Chapter 61

Liu Zhiyi saw the severed hand lift.

The man's voice was a little unsteady, as if nervous.

"So now… let me introduce myself again. My name is Zhou Fuqing."

The task on the watch updated.

[Meeting Again: the hello he only worked up the courage for after death.]

The man's voice: "Pleased to meet you."

It felt… a bit strange.

Maybe because she was fairly familiar with the cat, and the cat's usual manner toward her was never this cloying.

As her ears tingled at that current-laced voice, Liu Zhiyi also felt, inexplicably, a little uncomfortable.

Come to think of it, was the cat's personality like this before he was dismembered? Or was it because of the otome game?

Liu Zhiyi rubbed her face and simply set the game to auto-advance — most otome games had the function.

Tapping the phone to push the plot forward while facing this severed hand floating before her… there was really an awkwardness she couldn't put into words.

No help for it; the cat had been gentle and dependable with her before, and without noticing, Liu Zhiyi had come to treat him as a reliable senior.

The present scene… it felt like playing an otome game right in front of an elder.

Not long after she set the game running, Liu Zhiyi saw the severed hand open its palm and wave at her.

Though it didn't even have a face, Liu Zhiyi sensed unease from this hand.

At the same time, the man's voice sounded in the earbud.

"Did I… offend you?"

Set in reality, Zhou Fuqing's behavior really would be rather offensive.

But this was, after all, an otome game, and the cat becoming this way was more or less beyond his control.

Liu Zhiyi sighed and shook her head at the severed hand, glancing at the phone as she did.

She figured the auto-run plot would offer a choice by now.

Sure enough, two options appeared on the phone screen.

[Nod.]

[Shake your head.]

Huh — the options fit the gesture she'd just made.

Liu Zhiyi chose Nod.

The more she played, the more she felt this Love Heartbeat matched reality in a way — or rather, matched her own thoughts.

Liu Zhiyi had played some games, all with a main storyline, and because of that fixed main line, even if the player could make choices along the way, the direction was actually set from the start.

It felt like watching a film through the protagonist's eyes.

Some sense of immersion, perhaps, but not much.

But this otome game felt a little different — the immersion seemed… a touch stronger?

"Follow me." The man's voice said low in the earbud. "They've got their eyes on you."

Liu Zhiyi paused, moved her gaze from the phone screen, and began to look around.

—Crackle.

The carriage light above her flickered.

Hers was the only lit patch in the whole carriage, and the whispering in the dark rolled toward her like surging waves, one after another.

And the halo of light beside her was like a candle flame barely holding out in a gale, now bright, now dim, as if it would go out the next second.

The man's voice: "It's my fault. They may have caught your scent."

This time the severed hand didn't ask her opinion again — it took her hand straight away.

Then, with a "rustle," the drifting raincoat came down from above and settled over her head.

The earbud, right on cue, put out a soothing little piano melody, a few higher notes woven in among it, striking exactly on Liu Zhiyi's heartbeat.

—Thump, thump.

—Thump, thump.

The man's voice: "Time to run."

Liu Zhiyi quickly set her posture.

The next second she was pulled forward at a run, rushing out of the ring of light.

Liu Zhiyi could see nothing.

She could only hear the whoosh of wind and the drip, drip of rain.

Soon, human wails rose from the dark.

"A living person… there's a living person here!"

"Don't let her go, don't let her go!"

Liu Zhiyi truly felt what a chorus of ghosts wailing was like.

All sorts of screams and cries unlike human voices formed a rolling wall of sound that left her dizzy and reeling.

Amid this wall of sound, Liu Zhiyi raised a hand to cover her ears.

But the next second she felt her hand empty, and a hand pressed to the ear without an earbud.

The man's voice: "Run forward."

All the sounds faded from her ears, leaving only Zhou Fuqing's voice.

Liu Zhiyi ran on; the piano's rhythm in the earbud began to quicken, pressing bit by bit over the sound of her steps, while her heartbeat quickened with the running too.

The man's voice: "Do you like whole-wheat bread?"

Liu Zhiyi found the question rather out of nowhere, but the raincoat wrapping her suddenly cinched tight, dragging her forward at a run.

The man's voice: "The first time I saw you, you were carrying a bag of whole-wheat bread."

His words tugged at her thoughts; before she'd entered a dungeon, there had indeed been a stretch when she ate whole-wheat bread in the mornings.

But that wasn't because she liked it — only that she'd eaten too much takeout and wanted a healthier breakfast.

Still, why was Zhou Fuqing asking this?

Zhou Fuqing: "Actually, after a person dies they stay in the state they died in."

True enough; from the card, Zhou Fuqing's whole body was covered in cracks, and in the dungeon he had only a single severed hand left.

But wasn't he talking rather a lot? And all of it empty chatter.

He had the air of someone making conversation for its own sake, Liu Zhiyi thought.

Zhou Fuqing: "I thought my whole body would be shattered beyond recognition, but I hadn't expected I'd be wearing a raincoat. Then the dead here told me — obsession shows on the body too…"

Zhou Fuqing: "Come to think of it, the day I first saw you, it seemed to be raining."

Too cloying.

Set in the everyday, in normal life, Liu Zhiyi would definitely have broken out in gooseflesh.

