Chapter 57

This was a domineering, even somewhat fanatical person, Liu Zhiyi thought.

Liu Zhiyi: "Players on Earth have already thought of a way to fight back, and the method's odds aren't low."

The woman's voice paused a few seconds, the tail of her words drifting up.

"How did you find that out?"

Liu Zhiyi: "Your tone's very relaxed… I feel that with your temperament, if Earth's situation were dire, you wouldn't be speaking this way."

The woman's voice laughed louder.

"Wonderful — the more clever people, the better… Time you woke."

Liu Zhiyi still had many questions unasked.

But her body dropped hard.

—Whoosh.

Liu Zhiyi drew a breath and opened her eyes.

Deep-blue sky met her eyes; as a breeze brushed her face, the smell of green grass and earth rushed in.

"Awake."

Liu Zhiyi turned toward the voice and saw Shen Songyue crouching to one side.

Shen Songyue pointed a finger at the sky.

"Went into space and saw a few things, didn't you?"

Liu Zhiyi wasn't surprised she'd ask; after all, she and the cat both wore the look of people who'd been there.

"…I saw the shadow of the two-faced Buddha."

The words half out, Liu Zhiyi got up off the ground, her gaze passing through the crowd to the coffin by the mound of earth.

Her grandmother leaned against the coffin, eyes closed.

Her expression was peaceful, as if she'd fallen asleep.

Then the sun came out from behind the clouds, golden light falling on her grandmother.

Liu Zhiyi felt something, and ran, staggering, toward her grandmother.

But soon, smoke rose from her grandmother's body.

—Rustle.

A gust of wind blew past.

The smoke rose from below and scattered.

Liu Zhiyi knelt down.

"My condolences." Shen Songyue patted Liu Zhiyi's shoulder.

Liu Zhiyi blinked; her eyes were dry and stinging, not a single tear.

She felt grief, felt guilt… felt release.

Liu Zhiyi knelt for a few minutes. She saw the coffin was still above ground, not yet covered with earth.

So she braced herself up and rose again.

Liu Zhiyi: "The burial has to happen."

She called the people around her over to help.

Many people she didn't know had gathered around — officials, probably, like Shen Songyue.

Luckily, through all this upheaval, the Four Guardians hadn't left either.

So the gongs and drums started up again.

She'd have to buy another coffin, Liu Zhiyi thought.

When the thought surfaced in her mind, Liu Zhiyi was startled at herself.

She found she seemed to be slowly growing used to the passing of loved ones.

Though recalling them would still bring grief, still bring the ache of parting, she'd never again stop in her tracks, unable to move forward.

"It's not a great time to bring this up with you," Shen Songyue's voice cut in.

"But… I'm sorry."

Liu Zhiyi turned her head, her thoughts still lingering on her grandmother and mother.

Shen Songyue: "Did your mother ever nag you about marriage while she was alive?"

Liu Zhiyi startled. "Of course she did."

Back then they'd even quarreled over the matchmaking dates.

It wasn't that Liu Zhiyi disliked dating; she just very much disliked that kind of matchmaking, matching up family backgrounds like breeding stock…

Liu Zhiyi's mind wandered over a great many things without meaning to.

She suddenly saw that something seemed to be joined to the side of her palm.

Shen Songyue seemed to let out a breath of relief.

"Sorry, but the cat's situation isn't good. I found its body — it's been cut open…"

Liu Zhiyi turned her palm over and saw a red thread joined to the lines of her palm, running out and away.

Shen Songyue: "I have to trouble you to help bring its body back."

Liu Zhiyi flicked the red thread by her palm.

The thread was a little rough — cotton.

Liu Zhiyi: "If you want my help, just say so. Why go around such a big circle?"

Shen Songyue didn't meet her eyes, and turned her head away.

"To stir up your feelings — emotion isn't a thing fully under a person's control, after all."

There was sense in that.

Liu Zhiyi flicked the red thread. "Does this have to do with my mother nagging me about marriage?"

Shen Songyue paused, as if it were hard to say.

"Because the cat's body has been placed inside a romance game."

Liu Zhiyi: "…Huh?"

Shen Songyue held her head.

"The cat's prop is a bit special, which makes it rather hard to kill, so those people cut its body apart and used collective thinking to lock it inside the game."

It sounded terribly complicated.

Liu Zhiyi opened her mouth, not knowing for the moment how to even ask.

Shen Songyue: "A romance game is bound to have to do with love, so I only meant to try it — to see whether I could stir up your feelings in that area… From the look of it now, there's some, but not much."

Liu Zhiyi looked at her own palm; the red thread was very fine, as if a little force would snap it.

"…I don't think I have those kinds of feelings for the cat — fondness at most."

Shen Songyue sighed. "So that's why it's such a thin thread."

"You're grasping at straws in a crisis, aren't you." Liu Zhiyi said, helpless. "Well, the thread's here — what do you need me to do next?"

Liu Zhiyi tugged at her palm and saw the thread stretch off into the distance, its end out of sight.

"You want me to follow this thread to find the cat's body?"

"Mm." Shen Songyue nodded. "But even if you don't go looking, I think the cat's body will come toward you."

It sounded rather chilling; Liu Zhiyi thought a few seconds.

"Is it because of that toy prop?"

"Yes." Shen Songyue rubbed her nose. "That's the reason I came to you — because of that prop's effect, the cat will love you the way your mother did, without meaning to, and its body will draw near you."

Even as they spoke, Liu Zhiyi heard a "thud."

The coffin had been set into the pit.

Liu Zhiyi: "The burial's happening."

