Trapped in the Artist's Nightmare Chapter 2

The two men walked cautiously towards the small village.

Nathan Ke's eyesight has always been good, but the small village in the distance still looked blurry, with only a rough outline, like a low-pixel photo or an ancient painting.

"What do you think this is..." Owen Wei walked beside him tremblingly, talking to ease the fear in his heart, and kept looking to both sides, "Is this really not a dream? Do you think we have traveled through time? Or, or have we accidentally entered a parallel space? Can we still go back, do you think?"

"Shh, shut up for a moment," Nathan Ke lowered his voice, "The less you understand the situation, the calmer you need to be. You've wasted your time watching horror movies."

"Why does it have to be a horror movie? Stop scaring me!" Owen Wei didn't dare to speak louder and lowered his voice.

Nathan Ke was actually feeling very nervous as well.

The current situation happened too suddenly and too bizarrely, anyone would be confused.

Owen Wei was obviously frightened out of his wits. Both of them couldn't panic. One of them had to remain calm - at least appear calm on the surface.

The two tried to walk as lightly as possible. In the silent night, all movement seemed exceptionally loud, and in the dark and blurry places around them, there seemed to be some suppressed things or sounds that were about to burst out.

As we got closer to the small village, the scene in front of us became clearer and clearer. In the thick night fog, a dilapidated house made of earthen walls and mud and grass slowly appeared before our eyes.

There were seven or eight people standing on the outskirts of the village.

"Someone!" Owen Wei shouted softly, with surprise, fear and joy in his voice.

The fear comes from not being sure whether that group of people are actually people or "people".

Nathan Ke narrowed his eyes and looked at it, his voice more joyful: "It's a human."

He saw with his own eyes that there was a person inside fiddling with a cell phone.

Cell phone addicts are truly the most anxious creatures in the world. They look at their phones while driving, while taking their children to look at their phones, while crossing the road, and the first thing they do when they fall to the ground after being hit by a car is to look at their phones.

Even though I am in such a weird environment, I am still looking at my phone.

But you have to admit that when there are people using their cell phones, everything will seem... insignificant?

The two men quickened their pace and ran towards those people.

"Dude! What's going on? Does anyone know?" Owen Wei couldn't wait to ask one of the young men who had been watching them.

The man was about twenty years old, and was also wearing a baggy robe made of yellow and white linen. His hair was the same as Nathan Ke Owen Wei's, still in its original state, with the sides shaved short and a very greasy braid tied at the back of his head.

"Nine, ten." Pigtail counted and looked back at the others, "Three more, we have to wait."

"Brother, please explain it to me." Owen Wei asked.

Nathan Ke looked at these people.

There were men and women, young and old, middle-aged men with beer-filled bellies, and nervous and immature schoolgirls of sixteen or seventeen.

Without exception, everyone was wearing strange clothes made of linen.

Who are these people?

The braided boy glanced at Owen Wei, then at Nathan Ke, with no expression on his face: "Wait, three more people need to come, we'll talk about it when they're all here."

Owen Wei looked at Nathan Ke, and Nathan Ke gave him a look: Wait and see what happens.

While waiting in confusion, Nathan Ke observed secretly.

The first person I observed was the one playing with his cell phone just now.

He was a man in his thirties, wearing a pair of black-rimmed glasses. He kept his head down, with the light from the mobile phone screen shining on his face, making him look very numb and weird.

Nathan Ke also felt around himself and found his cell phone in his trouser pocket.

This is even more weird - although the clothes have changed, the things he had on him before are still there, including the cell phone, the house keys and half a pack of chewing gum.

It’s like only the style and texture of the clothes on my body have changed, nothing else has changed.

---What the hell is going on?

Nathan Ke unlocked the phone with his fingerprint and found that the screen finally lit up, but the top displayed "No Signal".

...Depend on.

It's simply the usual routine of a melodramatic movie - when you need to call the police or contact others, your cell phone always has no signal, when you need to drive away, you can never start the car, and when you need to open the door to take refuge, you can never find the key the first time.

Putting the phone back in his pocket, Nathan Ke looked around and his eyes involuntarily fell on one of the tallest people.

This person really stands out from the crowd, not only in terms of his height, but also in his appearance.

With fair skin, handsome eyebrows, a stern expression, and a calm temperament, no matter how many people he is standing in a crowd, you can notice him at first sight.

Even though he was wearing coarse linen clothes, it looked like mourning for others, but he looked like a free and easy wandering crane, with the elegance of the Wei and Jin dynasties.

This person noticed Nathan Ke's gaze, glanced at him indifferently, then looked away calmly, looking into the distance where the scenery was blurry.

Owen Wei couldn't hold back a bit, looked around, and rubbed against the side of the 16- or 17-year-old student girl, and asked in a low voice: "Girl, do you know what's going on?"

The student girl's face turned pale: "I don't know either... I just got here... They didn't tell me... What should I do... I'm scared... I'm scared..." As she spoke she began to sob.

