Category: My Cthulhu Girlfriend (gl)

Chapter 23: Food

White steam rose from the dishes on the table, forming a hazy barrier between the two.

Shen Yuhe’s eyes were obscured by the steam, their expression unreadable, but Xiang Er could feel her gaze.

She didn’t hesitate for long, standing up and carrying her small bowl across the coffee table.

Xiang Er wore a fluffy green pajama set, white top and green bottoms, her hair loose, her hands cradling a white porcelain bowl, her eyes slightly downcast. As she walked slowly, she resembled a soft, obedient white kitten.

She placed her bowl beside Shen Yuhe and carefully sat down on the sofa, perching on the edge, her slender back ramrod straight.

Shen Yuhe watched her every move, her gaze intense and… ravenous.

Xiang Er sat properly, bent down, picked up Shen Yuhe’s chopsticks, and gently picked up a shrimp dumpling. The plump dumpling, its translucent skin revealing the shape of the shrimp within, drew Shen Yuhe’s gaze away from Xiang Er’s face. She stared at the dumpling for a moment.

She suddenly extended the tip of her tongue, her eyes fixed on Xiang Er’s pale fingers holding the chopsticks, licking her full, red lips, her gaze languid and seductive.

A whole shrimp could be wrapped inside a dumpling. What about a person? If a person could be wrapped up like this, it would be an unforgettable sight… a small person bundled in a transparent film, their body curled up, their face filled with fear and panic. Just imagining the scene was… delicious…

Xiang Er, still focused on picking up the dumpling, lifted it and looked up at Shen Yuhe, just in time to see her lick her lips.

Xiang Er froze for a moment, and Shen Yuhe quickly retracted her tongue, composing her features into an expression of dignified composure.

Had she noticed something?

A moment later, Xiang Er smiled knowingly:

“Eat up, it’s delicious. I know you’re hungry.”

She was so hungry she was licking her lips, yet she didn’t reach for the food, just waited patiently, truly… adorable… Xiang Er extended the chopsticks a little further.

Shen Yuhe hesitated, then opened her mouth elegantly. Xiang Er placed the entire dumpling into her mouth, and Shen Yuhe closed her lips, chewing delicately.

Xiang Er watched her expectantly and asked:

“Is it good?”

Shen Yuhe, looking at the bright sparkle in Xiang Er’s eyes, at her thin, flushed cheeks, bit down.

The flavorful juices burst in her mouth, filling her senses, just like the exquisite body before her, being savored, its soft, tender flesh yielding, sliding down her throat…

She nodded, her eyes dark and deep:

“Very delicious.”

The clouds outside parted, and the bright sunlight reappeared. The thunder and dark clouds had come and gone quickly, as if they had never been there.

Seeing Shen Yuhe chewing, Xiang Er finally relaxed. She had been worried that someone so refined wouldn’t like the food she had ordered… Fortunately, she seemed to enjoy it.

And… the fact that she had asked to be fed meant that she considered their relationship to be fairly close, right? Xiang Er blushed slightly, quickly lowering her head and picking up her bowl, saying:

“Have some porridge, before it gets cold.”

Shen Yuhe turned to face Xiang Er, opening her mouth again, her gaze languid and contented, studying Xiang Er’s face.

Xiang Er was momentarily puzzled, then she understood.

She… wanted to be fed again!

Xiang Er’s cheeks burned. The flame that had been flickering within her now flared, its heat rising to her face, warming her palms.

Asking to be fed a dumpling could be attributed to her inability to use chopsticks, but now asking to be fed porridge… Surely Shen Yuhe knew how to use a spoon?

So, what… did Shen Yuhe mean by this?

The flames burned on Xiang Er’s cheeks. Her hand trembled slightly, but she still picked up the spoon, scooped up some porridge, and hesitantly offered it to Shen Yuhe.

Shen Yuhe even leaned forward slightly, making it easier for Xiang Er to feed her, her beautiful hands resting casually on the sofa, with no intention of picking up the spoon herself.

Her dark, inky eyes remained fixed on Xiang Er’s, an unsettling intensity in her gaze.

Xiang Er blushed even more deeply, unable to meet Shen Yuhe’s eyes. She was certain now, Shen Yuhe wasn’t interested in the food, she was interested in… something else.

Shen Yuhe sipped the porridge from the spoon, swallowed smoothly, and said again:

“Very delicious.”

After saying this, she didn’t open her mouth again. Instead, she reached out and took Xiang Er’s bowl.

Xiang Er:

“Huh? That’s mine…”

But Shen Yuhe had already scooped up a spoonful of porridge. Staring at Xiang Er, she smiled faintly, her words laden with meaning:

“Open your mouth.”

Xiang Er:

“Huh?”

She froze again. Although she had been doing that a lot today, she simply couldn’t keep up with Shen Yuhe’s train of thought. Was this… reciprocation?

Her first instinct was to refuse, politely leaning back:

“No, thank you, I can eat by myself, really, it’s fine…”

Shen Yuhe’s smile vanished, her gaze fixed on Xiang Er, her voice calm and even:

“Open your mouth.”

Xiang Er stopped retreating, her cheeks burning crimson, like the most vibrant sunset, its colors crushed and spread across her small face. She took several deep breaths, suppressing the urge to scream, leaned forward slightly, and opened her mouth.

Shen Yuhe’s movements were surprisingly gentle, as if afraid of breaking Xiang Er, carefully holding the ceramic spoon as she slowly fed her the porridge, then gently withdrew the spoon.

Xiang Er chewed mechanically, unable to taste anything. Even though the porridge had already cooled, she felt a flush of heat spread through her body, tears welling up in her eyes.

Shen Yuhe held the spoon in mid-air, as if waiting for something, her gaze filled with expectation and encouragement.

Xiang Er, bewildered, thought for a moment, then said:

“Um, it’s delicious?”

Shen Yuhe’s lips curved upwards, a bright, unrestrained smile blooming across her face, camellias and azaleas seemingly blossoming in the small living room, her eyes reflecting the brilliant colors of the sky and sea, her joy radiating from within.

Her smile was so beautiful that it almost made Xiang Er feel guilty: Why hadn’t she said that sooner? Why hadn’t she accepted being fed earlier? Just this small act of being fed could make her savior so happy, why had she refused?

Once the threshold was crossed, the rest was easy.

Shen Yuhe strictly adhered to the principle of “one bite for you, one bite for me,” opening her mouth again, waiting for Xiang Er to feed her.

Xiang Er, having mentally prepared herself, held Shen Yuhe’s bowl and fed her a spoonful of porridge with Shen Yuhe’s spoon.

Shen Yuhe nodded in satisfaction, then fed Xiang Er a spoonful in return.

Thus, they continued, feeding each other one bite at a time. Their bowls of porridge quickly emptied, and in between, Xiang Er deftly used her chopsticks to feed them both dim sum.

The meal lasted for over an hour, until they were both finally satisfied.

Shen Yuhe fed Xiang Er the last piece of dim sum and asked, seemingly reluctant for the meal to end:

“Do you want anything else?”

Xiang Er was already full. She quickly covered her mouth with her hand, afraid of being fed any more:

“No… I can’t eat anymore, I’m really full.”

Shen Yuhe said regretfully:

“You eat too little. You should eat more.”

Xiang Er had already eaten twice her usual amount and didn’t know what to say. After a moment, she asked:

“Are you full?”

Shen Yuhe looked at her, her legs casually crossed on the sofa, and nodded.

As if a nod wasn’t enough, she suddenly lifted her sweater, revealing her abdomen.

Xiang Er, caught off guard, saw her slender waist and the faint outline of abs below, her just barely calmed face flushing again. She cried out:

“Put your clothes on!”

Shen Yuhe looked at her innocently, her tone puzzled:

“I’m showing you my full belly. What’s wrong? Why such a big reaction?”

Xiang Er blushed even more deeply, embarrassed by her own momentary lapse in propriety. She turned away and mumbled:

“Okay, I… I see it. Put your clothes on, you’ll catch a cold.”

Shen Yuhe said:

“Oh… a cold.”

She obediently lowered her hand, the white sweater falling back into place, covering her stomach. But… it only covered her stomach, not the more important parts below, which remained… prominent.

Certain things were subtly visible, like dappled sunlight under a tree, impossible to ignore.

Xiang Er felt like she was going to lose it. She couldn’t bear to look!

She hurried into her room and frantically searched her closet, pulling out a comfortable, simple denim skirt. She poked her head out of the room and called to Shen Yuhe:

“Miss Shen, come try this on!”

Shen Yuhe stood up gracefully, her long legs moving rhythmically in the rabbit slippers, and in a few strides, reached the guest room, walking familiarly towards the closet:

“What is it?”

Xiang Er handed her the skirt, her ears still burning, her voice slightly trembling:

“You… wear this, if you don’t mind.”

Shen Yuhe smiled and took the skirt, but instead of trying it on, she tossed it onto the bed and turned to look inside the closet.

Xiang Er was horrified. Her collection of cheap clothes was about to be exposed! But she couldn’t stop Shen Yuhe, it would seem as if she had something to hide… She hesitated, and Shen Yuhe had already pulled out an item of clothing:

“I’ll wear this.”

Xiang Er was speechless.

Shen Yuhe had already started putting it on, her movements slightly awkward. She sat casually on the edge of the bed, lifting one long leg, its contours more graceful than a supermodel’s, captivating Xiang Er’s gaze.

She quickly finished dressing.

Her tall, slender figure stood before Xiang Er, and she turned around, smiling gently:

“Does it look good?”

Xiang Er looked at her cheap, ripped denim shorts on that perfect, Grecian-statue-like body. As she turned, the light and shadow played on her skin like honey, turning it a shade of jade and pale gold… The hem of the shorts barely reached her upper thighs, clinging tightly to her smooth, delicate skin. It was… far more distracting, far more suggestive, than being naked!

Xiang Er felt that if she weren’t so weak, she would have a nosebleed right then and there!

She even covered her nose with her hand, her voice muffled, and replied helplessly:

“It… looks good…”

Shen Yuhe laughed, her laughter like the chirping of a bird high in the treetops. The ripped parts of the shorts revealed glimpses of her jade-like skin, which trembled slightly with her laughter.

Xiang Er didn’t know what to say. Although she was covering her face, her eyes were glued to Shen Yuhe’s thigh.

She finally understood why beautiful people could make money. If such a beauty were willing to wear such clothes for her, she would gladly pay. It was a gift from heaven, a feast for the eyes.

Shen Yuhe walked gracefully towards the small empty space at the foot of the bed and twirled around a few more times, turning to Xiang Er with a smile:

“Does it look good?”

Xiang Er nodded eagerly. This was comparable to a runway model’s performance, and she even clapped:

“It looks amazing!”

Shen Yuhe, still smiling, walked out of the room, then suddenly turned and headed towards the master bedroom.

Xiang Er’s heart sank. That room… was where her former roommate had lived. It hadn’t been cleaned, and she didn’t know if the Evil God’s presence, or even… the tentacles… were still there.

She hurried out to stop her, but with a “click,” Shen Yuhe had already opened the door.

Xiang Er held her breath and slowly approached. Seeing the dust-filled room, she felt a sinking feeling in her stomach. She reached out to grab the doorknob and close the door.

But her hand was stopped. Someone grasped her hand, and at the same time, she felt a weight on her shoulder, a wave of fragrance enveloping her.

Shen Yuhe rested her sharp chin on Xiang Er’s shoulder, her beautiful face close to Xiang Er’s. Their gazes met, both looking at the old room, at the dust motes dancing in the beams of light.

Time seemed to slow down, Xiang Er holding her breath, her heart pounding in her ears.

She felt as if a beautiful, exotic bird had landed on her, rendering her motionless, afraid to even breathe, lest she frighten the proud bird away.

She didn’t even dare turn to look at Shen Yuhe’s face, but she didn’t need to look to know that it would be even softer, smoother, and sweeter than she imagined, like the honeyed heart of a flower.

Xiang Er’s mind was in turmoil. She could smell Shen Yuhe’s fragrance, feel her breath on her neck, a warmth spreading from their point of contact, from her shoulder and neck, through her entire body.

