The candlelight illuminated all the animal faces that turned around.
This made the young Wordsworth feel inexplicably frightened.
He didn't move to the front row, he just stood there.
On the stage, the doe's eyes originally held hope, but when he saw Wordsworth standing still, the light in her eyes slowly faded.
"What's the matter, Wordsworth?" Pan's shadow asked on the stage, "Don't you want to stay here?"
Relying on the candlelight, shadows were cast on the addicted people and came to Wordsworth.
The boy in the red shirt still grabbed the pen in his pocket and said, "Although I really want to stay,
"But, there are still things I want to do."
"What do you want to do, Wordsworth?" The shadow is cast on the body of a raccoon addict in front of the moonlight.
In order not to attract attention, the pianist even breathed softly.
The goat raised his head: "I want to be a playwright."
"Oh..." Pan's voice was quite soft, "Our Wordsworth has a heart that wants to 'go out'.
"You want to leave 'Downtown' and chase your dreams, right?"
I heard the flavor of "tolerance" and "understanding" from Pan's shadow. Wordsworth, who was originally a little scared, could finally speak smoothly:
"Yes, Mr. Shadow -
"I know the rules. I will keep it a secret. No one will know about the existence of this place!"
Wordsworth had long heard of people who chose to refuse the "ritual of stay" and leave Paradise.
Although I heard that their situation is not very good, but...
He still wanted to go out and give it a try.
The shadow's voice laughed: "Don't worry about this. The key point is - Wordsworth, have you really thought about it clearly?"
Almost without hesitation, he nodded.
After nodding, he himself was surprised by his decision.
He didn't realize that he wanted to get out so badly.
“Okay…” Shadow said as if talking to himself, “Some people grow up before they grow up.
"It's not that you have to leave - Midnight Paradise can't keep people like you."
The shadow turned around and walked away lifelessly, as if he decided to ignore this fool again and wanted to leave this joyful and warm fireplace and plunge into the snowy world.
"You'll regret it sooner or later."
When the shadow walked towards the stage, the entire hall of addicts fell into a depressed mood.
Wordsworth stood on tiptoes, walked through the crowd and waved to Tina, who was stunned on the stage.
The doe blinked, bewildered.
In the candlelight, she wanted to wave goodbye, but when she saw the heavy footsteps of Peter Pan's shadow, she still couldn't raise her hand.
Wordsworth's throat moved, his body trembling slightly, he turned around and strode outside.
I chose to leave!
I can leave!
None of the addicts looked back, and naturally did not see him take off his goat hood and reveal his thin and delicate face.
He rushed out of the door at a trot, looking at the dark front with mixed feelings in his heart.
Expectation, hesitation, excitement, uneasiness...
His eyes were fixed on the front, but he was completely unaware of two things——
The golden ticket stub was tightly attached to the back of his soul, as if it forever revealed his origin.
A huge silhouette appeared in the woods outside the Addict's House.
It seems to have tree-like horns on its head, with black buds on the horns.
The things in the shadows quietly stared at the back of the departing young man...
Inside the cave, the fire stopped.
A symbolic picture appeared in the hall of addicts:
The boy in red shirt wearing a goat hood was walking out of the cave.
On the other side, a girl in a green dress and a doe's hood is walking towards the shadow of Peter Pan on the stage.
One side was dyed a dangerous red by the light, while the other was a soft green.
"Is this...?" Yue Guang looked at it with some confusion.
Sean murmured: "After everything you have experienced, you need answers...
“What choices bring pain, and what choices lead to everlasting joy?”
This is what the gray rabbit girl said before.
"That is to say, now that we have seen the scenes from the past, it is time for us to make a choice regarding her question." Moonlight nodded.
He looked questioningly at the other two companions.
There is no doubt that everyone agrees that green should be chosen.
After all, this is not about giving them the choice of whether or not to accept the "stay ritual," but rather answering what is the "right" choice in the context of the addict.
It was an obvious warning.
And if they, the people participating in the game, give answers that the questioner doesn't want...
Even in a better situation, you may lose the game outright.
And losing the game in Midnight Paradise will never end well.
Sean and the four stepped into the soft green light.
Then, the layer of gray that had surrounded the hall of addicts, symbolizing the past, receded.
Time has arrived, and Sean and others are still mixed in the crowd in the hall.
The shadow of Peter Pan was still standing on the stage: "This is a scene that really happened here...
"Wordsworth, that silly boy...
"After he left Midnight Paradise, he didn't get what he wanted."
Suddenly, Wordsworth's shadow appeared on the smooth stone wall.
His shadow walked into a house, and the owner of that house promised to guide him in writing, and slowly cultivated him into his own "gunman"...
The shadows on the wall interpret Wordsworth's later stories.
The shadow's performance was reflected in the eyes of all the addicts present, allowing them to understand how terrifying it is to "leave Midnight Paradise and enter the adult world."
Finally, the shadow of the young man on the wall raised a sharp knife and stabbed his "mentor".
A bloody and tragic ending.
When everyone was feeling uncomfortable or obsessed with the tragedy that appeared on the wall, only Sean frowned:
"Could it be said that it was because of Peter Pan's intervention that Wordsworth's life fell into an irreversible tragedy?
"Now this is used as a warning to make the children in Xiacheng District choose to perform the stay ceremony instead of going out?"
The shadow is still replaying the carnage of that night.
Blades, blood, madness...
"However, there is a problem here." Sean raised his hand unconsciously, trying to caress his chin, but he only touched the hair on the gray wolf's chin. "Through this journey, one thing has become obvious - Peter Pan's magical power mainly lies in creating the spirit world and the rules of the game...
"How could he have arranged for Wordsworth to meet the old playwright Mourning?"
Powers involving "fate" are rare, even among gods.
"Is everything a coincidence?"
"He is just using this coincidence to educate addicts?"
It is unknown at the moment.
However, Sean always felt that Wordsworth's tragedy was not a coincidence.
Thinking like this, he unconsciously began to look through the "filing cabinets" that stored a large amount of information in the "Shengen Space".
The moonlight on one side seemed to suddenly remind him of something.
He craned his neck, searching with his eyes among all the addicts watching the "shadow play."
Soon, he saw the figure he was looking for——
That doe.
She is still the height she was then. Standing in the corner, the green color of the skirt has faded a little.
On the wall, Wordsworth's tragic fate was reflected in her eyes...
But she remained unmoved, just watching quietly, as if just staring at the swaying shadows of the trees.
