Smiling Gas XX

Translated by xiaohei

Edited by xiaohei

Usually, running 400 meters in two minutes would be no problem at all.

However, rubble and debris covered the ground beneath their feet. They had to be wary lest they trip over or were cut by something along the way. At the same time, smoke was billowing over, causing low levels of oxygen in the vicinity which in turn depleted their physical energy sharply.

Not to mention, he was bringing along a young girl with him, only the around the age of 6 or 7, as well as a sicky officer he could not help but worry about.

After stumbling around for a few moments, Yu Feichen could not stand to see things go on like this any longer. He immediately moved to Anfield’s right and picked up the young girl. Taking the officer’s right hand, he pulled him forward with force.

Fortunately, Anfield’s balance was good and he did not end up falling on the rubble. After a few minutes, they finally broke out of the ruins.

There were still 300 meters before they were at the south gate.

Yu Feichen looked back at Anfield. With a white handkerchief covering his nose, only the officer’s eyes could be seen. His skin was visibly pale, but he could still stand.

That was all he needed from him.

Looking at the flat road ahead, Yu Feichen took a deep breath and dragged him forward, running quickly without looking back.

Run.

Get out of this place.

There were no other thoughts in his mind but those. The wind whistled in his ears and the excessive exercise and thin oxygen from the atmosphere were starting to suffocate him. It felt like his lungs were being wrung out and his vision was starting to grow distorted—

The south gate was getting closer.

However, just one step away, he spotted a corpse lying right in front of them.

Yu Feichen had no time to care about whether they had the time or whether Anfield noticed the corpse by his feet. He was worried that he himself no longer had the strength to step over it. Almost by instinct, he yanked the man forward, holding him with one arm before raising his legs, up and over the corpse. He was running out of energy and the load he had to bear was too great. The moment his body went forward, he lost his balance.

However, everything was within his expectations. He used the forward momentum to lunge forward onto the ground.

Anfield held the little girl tight while Yu Feichen protected the back of his head with his right hand. The three of them rolled around twice on the ground. The two pillars of the south gate had already turned into gray streaks in Yu Feichen’s field of vision that quickly whizzed by.

They were finally out!

Yu Feichen tried to lift himself up with his arms while Anfield had also let go. The panicked little girl looked up and moved away from Anfield. She was in an okay condition, or rather, she was completely unaware of what had just happened.

Yu Feichen had only glanced at her once before looking away to check on Anfield below him instead.

The side past the gate was unaffected by the flames. Anfield’s long silver hair lay disheveled on top of the snow, and there were two wet curls stuck to his forehead. He was still gasping for air in an irregular rhythm. There was a slight red at the corner of his eyes, which looked slightly out of focus.

Yu Feichen stared for a while and pressed on his chest, approximately where his lung was located.

“Breathe deeply, quick!” he urged him.

Smoke, heat, oxygen shortage, carbon monoxide, strenuous exercise, lung disease.. The consequences of these factors combined together were carbon monoxide poisoning and asphyxiation!

There did not seem to be any response from Anfield. In the dead silence of the night, time seemed to flow infinitely slower. Yu Feichen seemed to hear his heart drumming.

Ba-dump ba-dump*.

Two sounds.

He patted Anfield’s cheek and called out to him in a hoarse voice, “Sir, wake up.”

“Sir.”

“Anfield.”

Anfield blinked slowly, snowflakes resting on his long eyelashes. Then, his eyes shut and opened again as he blinked.

He was still conscious. Yu Feichen breathed a sigh of relief.

He continued compressing his chest. “Breathe.”

He could feel the movements of his breathing from the palm of his hands. At first, it was slightly chaotic, but eventually, his breathing was regulated.

He looked down and saw Anfield pursing his lips tight. His body was trembling, but his breathing was gradually returning to normal.

Taking a deep breath on the verge of suffocation was a very painful thing to do. That was because his lungs could no longer withstand such an action, but only by breathing deeply would he be able to bring him back without any means of providing first aid.

Clearly, Anfield knew what he had to do, and he had enough willpower to force himself through the pain.

After a few short breaths, his breathing had calmed down considerably.

“Lift me up.” Yu Feichen heard a light and hoarse voice, just like the snowflakes on the ground.

He slipped his arm underneath Anfield’s body to lift up his shoulders, making him lean on his body before he sat the two of them up.

Anfield coughed a few times. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Yu Feichen answered.

He also adjusted his own breathing. Earlier, all his attention was on Anfield who was one foot in the grave. Now that his mind cleared up a little, the pain in his own heart and lungs finally crashed on him all at once.

His physical strength was exhausted and it felt like his chest was filled with sand. He could even vaguely taste blood in his throat.

