Chapter 14 - 1#

Alice#

Ye Sheng was stunned. He remembered very clearly that he had thrown the needle away and returned it to Xiao Fang.

His memory couldn’t be wrong.

Under the dim light of the haunted house’s utility room, this slender silver needle emitted a cold light. He touched it with his finger and unconsciously pursed his lips.

Something was wrong.

The bloody, malevolent aura that belonged to a corpse stitcher from years of sewing corpses had disappeared.

Clean, simple, just like an ordinary embroidery needle.

Ye Sheng suddenly remembered what Director Cheng had said at the reception center.

Director Cheng said that Xiao Fang had never harmed anyone and would receive special treatment. For a vengeful ghost who died of resentment and turned into a heresy, the best outcome was to be “healed,” to calm all grievances and hatred, to regain sanity, and to choose to either disappear or fall into a deep sleep.

In the early spring thirty-five years ago, she boarded that slow train to Huaicheng to find her husband. After decades of wandering, that night was considered her arrival at the station.

Ye Sheng played with the needle, closed his eyes, and let the memory palace in his brain continuously rewind and replay, finally capturing the part he had missed—he was holding his phone, clutching his stomach, and passed by Xiao Fang as he walked out with Director Cheng.

Next to Xiao Fang was a person from the Unnatural Bureau, with their hands on her head as if performing a healing. Xiao Fang looked up at him blankly.

So was that when she put the needle on him?

Why?

And did Butler Li find this needle when he was washing the clothes?

Ye Sheng frowned tightly.

Now this needle, faded of its blood color, had also lost all its evil nature. It was completely unrecognizable from its time in the hands of a C-level heresy.

It was like a souvenir left for him by the train.

“Junior, it’s almost five o’clock, you can get off work now.” Huang Qiqi’s enthusiastic and friendly voice came from outside the door. “Don’t be too tired, go eat first!”

Ye Sheng withdrew his gaze and wanted to leave, but his obsessive-compulsive disorder forced him to look at the broken doll again.

The doll was a little girl with gray buttons for eyes, wearing a yellow dress with dirty footprints on it. It looked like it had been dropped on the ground and stepped on several times.

The cotton sticking out of her shoulder was too conspicuous.

Ye Sheng stared at her quietly.

Just then, the old man who was supposed to fix the light called him again, his voice loud and clear.

“Hey, student, I’ll be at your university gate in ten minutes, remember to open the door for me!”

Ye Sheng: “Okay, thank you, I’m heading back now.”

He hung up the phone.

Ye Sheng finally succumbed to his obsessive-compulsive disorder. He picked up the needle, bit the thread, threaded the needle quickly, picked up the doll, and with time being tight, sewed up her arm in a few quick stitches.

After finishing everything, Ye Sheng said goodbye to Huang Qiqi and hurried back to Huaian University.

When he returned, a cheerful old man was already standing at the door of his dormitory. The old man quickly replaced the light for him, and Ye Sheng paid him fifty yuan. After seeing the old man downstairs, he returned to his dormitory and felt the pressure of poverty for the countless time in his life.

Fortunately, Xia Wenshi was a good boss, and his salary was paid daily as promised.

In the work group chat, Huang Qiqi did not hide her admiration for Ye Sheng, praising him at length.

[Huang Qiqi: Boss, Ye Sheng is really hardworking. I just went to take a look, and our entire haunted house is brand new. It’s so clean there isn’t a single hair in the corners! The broken radio and fan in the utility room have also been repaired by Ye Sheng. He even packed the plasma into bags and even sewed up the doll that was previously damaged by someone. Amazing, junior, is there anything you can’t do? [starry eyes][starry eyes]]

[Xia Wenshi: I told you I found a treasure.]

[Xia Wenshi: [Salary for hardworking Xiao Ye]]

While they were chatting in the group, Ye Sheng was reading a book. Logically, if he wanted to take the civil service exam and return to Yinshan, he should have chosen a major in literature and history, such as law, philosophy, or Chinese language and literature. Unfortunately, in Yinshan, no one gave him any advice.

At that time, the old man was still around. The old man, who was all about money, didn’t even think about it and signed him up for computer science—and shamelessly took credit for it, saying that Ye Sheng would thank him at graduation.

Because the end of the universe is computer science.

…Ye Sheng was really screwed.

He hadn’t had his own computer for seventeen years in Yinshan, and the phone he had was left by the old man before he left.

What the hell was he going to learn about computers!

But since the major was already chosen, he could only bite the bullet. So Ye Sheng’s summer goal was simple: to earn money to buy a computer while ensuring his livelihood.

