The cage door instantly slams shut, shocking Cristina and locking Jeric inside the cage. Then, the wooden door quietly opens by itself….

    Cristina clenches the steel bars in front of her, stunned by Jeric’s judgment. She glares at Jeric who is smiling at her reassuringly. “Are you crazy?!”

    “I’m not crazy,” Jeric retorts.  “I’ve just… made the best decision.”  

    “I can’t believe this is happening. You’re out of your mind.”

    Jeric lifts his right foot off button ‘A’. “Go ahead. Just… go.”

    “No…. NO! I won’t leave you. Why are you such a pain?!”

    “You think I want to risk our lives behind that… steel door?”  Jeric’s face suddenly turns serious. “We won’t stand a chance. It’s obvious! You know we can’t handle surprise attacks.”

    “But—”

    “Listen to me…. Go ahead and see the end of the tunnel. Then go back in here if you want to stay… or… if you’re afraid of being alone out there, okay? Now go.”

    “But—”

    “Just go! I’m forced to stay here for five hours, but at least there’s no monster in here…. Go ahead. And if you believe you have a golden heart, don’t abandon your hero.”

    Cristina exhales audibly, keeps quiet for several seconds, and finally utters her plan. “Okay…. So here’s what I’ll do: I’ll go ahead, scan the place outside, go back in here, report everything to you and then stay here with you for five hours.”

    “Good. But if you want to leave me—”

    “I won’t. I’ll be back. I promise.”

    “Good. Now go.”

    Cristina cautiously dashes through the tunnel, turns right, then left, and finally reaches a blue wooden door, panting and profusely sweating. “This must be it,” Cristina thinks as she grips the warm brass knob.  As soon as she opens the door, blinding sunlight darts onto her, forcing her to shield her eyes with her arm. She steps out into the open and hears the door thump behind her. Shocked, she turns around and frantically turns the knob as she pushes the door with her body. Unfortunately, the door doesn’t budge. She kicks the door repeatedly, almost ruining her gray rubber shoes, but it remains shut and unscratched. “Oh my God! Oh my God! Hey! What’s wrong with this door!? JERIC!”

    Cristina realizes that she’s all on her own now. With her vision already adjusted to the new surroundings, she quickly spots two other doors—a yellow door stands a few meters on the right of the blue door; a red door, on the left. She realizes that she’s actually standing at the foot of a mossy gray concrete wall about thirty meters high and stretching about a hundred meters on both sides. She gazes at the wall’s vastness for almost a minute, woozy and awestruck. She turns around and sees that a vast flat grassy field lies in front of her, so vast that the distant land seems to kiss the cloudless light green sky. Both sides of the field are fenced by thick forests stretching from both ends of the wall, making the whole place looks like an immense rectangular enclosure. On the grass, about two meters from the wall, a bright long red line of paint parallel to the wall exists. Beyond the line, several large red circles are painted on the grass on random areas, and Cristina assumes that more of these circles exist farther ahead.

    The sweltering heat worsens every passing second, forcing Cristina to desperately try opening the other doors. She fails. She...