Just as she was about to succumb to the intoxicating touch, Shen Yuhe’s magnetic voice, low and slow like a cello, reached her ear, its tone utterly seductive:

“I’ll move in and stay with you, okay?”

Chapter 22: Daylight

Xiang Er was completely enveloped by Shen Yuhe in the old sofa. The unyielding backrest dug into her neck and lower back, but the person in front of her prevented her from adjusting her position. Her neck was forced upwards, and she looked at Shen Yuhe with a mixture of helplessness and appeal.

Shen Yuhe’s unique, delicate sweet fragrance, like a soft, pale yellow veil, enveloped Xiang Er completely. She almost couldn’t feel her own presence, only able to look up at that breathtakingly beautiful face.

Shen Yuhe’s expression was neutral, her beauty perfectly sculpted, like a statue, only exquisite form, her soul unreadable.

Xiang Er stared blankly for a long time, then finally spoke:

“You… please let go of me.”

But Shen Yuhe didn’t release her, her expression still like a statue in a grand temple, detached from earthly concerns, her voice carrying an air of authority and pressure:

“Promise me you won’t reply to him.”

A strange, unique force seemed to take control of Xiang Er’s mind, her eyes unfocused as she nodded:

“Mm, okay…”

Shen Yuhe released her arms and sat up, the cage formed by her body finally broken.

Xiang Er gasped for air, steadied herself on the sofa, and turned to look.

Shen Yuhe suddenly stood up and walked away, her figure tall and elegant, her stride confident, like a radiant celebrity, as she entered Xiang Er’s room.

Xiang Er let out a surprised “Eh?” and quickly followed.

Shen Yuhe stood by the window, her hands gripping the frame, her body leaning forward, gazing out through the blue-tinted glass, as if lost in thought.

Xiang Er followed her gaze.

The weather was beautiful today. Sunlight had been streaming in since early morning, the sky a clear, polished mirror, reflecting the bright light onto countless boxy buildings, piercing through countless panes of glass, until, reaching the room, it became pale and papery.

Xiang Er asked:

“What are you looking at?”

Shen Yuhe replied softly:

“Your world.”

Xiang Er paused, then shook her head:

“But… I don’t think this is my world. This is… many other people’s world…”

But not hers. She had no home, no lover, not even any close friends. To this world, she was merely a passerby, not a resident, so it couldn’t be called her world.

However, having blurted out these words, she felt a pang of embarrassment. Their relationship wasn’t close enough for such a confession. It was awkward; Miss Shen must be secretly laughing at her… or perhaps, with her good upbringing, she would politely smile and let it go…

She didn’t expect Shen Yuhe to turn around, look at her intently, and ask with utmost sincerity:

“Then, where is your world? How can I enter your world?”

Her eyes were unfathomable, time and space swirling within them. Her swan-like neck, lowered in a gesture of humility and sincerity, as she leaned closer, eager… to enter Xiang Er’s world.

Was this real?

The scene was so beautiful, so dreamlike, that Xiang Er couldn’t believe her ears, letting out a surprised “Huh?”

Shen Yuhe repeated her question, her words clear and precise, her eyes fixed on Xiang Er’s face, searching for every nuance of expression.

Xiang Er’s face flushed crimson.

But Shen Yuhe continued to stare, seemingly fascinated by every minute change in Xiang Er’s expression, as if her ordinary face was more worthy of study than a world-renowned painting.

It was a gaze free of judgment, a gaze that made the observed feel… respected, seen in a way they had never been before.

Under Shen Yuhe’s unwavering gaze, Xiang Er’s blush deepened, her fingers clutching the hem of her clothes. She opened her mouth slightly, unsure what to say, but wanting to respond.

She had never been seen with such intensity, such focus. In the orphanage, she was surrounded by other children, no teacher ever singled her out. In elementary school, she was lost among the other, more vibrant children. In middle school, there were always more outstanding girls who caught everyone’s attention. In university, even the boys who pursued her were also pursuing other girls.

No one had ever seen her, truly seen her, the way Shen Yuhe did.

Xiang Er desperately wanted to respond, but… the question was too profound, she couldn’t find an answer. She could only say:

“I, I don’t know where it is either. Maybe someday? Maybe when I buy a house, find a partner…”

Shen Yuhe’s eyelashes fluttered, her eyebrows raising slightly. She nodded, encouraging Xiang Er to continue.

Xiang Er was still racking her brains, trying to think of something else to say, to give the other person a chance to understand her… when a knock on the door interrupted her.

The delivery driver’s voice was loud, audible even in the guest room:

“Your takeout is here! Open the door!”

Xiang Er immediately turned and ran towards the door.

She was still weak from the fever, and wearing plastic slippers instead of her usual cotton slippers. After only a few steps, her toe caught on the slipper, and she stumbled backwards:

“Ouch!”

Her cry was still echoing in the air when a pair of arms caught her, her body limp, her head landing against something soft.

The back of her head felt like it had landed on a thick quilt, no pain, only… a dizzying sense of comfort.

She didn’t see that beneath her head was a mass of thick, black, writhing substance, a viscous liquid spreading out, then contracting, its end… connected to the beautiful woman’s shoulder.

The beautiful Shen Yuhe looked at Xiang Er in her arms with concern and asked softly:

“Are you alright?”

Xiang Er was still dazed, her mind sluggish, unable to process what had just happened. In this warm, soft embrace, her entire being cried out: So comfortable, I want to sink into this, I want to fall asleep and never wake up…

But she couldn’t.

Her gaze focused, and she saw Shen Yuhe’s beautiful, concerned face.

Her mind cleared considerably, a smile involuntarily appearing on her lips:

“I’m fine, thank you… you saved me again.”

Shen Yuhe smiled back, her other arm tightening around Xiang Er’s waist, the tips of her fingers, trailing black shadows, caressing the delicate skin.

Merge… merge… this was what Akhe desired.

No matter who merged with whom… it was what It desired…

The delivery driver’s voice, now impatient, rang out:

“Do you still want your food? If not, I’ll just leave it at the door!”

Xiang Er quickly stood up, straightened her clothes, and ran to the door, calling out:

“Just leave it at the door!”

The delivery driver grumbled:

“Tch, so there was someone home. Taking so long to answer… Alright, I’ve left it at the door, come get it quickly.”

The sound of footsteps faded away. In the guest room, the beautiful woman stood motionless, looking at the mass of black shadow beside her, her expression unreadable. Without a single movement from her, the black, viscous liquid retracted, quickly coalescing into a new, beautiful arm.

Even the white sweater was perfectly intact on the arm.

Shen Yuhe slowly walked out of the guest room.

Xiang Er had already opened the door and brought in a large wooden food box, exclaiming:

“Wow, this box is beautiful!”

She placed the food box on the coffee table in the living room. There was no dining table in the apartment; they usually ate at the coffee table or in their rooms.

She took out the assortment of delicate dim sum from the wooden box. Along with the large pot of steaming hot seafood porridge, it looked quite appetizing. Xiang Er went to the kitchen to get some utensils, feeling slightly embarrassed about having to eat at the coffee table. She brought out spoons, small bowls, and small plates, serving Shen Yuhe a small bowl of porridge and placing a plate beside it.

“Sorry, it’s a bit simple. I’ll treat you to a proper meal when I’m feeling better.”

Xiang Er said with a smile, holding her small bowl.

Shen Yuhe sat motionless on the sofa, not picking up her chopsticks, a faint smile on her face, as she watched Xiang Er’s bowl with interest.

Xiang Er:

“Um, you should eat.”

Shen Yuhe picked up her chopsticks. Her grip was awkward, her five fingers unsure where to go, the chopsticks splayed out. She adjusted her grip for a long time before managing to hold them properly.

Xiang Er watched, thinking that perhaps Shen Yuhe was used to knives and forks, her lifestyle more Westernized, which was… rather cute.

Wanting to be a good host, Xiang Er picked up a crystal shrimp dumpling and placed it on Shen Yuhe’s plate.

Shen Yuhe picked up her chopsticks, looked at Xiang Er, and, imitating her, tried to pick up the dumpling.

But the dumpling seemed to be playing hard to get. Its skin was round, plump, and slippery, its filling soft and overflowing, a true test of chopstick skills.

Xiang Er quickly ate half of her porridge. It was her first proper meal in days, and the warmth of the food spread through her body, making her sigh contentedly. She picked up some other dim sum with her chopsticks.

While eating, she glanced at Shen Yuhe, her chewing stopping abruptly.

How… how adorable…

Shen Yuhe’s long, white fingers, holding the ebony and gold chopsticks, should have been a beautiful sight—but the chopsticks were at odds with her fingers, sticking out at odd angles. Her fingers were too long, the chopsticks too long, neither yielding to the other, clanging against the plate.

Shen Yuhe seemed to be getting frustrated. This was the first time Xiang Er had seen this expression on her face. Her brows were furrowed, her lips pursed, even her delicate nose wrinkled. Her entire face was tense with effort, yet she still couldn’t tame the two ebony “beasts.”

Xiang Er’s heart fluttered. This was too cute! Getting frustrated over chopsticks, what a silly, beautiful woman! And she looked even more beautiful when she was frustrated, like a goddess of fate… her goddess of fate!

Shen Yuhe stopped, glaring at the chopsticks.

Xiang Er felt a sudden chill. She looked outside, and the previously sunny midday sky was now overcast, the sun hidden behind thick clouds, lightning flickering within them.

Was it going to rain again?

As she was thinking this, she saw Shen Yuhe look up.

She still looked frustrated, her cheeks slightly flushed, accentuating her beauty.

She suddenly reached out and grabbed Xiang Er’s wrist across the table, staring intently into her eyes, her voice low and commanding, her words firm and resolute:

“Come here and feed me!”

Xiang Er:

“Huh? … Ah!”

Chapter 21: Morning Light p2

“Excuse me, please stay here for a while. I have a guest, she’s very important to me, could you please not scare her? Oh, and if you decide to show off your powers, you might end up being dissected in a lab, so please don’t do anything rash.”

She muttered to the sculpture. The sculpture’s large eye stared at her unblinkingly, as if not having heard a word. The wooden tendrils remained motionless, like ordinary wood.

Xiang Er breathed a sigh of relief, thinking as she washed up, that she should probably go out with Shen Yuhe later, away from this Evil God-infested apartment, to ensure Shen Yuhe’s safety… Wait, was today a workday?

She opened her phone and, as expected, her supervisor had sent several passive-aggressive messages: Your colleagues saw you having a meltdown and getting drenched in the rain yesterday. If you have mental health issues, please seek professional help. The company isn’t a hospital. If you take another day off this month, you’re fired… and so on. Just glancing at them made her head spin.

She turned her phone face down and carefully washed her face.

With Shen Yuhe here, her mood was unusually light. Looking at herself in the mirror, remembering the sight of Shen Yuhe wearing her sweater, she couldn’t help but space out again.

Shen Yuhe’s red dress… she needed to wash it before returning it. Which meant, she couldn’t leave yet, unless she wanted Shen Yuhe to leave in her sweater… Xiang Er started thinking about what outfit she could put together for Shen Yuhe, her lips curving upwards the more she thought about it.

After the intense self-doubt and the high fever of the past few days, she felt like she had been given a second chance at life, every moment too precious to waste!

And a beauty like Shen Yuhe, who had selflessly taken care of her all night without asking for anything in return, she couldn’t let her down. She had to spend the day with her.

Xiang Er picked up her phone and decisively sent a message to her supervisor: Taking a day off. Then she turned off her phone. She brushed her hair, her face still flushed and delicate from the fever, applied some lipstick to match the blush, successfully masking her sickly appearance.

She practiced smiling in the mirror.

It had to be a natural, sincere smile, cute and sweet, but not overly flattering, enthusiastic and lively, yet restrained and elegant… Her cheeks ached from smiling, and finally, she settled on the perfect smile, ready to face the day.

She took a deep breath, and another, mentally rehearsing what she wanted to say, adjusted her collar and hair, and took a few steps, practicing her posture.

“Don’t stumble… don’t let her see how nervous I am.”

She muttered to herself, forcing a confident smile, then opened the bathroom door and stepped out.

The sculpture on the shelf stood silently, observing everything.

