After witnessing an employee take his own life right before her eyes, Luo Shengle felt as if her soul had drifted out of her body.
She moved mechanically, repeating the same tasks again and again until she finally survived the shift’s end and walked back to the break area with a group of other staff members.
Sitting down on a chair to steady herself, Luo Shengle cautiously asked the person next to her, “That employee just now… what did he do wrong?”
“He was far too careless,” the person beside her said with a look of genuine regret, shaking his head with a sigh. “He actually injured one of the fry. Those baby fish are our aquarium’s most precious assets. Not even the slightest injury is acceptable.”
Luo Shengle murmured, dazed and unfocused, “Just because he accidentally hurt a fish? A human life is worth less than a fish…”
At her words, the person’s expression shifted subtly. He looked her up and down with confusion and wariness. “Are you alright? Fish have always been more noble than humans. They have the most elegant lines, the bodies most suited to the ocean, they’re far more perfect creatures than people.”
The way he spoke, so natural, so certain, frightened Luo Shengle even more than the absurdity of his logic.
And as if that weren’t enough, he sighed with a dreamy, longing tone. “It’s wonderful to work here. When I die, I’ll get to stay in the tank too… to rise from a person into a far more perfect fish…”
After experiencing all of this, Luo Shengle was exhausted and starving but even upon entering the staff cafeteria she couldn’t bring herself to eat. The moment she saw the braised pork on her tray, she couldn’t help recalling the employee who had smashed himself to death against the tank, his face mangled into a blur of flesh and blood.
Her appetite vanished instantly.
Yi Fengchu looked at her through the glass of the water cup beside her, sympathy clear in his gaze, understanding her state all too well.
He himself hadn’t finished his steaming bowl of tomato meat sauce ramen at dinner, unsettled by the bizarre shapes of the fish and the grisly scene he had witnessed.
After finishing dinner, Luo Shengle quietly followed the other staff members, making her way to the aquarium’s employee dormitories.
She didn’t know which dormitory room the original owner of the work uniform, “Lin Ye”, was supposed to occupy but fortune smiled on her once again: the dorm she came upon was a single room and there were several empty rooms around. This greatly reduced the chance of her identity being exposed.
The room was simple. An old iron framed bed paired with a low bedside table, a small wardrobe holding blankets and pillows and a sink with yellowed edges formed the entirety of the employee accommodation.
Luo Shengle picked a clean room at random. She waved her hand, sending a breeze over the dust covered surfaces and then set down the mountaineering backpack she had brought into this “instance,” quickly arranging the bedding.
Yi Fengchu frowned. His own obsessive cleanliness was severe; if while cutting vegetables the knife nicked his own flesh and a bead of blood splashed onto his face, his immediate reaction would be a horrified, “So dirty!” So he admired Luo Shengle’s tolerance of untidiness in the instance far more than he could express.
Under his watchful eyes, Luo Shengle finished tidying everything. The moment her backside touched the bed, she leapt up as though she had been burned alive.
She recalled the unlucky employee she had knocked out to swap clothes, temporarily left behind the stairwell door and hurried back out again. In no time, she returned, supporting a limp, unconscious woman in her arms.
To prevent anyone from noticing or becoming suspicious, Luo Shengle pressed the hat low over Lin Ye’s head and prepared a cover story. If anyone asked, she would explain that this was a drunken colleague. In the end, she managed to close the door without incident.
After knocking someone out, Luo Shengle gave Lin Ye a “Sweet Dreams Pill” prop, designed in theory to let the person sleep soundly for three days, unaware, with all vital signs remaining stable but leaving her in the stairwell felt too cruel for her conscience.
Since it was a single occupancy dorm, she decided to at least provide the unfortunate person she had impersonated with a proper sleeping environment.
Having completed all of this, Luo Shengle finally exhaled, feeling every bone in her body release its tension.
She glanced down at her hands, streaked with dust and moved toward the sink to wash them.
As she turned the tap, she thought fleetingly that perhaps she could later take a shower in the public bath…
But that thought lasted only an instant before she mentally squashed it.
Yi Fengchu only observed a sudden, uneven trickle of water flowing from the slightly rusted faucet but the instant her fingers touched the cool water, Luo Shengle’s expression changed drastically.
“Mother… mother…” she murmured.
She could hardly describe the sensation. It was as if invisible tendrils had brushed against her tactile and auditory nerves, tangling them together in confusion.
A distant, ethereal sobbing seemed to ride along the flow of water, curling slowly around her hands. It felt as though it was crawling along her fatigued nerves, leaving behind a cold, sticky sensation.
