Looking at the tentacles on the cave, Charles hesitated for a moment and then reached out to touch it.
"Swish!" The tentacles came to life instantly, stretched out from the wall, and pulled Charles into the wall.
"Come and help!! Quick!" Charles shouted loudly, but his companions in the distance seemed not to see him and continued to distribute equipment while talking and laughing.
Charles struggled hard but couldn't get free. Before long, most of his body had been dragged into the cave.
"Bang!" Charles took off the VR glasses and threw them directly at the opposite wall.
Trembling all over, he looked at the broken glasses on the ground in shock.
At this moment, his body shook violently, and the tentacle painting on the wall suddenly moved.
"No, something is wrong, I don't like this, get lost!" Charles closed his eyes and covered his head in pain.
When he opened his eyes again, he found himself back in his cozy bedroom.
My sister was half lying on the sofa, playing with her cell phone and watching TV.
"Are you watching TV or playing on your phone?" Charles sat down on the sofa, picked up the remote control and changed the channel.
The familiar scene calmed Charles' heart, and he quickly switched the TV, looking for a program that interested him.
Soon, a first-person perspective picture appeared on the screen. It was the scene of his tenth birthday. The two siblings were smearing cream on each other's faces.
The sister next to me took her eyes off her phone and looked at the TV.
Charles was half lying on the sofa, quietly looking at the picture above.
But as he watched, Charles discovered that there seemed to be some tentacles twisting constantly in the corners of the picture.
Charles was a little annoyed, so he picked up the remote and pressed it again.
"Why change the channel? Wasn't that show just now pretty good?" My sister turned her eyes to the phone again.
As various images quickly switch on the screen, the sounds in the speakers are also constantly switching.
"Welcome everyone to the midday 30—"
"Sir, regarding this—"
"Mom, I want to take this thing—"
"spring-"
As the program cut faster and faster, the sound became louder and louder, eventually forming a harsh noise. (High... Quick... Come...)
Throwing away the remote control in his hand, Charles, who was extremely irritated, turned and walked towards the balcony.
Modern high-rise buildings appeared in front of him. The scenery outside the window was very nice. Charles looked at the beautiful scenery and the irritability in his heart was slightly relieved.
However, at this moment, a tentacle grew out of the blurry rooftop in the distance and was crawling towards this side.
"What's going on! Where did these things come from?" Charles became nervous and felt that something was happening.
Gao Suling in the room heard her brother's shouting and came out with her cell phone. "Brother, what's wrong?"
Charles, covering his head, was about to answer, but was horrified to see a tentacle of the same appearance growing out of his sister's face.
"No, that's not right. It shouldn't be like this." Charles rushed over and forcefully pulled the tentacles off her face.
But this action was completely useless. The tentacles kept pulling more and more, and finally expanded to wrap Gao Suling completely and deformed into a mass of constantly wriggling flesh.
Charles, with fear in his eyes, held the bloody mass and shook it continuously. "It shouldn't be like this!! Change it back for me!! Quickly!"
The previous peace was completely gone, and everything around had turned into a living hell.
At this moment, Charles felt severe pain in his head, as if someone was holding a stick and sticking it into his brain and stirring it.
"Ahhh!!" He covered his head and screamed loudly.
"Gao Zhi... hurry... wake up..."
"Gao Zhiming, wake up quickly!"
As the familiar voice became clearer in his ears, his head started to hurt more and more.
"Go away, all of you! Leave me alone!" Charles held his head tightly with both hands and curled up like a baby.
Everything around him shattered like glass in an instant, and endless black waves rolled rapidly around him.
In this world, a pair of soft hands embraced Charles and hummed softly.
It was the song that lingered in the deepest recesses of his memory, a lullaby he had long forgotten had been sung in his infancy.
Charles slowly opened his eyes and saw Anna's delicate face.
He opened his arms towards her, and Anna chuckled and leaned in, their bodies pressed tightly together.
Charles used both hands to hold Anna tightly, with such force that it seemed as if he wanted to stuff her into his body.
"Okay, okay, it's all over..." Anna stroked Charles' back with one hand, her tone as if she was coaxing a crying baby.
At this moment, the surrounding sea water was still, hovering there like a transparent sculpture made of glass.
After a long time, Anna stroked Charles' hair with her palm and whispered in his ear, "Gao Zhiming, you really should wake up. You must know that everything here is fake."
“… …” Charles opened his eyes, his eyes sometimes excited and sometimes confused.
"Your situation is very complicated. I can't help you at all. I've already gone through a lot of trouble getting here. If we want to solve this problem, we have to work together. Hurry up. I hate men who run away."
Looking at the chaos around him, all kinds of painful memories emerged in his mind, and now he was completely clear-headed.
Charles froze in place, not moving, his head lowered and buried in Anna's arms.
Anna straightened his head and looked at him with a serious expression, "Gao Zhiming, look at me, do you really want to stay here forever?"
Charles showed a bitter smile on his face and opened his mouth with difficulty, "It may not be impossible. At least there is everything here..."
The surrounding environment began to change rapidly, and the indoor environment that had just collapsed quickly recovered. Gao Suling knelt on the sofa, looking at the two people who were talking curiously.
“But everything here is fake.”
"Does it matter what's real and what's fake? You're fake too."
A letter appeared in Anna's hand, and she excitedly slapped the paper on Charles' chest.
"This is what you wrote. What did you tell me at the beginning? Where did Captain Charles go?"
There was a hint of struggle in Charles' eyes, and the surrounding environment was sometimes calm and sometimes crazy as he thought.
He knelt on the ground, holding his head in pain, "Why should I go back to that hopeless world? Maybe there is no surface outside, maybe the outside world is not our world at all."
Anna half squatted down, looked at him quietly, and said softly: "No matter whether the outside is the earth or not, at least you still have me."
(End of this chapter)