Seeing that he had made the girl cry, Owen Wei quickly patted her shoulder and said, "Hey, don't cry. There are so many people here. It's okay. We can find a way back together in a while. Don't be afraid."

"I just came in to look at a painting, how come it turned out like this..." The student girl wiped her tears and sobbed, "My mom asked me to go home early. If it wasn't raining, I wouldn't have come in to take shelter from the rain. How come it turned out like this..."

She seemed afraid to say the word "terrible" and started crying again.

"Look at paintings? Are you going to the art museum to look at paintings too?" Owen Wei asked hurriedly.

The female student nodded: "I went in just to avoid the rain. If I had known this would happen, I would have gone out soaking wet instead of coming in!"

"Is it the Starry Sky Art Museum?" Owen Wei asked.

The student girl continued to nod.

"Is it the exhibition hall of the secret P*rnographic pictures?" Owen Wei asked again.

"Ah?" The schoolgirl looked up at him with tears on her face.

"Uh, no, it's that dark exhibition hall. There are no windows. All the paintings are blurry and can't be seen clearly." Owen Wei gestured.

The female student nodded: "It was the dark exhibition hall. The power went out as soon as I entered. Then a light came on, and then I... ended up here for no apparent reason..." Then she started crying again.

Owen Wei turned to look at Nathan Ke: "So everyone came here this way."

Nathan Ke raised his eyes and looked at the people in front of him. These people were quite strange.

If everyone had come to this strange place in the same way, they would have been as confused and flustered as Owen Wei and him. Even if they could suppress their panic, they would have asked questions like Owen Wei and tried to find a reasonable explanation. Most people were not as quiet and calm as they were now, as if...

It's as if I've gotten used to it, or understood the reason behind it.

Nathan Ke winked at Owen Wei.

The two of them grew up wearing the same open-crotch pants, and they have a perfect understanding of each other. They can understand each other's thoughts with just a glance.

Owen Wei shut his mouth and stood next to Nathan Ke calmly, intentionally or unintentionally keeping a certain distance from these people.

After waiting for more than forty minutes, three more people came to the depths of the withered grass in the wilderness. One of them looked familiar. Nathan Ke thought about it and remembered that this person was the owner of the pancake stall opposite the art museum.

"I just went into the art museum to find a toilet to pee, why did I end up here?!" The pancake stall owner looked at everyone with a look of surprise and confusion on his face.

"Everyone is here." The greasy braided man ignored the three newcomers' questions and turned to look at the others, "You can go in now."

"Where are you going? Where is this?!" The pancake shop owner grabbed his arm.

The pigtailed girl glanced at him, her face still expressionless, but her voice sounded a bit eerie: "In the painting."

"---Painting? What painting?" The pancake shop owner was confused.

"Did you enter an art gallery? Did you enter an exhibition hall? Was there a painting glowing in the exhibition hall? And then did you come into this place?" Pigtail asked a series of questions impatiently.

"Yes...yes, what's wrong? That painting is quite strange..." The pancake owner vaguely realized something.

"You are in that painting now!" The girl with pigtails shook him off and strode into the village following the others who had already started moving.

Nathan Ke and Owen Wei, who were listening at the side, looked at each other in bewilderment.

"Is this true?" Owen Wei was distraught. "How could a person enter the painting... I don't believe it..."

"I don't believe it!" the last three people shouted, "How is this possible! Where is this? Who are you? What on earth do you want to do?!"

No one paid any attention, and those who were ahead just walked towards the village.

Owen Wei looked at Nathan Ke: "What should we do? Should we follow them or..."

These people behave strangely, and I don’t know whether it will be a blessing or a curse to follow them.

Nathan Ke looked around and gritted his teeth: "Follow me."

Two of the three people who came later refused to follow and stayed where they were, shouting and yelling. The pancake boss strode up to them, grabbed one of the people in the front, and shouted with glaring eyes: "Don't leave! You have to explain the matter clearly! What on earth is going on?!"

The one he was grabbing was the young man who stood out from the crowd.

The man stopped and looked at him calmly: "This is in the painting. As for why people are in the painting, I don't know. But if you want to go out and return to your original world, it's best to follow us."

His voice was just like him, very cold.

The pancake shop owner wanted to grab him and continue asking questions, but he was pinched on the wrist. The pancake shop owner felt pain and was forced to let go.

This group of people didn't care whether the later ones caught up or not, as if they had waited for more than 40 minutes just to gather the people.

Nathan Ke counted them and there were thirteen people in total.

Judging from what this person said just now, this group of people seemed to be very familiar with this strange situation, and also knew how to return to the original world. Nathan Ke felt that if he and Owen Wei wanted to leave here, they still had to find a way to get along well with these people.

With that in mind, he caught up with the man in a few steps, walked side by side with him, looked at him with a gentle voice and harmless expression: "Hey, buddy, you see, this is the first time for us to encounter something like this, so we can't help but ask a few more questions. Can you tell us in detail what's going on and how to get out of here?"

The man also glanced at him indifferently, his eyes fell forward again, and his voice was still cold: "If you want to leave, there is only one way: survive and find the signature."

sign?