She was cold and starving. One gust of wind left her gasping for breath.
She’d never realized how hard it was to walk through snow.
But just as she found herself caught in the storm with no way forward or back, a path opened before her—
She saw someone coming. She hurried toward them, guided by instinct, by the instinct to survive.
Suddenly, her foot sank into a snowdrift, and Tang Danqing pitched forward.
She hit the ground and immediately began to drift toward sleep.
No—
Don’t go… She forced her eyes open and fixed them on the living person in the distance.
Thank goodness, they’re still coming!
They were moving fast.
Tang Danqing watched a pair of straight camouflage pants approach. Thick-soled black combat boots pressed deep into the snow, leaving clear tracks. A woman followed in their wake, drawing closer.
She had long, golden hair that streamed behind her, shining in the thin sunlight.
Tang Danqing lifted her eyes, watching as the woman came closer and closer.
“Help…” Her throat was raw.
She didn’t even finish the word before her face hit the snow and she blacked out.
Whenever I’ve been in danger, I’ve always managed to get lucky and make it through. I’m usually pretty lucky, so I should get out of this one, too… Right? God, please…
Under her umbrella, Shang You stood tall and slender. She looked down at Tang Danqing, then bent to check her pulse and breathing. Only after she felt them did she let out a breath of relief.
She bent down, hoisted Tang Danqing onto her back, and held the umbrella over them both.
…
Tang Danqing had no idea how much time had passed when she woke. Warm air filled her lungs.
Has the snow stopped? Has it warmed up?
As she slowly came to, her thoughts began to stir, too.
Her vision cleared. She was looking at a familiar bed and bedroom…
Oh no!
I’m dead!
I even hallucinated that I was back in my game home! This isn’t the real world!
For a moment, the realization that she’d frozen to death hit Tang Danqing like the end of the world. She was devastated that she’d died anyway. Then, accepting her fate, she called out, “Little Jelly…”
If this was her home in the game, was Little Jelly here?
“I’m here.” A woman’s voice, clear and gentle, sounded beside her.
“?”
Tang Danqing jerked her head toward the bedside and saw a woman with a face as lovely as a painting sitting there.
The woman was quietly watching her… watching her…
Her reflection appeared in Tang Danqing’s pupils…
An intruder!
Where was Little Jelly? The NPC she’d raised was gone!
It was an intruder! Tang Danqing became instantly certain of it. Then another thought hit her: had Little Jelly, the NPC, already been killed?
Tang Danqing scrambled upright. As she braced herself, pain shot through her arm!
The strange woman was here, and the horrifying memory of being eaten by starving people came rushing back!
The pain was far too real.
Maybe she wasn’t dead or dreaming after all. Strange happenings and impossible thoughts put Tang Danqing on high alert. The woman at her bedside reached for her—
Whatever the truth, this was Tang Danqing’s home, and this woman was an intruder. Maybe she’d been transported into the game world!
Tang Danqing sprang from the bed like an arrow, seized the woman’s wrist, and twisted her arm behind her. They tumbled to the floor.
In the confusion, Tang Danqing caught both of the woman’s wrists in one hand. She was faster, and the other woman was so slender that one hand was enough to pin both wrists together. Tang Danqing forced them over her head and back.
Good. She’d gotten the first move.
The woman let out a muffled groan. Tang Danqing took the chance to lock her other arm around her throat and pin her against the nightstand, driving her knee between the woman’s spread legs. Now she couldn’t get leverage…
The woman’s waist trembled and softened as she bent forward. Tang Danqing kept hold of her arms and pressed them back.
Tang Danqing had the intruder completely under control. She could wrench her arms out of their sockets at any moment, or crush her windpipe. She fixed her with a hard stare.
Just as Tang Danqing, on guard, was about to demand answers, the woman gazed up at her with an expression of helpless appeal and called out in a soft, trembling voice:
“Sh… Shan Qing…”
Tang Danqing faltered.
Shan Qing?
This woman knew her name.
She wasn’t the attacker who had drunk her blood and tried to bite off a piece of her flesh. She was much thinner. But who knew what other dangers this intruder might be hiding?
“Who are you?!” Tang Danqing tightened her grip on the woman’s wrist.
Her fingers squeezed hard enough to hurt. The woman’s breath hitched, and her eyes shone as they trembled.
“You don’t recognize me anymore…?” Shang You made no effort to resist. She let Tang Danqing hold her arms and put on an expression of pain.
She looked fragile and helpless, but there was bewilderment in her eyes, too. Real bewilderment.
Shang You’s voice was soft as a blade of grass. “Didn’t you just call me?”
“Shan Qing…” Shang You called her again, hesitant and anxious.
Like a little blade of grass bent beneath a fierce wind.
W-wait…
That timid, obedient, enduring look, as if she were being bullied… Why did it seem so familiar to Tang Danqing?
Little Jelly.
I’m here.
Tang Danqing remembered what had happened when she first woke up.
She glanced at her injured arm and saw that it had been bandaged, too.
“…” She hesitated, then slowly loosened her hold on the woman’s throat, followed by her wrists.
As Tang Danqing pulled her knee back from between the woman’s legs, the woman’s waist trembled and bent forward slightly.
She was so sensitive, so fragile.