Stepping out of the bathroom, Xiang Er saw that Shen Yuhe had somehow settled onto the living room sofa, in a position where she could see the bathroom door. She sat quietly, her long legs casually spread, her entire body sinking into the cushions, like a soft, boneless snake.

Her posture was completely unladylike, her clothes rumpled, patches of skin exposed here and there, making Xiang Er unsure where to look, the long legs, or elsewhere… She quickly averted her gaze, focusing on the space in front of her as she approached.

Shen Yuhe turned to look at her, her head tilted slightly upwards at an odd angle. Although her expression was neutral, it somehow conveyed a sense of alluring charm.

Her lips curved upwards, and Xiang Er’s heart skipped a beat.

Xiang Er fidgeted with the hem of her clothes and asked softly:

“I’ve washed your red dress, but it’ll take a while to dry. I don’t have a dryer, so it might not be ready until tonight… Would you like to wear my clothes for now?”

Shen Yuhe lifted her left hand and tugged at the collar of the sweater.

Her collarbones, like the banks of a river, the lines of her tendons and veins like mountain streams, flowed downwards from her neck, into the valley, carrying the jade-white promise of spring, nestled between towering peaks.

This tug gave Xiang Er a glimpse, and a lightning-fast thought struck her: Could it be… that she wasn’t wearing a bra?!

Xiang Er’s breath hitched, her scalp tingling at this realization. She wasn’t usually this prurient, she wouldn’t normally pay attention to whether someone was wearing a bra or not! But her focus on Shen Yuhe was revealing a new side of herself, a side she found slightly frightening!

Shen Yuhe’s slender fingers lingered on the collar of the white sweater, as if about to let go, her smooth elbow protruding from the sleeve, the very embodiment of icy jade skin and delicate bones.

Her lips curved upwards, her face resting against the back of the sofa, her dark eyes looking at Xiang Er from a slightly skewed angle, her aura carrying a unique, prickly sense of danger. She said playfully:

“But I’m already wearing your clothes.”

The faint morning light streamed into the room, the shadows of the trees dappling the balcony. Her cello-like voice lingered, mingling with the soft breeze outside. The air after the rain was unusually fresh, accentuating the sweet fragrance in the room, which wafted into Xiang Er’s nostrils.

Xiang Er felt dizzy, unsure if it was from the scent, or from Shen Yuhe’s words.

Her head began to throb slightly again, and she didn’t know where to look. Looking directly at Shen Yuhe meant seeing the white sweater clinging to her chest, looking down meant seeing her long, jade-white legs. Nowhere was safe, everywhere was Shen Yuhe, everywhere was the source of her racing heart.

She had almost completely forgotten the lines she had rehearsed in the bathroom, and could only stammer:

“Yes… yes. I, I just wanted to ask, are you… going out later?”

What she really wanted to ask was, are you going to leave, leave me? But of course, she couldn’t say that.

Shen Yuhe’s fingers finally left the collar of the sweater, but then casually rested against her cheek, like a silent invitation, drawing Xiang Er’s gaze.

Her cheek was incredibly fair, like porcelain, like white jade, smooth and delicate, yet bloodless, her skin flawless, without a single pore or blemish. The tiny imperfections that most people had were completely absent, her beauty almost too perfect.

Shen Yuhe, her perfect face turned towards Xiang Er, said:

“I’m not going anywhere. I’ll stay with you.”

Xiang Er’s mouth opened slightly, and she looked at Shen Yuhe, a smile spreading across her face. She felt like her smile was foolish, but she couldn’t control it.

After smiling for a few seconds, she remembered something and turned to go to her room:

“I’ll wash your dress…”

She picked up the red dress from the bed, its beautiful fragrance clinging to the fabric. The scent was somehow familiar… But Xiang Er shook her head. She was still feverish, how could she possibly distinguish the scent of perfume? She paused before taking the dress to the washing machine.

Designer clothes usually couldn’t be machine washed… She turned to ask Shen Yuhe:

“Can this be machine washed?”

Shen Yuhe shook her head. She stretched languidly, stood up gracefully, and shuffled over in the rabbit slippers. Extending a long arm, she plucked the red dress from Xiang Er’s hands.

She said:

“No need to wash it.”

She walked to the balcony, where the washing machine and clothes rack were. She casually tossed the dress over the rack.

Then, she turned around and said calmly:

“That’s fine. Aren’t you hungry?”

Xiang Er was shocked by her casualness. That dress looked expensive, how could she just hang it like that?

But perhaps it was precisely because it was expensive that she could treat it so carelessly… Xiang Er thought in awe, as expected, Shen Yuhe was even wealthier than she appeared. Even if the dress was damaged, she probably wouldn’t care at all.

What had she been asking just now? Oh, about food.

Xiang Er frowned again:

“Yes, it’s time to eat. What do you want to eat? I’ll order takeout.”

Shen Yuhe, her legs still spread casually, asked:

“Takeout? Is that the stuff they make at restaurants and deliver here? Let me do it.”

Xiang Er was puzzled:

“You don’t know about takeout?”

Shen Yuhe replied:

“I know.”

She reached out and, seemingly out of nowhere, produced a phone, clumsily poking at the screen with two fingers.

Xiang Er recognized the phone. It was a top-of-the-line model, costing over two thousand dollars, the latest trendy model often displayed prominently in phone stores.

Shen Yuhe’s handling of the phone was surprisingly awkward. She poked at the screen for a while, then suddenly turned to Xiang Er and asked:

“How do you order takeout?”

Xiang Er, confused, opened her own phone and showed her the food delivery app.

“It’s this app. What do you want to eat? I’ll order it on my phone. Consider it a thank you for taking care of me last night, besides, you don’t have my address.”

Shen Yuhe poked at her phone for a while longer, then stopped, tossing the expensive phone carelessly onto the sofa, her delicate brows slightly furrowed:

“Fine, you do it.”

Xiang Er asked her what she wanted to eat. Shen Yuhe said anything was fine. Xiang Er thought for a moment and ordered a nourishing seafood porridge and assorted dim sum from a nearby Cantonese restaurant. It was a bit expensive, but someone like Shen Yuhe would probably enjoy that kind of food.

After ordering, she turned to Shen Yuhe and found her staring intently at her phone screen, her eyes filled with childlike curiosity.

Xiang Er thought, as expected of a wealthy person, they probably never ordered takeout themselves. It was perfectly normal, just like in those novels. She couldn’t help but think that perhaps some authors of those CEO romance novels had actually met real CEOs, to be able to portray their habits so accurately.

Like their indifference towards expensive things, their inability to eat or do laundry by themselves… and so on.

But she now understood that a “CEO” like Shen Yuhe… was truly captivating.

She tilted her phone slightly towards Shen Yuhe, allowing her to see better, and continued browsing. She had several new messages on WeChat. After ordering the food, she opened the app, and as expected, they were all from her irate supervisor.

“What are you doing? Taking another day off! Do you think I’m a pushover?!”

“If you’re really crazy, just resign! Taking time off is delaying the project. Are you going to take the blame for me when we miss the deadline? A newbie acting like this, I see you don’t want this job!”

“Let me tell you, if you mess with me again, I’ll blacklist you from the entire industry!”

Shen Yuhe, having read the messages, frowned even more deeply:

“Who is she? Why is she talking to you like that?”

Xiang Er switched screens, not replying, and said:

“She’s my supervisor.”

Shen Yuhe leaned back, her body boneless, practically melting into the sofa, the view of her chest unobstructed. She extended a jade-white fingertip and poked Xiang Er’s phone screen, startling her. Her hand twitched, and the screen shifted, opening a different chat.

It was a new message from General Manager Cheng.

“Xiang Er, if you’re not feeling well, stay home and rest. I support you! I’ll be waiting for you to come back.”

Xiang Er felt something was off about this message. She placed her hand on the screen, bringing up the keyboard to reply.

A strong, slender hand suddenly reached out and grasped her right hand, preventing her from typing.

The grip was almost forceful, startling Xiang Er, making her cry out, her eyes instantly filling with tears.

She looked up at the person in front of her, her tear-filled eyes shimmering, and whispered:

“What’s wrong?”

Her voice was soft, like a warm bowl of snow fungus and pear soup, as sweet and clear as her glistening, misty eyes.

Shen Yuhe pulled her hand back, the phone falling onto the sofa with a “thud,” and Xiang Er, like a helpless kitten, was pressed against the back of the sofa.

Shen Yuhe looked into her eyes, then at her lips, her own face expressionless, cold as a statue.

But in her dark, intense eyes, a black fire seemed to burn, invisible yet compelling, impossible to ignore.

Xiang Er, flustered and blushing, turned her head away, and seeing the prominent veins on Shen Yuhe’s wrist, realized… that she was completely enveloped in Shen Yuhe’s embrace, surrounded by her.

Shen Yuhe spoke, her voice dangerously close to Xiang Er’s ear:

“Don’t reply to him.”

Chapter 21: Morning Light p1

The moment the girl fell into her arms, the wind and rain began to subside. The world, as if redeemed, slowly returned to peace and gentleness. The streetlight’s glow diffused through the rain, droplets of light falling to the ground, the thunder fading, the layers of dark clouds slowly dispersing.

As if the god, having tasted sugar, had ceased its torment of the world.

The woman in the red dress moved with a slight stiffness, her arms embracing the girl’s slender waist, carrying her into the apartment. The door closed automatically behind them, and the living room lights switched on.

Shen Yuhe stood inside, rainwater dripping from her clothes, soaking Xiang Er in her arms.

A woman’s body was inherently beautiful. Its curves and softness, inviting touch, were more delectable than cream, yet supported by a resilient framework, tangible but unseen. A woman was like a cake, sweet and soft.

Xiang Er wore a simple nightgown, its white gauze sleeves clinging to her slender arms, those arms pale, soft, and weak, one draped over Shen Yuhe’s shoulder, the other dangling, swaying with their movements, occasionally brushing against Shen Yuhe’s waist and legs.

Shen Yuhe looked at her face. Having gone without proper nourishment for so long, yet burning with a high fever, Xiang Er’s already unhealthy face now looked almost ghostly.

Her eyes were closed, her nostrils flaring, her face and lips bloodless, except for two spots of red on her cheekbones, like the rouge a paper effigy maker might casually apply to a paper doll, lending her a strangely surreal appearance.

But even as a paper doll, she was the most beautiful, the most exquisite.

Shen Yuhe lifted Xiang Er slightly higher, her hands supporting her thighs, so that her upper body rested completely in her embrace. Xiang Er, unconscious and pliant, her entire weight pressed against Shen Yuhe’s body.

Shen Yuhe held Xiang Er like this, pressing her burning face against her own cool neck, carrying her like a child back to the guest room, and gently placing her on the bed.

As she entered the room, the lights switched on automatically. With a wave of her hand, the thick quilt on the bed lifted and settled over Xiang Er, perfectly smooth.

Shen Yuhe stood by the bed, frowning, looking down at Xiang Er, her expression a mixture of confusion and bewilderment.

Behind her, the sculpture sat quietly on the desk, its presence almost forgotten.

Xiang Er’s face was flushed with fever. She moaned softly and kicked off the covers.

Shen Yuhe hesitated, then took off her red dress and draped it over Xiang Er. The long dress covered her completely, its damp coolness helping to lower her temperature. Xiang Er gradually calmed down, her fever receding.

The rain subsided, dawn approaching.

Shen Yuhe stood there naked, like a jade statue, expressionless, unbreathing, her chest still.

Her dark eyes remained fixed on Xiang Er, watching her all night, until dawn.

The first rays of light woke Xiang Er, who was sensitive to light, but it took a long time for her to emerge from the hazy layers of consciousness, to become aware of her own existence.

Almost as soon as she regained consciousness, a splitting headache made her cry out:

“Aa…”

She raised a hand to her head, struggling to sit up, hoping to alleviate the pain, and opened her eyes.

“Huh?”

The scene before her made her gasp.

What… was going on?

Xiang Er sat up, supporting herself on the mattress, ignoring the headache, and stared, then closed her eyes, then opened them again, staring again.

After repeating this several times, she finally confirmed that this wasn’t a dream, not a hallucination brought on by her fever, but reality.

The reality of the situation made her even more stunned. She stared for a long time, then finally spoke:

“You… cough, cough, cough!”

