Chapter 3: Super Afraid of Ghosts
Why was that child standing there in the middle of the night?
Lan Yu was naturally timid. A child suddenly appearing under a streetlight on a cold night, making strange noises, was enough to make his tiny courage tremble.
He must be waiting for his parents, right?
Just pretend I didn’t see him.
Lan Yu kept his eyes straight ahead, attempting to just walk past the strange child. However, the closer he got, the clearer the child’s voice became.
“…Go… go… home… go… jie ah…”
Lan Yu walked stiffly, forcing himself to move forward. Even though his gaze was fixed straight ahead, the more he tried not to look, the more his peripheral vision attempted to make out the child. But Lan Yu just couldn’t see the child’s face clearly.
The weather was freezing, and the child was bundled up completely. Aside from the possibility of eyes being exposed under the hood, not an inch of skin was visible anywhere else. But Lan Yu was already very close to the child, yet under the hood’s shadow cast by the light, he still couldn’t see anything at all.
Just as Lan Yu passed the child, he heard an extremely clear voice: “…Go home…”
Lan Yu had already walked past. The child’s hood had turned, following his direction as he passed, until Lan Yu could no longer catch a glimpse of him in his peripheral vision.
Perhaps because nothing happened after he passed, Lan Yu began to suspect he was being overly paranoid. His footsteps slowed down.
It shouldn’t be a lost child, right?
Can’t find his home?
How long has he been standing there alone?
Will he freeze in this cold weather?
Lan Yu stopped.
Should I go back and ask?
He clasped his hands and exhaled, but he couldn’t smell if the alcohol scent on him was strong. If a drunkard like him tried to take a child away, it would probably be misunderstood. Should I call the police?
Lan Yu turned back.
“…Go… home…”
Lan Yu didn’t get too close to the child. Standing at the boundary between the shadow and the light not fully reached by the streetlamp, he spoke to the child under the bright light, “Are you lost? Can’t find your home?”
“Go… go… go…”
He could only hear that word slurring indistinctly from between the child’s lips.
Does he have some intellectual disability? Or is he just too scared?
Lan Yu lingered for a while, finally taking a step forward. He crossed the line between light and dark, arriving beside the child. He squatted down halfway, trying to be at eye level, and reached out to hold the child’s arm. “Do you know your mom and dad’s phone num… ber…”
Lan Yu’s voice got stuck in his throat.
He was so close.
It was so bright.
He still couldn’t see the child’s face under the hood. Or rather, he saw it, but it didn’t look like a normal human at all—he could only see a gaping mouth.
A gigantic mouth that stretched directly across the entire space under the hood, opened wide. It was unclear if there were teeth, but a red tongue lying inside was clearly visible. From that organ, which lacked a nasal cavity, pharynx, uvula, or anything resembling human anatomy, a compressed, tuneless voice was squeezed out.
Under his hand, he was clearly holding the child’s arm, but it didn’t have the softness a normal child would have. It was stiff as a wood carving, weightless, yet incredibly hard.
“…Hurry… home…”
Lan Yu’s vision went black. Stumbling, he scrambled backward with all his might, landing on his butt. He crawled backward for several meters, struggled to get up from the ground, and fled as if flying.
What… what the hell was that!?!
Lan Yu sprinted back home, taking the stairs two at a time to the second floor, rushing up without fear of tripping. Standing at his door, his hands trembled so much he could barely find the key. Shaking, he opened the door, squeezed inside, slammed it shut, kicked off his shoes so they hit the wall, and burrowed straight into his blanket, curling up and shivering without leaving even a single air hole.
Was that a ghost? It was a ghost, right!
Lan Yu was afraid of ghosts. Super afraid. Terrified beyond belief.
Hiding under the covers, he cried softly. They say ghosts appear to people who are afraid of them—was it his turn to fall for it now?
Time passed, minute by minute. Nothing happened.
A tiny air hole appeared at the edge of the tightly sealed bedding.
Ten minutes later, a finger poked out from the small air hole.
Twenty minutes later, the lump on the bed squirmed. A hand reached out from under the covers and pressed the switch. The only small light in the ten-plus square meter room instantly illuminated the entire space.
Thirty minutes later, Lan Yu poked his head out from the covers.
Nothing happened.
Lan Yu sat on the bed wrapped in his blanket, dazed for a good while.
It seems really okay now.
Only then did Lan Yu smell the scent produced by the heater baking the narrow room. Crawling out from the covers, he looked at the sober-up medicine box that had been crushed flat under the bedding. He hadn’t let go of the medicine bag from start to finish.
He took the medicine with warm water from the small thermos on the table and sat on the bed.
Did I drink too much and hallucinate?
Lan Yu scrutinized his small rental: a single room of just over ten square meters with a cramped bathroom. A secondhand single bed bought for fifty yuan and a small coffee table bought for thirty yuan were the only two pieces of furniture he had added since moving in. The bed was layered with a quilt serving as a mattress, covered with an old sheet, and a folded duvet. The cup and small thermos on the table were things Zhou Hesheng had given him.
His heart, which had been suspended ten thousand meters high, instantly returned to solid ground. Lan Yu dropped all his defenses and flopped back onto his bed. It was a very small room, but for him, it was currently the only safe place that belonged to him.
