Walking through the fog corridor, she could see nothing in any direction but the vast, boundless mist.
Chu Yao steeled herself and pressed on. After a whole day of being hunted by Anomalies, she had long since made up her mind to meet death with courage. She wanted to see for herself just what secret this fog — the fog that had saved her from the Anomalies — was hiding!
Worst case I just die — and once I'm dead I'll be an Anomaly too anyway!
"%@¥&."
"*%@**&..."
From time to time, untranslatable Evil God murmurs drifted past her ears. Merely hearing them gave her a horror that twisted the soul and shattered the will.
The baby-faced, bustily-endowed high school girl trembled with fear and instinctively covered her ears. Had she been able to decipher those murmurs, she would have heard the following exchange between the Evil Gods:
"This chest, good enough? Big enough?"
"By human standards, should be plenty — big and beautiful, and best of all, she's a proper one."
"Right, there's no more proper identity than a student."
"..."
How much time passed, she couldn't say, but eventually Chu Yao walked out of the fog corridor.
The Evil God murmurs that had circled her ears finally fell silent, and Chu Yao heaved a long sigh, as if a great weight had lifted.
Those sounds had been too terrifying — she suspected that if she kept listening she would go completely insane!
"Where is this..."
Chu Yao looked around the bleak, deserted street, and her eyes went at once to the only storefront with a light on.
She was abnormally sensitive to light now. Without a moment's hesitation she walked toward it, and when she reached the entrance, she found herself looking up at the sign.
Endless, boundless fog gathered on the surface of the sign, forming a name in an ancient, simple script.
"Origin Internet Cafe?"
Chu Yao was bewildered. She had never expected it to be an internet cafe.
As a bright, lovely young high school girl from the Demon Capital, of course she knew what an internet cafe was. Every day after school, the boys in her class would go off in little groups to play games at internet cafes. She simply never went to places like that, because her home already had a computer, and besides, she didn't like games.
After hesitating a moment, Chu Yao pushed open the glass door and asked cautiously, "Hello, is anyone inside?"
After all, this was the only source of light on the entire street, and she longed for light more than anything.
***
Liu Haoming was sitting at the counter, waiting for his game to find a match, when he suddenly heard a noise at the door.
"A customer really came!"
Delighted, he called back, "Yeah, someone's here, come on in."
Chu Yao froze. The voice was like the toll of a bell — "clang, clang" — and it filled her with a grand, sacred sense of security, as though as long as she stayed inside the internet cafe, there was no Anomaly left in the world that could harm her.
Curious what kind of person could have a voice like that, Chu Yao walked toward the faint, indistinct silhouette.
Just then Liu Haoming turned his head, and his gaze stopped the little girl in her tracks.
***
Chu Yao stared helplessly at the internet cafe owner — she couldn't even tell what He was.
His face was shrouded in chaos mist, and two orbs of flowing fire, hotter and brighter than magma, flickered in His pupils.
"Is He an Anomaly too?!" The alarm bells in Chu Yao's head blared, and she nearly bolted out the door.
What she didn't know was that she had given Liu Haoming quite a start too.
Good grief, what a massive sin! Did she grow up eating papayas?
Judging by her fresh, tender young face, she was probably just a high schooler. A high schooler at an internet cafe in the dead of night — no need to even think about it, she had to be another gaming-addict girl, just like Li Xi last night.
Having formed a rough first impression of Chu Yao, Liu Haoming put on his standard customer-service smile and asked:
"Hello, would you like a computer?"
***
The internet cafe owner's voice was like the dawn drums echoing across Mount Wutai, carrying a strange magic that soothed the heart. The fear Chu Yao felt toward Him was pressed down, and instinct told her that as long as she obeyed the internet cafe owner, He wouldn't harm her.
"Can I... not use one?" Chu Yao answered timidly.
She had never been to an internet cafe before, and having just narrowly escaped death at the hands of the Anomalies, she truly wasn't in any mood to play on a computer right now.
The main reason, though, was that she'd rushed out the door today without bringing any money, and she hadn't brought her ID either.
The smile on Liu Haoming's face stiffened, and he fell silent.
Not use a computer?
You come to an internet cafe and don't use a computer — then what are you going to use? Me?
Chu Yao sensed the shift in the internet cafe owner's mood. Afraid of being driven out to face the Anomalies in the darkness all over again, she hurriedly added, "I'm really sorry, I didn't bring any money. Could I please just stay in the internet cafe for one night? I'll leave the moment the sun rises tomorrow!"
As long as the sun came out, she could live through another day under the protection of daylight.
By now Liu Haoming understood. So it wasn't that she didn't want to use a computer — she just had no money to.
Such a cute little girl — how could she not even scrape together enough for a session? Don't tell me she snuck out without telling her family, like Li Xi?
The thought made Liu Haoming worry for her.
Dragon City might have decent public safety, but you still shouldn't hand bad people the chance to commit a crime. A delicate little girl wandering all over the place without a cent to her name, having to crash at an internet cafe — what, are you some Sanhe drifter?
"Miss, you'd better just go home."
Breaking his silence, Liu Haoming told her so. He meant to call the authorities and have the officers escort her home.
Chu Yao's heart lurched. So the internet cafe owner was going to drive her away after all?
But she couldn't leave. If she ran into an Anomaly in the darkness again, she'd be as good as dead!
Chu Yao bit her lip and pleaded, pitiful and forlorn:
"Please don't send me away, all right? If I go home now, I'll die!"
Die?
Liu Haoming frowned. He hadn't expected her to put it so seriously.
Did she run away because her family abused her, or did she have some other unavoidable hardship?
Liu Haoming's imagination ran wild. After mulling it over for a moment, he asked her, "Do you want me to report this to the authorities for you?"
"No, don't..."
Chu Yao shook her head. She was being hunted by Anomalies, not by bad people. "This kind of thing — even reporting it to the authorities won't do any good," she answered dejectedly.
Liu Haoming's frown deepened. If even reporting it to the authorities couldn't solve it, she really must have some unavoidable hardship.
Every family has its own troubles — Liu Haoming understood that. If her family really was abusing her, reporting it blindly might only make her situation even harder.
"I'm begging you, please let me stay here for one night, okay? The moment the sun rises I'll leave, and I won't cause you any trouble at all." Chu Yao kept pleading, her eyes brimming with hope.
The internet cafe owner looked deeply wrong — scarier even than an Anomaly — yet she sensed no malice from Him. Standing before Him, she felt nothing but utterly grounded and safe.
Liu Haoming sighed, looked at Chu Yao with deep sympathy, and said helplessly:
"Fine. You can spend the night at the internet cafe. I'll open a computer for you for free — watch a movie, relax a little."
Letting the girl spend the night at the internet cafe was no problem at all; he could even cover the fee for her. What worried him was what the girl was going to do once dawn broke.