The best way to get to know a person is to visit the place where he lives.
Yang An is a real workaholic. His office is his bedroom, because this small apartment only has this small room.
In this room, besides the bed, there is a 24-hour computer. There are stacks of drawings on the floor of the house. Even the walls are pasted with sketches of the maze. He seems to be integrated with the maze. He is also the most outstanding designer in the industry.
But now, even the top maze designers are facing a job crisis. In this fast-food game generation, no one will bother to explore the complex maze in the game.
Yang An sits in front of the computer. In the confined space, only the computer screen emits cold light. The narrow room makes people a little breathless. The air seems to have solidified, and it is too thick to breathe.
'Tick' The fingers of the mouse stirred the frozen air, and he opened an unread email.
'Create a maze as required, and take away any treasure in the maze after completion. Interested parties can send their resumes, and we will select the winners according to their resumes. Signature: God of Labyrinth. '
He unconsciously sent his resume to me, and I don't know how long it has been since he came to work.
He got up from the chair, which may be the reason why he hadn't gone out for a long time. The weakness of his limbs made his center of gravity a little unstable. The clock on the wall had passed three o'clock in the morning, and he fell directly on the bed with a dull brain. However, he had a headache but no sleep, and hunger but no appetite.
Yang An looked at his raised hand. The owner of that hand was once known as the genius of maze. He had participated in the production of the most complex maze in the world. He also cooperated with the most famous level designer. But with the impact of fast food culture and AI, the maze designer has gradually become less important.
Maybe the next one to be eliminated is this profession. It is not so easy for a person to stick to his original dream. Maybe he chose the wrong one at the beginning, but he can no longer look back.
Unwilling and distressed, Yang An stretched out his hand to the bedside.
Sleeping pills, he can find only a little happiness in his dream.
The medicine came quickly, and Yang An slowly let himself go back to the original and fell asleep.
This time he did not dream. Sometimes dreaming is also a luxury. He usually has many strange dreams, like experiencing others' life after life, and will feel that he is not real enough after waking up.
But this time he had a very real dream. In the dream, he felt that a pair of hands slowly tied his neck, making him suffocate until he woke up. Sweat seeped from his body, and he could not remember what he had dreamed.
He gasped and looked at the clock beside the bed. It was the next morning. Yang An pulled the edge of the curtain to block the dazzling sunlight. He began to hate the light. Only in the dark can he feel relieved.
Yang An prepares to get out of bed, but sees a girl sitting on the ground staring at herself. The long golden hair is tied in a bunch, which falls down like gold silk, bypassing the girl's body and placed in front of her.
"Hallucination, or dreaming?" He rubbed his aching head, feeling a little confused, and the whole person was too sleepy to lift up his spirit.
When I saw her clearly, I found that she was wearing the uniform of a courier. Her typical white skin color was as delicate as suet. Her pupils were the rare light green in the oil painting. She sat on the carpet like a doll, without feeling any emotion fluctuation. The only gently trembling eyelashes proved that this was a fresh life.
From the perspective of sitting posture, she should be an extremely disciplined person. From the beginning to now, she has been sitting quite straight, and has hardly moved anywhere except for her slightly undulating chest.
The girl still didn't say a word when she saw Yang An staring at her. This is a person who doesn't seem to intersect with him. It seems very inconsistent to appear here. Yang An even doubted whether he was still in a dream.
"How did you come in? Do we know each other?" After staring at each other, Yang An went to pour himself water, but found the thermos empty.
"I am Claire, the maid of the Labyrinth God." The foreigner named Claire said something like a joke seriously, "Come to respond to your previous request."
"Hello, my name is Yang An." Yang An subconsciously introduced himself and found out what was wrong. "Wait, the god of the labyrinth, suffering from the second disease?"
The other party took out a scroll, carefully opened it and spread it on the table, "This is the contract, and you can't go back if you sign your name."
Yang An scratches his head. What's wrong with that? He sits down and takes a look at the scroll. The contents on it are exactly like the deed of sale.
"Just ask, is today April Fool's Day?"
"Please choose whether to respond or not." Claire's face did not show any joking meaning. She stood opposite Yang An but kept looking at his pillow. "It seems that you have no choice."
Anyway, it has no legal effect. Yang An signed his own name on this' contract 'and only hoped that the other party would leave as soon as possible.
"That's all right."