However, this was fine. He had gotten used to situations like this after years of going through all sorts of dangerous situations. Only the thumping of his heart felt strange and unfamiliar to him. He took in a deep breath, attributing his unusual reaction to the intensity of the situation earlier.

As he was thinking about that, Anfield grabbed onto a corner of his sleeves to steady himself while he popped open the cover of his pocket watch with his other hand.

Almost twenty seconds have passed since they stumbled out of the gate. Right now, the slim second hand of the pocket watch was pointing at the number 11.

11:59:55

—5 seconds before midnight.

At this moment, the two of them coincidentally looked up at the camp behind the walls.

The crimson sky, the tall cremation tower, the remaining flames. The ruined walls were burned black and there were bodies near and far. Everything they saw looked like it came straight out of an apocalyptic scene from ancient legends.

What will happen when the clock hits 12 and the timeline shifts again?

Yu Feichen backed away from the camp with the officer, counting down silently in his mind.

5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

The moment the second hand reached “12”, it was as if time stood still.

His breath also hitched all of a sudden.

At that moment, though visions of flames still remained clearly in his retinas, no shadow of spark or flame could be seen in the concentration camp in front of him.

It was difficult to describe how those flames had been extinguished, whether they suddenly disappeared from the world or dispersed like fireworks in the sky, because the naked eye was simply incapable of capturing such a quick change.

Like a videotape that was playing normally until jamming at a certain frame, and a completely different image appeared afterward.

With the flames gone, even the sky, lit red from the reflection of the fire, also returned to pitch darkness. A cold breeze blew over and even the heavy smell of carbon had faded.

Looking past the south gate, the camp was dark and in ruins, just like before.

It was silent all around them.

The strange changes happened within the walls, but they were outside of it.

All of a sudden, a soft but unemotional robotic sound played in his ears.

“Escape successful.”

At the end of the system notice, everything around him suddenly vaporized and disappeared. When he blinked his eyes, he found himself in the middle of a gray void that seemed to run infinitely in all directions, but it was completely devoid of anything.

In the next moment, a cloud of grey appeared in front of his eyes, flowing slowly. Then, vague shadows and images appeared in the cloud all of a sudden. Yu Feichen backed up a few steps and saw the image in its entirety—It was a three-dimensional model of the camp drawn out of Grey and black lines of smoke.

He reached out his hand, only to pass through the image, unable to influence it in any sort of way.

Then, the system notice sounded again.

“Please begin deconstructing.”

Yu Feichen heard the voice clearly.

Did the successful escape from the concentration camp refer to escaping from the premises within a set time? Then what did “begin deconstructing” mean?

After the notice ended, there was no change in the hazy image, and the only other thing present within this empty space was the model and himself. In which case, there was no doubt that the system was telling him to “begin deconstructing”.

The meaning of “deconstruct” was implicit. Its definition was to take something apart, to uncover its pieces. And, he was currently presented with a virtual image of a concentration camp with a problem—most likely his prompt to uncover just what was going on in that place.

It was just like a test question.

Yu Feichen focused his mind and quickly went through everything that happened in recent days.

Then, facing the image in the fog, he gave his answer.

“Oakvale Concentration Camp was where the Black Badge Army held and executed their Koroshan prisoners. Prior to January 15, everything was normal.

“From the 15th on, a disturbance in time-space was noticed within the camp.

“Every night at 12 o’clock, I could see the events that would happen eight days later from the entrance of the barracks I resided in, but I was not brought to the future. I merely saw a parallel timeline. A split overlapping eight days in the timeline, which was only supposed to go one way. The 15th and the 23rd took place simultaneously, as did the 22nd and the 30th, and so on.

“Due to the split in the timeline, the cause and effect links were disrupted, thus the scenes presented at midnight were not strictly the eventual future, but a logical extrapolation based on the events that happened in the real timeline.” After reaching this point, Yu Feichen paused. He was not completely sure about his hypothesis, but this was the only explanation he could think of at the moment.

“Thus, what happened during the day would affect the vision that was shown at night.

“On the 22nd, everyone escaped from the containment camp. At the same time, a fire broke out. So, the only possible extrapolation that can be extracted from that point, 8 days onwards, was that the camp would become burned ruins devoid of life.

After a pause, he continued, “Once 12 hit tonight, the timeline had exceeded the overlap, and we were brought directly to the 31st.

“With that, the future as predicted would become reality. Today, the camp as depicted was the camp on the 31st. The fires have already burned out, and the buildings were reduced to rubble. As for the real concentration camp from the original timeline as well as everything inside of it, all of it was gone.

“In conclusion, the only way to ensure a successful escape was to leave the camp before 12 o’clock hit on the 22nd day of the month.”

The gray fog continued flowing in silence. He reviewed everything he said before announcing, “I have finished speaking.”

As soon as he finished speaking, the system sounded again.