Lan Yu turned his head to look at the only small window in his rental. Placed on the windowsill was a black-and-white photo—a selfie he had printed out. In front of the photo was a small incense burner, and beside it lay an apple. It was a small altar.
This was also the reason he gave up sharing an apartment in a better, brighter building and insisted on finding a cheap, self-built single room he could rent entirely.
Only he knew that the real Lan Yu had inexplicably disappeared. In this world, only he could pay respects to this person.
While living at Zhou Hesheng’s house, it wasn’t appropriate to set up an altar. As soon as he moved out, he made this small one. Although it was very simple now, he was willing to spend money to customize a more beautiful altar when he had money in the future.
Lan Yu got up and lit a stick of incense for the altar, looking at himself sitting upright in the photo.
His original appearance was actually the same as the original host’s, but only the facial features were identical. Because of his chronic illness, his face used to be full of sickness—frail body, sunken cheeks, pale complexion, dark circles under his eyes. But if he were healthy, he should look just like the original host.
Lan Yu looked down at his hands. His fingers were long and fair, not because of illness but naturally pale skin, with blue veins faintly visible. There was a shallow scar near his hand where the scab had already fallen off; he had accidentally cut himself when he was clumsy as a new waiter. It was just fully healed now.
This was his body now.
Lan Yu looked at the altar.
“I’m sorry. Please, seeing that I didn’t take your body on purpose, could you bless me? Don’t let me see ghosts again. You’re the only ancestor I have in this world. Please protect me.”
Although calling him “ancestor” was strange, Lan Yu couldn’t find any other term.
As a cannon fodder in a pure urban romance novel, he was a character living in an urban romance novel. There shouldn’t be ghosts anyway. He could trust his ancestor!
He took a simple shower and lay in bed. Even though he had encountered something terrifying, the alcohol surged up again, making him unusually sleepy.
When he woke up, the drunkenness had dissipated. Lan Yu sat on the bed in a trance for a long time, staring at the scratch on his hand from when he was scared onto the ground yesterday…
The memory was very clear.
Such a huge mouth covering the entire face.
It wasn’t a drunken hallucination, ahhh!
Lan Yu arrived at the restaurant very early to start prep work.
Lan Yu was currently working as a waiter. This was the job he could find quickly that paid the highest wages and was easiest to pick up after being taken in by Zhou Hesheng. He had a good appearance, was young and physically fit, the work wasn’t difficult, and it was very close to Zhou Hesheng’s home. At the time, in order to replace rent with labor, Lan Yu didn’t dare take on more work, needing to save time for housework.
During work hours, all phones were put in the locker room. Lan Yu appeared before the other employees in his fitted uniform. Although the restaurant was open, the cleaning work had just finished. There were no banquets today, and before the meal rush, everyone was still quite relaxed and could gather to chat.
Except Lan Yu had never participated in the employees’ chats.
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to chat. At first, everyone was relatively friendly to him and took the initiative to communicate. But Lan Yu, having just transmigrated, was busy with survival. He spent his time before and after work handling Zhou Hesheng’s housework and didn’t spend time socializing with those around him. Over time, he knew he had left an impression of being reticent, and now people wouldn’t actively talk to him anymore.
Current Lan Yu no longer had an opening to join everyone’s topics.
But things were different now. He rented a place, didn’t need to rush back to do housework, had saved some money, and could join in for meals and socialize.
And perhaps because of the sudden ghost encounter, Lan Yu was desperate for a friend he could chat with.
Although this was a restaurant that could host banquets, it wasn’t large. The entire restaurant had about sixty employees, with thirty to forty waiters. Not all of them were seen at once; there were morning and evening shifts. Today Lan Yu was on the evening shift, and there were over a dozen waiters he could see, with a few chatting right now.
Lan Yu slightly adjusted his collar and stood not far from the chatting employees.
“What was that acting yesterday? The protagonist really makes people angry. Stupid as hell, just dragging things out, literally dragging the good people to death.”
Lan Yu pricked up his ears. What was it? A TV drama? He hadn’t watched it. Should he ask what drama it was to express interest?
“If I were killed like that, I wouldn’t let the protagonist off even as a ghost.”
Lan Yu shuffled a step closer to the chatting employees. Hearing the word “ghost,” he blinked sensitively. Would segueing from the word “ghost” to the topic of ghosts make the conversation awkward?
“I’ve seen a similar ghost movie, where the victim takes revenge, but in the end, it was all done by humans. Those domestic screenwriters should really go make a cameo in that situation.”
Heavens… Heavens help him!
Ghost movies!!
Topic of encountering ghosts!!
Yes, yes, yes, this is it, talk a bit more!!
Lan Yu moved another step closer to the chatting employees, his toes curling nervously in his shoes.
It’ll be fine. Didn’t Brother Zhou make friends with the guy at the next table in just a few sentences yesterday? The guy even treated them to a meal. It’s not that hard.
Taking a secret breath to gather his courage, Lan Yu opened his mouth: “I…”
“Stop gathering around. Go check if there’s any spot not cleaned properly.” The manager in the distance suddenly clapped his hands loudly, interrupting the waiters’ chat.
“Let’s go, let’s go, customers are coming soon.” The chatting waiters quickly dispersed.
Lan Yu: “…”
Lan Yu’s head drooped, his shoulders slumped, and he threw himself into the non-stop restaurant work.
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