Immediately, Luo Shengle was reminded of the creatures she had fed earlier in the day, tiny, living things in individual tanks. She thought of their fine, flexible tentacles or the coarse, sandpaper like texture of their scale like shields.
It was as though… the water itself was alive.
She jerked her hands back, her face twisting in a mix of disbelief and disgust. She flicked off the remaining droplets, her spine arching slightly as she fought back the urge to vomit.
After a long moment, she felt slightly better. She dragged her heavy body to the bed, grabbed a cup of water and gulped several mouthfuls, washing away the nausea.
Yi Fengchu didn’t know the precise state Luo Shengle was in but he could see her discomfort clearly.
He patiently waited until the cup was nearly empty. Then, at the bottom, a line of text appeared, shimmering in silver, refracted through the rippling water like liquid mercury:
[What did you feel?]
Luo Shengle was grateful that the “Narrator” contacted her only after she had swallowed the water and calmed down. Otherwise, she might have spat it all out in shock, collapsing over the sink in a mess.
She had long grown accustomed to this mysterious being’s amusement with observing humans and she reported the strange sensation truthfully.
“You may not understand the human concept of ‘vomiting,’” she explained, considering that the Narrator was likely not human. “It’s a feeling of complete loss of appetite, a fleeting desire to survive, a sense that the world is utterly terrible…”
Yi Fengchu’s expression was complex. He felt that even without putting on a show, Luo Shengle and others had already preemptively covered up his non human, high level status for him.
He even began to wonder: if he didn’t perform convincingly, wouldn’t he be letting them down after their goodwill?
After a long, exhausting day, Luo Shengle finally relaxed a little. She began rambling to the cup, unloading a flood of words.
She didn’t know if the elusive Narrator was still listening but she desperately tried to distract herself. Unknowingly, her stress poured out through her speech:
“Today, it didn’t seem dangerous but the atmosphere was so oppressive… The fish in the aquarium are strange and the people are even stranger.”
“Every single person here has a worldview and logic completely unlike normal humans. They worship fish as the most perfect creatures, so even their kind smiles are terrifying.”
“From what I’ve seen, the first rule to survive three days is: don’t reveal that you’re not staff; second: don’t harm the fish… or else I’ll be thrown into the tank as fertilizer for the fry, won’t I?”
Yi Fengchu listened quietly. Having seen the storms of amusement parks and chaos, he couldn’t say he was particularly moved but out of courtesy, he waited patiently until Luo Shengle’s eyelids drooped, then turned off his phone.
After watching the human livestream for most of the day, he felt a twinge of drowsiness himself.
“Time passes so fast. It feels like I just got up to eat and now it’s time to sleep again…”
He glanced out the window. The bright moon hung high above the clustered skyscrapers, the tranquil atmosphere making him yawn as he murmured, “Fortunately, tomorrow is the weekend.”
After washing up and lying in bed, Yi Fengchu soon slipped into a deep, sweet sleep.
But… this sleep felt different from usual.
He vaguely felt himself trekking, through the steel and concrete of the city, through countless crystal sphere like worlds with different landscapes, until finally he reached a vast, rolling ocean.
Though his thoughts were still hazy, his keen senses picked up on an overwhelmingly sweet, irresistible scent carried on the briny air.
He paused, then plunged headfirst into the sea. How long he searched, he didn’t know, until he entered a dim, pitch black space.
Closer… closer… that scent, the one that,
Made him hungry.
✦ ✧ ✦
Nycreth
[Translator]
☕ A LITTLE SOMETHING FOR THE TRANSLATOR
(≧▽≦)ﾉ☕ coffee!