Ye Sheng clicked on the salary and found that it was actually five hundred yuan. He was stunned for a moment and typed.

[Ye Sheng: Senior, I only did what I was supposed to do, you don’t need to give me extra.]

Xia Wenshi, even when he was so poor that he only had his underwear left, still couldn’t change his extravagant habits. With a wave of his hand, he was very generous.

[Xia Wenshi: It’s okay, the extra is a newcomer red envelope from the boss. Xiao Ye, work hard, I’ll be back the day after tomorrow.]

Huang Qiqi was still chattering away with praise.

[Huang Qiqi: Wuwuwu, looking at handsome guys really prolongs life. Thank you, junior Ye Sheng. My high blood pressure caused by my stupid ex-boyfriend and brain-dead best friend is now cured.]

[Huang Qiqi: Junior, is there really anything in this world that you can’t do?]

Before Ye Sheng could answer, Xia Wenshi had already interjected cheekily.

[Xia Wenshi: I know, junior Ye Sheng can’t have children [laughing][laughing]]

Huang Qiqi seemed to find this joke interesting too, and sent a series of hahahahas.

It was clear that her mood had indeed improved a little.

Then the two of them started talking about that melodramatic love affair again.

[Xia Wenshi: So he’s an ex-boyfriend now?]

[Huang Qiqi: Well, in my heart he is, but I haven’t made it clear yet. I’m definitely going to drag this scumbag to Lover’s Lake again and scare him to death!]

Huang Qiqi still didn’t believe in the story of the water ghost killing people at the verification bridge. She said.

[Huang Qiqi: I bought a remote-controlled radio and recorded his name in it. I’ll hide it at the head of the bridge and play with him to death at night.]

[Xia Wenshi: [Awesome][Awesome][Awesome]]

Ye Sheng twitched the corner of his mouth, turned off his phone, and didn’t plan to have much contact with them.

He was not a person who was easily softened by the kindness of others. Just as he had told Ning Weichen in the car, maybe he was also mentally ill. His life, his future, was on a straight line. Huaicheng was just a temporary stop for four years, and everything would be left behind after he left. So even though the group was full of joy and harmony, Ye Sheng’s eyes were still indifferent.

In Ye Sheng’s eyes, these two people were now one, a boss who paid him, and the other, a colleague.

He didn’t want to care about their hobbies, occupations, emotional experiences, or interesting life stories, and he was too lazy to care.

Fearing that the money from two months of part-time work would not be enough, Ye Sheng planned to find a tutoring job online. He quickly threw himself into his own life, busy with this and that. The change occurred one evening when he was returning from tutoring. A ridiculously flashy red sports car appeared at the school gate. A person was standing in front of the car door. It was the birthday boy he had seen when he went to find Xie Wenci that day. A wretched, long face, a shriveled body shrunk in a floral shirt.

Next to Wang Gaoyang was a fat man.

The fat man was currently chewing on a popsicle. He saw Ye Sheng walking over and immediately nudged the person with his elbow.

“Here he comes, here he comes!”

Wang Gaoyang immediately became excited, cleared his throat, stood up straight, and looked at Ye Sheng with undisguised desire in his eyes.

Ye Sheng: “…”

He looked at the two of them as if he had seen a ghost, and walked directly to the dormitory, dangling his keys.

“Hey, wait, wait, Ye Sheng, your name is Ye Sheng, right!”

How could Wang Gaoyang let a cooked duck fly away? He quickly chased after him, his heart itching to touch Ye Sheng’s shoulder. But Ye Sheng didn’t even turn his head. The moment he got close, he twisted his arm backhand.

With a crack.

Wang Gaoyang clearly heard the sound of a dislocated bone.

Wang Gaoyang: “…”

Fatty: “…”

Fatty almost choked on his popsicle. He was now sure that Liu Dao was not wrong, this person was a predestined criminal…

Wang Gaoyang was furious: “Ye Sheng, what are you doing?!”

Ye Sheng’s eyes were cold: “I don’t know you, do I?”

Wang Gaoyang wanted to get angry, but Ye Sheng was the person who was going to be given to the Qin family in the future. He couldn’t be tough, so he could only swallow his anger and force a smile: “We’ll know each other after we introduce ourselves. My name is Wang Gaoyang, I’m a friend of Wenci. You will be Wenci’s older brother in the future, so we are friends by rounding up.”

Ye Sheng stopped dangling his keys and looked at him as if he were looking at an “idiot.”

“You are Xie Wenci’s friend, no need to round up, we are enemies.”

Wang Gaoyang: “…”

Fatty: “…”

Ye Sheng walked towards the dormitory, leaving behind a cold sentence: “If you don’t want to lose your other arm, don’t bother me again.”

