Yun Xi realized that she had taken a bus that had driven straight in one direction for over an hour and then had been brought back here. In the gloomy fog and under the gloomy lights on both sides, the four scarlet characters on the nameplate stone seemed like some kind of mockery and also like some kind of threat. And the regular, courtyard-style greenery landscape behind the hospital gate now looked more like a high-end cemetery for burying the rich. ...To go in or not? That was a question. Yun Xi thought about it for a while and decisively chose to turn around and leave! She didn't go in. The reason was simple: Only she had run out of this spooky hospital from the beginning to the end, which proved that there couldn't be anything good waiting inside! As the only little fish that had slipped out, instead of walking right into the trap, she might as well struggle a bit more outside. But although she had made this decision, the reality was another story. Even if she was given ten thousand times more courage now, she wouldn't dare to wait for the next bus. So it seemed that the only option left for her was to walk back to the city center. And in the vast fog, this was a bit desperate. Yun Xi felt like crying. But she just sniffed, clenched her small bus hammer tightly, and tried to cheer herself up with her glorious achievements in shopping: "It's okay, Xixi. You could walk around Wenmiao Street in four hours last Sunday. So today, you can definitely walk for another four hours and make your way back... Come on!" Yun Xi muttered to herself a few times, then with her fingertips trembling slightly from the cold, she turned around and walked into the fog, leaving the hospital gate behind. On the pale nameplate stone, the blood-red characters seemed to blur into a mass of blood mist in the fog and then gradually disappeared completely under the thick fog. Yun Xi started walking along the street lights. The main road from Meili Hospital to the city center was a newly built expressway, and there were no side roads on this road. So as long as she walked along this road in the direction of the city center, she could get back. But when Yun Xi passed the third street light, she noticed something was wrong. She stopped and looked around. The fog was too thick. Even the street lights across the street just blurred into a big, indistinct circle in the thick fog. And the street lights could only really illuminate a small piece of the sidewalk below and part of the asphalt road surface beside it. This made the front, back, left and right all look similar, just flowing white thick fog. Walking like this seemed to make it easy to get lost. Yun Xi thought for a while and walked to the street light. The street light was the kind of magnolia-shaped light commonly used on the main roads in the city. The lamp post was made of iron sheet, and there were some reliefs of magnolia flowers on it for decoration. Yun Xi tried to scrape the center of the magnolia flower relief with the head of the bus hammer and successfully made a shallow mark. [This will do.] Yun Xi nodded, counted the steps silently, walked to the next street light, which was exactly thirty steps away. She then scraped the center of the relief in the same position on this street light as a mark. Then she continued to repeat this. Soon, the unchanging white fog around, the continuous walking, and making marks... gradually numbed Yun Xi's perception. Until at a certain moment, after Yun Xi had made a mark and looked up to find the next street light, she suddenly realized: The circle of light of the next street light in the fog ahead had only become a模糊的白影. The fog was getting thicker. And if this continued, it would be difficult for her to even tell the direction of the next street light. Even between two street lights, she would lose her way. Although according to common sense, Yun Xi was right beside the main road, and she couldn't get lost too badly. But really according to common sense, she should have already been back at school by now, eating hot pot and singing songs while sharing her "corridor scare" with her roommates. Yun Xi took a breath and stopped. She took out her mobile phone. It was only then that she realized that her fingers had been frozen stiff for a long time. The mobile phone showed that it was nine twenty-five in the evening. This meant that she had been walking non-stop in the fog for nearly two hours. At this moment, Yun Xi's strength was almost exhausted. She felt cold all over and her feet hurt. But things had come to this point, and Yun Xi could only hold back her tears and put the mobile phone back in her pocket. But some things couldn't be overcome just by holding back. Just in the short time when Yun Xi looked down at her mobile phone, the fog seemed to have thickened to a certain limit. When she looked up again, she couldn't see anything clearly around her! In every direction, there was only thick, pale fog slowly flowing around her. Yun Xi looked up and saw that even the street light above her head had become a模糊的光晕. A sense of