Fan Ning slowly woke up from the auditorium, his head tilted to one side, almost parallel to his shoulder.
——A typical bad posture after falling asleep in a sitting position.
The environment is extremely quiet, my heartbeat is slightly faster than usual, and I can hear its sound.
My neck felt like it was sealed with cement, and it hurt like hell every time I lifted it upright.
It took a long time for Fan Ning to raise his head with difficulty and slowly open his eyes.
Vision is dim and blurry.
I could barely see the stage facing me in front of me through a few weak green light sources in the distance.
There is also a row of potted flowers in the front of the stage, a few chairs and music stands further in, and a grand piano in the middle.
The black outline of the object is shrouded in a dull green color.
Fan Ning finally came to his senses.
Isn’t it? No one woke me up after the show was over?
The concert hall just ended and the lights were turned off?
Are the staff here not clearing the place for inspection?
…
Fan Ning is a recent graduate of science and engineering and a deep enthusiast of classical music.
Since childhood, I have enjoyed playing the piano, listening to records or concerts, and studying various composers and music theories.
With this kind of attribute, as long as the appearance is good and the emotional intelligence is online, it is easy to gain a group of peers and fans in school, and experience a relatively rich emotional life.
Various titles similar to "Great God" were attached to him, as well as high-profile moments in clubs or cultural activities, which made him once feel that he was not an ordinary person.
Until he started to be severely beaten by society.
A chemical company in the urban-rural fringe, moving bricks in the laboratory, embarrassing salary, workplace troubles, and the landlord’s quarrel.
Within a few months, all the elements were in place, and everything was inevitably moving towards vulgarity.
Fortunately, I have this spiritual comfort.
——For example, tonight, between 996 work and a 2-hour drive to the city center, there will be a concert of Bach’s chamber music.
Fan Ning's last second of memory was when he was listening to the performance.
In the dim concert hall, his vision gradually adapted and his physical weakness eased slightly.
"I never felt sleepy before. Can I fall asleep while listening to a concert? It doesn't exist."
Confused, he stood up and was about to take out his cell phone to see what time it was.
Alas, I have to continue moving bricks tomorrow...
After groping around for a while, the feel of the clothes seemed unfamiliar, but I still felt the phone.
No signal, battery level 1%, time 23:30, long before the end of the concert at 10 o'clock.
A bunch of DingTalk work news shows that the boss still doesn’t forget to gank employees crazily on 996’s single day off.
But the top one is——
Short message?
[Reproduce the music in your memory to the audience of this world.]
[As fast as possible, as much as possible.]
[If you want to live.]
[0/100]
The time is 21:30, and the number is a series of garbled characters.
What, what's going on? What do you mean?
The time I received it was during the second half of the concert, perhaps when I was cutting off the piece.
Fan Ning looked around the concert hall doubtfully, feeling more and more something was wrong.
Although the walls in the distance cannot be clearly seen, this concert hall is much smaller than I thought, with no more than a hundred seats for the audience.
The dim green light source was not a safe passage sign, but came from a few unclearly visible lights high up on the wall.
Fan Ning swiped down the control panel of his phone and turned on the flash.
Most naturally, he pointed towards the stage first.
This photo scared him so much that his whole heart felt like it had been hit hard by a heavy hammer!
Two white figures jumped out under the flash!
No, to be precise, they are just two humanoid outlines on the stage plane, with indescribable light smoke-like traces outlining their twisted heads, torsos and limbs, and then spreading out radially.
It's like being dissolved, burned out, or evaporated by something unknown.
The battery of the mobile phone is low, it automatically shuts down, and the vision returns to darkness.
Fan Ning's back was instantly covered with cold sweat.
"Is this the musician on the stage before?"
He felt as if he shouted instinctively, and then took a few steps back.
But in fact, his voice was hoarse and he didn't move.
It wasn't until I almost couldn't feel my body anymore that I mustered up the courage to move my legs.
He didn't dare to turn around, let alone run. Instead, he stepped backward step by step, retreated from the stage, retreated to the wall, retreated to a connection similar to a corridor, turned around and plunged into the darkness.
At the end of the darkness, after groping around for a while, I finally found something like a gate, and then pushed it open.
