The shrill, piercing howl lingered in the air for a long time, echoing relentlessly in his ears. The immense pain contained within it felt as though flames were scorching every inch of the body, a hoarse scream torn from the throat only after swallowing blazing hot embers.
Yi Fengchu halted where he was, his expression filled with confusion. Only after the disturbance had completely faded did he tighten his grip on his phone and cautiously approach the charred mass of “ashes” scrutinizing it back and forth with great care.
“When I passed by here just now, there definitely wasn’t a pile of this stuff…” he muttered. “What is this? Could that scream have come from it?”
He glanced toward the nearby woods, intending to casually pick up a tree branch to poke at the ashes. However, his fastidiousness made him hesitate again and again. In the end, he simply couldn’t bring himself to do it. He gave up on touching it altogether and merely squatted in front of the ashes, studying them quietly for a while.
As he stared, he suddenly caught a whiff of an aroma that was irresistibly enticing. Unlike the sesame and seaweed salty sweet scent from last time, this one carried a faint hint of smokiness, a rich, savory fragrance of roasted meat, warm and mouthwatering, drifting gently into his senses.
Yi Fengchu subconsciously sniffed the air, trying to trace the source of the fragrance, turning his head left and right as he looked around.
In the end, his gaze slowly lowered, settling on the shapeless pile of charred black ashes beneath him.
He must really be starving badly enough to hallucinate.
Doubting himself for a brief moment, Yi Fengchu opened the search engine on his phone right where he stood and began typing:
【Symptoms of pica.】
【How should pica be treated after diagnosis?】
【Can people suddenly feel like eating random black, burnt looking things on the road?】
Just as Yi Fengchu frowned at the screen and continued searching, a series of faint rustling sounds suddenly came from the dense weeds nearby, drawing his attention.
After a short while, a small snake with a vividly mottled body poked its head out of the grass. Dragging its long tail, it slithered over to Yi Fengchu, flicking its tongue and hissing softly.
By common sense, when a normal person encounters a situation like this, they would either be so frightened that they scramble away in panic or freeze on the spot, too scared to move.
However, Yi Fengchu felt no fear at all in his heart. He could even vaguely understand what the snake was trying to convey,
‘It’s a pupa… imitates human voices… must not answer…’
The colorful little snake offered its reminder with earnest friendliness.
Yi Fengchu: “……”
At this point, he was no longer surprised that he could understand what a snake was saying.
After all, he could clearly see the threads of fate that bound all living beings together and he could even take a bite out of all kinds of strange, unorthodox creatures, so what was so strange about understanding snake speech?
Staring at the tiny, bean sized eyes of the little snake, Yi Fengchu was momentarily dazed. In front of his eyes, another pair of eyes he had once seen in a dream seemed to surface, far larger, blazing like molten gold and a scorching sun.
…Wait, could those have been his own eyes in the dream?
Was he really not human?
As fragments of dreamlike memories stirred back to life, Yi Fengchu felt momentarily disoriented.
He and the flower patterned snake stared at each other for a while before he cautiously tried to communicate, “You… you can understand what I’m saying, right?”
The little snake tilted its head and nodded.
“What exactly is this ‘pupa’ you mentioned? Is it something that can imitate human speech and if someone responds when it calls them, something dangerous will happen?”
The small head bobbed up and down. The snake seemed to be listening very seriously but its reply came out fragmented, making it hard for Yi Fengchu to fully grasp: ‘Pupa… white… in the mountains… eats, eats…’
Yi Fengchu listened intently with a solemn expression for quite some time but he was still completely confused. He lowered his head and asked his phone, “Is it that my grasp of this foreign language isn’t good enough? Why can’t I really understand what it’s saying?”
【It’s actually not a problem with your listening. It’s just that it doesn’t speak very fluently and has limited expressive ability.】
The phone’s tone seemed oddly nuanced. 【What exactly are you expecting from it? It’s just an illiterate wild mountain snake.】
Yi Fengchu was taken aback. “Aren’t all snakes the same? Don’t they all just hiss from birth? There’s such a thing as a literate or illiterate snake?”