A violent coughing fit interrupted her, choking her words. She coughed for a long time, until her throat felt raw, then finally calmed down, hesitantly looking up, finishing her sentence.

“What are you doing here? And…”

She couldn’t finish, a blush creeping up her cheeks, not from fever this time, but from a mixture of shyness and delight.

The tall woman before her, wearing her white sweater, was looking at her with concern.

It was… Shen Yuhe.

The sweater, which usually reached mid-thigh on Xiang Er, only reached Shen Yuhe’s upper thighs, barely covering her. It was as if a deity had spilled a cascade of jade nectar, revealing her beautiful, long legs, flowing out from beneath the fluffy sweater, unadorned yet breathtakingly beautiful.

She wore Xiang Er’s pink, rabbit-fur slippers, her jade-white toes peeking out like plump cherries, instantly transforming the cheap slippers into high fashion.

Xiang Er thought she must still be sick, her fever returning, spreading from her head to her toes, her eyes misting over. She didn’t dare look at too many details, quickly lowering her head, another coughing fit seizing her.

“Would you… like some water?”

That pleasant, magnetic voice reached her ears, slightly hesitant, as if it hadn’t been used in a long time.

Xiang Er’s mind was a jumble. The fever and the madness had left her memories fragmented. Sleeping had helped, but she couldn’t quite piece things together yet. She sat up and quickly glanced at Shen Yuhe’s face:

“Please… thank you.”

Shen Yuhe nodded, handing her a glass of water in Xiang Er’s favorite purple mug. Xiang Er took the mug and drank the entire glass in one gulp, finally feeling fully awake.

“More?”

Shen Yuhe asked, taking the mug from her hand.

“No, thank you.”

Xiang Er said, trying to get out of bed. She pushed against the mattress, but her arms gave way, and she collapsed back onto the bed.

Her body was too weak. Panting, she leaned against the headboard to catch her breath.

Shen Yuhe placed the mug on the table and turned back to look at her. Xiang Er looked down and suddenly realized that she wasn’t covered by her quilt, but by a beautiful red dress.

She had only seen one dress made of such exquisite material, the one Shen Yuhe had been wearing… A blush crept up Xiang Er’s cheeks and ears as she realized that Shen Yuhe was wearing her sweater because she had given her the dress.

This was too… too intimate!

The more Xiang Er thought about it, the redder her face became. She didn’t dare look at Shen Yuhe, feeling like a cotton candy cloud, unable to think, her gaze fixed on the red dress.

Her memory finally stirred, and she recalled the image of Shen Yuhe standing at her door last night, drenched. She remembered opening the door for her, seeming to fall into her arms, and then… she couldn’t remember anything else.

Could it be… that Shen Yuhe had been taking care of her all night, without even taking care of herself after being caught in the rain?

She was truly an angel!

Xiang Er didn’t know how to thank Shen Yuhe. She looked up at her, her eyes filled with sincere gratitude:

“Did you take care of me all night? Thank you!”

The girl’s eyes were bright and clear, glistening with unshed tears, her cheeks flushed, her lips slightly parted, her expression and tone filled with a warmth and sincerity Shen Yuhe had never seen before.

Shen Yuhe paused for a moment, then nodded slightly:

“Mm.”

Xiang Er’s eyes, already bright with fever, now shone even brighter, the corners of her eyes, her ears, and her neck all flushing pink. She whispered:

“Thank you… thank you so much. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”

Shen Yuhe looked down at her, her gaze deep, her jade-white neck trembling slightly. She asked, a hint of anticipation in her voice:

“So you’re not angry with me anymore?”

Xiang Er:

“Huh? When was I ever angry with you…”

Shen Yuhe paused, then chuckled softly, looking away, and said:

“It’s nothing, I misspoke… How are you feeling now?”

Xiang Er’s head was still throbbing, but it was better than when she first woke up. She carefully got out of bed, holding onto the mattress, but as soon as her feet touched the floor, her legs went weak, and she almost fell.

Fortunately, Shen Yuhe reached out and steadied her.

Her smooth, jade-like hand gripped Xiang Er’s waist, brushing against the exposed skin.

Xiang Er flinched as if electrocuted, her face flushing again, and heard Shen Yuhe ask:

“Are you alright?”

Xiang Er nodded:

“Yes, I’m fine. I’m going to wash up.”

She walked past Shen Yuhe, a wave of warm fragrance washing over her.

Was this Shen Yuhe’s perfume? Xiang Er thought, then realized that didn’t make sense. Shen Yuhe had been drenched last night, where would the perfume smell come from?

Could it be her natural scent?

This thought made Xiang Er blush even more, her face burning.

She passed by her desk and couldn’t help but glance at the sculpture.

The sculpture’s large eye was now fixed on Shen Yuhe. Although it seemed harmless at the moment, it was… an Evil God!

Xiang Er gritted her teeth, grabbed the sculpture, and carried it into the bathroom, placing it on the shelf.

Chapter 20: The Storm

The aurora didn’t last long.

Akhe withdrew its domain, and Xiang Er’s consciousness plummeted from the heights, falling into unconsciousness.

Cold air brushed against her cheeks, a tingling, aching sensation. Her senses gradually returned, her mind stirring.

She forced her eyes open and saw the familiar, old ceiling.

And four or five familiar dark red tentacles.

Seeing her awake, the tentacles immediately swayed towards her, attempting to slide beneath her and lift her up.

But Xiang Er waved them away:

“No, I can do it myself.”

She pushed herself up from the floor with her still-weak arms, carefully avoiding touching the tentacles. The tentacles swayed gently beside her, not forcing their assistance, but surrounding her protectively.

Xiang Er stood up, staggering slightly before regaining her balance. She took a deep breath and looked around.

All traces of the monster were gone, everything was clean and fresh, the air clear, no unusual smells. The floor was so clean it looked like someone had mopped it thoroughly, not a trace of the filth or black blood, not even a speck of dust.

The stains on the sofa and cushions were also gone, as if someone had called a cleaning service while she was unconscious, leaving everything sparkling.

Xiang Er was surprised. She thought for a long moment, then turned to the tentacles:

“Did you clean this up?”

The tentacles remained motionless, their tips still, seeming dignified and imposing, as if saying: How could you even ask?

It made sense. Tentacles were part of a god, not cleaning ladies.

But besides herself, there were only the tentacles here…

Forget it, Xiang Er decided not to dwell on this question.

She took out her phone and called Li Wan, but the number was out of service. A mechanical female voice said, “Sorry, the number you dialed is not in service…”

Could she have gotten the number wrong? She frowned, then texted her landlady, lying that she had forgotten her key and asking her to call Li Wan and find out where she was.

The message was sent successfully, and delivered instantly. It seemed to have gone through without a hitch.

Xiang Er sat at her desk, restless. She wasn’t good at handling these kinds of situations. A man had disappeared from her apartment, and if anyone asked, how could she explain it? Li Wan had run away too, and she didn’t know where she had gone. Logically, Li Wan should be the one dealing with all this.

Unable to figure it out, her gaze naturally drifted towards the sculpture.

The serpentine body coiled around the wooden column, topped with a large, irregular eye, watching Xiang Er. The long, thin tendrils carved from wood behind the eye swayed softly in the air, like Medusa’s snake-like hair.

Xiang Er felt a chill. She knew the Evil God resided within the sculpture, but she didn’t want to see these writhing tentacles all day long. It was a very unsettling visual experience.

She asked softly:

“Can you retract your tentacles?”

As soon as she spoke, the tentacles froze, and in the blink of an eye, they turned back into wood, identical to the original sculpture.

Xiang Er was slightly taken aback. Akhe was actually listening to her?

The sculpture had returned to its normal, wooden state, looking like an ordinary ornament. The room and living room were spotless, the mushrooms were gone.

It was almost evening, and the clouds finally parted, revealing a sliver of sunlight, painting the edges of the vast, dark clouds with a splash of color.

Everything seemed to be improving. The sunlight even shone generously on the sculpture, creating a small rainbow. Xiang Er gently extended a finger and touched the rainbow on top of the sculpture.

She couldn’t help but smile.

Her phone buzzed with a new message notification. She opened it and saw that it was a reply from her landlady.

Scanning the message, Xiang Er’s eyes narrowed, a chill running down her spine.

“Who’s Li Wan? I don’t know anyone by that name. Did you send this to the wrong person?”

Ignoring the chill on the back of her neck, Xiang Er quickly typed:

“Li Wan is your tenant. I’m her roommate, she introduced me to the apartment. Don’t you remember?”

The landlady replied quickly this time:

“No, you’re my only tenant. You’ve been the only one for the past six months. The previous tenants were a young couple, no one surnamed Li. You must be mistaken.”

Xiang Er stared at the messages, her fingers trembling, the color draining from her face, a wave of coldness creeping up her spine, chilling the back of her neck.

She didn’t understand what was happening.

Li Wan… what had happened to Li Wan?

How could she have… disappeared from the landlady’s memory?

It was impossible! Li Wan was the one who had signed the lease with the landlady; she was practically Xiang Er’s sub-landlady. How could the landlady not remember her?

Her hands shaking, Xiang Er rushed to her desk and frantically searched for her copy of the lease. It should have Li Wan’s signature on it!

She opened the lease and carefully checked every page, but… she found nothing.

Her name, the landlady’s name, their ID information, everything was there, but there was no sign of Li Wan’s signature, nowhere at all.

Cold sweat trickled down Xiang Er’s forehead.

How was this possible?

She even remembered the pen Li Wan had used to sign! She remembered it clearly!

She messaged the landlady again, but the landlady insisted that she didn’t know anyone by that name, and finally, annoyed by the persistent questioning, stopped replying.

Xiang Er’s legs went weak.

She ran next door. Unable to open the locked door, she resorted to brute force, grabbing a small hammer and smashing the doorknob!

Li Wan’s belongings, her boyfriend’s belongings, they were all still in this room, they should be evidence!

After a loud crash, the lock on the master bedroom door finally broke.

The door creaked open, the golden light of dusk streaming in, dust motes dancing in the light.

The floor was covered in a thick layer of dust. The bed frame, the desk, the dressing mirror, all were old and worn. The mattress was bare, covered only with a plastic sheet. The wardrobe doors were open, empty, the bottom also covered in dust.

The hammer fell to the floor, and Xiang Er collapsed onto the ground.

Why… why? The room was empty, not a single trace of human habitation?

Where… had Li Wan’s and her boyfriend’s belongings gone?

Or… had Li Wan’s boyfriend, even Li Wan herself, never existed?

Monday morning arrived, the weather turning colder, the air damp and heavy, the sky dark and ominous.

The weather forecast warned of unusual weather patterns, more severe than in previous years, advising citizens to dress warmly and avoid deserted areas.

A large supermarket issued a statement urging people to shop rationally and avoid panic buying, assuring them of sufficient supplies. A chain restaurant went bankrupt, the reasons unclear. A famous fitness influencer died, rumors circulating that he had suddenly become violent and attacked people before his death. A celebrity, after getting divorced, aged rapidly, becoming ghost-like, only venturing out at night.

The world seemed to be undergoing many strange changes, but Xiang Er didn’t care.

She didn’t care about anything anymore. She had spent the entire weekend lying in bed, not eating a single bite.

The apartment was eerily quiet. The walls seemed to be closing in on her, suffocating her.

For the past two days, only she and the sculpture had been together, but the sculpture, perhaps sensing her state of mind, had been unusually inactive, even the tentacles only appearing occasionally before quickly retreating.

Xiang Er had been thinking. She had realized a few things… for example, the Evil God could alter human perception, so were her thoughts, her experiences, everything she had seen and heard while surrounded by the Evil God, real?

Could it be that everything she had witnessed so far was fake? The tentacles, the monsters, her roommate… Did they even exist, or were they all just a hallucination, a dream induced by the Evil God’s influence?

But from another perspective, if she believed her own perception, believed that Li Wan and the others had been real, then they, along with her boyfriend, had been devoured by the Evil God, even their traces erased by It.

But this was even more unacceptable. She had begged the Evil God for help, and It had killed the monster to save her, and perhaps, in doing so, had also killed Li Wan.

Even if Li Wan had been difficult, even if her boyfriend had been problematic, Li Wan herself hadn’t done anything wrong, she hadn’t turned into a monster, she didn’t deserve to die!

