Something terrible had happened.
Early the next morning, Qin Shu abruptly sat up in bed, drenched in sweat. Still dazed, he stared fixedly at his trembling hands while harsh breaths continued spilling from his chest, impossible to calm for a long time.
Ever since his Heavenly Eye had been opened, this was the first time Qin Shu had awakened in the morning with every detail of his dreams still perfectly clear in his mind.
Honestly, he would have preferred to forget some of the more unpleasant details. Unfortunately, he could not forget them even if he tried.
He felt as exhausted as if he had run the eight-hundred-meter race three times in a row. No—he wished that was all he had done. Merely remembering the succession of separate ordeals he had endured in the dream made his body seize with stress.
He had been hunted by indescribable, grotesque monsters and had his limbs eaten. He had been suspended by hooks through his shoulder blades in an endless expanse of cold darkness. Flames as hot as the molten rock of hell had burned off his eyebrows and left his entire body gleaming with oil. He had been flayed and taken apart, then fitted with skin, bones, flesh, and sinews that did not belong to him. Finally, he had been struck by lightning hundreds of times.
Why did he consider them separate ordeals? Because in some scenes, he still had all four limbs, while in others, his hands or feet had already been severed—and the missing parts were different every time. There was no logical timeline by which he could arrange the events in order.
Qin Shu struggled out of bed and drank some water. He glanced at the eyeball lying silently on his bedside table, pretending to be dead, then poked the little centipede curled around his wrist. In a hoarse voice, he asked, “Did either of you notice anything strange last night? Did I talk in my sleep?”
—Nothing happened.
“Fine. Never mind, then. I’m going to shower. You’re not allowed to follow me.”
The little centipede flicked its cool tail and crawled into the acrylic box containing the eyeball, flipping the lid open with a sweep of its tail.
The gray-white eyeball immediately trembled and instinctively tried to flee. It failed. The little centipede balanced it on top of its head and flew around the house, darting upstairs and downstairs with the eyeball riding helplessly upon it.
Qin Shu: “…”
How had his perfectly ordinary home somehow ended up like this? If he encountered more mountain spirits and strange creatures in the future, would his house eventually become a chaotic gathering place for monsters—some kind of deeply unsettling zoo?
Qin Shu did not dare think about it too deeply. He went into the dressing room for a towel and clean clothes. Since it was not snowing that morning and the sunlight outside was pleasant, he hurried into the bathroom for a quick shower.
When the hot water soaked through his hair, cold sweat still broke out over his skin. Every time he remembered the terrifying images from his dream, his mind began connecting ordinary things in the real world to the horrors he had experienced.
Scalding water. Wet skin. Cold tiles. Thick, slippery body wash and shampoo. Even the faucet handle, which felt like iron beneath his fingers when his eyes were closed… The nightmare had cast too deep a shadow over him to fade anytime soon.
Qin Shu gritted his teeth and forced himself to remain in the bathroom. His wet black hair hung over his forehead, blurring his vision through the steam. The firm muscles across his back twitched uncontrollably as he leaned backward and pressed himself hard against the wet, cold tiles.
He was going to force himself to become desensitized.
He had never experienced anything so terrifying in his entire life. But that was precisely why he needed to adapt as quickly as possible.
What if the next person to fall into the depths of the sea was not Liu Yang Yang, but Qin Shu himself? Would he be able to withstand all that surging fear and pain, then force himself to struggle and search for a way to survive?
No. Qin Shu knew his own limits. At present, he was not capable of that. He therefore had to overcome the barrier in his own mind deliberately, so he could become stronger and more capable of surviving real danger.
His breathing was restricted, his vision obstructed, and his excessively sharp physical senses became a strange torment, like needles stabbing directly into his awareness.
“Breathe out… breathe in… breathe out… breathe in…” Qin Shu forced himself to endure it, attempting to breathe in a steady rhythm. He squeezed a pump of conditioner onto his head, worked it through his hair, and slowly massaged his scalp with his warm fingertips. He pretended to be concentrating on caring for his hair, afraid that the slightest lapse would send him tumbling into complete panic from the inside out.
It did not work particularly well. So he began imagining that he was actually washing Pei Zhao’s hair. Pei Zhao would certainly sit obediently on a small stool and cooperate with him. And perhaps, as Qin Shu continued washing it… he might rub two fluffy cat ears out from among those black strands. That would be unbearably cute.
