Lin Xiao's fingers reflexively brushed over the spot where he usually kept his phone, but it was gone. Panic started to rise in his chest. He quickly tried to summon his system.
"System, open!" he called out in a hushed but urgent tone. Nothing happened.
"System?" he tried again, louder this time. Silence.
Lin Xiao's heart skipped a beat as he tried repeatedly to call up his system, but each attempt ended in the same eerie quiet. The familiar HUD that usually displayed before him was nowhere to be found. His status window, the map, the skills—everything was gone.
"What the hell is going on?" Lin Xiao whispered, his voice trembling slightly. Without his system, he felt vulnerable, cut off from the power and knowledge he had relied on for so long.
He clenched his fists, fighting back the wave of anxiety that was threatening to crash over him. His system had never failed him before—not even in the most bizarre of worlds. Yet here, in this sterile hospital, it was like it had ceased to exist.
"Calm down. Think, think..." he murmured to himself, pacing slightly, the cold floor beneath his feet grounding him. Was this some kind of trap? Had he entered another world where his system didn't work? And where were Xiao Bai and Little Blackie?
Lin Xiao's mind raced, still trying to piece together what had happened. The sterile white walls of the hospital room were foreign to him, yet eerily familiar, as though he had been here before in some distant memory.
The fluorescent lights buzzed softly overhead, casting a harsh glow on the ceiling, intensifying the confusion that churned inside him.
The white sheets on the bed, the medical equipment humming quietly by his side—everything seemed too real, yet out of place.
He rubbed his temples, trying to fight the dizziness that had crept up on him. How long had he been out? And where exactly was he? The portal had dumped him here, but it didn't feel like the peaceful world he had left. There was an unsettling quiet that filled the air, like the calm before a storm.
"Xiao Bai? Little Blackie?" he called out again, louder this time. Still, no response. He tried using telepathy, mentally reaching out to his two loyal companions, but it was as if a wall blocked his thoughts from reaching them. It felt wrong. Deeply wrong.
The quietness of the room grated on his nerves. The footsteps he had heard earlier were now closer—outside the door. Lin Xiao tensed up.
He needed to know where he was before anyone found him in this state. Without his system and without his powers, he felt exposed.
The door creaked open slightly, making his heart race. Lin Xiao expected some kind of monster to pop up, but it was a nurse.
Lin Xiao was surprised.
Lin Xiao watched as the nurse's face shifted from mild surprise to outright shock. She didn't say a word, simply turned and ran out of the room, leaving him alone again. The sound of her hurried footsteps echoed down the hallway, the tension in the air growing thicker with each passing second.
Moments later, the door swung open once more, and this time a man in a white lab coat stepped in. He was tall, with graying hair and a pair of thin-rimmed glasses perched on the edge of his nose. His name tag read "Dr. Huang." The doctor gave Lin Xiao a cursory glance, then quickly moved over to check the equipment by his bed.
"Well, this is quite a surprise," Dr. Huang muttered, sounding both amazed and relieved. "You're awake."
Lin Xiao blinked, still trying to shake off the fog in his mind. "Awake? What are you talking about? Where am I?"
Dr. Huang turned to him, his expression softening into one of concern. "You're at Xianghe Central Hospital. You've been in a coma for several weeks."
Lin Xiao's eyes widened in disbelief. "What? That's impossible. I—I wasn't in a coma. I was… somewhere else."
The doctor gave him a sympathetic look, clearly used to this kind of confusion from patients just waking up. "I know it's disorienting. Your memory might be a little jumbled right now, but I can assure you, you've been unconscious for quite some time."
Lin Xiao shook his head, trying to make sense of it. "How… how did I end up in a coma?"
Dr. Huang flipped through some notes on a clipboard. "According to the report, you and your mother were unloading boxes at your home. One of the heavier boxes fell and struck you in the head. You lost consciousness immediately, and we've been monitoring your condition ever since. There was some swelling, but we managed to stabilize you."
Lin Xiao's heart sank. That didn't make any sense. The portal, the red moons, the supernatural events—none of it lined up with this version of events. It felt real, too real to be just a dream or a figment of his imagination. But this doctor was saying he had been here the entire time.
"Wait… you're saying it's been weeks?" Lin Xiao asked, his voice barely a whisper.
"Yes," Dr. Huang confirmed. "Six weeks, to be precise. It's quite miraculous that you've regained consciousness with no apparent lasting damage. Your mother will be relieved to know you're awake."
Lin Xiao felt a chill creep up his spine. The world around him seemed too normal, too perfect. None of what the doctor was saying matched up with the reality he had just experienced. But at the same time, the medical equipment, the hospital, even the nurse—they all felt undeniably real.
"So, all of it… was a dream?" Lin Xiao mumbled to himself.
Dr. Huang raised an eyebrow. "It's not uncommon for patients in a coma to experience vivid dreams or hallucinations. Your brain was likely processing all sorts of things while you were unconscious. But now that you're awake, you should focus on recovery."
Lin Xiao's mind raced. Could it all have just been some elaborate dream? The portals, the supernatural beings, the red moons… Li Jing? No. It felt too real, too intense to be dismissed so easily. He wasn't sure what was happening, but something about this explanation didn't sit right with him.
"Can I see my mom?" Lin Xiao asked, trying to push down the growing unease.
Dr. Huang nodded. "Of course. I'll notify her right away." He gave Lin Xiao a reassuring smile before stepping out of the room, leaving him alone once again.
As Lin Xiao sat in the sterile hospital bed, he couldn't shake the feeling that something was horribly wrong. If this was truly reality, then why did everything else feel more real than this? Why did it feel like he had just stepped into another world? A world that was almost too normal.
The door creaked open again, and Lin Xiao braced himself. Would it be his mom? Or would he wake up in another place, another version of reality entirely?