Under the train.
Yu Jinghe’s breathing grew increasingly difficult, and his vision began to blur. No matter how hard he struggled, he couldn’t seem to pull the vine off his neck.
Has it been a few seconds or ten minutes already? He had lost all sense of time when suddenly, the force that was choking him vanished, and his hands were empty. He tried to grab the tentacles that had been wrapped around his neck, but they had disappeared.
Yu Jinghe froze, a look of surprise on his face.
Wait a minute, he didn’t think this monster decided to spare him out of mercy, so there was only one possibility left.
Could it be that Jian Xie…
He quickly turned over and twisted his body on the narrow, enclosed railroad tracks, taking some time to figure out how to climb out from under the train.
But unexpectedly, at the last moment when he reached out to grab the edge of the platform, he was suddenly grabbed by a pair of cold hands. Despite being a grown man of considerable weight, he was lifted up effortlessly with just one hand, catching him completely off guard.
Yu Jinghe: “……?”
The man let go of his hand and he immediately fell to the ground.
He looked over in confusion, and there before his eyes was the high school student’s expressionless face.
The other person was looking at him strangely, as if he were looking at a dead person, with a coldness that had never been seen before.
“……”
For a moment, too many questions arose in Yu Jinghe’s mind.
Where did the monster go?
Since I was unharmed and could no longer feel that cold aura, that must mean… the monster is dead, right?
However, the only person who had come into close contact with the monster, the teenager in the white T-shirt, was not covered in a single speck of dust. Except for his shoelaces coming undone, not even a drop of the foul-smelling liquid had splashed onto the surface of his shoes. He was clean and tidy, forming a stark contrast to the disheveled appearance of Yu Jinghe at that moment.
It didn’t look like there had been a fierce struggle at all.
As he looked at the other person, the high school student was also sizing him up. Anyone who was subjected to such an intense, almost scrutinizing gaze, as if they were being dissected on an operating table, would feel a chill run down their spine and would want to immediately reveal all their hidden secrets.
“What—”
“You.”
The young man in front of him snorted derisively, crossed his arms, and coldly interrupted him, “Don’t ask too much, don’t say too much, or you’ll die.”
The moment he finished speaking, an overwhelming sense of pressure suddenly engulfed him!
And this intimidating aura told him that the other person was not joking at all. The arrogant tone, the mocking words, the dark threats, not to mention those dark eyes, did not seem human at all. The person in front of him—
Definitely not a person!
Yu Jinghe was startled, his back went cold, his adrenaline shot up, his legs trembled, and his whole body almost shook unconsciously.
——It was submission to a dominant, absolute power.
As an A-class investigator, he still felt the urge to fight to the death against the Special A-level monster he had just encountered. However, in the presence of this high school student who was much younger than him, he couldn’t muster any desire to resist.
Because he’ll die.
Noises and moans came from behind Yu Jinghe. The space that had been forcibly pulled into the predation field began to stir with movement. Remembering his duty as an investigator, he couldn’t help but glance back only to see that the ordinary people on the subway who had been under control were all waking up.
Evidently, it was all over.
……
“I think you should at least give me a rough outline of the story, rather than leaving me hanging like this.”
In the passenger seat of the car, a man with a messy tie had a dumbfounded look in his eyes. After calming the crowd and notifying the police to arrive and maintain order, he had to fulfill an important duty of the Logistics Department—write a report on the incident, organize it, and submit it.
However, the investigator originally assigned by the Supernatural Management Bureau had informed him just minutes earlier that he knew nothing about the matter.
He almost broke the voice recorder in his hand.
Yu Jinghe: “…”
It wasn’t his fault. He really just fell off the subway train and then everything was resolved. What was even more unbelievable was that when he looked back, Jian Xie had already disappeared, and even the man with the messy tie who rushed over quickly didn’t even brush past him.
How to put it…
Yu Jinghe recalled their first meeting when Jian Xie had mentioned that he had a mental illness but everyone had dismissed it as a joke and let it pass.
Now it seemed that Jian Xie may indeed have schizophrenia. Otherwise, Yu Jinghe couldn’t imagine why a person’s emotions could change so much.
But he didn’t think it had anything to do with the terrifying thing that had appeared during that first incident which frightened him.
After all, if an unknown entity attached itself to a human being and neither harmed him nor harbored any purpose but merely protected him, watched over him, and allowed him to act recklessly as he pleased… Just thinking about it was laughable.
Having killed so many monsters, Yu Jinghe had never seen such a precedent.
Real life wasn’t a novel.
“So, you think it was Jian Xie who did these things.” Messy-tie smiled and said, squinting his eyes, “You’re not trying to shift the blame, are you? I know you want to transfer to the Logistics Department. If you accomplish something significant this time, you will be promoted and they will certainly not allow you to leave the Investigation Department.”
Upon hearing this, Yu Jinghe furrowed his brows, remained silent for a moment, then suddenly looked at messy-tie.
“What?” Messy-tie was startled by his gaze. “What’s the problem?”
“…Did I tell you earlier that the high school student’s name is Jian Xie?”
While explaining some matters, he clearly altered Jian Xie’s name, vaguely replacing it with “high school student.” However, his companion before him directly called out the other person’s real name, and his familiar tone did not seem like that of someone meeting the other for the first time.
It was more like he had silently repeated this name countless times in his heart, so it slipped out unconsciously when he let his guard down.
If he remembered correctly, he had not mentioned the name “Jian Xie” at any point during the entire incident.
So how did he know?