Ding-dong—
Just as Qin Shu’s imagination was beginning to wander farther and farther off course, the doorbell rang outside.
Who could possibly be visiting at this hour? Wait… Pei Zhao!
Qin Shu snapped back to reality and no longer had time to feel afraid. He clumsily pushed his dripping bangs back and aimed the showerhead at himself, rinsing frantically until the enormous amount of foam had been washed away.
He threw a towel loosely over his dripping hair, hurried into an oversized sweatshirt and pajama pants, then pushed open the door and strode outside. Halfway there, he broke into a run.
The problem with living in such a large house was that it took forever just to answer the door. Complaining inwardly, Qin Shu held down the poorly secured towel on his head. The moment he rushed into the entryway, he collided with Pei Zhao with a solid smack.
“…Hiss, that hurts. My forehead really hurts. Zhaozhao, are you all right?” Qin Shu immediately forgot about the towel sailing away and grabbed Pei Zhao, turning him from side to side to inspect him.
Pei Zhao was trapped firmly in his embrace, unable to move, like a human pillow. A faint scent of mint and damp mist clung to him, and even his clothes were speckled with water dripping from Qin Shu. He was used to this by now and merely released an almost imperceptible sigh.
Then Qin Shu realized something was wrong. “Wait, Zhaozhao. Who opened the door for you?”
Pei Zhao raised his right hand and lightly shook his wrist, revealing the obedient little centipede curled around it. “It did.”
The beautiful dark-red centipede encircled his pale wrist like an exquisitely carved tattoo or totem, making it appear especially striking. It carried a faint sense of ancient, oppressive danger. Sunlight spilled in from outside the entryway and passed through its dark, blood-colored shell, giving the strange insect a hazy golden sheen.
Qin Shu instinctively sensed an uncanny harmony between them. He became so absorbed in the sight that he stared blankly for several moments before stammering, “…What? No, wait… You haven’t been poisoned?”
Truthfully, Qin Shu could not tell whether he was worried, frightened, or simply shocked. He stared into Pei Zhao’s unusually clear golden-amber eyes and had no idea what he was supposed to do.
Should he hurry and remove Pei Zhao’s shirt to check whether he had been poisoned? Was that really appropriate? Probably not.
“I can’t be poisoned. Yuanbao is very well-behaved. It won’t hurt anyone.”
As though he could read Qin Shu’s mind, Pei Zhao spoke at that exact moment. He opened his palm, and the little centipede cooperatively crawled onto it, lifting the front half of its body. Its antennae swayed toward Qin Shu as it attempted to express its delight.
“So its name is Yuanbao?” Qin Shu reached out, pinched the centipede between his fingers, and held it close to his eyes. He turned it back and forth, squinting suspiciously. “Little bug, you had a name all along? Why didn’t you tell me… What do you mean, I already knew? How could I possibly know?”
“Qin Shu, don’t argue with an animal,” Pei Zhao said quietly, cutting off the farce before it could properly begin.
Then he unwound the soft cashmere scarf from his neck and hung it on the coat hook in the entryway. He picked up Qin Shu’s fallen towel, placed it back over his head, and pulled him toward the study. Every movement flowed smoothly, as though he knew the house as well as his own.
Naturally, Qin Shu did not resist. He tossed the centipede into the hood of his sweatshirt and let Pei Zhao pull him along by the sleeve. Laughing, he said, “Oh, Student Pei is so diligent. Why are we going to the study this early in the morning? No, no, I refuse.”
“I brought you breakfast.” Pei Zhao ignored his protests, set down his backpack, and took out the coffee and sandwich he had prepared—followed immediately by several extremely difficult comprehensive mock-exam papers.
The two lattes had come from a coffee shop by the roadside. They sat side by side in a sturdy cardboard carrier, giving off the rich, sweet scent of warm milk. The shop was always extremely popular on cold winter mornings in Jiangcheng.
Qin Shu’s was a rich matcha latte made with extra-creamy milk. Pei Zhao disliked that flavor and had bought himself the plainest basic latte.
The sandwich was packed tightly inside an insulated lunch box and was still steaming. Qin Shu could tell at a glance that Pei Zhao had made it himself that morning. The ingredients were far too extravagant: thick slices of freshly seared steak and rich, stretchy cheese with caramelized marks across the surface. Even the knife work was astonishingly precise.
