Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Xu Muchan couldn't see the incense burn out, but after waiting a moment, his head tilted to the side, he noticed that the smoke from the burning incense was gradually fading. A stick of offering incense should burn for at least ten minutes or so—the scent shouldn't fade that fast.

Puzzled, he slowly ran his fingers up from the base of the incense stick. When he reached the tip, sure enough, he felt no heat from burning.

That settled it—the incense had gone out.

This wasn't the first time this had happened. Even though he called him "brother" out loud, and he'd been able to study and live in peace all these years thanks to the other's protection, the moods of a non-human being were still hard to figure out.

He sighed quietly, relit the incense, and asked softly, "Does the food today not suit your appetite, brother?"

"..."

The room was silent. No response. But the scent of the incense soon faded again—clearly, it had gone out once more.

Xu Muchan thought for a moment, head tilted, then didn't push it. He put the incense away and opened the window to let the room air out. Then he picked up the bowl of raw rice mixed with eggs, felt his way to the kitchen to dump it, and washed the bowl while he was there.

"Such a waste."

"If I'd known, I wouldn't have added the eggs."

Xu Muchan muttered under his breath while washing the dishes. He'd put in three whole eggs, after all—if he hadn't, he could've reused the raw rice tomorrow.

After washing the bowl and covering up the trash so no one would notice anything off, Xu Muchan slowly made his way back to his room.

Since he couldn't see and wasn't yet familiar with the new house's layout, he took every step slowly and carefully. His cane tapped the ground ahead of him, and the sound of his shoes hitting the floor was especially clear in the quiet, empty villa.

"Tap, tap, tap"—each sound seemed to echo.

Xu Muchan stopped, puzzled. But the tapping continued, getting closer from behind.

So it wasn't an echo after all.

It was another set of footsteps—ones that didn't belong to him.

The light he could sense through his eyelids was still faint, meaning the villa's lights were out. So it wasn't Xu Wangchuan, and it wasn't the couple, Xu Qingming and his wife.

It was something else that had emerged.

Xu Muchan's heart beat faster, and his limbs went slightly stiff. He took a deep breath, pretending not to notice the extra footsteps behind him, and continued forward at his previous pace.

He didn't dare speed up—if he panicked, he'd be found out.

The kitchen wasn't far from his room. He'd already covered half the distance—only about a dozen steps remained.

Xu Muchan kept his slow, steady pace, leaning on his cane, heading for his room.

The footsteps behind him got closer. Whatever was following him was clearly walking faster, or taking bigger steps. Either way, after Xu Muchan took four or five steps, he felt a cold, oppressive presence above his head.

And an indescribable prickling sensation, like he was being watched.

This feeling wasn't new to Xu Muchan. He'd felt it when he was very young, but back then he was a kid who didn't know enough to be scared. He'd even treated the thing like a playmate.

Of course, as it turned out, making friends with a non-human entity never ends well.

If he remembered correctly, Xu Muchan recalled that the thing was about two or three meters tall, its head wrapped in red cloth, brushing against the ceiling, its thin body hunched over. Its two exposed hands were long and thin, with hooked claws for nails, and its knuckles had several more joints than a human's.

The prickling on his back most likely meant the thing was right behind him now, hunched over, head lowered, staring at him.

Xu Muchan couldn't help wondering—was the red cloth on its head still there?

He remembered that he'd later been tricked into lifting the red cloth... but now he couldn't recall at all what was underneath.

His memory had always been excellent. He shouldn't have forgotten something like this.

What exactly did that thing look like?

Xu Muchan felt a curiosity he'd never felt before and couldn't help turning his head to look back. Just as he turned, a faint voice—neither clearly male nor female—called his name: "Xu Muchan..."

A cold breath of air brushed against his cheek. Xu Muchan snapped back to reality, his eyelashes trembling violently. For the first time, he was immensely grateful he was blind.

The thing was now right in his face.

The muscles in Xu Muchan's face twitched. He clenched his jaw, steadied his ragged breathing, and painfully turned his head back to keep walking.

His hand at his side clenched into a fist, using the pain of his nails digging into his palm to stay alert.

One step, two steps, three steps...

For every step Xu Muchan took, the thing took one too. The two sets of footsteps almost overlapped. Xu Muchan's jaw was tight as he desperately tried to calm his pounding heart and covered the remaining distance.

But his outstretched hand, reaching for the door handle, found nothing there.

Xu Muchan refused to believe it. He took two more steps forward and reached out again—still nothing.

Under the extreme tension, a dull ache spread across his chest. Xu Muchan took a deep breath, telling himself over and over not to panic, not to be afraid. He carefully retraced his route in his head to see if he'd gone the wrong way.

He'd walked from the kitchen to his room three times already, so he knew the route pretty well. At the last turn, his cane had hit the wall, and after that corner, four or five more steps would bring him to his room. He was sure he hadn't made a wrong turn.

Most likely, he'd run into a ghost wall—those things always used tricks like this to mess with people.

Xu Muchan bit his lip and stood still, not moving. Since he was sure he hadn't gone the wrong way, the door had to be close.

There was no sound from the room, and his brother hadn't shown up. He didn't know if his brother didn't want to help, or just wasn't there.

Xu Muchan's stomach clenched. His right hand held the cane, and he curled the index finger of his left hand and brought it to his mouth.

