“Wee-woo, wee-woo.”
The wail of police sirens drifted in from outside, sharp and piercing.
Xiao Hua, an ordinary resident of Blue Star, was currently lying in bed. Clad in a pair of wrinkled pajamas, he hadn't closed his eyes for a full day and night.
His eyelids felt as heavy as lead, yet his mind remained painfully clear. He could hear the sounds of footsteps and harsh shouting coming from his neighbor's house.
Mustering his energy, he rolled off the bed and ran barefoot to the balcony.
A cold breeze blew past, fluttering the collar of his pajamas.
Below, he saw police officers escorting a man out. The man's hair was as messy as a bird's nest, and he was wearing slippers. Flanked by two officers, he was half-dragged and half-carried into a police car.
“Officers, I just posted a few things online! Why are you arresting me?!” the man cried out, his voice thick with indignation.
He was still struggling, his shoulders twisting, until an officer pinned him down.
The police car door slammed shut with a heavy thud.
The red and blue lights flashed as the vehicle drove away through the residential complex. Its taillights flickered one last time at the corner before vanishing completely.
Xiao Hua stood on the balcony, his fingers cold as they gripped the railing.
He recognized that neighbor. The man lived in the adjacent unit; they weren't close, having only met a few times in the elevator to exchange a nod and a smile.
He seemed to be a freelancer who worked from home, writing some kind of third-rate novels, locked away in his room all day cranking out words on a computer.
Xiao Hua never expected the man would be arrested just for posting something.
Blue Star had always been relatively lenient toward public speech, as long as one didn't cross the red lines.
But this time, things seemed truly different.
Xiao Hua rubbed his eyes. They were so dry it hurt, his tear ducts seemingly blocked. He had to blink several times just to squeeze out a tiny bit of moisture.
Ever since he contracted Nightmare Sickness, he had been forcing himself to stay awake. From yesterday until now, his eyelids had barely closed.
Every time he shut his eyes, he feared that darkness would come surging back.
He didn't dare sleep, terrified that if he did, he would never wake up again.
Yet his body craved sleep—a biological instinct. He was like a drowning man trying to grab a piece of driftwood, knowing full well that an abyss lay beneath it, yet unable to stop himself from reaching out.
Turning back into his room, Xiao Hua picked up his phone and leaned against the headboard.
The battery was at 43 percent. He opened a social media app, only to find that the content on his feed was much sparser than usual.
The accounts that used to be active were now silent. The occasional posts he did see were just mundane daily life updates—vague and meaningless.
No one was discussing that dream anymore. No one was describing that luminous celestial body. Every related post had been scrubbed clean; nothing remained.
“Has Nightmare Sickness been solved?”
“Or has it become so uncontrollable that the authorities have to suppress all talk of it?”
Xiao Hua's mind was a mess.
The Blue Star authorities had recently released an announcement: “A Nightmare Sickness of unknown origin has broken out globally. It is recommended that patients attempt to reduce their deep sleep time. The cause of the incident is currently under investigation.”
The message was brief—so brief that Xiao Hua read it over and over, feeling like there should be more, but the scroll bar had already reached the bottom.
He felt a surge of panic.
The more restrained the official phrasing, the more troublesome the underlying situation usually was.
If there were truly a way to solve it, the announcement would surely have said, “Please rest assured, we are working at full capacity to overcome this.”
But there was nothing. The officials didn't even offer a single word of comfort; they only suggested reducing deep sleep.
Xiao Hua was someone who listened to advice. Ever since seeing that announcement, he hadn't slept much.
By now, he was reaching his limit.
Opening his phone, he typed “Nightmare Sickness” into the search bar and hit enter.
The page refreshed, only to display a small line of grey text: “No related entries found.”
Xiao Hua's eyelid twitched. “Even the name has been censored? Is it that serious?”
He searched for other keywords like “nightmare,” “incubus,” and “sleep.” Either there were no results, or the content had been wiped.
The discussion threads that had once flooded certain forums—thousands upon thousands of posts—seemed as if they had never existed.
He opened several pages he had previously bookmarked, only for them to all show: “This content has been deleted.”
Xiao Hua thought for a moment and posted a message: “What is actually happening? Why has everything on the internet vanished all of a sudden? Has that disease already worsened to this point?”
He felt that since his text didn't contain a single word directly related to Nightmare Sickness, it shouldn't be deleted.
However, ten seconds after he posted it, the page refreshed automatically, and the post was gone.
A system notification appeared: 【This post has been deleted.】
Xiao Hua was stunned. “This is ridiculous!”
He immediately made another post. This time there was no text, only a Shiba Inu sticker with a question mark over its head.
The post went through and wasn't deleted.
A moment later, several replies appeared beneath it.
The reply count began to climb, faster and faster.
Xiao Hua clicked on the comment section; the thread was already dozens of levels deep.
“So many posts are gone. The officials must be cracking down.”
“This control is way too strict. I've lived most of my life and I've never seen anything like this.”
“The internet is not a place beyond the law. Everyone, be careful. Do not speak out of turn lately. A friend of mine ignored the cyber police warnings and insisted on discussing that ‘you-know-what’ online. He was arrested immediately.”
“MakingUpAFriend.jpg”
“Currently on Blue Star, just got out of prison. Can someone tell me what's been happening lately? I have no idea what you guys are talking about.”
“Don't ask. Those who know, know. For those who don't, I can't say much more. This involves too much...”
The replies kept increasing. Xiao Hua scrolled through them one by one.
After a while, someone accidentally mentioned the word “nightmare” in a reply.
The page lagged for a second, and then the post vanished. The entire thread was leveled.
Xiao Hua scratched his head. He didn't quite understand. Why was it necessary to be this strict? Why wasn't anyone even allowed to mention it?
Logically speaking, mentioning it shouldn't cause problems. Keeping the public in the dark was arguably more dangerous.
People who didn't know the truth would keep going out, and people who were originally safe might get infected because of it. The logic wasn't hard to grasp; he just couldn't understand the authorities' reasoning.
Soon, perhaps because the Blue Star officials also felt that saying nothing would cause the situation to deteriorate in another direction, the official account quickly released a new announcement.
This announcement briefly explained the necessity of the information lockdown and advised citizens to maintain self-isolation, avoid moving around unnecessarily, and report any onset of symptoms. It stated that the authorities were currently doing their best to resolve the issue.
Xiao Hua stared at the announcement for a long time before irritably tossing his phone onto his pillow.
He wanted to sleep but couldn't, and even if he did, it would be worse than not sleeping at all.
The more he thought about it, the more frustrated he became.
...
Dream Disaster Research Group.
The numbers jumping on the circular screens finally began to slow down. The curve that had once been racing like an unbridled horse was now experiencing a cliff-like drop.
The number of new patients was plummeting. The effectiveness of the internet crackdown was immediate; the transmission chain had been severed, and new cases were no longer popping up like mushrooms after rain.
A cheer erupted in the meeting room.
They had finally succeeded in resolving a major crisis!
Zhou Ping sat in the corner, clutching an experimental report he had written himself. The skin beneath his eyes was dark and bruised from exhaustion, but the corners of his mouth were turned up.
The cheering gradually subsided, and the meeting room fell silent once more.
After the brief moment of joy, they still had to face the cruel reality.
They had only extinguished the fire; the people who had already been burned were still there.
What were they supposed to do about the countless patients who had already contracted Nightmare Sickness?
Rate on N.U.
