Chapter 24: Sensory Deprivation

Chapter 24: Sensory Deprivation

A searing pain struck Zhou Liao's brain in an instant. Before he could even scream, a piece of cloth was stuffed into his mouth.

In the final moments before losing consciousness, he heard a low male voice by his ear.

"I said I don't like torture. Wouldn't it be better to behave?"

Zhou Liao woke up to a throbbing pain. Unlike the first time he lost consciousness, this time his entire body felt as if it were breaking apart. In the familiar darkness, his eyes stiffly scanned the surroundings.

His last memory was of jumping out of the window. Then... Zhou Liao swallowed hard as memories flooded back, overwhelming him with panic and helplessness, causing him to push himself up.

Qin Zhan knew he would try to escape; that's why he deliberately took him there to test him.

So it was over. Everything was finished, and there was no chance left.

Zhou Liao tried desperately to stand up, but as soon as his right foot touched the ground, a piercing pain shot through him, making it impossible to bear his weight. He fell to the ground in a heap, barely suppressing a pained groan. His hand stiffly reached down, only to find his right leg encased in plaster and bandages, still damp with blood.

The warehouse was darker than before, perhaps because Qin Zhan hadn't even left a lamp on. In this pitch-black darkness, Zhou Liao began to feel a suffocating despair slowly consuming him.

His past life seemed like a dream. If he could turn back time to the day Qin Zhan hit him, he would never have provoked this person again.

The defiant gaze he once had now turned into a nightmare that destroyed him.

Initially, he waited for that person to return as usual. But then he realized that Qin Zhan had vanished without a trace, never appearing again.

The warehouse became his solitary world, with water and food provided, enough to sustain him, like a completely dark greenhouse.

He couldn't see anything around him or hear any sounds from the outside world.

Every day he stayed here, his only hope was to hear the sound of the lock, waiting for the door to open and see him return. But after repeatedly waiting in vain, that person suddenly disappeared, disappearing so thoroughly that he began to doubt whether this long period was actually just one day. Disappearing to the point where he wondered if everything was just his imagination, and maybe Qin Zhan didn't exist at all.

Now, no shackles bound him, but Zhou Liao knew he couldn't leave this door. Not only because his leg was broken, making even crawling excruciatingly painful, but also because his mind was trapped here.

He began to fear escape, fear the unknown, not knowing what he would face when he woke up next time. He lost the courage to fight anymore.

...

Time passed slowly, each day spent in endless darkness.

At some point, fear and panic grew more severe, isolating him until his whole body trembled.

Zhou Liao started to miss those days that seemed like a dream, missing the times when Qin Zhan would throw food at him, missing the gentle touch on his head, missing the nights when he knelt behind Qin Zhan watching him write game code.

He had never prayed so fervently for that person's return.

Time seemed to pause here. In the darkness and uncertainty, his fears were amplified to the brink of madness.

He began to hallucinate, often hearing the sound of the lock, imagining that person returning, wrapped in cold air.

Later, the hallucinations worsened. Qin Zhan seemed to start talking to him, sharing his daily life. Zhou Liao listened, responding to himself, sometimes laughing as if the other person was in a good mood.

In the silent darkness, his ingratiating laughter sounded eerie and hollow, echoing around. It was like he was performing a ghostly monologue, splitting into two personalities, having neurotic conversations with himself.

"Are you going to work at the bar tonight?"

"What do you mean?"

"...Can you not go?"

"Why?"

"Can you stay with me?"

The other person remained silent, calmly dressing without even a glance in his direction.

Watching Qin Zhan about to step out the door, the fear of being abandoned overwhelmed him. He crawled on the ground, pleading, his nerves taut, ready to snap.

"Please, stay with me, okay?"

"Please."

"Please."

"Please... can you stay with me?"

He repeated these words obsessively, but Qin Zhan seemed to look at him with disdain, almost as if he could hear the other person's sneer.

The moment the door closed, the taut string snapped. Zhou Liao's palm began to bleed, his hand crushed in his own grip, the skin torn and nails embedded deep, reflecting his fear.

As the pain surged, his brain's nerves trembled wildly, and after several flashes of white, he abruptly returned to reality.

Zhou Liao knelt on the ground, staring blankly into the endless darkness. After a few seconds of frozen silence, he suddenly grabbed his hair and broke down, screaming in anguish, repeatedly banging his head against the rough floor until he had no strength left, his skin scraped raw and numb.

But no matter what, there was no response.

He wanted to die, something he had never thought before, but he couldn't.

There was nothing here to kill himself with.