The phone fell silent for a moment before replying: 【Of course there’s a difference. Non illiterate snakes are proficient in complex long sentences. They can spell. They can communicate properly…】
Feeling a sense of novelty, Yi Fengchu perked up his ears and listened closely.
【They can do homework. Take exams…】
At this point, Yi Fengchu sensed something was off and instinctively became alert.
Sure enough, the phone finally said in a faint tone: 【They even go to university. Isn’t that something new? Completely different from the ordinary snakes in the wilderness with limited brain capacity.】
“…,” Yi Fengchu took a deep breath. So it had all been the phone making things up to tease him.
With no one paying it any attention for the moment, the little flower snake coiled itself into a neat spiral like a mosquito coil and waited quietly where it was.
Seeing how cute and obedient it looked, Yi Fengchu couldn’t help reaching out and gently touching the snake’s cool head with his fingertip.
He instructed the flower snake to hide in the woods next and secretly observe the others and to come back and warn him if anything unusual happened.
The little flower snake nodded in an exaggerated, earnest manner. It was unclear how much it actually understood but it slowly slithered into the weeds and vanished from sight.
Yi Fengchu didn’t mind whether it could complete the task or not. He had never intended to place all his hopes on a wild snake with an undeveloped, instinct driven mind, it was merely an extra precaution.
Standing up, Yi Fengchu soon returned to the small Western style house where they were staying temporarily.
The living room on the first floor was empty. Aside from a few people who were resting in their rooms due to motion sickness, the rest of the students had all gone out in high spirits to explore together. Yi Fengchu sat down on the sofa, knocked lightly on his legs that had gone numb from squatting and then closed his eyes to rest for a moment.
Without realizing it, the sunlight streaming into the room gradually slanted westward, taking on a dusky yellow hue and casting long, narrow shadows at an angle.
Just then, a flurry of hurried, panicked footsteps outside shattered the quiet. Accompanied by a series of loud clatters, a group of university students pushed the door open and rushed in, all of them wearing unsettled, wary expressions.
After stumbling inside, they panted heavily as they braced themselves against the doorframe. Their backs were slightly hunched in an extremely guarded posture and their frightened gazes repeatedly flicked outward, as though they were wary of something chasing after them.
Only after a long while did they finally ease up a little and reach back to shut the door.
“What happened?” Yi Fengchu opened his eyes, his gaze clear and calm as he observed them.
The group was still shaken, exchanging looks with one another. For a moment, no one could answer. All that could be heard was their disordered, trembling breathing, brimming with fear.
After an indeterminate amount of time, someone finally seemed to jolt awake from a nightmare. With pale lips quivering, they murmured in a low, dazed voice:
“A ghost… there’s a ghost in the mountains…”
Outside the window, the mountain wind surged. A thread of chill brushed across the backs of everyone’s necks. As those words softly fell, the students present seemed to be pulled back into their memories.
Half an hour earlier, the golden sun had sunk toward the horizon. The dying light was blood red and the sunset pierced through the lush forest, painting crimson patches of light and shadow across the students’ faces.
The group walked through the mountain woods laughing and joking, occasionally reaching out to push aside the tangled branches jutting out beside the path, bending low as they threaded their way through the gaps between the trees.
When the wind blew, the vegetation on both sides swayed gently and with it, the shadows writhed wildly as well, baring their teeth and claws like emaciated fingers stretched out by ghosts.
Suddenly, one student stopped and asked hesitantly, “Did you hear that? Does it sound like someone calling Li Yin’s name from behind us?”
As soon as those words were spoken, everyone fell silent. They turned their heads to look back while simultaneously straining their ears to listen to the faint movements carried by the wind.
Sure enough, a distant calling voice echoed through the desolate wilderness.
The sound was very soft yet unmistakably clear. Once all other noises were suppressed, it became strikingly distinct.
After thinking for a moment, Li Yin suggested, “Could it be Wang Er catching up after falling behind just now?”
There were two students surnamed Wang in their department. Coincidentally, the two looked somewhat alike and shared similar temperaments, both tall and sturdily built, honest and taciturn, so their classmates jokingly referred to them as long lost brothers.
After everyone became familiar with one another, they ranked the two by age and called them Wang One and Wang Two, a habit they maintained in everyday conversation.