If this were true, then Xiang Er felt like she had Li Wan’s blood on her hands!

She couldn’t coexist with the Evil God anymore. Although she was weak and exhausted, having barely eaten or slept for days, she still put on her clothes and went to work.

Before leaving, she looked back at the sculpture and smiled faintly. It was a self-deprecating smile, mocking her own momentary delusion, the hope that she could coexist peacefully with the Evil God.

How could that be possible? She had been so naive.

She closed the door firmly behind her, stepped out into the cold, biting wind, wrapped her coat tightly around her, and lowered her head, walking away.

By the window, a thin, dark red tentacle clung to the frame, extending towards her, then hesitating like a child who had done something wrong, before retracting back into the room.

She went through the workday like a sleepwalker. When she left work, dark clouds churned in the sky, and a torrential downpour began.

She didn’t have an umbrella again. She walked downstairs, watching people leaving in pairs under their umbrellas, and suddenly burst into laughter, hysterical, manic laughter.

“Hahaha… hahahahaha!!”

Passersby moved away from her. Xiang Er saw their strange looks, but she didn’t care. She was cold and drenched, but she felt a sense of exhilaration. In this world, she was, for the moment, free, her mind clear!

She took a taxi home, and as soon as she arrived, she collapsed onto her bed, falling into a deep sleep, her body burning as if consumed by fire.

The rain intensified, the thunderclouds roiling angrily, the wind and rain battering everything. The camphor tree outside her window thrashed wildly, its branches slamming against the windowpanes.

Amidst the torment and nightmares, Xiang Er heard a knock on the door. She thought, could it be Li Wan?

She got up and stumbled towards the door, reaching out. The doorknob turned on its own, but she didn’t notice.

In the hazy darkness, amidst the torrential rain, a figure in a red dress stood at the doorway, the streetlight casting a soft golden glow around her, the wind and rain whipping her long hair, her shadow flickering on the corridor floor.

The corridor was awash with dark rainwater. The woman’s figure swayed alluringly in the downpour, but the golden streetlight illuminated her face, highlighting her watery eyes, eyes filled with emotion, more profound and beautiful than any lake in the world.

The woman was drenched, water dripping from her hair, eyebrows, and ears. Her clothes clung tightly to her body, outlining her curves in the dim light, water streaming down her clothes, the whiteness of her skin almost glowing through the fabric. The interplay of rain and the deep red, almost black fabric created a painterly contrast of light and shadow, like a statue of Venus brought to life.

The woman stood there, slightly bent over, her jade-white arm extended towards Xiang Er’s face, so close, yet hesitating. Her blood-red lips parted slightly, but she didn’t speak.

Xiang Er’s eyes widened, a name she had repeated countless times escaping her lips:

“Shen Yuhe?”

But her fever made her voice slurred, almost a loving murmur.

“Boom—” A clap of thunder rolled through the clouds, the ground trembling, rain splattering on Xiang Er’s face, her vision distorting, the world fading away.

Xiang Er collapsed, falling into the cold, soft embrace of the woman before her.

She lost consciousness.

Chapter 19: Madness

Li Wan looked at Xiang Er’s neck with suspicion.

On that smooth, flawless skin, a string of purplish-red hickeys trailed down, disappearing beneath her collar, hinting at the passionate scene hidden beneath.

But Xiang Er’s expression was cold and indifferent, numb and weary. This wasn’t the look of someone after a passionate encounter, it was more like…

Li Wan realized. These hickeys must have been the work of her unfaithful boyfriend!

She turned and glared at her boyfriend, hissing:

“You scumbag! We’ll settle this later!”

She turned back to Xiang Er, composing herself, and said:

“I know about what happened yesterday. I came back today mainly to tell you that we’re moving out.”

Xiang Er didn’t react, her eyes unfocused as she gripped the doorknob.

On the other side of the door, hidden from Li Wan’s view, several tentacles were brazenly coiling around Xiang Er’s ear, sniffing her cheek and hair, pressing their suckers against her skin.

Like the wet noses of puppies, the sensation made it impossible for Xiang Er to concentrate, and she struggled to remain silent.

Li Wan continued:

“But I need an explanation for you injuring my boyfriend yesterday! The hospital bills cost several thousand yuan. You have to take responsibility!”

Xiang Er’s eyes shifted, looking towards the living room, or perhaps at nothing at all. An unnatural blush crept up her cheeks, puzzling Li Wan.

“Did you hear me?”

Li Wan yelled, slapping the door.

“What?”

Xiang Er snapped out of her daze, tilting her head in confusion.

“You didn’t hear a single word I said!”

Li Wan, enraged, raised her hand and slapped Xiang Er across the face.

Xiang Er didn’t dodge, seemingly stunned.

But Li Wan’s hand was intercepted. She turned around in astonishment, and saw that it was her dear boyfriend who had caught her arm.

His gaze was fixed on Xiang Er, a strange greed in his eyes. He held Li Wan’s arm and said to Xiang Er:

“You don’t have to pay the money back. Just agree to play with me, and we can forget about what happened before.”

Li Wan:

“What the fuck—”

She turned and started hitting her boyfriend, her hair flying, her eyes red with rage.

“Do you think I’m dead! Hitting on someone else right in front of me? Are you crazy? What kind of love potion did that Xiang girl give you! What the fuck…”

Li Wan clawed at her boyfriend’s arm and face, lashing out like a madwoman.

Xiang Er watched the scene unfold, unconcerned about the seemingly crazed Li Wan. She was focused on the man.

Even while fighting with Li Wan, his eyes remained fixed on her, a disgusting, viscous look in them, as if he wanted to devour her.

It was the look of a predator eyeing its prey, a look Xiang Er had seen before.

On the dog-like mutant creature.

Xiang Er took a step back and subconsciously glanced to the side. Several tentacles were curiously peeking through the gap in the door, like onlookers watching a spectacle.

A strange smell began to fill the air, and Xiang Er’s eyes widened.

Right in front of her, Li Wan slapped the man, her long nails catching his cheek, leaving a deep gash. Thick, black blood oozed out.

The man, like a rotten, peeled fruit, emitted a putrid odor, and yet he was still smiling at Li Wan.

Li Wan froze. She realized… something was terribly wrong with her boyfriend, and that substance oozing out wasn’t blood!

Her beloved boyfriend smiled at her and said:

“What’s wrong, honey? Don’t be angry. She can be the mistress, you’re my wife.”

As he spoke, another piece of skin fell from his face. The yellowish-black skin began to peel off along the wound, piece by piece, falling to the floor with a series of “splats.”

“Ah… aaaaaaah, stay away from me—!!!”

Li Wan truly lost it this time. She ran towards the balcony, tears and snot streaming down her face, her body trembling with fear, her legs weak, unable to run properly!

Her boyfriend chased after her, the skin on his body continuing to peel and fall to the floor, leaving a trail of black blood and splattering sounds, his voice hoarse and strange:

“Honey? Honey, don’t run! Honey, I love you, come here… hahaha! Come here!”

Li Wan reached the balcony, then changed her mind, turning and running towards the entrance! But as she turned, she came face to face with her boyfriend and screamed:

“Aaaaaaaah! Get away from me! I’m not your wife, whoever your wife is, go find her! Xiang Er, Xiang Er is your wife, over there, she’s over there!”

Screaming, she pointed wildly towards the guest room.

Xiang Er stood there silently, watching everything unfold, motionless, her grip on the doorknob unwavering.

But the boyfriend understood Li Wan’s frantic gesture. He turned with a grin and walked towards the guest room. Li Wan seized the opportunity to escape, running to the entrance, throwing open the door and running out, slamming it shut behind her, as if afraid the monster would follow.

Only the monster and Xiang Er remained in the apartment.

Splat, splat, splat, the viscous sound of footsteps accompanied by heavy breathing, his pace several times faster than before. The man seemed to be quickly adapting to his new identity, his grin growing more predatory and cruel as he walked, the skin on his face almost completely gone, revealing black veins, swollen muscles, and glimpses of white bone and teeth.

The man opened his mouth, his white teeth glinting, and said to Xiang Er:

“I like you, beautiful. Be with me… be with me…”

Xiang Er, watching this scene, felt a sense of detached absurdity. She had seen this kind of monster before, and now, seeing this one, she felt more shocked than terrified.

Having a point of comparison, she realized that her fear of the tentacles and the sculpture was much stronger than her fear of this ordinary monster.

But now… how should she react?

This wasn’t a human threat, this was a monster, far beyond her ability to handle. She had been able to deal with the sexual harassment herself, but this time…

She glanced back. The sculpture sat quietly on the desk, its eye gleaming, the tentacles behind it swaying slowly.

The monster’s stench grew stronger. At this crucial moment, Xiang Er turned and looked at the sculpture.

As if… in the whole world, there was only her and the sculpture.

The sculpture swayed its tentacles leisurely and playfully, paying no attention to the approaching monster at the door. Its gaze was fixed on her, and only on her.

This was a moment between her and It, a silent exchange of gazes, a first, intimate connection between her and It in this fractured world.

It waited, patiently, unhurriedly, using a tentacle to gently brush a stray strand of hair from Xiang Er’s face.

Even with the man-eating monster inches away, the strand of hair floated lightly, like… a line of poetry, a work of art, a fleeting glimpse of the beauty of life.

It savored this beauty, unhurried.

Like a spider sitting in the center of its web, waiting for its prey… to walk into the trap.

Xiang Er frowned at the sculpture. She was reluctant, but she had no choice. She knew the Evil God was forcing her, forcing her to utter the plea she had desperately refused before, forcing her… to submit.

The black slime had already reached the doorway, spreading to her feet, the overwhelming stench filling the room, suffocating her.

Chunks of flesh splattered on the floor. Behind her, the putrid breath of the monster brushed against her neck, his hoarse, grating voice chuckling, so close that it vibrated in her ear:

“Good girl… that’s right, don’t move, I’m coming…”

As the stench reached her neck, Xiang Er finally gave in.

From the corner of her eye, she could see the monster’s skinless, bloody face, only inches away from her neck, his fangs about to pierce her skin…

She sighed, her lips barely moving:

“Akhe, I need you… to save me.”

Xiang Er seemed to hear a soft chuckle, but it was so faint, she couldn’t be sure.

In an instant, the world turned upside down, the sun and moon turned blood-red, a giant eyeball hung in the sky, and the black river surged forth, cleansing everything, devouring everything!

Xiang Er turned to look behind her. Countless thick, giant tentacles extended, trembling with excitement, wrapping around her, lifting her into the air.

The world turned dark red, the apartment vanished, the sky became an endless twilight! She looked up and saw the giant eyeball staring at her, its gaze making her head buzz, her body going limp.

Numerous thin tentacles emerged from the river, like countless writhing roots.

The man who had been chasing her lay in the river, his body quickly being filled with the asphalt-like water, his limbs bound by thin tentacles…

He shouted and screamed frantically, but not a sound escaped his lips.

This place seemed to follow certain rules, and sounds that weren’t permitted couldn’t be made!

Soon, the man’s struggles ceased.

Every part of his body was being devoured by the river and the tentacles, the crunching of bones echoing endlessly.

He struggled violently, but it was like a moth to a flame, not even a whimper escaping his lips.

Beneath the twilight sky, the girl in the white dress, lifted by the eerie tentacles, floated gracefully, clean and beautiful, high above. Thick tentacles gently caressed her face, their movements incredibly gentle and careful, as if handling a precious, fragile piece of porcelain.

Xiang Er’s mind still buzzed, but her thoughts were clear again. She looked at the monster slowly dissolving in the river ahead, then at the tentacles in front of her.

She looked intently at the translucent red tip of the tentacle and said:

“Akhe, thank you.”

It was the first time she had sincerely thanked Akhe.

Hearing these words, the tip of the tentacle flushed a deeper, more translucent red, until the entire tentacle glowed red.

Even the dim sky in the domain was tinged with blood-red, shimmering and shifting, like an aurora.

Xiang Er thought: I never imagined seeing the aurora for the first time would be in a place like this, with a being like this.

But it was quite beautiful.

Chapter 18: Desire

Mornings were generally pleasant.

Xiang Er liked mornings, liked the way her pale face and hands stretched out into the cool air, as if still embracing hope.