She didn't know why she'd said such a meaningless, empty thing either.

But Shen Songyue, chattering a moment ago, went quiet, as if afraid of upsetting her, and shut her mouth and turned her head away at once, even softening her breathing.

Liu Zhiyi smiled. "No need to be so careful."

"The feeling of letting go is strange, isn't it." Shen Songyue knit her brows, then smoothed them. "You cling to one thing for years, and no one's talk or urging helps at all — you just can't let go… and then one day, for no reason, you're released, and you let it go."

It really was like that.

Perhaps it sounded a bit cruel and cold.

But as time passed, the hurt seemed to slowly fade, growing less painful, growing bearable.

Shen Songyue: "After I was released, I rose into outer space… and then, seeing that black shadow — or should I say the false god? — I suddenly felt my own obsession didn't amount to much."

Looking back on it now, Liu Zhiyi still found it quite science-fiction.

She'd never imagined the dungeons were the work of a thing like that.

—Swish, swish.

Earth was being shoveled over the coffin.

As the soil fell shovelful by shovelful, Liu Zhiyi still couldn't help feeling a loss.

Because from this moment, in this world, she had truly, truly become one person alone.

The Four Guardians worked briskly, not looking in the least like old people.

Following the village chief's guidance, Liu Zhiyi draped the white cloth over herself and knelt before the mound.

She would still feel grief, but life had to go on.

Liu Zhiyi bent, pressed her head to the ground, and kowtowed once.

Goodbye, Mama.

---

By the time the after-affairs of the burial were seen to, the sky had gone dark.

Shen Songyue wasn't in a hurry either; she stayed with her, lending a hand now and then.

And when it was done and they were walking back toward the village, Shen Songyue caught her hand.

Liu Zhiyi: "What is it?"

Before she'd finished, she felt the earth heave and the mountains shake.

Liu Zhiyi startled, and amid the village chief's cry of alarm, someone beside her called out.

"Earthquake!"

Shen Songyue: "Your grandmother sealed the dungeon, I'd say."

Liu Zhiyi thought of the mosquito net her grandmother had mentioned, and fell mute for a moment.

Liu Zhiyi: "Never mind that — hurry, save people!"

Shen Songyue was very calm.

"We moved everyone out ahead of time."

Liu Zhiyi stood by the road; from this angle, looking down, she could see the whole of the village.

The brick houses that had still been standing had all collapsed, bricks and rubble rolling across the ground, a fissure splitting from one end of the village to the other, leveling it utterly.

Liu Zhiyi stood there dazed.

She suddenly felt her grandmother had been a little cruel.

Liu Zhiyi: "You won't even leave me a single thing to remember it by?"

"At the hospital, your grandmother talked with me," Shen Songyue said. "She said you're sometimes indecisive, that you need someone to give you a push; and she said you'd gone through two dungeons in a row, worn out enough to break her heart."

Shen Songyue: "Was your grandmother's dungeon frightening?"

Liu Zhiyi shook her head. "I slept several good sleeps in that dungeon, and the food was good. Some places were a bit scary, but it was so much better than the dungeons before…"

Shen Songyue: "That's what a dungeon born of obsession originally looks like. Your grandmother loves you — how could she bear to frighten you?"

Liu Zhiyi could feel it, and thinking of it now filled her heart with a wistful ache.

Shen Songyue: "We've heard of dungeons like this before — not many, mostly from someone driven to mad repression for a loved one…"

As she spoke, Shen Songyue pointed upward.

"It's the false god's malice that makes a dungeon look so frightening. Your grandmother was remarkable — stronger in willpower than most."

Liu Zhiyi wiped her eyes.

"Are you trying to make me cry again?"

Shen Songyue smiled and patted her shoulder.

"I just feel some things should be told to you clearly. Love has to be conveyed clearly and completely — that way no regret is left behind."

Liu Zhiyi covered her face.

---

People really are sentimental creatures sometimes.

Liu Zhiyi had finally found release, but her grandmother had been with her through two dungeons, and then there was her mother's death.

Alone by herself, Liu Zhiyi felt her heart go hollow.

The village had been shaken flat, so of course there was nowhere to stay.

Shen Songyue booked a small hotel in the town, one room each.

Liu Zhiyi sat alone on the bed, gazing at the lights out the window, that empty, wistful feeling swelling in her chest without stop.

It kept her from even taking in her phone.

In the end, Liu Zhiyi lifted the front of her shirt to see whether there was a hole in her chest.

This intense sense of emptiness pushed her to want to do something.

No knowing what Shen Songyue was thinking either, bringing up the cat only to tell half of it.

So Liu Zhiyi knocked on Shen Songyue's door.

Shen Songyue: "Don't we still have to go up the hill tomorrow to see to your grandmother's affairs? Not asleep yet?"

Liu Zhiyi hung her head. "I can't think too deeply about it — the moment I do, my heart feels terribly empty."

It was a feeling Liu Zhiyi had never had before.

Not even studying or working alone away from home had felt like this.

Liu Zhiyi: "I used to think it was affected, hearing people say they stood amid all the glittering lights and felt none of it had to do with them… I don't know how to put it, it's just… it's just, it's like I have no home anymore."

Shen Songyue stepped straight up and gathered her into her arms.

Liu Zhiyi sniffed and buried her head in her shoulder.

"Find me something to do — take my mind off it."

"All right, all right." Shen Songyue pulled the door shut. "And here I was thinking, with all this happening in your family, I'd let you rest well first…"

Liu Zhiyi shook her head and pressed a hand to her chest.