Claire walked to Yang An's side. His slender figure seemed to be a head taller than him. His golden ponytail hung down and almost touched his bare feet
"You are joking," said Yang An, leaning back slightly to keep a distance from her. "Although I haven't cleaned myself for a long time, I'm still a living person."
"What a pity!" Claire's face showed sympathy. She turned around like a golden butterfly, and the golden super long horsetail swung across Yang An's body, leaving a touch of purple in Yang An's body through his chest.
She raised the sleeping pill on the head of the bed and turned to look at him
At the moment, Yang An is looking down at his body in horror. A purple color inside his chest is shining faintly through his clothes. It seems that there is haze in his brain.
"Why?" Yang An glared and took a step back. "Are you a ghost?"
Claire turned her head and smiled funny. "It's funny. A ghost said that."
A strong wind suddenly blew in the house, and the curtains were opened. The light pouring into the house dispersed the blocked air, just like the holy light coming to hell.
Yang An puts down his hand and wants to scold the other party, but he finds something lying on the bed.
The withered arm hangs on the floor, and countless tiny dust that cannot be explained is lingering on the withered skin. Is there a corpse lying on the bed?
Yang An suddenly felt a chill, and looked at the corpse in disbelief. He wore his usual clothes, which didn't look fake.
"Is it terrible? This person is you. He died about a month ago." Claire calmly told this fact. "It seems that you love life very much. Is it really OK to die like this?"
Am I dead? Yang An hung his head and thought carefully. He had not eaten for a long time and had not gone out for a long time. Death suddenly became so calm, like being told a very trivial thing.
"That contract is not a joke." In the face of such a situation, Yang An suddenly realized the importance of that contract, and he didn't even look at it carefully.
"Of course, once you sign it, you can't go back on it." Claire reopened the contract. "Although you can't go back on it, you'd better take a closer look. You should know more or less about your future destiny."
Yang An smiled bitterly and thought that the contract was no better. He took the parchment and read it carefully.
"Go to a different world to build a maze, and it will not be broken for at least 300 years. After the work is completed, you will be rewarded by the God of Maze."
"The specific requirements are as follows. First, the scale of the maze is not less than 500 square kilometers, which is too huge
"You are not allowed to build only one labyrinth, but 500 square kilometers in total."
Yang An sighed darkly. The total area of the maze he has designed for so many years may not be one tenth as large as this one.
"II. The popularity is no less than 150000 square kilometers around." This is good to say, not too big.
"III. The validity period of the maze must be at least 300 years. The God of the maze reserves the right to interpret the above matters. If there are other requirements, we will notify you later."
Yang An is silent. This is obviously an unequal treaty. In the end, Party B is not given any rights. Is it Party A's decision to make arrangements? However, it seems that the god of labyrinths doesn't know much about labyrinths, and the requirements are only for quantity, not for quality.
"How about that?" Claire hugged her shining golden hair, which was out of place with the room.
"This is not an easy job."
"Of course, you can choose to refuse, stay in this room and watch your body slowly rot and stink, and finally be found out until you are scared out of your wits." Claire calmly told Yang An's terrible future fate.
Yang An smiled bitterly. "I didn't say no, but I just wanted to win some benefits for myself." He looked at his body and said, "For example, what will happen to me after the task is completed?"
"I could have satisfied one of your wishes first, and then deleted your memory. But you are now dead, right? It's the biggest reward to be able to live again. If your work is done well, Lord Lilika may give you a seat of demigod."
"Is that to open a new life?" Yang An suddenly felt relaxed. For him, designing a maze is the whole of his life. Projection of the maze into the real world is a strategy, which is also good on the other hand.
"Well, after all, nothing will be left after death, and you don't want to disappear." Claire casually picked up a maze drawing, "Maybe it is because of your enthusiasm that Lilika chose you."
Yang An looked around his room. The gloomy room was filled with unknown particles under the sun. He looked at his body lying on the bed and felt that everything was like a nightmare.
"I didn't expect my life would end like this."
"I'll take you to see Lord Lilika. If you lose him, you'll become a ghost." Claire almost pointed to his nose and told him, "Even I can't find you again."
Yang An plays a drum in his heart. Although he has experienced death, this kind of unfolding still makes him feel like he is in a dream, so that his brain can't accept it. What will happen in the future? He felt that feeling again just like a child about to enter school.