He bit down hard. The taste of blood immediately flooded his tongue. The sharp pain made his whole body tremble, but it also cleared his head, making it easier to break free from the illusion those things created.

Sure enough, when Xu Muchan reached out again, he felt the familiar wall.

And next to it, the familiar door handle.

Xu Muchan suppressed his fear, careful not to act too strangely. He opened the door at a normal speed, stepped inside, quickly shut it, and locked it.

But he wasn't sure if the thing would follow him in, so after locking the door, he stumbled toward the cabinet with the shrine.

The cabinet door was still open, and Xu Muchan easily found the shrine. Ignoring his bleeding finger, he grabbed the deity statue on the shrine with trembling hands, clutching it tightly.

Blood from his finger smeared onto the statue, but Xu Muchan didn't notice. He slid down to sit with his back against the cabinet door, head tilted slightly, ears straining for any sound at the door.

Not a single footstep.

It seemed the thing hadn't come inside.

But Xu Muchan didn't dare let his guard down. His chest heaved as he pressed the statue to his forehead and murmured, "Brother, are you there?"

No response. Xu Muchan also didn't feel the familiar presence. He couldn't deny that he was disappointed.

Guess you really shouldn’t expect too much from anyone but yourself.

And especially when that someone isn’t even human.

He was just a sacrifice the ignorant villagers offered up to the mountain god.

To pray for rain, the villagers of Leigong Village, sticking to their old customs, dressed him up as a bride and offered him to It.

Rumor had it that way back, Leigong Village would hold a ceremony for the mountain god every few years, picking young, pretty women to give to the mountain god as brides. Every woman who went into that cave never came back—they all died.

Xu Muchan was the last bride of the mountain god.

Back then, a lot of the younger villagers didn’t buy into these feudal superstitions anymore, and really didn’t want to hand their own kids over to the mountain god. But they couldn’t out-stubborn the village elders, and since Xu Muchan had no one to depend on, they met in the middle and “married” him off.

Back then, some people even secretly reassured Xu Muchan, saying it was just going through the motions, that there was no such thing as a mountain god, and once the ceremony was done, he could come back.

But when the bridal sedan carried Xu Muchan to the mountain god’s cave and he felt that cold, creepy air seeping out from deep inside, he knew the stories about the cave were real.

Xu Muchan couldn’t say for sure whether It was really a mountain god, but the second he laid eyes on It in that cave, he knew It wasn’t human, no question.

To stay alive, young Xu Muchan played dumb and called this non-human thing “big brother,” and that’s how he lucked out and survived.

But that didn’t change the fact that the thing he’d been calling “brother” was the same kind of creature as the one prowling outside his door.

Xu Muchan kept telling himself, biting his lip hard to force himself to stay calm. He put the idol back, steadied himself on the cabinet, slowly got up, and felt his way back to the bed.

He yanked the blanket over his head and tried to force himself to fall asleep fast—based on past experience, these things were pure mind games—the more scared you got, the stronger they got.

Sure enough, the thing hadn’t left. Dragging footsteps came from the door, along with a low, ghostly wail, calling Xu Muchan’s name over and over. The more he heard it, the more he felt this uncontrollable urge to answer back.

Xu Muchan curled up on his side, clamped his hands over his ears, and focused on counting sheep to hypnotize himself to sleep.

So he didn’t see the cabinet door—which hadn’t been shut all the way—silently swing open even wider. A thick shadow slid down to the floor, crept over to the bed, and slowly stretched into a twisted human shape over six feet tall, bending down to stare at the bulging blanket.

“Poor Achan.”

“Not obedient.”

The shadow let out a sound inaudible to human ears, merging with the faint calls from outside the door, blending into a twisted, nauseating tone.

The locked doorknob suddenly began to turn on its own, clicking and clacking as if an invisible hand was trying to open the door.

Xu Muchan curled into a shrimp-like ball, barely managing to keep counting sheep, biting hard on his index finger to keep from being overwhelmed by fear.

The shadow suddenly flew into a rage, its head-like part glaring at the door. Its neck stretched impossibly long, nearly pressing against the door, and it hissed coldly, “Scram.”

The turning doorknob froze, then snapped back into place.

Under the blanket, Xu Muchan soon noticed the doorknob’s turning had stopped, and the haunting calls had ceased as well. He released his teeth and listened intently to the sounds outside. The dragging footsteps seemed to fade away, heading toward the next room.

Xu Muchan finally let out a sigh of relief, collapsing limply onto the bed, drenched in cold sweat.

With his tense nerves finally relaxed, this time he didn’t need self-hypnosis. Xu Muchan quickly fell into an exhausted sleep.

The shadow by the bed climbed up, slipped under the blanket, and wrapped its slender limbs around the sleeping youth in a twisted manner impossible for any human, enveloping him completely. It lowered its head and licked the bitten spot on his index finger.

As the fresh blood entered its throat, the shadow seemed to savor an unparalleled delicacy. It couldn’t resist drawing the entire finger into its mouth-like part, making eager, strange swallowing and sucking sounds, occasionally interspersed with garbled words like “Achan” and “so fragrant.”

The strange noises in the room took a long time to subside.

If anyone had been present, they would have seen the non-human entity embedding the sleeping, beautiful youth into its own body.