“This is happiness. This is what true happiness looks like.” Qin Shu closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. Then, as though accepting a marriage proposal, he voluntarily spread the mock exam out on the desk and pressed his palms together. “I do.”
Pei Zhao paused, then expressionlessly picked up his coffee. “…Dry your hair and eat breakfast first. When you’re finished, do the paper on top. I’ll time you. There will be no break. Treat it as the final mock exam of the year.”
Faced with such fresh and tempting homemade food, Qin Shu could not possibly refuse any request Pei Zhao made.
Honestly, after waking from the nightmare with his mind in agony, having it so quickly occupied by such a warm and ordinary morning made Qin Shu feel even more touched.
He took a huge bite of the hot sandwich and closed his eyes again. “Zhaozhao, you’re so good to me. How can you possibly treat me this well? My taste buds have ascended to a higher realm. What would I ever do without you?”
“Aren’t you good to me?”
“Mmph?”
“You’re very good to me,” Pei Zhao said softly. Immediately afterward, he extended a hand without mercy. “Also, hand over Yuanbao. It isn’t allowed to see the questions, and it can’t help you solve them.”
“…Mm-hm.”
What an incredibly strict proctor! Qin Shu thought with slight guilt. He held his coffee and rubbed the cup between his hands before giving in and testing the waters again. “Zhaozhao, how do you know Yuanbao?”
“I’ve always known Yuanbao.” Pei Zhao looked at him calmly. “I’m not telling you the rest.”
Qin Shu raised an eyebrow and handed the centipede over. At the same time, he closed his hand around Pei Zhao’s cold wrist. His wheeled chair rolled forward with the movement. Caught unprepared, Pei Zhao was pulled close.
The two sat facing each other beside the desk, their knees touching. With no sense of personal space whatsoever, Qin Shu squeezed Pei Zhao’s hand and continued asking, “Then do you know how Liu Yang Yang is doing now?”
“I don’t.” Pei Zhao tilted his head slightly, his gaze darkening. “You care that much about him?”
Qin Shu froze beneath his stare and inexplicably felt a little guilty. He cleared his throat. “Our Yuanbao harmed him—no, wait, Yuanbao was originally his. Either way, he’s obviously in danger. How could I possibly ignore it? Naturally, I should help however much I can, right? I didn’t sleep well last night either. I had nightmares the entire night. I suspect it’s because I feel unsettled and can’t put the matter out of my mind.”
“Oh.”
“Zhaozhao, comfort me a little… I had a nightmare.”
Pei Zhao fell silent for a moment, seemingly uncertain what counted as comforting someone. In the end, he awkwardly stroked Qin Shu’s cheek, then patted his hand.
Sometimes he truly resembled a small animal—clumsy and uncertain when it came to expressing affection. Qin Shu did not dare say that aloud, but his mood had already improved considerably.
For the time being, he would put his worries aside and focus on spending New Year’s with his good friend. Qin Shu attacked the sandwich with fierce determination, attacked the mathematics paper with the same fierce determination, then charged straight into the geometry problem he was worst at… only to discover that he knew exactly how to solve it.
At first glance, he had no idea where to begin. He genuinely could not solve it. But after forcing himself to think a little longer, the answer suddenly became obvious.
The complicated diagram that once would have seemed impossibly abstract now looked simple and straightforward. It was genuinely easy to understand. At that moment, Qin Shu could not even relate to the version of himself who had scratched his head in frustration over similar questions the previous week.
When he handed in the paper, Qin Shu looked at Pei Zhao with a grave expression. “Zhaozhao, breaking news. I think I’ve become smarter.”
Pei Zhao: “…”
Ten minutes later, after rapidly checking the answers, Pei Zhao confirmed it with an equally grave expression. “You have become smarter. One hundred and forty-six.”
They stared at each other in silence for a long moment. Then Qin Shu swept Pei Zhao up around the waist with fierce determination, slung him over his shoulder, grabbed both cups of coffee in one hand, and strode away. “Upstairs. Time for a horror-movie marathon!”
This time, Pei Zhao had no reason to object.
Meanwhile, in an unnamed fishing village near Haicheng—
Liu Yang Yang lay naked on the rocky shore, his body covered in mottled, fresh wounds. Any blood had long since been washed clean by the icy seawater.