But right now, in the pitch dark, the damp raincoat wrapped around her, the severed hand at her ear covering it gently but firmly, walling out those horrifying, mind-fraying ghost-wails —

the sound of rain mixed with the little piano melody, in time with her heartbeat, sounded in her ears.

—Thump, thump.

—Thump, thump.

Liu Zhiyi knew she wouldn't feel much stir at these corny, thoroughly cloying words.

But somehow —

—Thump, thump.

Zhou Fuqing: "So I thought — next time we met, I'd bring an umbrella."

It sounded so silly.

Liu Zhiyi suddenly felt like laughing.

Zhou Fuqing: "You're finally happy."

Liu Zhiyi startled, but then she saw a light come on in the carriage.

Still the one on the carriage ceiling, only the carriage had changed.

The umbrella hung over her head; up close, Liu Zhiyi found the umbrella was actually pink.

The severed hand withdrew from her ear.

Zhou Fuqing: "Sorry, I said a lot of strange things… but the ghosts here find a living person by smelling their fear, so I hoped you might be a little happier."

More strange talk.

Liu Zhiyi smiled.

Zhou Fuqing: "I'm sorry, I seem to have said something odd again. I really do hope you're happy… all right, I'll stop talking."

Liu Zhiyi pressed a hand to her chest; her heartbeat slowly settled.

That indescribable flutter was slowly receding.

Was this the effect of the surroundings?

Or the suspension-bridge effect?

—Clatter.

The carriage shook, and then, like a vehicle coming out of a tunnel, light suddenly came in through the windows.

But the light was red, like a setting sun.

Liu Zhiyi's spirits lifted, and she looked out the window.

Zhou Fuqing: "That's Blood Pool Hell."

Through the window, Liu Zhiyi saw a red sea, its surface red as blood itself.

Zhou Fuqing: "In Buddhist belief, it's the hell for those who don't respect others, aren't filial to their parents, aren't upright, who take crooked and evil paths."

Across the red sea was a city floating on the water.

Liu Zhiyi heard many sounds coming from the city — an infant crying, and the laughter of men and women.

And from this side of the sea, people streamed endlessly across it, their posture very strange — arms flung open, as if wanting to embrace the people on the far side.

Liu Zhiyi drew a sharp breath.

This was the largest multiplayer dungeon she'd ever seen.

The whole city was one.

Zhou Fuqing: "But I don't think it looks like a hell. The people who go there are all people who can't let go of some regret over their dearest ones."

—Rustle.

The sound of the sea's waves came one after another.

And mixed into the wave-sound were other sounds.

"Zhizhi."

Liu Zhiyi heard her mother calling.

"Want some soy-braised bream?"

That was her grandmother's voice.

These sounds came with the waves from the city across the red sea.

Zhou Fuqing: "But then I feel this is exactly hell."

—Ding-dong.

A chime suddenly sounded in the carriage, and the train stopped.

A woman's station announcement rang out.

"Now arriving at Blood Pool. Passengers wishing to reunite with loved ones, please alight here."

Her grandmother's and mother's voices suddenly grew louder.

The scent of sweet-and-sour ribs drifted in through the crack of the door.

The instant the doors slid apart to both sides, the red light turned white.

It looked like a door opening.

She saw.

Her mother pushed the door open and stood before her.

She saw.

Her grandmother in an apron, carrying a steaming dish of sweet-and-sour ribs, set it on the dinner table, and when she'd done it, still didn't forget to wipe her hands on the apron.

Then her grandmother walked up behind her mother too, and smiled at her.

"Zhizhi, come eat."

Zhou Fuqing: "Knowing full well it's all a fantasy of the heart—"

Liu Zhiyi's vision went black; a severed hand covered both her eyes.

Zhou Fuqing: "—you still want to step into hell."

As his words fell, the severed hand moved away.

Before Liu Zhiyi's eyes was the carriage again.

—Splash.

A black shape walked past her, straight out the door, and dropped into the red sea.

And then more and more black shapes walked out.

Liu Zhiyi blinked and came to herself.

She suddenly realized she was on a subway that could travel between different dungeons.

And these black shapes…

were all mutated players.

Liu Zhiyi went to grab at the black shapes, but was bound by the red thread.

Zhou Fuqing: "It's no use. They want to go — you can't stop them."

"This train carries ghosts to the hell they want to go to," Zhou Fuqing said slowly.

So the train stopping at Blood Pool station was because of her?

"I'm sorry." The red thread tightened again, binding her until she couldn't move.

Zhou Fuqing: "I can't let you get off at this station."

—Ding-dong.

As the chime inside the carriage sounded —

Zhou Fuqing let out a breath of relief.

The train started up again.

The carriage drove back into darkness.

Liu Zhiyi didn't move. Meeting yet again a dungeon that lured her with the images of her mother and grandmother —

her feelings were a tangle, yet she wasn't as pained as before.

But before she could react, liquid dripped onto her head.

Liu Zhiyi jumped and turned on the watch's flashlight, shining it upward.

The red thread was tied too tight; she couldn't even run.

But the moment she raised her head, she saw water dripping steadily down inside the pink umbrella.

Leaking rain?

Liu Zhiyi raised a hand and caught a few drops, and saw that the water was not only clear, but warm.