She also liked the thin mist. The mist settled on the crowns of the camphor trees, on the grey tiles, on the black and white walls, and on the faces of passersby, gently obscuring their gazes and stares.

Xiang Er was afraid of being stared at. She had always been afraid, ever since she was a child. As a kid, she didn’t want to stand in the center of the choir, and as an adult, she avoided speaking up in group interviews. She wanted to live her life unnoticed, tucked away in a corner, needing only her own company, without anyone looking at her.

But now… she desperately wanted someone beside her, so she could hold up her finger and ask:

What’s going on?

The two tentacles wrapped around her finger hadn’t disappeared. Since that first kiss, they had clung to her softly, their suckers tracing the lines of her finger, occasionally sucking gently, sending a tingling, prickly itch across her skin.

“Pop,” “pop,” “pop…” each time a sucker detached from her skin, it made this soft sound, drifting in the morning mist, sometimes overlapping, like the sound of flowers blooming.

The sweet fragrance quickly filled the room. That intoxicating scent that always drove Xiang Er to the brink of madness, a fragrance no combination of crushed flowers and fruits could replicate. It filled her nostrils.

Her finger ached when she focused on it.

Her right index finger was now completely red, the blue veins more prominent, a pale pink blush spreading, and some parts of the skin, where the suckers had been, had even turned a dark purplish color.

It was as if someone had spilled a chaotic palette of colors onto her finger.

Xiang Er’s heart pounded, and she felt unsteady, leaning back against the wall. The cold wall slightly eased the throbbing vein in her temple, but not by much. Her thoughts raced.

The “pop” sounds continued.

Suddenly, Xiang Er realized that the Evil God had never actually said it was going to eat her.

The Evil God had only bound her body tightly with its tentacles, completely immobilizing her, using endless pressure and scenes of bloody horror to subdue her, to make her… submit to Its will!

With such immense power, It wouldn’t need to go to such lengths to eat her. All that talk about optimal dining time, dining etiquette, it was all her own wishful thinking. If the Evil God wanted to eat someone, how could they possibly resist?

If not to eat her, then what was Its purpose?

Thinking this, Xiang Er exhaled deeply. Looking down, she saw that the two thin tentacles had somehow reached her palm.

The tentacles, thicker than the lines on her palm, traced the patterns of her palm print, their touch delicate and gentle.

Perhaps influenced by her thoughts, Xiang Er, staring at the two exploring tentacles, even saw a hint of intimacy and desire.

As this word surfaced, the tentacles suddenly tightened around her finger, their suckers firmly attached to her finger and palm!

“Ah! It hurts!”

Xiang Er cried out, a vein throbbing in her forehead. She grabbed the tentacles with her left hand, pulling at them, but she couldn’t tear them away!

The two tentacles, with their hundreds of tiny suckers, clung tightly to her hand, as if in anger, in resentment, refusing to let go! To tear them away would mean ripping off all the skin and flesh from her hand!

Xiang Er, terrified by this development, and even more so by her own deduction, broke out in a cold sweat, her clothes completely soaked!

It was… desire!

The Evil God desired “desire”!

She screamed in agony:

“Let go of me!”

She didn’t want to become the Evil God’s plaything! Why her? Why did it have to be her?!

The intensity of her emotions caused the sweat to evaporate, her own scent mingling with the overwhelming sweet fragrance. The scent began to change, taking on a strange, metallic tang, the smell of earth and vegetation, intermingling with the cloying sweetness.

The room seemed to fill with mist, a swirling mix of pale green and pale pink.

Xiang Er’s hand was incredibly weak, but she still desperately tugged at the tentacles, and this time, they easily detached. The tentacles released her finger, the dark purple marks beneath the suckers exposed to the cool air.

Xiang Er opened her eyes blearily. The two tentacles swayed in the air, as if observing her, their suckers opening and closing, their entire length now a translucent dark red. Mushrooms began to sprout on the walls, red and pink mushrooms with translucent edges, growing in clusters.

Xiang Er’s face was ashen. Her voice was barely a whisper:

“You want my desire, don’t you?”

She looked at the tentacles. The tentacles swayed again, as if in confusion, then… dipped downwards twice.

It was nodding. It agreed, her deduction was correct.

Xiang Er let out a weary sigh.

But then, the tentacles… swayed from side to side, as if shaking its head.

Xiang Er hummed in confusion, looking towards the source of the tentacles, the wooden sculpture.

The sculpture’s large eye was fixed on her. The wooden tendrils around the eye had now all transformed into thin, dark red tentacles, writhing around the large eye.

It was no longer concealing itself, forcing Xiang Er to face this grotesque sight.

Xiang Er struggled to think clearly, then asked:

“You don’t know what you want either?”

The tentacles dipped twice this time, without swaying.

Xiang Er frowned, momentarily speechless. This was too strange. A Evil God, in her home, yet It didn’t know what It wanted.

Xiang Er tentatively asked:

“Then, do you want to try… somewhere else, with someone else? Maybe I’m not a suitable test subject.”

The tentacles froze. After a moment, the two long tentacles reached out and wrapped around Xiang Er’s neck, not tightly, their cold, slimy surface pressed against her skin.

The meaning was clear—I don’t want anyone else, I want you.

Xiang Er felt a wave of helplessness. She leaned against the wall, panting, doing nothing, letting the tentacles coil around her neck, both of them frozen in place.

This was… awkward, Xiang Er thought self-deprecatingly.

The sweet fragrance and the faint scent of vegetation in the room slowly dissipated. The Evil God seemed to have no intention of further action. Xiang Er reached out to remove the tentacles, but as soon as she did, the tentacles wrapped around her hand, extending and retracting like stretchy candy, impossible to shake off.

Xiang Er simply raised her hand above her neck, towards the sculpture’s eye, and sighed in resignation:

“Is this helpful? Will this help you figure out what you want?”

The tentacles slowly released her hand, then her neck, but they remained hovering a few inches away.

Xiang Er looked at the tentacles for a while, then suddenly chuckled and asked:

“You’re not going to kill me, not yet, right?”

The tentacles immediately nodded.

Xiang Er felt a great sense of relief, a heavy weight lifting from her heart.

But then, the tentacles… shook their heads.

Xiang Er froze. What did that mean?

“You still… will kill me? Just not now?”

The tentacles nodded this time. The translucent red tip slowly extended, pressing against her neck, right where her carotid artery was.

The suckers, opening and closing, attached themselves to the thin skin above her artery, a dull ache spreading.

Xiang Er’s body went rigid, afraid to move. She had been too presumptuous, and now she regretted it. She shouldn’t have said so much to the Evil God… Her life was completely in Its tentacles. If the tentacle exerted even a little more force, she would die instantly!

“You… I’ll be obedient, please don’t do this…”

Xiang Er said, her throat constricting painfully under the tentacle’s suckers.

With a “pop,” the suckers detached from her neck, the tentacle lifting, swaying playfully in the air, its tip lowered towards her neck, admiring its handiwork.

Xiang Er turned to look at the mirror on her desk.

There, on her neck, were several distinct, dark purplish-red… hickeys.

Xiang Er’s face flushed crimson.

Time quickly passed, and it was past ten o’clock. Xiang Er hadn’t left the apartment.

At that moment, Li Wan quietly opened the apartment door and entered.

Li Wan walked silently, her boyfriend following close behind. They tiptoed past the shoe cabinet and bathroom, peeking towards the guest room.

The guest room… was closed.

Li Wan and her boyfriend exchanged glances. The boyfriend had bandages on his head and several band-aids on his face, his expression comically exaggerated.

Li Wan stepped forward, cleared her throat, and knocked on the door:

“Xiang Er, come out!”

She knocked for a while before a sound came from inside, someone shuffling in slippers, slowly approaching the door.

Li Wan’s heart pounded with nervousness. She had always felt that there was something strange about Xiang Er, and now… she suddenly imagined, what if a female ghost opened the door?

The door opened, revealing a deathly pale arm, covered in purplish bruises. Li Wan almost screamed.

Fortunately, the door opened wider, revealing half of a pale, thin face. It was Xiang Er, her eyes dark-circled, her lips pursed, her usual listless, unenergetic self.

However… Li Wan’s sharp eyes caught sight of a series of purple marks on her neck. She thought incredulously: Hickeys? Was she into that kind of thing?

Xiang Er looked at Li Wan, her dark eyes staring intently:

“What’s wrong?”

Li Wan couldn’t resist asking:

“Are those hickeys on your neck? Who gave them to you?”

Xiang Er froze, turning her head to the side, her lips pressed together in a helpless grimace.

Inside the room, hidden from Li Wan’s view, a dark red tentacle swayed playfully, its tip tapping the sculpture in the distance, then returning to caress Xiang Er’s ear.

Cold suckers opened and closed against her ear, fragments of information transmitting into her mind, like an answer to the question, and also like a warning:

Akhe gave them to you.

It’s your honor, you must show them off, don’t you dare cover them up.

Chapter 17: The Embrace

This was truly…

Xiang Er couldn’t understand. A mixture of exasperation and amusement filled her, and she simply plopped down on the bed, looking at the sulking sculpture.

Was it really angry? She wanted to ask, but it felt wrong.

Wasn’t that a bit too intimate? She didn’t want to be so close to a Evil God.

Xiang Er hesitated, then realized that it was better for the Evil God to ignore her; it gave her some peace. The most pressing issue now was… Remembering the blood splattered on the shoe cabinet, her face darkened.

She had been in a state of utter chaos, driven mad by the Evil God, striking the man’s head, face, and hands with the high heel, holding nothing back. Blood had splattered everywhere; the scene had been horrifying.

If the man was sane, he would definitely call the police. And she wouldn’t be able to explain herself. There were no security cameras in the apartment, she couldn’t claim that the man had sexually harassed her… This was a serious problem.

Xiang Er’s understanding of the world was still based on strict social order and normalcy. What she had done was clearly beyond the bounds of acceptable behavior.

She waited for the police cars to arrive, for the police to knock on her door, or for Li Wan to return with her boyfriend and yell at her.

She waited anxiously, waited… then closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.

She woke up once in the middle of the night. The light in the room had been turned off, the entire room was dark, the lake-blue window rippled like waves, and within those rippling waves, she vaguely saw a dark red tentacle… covering her with her quilt.

She came to her senses and focused her gaze.

But the tentacle was gone, the quilt falling onto the bed with a “whoosh,” stirring a cool breeze. Drowsily, Xiang Er reached out, pulled the quilt over herself, and quickly fell back asleep.

Beneath the window, a thin tentacle was curled up quietly on the bookshelf. Seeing the even breathing of the person on the bed, it lifted slightly.

It slowly, hesitantly, crawled along the damp, old wall, carefully picking up the corner of the quilt and pulling it over the exposed, pale foot on the bed.

After covering the foot, the tentacle patted the quilt lightly, then slowly retreated to the bookshelf.

But it didn’t disappear.

The thin tentacle, like a vine, climbed out through the half-open, lake-blue window, leaving barely visible trails of slime on the metal window frame.

Once outside the wall, it moved quickly, growing larger and thicker, like a giant python under the moonlight, crawling and extending along countless walls and rooftops…

It, or rather She, with its tentacles as threads, wove a dense web within a radius of several thousand feet, every sucker, every spine on its tentacles, sniffing, sensing, searching for one person.

A thin man whose blood It had tasted.

The network of tentacles spread silently around the sleeping, unaware people. A surging wave of polluting miasma emanated outwards, the world beneath the moon becoming dark and distorted. Many people began to have nightmares, or woke up with a start, unable to identify the source of their fear.

Like geese awaiting slaughter, they looked out the window.

And in a small hotel, a few hundred meters away from the residential compound, the tentacles found their target. Numerous tentacles quickly retreated, converging on the hotel room, hanging and swaying outside the window, looking at the couple on the bed.

It was Li Wan and her injured boyfriend, sleeping back to back.

After being injured, the boyfriend had called Li Wan. Li Wan had wanted to call the police, but the boyfriend, with his criminal record, had strongly resisted. They had gone to the hospital to have his injuries examined, and then rented a room in a small hotel, planning to deal with the situation the next day.