Strong light shone into his eyes.
It's not the sunlight from the outside, but the flashlights in the hands of several people outside the door.
"Police, stop, calm down!"
Amid the dazzling discomfort, Fan Ning's vision was intermittent and blurry.
He first saw the three-breasted black uniforms, then saw the khaki tasseled epaulettes and sleeve ornaments, and finally saw the red and white checkered wide-brimmed hats on their heads, and the solemn expressions under the hats.
"" Fan Ning was stunned, not only because of their attire and appearance, but also what they said.
He had never heard this language before, and now he was familiar with it at a strange speed.
This sentence was like a huge spoon, stirring up something in his mind, causing something to break, bringing out a lot of chaotic memory fragments:
This is Uflansel in the year 912 of the New Calendar, the second largest industrial city in the Theoline Empire.
Carolyn Van Ning is a fourth-year student at St. Lenia University, majoring in musicology.
My father was once a well-known folk artist in this city and the director of the Turner Museum of Art. He lost contact three years ago and has not been heard from since. My mother died of illness many years ago.
In this era, there is no longer a strict feudal hierarchy, but there is still a distinction between superior and inferior social classes. The upper-class resources belong to the nobility, academic circles, large factory owners, and the mysterious and rumored extraordinary group with a transcendent status - the "knowledgeable people".
With his middle-class background, it was difficult for him to reach the threshold of this imperial aristocratic public school.
But my father’s identity as an artist seems to be a great bonus in this world.
Of course, as soon as he disappeared, his status in the school quickly changed from passerby level to sewer level.
If I hadn't paid the high tuition fees for four years at once when I enrolled, I might have been kicked out now.
The operation of the art museum is naturally unsustainable.
At first, I sold some of my father's paintings to use for debt settlement, equipment maintenance and staff salary payment.
Later, I had to lay off the staff, close down the business, cut back on food and clothing, and live alone in a small apartment.
Have you traveled through time? Have you traveled through time yourself?
Fan Ning's head was throbbing again and again, and the complicated memory fragments were crowded and pushed against each other, gradually turning into distracted roars and murmurs in his ears. He changed from standing to squatting, from squatting to lying down, and the police figures were in his sight.
It's getting blurry.
…
When he opened his eyes again, Fan Ning saw the ceiling.
besides
Why is this thing still in front of me?
Last line of text message: [0/100]
The faint light golden color made Fan Ning suspect that he was dazzled.
It seems that when I have this thought, it becomes more obvious, and when my attention shifts, it fades to almost transparency.
"Are you awake? Mr. Carolne Van Ning? If you are still in good spirits, please get up first."
A very close voice interrupted his thoughts.
This is the Hofman language, the official language of the Theoline Empire, and the language spoken by the Hofman people with the largest population proportion.
Fan Ning stood up and sat on the edge of the hard bed.
A small room with four gray walls and two mahogany tables.
The pale light of the carbonized lamp hit the only pen, paper and a vertically patterned glass on the table.
The water in the cup reflected a cold light.
Sitting across from them were two policemen, tall and tall in their uniforms and with serious faces.
One of them unscrewed the cap of the pen and said: "Let me introduce myself, Newman Ellens, senior police inspector of the Ufranser Police Department, responsible for the security work in the Neleniya neighborhood."
"I slept all night? Also, are you going to question me?"
Fan Ning, who had just traveled through time, was slightly panicked.
He is neither sure whether the human silhouette on the stage is a prank or an abnormal death of a living person, nor is he sure whether he is an innocent party or the instigator?
Calm down, at least judging from the original owner’s relatively complete memory, he did not do this by himself, and there is no need to hide anything. Let’s answer truthfully first.
Fan Ning composed himself: "Okay, Officer Ellens."
The police officer took out an item from the drawer and placed it on the table: "Explain first, what is this?"
Fan Ning looked at his brand-new touch-screen phone and checked again the original owner's memory of the world.
Then my forehead and vest started to sweat.
In this Victorian-era steam industry world, it's not very easy for me to explain it to you, you know?
Do you believe me when I say this is the latest flashlight from Empire?
No, how can anyone get into trouble just after traveling through time?