Cold.
Mo Ling struggled awake, his entire body aching. He instinctively tried to stretch, but his head slammed into a hard wall.
THUD!
'What's going on?' Mo Ling rubbed his head. 'Why is there a wall in my bed?'
Wincing in pain, Mo Ling forced his eyes open.
Faintly glowing metal walls illuminated the small space. He was leaning against the back wall, sitting with his knees curled up in his pajamas, unable to even straighten his legs.
'Where am I?'
Mo Ling was lost in confusion, unable to understand why he was trapped here.
'Have I been kidnapped?'
Mo Ling reached out, feeling around the cramped space for an exit.
The metal walls were perfectly smooth, the seams invisible.
He turned around, but the view behind him was no different. All four sides were identical.
Carefully, Mo Ling looked up and knocked on the metal panel above. It made no sound.
Even the floor was the same smooth, indestructible metal, forged from some unknown material.
It was oppressive and cramped, creating a suffocating feeling.
Mo Ling estimated the size of the cubic space. It was about one cubic meter.
In other words, he was locked inside a 1m x 1m x 1m metal cage.
"But why am I trapped here?"
Mo Ling replayed the events before he fell asleep, but everything had been completely normal.
Until he woke up here.
After moving around a bit, Mo Ling scooted into a corner and sat down. Now, at least, he could straighten his body and relieve his aching joints.
RUMBLE~
But just as he'd solved the issue of space, his stomach started to rumble, and hunger washed over him.
"Is anyone there!" Mo Ling shouted, but his voice was swallowed by the metal walls as if it were nothing.
Panic began to set in again. He beat desperately against the walls, earning nothing but pain in his hands.
'Am I going to be trapped here until I die?'
Frantically, Mo Ling searched his pajamas for any kind of tool.
But who keeps tools in their pajamas? Of course, he found nothing.
All Mo Ling found was a piece of candy he had casually shoved into his pocket the night before.
He was like an ant on a hot griddle, his mind spinning frantically.
But no matter how hard he thought, there was no way a frail young man like himself could break through a metal of unknown composition.
'Hope for rescue from the outside?'
He had no way of even sending out a message; the solid walls cut him off from everything, inside and out.
In the oppressive space, only despair remained.
Mo Ling raised his fist, wanting to punch the wall, but his strength gave out, and his arm fell limply to his side.
Lashing out would only cause him more pain and serve no other purpose.
The light in his eyes gradually faded. Mo Ling slumped to the floor.
'Guess I'll just wait for death.'
He began to wonder who he might have offended, or if his family had any enemies, but he couldn't think of a single reason for this.
Mo Ling was mild-mannered, and his family was honest and upright.
Just yesterday, he'd helped his neighbor carry something, and the old grandmother had given him a piece of candy.
Mo Ling took the candy from his pocket and looked at it.
Xiaohai Rabbit Milk Candy.
"At least I can taste something sweet before I die," he said with a bitter smile.
'Good people are supposed to be rewarded, right?'
With trembling hands, he unwrapped the candy and placed the precious morsel in his mouth.
A faint, milky sweetness.
The sweetness spread through his body. He had never felt such bliss. The churning in his stomach was slightly calmed.
He saw his own body. He saw the space he occupied. He saw the hard metal walls.
And then, it passed right through them.
A lush jungle. Raindrops dripped from emerald-green leaves. There was a clearing in the woods.
A one-cubic-meter metal Block stood in the center of it.
Once his perception was outside, it grew blurry. After reaching a certain distance from the Block, it could go no further.
It was the same in every direction.
His perception was trapped within an 11m x 11m x 11m cube, with the Block at its center.
He could even see clearly underground, though his perception was slightly obstructed there.
"Why can I see outside?"
The question jolted Mo Ling from his sweet reverie, but the abnormal perception remained.
He discovered that his mind was incredibly clear, moving about inside the metal block as freely as a fish in water.
Outside, his perception was a bit sluggish, but he could still see and hear in all directions.
'A rainforest?'
Watching the clear rainwater drip down, Mo Ling couldn't help but swallow.
'I'm so thirsty.'
A bead of water dripped from a massive leaf, seemingly about to land on Mo Ling's head.
He opened his hand, trying to catch the droplet, and then laughed at his own foolishness.
"How could I have forgotten that I'm trapped?"
DRIP!
'What's this sensation?'
It was cool and wet.
The droplet had landed squarely in Mo Ling's hand.
He didn't have time to think. He brought the precious water to his mouth and licked his palm clean.
The single drop of liquid moistened his chapped lips, sending a refreshing chill through him.
Once Mo Ling recovered his wits, he realized with a start that he had somehow caught that droplet in mid-air!
It hadn't phased through the metal wall—it had been caught by his consciousness!
'Let's try that again.'
Now that he had the hang of it, subsequent attempts were much easier.
Mo Ling mentally selected a square area in the air, and the objects within were seized and brought inside the metal Block.
Droplets of water, leaves, branches, clumps of dirt, stones...
Soon, the already small metal space was cluttered with all sorts of debris.
But that wasn't a problem.
Repeating the process, Mo Ling tossed all the items back out of the space.
Furthermore, his control over things inside the Block was even more effortless.
At this point, a daring thought appeared in his mind.
"Could I be thrown out, too?"
After some experimentation, the result left Mo Ling deeply disappointed.
Anything that detached from his body, like hair or dead skin, could be thrown out, but he himself could not.
It was like he couldn't be selected, no matter how he tried.
"This is just a bigger cage."
Like a prisoner at a barred window, he could see the blue sky outside, but it had nothing to do with him.
Within his small field of view, the rainforest scenery was repetitive and unchanging.
But at least he could now send a message.
A flash of inspiration struck Mo Ling. He transported a stone from outside and then tossed it up into the air.
Pulled down by gravity, the stone splashed into a puddle of water.
PLINK! PLINK! PLINK!
A continuous stream of stones began to fall beside the solitary metal block.
Mo Ling lost track of how long he'd been at it. When he was thirsty, he drank dew; when he was hungry, he chewed on earthworms.
Finally, a new movement appeared within his narrow field of perception.
Something was coming.
Two small, dark-skinned figures, about as tall as the metal block, stopped in front of Mo Ling's prison.
The dark-skinned figures wore ragged clothes made of grass. They were short and scrawny, with long, pointed ears and sharp, venomous fangs in their mouths.
Their bodies were covered in all kinds of totems painted with multicolored pigments.
They looked just like goblins from a video game and were chattering away in a strange language.
Mo Ling was stunned, and not just because he was seeing these fantastical creatures with his own eyes.
But because he could actually understand them!