A vibration came from her pocket, barely pulling Yu Ning's thoughts back. She took out her phone and saw a new message pop up on the screen: [Remember now?]
Yu Ning's chest felt tight and swollen with discomfort. She didn't know how to reply.
1*******5: [You also raised a dog once. Remember?]
Dog…
Yu Ning furrowed her brows, a misty layer of moisture gathering in her eyes. She stood up and looked aimlessly around her surroundings, her gaze settling on a storage box on the table. As if drawn by something, she walked over on her own, picked it up, and rummaged through it, pulling out a palm-sized wooden tag with carved lettering.
Yu Wan.
The moment she saw the words clearly, Yu Ning's heart sank even further. Many fragments she had little recollection of pierced deep into her mind like shards of broken glass.
She thought of a certain morning after Jiang Xian's death, when Pei Chongqing had brought a dog into the bedroom; she thought of how she had named it "Yu Wan" and carved the wooden tag; she thought of how every morning it would obediently lie by the bedside, waiting for her to wake up, then curl up together with her on the sofa to watch TV, and walk around the courtyard together.
When had she forgotten?
It seemed to be the third day after she was rescued following the monster invasion. She had walked out of the bedroom, not seeing Yu Wan's shadow, and asked her husband where it had gone.
The fragmented pieces gradually assembled into a complete picture, and Yu Ning's breathing grew increasingly difficult—as if a plastic bag had been wrapped over her head, her vision blurring, the air growing unbearably thin.
At that moment, a knock came at the study door. Yu Ning's whole body trembled, her gaze darting toward the door. She saw the doorknob being gently turned downward, but it didn't open.
"Wife."
From behind the door came Pei Chongqing's magnetic, mechanical voice. "Time to eat."
Yu Ning's hand gripped the name tag tightly. Hearing his voice only made her feel more terrified. Her vocal cords and feet felt as heavy as if they'd been injected with lead—she couldn't make a sound, couldn't move a single step, her body about to sag downward bit by bit.
Perhaps because she didn't respond, the doorknob was turned once more.
Yu Ning wiped away her tears and forced herself to speak: "I know."
She was still trembling slightly. "I-I'm not hungry right now. You go down first."
These words weren't enough to send him away. Pei Chongqing paused briefly, then asked again: "Yu Ning, what are you, doing?"
Accompanying these words, he twisted the doorknob twice in succession, as if he would find every possible way to force the door open if she didn't unlock it.
Yu Ning knew she couldn't hide forever. She calmed herself down, stuffed the name tag and phone into her pocket, and hurried over to open the door.
The gap in the door widened, revealing the man's face—split horizontally by scars and divided vertically by shadows. It was like an irregular jigsaw puzzle, even the smile he curved his lips into carrying an asymmetrical awkwardness.
Yu Ning still hadn't gotten used to his appearance, especially after those memories came flooding back. Suppressing her discomfort, she went downstairs with him.
Before leaving, Pei Chongqing's gaze lingered on her, then glanced toward the study. When they reached the dining room and he sat across from her, he asked again what she had been doing in the study. Ever since he had taken Yu Wan back into his body, he no longer had any surveillance to observe his wife in real time.
Yu Ning held her chopsticks, poking at the rice without much appetite, and said with her head lowered that she had been reading.
"I want, to read, too." Pei Chongqing stared at her without blinking. "Yu Ning's, book."
Only at times like this did he display such a strong desire to explore.
"We, together, watch."
"…"
Yu Ning didn't know how to refuse. She racked her brain and declined in a voice as faint as a mosquito's buzz: "I want to be alone for a while. If you're by my side, I'll get distracted."
"Why?"
He stopped eating, setting his wooden chopsticks down on the table.
"…I'm preparing for an exam."
"Exam?" Pei Chongqing narrowed his eyes. He knew the word—when he had first been introduced to human knowledge, Yu Ning had given him an exam to test whether he understood what he had learned.
He didn't understand, and deep confusion spilled from his eyes: "Yu Ning, already know, a lot, why, need, exam?"
Yu Ning also felt the excuse was flimsy, but she couldn't think of anything better. She truly needed some personal space and distance from him to think about those matters.
What that phone had said might not necessarily be true, but her body's instinctive reactions were genuine. Heartache and tears were human emotional expressions for the loss of something cherished, and that feeling to her… was far too real.
She had to privately ask that phone again.
"Yu Ning, can leave door, open?" Pei Chongqing took half a step back, smiling. "I won't disturb, you. I, need to, watch you."