☕ BUY THEM A COFFEE →
✧ (づ｡•ㅅ•｡)づ ☕ ✧
✦ thank you for reading ✦
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ChaptersChapter 1 · Mysterious letterChapter 2 · Divine MessagesChapter 3 · Gamer ForumChapter 4 · Invitation from GodChapter 5 · JudgeChapter 6 · TerminalChapter 7 · Destruction of recordsChapter 8 · Whale Bone Aquarium (1)Chapter 9 · Whale Bone Aquarium (2)Chapter 10 · Whale Bone Aquarium (3)Chapter 11 · Whale Bone Aquarium (4)Chapter 12 · Whale Bone Aquarium (5)Chapter 13 · Whale Bone Aquarium (6)Chapter 14 · Whale Bone Aquarium (7)Chapter 15 · Whale Bone Aquarium (8)Chapter 16 · Whale Bone Aquarium (9)Chapter 17 · Whale Bone Aquarium (10)Chapter 18 · Whale Bone Aquarium (11)Chapter 19 Part 1 · Whale Bone Aquarium (12)Chapter 19 Part 2 · Whale Bone Aquarium (12)Chapter 20 · Interlude: His ApostlesChapter 21 · Echoes in the pupa (1)Chapter 22 · Echoes in the pupa (2)Chapter 23 · Echoes in the Pupa (3)Chapter 24 · Echoes in the Pupa (4)Chapter 25 · Echoes in the Pupa (5)Chapter 26 · Echoes in the Pupa (6)Chapter 27 · Echoes in the Pupa (7)Chapter 28 · Echoes in the Pupa (8)Chapter 29 · Echoes in the Pupa (9)Chapter 30 · Echoes in the Pupa (10)Chapter 31 · Echoes in the Pupa (11)Chapter 32 · Echoes in the Pupa (12)Chapter 33 · Echoes in the Pupa (13)Chapter 34 · Interlude: Investigation by the Bureau of Extraordinary Affairs (1)Chapter 35 · Interlude: Investigation by the Bureau of Extraordinary Affairs (2)Chapter 36 · Interlude: Investigation by the Bureau of Extraordinary Affairs (3)Chapter 37 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (1)Chapter 38 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (2)Chapter 39 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (3)Chapter 40 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (4)Chapter 41 · Advertisement Coming Soon (1)Chapter 42 · Advertisement Coming Soon (2)Chapter 43 · Advertisement Coming Soon (3)Chapter 44 · Advertisement Coming Soon (4)Chapter 45 · Advertisement Coming Soon (5)Chapter 46 · Advertisement Coming Soon (6)Chapter 47 · Advertisement Coming Soon (7)Chapter 48 · Advertisement Coming Soon (8)Chapter 49 · Advertisement Coming Soon (9)Chapter 50 · Advertisement Coming Soon (10)Chapter 51 · Advertisement Coming Soon (11)Chapter 52 · Advertisement Coming Soon (12)Chapter 53 · Advertisement Coming Soon to EndChapter 54 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (1)Chapter 55 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (2)Chapter 56 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (3)Chapter 57 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (4)Chapter 58 · Childhood Ghost Stories (1)Chapter 59 · Childhood Ghost Stories (2)Chapter 60 · Childhood Ghost Stories (3)Chapter 61 · Childhood Ghost Stories (4)Chapter 62 · Childhood Ghost Stories (5)Chapter 63 · Childhood Ghost Stories (6)Chapter 64 · Childhood Ghost Stories (7)Chapter 65 · Childhood Ghost Stories (8)Chapter 66 · Childhood Ghost Stories (9)Chapter 67 · Childhood Ghost Stories (10)Chapter 68 · Childhood Ghost Stories (11)Chapter 69 · Childhood Ghost Stories (12)Chapter 70 · Childhood Ghost Stories (13)Chapter 71 · Childhood Ghost Stories (14)Chapter 72 · Childhood Ghost Stories (15)Chapter 73 · Childhood Ghost Stories (16)Chapter 74 · Childhood Ghost Stories (17)Chapter 75 · Childhood Ghost Stories (18)Chapter 76 · Childhood Ghost Stories (19)Chapter 77 · Childhood Ghost Stories (20)Chapter 78 · Childhood Ghost Stories (Complete)Chapter 79 · Interlude: His Kingdom (1)Chapter 80 · Interlude: His Kingdom (2)Chapter 81 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (1)Chapter 82 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (2)Chapter 83 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (3)Chapter 84 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (4)Chapter 85 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (5)Chapter 86 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (Complete)Chapter 87 · Fate casually rolls the dice (1)Chapter 88 · Fate Casually rolls the dice (2)Chapter 89 · Fate Casually rolls the dice (3)Chapter 90 · Fate Casually rolls the dice (4)Chapter 91 · Fate casually tosses the dice (5)Chapter 92 · Fate casually tosses the dice (6)Chapter 93 · Fate casually tosses the dice (7)Chapter 94 · Fate casually tosses the dice (8)Chapter 95 · Fate casually tosses the dice (9)Chapter 96 · Fate casually tosses the dice (10)Chapter 97 · Fate Casually tosses the dice (11)Chapter 98 · Fate casually tosses the dice (12)Chapter 99 · Fate casually tosses the dice (13)Chapter 100 · Fate casually tosses the dice (14)Chapter 101 · Fate casually tosses the dice (15)Chapter 102 · Fate casually tosses the dice (16)Chapter 103 · Fate casually tosses the dice (17)Chapter 104 · Fate casually tosses the dice (18)Chapter 105 · Fate casually tosses the dice (19)Chapter 106 · Fate casually tosses the dice (20)Chapter 107 · Fate casually tosses the dice (21)Chapter 108 · Fate casually tosses the dice (The End)Chapter 109 · Interlude