Zhengyi closed his eyes.

This is really terrible!

"When did she leave?" Yiren's voice sounded so panicked.

"Miss Diwu doesn't know when Miss Lüqiu left the apartment. Miss Lüqiu came out quietly. Miss Diwu already asked the security at the apartment. The guard on the apartment lobby floor said that Miss Lüqiu had left the apartment building earlier," said Caihong.

"She must have gone here," Yiren guessed.

"That's right, Uncle! "Miss Lüqiu wrote a message that she was going to this mall," replied Caihong.

"How did she know we were here?" Qiuzhen frowned.

"Earlier, when Uncle Duanmu called to the apartment, he told Miss Lüqiu that the police used this mall as a transit point. Maybe she already guessed that when we arrived here on the way home, we were hungry and would buy food here."

Zhengyi smiled wryly. Miss Lüqiu, who just got to know them, could already easily read their minds.

"Then she's already here!" said Yiren.

They all looked at each other as they realized the worst that had happened. But before they could digest it all, a buzzing sound was suddenly heard. This buzzing sound seemed to have a rhythm. Very similar to drum beats in music. They felt very uneasy when they listened to that voice.

"What is this sound?" Qiuzhen raised his hands. He tried to cover his ears. "How can a sound like this cause anxiety?"

"Maybe there is another voice that accompanies this voice. It is the other sound that makes us nervous," said Zhengyi.

"So Yige means, maybe this sound is a low-frequency sound that bothers us?" Yiren asked.

"There are certain institutions that often make low-frequency sounds to make prisoners feel restless when they are interrogating people. The prisoners can't hear the sound, but they can feel its effect, which is a sense of heightened anxiety. In such an agitated state, they will find it much more difficult to lie during interrogation," Zhengyi said.

The sound was getting more and more annoying. Their ears hurt. Instantly, Zhengyi followed what Qiuzhen did. But it was not very useful. He could still hear everything because his ears were not tightly closed. In addition, covering both ears did not make his anxiety disappear.

"I don't think this is the same as the one used to interrogate people," Qiuzhen said.

"I don't know. Maybe this is the development of the previous technology," said Zhengyi.

"I mean, this pain comes from the sound we're currently hearing, not from the low-frequency sound we can't hear!" Qiuzhen again covered his ears. This time he did it differently than before, which was to close it tightly. At least, that's what Zhengyi saw.

As before, Zhengyi also followed what Qiuzhen did. He covered his ears to ease the pain a little. But over time, this method also did not work. The sound was getting louder and more painful to the ears. The other people in the diner were already rolling on the floor, covering their ears. Almost everyone screamed in pain.

When he ran out earlier, Shanquan had nothing with him. He left the small waist bag on the table. Zhengyi took the small bag. He quickly opened it. He remembered that he had bought Shanquan a pair of earplugs a few months ago. At that time, he bought it just for fun. While walking on a busy street, he saw street vendors selling their wares. Among the items being sold, there were various earplugs. Because the price was so low, he bought several pairs. When he got home, he distributed the earplugs to all his friends. Shanquan accepted the earplugs happily. Zhengyi remembers well that Shanquan immediately put the earplugs he gave him into this small waist bag. After that, Zhengyi never saw Shanquan wearing those earplugs. So, the earplugs should still be in Shanquan's waist bag right now.

Turned out his guess was correct. The earplugs were still inside. It's even still in the plastic packaging. Apparently, Shanquan had never opened the packaging at all. Without wasting time, Zhengyi quickly tore off the plastic packaging that wrapped the earplugs.

"You wear this!" Zhengyi held out the earplugs to Yiren.

"No! Please, use it. You have more right." Yiren brushed off Zhengyi's hand.

Zhengyi held out the thing to Qiuzhen, who also rejected it at once.

"No need. Thank you. Yige is older than me."

Caihong also shook his head when Zhengyi handed him the earplugs. "I'm still young, Uncle," he said briefly.

What does age have to do with it? I'm no more vulnerable than you guys.

Since no one was willing to accept it, Zhengyi immediately put the earplugs into his own ears. The earplugs turned out to be very useful. Zhengyi couldn't hear any sound. Regarding the anxiety and pain that hit him, it did lessen, although it didn't completely disappear.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Zhengyi looked at his surrounding places. His gaze fell on a room.

Ah! That's a reasonable idea!

"All of you follow me!" Zhengyi pointed to three of his friends.

Zhengyi then ran to the restroom in the restaurant. His three friends followed closely behind. Zhengyi went into the place and took the toilet paper roll provided inside. He handed the toilet paper roll to Qiuzhen, Yiren, and Caihong. They quickly tore off the tissue paper and used it to plug their ears. Zhengyi knew that might not help much, but at least it was much better than nothing.

The four of them were still crammed into the toilet when suddenly the lights went out.

What else is this? After a burst of light, a disturbing sound, and now, the power went out! As I recall, the strange noise and power outage didn't occur in the incident a few days ago!

