Death encore

"Do you understand everything you've been told, Mr. Conroy?"

Silence, a stifled silence; coldness, piercing coldness. His eyes remained wide open, not a word escaping him. The halo in his eyes gradually diminished, as if all vitality had been drained.

This wasn't a dream.

It was over, everything was over. The dream ended, even his life ended.

No insurance payout, Linda left with nothing. Their house would become a heavy burden. Even if she resisted, after the bank repossessed the house, she'd have no choice but to return to her parents' home with Shane. Slowly, she would forget about him. After his death, his presence in this world would fade away, eventually vanishing completely, as if he had never existed. Even his mother, who suffered from Alzheimer's, wouldn't remember him.

Everything was a lie, a beautiful lie.

The White House claimed Iraq posed a threat, that they orchestrated 9/11, so the entire nation rallied for war. Yet, they became entangled in a quagmire from which they couldn't escape. Who cared about the innocent soldiers on the battlefield? The company declared that the job in Iraq was not dangerous at all and promised lucrative rewards. So he left his home without hesitation, hoping to do something with his own hands for Linda and Shane. But now he was trapped in this small box, waiting quietly for death, while all they cared about was how to evade insurance payouts.

How ridiculous, how absurd, how desolate.

But even more tragic, he couldn't even muster his anger now. He was consumed by a sense of powerlessness, the weight of despair leaving him breathless. Was he alone now? Linda didn't answer the phone. Shane was at school. The White House rescue team didn't appear. On the other end of the line, a cold-blooded creature just wanted to finish the job quickly. There was nothing left. No hope, no follow-up, this was the end.

"Mr. Conroy?" The voice on the other end called again, but he remained unresponsive. "That concludes our interview with Paul Conroy. I am now turning off the recorder. "

His eyes widened, yet those deep brown eyes were vacant, devoid of any sign of life. A single, scorching tear slid down his cheek, but before it could reach the ground, it evaporated into thin air. He had even lost his tears.

As Chu Jiashu, he had died once; as Paul Conroy or perhaps Renly Hall, he couldn't distinguish anymore. Whether Renly was a dream or Paul was a dream, he couldn't tell. But whoever he was, it was time to end it all, once again.

To die once more.

The fear of death? The yearning for survival? The longing for freedom? All gone. All extinguished with icy finality. Nothing remained, he couldn't even feel the pain. He lay still, waiting for death to arrive. The entire world turned gray, vast and mighty, but he lacked the strength to struggle, let alone escape.

Quietly savoring the world's disintegration, what a wondrous thing it was. His lips curved slowly, gently, forming a faint arc— a smile.

The silence was so still that it created an illusion of time standing still. On the other end of the phone, a prolonged wait yielded no response. It seemed as if even the sound of breathing had vanished. A sense of sadness crept in as he whispered, "I'm sorry." Gone was the business-like tone, replaced by a faint heaviness. Amid the faint glow of his cellphone, these words hung, imbued with a melancholy akin to a rabbit's death and a fox's mourning.

He terminated the call and lowered his arm slowly. His gaze remained fixated on the wooden plank above him. The flashlight he held against his chest flickered twice before finally stabilizing. A touch of radiance seemed precarious against the oppressive darkness, on the brink of extinguishing.

Lying there, the sound of his breath gradually faded, the rise and fall of his chest quieted, and the curve of his lips returned to its original state. The brilliance within his deep brown eyes gradually dissipated. Gone were the anger, the despair, the sarcasm—replaced by nothingness. Only calmness remained, allowing him to witness the process of faint vitality fading away along with its brilliance.

Ah. The world fell silent once again.

In a trance, he returned to the bed of his past life. It was a white expanse, where doctors and nurses rushed around in a blur. Ding Yanan's tearful face was etched with despair and shock. In the surging crowd, her visage became increasingly blurred. The cacophony around him began to fade, and the world grew dimmer. He knew there wouldn't be another chance. This was the end, a point of void.

"... Renly."

A distant, echoing voice reached from the vast horizon, unclear and ambiguous. Lost in the boundless darkness, it seemed impossible to discern direction or content—merely the howling of the wind.

"... Renly." The voice continued to drift, its hollow echo frail and fragile. Suddenly, the voice surged across the vastness of space, erupting directly in his ears. "Renly!"