despair finally emerged irresistibly! But Yun Xi still wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and continued to walk in the direction of the next street light that she remembered seeing just now. Twenty steps, thirty steps, forty steps, fifty steps... The street light didn't appear, and Yun Xi gradually stopped. She remembered that she had seen people setting up stalls in the park and doing blindfold challenges. The challengers needed to stand in a drawn circle with their eyes blindfolded and march in place. As long as they took fifty steps and hadn't stepped out of the circle, they would be considered to have succeeded in the challenge. But when people's senses were blocked, it was difficult to tell their own position. Yun Xi had been to the park so many times, but she hadn't seen anyone succeed in the challenge. And now, this thick fog was also blocking her senses. However, although people's senses were unreliable, some things were reliable. Yun Xi took out her mobile phone again, used her fingers that were so frozen that they didn't listen to her very well, opened the built-in tools of the system, and found: The compass. In the past, Yun Xi had always thought that these small tools on the mobile phone were just something that mobile phone manufacturers made because they had extra technical capabilities and thought they might as well make this function since they could. But in normal life, who would look at the compass on their mobile phone? Wasn't it unnecessary? But now, Yun Xi just wanted to say: Thank goodness for technology! The compass on the screen deflected to the left and right for a moment and finally pointed firmly to the north. Yun Xi sniffed, stared at the direction of the pointer, and walked forward to make sure she was walking in a straight line. Ten steps, twenty steps, thirty steps... When she counted to thirty-five steps, Yun Xi's legs were trembling. She could hardly suppress the panic in her heart! However, at this time, in the fog ahead, the shadow of a lamp post vaguely appeared. She had finally found the way again! "I love science!" Yun Xi rushed to the lamp post in two excited steps, took out the small hammer, and was about to make a mark. But in the next second, her action suddenly stopped. A shallow scratch slanted across the center of the relief. —This lamp post had already been marked. However, as if it wasn't enough to make her despair, at this time, a soft "click" sound came from behind Yun Xi. She quickly turned around and saw that not far behind her, the white fog in the middle had clearly darkened. Yun Xi was stunned for a moment before realizing that a street light there had just gone out. And the area left after the light went out was a strange, absolute dark area, exactly the same as what she had seen in the hospital corridor! Instantly, the fear of death inspired Yun Xi's will to survive. She immediately grabbed her mobile phone and started running as fast as she could in the direction of the next street light. Click. Click. The sounds of lights going out came from around one after another, but fortunately, compared to the hospital corridor, the road here was wider. Even if a dark area appeared in front, Yun Xi could still choose to go around it and continue running along the lighted area. The sounds of "click, click, click" were like the drums of death. The darkness expanded, driving Yun Xi to run as hard as she could. She relied on the compass on her mobile phone to make sure she was still walking in a straight line and ran past one street light after another. But without exception, these street lights had all been marked. [Am I running back the way I came?] Yun Xi thought in horror and confusion. And when she passed another marked street light again, a sense of extreme horror suddenly rose: [It's the same.] Yun Xi finally stopped running, gasped for breath, and walked to the street light. Although the scratches she had marked on the reliefs were in more or less the same position, it was impossible for every one to be exactly the same. But from just now, the marks on the street lights she saw were all exactly the same! After extreme horror, a nameless anger surged in Yun Xi's heart. Yun Xi hardened her heart, gasped for breath, raised her hand, and hit the relief hard with the hammer. Dang! A loud noise of hitting a hollow iron pillar rang out in the vast fog, sounding particularly harsh. And a small round mark was knocked out in the center of the relief by Yun Xi. Yun Xi started running again as fast as she could. Soon, the next street light appeared in front of her again. And when Yun Xi gritted her teeth and went over to look, a chill ran down her spine: On the relief of the lamp post, there was still that identical scratch and a newly appeared small round mark. She wasn't lost. She had been running in circles all along! This darkness wasn't driving her away. It was playing with her. Click. As if to confirm Yun Xi's guess, this time, the next street light right in front of her went out. This was the closest Yun Xi had been to a light-out area.