand and touched the glass.

Foxy knocked again.

The vibration passed through the mirror and into the other side.

The young man flinched and pulled his hand back.

Then he seemed to understand the sound came from “reality.” Cautious but hopeful, he reached out and tapped the glass a few times.

Yu Sheng heard faint knocks. The sound was dull, like it was wrapped in something thick, but the vibration really crossed over.

He was about to work out how to use this small link to pull the man out of the “mirror,” when the young man suddenly looked over his shoulder in fear and sprinted away.

Irene burst out: “Hey! We told you not to run!”

Foxy answered at once, serious: “He’s not running at random. Something is chasing him.”

“No kidding. I can see that,” Irene said as she tugged Yu Sheng’s hair. “Yu Sheng, think of something. Our client is about to die.”

“Don’t rush me. I’m thinking,” Yu Sheng said. He stepped to the window and felt across the glass with his hand.

Little Red Riding Hood froze and said: “Wait, you can open this too?”

Irene, suddenly smug, said: “He can open anything.”

Yu Sheng ignored the Doll’s bragging. He searched for the Door that would lead to the other side of the mirror.

He needed a coordinate, a guide, or at least a trace that pointed to the “other side.”

The only pointer was the young man’s taps from moments ago.

He placed his hand where the man had knocked. He shut his eyes a little and pictured the heavy pane as it vibrated. He imagined that on the other side, in the world reflected by the glass, there had been a vibration, dull and wrapped in something thick. He pictured that vibration flowing into his palm and turning into an invisible handle.

There was a Door there. Turn the handle, and the Door would open.

He turned the handle.

Liu Bing stared as Yu Sheng opened a Door on the glass window, as if a Door made of mirror had appeared out of nothing. The Door swung inward. On the other side lay the same street behind them.

Only, that street was filled with thick fog and no people.

“All right, the Door is open,” Yu Sheng said, keeping his hand on the handle as he glanced back at Little Red Riding Hood and Liu Bing with a smile. “I’ll go take a look.”

Foxy stepped forward at once and said: “Benefactor, I’m coming too.”

“I’ll go with you,” Little Red Riding Hood said, then added: “The Wolf Pack’s scouting will be very useful in a strange place.”

“Good,” Yu Sheng said. “Be careful when we get over there. It looks like the ‘depth’ isn’t very deep, but the situation is weird.”

Just as they were about to step through the Door, Liu Bing came up and pressed something into Yu Sheng’s hand.

“Take this.”

Yu Sheng looked down. It was a palm-sized little box, a metal device with a black shell. There were no switches or buttons, only a row of blinking lights on one side.

“What is it?”

“A Locator,” Liu Bing said. “My team has to guard this side of the street, so we can’t go in with you. Time is tight. Take the Locator ‘over there.’ The Special Affairs Bureau’s support unit will follow the signal and come find you.”

Yu Sheng paused, puzzled: “I thought there’s no signal in an Otherworld once you pass L-1 depth.”

“There’s no normal signal, or rather, no ‘information’ that human minds understand can get out,” Liu Bing said with a small smile. “But this Locator doesn’t send a ‘signal.’ It sends a Subspace vibration called a ‘Deep-Sea Echo.’ It isn’t for people to hear. It’s for certain Machine Spirits in the Special Affairs Bureau to ‘hear.’”

“I don’t get it, but I’ll take it,” Yu Sheng said earnestly. He slipped the palm-sized Locator into his jacket pocket.

He drew a breath, nodded to Little Red Riding Hood and Foxy, and said: “Let’s go.”

Little Red Riding Hood and Foxy stepped through the Door on the mirror. Yu Sheng followed with Irene.

The Door closed without a sound. The window returned to normal, as if it had never opened.

Fog rolled up to meet Yu Sheng. Beyond the mist stretched the streets of Boundary City inside the mirror.