"A rhinoceros and an elephant? Could it be related to the Rhinoceros and Elephant Art Museum?" Sha Liu found it somewhat unbelievable.
Many others had also considered this possibility; the coincidence between the painting and reality was even more astonishing.
Old man Li Taiyong, however, maintained his usual demeanor: "The Rhinoceros and Elephant Art Museum originally occupied this area. A few years ago, the street in front of the museum was called Chunsun Street. Later, the street was renovated, and a subway was built underground, so Chunsun Street completely disappeared."
"Could it be that the Rhinoceros and Elephant Art Museum and that famous internet-famous restaurant are both..." Xin Miao felt that talking about the outside world in this world was like talking in a dream.
"Yes, they were both run by that Hong Kong developer," Old man Li Taiyong affirmed.
This information was clearly important to Chunsun Apartments, but no one could connect it to the seal. After all, the world depicted in the painting was confined to the tenement building; it was impossible to go outside and search for it on the stone rhinoceros and elephant.
Besides, the gate was tightly closed, making free entry and exit impossible.
Feeling depressed, coupled with the hot weather, everyone ate very little for lunch, and afterwards, they were all quite tired, having not slept well the previous night.
So, they each returned to their rooms for a short afternoon nap.
Ke Xun returned to his room, 411, and went into the bedroom. He first glanced down at the red slippers under the bed, but didn't notice any change in their position. "Was there any noise in our room last night?"
Mu Yiran: "No."
Indeed, with the loud noise outside the window last night, all sounds were barely audible.
During the day, the room had electricity, so they could turn on the fan, which was quite a comfort in this harsh environment.
Ke Xun quickly fell asleep and had a very vivid dream. In his dream, he was a child, using a small craft knife to carve on the wall, creating only clumsy bamboo shoot patterns.
As he carved, the sky began to darken, and Ke Xun woke up with a start.
In the hot weather, an afternoon nap wasn't comfortable. Ke Xun was covered in sweat, and when he woke up, he found one leg still draped over Mu Yiran's. He instinctively tried to pull away, but suddenly realized the other was awake.
"Sorry, I was half asleep and pressed down on you." Ke Xun touched the bamboo mat mark on his face, fully waking up.
He had no idea how long Mu Yiran had been awake or how long he had been on top of her.
Mu Yiran was still lying flat on his back: "I just didn't want to wake you from your dream."
"Hmm?" When did the big boss start caring about his dreams?
"You were talking in your sleep."
"This... is extremely rare; I don't usually have this problem." Ke Xun quickly clarified.
"You said: The bamboo shoots will be finished soon, they'll sprout soon."
"I said that?!"
"Yes, you said that."
Ke Xun carefully recalled his dream: "I dreamt I was a child..." He suddenly realized, "Yes, a child! Did you notice that the bamboo shoots weren't drawn very high up? I had to bend down to see them!"
Mu Yiran seemed thoughtful, and unconsciously got up, sitting cross-legged on the bed: "The painter Luo Bin is very young, born in 1985. If the world in the painting is 1996, then Luo Bin was only 11 years old then, not even fully grown yet."
"You mean, the child who drew these bamboo shoots could very well be the painter himself?" Ke Xun felt this idea was bold, but not entirely unfounded.
If that were the case, where could they find clues about the seal? Could that seal have also been carved somewhere with a craft knife?
Mu Yiran said, "The situation in room 616 is quite different from ours. 616 used to be an empty room; the bedding and furniture were all put in later. It's like the apartment was furnished uniformly for easy rental; it looks more like a hotel."
"You mean, the previous residents of 616 moved all their things out?" Before Ke Xun could finish speaking, there was a sudden knock on the door.
Although it was broad daylight, the knocking still seemed abrupt.
Wei Dong's voice came from outside: "Ke'er, open the door!"
Ke Xun opened the door and found that Sha Liu from next door had also arrived at the door at some point, looking anxious and asking, "What's wrong? What happened?"
Wei Dong simply said from the doorway, "Hao Wen'er discovered it; outside our window, outside... the terrain has risen."
"What do you mean the terrain has risen?" Sha Liu asked urgently.
"Didn't they build a cement wall around the outside? It went all the way up to your fourth floor. Now, looking out the window, we see the road surface is level with the fifth floor!" Wei Dong didn't know how else to express it.
"Let's go up and take a look." Mu Yiran had already gone out, and Sha Liu followed closely behind. Ke Xun, ignoring his previous dizziness and nausea, also forced himself to follow.
As soon as he reached the fifth floor, Ke Xun felt that suffocating feeling of being pressed down: "I feel like the stairs here are deformed too."
Ke Xun took a few more Danshen pills, forcibly suppressing his almost exploding heart, and gritted his teeth to go up to the sixth floor.
616 was indeed as Mu Yiran had said, with a decor and furnishings that felt like an old hotel. It had old-fashioned textured wallpaper, wooden trim on the doors, windows, and radiators, and even the bed was a standard hotel single bed. There was also a color TV on the TV cabinet.