None of the four of them were carrying flashlights. They left the house in the morning. Of course, it was unthinkable that they would need the help of a flashlight. In complete darkness, Zhengyi could not see anything.

Now, what should we do?

In the darkness, Zhengyi felt a hand touch his shoulder. Zhengyi didn't know whose hand it was. The hand gesture was sign language. Zhengyi recognized the cue, which meant telling him to stay calm and not move. Zhengyi didn't know who invented such sign language, but it was Songfei who taught them. He could only hope that Caihong would also know what the hand gesture meant. Had he not known and had chosen to run outside, things would have been much worse.

Even though he couldn't see, Zhengyi knew their circumstances. Because the restroom was narrow, Zhengyi could feel that his three friends weren't standing. Maybe because their ears hurt so badly, they had to squat or curl up on the floor to reduce the pain. Zhengyi, even though he was wearing earplugs, he still felt pain in his eardrums. He could only imagine his friends must have been in much worse pain than he had.

What about the other guys out there who don't plug their ears at all? I can't imagine how they felt!

Zhengyi felt that everynseconds they passed was like the movement of a snail. He really hoped that such discomfort would pass soon. On the one hand, such a thing was very annoying. But on the other hand, it was a precious experience. Zhengyi imagined that someday he would have a lot of material to tell his grandchildren.

After being in that state for a while, the pain in his ears seemed to have lessened a lot. Zhengyi wasn't sure if the pain had subsided because the cause had stopped or that he had gotten used to it a bit, so it wasn't as painful as before. But over time, the pain did go away little by little. And finally, Zhengyi did not feel the pain in his ear anymore. Actually, it's not that he didn't feel pain at all, but there were no attacks of pain like before. The pain that was still there was a remnant from a previous pain attack.

He ventured to remove slowly one earplug in his ear. After removing the thing, he didn't hear the buzzing sound that had been so annoying. He didn't feel the restlessness that had plagued him before. Zhengyi then removed the earplug from his other ear.

"It's stopped! The sound has stopped!" Zhengyi shook the bodies of his friends, who were huddled together in the toilet. They didn't react. Zhengyi was worried that they had lost consciousness. He shook their bodies again until one of them squirmed.

"Ouch! My head hurts so bad!" The squirming body let out a sound.

Zhengyi could tell that it was Qiuzhen's voice. He touched Qiuzhen's body and motioned with his right hand. He told Qiuzhen that the noise had stopped. Qiuzhen could release clumps of toilet paper that clogged Qiuzhen's ears.

"Ah! What a relief," said Qiuzhen. Apparently, he had removed the lump of tissue from his ear.

The two of them then shook the bodies of their other two friends. After trying for a while, Yiren and Caihong came to their senses. Zhengyi could hear their voices.

"How long have I been unconscious for?" Yiren asked.

"I don't know. But I think it's only for a moment," Zhengyi answered.

"My ears still hurt a lot," said Caihong.

"Let's just stay here for now," said Qiuzhen. "It's even more dangerous if we go out."

"What about Dage?" Zhengyi asked.

"We just hope he found a way to protect himself," Qiuzhen replied.

"Then, what about Miss Lüqiu?" Caihong asked.

Qiuzhen sighed. "We're not absolutely sure that at the time of the incident, Miss Lüqiu was already in this building. It's possible that she was still on her way here."

"Or she was still outside the building," said Yiren.

Zhengyi nodded. "I really hope she hasn't had the chance to enter this building yet."

"Eh! What time is it?" Yiren slapped his forehead.

They all fell silent, realizing that they had something else to do.

"It's not twelve o'clock yet," said Caihong. His watch was a special watch that could give off a little light. Although it could not be used as a flashlight, the long and short hands of the watch could be seen clearly.

"We can't possibly go down to the parking lot in a situation like this," said Yiren.

"So, now what?" Caihong's voice sounded like a very anxious person's.

Turns out he can panic too!

"Actually, it doesn't have to be Dage, does it? The one who has to take calls from those criminals?" Zhengyi asked.

"It doesn't have to be Dage. The thugs want to talk to Dage because Dage is the leader of our group. But I think they already know who the people in our house are. So even if Shyongge takes their call, that's okay too," said Yiren.

"Hopefully so," said Caihong.

"Now we wait here quietly until the electricity comes on," Qiuzhen said.

"Eh! What is this?" shouted Zhengyi. He was currently sitting on the toilet floor, just like the others. His palm touched something like soft plastic wrap.

"Ah! That must be our food." Qiuzhen laughed. "Just when I ran here, I brought the packages here."

"What for?" Caihong asked. "Did you know that the electricity would go out?"

"I didn't know that the electricity would go out. It was just my instinct. When I had to go somewhere, and I didn't know what was going to happen next, then the things I could reach I would take with me."

"I also had time to bring Dage's waist bag," said Yiren.

Caihong laughed. "Uncles are all wonderful. All right, now let's just sit here nicely."

"Que será, será!" said Yiren.

"Que será, será." said Zhengyi.

The four of them sat on the slightly damp toilet floor. Patiently waiting for the power to come on again.