Love Burned, She Rose Unscathed



"In a botanical garden this vast, you'd think they'd have some night staff on duty. Or maybe they're just snoozing on the job..." Corley mused, ready to press the button again.

But before his finger could make contact, the alarm suddenly buzzed to life.

"What's going on?" he blurted out, clearly confused.

Roseanne suddenly had a bad feeling in her gut, and when she saw Owen Reynolds wearing an "I knew it" expression, her intuition was instantly confirmed.

Owen Reynolds said, "You rushed into it."

Without waiting for confirmation, he acted rashly.

Corley, puzzled, asked, "The sign clearly says this, where's the mistake?"

Owen Reynolds explained, "The yellow bell has two meanings. One is what you mentioned, for emergency contact with the outside world; the other is a warning."

"A warning?"

"The buzzing we're hearing now is a warning signal. In a place like this botanical garden, while it's unlikely there are any large predators, it's crawling with snakes, insects, and other pests. Some of them might be venomous."

"So, the purpose of this button is essentially to provide a warning to take caution."

Roseanne interjected, "Did I just hear the door lock click?"

Owen Reynolds nodded, "I heard it too."

He moved forward to inspect the glass door and, sure enough—

The only door leading outside from this controlled climate area had been forcibly locked.

"...What does locking it mean?" Corley frowned. "Wasn't it always locked?"

Owen Reynolds clarified, "It's been locked down."

The door, which could originally be opened with a code, was now completely locked due to the activation of the warning system.

Roseanne asked, "Can't it be opened with the code?"

"No."

Corley was visibly frustrated, "..

"Sorry, that was impulsive of me." He looked genuinely apologetic.

Just when hope had appeared, it had vanished again, leaving Roseanne feeling a bit down.

Fortunately, there was electricity and light at the exit, and their cell phones had signal. It wasn't pitch dark, leaving them totally blind.

Owen Reynolds took out his phone, "I'll contact the garden administration. This seems like a technical issue that their staff should be able to fix." Corley scowled, "Why didn't you call earlier?"

Owen Reynolds said, "I was about to, but then you pressed the button."

Corley was silent.

Soon, the call connected.

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"Hi, this is Owen Reynolds. I'm here with Corley, and we've found Roseanne. We're currently at the exit of the tropical climate area. We accidentally triggered the warning device and locked the main door. Can you find a way to open it?"

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The person on the other end paused for a couple of seconds, taken aback by Owen's calm demeanor. It took him a moment to respond, "We received the warning alert here as well and guessed it might be you. But we're not entirely sure about the specifics of the warning system's setup, only our technical staff can handle it. We've urgently called back our engineer, but you'll need to wait patiently for rescue..."

Owen Reynolds asked, "How long will it take?"

"...Pardon?"

"How long until you can get the door open?"

"Uh! We have three technicians in total. Two of them are away for training in Ravenport and haven't

returned. The one in Lumina Citiet

lives out in the suburbs, so it'll take some time for him to get here. We're estimating about... 5 hours."

Owen Reynolds: "..." Five hours, and it would nearly be dawn.

"Is there no other way?"noveldrama

"...Sorry, none of our onsite staff have the technical know-how."

"Well then," Owen sighed, "it looks like we have no choice but to wait."