Wang Er was the younger of the two.
Li Yin grinned and glanced around. Sure enough, she didn’t spot Wang Er in the group, which further reinforced her guess.
So she turned back with a laugh and shouted loudly, “Wang Er, hurry up and catch up already! Be careful we won’t wait for you for dinner, ”
The forest was silent and deep. After a while, the calling voice faintly drifted from behind once more:
“Li Yin, Li Yin…”
The smiles on everyone’s faces slowly faded. This time, even Li Yin sensed that something was wrong. She stared at the forest ahead, half submerged in mountain mist and called out again, “Wang Er? If you’re not coming over, why do you keep calling my name?”
Li Yin’s voice echoed through the woods, tinged with an unmistakable tremor. When the echoes faded, there was still nothing but suffocating silence.
Only then did everyone belatedly realize, at some point, even the insects and birds that should have been heard in the wild had gone completely quiet.
Only layers of branches hung heavy like hanged corpses dangling from the treetops, drooping low and rustling softly in the wind.
Despite the luxuriant growth of vegetation in the mountains, which should have been brimming with vitality, everything now appeared steeped in lifeless gloom.
“…”
Far behind them, “Wang Er” still did not respond. Instead, in a tone that drifted through the mountain mist, the voice continued to call out “Li Yin” again and again.
“C.. could we really have run into something unclean?”
“Like the kind from legends… wandering spirits or something?”
Everyone swallowed in unison, their gazes fixed on the distance yet all they could see were shifting tree shadows and the darkened undergrowth stirred by the wind.
And it was precisely this fear of the unknown that made one’s scalp prickle the most, provoking instinctive resistance.
Their body heat seemed to be gradually carried away by the wind, raising goosebumps across their skin. Sensing something profoundly ominous, the students stopped trying to respond to the inexplicable voice behind them and instead stiffly moved forward.
Li Yin in particular was nearly frightened to tears. She bit down hard on her lip to keep herself from breaking into sobs.
No matter how relentlessly the voice behind them called her name, she didn’t dare turn her head again, her eyes locked tightly on the path ahead.
At first, they were still walking at a normal pace but as their hearts began to pound more and more violently, the group unconsciously quickened their steps, walking turned into fast walking, then into a full sprint.
After a moment of silence, Li Yin stammered in terror, “That voice… it was strange, so strange…”
“The distance between it and us… how did it seem like it never changed?”
No matter whether they sped up or slowed down, that voice lingered behind them like a ghostly shadow, neither far nor near, never making any sound of footsteps or breathing.
It didn’t draw closer but it never fell behind either.
The moment they realized this, all the students felt their hair stand on end. Panicking, they fled without regard for direction, stumbling all the way back to the small Western style house.
“That’s what happened,” Li Yin said after drinking half a cup of water, gradually calming down as she recounted the events. “Thankfully… that thing doesn’t seem to have followed us back…”
The sense of safety that came from hiding indoors gradually dispelled the shadow cast by the strange calling voices and the tense atmosphere slowly eased.
Just at that moment, the tightly shut front door was struck twice, the knocking resounding with two heavy bangs.
A voice drifted in from outside, low and hollow. “Could someone come and open the door for me? I’m Wang Er.”
The student standing closest to the door moved toward it instinctively. Just as their hand touched the doorknob, it was as if they had been pricked by a needle, they jerked their hand back in a flash.
Their faces had gone deathly pale as they whispered in a trembling voice, “Wang Er… although he doesn’t mind us calling him that, he would never refer to himself as ‘Wang Er’…”
So then, who exactly was the “person” standing outside the door?
The knocking came again, several more heavy raps and the doorknob began to turn repeatedly, as though whatever was outside was trying to force the door open…
Just as every student’s heart was lifted high into their throat, fear making them hold their breath, the knocking finally stopped.
After a short while, the door was knocked once more and the handle was twisted a few times from the outside. This time, however, the person beyond the door used a different line:
“Why is the door locked? Hurry up and open it, I’m Wang Lin…”
✦ ✧ ✦
Nycreth
[Translator]
☕ A LITTLE SOMETHING FOR THE TRANSLATOR
The Realm demands coffee. The Realm is not accepting complaints.
☕ 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