Even when he tried to starve himself while conscious, his survival instinct in hallucinations made him unconsciously eat the food.

Gradually, Zhou Liao could no longer distinguish between hallucination and reality. He talked to himself constantly. Most of the time, he was lost in hallucinations, carefully conversing with Qin Zhan's back, just like every day before.

Now Qin Zhan treated him better. When he pleaded, Qin Zhan would stay, squatting down to stroke his head, saying he wouldn't leave, bringing him delicious meals, and even playing movies at night. Zhou Liao felt they watched many movies together, of various genres.

But he couldn't remember the content of any movie; he always forgot them immediately, his memory fading. The only thing he could recall was that most movies seemed to involve women and bars, sometimes set in schools.

Occasionally, Qin Zhan would show him violent movies, scenes of cigarette burns on throats. He remembered these because he seemed to watch them repeatedly. If Zhou Liao said he didn't want to watch, Qin Zhan's gaze would darken, grabbing his hair and forcing him to focus on the screen, making him remember how high heat burned the skin and tissue, causing healthy flesh to rot.

Every time this happened, Zhou Liao would wake up screaming, then uncontrollably convulse before falling into a long coma.

Daily life seemed to consist only of waking from comas and playing out new scenes. Now these scenes had become coherent, no longer just fragmented snippets. Even upon waking, he could naturally pick up where he left off the day before.

Zhou Liao felt as if he lived within a self-constructed framework, detached from reality.

Today, Qin Zhan was acting strange. As soon as he returned, Zhou Liao saw him kneeling on the ground, folding clothes. After asking him, there was still no response. Then Zhou Liao watched as he suddenly stood up and packed all the folded clothes into the suitcase by the bed.

An indescribable sense of drowning suddenly washed over him, and he clutched his clothes tightly, "Where are you going?"

The other person glanced at him, then closed the suitcase and stood up.

Qin Zhan had been very kind to him recently, so Zhou Liao didn't understand why he was acting like this.

"…Where are you going?"

"What's it to you?" the other person replied coldly.

He tried to force a smile, "Is something wrong?"

"Yes."

"Will you come back?"

"…"

"When will you be back?" Zhou Liao wanted to grab the hem of Qin Zhan's clothes, "Are you going for a long time? Why are you packing clothes?"

The other person shook off his hand, seemingly irritated, "Figure out our relationship."

"Haven't things been good lately? Did I do something wrong?"

Watching Qin Zhan's indifferent back, Zhou Liao reached out several times but pulled back. The sea level seemed to rise higher and higher, almost submerging him entirely, yet he dared not cry for help.

"Do you find it amusing to deceive me?" Qin Zhan turned around.

"…What?"

"Is it fun to pretend to be obedient and deceive me?"

"I didn't!" Zhou Liao tried hard to explain, "I didn't deceive you!"

"No need to deceive anymore." Qin Zhan opened the door expressionlessly, "Now, you are free."

Watching the other person drag the luggage out the door, Zhou Liao suddenly stood up. In an instant, he recalled when he was a child, begging the woman in his memory to stay one more day after her business trip, only to receive a cold response: "Do you think money grows on trees?"

He cried until he hiccupped, until his voice was hoarse, but no one turned back.

The surging sea finally engulfed him completely. This was the first time Zhou Liao wanted to cry for help, to grab their legs, beg them to turn around, beg them to stay, beg them not to leave him alone, to be devoured by loneliness and fear.

Just as Zhou Liao took a step forward to grab the hem of Qin Zhan's clothes, the door slammed shut.

The sharp pain in his legs made him fall to the ground instantly. He lay on the floor, sobbing softly at first. The constant alternation between illusion and reality tore him apart, making his mind unbearable, as if someone was hammering and shaking it.

The dull pain in his head began to radiate throughout his body, his limbs stiffened, and even breathing became difficult. Zhou Liao clutched his throat, trying to breathe with wide-open mouth, and in the flashes of darkness, he saw it again.

This time, the sobs turned into a breakdown. Everything was fake… everything.

His heart started racing wildly due to lack of oxygen, turning his entire body red, even his temples throbbed violently. His mental endurance seemed to reach its limit, and his nerves, which had been lethargic, suddenly became strangely excited, as if burning every cell in his body.

He clutched his throat, painfully dragging his body, retching repeatedly.

A beam of light suddenly shone in, and the warehouse door had somehow been pushed open.

Zhou Liao felt enveloped by an indescribable warmth, and in what might be a hallucination of death, he heard a familiar and nostalgic voice.

"Don't be afraid, I'm here."

"It's all over."