NFM Chapter 83

“Crow?” Lin Huai frowned. “This person…”

Before he could ask his next question, Chu Tianshu gave him a deep look.

“You’ll understand later,” he said.

“Hmph, hmph.” Lin Huai twitched the corner of his mouth. “Generally speaking, there are two reasons for this kind of answer.”

“First, to create suspense and attract readers to continue watching. Just like how movies always add a ‘1’ after the title, for example, ‘Detective Chinatown 1,’ ‘Harry Potter 1,’ ‘World’s Best 1’… This way, they can naturally make sequels to earn money, like ‘Detective Chinatown 2,’ ‘Harry Potter 2,’ ‘World’s Best 2’…”

“…I feel like the last one doesn’t match the style of the previous ones,” Chu Tianshu quipped.

“Second, the timing isn’t right. Just like many superhero movies, all the mysteries are only revealed when the guide is about to die, otherwise, it wouldn’t be enough to maintain their enigmatic image…”

“So, what do you think?” Chu Tianshu stared into his eyes. “Which reason do you think I have?”

Lin Huai smiled.

“What do you think I’m thinking?”

As he spoke, he leaned down, bringing his face close to Chu Tianshu’s forehead. As his nose brushed against Chu Tianshu’s, he could clearly feel the young man beneath him become flustered.

He seemed to be deliberately suppressing the urge to jump up from the couch. Seeing him like this, Lin Huai smiled even more happily.

“Alright, I won’t tease you anymore,” he blinked. “I’ve never been able to figure you out, so this time, I won’t bother trying to guess. You’ll tell me someday, won’t you?”

After saying this, he straightened up and threw the blanket that he had tossed aside back onto Chu Tianshu. “Take your medicine and drink more hot water. I’m leaving.”

As he spoke, he pressed down on his non-existent hat brim and walked down the stairs with a swagger. When he reached the stairwell, he turned to the stunned Chu Tianshu and asked, “Why were you so nervous just now?”

Chu Tianshu, who was always full of witty remarks, was unusually speechless. A strand of his deep chestnut hair stood up under Lin Huai’s gaze. “I was afraid of giving you my cold…”

“Ha ha ha ha.”

Lin Huai laughed heartily as he left the villa. It wasn’t until the sound of the door closing came from downstairs that Chu Tianshu, with agility unbefitting of a patient, rushed to the windowsill to watch him leave.

‘Just now…’ he guiltily touched his nose, ‘it must have been…’

‘It must have been a mistake in the neurotransmitters released by the nerve endings…’ he thought, but couldn’t help but pick at his palm again after putting his fingers down, putting his fingertips back on it before his palm started to heat up, ‘I can’t be so flustered next time, I need to be prepared…’

Thinking this, he suddenly jumped up from the couch and opened the safe. He took out all the documents inside and, after some thought, whispered, “Let’s confirm it again. If it’s certain, then I’ll go—”

“Get a mental health check.”

Lin Huai was completely unaware of Chu Tianshu’s thoughts. He returned to school, handed the manuscript to his senior, and received her effusive praise from across the ocean.

“You’re really too good, little brother,” the senior sister said excitedly over the phone. “This is the first time he’s been so straightforward…”

“Senior sister,” Lin Huai heard a lot of noise on Qin Jiang’s side, as if there were a group of men and women partying on the other end of the phone, interspersed with a few English words he couldn’t understand. “I can’t hear what you’re saying…”

“What’s wrong?” Qin Jiang stood up from the hotel bed and walked to the window. “Is the signal bad? I’m by the window now, is it any better?”

She shook her phone, aiming it at the moon outside the window, somewhat puzzled.

“It’s not a signal issue,” Lin Huai said, crossing his legs as he sat on the dorm chair. “It’s too loud… are you having some kind of dance party over there?”

“Dance party?” Qin Jiang’s voice was filled with confusion. “No, I’m alone in the hotel room resting.”

As she spoke, she glanced back at her empty room. All the lights were on, and the scene was clear as day. “…hotels in the city center of New York are too expensive. I searched for a long time before finding this cheap hotel in Queens…”

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone, followed by Lin Huai’s gentle voice. “Oh, I must have misheard. Good night, senior sister. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Alright.”

After hanging up, Qin Jiang opened her laptop and continued editing the manuscript she had received. Perhaps due to the angle of the desk lamp, the screen was reflecting, showing only rows of text and her focused face.

The hotel room was quiet, except for the crisp sound of the keyboard being tapped and the hum of the powerful air conditioning. She focused solely on the computer, silently reading each line of text, oblivious to the world outside.

‘Strange,’ she thought. ‘Why is the room so hot today?’

Having been in the U.S. for four days, she had already gotten used to the aggressive air conditioning in American public places. The U.S., as a country that often criticizes third-world nations for wasting resources, also leads by example in this regard.

