Meanwhile, He Yu finished signing the contract and completing the handover with the shady agent, and told him to get the water and electricity reconnected first.
He Yu walked around the house once more, and picked up a worn-out rag doll from a corner. The doll wore a little dress and was covered in dust. It had two black eyes made of buttons, sewn onto its face with crossed threads. One of them had come loose and hung there, about to fall off but not quite, giving off a distinct horror-movie vibe.
He Yu picked the doll up, gently patted off the dust, and set it on the table, which was likewise covered in dust.
He thought this doll was rather cute. Although it was old, dirty, and worn with age, it had once been someone’s treasure, someone’s good friend, and now it had been left all alone in this place.
“Once I’ve got everything cleaned up, I’ll sew your eyes back on properly.”
He liked dolls and plush toys. Once the storefront at the front was cleaned up, it would be perfect for opening a plush toy shop. Whether it made money or not didn’t matter. When he was in a good mood, he’d open up and sit in the shop, and when he was in a bad mood, he’d close up and go out to have fun.
The house was quite big, so there was no way he could finish cleaning it all today. He Yu planned to clear out one room first, then go out and buy bedding, pillows, and other daily necessities. He would be staying here tonight.
He had used a little trick when signing the contract, so he wasn’t afraid of the shady agent cheating him.
When leaving, He Yu went out through the residential entrance door. He wanted to take a look around the residential complex.
The harmonious neighbors of Happiness Residential Complex were gone, but he could work hard to build good relationships with the new neighbors here, and rebuild a harmonious, friendly community environment!
The moment he opened the door, He Yu saw a female neighbor who was about to go upstairs. She was very thin, with graying short hair tied messily behind her head. Her shoulders were hunched, her head lowered, the corners of her mouth drooping, and her expression was gloomy and numb. In her hand she carried an enormous black plastic bag that looked very heavy, and it was cutting into her fingers, turning them red and purple.
“Hello, I’m new here,” He Yu said warmly and in a friendly manner. “Your things look heavy. Shall I carry them upstairs for you?”
The female neighbor kept her neck stiff and didn’t turn her head. Only her eyeballs moved, rolling toward He Yu and revealing a large expanse of yellowed white. She looked at He Yu like this for two seconds, then her eyeballs rolled back. She said not a word and continued to haul her things upward by herself.
He Yu blinked and didn’t think much of it. He strolled around the inside and outside of the complex.
The ground-floor commercial units in the complex were quite popular. All of them had been turned into shops, with no vacancies. There were supermarkets, restaurants, home renovation stores, and even a pet clinic, everything one could need.
As He Yu wandered, he was drawn to a steamed bun shop. The aroma of buns drifted out of the shop door, mixed in with snow-white steam.
He walked in. It was a husband-and-wife shop. The owner, a towel wrapped around his hands, was carrying out several freshly steamed trays of buns. The snow-white buns nestled in the steamers, each one as big as a fist.
He Yu picked three kinds with different fillings, one of each.
While the owner’s wife was packing the buns, He Yu asked her for directions. “Where do I need to go to buy bedding?”
“There’s none around here. You’ll have to go to a bigger supermarket a bit farther away, they sell it there.”
The owner’s wife pointed out the way for him. He Yu thanked her, and after leaving the bun shop, he opened the bag and took a bite of the steaming hot, big bun, squinting his eyes happily.
The owner happened to look up and saw that He Yu had already finished one bun and was eating the second.
He rubbed his eyes.
Freshly out of the steamer! Wasn’t it hot?!
Could his buns not have been steamed through?
The owner reached out and touched the steamer tray.
Hiss!
“Hey! Are you stupid?! Go run it under cold water, quick!” The owner’s wife pushed him into the back kitchen.
The owner, pinching his earlobe with his burned fingers, grimaced and headed toward the back kitchen, muttering, “I thought it wasn’t hot anymore…”
……
After finishing the buns, He Yu threw the bag into the trash can and dusted off his hands. The big supermarket wasn’t too far away, so he went there on foot.
After buying his daily necessities, He Yu went to the place that sold flower pots. His amaryllis was hardy and full of vitality. Its leaves had wilted and broken, but the bulb was still alive. He had bought the amaryllis himself after transmigrating, and He Yu had taken it away with him from that apartment building. Now that he had a new place, he planned to replant it.
After finishing his shopping, He Yu found a place where no one was around and stored his purchases away, then headed back, humming a tune.
He truly had taken a liking to that house. He liked the wild Chinese rose in the back yard, liked its vigorous vitality.
Tomorrow he would contact a home renovation company, and have the house properly cleaned up and renovated.
Farther ahead was an uphill slope. At the bottom of the slope sat an old granny, with a two-wheeled small cart parked beside her, a pile of vegetables tied onto it.