No one went fishing in winter, and the rocky section of coast where boats could not dock was even more desolate. Liu Yang Yang lay there alone and motionless until a sharp, needlelike pain pierced his back and jolted him awake.
“Hiss, hah… Who am I? Where am I?”
His face twisted with pain. Summoning every bit of strength he had, Liu Yang Yang struggled upright. Barefoot, he stepped across the uneven rocks, which felt like blocks of ice beneath the seawater. Staggering and slipping, he painfully made his way ashore. After walking roughly fifty meters in one desperate push, he finally reached a relatively dry stretch of beach.
The sand had absorbed a little warmth from the morning sunlight and barely provided any relief to Liu Yang Yang, who was shivering violently from the cold. Even so, the empty coastline left him deeply uneasy.
Looking around, he saw that the vegetation in the area was extremely sparse, consisting mostly of tangled trees and dead branches. There were no tall buildings beyond the horizon across the water, nor were there any behind him.
Two dilapidated, uninhabited wooden huts stood nearby. The timber had rotted from damp and gave off a moldy, wet stench. It looked as though touching the walls a few times might be enough to cause a fungal infection in the lungs.
Liu Yang Yang did not dare approach them, much less look casually into the huts’ dark windows. Instead, he followed the open ground inland and kept strictly to the main road, ensuring that nothing severely obstructed his view. That was the hard-earned experience of a veteran corpse herder.
“Hello—! Is anyone there—?”
“Hello—! I need help—!”
Liu Yang Yang shouted at the top of his lungs several times. In the distance, he vaguely saw figures at the far end of the road and what appeared to be cooking smoke curling through the air. He quickened his pace and continued limping forward until an utterly ordinary fishing village came into view.
To the left of the village entrance stood an ancient stone monument commemorating a jinshi graduate. It was more than two meters tall, with a large decorative flower made from red cloth tied over the granite. The fabric was damp, while its trailing ends had turned black with mold. Judging by the style and carved inscription, someone from this village had astonishingly become a first-class jinshi more than four hundred years ago.
On a matching stone to the right of the entrance, the village’s name had been carved: Living Water Village.
“Living Water Village. Hm. Never heard of it.” Liu Yang Yang repeated the name. For some reason, the hair along his back prickled, and a subtle unease stirred in his chest.
Ordinarily, he would already have turned and run, trusting his instincts without question. But Liu Yang Yang had nowhere else to go. He was not even wearing clothes, and the wounds covering his body hurt so badly that his temples throbbed. Several of the deepest had yet to close. After only a few additional steps, they had begun bleeding again, the torn flesh curling outward until yellow-white fat was almost visible beneath it.
He needed clothing to cover himself and effective first aid immediately.
The buildings inside Living Water Village appeared completely ordinary as well. Most were single-story homes built by the villagers themselves. The better ones had gray bricks and tiled roofs. The poorer ones mixed red brick with mud reinforced by straw, then covered the roof with broad rows of interlocking clay tiles. The worst were simply roofed with woven stalks. Everything looked thoroughly commonplace.
As he observed the surroundings and continued inward, Liu Yang Yang could tell that the village was not prosperous. There appeared to be no scenic area or tourist attraction under development nearby. It resembled a settlement populated by an ethnic minority, so visitors rarely came. In the depths of winter, even diners who waited by the fishing boats to buy freshly caught seafood would not appear.
That was what frightened him most. A closed-off village with no outsiders meant the danger level had doubled—and then doubled again.
As for the figure he had spotted in the distance, Liu Yang Yang had prepared himself for ten thousand possibilities. Even if it turned out to be a ghost, he had ways to kill it. Yet when he awkwardly approached while covering his crotch, the two of them stared at each other for a moment, and he nearly fainted from shock.
The person before him was not an ordinary villager.
It was Qin Shu dressed as one.
That was far stranger than encountering a ghost.
Qin Shu did not look at his face. His gaze dropped briefly, then snapped away at once. He hesitated before asking, “Um, sir… what happened to you?”
“Y-you don’t recognize me?” Liu Yang Yang’s heart pounded wildly. “Brother Qin, don’t scare me… I’m only missing my clothes. Surely that isn’t enough to make me unrecognizable?”
“Brother Qin… Are you talking to me?” Qin Shu scratched his head and gave him a friendly smile. “Sorry. My name is Kan Kan.”
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