But for some reason, today the air conditioning seemed to have lost its effect, merely humming without releasing any refreshing coolness. She felt strands of heat seeping through the gaps in her T-shirt’s fibers, soaking into her nerve endings like a swamp.

A drop of sweat fell from her chin. She closed her eyes, wiped her forehead, and let out a frustrated sigh that everyone makes when facing a deadline.

She irritably pushed the laptop aside and squatted in front of the air conditioner to inspect it.

“This thing is blowing cold air!” she knocked on the machine. “Why isn’t it working?”

After fiddling with the air conditioner for a while, she still couldn’t get it to produce any ice. Qin Jiang stood up from the carpet, rubbed her ankle, and decided to go downstairs to find the front desk for help. Just from squatting for a while, she was already covered in sweat, dripping down her spine.

As she reached the door, she was about to grab the handle when she noticed something on the floor and exclaimed, “Huh? Why is this wallpaper peeling?”

She bent down to take a closer look. It wasn’t the wallpaper that was peeling, but the wall itself. The room had been covered with pure white wallpaper, but for some reason, it was now peeling upwards. She pressed the wallpaper back down, only to find that the wall beneath was scorched black.

“This…”

She didn’t think too much about it, just hoping that the hotel owner wouldn’t deduct her deposit because of it. The metal handle was right in front of her. She was about to grab it when she heard a cold voice behind her.

“I advise you not to open that door,” the voice said.

“Huh?”

“Unless you want to use your hand to make a hot plate.”

She turned around and saw that the previously empty room now had an extra person. He was dressed in a bright red suit, his face covered by a white mask, his legs spread apart, left hand propping up his chin, and right hand tapping on the table.

“Who are you? How did you get into my room?” Qin Jiang demanded, her hand reaching for the door handle. “Get out! Or I’ll call the police!”

As soon as she finished speaking, she let out a scream. Her fingers had landed on the scorching hot door handle, and as soon as she touched it, blisters formed.

She clutched her hand in pain, but the man in the red suit showed no sympathy. He looked at Qin Jiang and shook his head. “You young people never listen to advice. So naive…”

He spoke as if pitying her, but there was no positive emotion in his tone. Qin Jiang gritted her teeth, still holding her injured hand. “What do you want?”

“To join the dance party,” the man casually spread his hands. “You know, I’m a person who loves a good party.”

“Dance party… are you crazy!”

As she shouted this, the man chuckled softly. Then, he snapped his fingers.

“Surprise,” he said.

With the crisp sound of the snap, the entire room burst into flames. Qin Jiang screamed and took a step back, pressing herself against the burning wall.

The previously empty and cold room instantly transformed. A colorful disco ball spun in the air, casting ominous light. Under this light, several men and women dressed in revealing clothes danced in the room.

Their outfits were scant, and the figures of two of the women were particularly alluring… except.

Their bodies were covered in black burn marks.

Qin Jiang continued to scream, shrinking back to the door, only to be scalded again by the hot door panel. The man walked up to her, leaning against the wall to look at her. “I told you, girls should be careful when traveling alone. Don’t choose rooms that look so eerie…”

Before he could finish, Qin Jiang fainted. Lin Huai squatted down to look at her and sighed.

“Fine,” he said softly. “If that’s the case, I’ll have to dance alone.”

As he spoke, he dragged Qin Jiang into the bathroom. The moment he closed the door, he looked back at the room and saw four charred black figures staring at him.

They seemed puzzled by the sudden appearance of an uninvited guest—understandable, since they didn’t speak the same language, and they weren’t intelligent Fierce Ghosts or Evil Spirits.

They were specters—the most troublesome of the non-intelligent Nether Beings, endlessly repeating the scene of their death, endlessly pulling passersby into their vortex—like Sisyphus eternally pushing a boulder up a hill.

“Dance, why aren’t you dancing?” Lin Huai spread his hands, a smirk on his lips as he looked at the specters. “What a pity, I wanted to join you.”

After a moment, he frowned. “Oh, I forgot. You don’t understand Chinese, do you?”

“Fine,” Lin Huai shrugged, putting a finger to his lips. “In that case—”

“—Let the dance begin.”

He smiled, his mood shifting unpredictably.

After Lin Huai twirled and leaped, dancing to the rhythm as he dispatched the specters, and then managed to send himself back across the ocean through the computer (yes, he almost got stuck in the screen—if Qin Jiang had woken up a bit later, she would have seen a butt and two legs stuck in the screen, perhaps a case of karma for showing off), Qin Jiang finally woke up in the bathroom.

She looked around in terror, then rushed out of the room.

After being treated like a lunatic by numerous hotel staff, Qin Jiang insisted on changing hotels. Once settled in her new room, she shakily called Lin Huai. “Junior, just now…”