The old granny was rubbing her ankle with one hand, looking worriedly at the slope. When she saw He Yu, her eyes lit up, and she called out, “Young man, could you help me pull my cart up the slope?”
“Did you twist your ankle?” He Yu crouched down in front of her. He could faintly see some black qi wrapped around the old granny’s ankle.
He Yu had seen an introduction to this stuff in the materials Jiang Xian gave him. The Paranormal Affairs Bureau called it yin-sha qi.
Thinking of Jiang Xian, He Yu couldn’t help feeling regretful. Back then, to make it easier for He Yu, an ordinary person, to understand, Jiang Xian had very thoughtfully sent him a set of materials on the basic concepts of the paranormal world. Although Jiang Xian was a bit of a chuni teenager, he was friendly and kind-hearted. It was a pity that He Yu had to flee from the Seven Parts Association. He had abandoned his previous identity, so he could no longer contact Jiang Xian.
The terrain here wasn’t very good. The yin-sha qi wasn’t generated on its own, but was carried over from other places by the flow of traffic, and it accumulated at the bottom of the slope and didn’t easily disperse. Over time, although the amount was small, when physically weak people passed by and were affected by it, a moment of distraction could easily lead to a twisted ankle.
“It’s nothing, I can walk by myself, it’s just that I can’t pull the cart anymore,” the old granny said. She had a strong, stubborn character, and even with her ankle swollen, she could endure the pain.
He Yu placed his hand on her ankle and pressed gently a couple of times.
The old granny had just been thinking that this young man’s hands were icy cold, which made her ankle hurt less, when he suddenly gave it a forceful twist, and she couldn’t help crying out “Ouch!” After that one burst of pain, it actually stopped hurting.
She set her foot on the ground and moved it around a couple of times, and said in delighted surprise, “It’s better! I can move it!”
He Yu smiled and said, “It’s fine now. Don’t put too much strength on it yet. Go back and rub on some medicated oil and rest for two days, and it will heal.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at the bottom of the slope, and casually swept his foot across it as if just stretching. A gentle breeze rose from the flat ground and blew away the grayish yin-sha qi at the bottom of the slope.
He Yu helped her push the small vegetable cart all the way home. The old granny’s name was Sun Shiyun, and she lived nearby, just one street away from the house He Yu had newly rented. As soon as the door opened, the aroma of cooked food drifted out of the room, and He Yu couldn’t help swallowing.
If there was anything He Yu missed most after running away from the Seven Parts Association, it was the three meals a day that Sister Zhao next door used to send over. He Yu couldn’t cook. In his previous life, his wage-slave career had been so exhausting that he generally relied on takeout, and his highest culinary achievement was making hand-torn eggplant in the microwave. These past few days, all he had eaten was instant noodles.
Granny Sun laughed. “You haven’t eaten yet, have you? Come in and eat something.”
He Yu happily agreed.
Granny Sun was old and didn’t have much of an appetite, so what she had made earlier was millet porridge and smashed cucumber salad. Afraid that it wouldn’t be enough for He Yu, she also cooked a plate of dumplings for him.
“Eat more, I made a lot of dumplings, and if it’s not enough I’ll cook more.” Granny Sun was full after eating only half a bowl of porridge, and looked at him kindly. “Big young fellows all have big appetites. Don’t go hungry.”
The dumplings were filled with napa cabbage and pork, seasoned with sesame oil and dried shrimp, and were absolutely delicious.
“This is so delicious! These are the best dumplings I’ve ever eaten!” He Yu praised sincerely.
Granny Sun’s expression was tender, and her gaze was distant and absent as she rambled on about her secret recipe: don’t wring the juice out of the cabbage, that way the dumplings will be juicy and flavorful.
“You just moved here, so you probably can’t cook for yourself, right? You can come eat at my place. I live alone, and sometimes I cook too much and can’t finish it all.” Granny Sun’s tone was lonely, and her eyes held a look of expectation.
“Sure!” He Yu grinned, flashing the little dimples in his cheeks. “Then I’ll pay you for the groceries. For the next couple of days you shouldn’t walk far on your foot, so I’ll bring you whatever groceries you want to buy.”
Granny Sun was very happy too. “Let me get you some more dumplings, you can take them back and put them in the refrigerator, and just boil them when you want to eat.”
He Yu hurriedly stopped her: “No need, no need. I only moved in today, so I don’t have a refrigerator yet, and no stove either.”
“Where are you living?”
“There’s an empty shop at the corner of Beiquan Street, and I’ve rented it there.”
Granny Sun’s face changed. She grabbed him. “Why are you living there? Who rented it to you? Go find him and get a refund right now, you can’t live in that place!”
“What’s wrong?” He Yu asked, puzzled.
Granny Sun’s expression was grave. “You’ve been cheated! That building is a haunted house!”