In any case, now Li Wan and her boyfriend were lying on the small bed, fast asleep, their snores rising and falling.

The tentacles rustled, extending through the window frame, their thin tips swaying excitedly, like blades of grass dancing in a meadow, delighted by the small morsels of flesh and blood before them.

Rejected by Xiang Er, “It” needed this now.

Several tentacles slowly stretched along the walls and floor, graceful like snakes hunting in the night. They climbed the bedposts, the man on the bed stirring uneasily, and the tentacles paused, waiting. When the man fell back asleep, the tentacles continued to climb, reaching for the sheets…

But just then, all the tentacles abruptly froze, their tips turning in unison towards a distant point.

In the old apartment, deep within the residential compound, Xiang Er tossed and turned in her sleep, kicking off the covers as if she were hot, then muttering as if arguing with someone in her dream. Soon, she whimpered again, burying her face in the pillow, tears soaking the fabric.

“Wuwuwu… mm… don’t touch me…”

The thick tentacles that had been active outside suddenly vanished. The meticulously woven giant web rapidly dissipated, the dark fog and distorted light disappearing, the countless spiderweb-like tentacles vanishing on the spot, too late to retreat.

The tentacles that had been reaching for the sheets in the small hotel room instantly vanished without a moment’s hesitation, no longer paying attention to their previous target, their power rapidly returning to their source.

The remaining nearby tentacles quickly retreated, squeezing themselves back into the small window of the top-floor apartment in the residential compound, jostling and scrambling, almost crushing the window frame.

Then, the hundreds of thick tentacles coalesced into a single, incredibly thick rope.

It stretched and stretched, until finally, a thin, soft, fingertip-sized, dark red tip extended.

The tip of the tentacle, with extreme lightness and care, reached out and gently touched Xiang Er’s cheek.

Her tears were absorbed, her face clean and delicate. Xiang Er murmured a few more times.

She turned slightly, reaching out with both hands, groping blindly, as if trying to grasp something.

The tentacle, unable to retreat in time, was caught and held tightly in her embrace. Her legs wrapped around the middle section of the thick tentacle, holding it between her knees like a pillow.

The thick, massive tentacle was now completely rigid, motionless, like a cold, elastic baseball bat.

Xiang Er, hugging the tentacle, quickly fell into a deeper sleep. In her dream, she nuzzled her warm cheek against the surface of the tentacle, her tears and breath lingering on its cold surface.

“Mm…”

Her cheeks flushed, she sighed contentedly in her sleep.

The tentacle remained quietly by the bed, no longer attempting to extend outwards.

The sculpture silently turned, looking at the girl sleeping on the bed, hugging the tentacle, its eye shimmering.

Peace returned to the world, the moonlight gentle and soft, burying all that hadn’t transpired, deep within the night.

Xiang Er didn’t expect to sleep so well. She woke up the next morning feeling refreshed and alert.

All she remembered from last night was feeling hot, then cold, and seeming to hug something in her sleep. It must have been her quilt.

She looked towards the bookshelf, wondering if the angry Evil God had changed its mind overnight.

The sculpture on the shelf wasn’t facing the wall like yesterday. Instead, it had turned completely around, its eerie eye meeting hers.

The wooden eye was filled with light, a fervent light.

This was strange… Wasn’t It angry last night? What had happened? It not only seemed to have stopped being angry, but It almost seemed happy?

Xiang Er frowned. She felt like the sculpture was expecting her to say something, or do something.

She sighed, grabbed her clothes, and went to the bathroom to wash up and change.

As she moved, changing her angle, the sculpture immediately turned, its base scraping against the old bookshelf with a “creak.”

It wasn’t even bothering to pretend anymore? Before, It would at least try to conceal it…

Xiang Er pretended not to notice, walking towards the door, the scraping sound behind her continuing.

She opened the door and, as she stepped out, glanced back.

As expected… the sculpture was staring directly at her, its angle perfect, the light in its eye almost tangible.

Xiang Er closed the door, her brow furrowed deeply.

What was going on?

This Evil God… wasn’t even pretending anymore…

It was openly using the sculpture as a vehicle, what was It planning?

Could It be planning to… consume her early?

The more Xiang Er thought about it, the more certain she became. Perhaps danger was imminent, and she hadn’t even realized it!

While washing her face, Xiang Er plunged her face deep into the water. She knew the Evil Godcould peer into her thoughts, so she wasn’t going to think at home, she would go to work… unfortunately, today was Saturday, she didn’t have to work!

Xiang Er exhaled sharply, a large bubble rising to the surface and bursting. She pulled her head out of the water, gasping for air, looking at her pale, slightly flushed face in the mirror, bewildered and lost.

Where could she hide? Wherever she went, It would follow… Not to mention last night’s incident; she didn’t know how to deal with it. She lacked experience; she needed to ask someone with experience… Ask whom?

A name surfaced in Xiang Er’s mind, a name she had repeated silently many times. The woman had been helping her. Although they had only met a few times, she seemed more genuine than anyone Xiang Er knew, helping her without any ulterior motives.

At least, that’s what she believed.

Shen Yuhe!

Xiang Er decided to go to work, to the industrial park. There were coffee shops there. She could spend the entire day there, waiting for Shen Yuhe to appear, like a unexpected rain shower, and she would grasp onto this lifeline.

She got dressed, returned to her room to get her things, and carefully applied light makeup, looking at herself in the small mirror.

During this time, she deliberately avoided looking at the sculpture.

But the sculpture tumbled from the bookshelf with a series of creaks, its tentacles sprawled across the desk, lying on its side, its eye still facing her direction.

Xiang Er’s pale hand reached for her jewelry box, and the sculpture, lying beside it, its large eye upside down, looked at her, its gaze seeming slightly disappointed.

Xiang Er bit her lip, gently reached out, and set the sculpture upright on the table.

She exhaled, about to withdraw her hand.

Two tiny tentacles, as thin and delicate as newly sprouted willow leaves, extended from the sculpture and wrapped around her finger.

The two translucent red tendrils coiled around her finger several times, holding it tightly, reluctantly. One of the tentacles stretched out, its tip lifting, pressing a sucker against the tip of her finger, then slowly pulling away.

The sucker tugged at her skin, making a soft “pop” sound.

It was incredibly ticklish, a deep, tingling itch that made her chest tremble.

Xiang Er froze.

Was that… a kiss?

Chapter 16: Exquisite Porcelain

The moonlight trembled in the emerald green treetops. The whole world seemed to be eavesdropping on the struggle within the apartment, even the wind and leaves were silent.

Suddenly, Xiang Er was violently thrown to the floor.

The bleeding man roared hoarsely, lunging at her like a wild animal, pinning her to the floor, and reaching for the high heel in her hand.

“You fucking… you crazy woman! Let go!”

But Xiang Er’s grip was tight, her fingernails digging into the shoe, her hand and the shoe becoming one, with no intention of letting go. Even on the floor, her face remained expressionless as she raised the shoe, about to bring it down on the back of the man’s head.

The man finally gave up. He stood up, moved away from Xiang Er, and stumbled backwards, his head bleeding, his eyes filled with fear.

He muttered:

“Fucking crazy… crazy! Crazy woman… insane…”

Muttering these words, he retreated to the door and, while Xiang Er was still on the floor, quickly opened it and ran out, slamming the door shut behind him.

With a “bang,” the apartment fell silent.

The world quietly observed the apartment, the moonlight shifting and entering, casting a silver glow on the struggling girl on the floor. Her face, illuminated by the moonlight, was expressionless, or perhaps… the calmness of utter numbness.

Xiang Er lay still, sprawled on the wooden floor, her body limp and relaxed, as if merging with the floorboards. The apartment was quiet, a quiet that carried a warm drowsiness, and she felt like falling asleep right then and there.

She turned her head and saw a thick tentacle, latched onto her right wrist, licking the blood.

The tentacle was nimble, soft, and elastic, its suckers like countless tiny feet, moving across her skin, cold and slightly ticklish, like a small animal crawling on her.

Xiang Er’s gaze followed the tentacle to her own hand. Her hand clutched a high heel, the metal heel broken off, the entire shoe covered in blood.

Somehow… the black, business-style shoe, now stained with irregular patterns of blood, looked almost like a designer piece, beautiful under the moonlight.

Xiang Er’s emotions were heightened, her body drained of strength, but her mind was clearer than ever.

She didn’t regret her actions. In that critical moment, by striking the man’s face and neck, she had actually saved him from the Evil God’s tentacles.

A few injuries were better than being drained dry and devoured by a Evil God. There was no doubt that if she had asked the tentacle for help, she would now be facing a corpse.

A Evil God knew no restraint.

Xiang Er wouldn’t ask anything of the Evil God. The implied meaning of “What do you desire” was actually “What price are you willing to pay,” and she wasn’t willing to pay any price.

So she had chosen to act, to solve the problem herself, and to show the Evil God that she had a will of her own.

Yes, she would handle her own matters. She had never invited the Evil God into her home to help her, and she wouldn’t pay the price It demanded!

Xiang Er extended her left hand, moving it above her right wrist, and grasped downwards.

As expected… she grasped the tentacle.

Thick and elastic, its surface slimy and unpleasant, the tentacle wasn’t easy to hold. In Xiang Er’s weakened state, the slightest struggle from the tentacle would have been enough to break free from her grasp.

But the tentacle didn’t move at all, no struggle, no wriggling, it didn’t even pull her into the black domain to lecture her again.

Instead, the tip of the tentacle extended, moving around her hand, its rounded tip slowly tracing the lines of her palm.

From her thumb, to the base of her palm, to the center, then to the blue veins on her wrist.

The tentacle, with its slimy, elastic tip, touched each of these places, its movements gentle and slow, patient. As if aware of her fragility, it didn’t attempt to damage the exquisite porcelain.

It was merely… observing.

Like observing all the porcelain in a museum, up close, slowly and carefully.

Xiang Er would rather it fight her than do this. Every part of her skin that the Evil God’s tentacle touched burned, her veins itched, her joints felt like they were about to burst.

The sensation was strange. It felt like the places the Evil God had touched no longer belonged to her, but to…

“Akhe.”

Xiang Er mustered her strength and squeezed the tentacle, signaling for it to stop.

The tentacle obediently stopped tracing her wrist and fingers, remaining pressed against her hand, its tip raised, as if looking at her, waiting for her to speak.

It had become much calmer, even willing to communicate… Compared to a few days ago, when It had unceremoniously dragged her into its domain, the Evil God now seemed almost gentle and patient.

“Akhe…”

Xiang Er tried to remain calm. She released her left hand, no longer gripping the tentacle. Feeling the sticky residue on her hand, she licked her dry lips, forcing herself to treat the tentacle in front of her as a person, to look at it directly, to negotiate.

She had to think carefully, to find the right angle, the words that would make It understand… But perhaps It didn’t want to understand at all.

She could only try.

“Akhe, may I ask, what exactly do you want… from me?”

Despite her best efforts to suppress it, her voice still trembled with fear and pain. The tremor in her throat was uncontrollable. Xiang Er closed her eyes for a moment, then looked at the tentacle, trying to appear less panicked.

She waited.

The sweet fragrance in the air suddenly intensified, the tip of the tentacle turning red, becoming blood-red from the inside out, translucent, the transparent slime on its surface… visibly increasing.

Xiang Er didn’t know what this meant.

Or perhaps, it wasn’t a response at all, but a… threat?

Had her question offended the god? But if that were the case, why hadn’t she been dragged into the domain yet?

The tentacle swayed on its own, then suddenly pressed against her skin, and before Xiang Er could react, it slipped into the sleeve of her sweater like a small, red snake.

Slime dripped down, clinging to her wrist and the inside of her sleeve. Xiang Er let out a cry of discomfort and reached into her sleeve with her left hand, trying to pull the tentacle out.

But how could she possibly catch it?

The tentacle was like a snake, a nimble, soft slug, a slimy snail without a shell, elastic and soft, crawling up her arm.

Emitting its sweet fragrance.

Xiang Er could smell the pervasive sweetness, inhaling the intoxicating floral scent, spreading from her nose to her limbs, everything around her distorting and shifting, the living room expanding and shrinking, objects appearing and disappearing.

Xiang Er’s body quickly heated up, turning limp and soft, her joints aching, her mind hazy and swollen, unable to think clearly.