Zhu Haowen was sitting on the edge of the bed playing games. Seeing that everyone had arrived, he voluntarily gave up his window position.
Mu Yiran opened the window and, sure enough, found that the ground outside was on the fifth floor; to outsiders, it might appear to be only a two-story building.
Ke Xun and Sha Liu gazed at the bustling traffic outside, feeling as if the mundane world outside was unreal.
"Then where are the residents below the fourth floor?" Sha Liu seemed to have thought of something and shuddered.
"Below the ground," Mu Yiran said.
Ke Xun was still somewhat confused: "What was outside your window before?" He looked at Mu Yiran again, "What was it like outside the window when you came to inspect this morning?"
"It was a cloud of white fog," Mu Yiran said.
Wei Dong nodded in agreement: "Yes, although our window was bright, we couldn't see clearly outside; it was like a huge fog had rolled in, with only the sunlight faintly filtering through."
"Now you can suddenly see?" Ke Xun found this very strange, even somewhat absurd.
"It wasn't sudden," Zhu Haowen suddenly spoke up, "This morning we could vaguely see some things."
Sha Liu looked at the world outside and suddenly felt a urge to rush out, but Zhu Haowen stopped her in time: "You can't get out, this window can't be opened."
Mu Yiran, however, seemed to have thought of something: "Let's go to the fifth floor and take a look."
Zhu Haowen glanced at Mu Yiran and followed everyone to the fifth floor.
Since they didn't have any companions on the fifth floor, they went to the window of the public restroom and found that it was still shrouded in a hazy mist outside, but they could vaguely see the outline of the city.
"This is too strange, what can these phenomena mean?" Sha Liu didn't care at all that she was in the men's restroom.
"This must be related to the room's distortion." Ke Xun felt a little better after reaching the fifth floor.
"Why is the room distorted? Where are we?!" Sha Liu was almost out of control, feeling suppressed. "Based on what we saw on the sixth floor, this apartment building is clearly buried in the ground! We've been in the ground all along!!"
"So, the name of this work is 'Breaking Ground'." Mu Yiran faced the window, his expression unreadable.
Ke Xun felt a jolt of goosebumps all over his body, not from fear, but from an inexplicable realization: "So this is magical realism."
Wei Dong was quite startled by Ke Xun: "Ke'er, can't we talk this out?" —Why did he suddenly start talking about something so professional?
Ke Xun, however, spoke with a serious expression: "What's breaking ground is our apartment building, the entire Spring Bamboo Apartment complex. Those bamboo shoots symbolize our building. We're currently buried in the soil, and now we're slowly emerging."
Mu Yiran couldn't help but turn around: "Continue."
Because of the emptiness of the men's restroom, Ke Xun's voice echoed, like a uniquely meaningful speech—
"The reason the rooms are deforming is because the top of the apartment building is converging inwards. Why converging inwards? Because the entire building is transforming itself into a bamboo shoot with a pointed top, then waiting for its chance to break through the soil!"
Ke Xun's words were full of imagination, full of unreality, yet they fit perfectly with the world in the painting, forming a vivid and realistic story.
Sha Liu's voice trembled: "If it really breaks ground, what will happen to us?"
No one answered this question; no one could answer it.
Finally, Mu Yiran said, "Before the groundbreaking ceremony, the top of the building will completely close in, trapping us inside and isolating us from the outside air—the groundbreaking isn't for us; we're just casualties."
"No, no," Sha Liu took two steps back, "What do we do now? It's almost night, the ghost of 307 is about to emerge!"
Mu Yiran glanced at his watch: "Four o'clock. We still have time. We must find a way to collect graffiti in the building, no matter what it's on! Maybe the seal is among them."
"Okay!" Sha Liu was the first to leave; the search before nightfall became their lifeline.
The others dispersed, some searching directly for graffiti, others communicating with other members to search together.
Dinner was around 6 PM, and they still hadn't found anything.
The doorman suddenly appeared at the restaurant, bringing new instructions: "Stay in your rooms tonight and don't go out."
The NPCs had suddenly changed their strict rules, or rather, suddenly narrowed everyone's activity range—not being allowed to go out meant even less chance to visit other rooms or go up the stairs.
Xinmiao was the first to raise a question: "What about going to the toilet at night?"
"I've put a bucket outside each of your rooms. After you finish eating, take it back to your rooms. You can relieve yourself in the bucket first," the doorman said expressionlessly.
The return of nightfall left many feeling somewhat lost and uncertain.
Qiu Lu was even more frightened because two of her companions had died: "If we're not allowed to go out, we won't even have a chance to escape! If some monster breaks down the door, we'll definitely die!"
Sha Liu said, "If all else fails, we can jump out the window."
Ke Xun frowned: "That would probably be even worse."
Sha Liu stared with reddened eyes: "It's better than having our filling stirred up!"
This reminded everyone of the hunched-over person in room 307, who was holding a porcelain basin and constantly stirring the filling inside.