"I don't want to." Yu Ning steeled herself to refuse, tears threatening to fall again. "If you watch me, I won't be able to study at all."
The atmosphere grew tense. Noticing the glimmer of tears in his wife's eyes, Pei Chongqing, though puzzled, was the first to stop pressing the matter and made no further demands. If she was unwilling, he would just have to release that dog's soul-spirit again.
After dinner, Yu Ning hurried upstairs to the study and locked the door behind her.
Pei Chongqing had been far more easily appeased than she had imagined, but her heart was still racing.
Yu Ning pulled out the chair at the desk and sat down. When she reached for her phone, she found her pocket empty—only a wooden nameplate remained.
She froze, unwilling to give up, and turned her pockets inside out. But no matter which pocket she searched, she couldn't find the phone.
It had disappeared… was it hiding from Pei Chongqing?
At that thought, Yu Ning immediately stuffed the wooden nameplate she was clutching into one of her pockets, grabbed a few books from the shelf, and piled them in front of her, putting on a pretense of studying.
She didn't dare turn around to look, but she remembered clearly that she had locked the door.
Yu Ning stared at the adult college entrance exam textbooks that she hadn't opened in a long time, not knowing where to rest her eyes. The knowledge points she had once studied seemed to have drifted away with the passage of time.
It wasn't her fault, though—who told her to end up in this godforsaken place with no way back?
The more Yu Ning thought about it, the sadder she became.
Just as she was staring blankly at the textbooks, at a loss for what to do, an unexpected familiar vibration came from her pocket.
Yu Ning paused, her gaze following the sensation to the right pocket of her skirt, where she could clearly see a square outline against her leg. She reached in, pulled it out, and there it was—the phone that had just disappeared.
1*******5: [You're not stupid, at least you know to keep your distance.]
Yu Ning pressed her lips together. Though being teased like this was irritating, she was indeed deliberately hiding, so she didn't dare bring the phone up to the desk. Instead, she held it in her lap, like a bad student secretly playing with her phone under the desk.
Yu Ning: [Do you have radar? You think he's outside?]
After sending that message, she looked up and glanced at the tightly shut door through the small round mirror she had just taken out, then added another line: 【My door is closed. It's just me in here.】
1*******5 replied almost instantly: 【He's not in there, but he's placed an eye you can't see right beside you.】
Seeing those words, Yu Ning imagined a human eyeball and felt a chill run down her spine.
She typed back with trembling fingers: 【Stop trying to scare me. I'm not that easy to fool. Don't use these tricks to boost your so-called credibility—I won't believe you.】
Deliberately hiding away for a while and then claiming to be avoiding an invisible eye—the signs of self-staging were all too obvious. She wasn't stupid enough to believe everything she was told.
Yu Ning pressed her lips together in thought, but her neck still unconsciously bent lower.
She expected 15 to argue back, but instead it sent: 【Haha, you're so cute!】
Yu Ning's face grew warm. She felt teased—and by a phone, no less. She poked at the screen with her fingernail in dissatisfaction, making loud tapping sounds.
1*******5: 【I'm not lying to you. No need to poke me like that.】
1*******5: 【Ah… that tickles… Your fingers are poking me right out.】
Seeing that second line, Yu Ning was so startled her hand slipped. She lost her grip, and the phone dropped onto her lap. Unfortunately, her legs didn't catch it, and with a thud, the phone hit the floor.
Yu Ning's mind buzzed. Only when she heard the sound did she think to push back her chair and look for the phone. But even as she knelt on the ground, she couldn't find it anywhere.
Where did it go? This thing could appear out of nowhere at any moment…
After searching for a long time, her lower back ached so much she could barely straighten up. She knelt back on her heels, sat up straight, and rubbed her lower back with her hand. When her gaze rose to the edge of the desk, she saw that familiar gray-silver iPhone.
1*******5: 【Tired from searching?】
Yu Ning sat back down on the chair with a plop. Instead of picking up the phone, she poked at it on the desk, her lips turned down in a pout, looking a bit aggrieved: 【Are you doing this on purpose?】
【Mm.】
15 answered without hesitation.
Yu Ning: 【Are you human?】
【I'm not insulting you—I just want to know what you are and why you're giving me well-intentioned warnings. Of course, I still don't quite believe in your so-called "well-intentioned warnings."】
【A phone that can appear and disappear out of thin air is far less convincing than my husband just standing there. He's covered in scars and not good-looking, but at least he has a nose and eyes… But you? You're just a phone. So whatever you tell me, I won't believe it.】
Yu Ning carefully and deliberately typed out her concerns, word by word. Although she had recalled many painful memories through it and shed plenty of tears, she still found it hard to believe those things had actually happened.