Looking at her now, Tang Danqing couldn’t see anything particularly dangerous about her. Even if she was a stranger, she was just a delicate, slender woman.
But who had she said she was?
Tang Danqing stared blankly at her long golden hair.
It fell to within seven or eight inches of her waist. It looked about the same length as Little Jelly’s.
Tang Danqing studied her, then noticed the silver ring on her hand.
On the middle finger of her right hand—the same one where Tang Danqing had put the ring on Little Jelly.
This was still her home. She and Jelly were still…
“Did you bring me back here?” Tang Danqing suddenly remembered the woman with long golden hair who had come toward her through the blizzard before she passed out.
“This is your home, too.” Shang You nodded, lowering her eyes as she clasped her hands and spoke softly. “Shan Qing, if you don’t want me staying here anymore, I’ll go find somewhere else… Don’t pretend you don’t know me… I… I’ll leave on my own…”
Shang You gently bit her lip, looking stricken.
Her sadness and helplessness washed over Tang Danqing. It was like a cat’s tongue brushing her heart, leaving it abruptly sore.
The only person who was so good-natured, so easy to bully, and spoke to her like this was—
Little Jelly. Hurt and dejected, she’d already lowered her eyes and started to leave.
Tang Danqing snapped out of it and hurried after her.
She caught hold of the woman, then stammered, both disbelieving and flustered. “I’m sorry, Jelly… Jelly, is that really you? I’m sorry. You look a little different from before. I didn’t recognize you right away…”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Don’t go. I didn’t want you to leave… I’m so happy to see you. I missed you so much…” Tang Danqing rushed to explain.
She was an idiot. Her brain had been so slow. She’d recognized the place the instant she saw the bedroom—every scene had been recreated exactly, down to the last detail.
Why hadn’t it occurred to her that Jelly could change from an animated character into… a real person?
But… God.
“Don’t be sad…” Tang Danqing heard herself say, instinctively trying to comfort Little Jelly as she reached to pat her head.
But as soon as she raised her arm, she seemed to stall. She stiffened, then lowered it again.
Shang You’s skin was pale and cool, her features as crisp and clean as a finely painted ink-wash portrait. Her cool beauty held a trace of gentleness; her lips were a glossy cherry red.
No matter how you looked at her, she was a grown woman—stunning, even, and… alluring.
How was she anything like the little blob of jelly from before?!
If not for her expression, her voice, and the way she acted, Tang Danqing would have had every excuse for not recognizing her at a glance.
Even those big, adorable eyes were different now. When Little Jelly looked at her pitifully, Tang Danqing saw rippling spring light. Just a moment ago, while pinning her down as an intruder, she’d been thinking that no beautiful woman would ever fool her by batting her eyes.
“What’s different about me?” Shang You asked, genuinely puzzled.
“You…” Tang Danqing stumbled over her words, then gave an awkward smile. “You’re prettier. A lot prettier…”
As she spoke, she quietly let go of Shang You’s hand. Holding it felt like ants were crawling over her skin. Something wasn’t right.
Shang You didn’t know whether Tang Danqing was deliberately flirting with her. She had nothing to say, so she kept quiet.
After a moment, she smiled. “Maybe it’s just been too long since we saw each other, Shan Qing. I missed you, too.”
Shang You raised her right hand and removed the silver ring. “Shan Qing, take this. It seems to be looking for you.”
She slid it onto Tang Danqing’s right middle finger.
The silver ring sat quietly at the base of Tang Danqing’s finger for a few seconds. Then tiny points of light rose from it and dispersed like mist. Once they were gone, the ring had vanished completely.
Only one message remained, and both Tang Danqing and Shang You sensed it at the same time—
[Spatial Storage Unlocked!]
At last.
Now that she’d returned the ring to Tang Danqing, Shang You could use her temporarily sealed spatial storage again.
Like Shang You, who had been bewildered and suspicious time and again, Tang Danqing wore the same stunned expression.
“What’s going on?”
…
Half an hour later, the suite’s living room held a calm storyteller and a woman questioning her entire existence.
With the easy composure of someone who’d been through a lot, Shang You merely glanced out the window again. “So this is your world.”
Without joy or sadness, she drew the blackout curtain shut over the small opening.
The suite remained cut off from the world, hidden in the blizzard.
The Switch still had the record of Tang Danqing and Shang You playing Contra together. The number of levels and save point were exactly where they should be.
Tang Danqing gripped the controller, real to the touch, while her mind struggled to sort through the stream of bizarre information.
The world of the game Extreme Cold Apocalypse had come to life in the real world.
The home she’d built had come, too. And the NPC in her home… No. She was a real person.
If the game was another real world, then Little Jelly had been a real person all along!
The twenty-second floor of the hotel she’d built in the game was exactly the twenty-second floor of the Yanyun Hotel where the film crew was staying. Even the presidential suite had the same layout!
Everything she’d ever bought had become real. The spatial storage feature was real, too. Little Jelly had already turned every Survival Coin she’d had left in the game into supplies.
Tang Danqing stared at the wealth filling her space…
When she thought about it, aside from the fact that everything was bizarre, her situation didn’t seem all that bad.
Tang Danqing even took a gun out of her space. She felt the barrel, tested the safety, and checked the magazine before putting it away again.