……
The car parked by the side of the road fell silent. Suddenly, there was a teeth-grinding sound of a skull cracking, but after just a few seconds, it returned to dead silence again.
After a while, the car window was rolled down, revealing Yu Jinghe’s face.
So familiar, yet so unfamiliar.
He slowly lit a cigarette for himself, took a puff, and flicked away the ash. His eyes darkened.
“I still prefer my original body.”
*
Jian Xie was awakened by the ringing of a bell.
He stood there for a few minutes before realizing that it was indeed the alarm clock he had set for himself to wake up early. As a senior in high school, the first day after the weekend was the hardest to get out of bed, even for him, so an alarm was very necessary.
But, if he remembered correctly, it was— morning, six o’clock.
And yesterday, he went to subway line 6 in the afternoon.
In other words, he lost all memory of his entire weekend vacation, skipping straight from Saturday to Monday.
Jian Xie: “…”
He could only mourn his hard-earned vacation.
【You need to digest it well.】 Almost immediately after his silence, Qin Zhuo’s lazy words echoed in his mind. It was like a big cat waiting by his bed for him to wake up, making a sound when it sensed something was wrong. 【After closing the [Eight Cold Hell], I brought you back.】
Upon hearing this, Jian Xie subconsciously lowered his head and looked down at himself.
Not bad, It even helped him take off his clothes and put on his pajamas.
“Digest?”
【Although you retained a bit of energy when you threw it into hell after it became its original form, it’s still overeating for you at this stage.】
“Oh.”
Because it was so eager to reveal its own crimes and talked incessantly and confessed everything it had done, Jian Xie felt he couldn’t let it off easily. So, just like he had done with the little bear doll that was left with only its body, he threw the leftovers of the eyeball monster into the [Eight Cold Hell], a kind of refrigerator, for frozen storage.
They should also be made to experience the agonizing feeling of being immersed in fear and living in constant dread.
What goes around comes around. It was the way it should be, otherwise it would be unfair to the innocent victims who were hunted down for entertainment.
Jian Xie recalled that taste…
It’s a little like lychee-flavored turtle jelly, a snack you can slurp up.
It’s pretty unique.
Maybe if I raise it for a while, I can go back to hell and eat it again.
He didn’t think his idea was scary at all.
“Right.” He suddenly remembered something and questioned Qin Zhuo, “Did you bring everything back? Including the [Eight Cold Hell] dagger on the floor?”
【I brought everything back—】
Although Qin Zhuo deliberately dragged out his words in a lazy tone, to Jian Xie’s ears, they sounded unusually obedient and well-behaved.
【But you already ate that dagger.】
Jian Xie froze: “……?”
What? What the hell? What did he eat?
That’s not right. How can he eat everything? Can one eat the boundary monuments of hell?
【You know, monsters expand their predation field when they encounter prey because it’s inside their bodies, just like the mouthparts that extend when animals feed.】
The black fog spread and slid to the edge of the bed, revealing a figure completely shrouded in darkness. Qin Zhuo rested his chin in his hand, staring intently at Jian Xie’s profile. It said with interest, 【Now, the [Eight Cold Hell] seemed to have become something similar to a predation field of your own.】
【As long as you want to, you can absorb the monsters you want and trigger what is known as hell.】
Jian Xie paused for a moment.
His comprehension skills were not poor. Even though Qin Zhuo spoke in vague terms, he understood the general meaning.
First, because Jian Xie ate enough food yesterday, his ability to absorb nutrients was no longer passive but has become an active skill.
He was well aware of this, after all, that was his intention when he went to Subway Line 6.
However, at the same time, Jian Xie used the dagger to create a pseudo-hell, which overlapped with part of the monster’s predation field.
Therefore, when his body was passively absorbing energy frantically, he accidentally mixed the two together, causing the [Eight Cold Hell] to be absorbed by himself at the same time and becoming an existence in his body similar to a monster’s predation field.
Exclusively used for eating.
Now he didn’t even need a dagger. He could trigger the [Eight Cold Hell] just by thinking about it.
He really is…
Getting closer and closer to being a monster.
Would a normal human being, or any investigator for that matter, have a predation field where they could hunt monsters like he does?
Jian Xie expression looked odd.
But to say he was worried… not really. After all, even if someone were pointing a gun at his temple right now, he wouldn’t feel particularly afraid.
However, this meant that he needed to find time to get information about monsters’ predation field from Cheng Li and take a look at it.
After all, apart from being used to confine prey while feeding, he had no idea what else the predation field could be used for. Perhaps it could provide him with some enlightenment… He couldn’t waste it. Otherwise, he had a feeling that the [Eight Cold Hell], which he had used only once and then inexplicably eaten as a side dish would die with regrets.
Jian Xie slid off the bed and started looking for clothes in the closet.
Although high schools did not strictly regulate dress code during the week, Monday was flag-raising day, and all students were required to assemble on the sports field. On this day, students were required to wear the school’s unique uniform, which included a tie and has a distinctly British style, giving it an expensive look.
Although it took some time to put on, once he had it on, it accentuated Jian Xie’s body line, who usually preferred casual clothes. His slender figure, still in puberty, looked exceptionally beautiful, and compared to his usual appearance, he exuded an additional air of pride.
【……】
“What’s wrong?”
Extremely sensitive to gazes, Jian Xie immediately noticed something was amiss with Qin Zhuo.
【Nothing.】 It said slowly, with a hint of meaning. 【I just realized that I like Mondays.】
Jian Xie: “…”
Translator Xena’s other works: https://ko-fi.com/xenatl/gallery
– Just click the pictures and the link will show <3