Wang Gaoyang’s chest heaved violently. He stared at the departing figure of the young man. When Ye Sheng’s back disappeared, he cursed loudly, his fists cracking: “What the hell, a bastard born from a mistress, giving him face, putting on airs with me.”

Fatty threw away the popsicle stick, stepped forward and put his arm around his good brother’s shoulder, saying: “I advise you not to mess with him. This person really looks like a tough character, a hard bone.” Wang Gaoyang’s small eyes were full of anger, and he sneered: “Fatty, you haven’t played with college students, have you? It’s this kind of hard bone that’s satisfying to break and chew on.” Relying on his status, he had been acting tyrannically in Huaicheng for many years. He looked forward greedily and lustfully, and said: “No parents, came to Huaicheng for university alone. Ruin his job, make him unable to earn a single penny, and see if he doesn’t come begging me with a smiling face.”

Fatty said warily: “What are you going to do?”

Wang Gaoyang: “Find out where he works tomorrow.”

The counselor knew he was a poor student and had always taken good care of him, telling him that the money for repairing the dormitory’s water and electricity could be shared with his future roommates.

Ye Sheng had no such intention, but he couldn’t resist the counselor’s enthusiasm, who directly pushed a Huaian University freshman group to him.

Ye Sheng was probably the last person to know that there was a freshman group.

The counselor said: “This is the freshman group of the computer science department. Everyone’s nickname has been changed to class + dormitory + name. Change your nickname, and your roommate should find you soon. Xiao Ye, why did you join the group so late? Your roommates have probably already created a dormitory group. You should be more proactive in making friends in college.”

Ye Sheng: “…”

Ye Sheng’s long-dormant social software became active just by joining such a group.

He looked at the 99+ messages and was a little dazed for a moment.

Outside the window on a summer night, the low chirping of insects could be heard intermittently, and the cool breeze carried the fragrance of camphor trees.

After taking a shower, Ye Sheng sat on the chair at the desk, watching a group of peers in the group laughing, joking, and fooling around. He looked at the format of their names, changed his nickname, and threw his phone aside.

However, in less than a minute, the phone buzzed crazily. He opened it and saw a group of people @ing him.

[Chocolate Candy: Welcome newcomer]

[Grandma Liu Doesn’t Eat Durian: Welcome newcomer! Welcome handsome guy!]

[Wind Blowing Butt So Cool: Welcome newcomer!]

[Chen Can: Post a photo! Post a photo! Post a photo! Newcomer post a photo!]

Because of this guy’s rhythm, a flood of people came out asking Ye Sheng to post a photo.

Ye Sheng typed expressionlessly.

[Ye Sheng: I don’t have any photos.]

He didn’t like taking pictures in the first place.

Plus, with that evil thing with red eyes on his phone, he now felt unlucky just opening the camera.

[Chen Can: Hahahaha bro, who are you kidding? If you don’t have photos on your phone, just take one casually. [smirking face]]

Ye Sheng: “…”

Is this person ever going to stop?

Ye Sheng wanted to reply again, I don’t have a phone, but after taking a deep breath and telling himself to be kind to others, Ye Sheng deleted the three words “don’t want to take” that he wanted to type, and answered slowly.

[Ye Sheng: The camera is broken]

[Chen Can: Hahahahahahaha bro, you’re so humorous. We’re all in the same department, we’ll see each other when school starts anyway [smirking face] What’s the point of hiding? Come, come, I’m ugly and brave, I’m not shy, I’ll post one for everyone first.]

[Chen Can: [Image]]

This was a mirror selfie. The phone blocked his face, and the gray hoodie was pulled up to his chin, only revealing a well-manicured but not very good-looking hand.

Ye Sheng raised an eyebrow. He had just come from the mountains and didn’t understand the “vibe” of an internet male god. He was confused as to why this photo, where not a single facial feature could be seen, was considered “posting a photo.”

The group started a flood of praise.

[Come see the handsome guy] [Hahaha Chen-ge posted a photo again] [The hand is so good-looking] [As expected of our department’s heartthrob]

[Chen Can: Hahaha, I can’t be called the department’s heartthrob. There are many more handsome guys in the group than me. Thanks for the support, folks.]

He started to set the rhythm again.

[Chen Can: Newcomer post a photo, post a photo! Post a photo! Post a photo!]

“…”

Ye Sheng had already muted the group messages.

Fortunately, Chen Can didn’t actually need him to post a photo. He just needed an excuse to show himself off in the freshman group, and continued to joke around with some of the active members in the group.

