Meanwhile, in Yi City, while Shen Miaoyi was nervously taking her preliminary exam at No. 1 Middle School, Pei Xi was also writing furiously in the examination room.
Competition questions are naturally more difficult than regular questions. Although chemistry is Pei Xi's forte, she barely managed to answer many of the questions. However, she believes that participation is more important than the result.
After the exam, everyone was urging each other to go out and have fun.
For students of this age, no matter what type of exam it is, the moment they walk out of the exam room is a moment of relief, and they just want to let loose.
When Gao Jialiang said he would take everyone to play an escape room game, Dai Wei got excited. She loves playing escape rooms, but she doesn't usually play them often and it's hard to find enough people to play with. Since there was a ready-made team today, she immediately responded enthusiastically.
Seeing how happy she was, Pei Xi let her lead the group of six or seven to an escape room near the snack street.
The store is large, and the overall decoration style is dark industrial style. There are also various room-themed posters on the walls, most of which have some horror elements.
Several young staff members, both men and women, were sitting in front of the front desk watching the surveillance footage on their computers.
Upon seeing them enter, a blonde girl with shoulder-length short hair stood up to greet them. "Do you all have appointments?"
"No." Gao Jialiang stood at the counter and said to her, "What's the most fun notebook in your store? Can you recommend one?"
The short-haired girl handed over a flyer and pointed to a poster on it, saying, "Our store's most fun attraction is this 'Horror Gallery,' which has seven rooms in total. It's moderately scary, with a difficulty level of five stars. This room even won the Best Design Award in the Escape Room category this year."
The group glanced at the description and were all very interested. Dai Wei was the first to say, "Let's go with this one. We've come all this way to have fun, so of course we should go for the most interesting one."
The remaining people chimed in, "Okay, let's play this, it looks good."
Gao Jialiang asked the short-haired girl, "Can we play now?"
The short-haired girl glanced at the time and said, "You've come at the right time. The last group just finished, and they're putting the layout back on. You should be able to go in in about five or six minutes."
The group was delighted to hear this; it was truly a case of timing being better than arriving early.
Pei Xi sighed inwardly. She was actually quite interested in puzzle games, but she had one fatal flaw: she was afraid of the dark.
The unknown of the darkness made her very uncomfortable.
Those without horror elements are fine, but this kind of horror is even more exaggerated; once you enter, you immediately lose your ability to think.
She had tried it once before, but she was scared out of her wits after less than five minutes inside.
Pei Xi hadn't expected that the most famous book here would be a horror story, but seeing that everyone liked it, she couldn't spoil their fun. So she patted Dai Wei on the shoulder and whispered to her, "Go inside and play first, I'll wait for you outside."
Dai Wei was taken aback and asked her, "Aren't you going in?"
Pei Xi lowered his voice: "I'm a little afraid of the dark."
Dai Wei tugged at her sleeve, "It's okay, just give it a try."
"I'm really afraid of the dark." Pei Xi pursed her lips. "You can go in and play, it's okay."
Dai Wei stopped pressuring her, realizing she was genuinely scared, so she nodded and comforted her, "Okay, let's try to get out as soon as possible."
Gao Jialiang somehow appeared beside the two of them. Hearing their conversation, he looked at Pei Xi with a grin and said, "Don't be afraid. What's there to be afraid of? I'll protect you."
"Really, there's no need." Pei Xi already had a bad impression of him, so her attitude became colder.
Gao Jialiang wanted to say something more, but she interrupted him after he had only uttered one word, saying, "You guys go ahead, I'll wait for you outside. Don't let me spoil your fun."
Gao Jialiang moved his lips, but having said all that, he couldn't force him any further.
A moment later, the short-haired girl said something to the person on the walkie-talkie, and then called out to them, "It's all set up inside now, you can go in."
A male staff member led the way, Dai Wei waved to Pei Xi, and the group filed in one after another with excited and expectant expressions, entering the secret room.
Pei Xi found a seat in the waiting area and sat down, looking at his phone listlessly.
Next to this escape room is a board game shop, and upstairs there's an internet cafe. The surroundings are noisy, filled with muffled screams and laughter. The students are young and energetic, letting their vitality run wild in the games.
Pei Xi casually browsed the illustrators and art bloggers he followed online, giving a thumbs up to pictures he liked, and saving some of his favorites to study their techniques.
As I was engrossed in watching, a pungent smell of smoke suddenly reached my nose.
Someone came over, stood beside her, and held onto her table.
"Beautiful lady, are you a student at our school? You don't seem like it."
He was a boy who looked like a student from the university next door. He had curly hair, long and narrow eyebrows and eyes, and a frivolous, slick appearance.
He had a cigarette between his fingers, which was very close to Pei Xi and a bit pungent.
She moved outwards and changed to a spot next to her.
Pei Xi glanced at him, her eyes cold and wary. "Sorry, I don't know you."
The boy seemed to be an expert; his expression didn't change at all upon seeing this, and he smiled knowingly, saying, "It's okay if we don't know each other. We can exchange names, add each other on WeChat, and we'll be friends, right?"
Pei Xi frowned and said softly, "No need."
"Hey, let's add one, just to make friends." The boy persisted, even pulling out the chair opposite Pei Xi and preparing to sit down.
Before he could even sit down, a cold voice suddenly came from behind him: "She said she didn't want to join, didn't you hear?"
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