Who knew whether that wooden plaque and the relic bearing the name "Jiang Xian" were fabricated out of thin air by this phone?
The only reason she was willing to communicate with it was that its way of speaking resembled a logical, living person.
The monsters she had encountered before—including that flower-type monster that had lured her to open the door—were all beings with extremely bizarre behavior. Even now, thinking back on it made her shudder. She could hardly understand how she had been lured in the first place.
However, Yu Ning wasn't sure if her own memories might be deceiving her. If those memories only seemed full of holes in hindsight after being exposed, then wasn't the phone she now somewhat trusted and was willing to communicate with perhaps weaving her a perfect lie she couldn't even recognize?
After all, people only think clearly when they're observing from the sidelines or after they've stepped back from a situation.
After the message was sent, the phone lay there silently for a long time. Seeing that it hadn't disappeared, Yu Ning relaxed and slumped onto the desk.
She had been on high alert all day, and the moment she rested her head on the desk, her eyelids began to droop heavily.
Just as Yu Ning, drowsy and half-asleep, was about to close her eyes, the phone buzzed twice.
She rubbed her eyes and picked it up.
1*******5: [Fine, you're really stubborn, but let me say this upfront.]
1*******5: [Whether you believe it or not, I'm definitely more useful than that incompetent husband of yours.]
1*******5: [I can get you out of this godforsaken place.]
Yu Ning didn't actually believe it, but when she saw the third message, her eyes couldn't help but widen.
[Really?]
She sat up straight and sent those two words.
15 didn't continue that topic, instead asking her to find a mirror. Yu Ning hesitated, not understanding their reasoning, and remained wary.
1*******5: [Don't you want to know what I look like?]
Yu Ning instinctively glanced at the small round mirror on her desk.
1*******5: [Something that small won't work.]
[Don't worry, even though my existence is indeed strange, I won't hurt you.]
A flippant remark, still not very convincing, but Yu Ning got up to look for a mirror.
She wandered around the study, eventually stopping in front of a door.
At that moment, Yu Wan, who had just woken up on the desk, saw Yu Ning pause at the bathroom entrance. Still groggy, it shook its head and drifted over sluggishly.
It didn't even know when it had fallen asleep, nor had it picked a good spot to sleep—like on Yu Ning's body.
Yu Wan was just about to fly over and perch on Yu Ning's shoulder when, the next second, it flopped onto the floor with a thud. Before it could get up, its eyes were suddenly covered by an invisible hand, and its Soul Consciousness was pulled away as well.
Because of what happened last time, aside from taking care of physical needs, Yu Ning really didn't like being in the bathroom.
But in a place like the study, if she wanted to find a large mirror, this was the only option.
Yu Ning left the door open and turned on the light, standing right at the doorframe to look at the mirror inside, refusing to step any further. Even when 15 asked her to go deeper in, she repeatedly declined.
15 seemed somewhat helpless and even asked if she had PTSD from last time.
Yu Ning pressed her lips together without replying, only feeling that their existence was becoming more and more intriguing. Would Monsters be clever enough to use a word like "PTSD"?
[Put down the phone. Look at the mirror.] 15 said.
Yu Ning gripped her phone, her hand hanging naturally in front of her, her gaze fixed directly on the mirror.
[In 10 seconds, I'll reveal myself.]
[10, 9, 8, 7, 6…]
[5, 4, 3, 2…]
[1.]
The phone vibrated with each number popping up on the screen, and with every vibration, Yu Ning's heartbeat counted along in silence.
She was terrified of seeing something she shouldn't, or provoking something she shouldn't, but knowing that Pei Chongqing was at home, she felt a little less worried.
This kind of psychology was actually very strange, very unreasonable… She was clearly afraid of him too, deliberately keeping her distance because of his appearance and his many actions.
The next second.
When she saw the figure materializing in the mirror, the unease in Yu Ning's heart instantly vanished, her gaze turning dull and incredulous.
What appeared was Pei Chongqing as he had been before so many scars, before his disfigurement. Bare-chested, he bent down to smile at her, then pressed his hand against the mirror and waved at her, writing a line of words.
—You should be able to figure it out, right? Surely you wouldn't even know who your real husband is.