Around midnight, Ye Sheng received an invitation to join a group. The group name was “404 Dormitory Group,” very simple and direct.

After he entered, he found that there were already three people in the group.

[Wang Zixiu] [Kang Xiaoxiao] [Chen Can]

Ye Sheng looked at the last familiar name and almost wanted to mute the group messages again.

But Wang Zixiu spoke first.

[Wang Zixiu: Xiao Si, we’ve been waiting for you. We even made a bet on when you would join the freshman group.]

[Kang Xiaoxiao: Hahahaha you’re late, we’ve already ranked ourselves by age. To punish you for being late, you’ll be the youngest.]

Ye Sheng did not reject this kind of communication.

[Ye Sheng: Hello.]

[Wang Zixiu: Wow, so polite, hahaha hello.]

[Kang Xiaoxiao: I feel like Xiao Si is a good boy. Where are you from, Xiao Si? I’m from Xi City, Lao Wang is a local of Huaicheng, and Xiao Chen is from Luo City.]

[Ye Sheng: Yinshan.]

The atmosphere in the group was silent for a while. Kang Xiaoxiao immediately came out to liven things up.

[Kang Xiaoxiao: Yinshan? My aunt went to Yinshan to play before and said the scenery there is very nice!]

At this time, Chen Can returned from the freshman group.

[Chen Can: Eh? Xiao Si is finally here.]

[Chen Can: Wow, what a coincidence, Xiao Si, we just chatted in the freshman group.]

After he found the chat history, his hands were faster than his brain, and his tone was very surprised.

[Chen Can: Yinshan? Xiao Si, you’re from Yinshan, that poorest Yinshan in the country?]

[Ye Sheng: Yes.]

Seeing that Chen Can wanted to type again, Wang Zixiu spoke up.

[Wang Zixiu: I also went to Yinshan in high school, the scenery there is indeed very beautiful.]

[Chen Can: Hmm? Lao Wang, what were you doing in Yinshan in high school?]

[Wang Zixiu: A donation activity.]

[Chen Can: Hahahaha, I didn’t travel in China in high school, I all went abroad. Speaking of which, I remember when I was in the first year of junior high, I got lost in Central Park in New York, hahaha, I’m just a person with no sense of direction. Not only in New York, I almost got lost in Moscow and London before… Later when I traveled to Hokkaido, Japan…]

Chen Can started his solo show again.

It was midnight.

Ye Sheng had a good biological clock. He turned off his phone and planned to sleep.

Before going to sleep, he seriously recalled the people he met after getting off the train, and for a moment, he actually wanted to laugh.

It was quite interesting.

Xia Wenshi, Huang Qiqi, Xie Wenci, Wang Gaoyang, Chen Can, Kang Xiaoxiao, Wang Zixiu.

—No matter who it was, they were all quite interesting. A lively, vivid, and real kind of interesting.

Ye Sheng would only reply in the dormitory group and freshman group when he was @ed. The rest of the time he was working, and his phone was turned off for a long time. After all, as soon as he turned it on, he would see that app with big, blood-red eyes, and he found it annoying.

One day when he was working at the haunted house, two familiar customers came.

“Welcome!” Huang Qiqi stood up and was slightly stunned when she saw the two red sports cars at the door. What kind of evil wind was blowing today? A group of rich second-generation kids came to experience life?

The cars were parked on the side of the street, attracting a lot of attention.

Wang Gaoyang finally found out where Ye Sheng worked and decided to come and cause trouble with Fatty and Liu Dao.

He took off his sunglasses, revealing a face with sunken cheeks due to excessive indulgence, and walked in with a face full of malice.

“Miss, three people, do you have tickets?”

Huang Qiqi: “Yes, but we only have the spirit doll scene open for now. It’s a puzzle-solving escape type, no NPCs. Do you want to play?”

Wang Gaoyang glanced at Ye Sheng who was wiping the table next to him: “No NPCs?”

Huang Qiqi said: “Yes, this instance is for players to find clues to clear it themselves.”

Wang Gaoyang said: “My friend has a bad heart, what if something happens inside?”

Huang Qiqi thought to herself, if your friend can have a problem watching Makka Pakka dance, then that heart is better off without.

However, she still put on a perfect smile and said: “You can shout our names at the monitor. We will go there as soon as possible.”

Wang Gaoyang glanced at Ye Sheng meaningfully again and nodded: “Okay.”

After the three bought tickets, they took the script and walked into the doll scene.

After they left, Huang Qiqi was a little strange: “Junior, why did that person look at you sideways?”

Ye Sheng said: “I don’t know, maybe he had a stroke.”

The doll scene was arranged with four small rooms and a long corridor in the middle.