The first time Li Wei saw the walls, they shimmered in the sun like a mirage.
From the ridgeline, with Rui asleep on his shoulder and Chen Yu swatting flies behind them, the settlement looked like a forgotten dream — a high ring of welded metal and concrete, banners fluttering in the wind, smoke drifting gently from chimneys. Civilization. Not war camps. Not scavenger dens. Real homes.
They hadn't seen real homes in almost a year.
"Looks like heaven got a factory reset," Chen Yu murmured, squinting. "Either that, or we're walking into a very polite slaughterhouse."
Li Wei said nothing. He adjusted his grip on Rui, stood up, and started down the hill.
The guards wore white armbands and clean uniforms. That alone made Li Wei's fingers twitch toward his blade. No one wore clean white anymore — unless they had someone else to wash it for them.
The gate didn't open until they'd stood under the sun for nearly fifteen minutes. A speaker above them clicked.
"State your purpose."
"Shelter," Li Wei said. "Food. Rest."
Pause. Then the gate groaned and split apart like a slow yawn.
They were ushered inside by two guards with masks. Rui clung to his arm, silent. Chen Yu grinned wide, his clothes filthy and voice loud.
"We bring joy, germs, and exceptional storytelling. What's your hospitality rating out of ten?"
No one laughed.
Inside was quiet. Unnaturally quiet. Children played in the dirt. A market bustled without shouting. People walked, nodded, smiled — but too precisely. Too choreographed.
Like a play rehearsed too many times.
They were taken to a visitor hall. Given hot soup. Warm beds. A doctor even examined Rui, checked her vitals, nodded and whispered, "She's stable. Don't worry."
No one asked questions. No names. No histories.
That night, Chen Yu sat on his cot and peeled a boiled potato like a man performing heart surgery.
"So. No lice. No threats. No missing limbs. I don't like it."
"It's a gift," Rui whispered, curled in the corner like a cat. "Gifts come with strings."
Li Wei said nothing.
Days later, the routines set in. The settlement — called New Lianzhou — had order. Jobs were assigned by a quiet, smiling woman named Sister Fang. Meals came three times a day. Lights turned off at exactly 9:00 p.m. every night.
"You ever met someone who smiled too much?" Chen Yu whispered as they carried buckets in the garden. "Like they're trying to smile you into a coma?"
Sister Fang passed them, bowing.
Chen Yu waved with both hands and whispered, "She's hiding bodies under that nice hair bun. I guarantee it."
Rui laughed — but only once.
A week later, things cracked.
They noticed the absence of elders.
No one over fifty. Not a single person.
When Chen Yu asked a teenager sweeping the steps where his grandmother was, the boy looked confused. Then scared. Then said: "We… don't talk about the old."
Rui had nightmares. She sat up gasping, nails digging into her skin. "There are masks," she whispered one night. "They come at night."
Li Wei began taking shifts patrolling after curfew.
The streets were always empty after 9 p.m.
And yet — he felt watched.
Another week.
They were asked to contribute DNA samples for "medical safety."
Li Wei refused.
Sister Fang smiled too widely. "Everyone else has."
"I'm not everyone."
They were "kindly" reassigned from gardening to waste disposal.
Chen Yu held up a mop dripping brown water and said, "We've been diplomatically downgraded."
Rui found a hidden door in the sanitation tunnel.
It had a lock. And a keypad.
"I dream about this place," she whispered.
Chen Yu leaned closer. "You got some real travel agency in your head, Rui."
They didn't open the door.
Not yet.
Then the vanishings began.
First it was the boy who swept the steps.
Then a girl from the kitchens.
Each time, Sister Fang said they had been "transferred to a sister colony."
But no one ever left through the gates.
Li Wei began keeping weapons hidden in three locations.
Chen Yu made pipe bombs out of scrap "just in case the hospitality wears off."
Rui started drawing on the walls.
Symbols. Eyes. Spines.
"They follow," she whispered. "Even here."
One night, well past curfew, the three of them stood in front of the hidden door.
Li Wei had the keypad open in minutes.
"Are we sure?" Chen Yu asked, gripping a spanner. "Could just be a janitor closet full of ancient yogurt."
Li Wei opened it.
They went in.
The smell hit first. Not death — not rot — but antiseptic.
Clean.
Too clean.
A narrow hallway led down into concrete silence. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead.
They passed holding cells.
Padded rooms.
Tables with restraints.
Then they found the monitors.
Dozens of them. Showing live feeds.
Rui. In bed. Sleeping.
Chen Yu. Eating a pear.
Li Wei. Training with a knife.
Others. Children. Strapped to beds.
Some of the screens were cracked, blood dried on the edges.
Some of the subjects were still alive.
On the far wall, stenciled in red paint:
UNIT 107: SPECIAL OBSERVATION – PARADIGM CONTAINMENT
Below it:
PROJECT GHOST BATCH – STATUS: LOST
Rui touched the number.
She swayed.
Her breath fogged the glass.
"I remember… I remember this place."
Chen Yu looked at Li Wei. "You seeing what I'm seeing?"
Li Wei's voice was hard.
"They're experimenting. They're still experimenting."
Then — footsteps. Doors closing.
Someone knew they were there.
Rui's voice was small.
"We have to burn it. All of it."
They escaped that night. Barely.
Fire rose behind them. Li Wei didn't look back.
Neither did Rui.
Chen Yu did. Once. Just to throw a grenade.
"Hospitality revoked," he muttered.
They ran. Again.
But something had changed.
Rui walked ahead, shoulders stiff.
Li Wei no longer wondered if the world had broken.
Now he wondered how deep the cracks went.
And who was buried in them.