A beam of light exploded within his pupils. The blinding radiance surged into his eyes, and the searing pain forced his body to instinctively shut his eyes. The intense light, almost scorching, dissipated all darkness in an instant. Even with his eyes closed, he felt the boiling heat. Yet, he lacked the strength to touch it, his brain unable to process.

"Renly! What in God's name is happening? Renly! Renly!"

The anxious voice roared in his ears, as if a tremendous force was dragging him upward from the depths of the ocean. Suddenly, he broke the surface, his lungs starved for air, and he inhaled a massive gulp of oxygen. "Gasp." He involuntarily took a breath of cold air, his eyes reopening. His muscles tensed to the extreme, rendering his body immobile, but his gaze remained fixed on the light source above him, causing a faint ache in his eyes.

"Renly? Answer me! Renly!"

"Hoo, hoo, hoo..." He breathed heavily, inhaling deeply. His soul had returned to his body. He turned his head in a daze, trying to find a reference point in his blurred vision. Distant figures lost their faces, each wearing identical masks. Even those who were close wore the same white, featureless masks. His confusion deepened as he was surrounded by question marks without answers.

Who was he? Was this a dream or reality? How should he differentiate? Was he Paul or Renly, or perhaps just a dream of Chu Jiashu? Was he buried alive? Was he rescued? Did he survive? Or was he still filming? What was the deal with the hotel? What was a dream and what was reality? What had happened? What was the current situation?

"... Where am I now?" Struggling, he finally voiced a question.

Rodrigo looked at the figure before him, tears inexplicably welled up in his eyes. He knew he looked disheveled, but he couldn't control himself. He wiped the hot tears from his cheeks. "Warehouse. We're in a warehouse. This is the set." Rodrigo didn't understand why Renly would ask such a question, but he did his best to answer.

"Do you remember? We were filming, and then... you fell asleep because you were too exhausted. After waking you up, we resumed shooting. Are you alright now? If you need to, we can pause today's work, and you can take a rest. Don't worry about the warehouse rental fee; our funds are quite sufficient right now..."

Rodrigo continued speaking, but Renly raised a hand to stop him. He turned his head again, looking at faces that gradually became clearer in his line of sight—faces both unfamiliar and familiar, filled with panic and shock. Their gazes fixated on his shoulders, as though... as though he had narrowly escaped death.

"So, we were just filming." Renly's brain functioned somewhat sluggishly, and he still felt somewhat hazy. He had just been referred to as "Renly," which meant this was reality, right? But how could he be sure? Was he supposed to seek the unsteady feeling of falling, like in "Inception"? Or perhaps find his totem?

His jumbled thoughts began to converge. He raised his head again, meeting Rodrigo's urgent expression. The lingering tears in his eyes reflected his pale, desperate face. "... Was the filming of that scene just now successful?"

Everything lacked a sense of reality, yet everything was also too real. The boundary between illusion and reality was extraordinarily blurred. The current moment seemed indistinguishable from the previous one. At least he was "alive" now. Even if it was an illusion, he was alive. He needed some time to sort out his thoughts.

For now, let's assume he was Renly, let's assume that they were just filming, and let's assume that watching the script in the hotel and falling asleep were just part of a dream.

"Good." Rodrigo's words stumbled a bit. Renly's question caught him off guard. Given Renly's terrible state just a moment ago, and now he was asking about the filming progress? This... this... truly left Rodrigo at a loss for how to respond. But looking at it from another angle, Renly had delivered an outstanding performance, and if the camera hadn't faithfully recorded it, that would have been their fault. "Perfect! I mean," Rodrigo quickly corrected himself, "everything was flawless. The camera angles were perfect, and there's no need for reshoots. It was incredible, truly an outstanding performance!"

In his mind, he couldn't think of any actor who could reach such heights. Not even Robert De Niro, not even Al Pacino, not even Marlon Brando. Though he might lack knowledge, though his judgment might be unfair, though he might be easily amazed, this was his thought. The performance just now was undoubtedly worthy of being recorded in history!

"That's good. Isn't it? This is a good thing, right?" Renly's feeble voice quipped, followed by a fit of intense coughing.