“Don’t… don’t do this with the smell… don’t…”

Xiang Er said haltingly, her senses dulled, barely able to feel where the tentacle had gone.

She tried to push herself off the floor, but her body was too weak. She floundered, then collapsed again. The tentacle inside her sleeve stretched out like a thread, its coldness trailing up her arm and shoulder, then up her neck, where it paused briefly.

There were no lights on in the apartment, only moonlight. The silver moon cast its light on everything that was happening, as if veiling all the filth and evil in the world.

Under the moonlight, the girl, struggling to sit up, her back slender, her shoulder blades trembling like wings about to take flight, the soft white sweater barely concealing the outline of something mysterious beneath.

Like a grand brushstroke on a blank canvas, the sweet-smelling slime marked the girl completely, staining the white with black, her reason slipping away, desire consuming everything…

The girl’s neck arched back, a moan of pain escaping her lips:

“No… get out…”

But from her neck, like a vine, a slender, soft, translucent red tip emerged, swaying gracefully, entwined with her hair.

The blood-red vine extended, coiling around the girl’s slender neck, loop after loop, like a blood-red scarf, slowly covering her fair skin.

Xiang Er sensed something, her survival instincts kicking in. She reached up to pull at the tentacle on her neck, but she couldn’t remove it. She wanted to scream, but her voice was soft and weak, almost a whimper:

“What… what are you doing! I don’t want… I don’t want this!”

The tentacle’s restless tip suddenly stopped. Then, it lifted from her neck and gently touched her cheek.

Like a soft kiss.

Then, the tentacle quickly retreated. The coils around her slender neck unwound, sliding down, the hidden parts within her white sweater quickly withdrawing, the speed of its retreat much faster and more decisive than its advance.

The sweet fragrance quickly faded. Xiang Er’s mind finally cleared somewhat. She watched as the tentacle retreated from the hem of her sweater, its entire length turning black, the dark red upper part losing almost all its color, becoming so dark that…

It resembled a human face, darkened with anger.

Xiang Er was startled by this thought. But after that ordeal, she was now covered in sweat, her body hot, weak, and aching, her neck so stiff she could barely lift her head.

The tentacle, having left her body, quickly slithered towards her bedroom, its entire length dark, leaving fewer slime trails.

Xiang Er was too exhausted to negotiate with It any longer. Panting, she watched as the tentacle disappeared into her bedroom.

After recovering for a while outside, she stood up, cleaned the mess on the shoe cabinet, casually wiped up the slime trails in the living room, and mentally prepared herself before opening her bedroom door and stepping inside.

The Evil God sculpture sat on the shelf, facing the wall.

Xiang Er hesitated, then walked over and turned it slightly. It seemed disrespectful to keep it facing the wall all the time.

She went to the bathroom to change her clothes, wash the slime off her hands and body, and returned in her pajamas.

The sculpture had turned back, facing the wall resolutely.

Xiang Er stared at the back of the sculpture for a long time, before belatedly realizing: the Evil God seemed… angry.

Huh? Why would It be angry?

Chapter 15: Torment

In the subway station, people came and went, their tired faces reflected in the glass beyond the dark train tracks.

Many passersby noticed the woman in the red dress on the platform. She was so beautiful, so striking, that anyone who saw her couldn’t look away. Some even missed their trains because of her.

The woman in the red dress stood still, holding a black and red gradient umbrella of unusual material, her beautiful face expressionless as she watched the departing train.

After a while, she walked towards the end of the platform, her long hair swaying without a breeze, her steps light and languid, the hem of her dress blooming like a camellia, revealing her fair, delicate ankles.

A man followed her, his gaze fixated on her slender ankles, mesmerized. The thought of holding those ankles in his hands involuntarily filled his mind…

“Aaaaaaa!!!”

He suddenly fell to his knees, screaming, clutching his right wrist with his left hand, blood gushing from between his fingers! His right hand hung limply, as if all the tendons had been severed in an instant, completely useless!

“What’s wrong? What’s wrong?”

“Holy crap, there’s blood! Someone call for help! Someone’s injured!”

“Who hurt you? Who was it?”

Passersby immediately crowded around, some screaming, some crying in fear, the scene descending into chaos.

The man screamed and writhed in pain. When he looked up again, the woman in the red dress was gone.

Ahead was the enclosed glass wall of the platform, with no other exits, no hidden doors.

His eyes bloodshot, he cried out tremblingly:

“That woman in the red dress… she’s a ghost! A ghost, there’s a ghost, aaaaa!”

But the passersby seemed to have forgotten something, looking at each other in confusion:

“What woman in red? Where?”

“Yeah, I’ve been here for ten minutes and haven’t seen anyone like that.”

“Sir, are you mentally ill?”

“No one wears a dress in this weather…”

Until she opened the door to her apartment, Xiang Er’s mood remained light and airy, as if she were floating on a cloud, unable to perceive the heavy reality before her, only willing to look towards the fluffy, cotton-candy-like world of her imagination.

Shen, Yu, He.

*Shen Yu He (沈遇鹤) suggests a person destined for good fortune, elegance, and a long, meaningful life*

Such a beautiful name, so perfectly suited to her.

Her tongue danced nimbly, savoring the three syllables, their meaning rich and subtle. Xiang Er repeated the name silently, all the way home.

Key in the lock, Xiang Er pushed open the door and looked inside.

With a “bang,” those vibrant imaginings, that light and joyful mood, instantly plummeted, crashing down into the heavy reality, her brows furrowing deeply.

She saw it. Right there in the living room, on the walls, the floor, the ceiling, were countless shimmering trails, layer upon layer, strand upon strand, as if giant snails had crawled all over the apartment.

It was… “It”.

It had released Its tentacles in this living room!

Why? What was “It” trying to do?

The trails shimmered, like a thick, viscous coating, covering the living room floor and walls, even the sofa. They reflected the light like countless twinkling stars.

A sweet fragrance filled the room, mingled with a faint fishy smell. Even though the windows were open, the smell lingered.

She didn’t know when it had happened… Had these trails been here when she left this morning? Xiang Er tried hard to remember, but she couldn’t.

“Yo, you’re back.”

A thin man emerged from the master bedroom. He wore only an undershirt and pajama pants, a cigarette dangling from his lips. He shuffled out in his slippers and, seeing Xiang Er, grinned, his face wrinkling.

Xiang Er ignored him, looking down to change her shoes.

“You go to work so early and come back so late every day. Are you fooling around outside after work?”

The man leaned closer, continuing to speak.

Xiang Er didn’t answer. The smell of cigarettes mixed with the sweet fragrance made her nauseous. She quickly changed her shoes and tried to go to her room.

But the man blocked her path, grinning at her:

“Let’s chat, little sister. What, are you afraid your roommate will get jealous?”

Xiang Er turned her face away and muttered:

“Excuse me.”

“Don’t be so nervous. She still has an hour before she gets off work. We have plenty of time to chat… I’m very interested in you…”

The man continued to smile, the pungent smell of cigarette smoke wafting towards her, as if trying to trap her within a wall of odor.

“You…”

Xiang Er frowned. She wanted to push him away, but she felt it would be too dirty to touch him with her hands, and… what would happen afterwards? Could she afford to move? If she angered him, she might be in danger…

Years of enduring such situations made Xiang Er hesitate to resist, even though she wanted to. She couldn’t think of a foolproof solution, so she took a step back.

This seemed to please the man. He exhaled a cloud of foul-smelling cigarette smoke and grinned at her, taking two steps forward, closing the distance between them, his undershirt almost brushing against her clothes.

He laughed triumphantly, knowing that a recent graduate like Xiang Er, so young and naive, wouldn’t be able to resist him, a man of the world. He hadn’t misjudged her; the girl didn’t even dare to speak, let alone resist, hahaha! It seemed he was in luck today!

“So? Chat with me, and I’ll look after you, treat you to good food and drinks… Come on, let’s sit on the sofa and talk…”

The man extended a skinny arm towards Xiang Er, his hand like a monkey’s paw.

But Xiang Er’s eyes narrowed, her gaze fixed on something behind the man. The fear on her face transformed into… a complex expression the man couldn’t understand.

She stared intently ahead, not even reacting when the man’s hand touched her arm, as if…

As if, in that instant, she could no longer see him, something more important having captured her attention, reducing him to an insignificant ant, unworthy of her gaze.

And indeed, that was the case. Behind the man’s shoulder, Xiang Er saw a thick, dark red tentacle slowly swaying.

The tentacle seemed to be greeting her, its tip dipping slightly downwards, like a human nodding in acknowledgment.

The moment Xiang Er saw the tentacle, a powerful, mysterious consciousness and thought flooded her mind. It wasn’t expressed in any human language, yet it resonated within her brain, allowing her to completely understand, to grasp its meaning in her own words.

She subconsciously translated the thought: Tell me, what do you desire.

Waves of powerful intent surged towards her, repeating the same message.

Tell me, what do you desire.

No sound, no image, no other external stimuli, as natural as a thought arising in her own mind.

Xiang Er understood the tentacle’s meaning, and at the same time… she was terrified.

Truly terrified, a terror that reached the depths of her soul.

Earlier, when the man was harassing her, she had only felt a vague, chaotic annoyance, not true terror. But now, receiving this message from the Evil God, she felt an overwhelming fear.

The Evil God… did It want to make a deal with her?

And making a deal meant paying a price. The memory of that near-miss with the tentacles was still vivid in her mind. She absolutely didn’t want to experience that again!

[Tell me, what do you desire…]

Xiang Er stared intently at the tentacle. The tentacle stood upright, serene and peaceful, taller than the man, its rounded tip covered in small suckers, like tiny eyes, looking back at her.

The tip of the tentacle swayed gently from side to side, like a kitten flicking its tail in the sunlight.

But this wasn’t the time to be charmed by a tentacle!

Was It amused? Was It enjoying her predicament, her helplessness, forcing her to beg?

Indeed, if she responded, then It could probably enjoy its meal tonight…

Xiang Er’s mind raced, her fear so intense she felt like vomiting, her face deathly pale.

The man, angered by her reaction, turned to look behind him. There was nothing there, just the normal, old living room, except for a slight chill on the back of his neck. The balcony window was open; it was normal to feel a draft.

Then… what was this girl looking at?

The man opened his mouth, his breath foul:

“Hey, what are you looking at? What’s so interesting?”

But Xiang Er didn’t answer.

The slender, frail girl in white was curled up in a strange posture, as if something large was looming over her. Her thin arms, clad in the white sweater, wrapped around her upper body. Her face was paler than her exposed wrists, her lips almost bloodless. Like a white daisy, beaten down by the rain.

The man didn’t care about her expression. He reached out and roughly grabbed her pale wrist. Her bones were so delicate; he could almost snap them. He ran his fingers over her smooth skin.

“Don’t be scared, little sister. Whatever you’re seeing, I’ll protect you!”

He said this with a lewd smile, trying to pull her hand.

However… Xiang Er’s gaze, previously fixed on something behind him, suddenly snapped towards him, staring directly into his eyes.

Her pale lips parted, and she whispered:

“I don’t desire anything… I don’t want anything.”

As she said this, her other hand rose, clutching a high heel, its sharp metal heel glinting coldly.

Her face expressionless, she brought the shoe down hard!

“Aaaaaah, owwww!!!” A scream of agony ripped through the air, blood splattering!

The tentacle abruptly straightened, its tip swaying more rapidly. Amidst the smell of blood and the screams, it suddenly lowered its thick body, bringing its tip directly to Xiang Er’s face, its suckers opening and closing, swaying gently.

Xiang Er looked at the tentacle, continuing to strike repeatedly, mechanically repeating:

“I don’t want anything, I don’t want anything… because I can do it myself.”

Blood splattered, the man thrashed and struggled frantically. Xiang Er continued to strike with steady hands, staring at the countless suckers opening and closing on the tentacle, repeating:

“I. Can. Do it. Myself.”

The tentacle, rejected, seemed rather pleased. It swayed, stretching and thinning, coiling around Xiang Er’s wrist.

It used its suckers to inch its way along her skin, absorbing the blood splattered on the back of her hand.

Xiang Er felt it… It was satisfied. Unexpectedly satisfied.