Salted Fish Zombie

Chapter 42.1: Manman (15)

June 10, 2023 by Wyrd

At 3 AM, the castle was silent.

Ning Su stepped out of his room, rubbed his nose, and climbed up to the window of room 507, following the lily vines on the arched window.

Just like at night, he scraped away the hazy insects and poked his head out, squinting his eyes. “Hey.”

This time, the oil-painted puppet didn’t turn its head stiffly because it was already facing the window.

Ning Su pointed at the window. This time, the window not only had insects crawling all over it, but was also locked from the inside.

After pointing, he eagerly waited for the oil-painted puppet to open the window for him.

For a ghost friend, this was a magical thing.

When a ghost friend was born, they would knock on the player’s door. When they were determined to knock on a specific player’s door, it meant they had chosen that player. When the player opened the door, inviting them in, they considered themselves bound to that player.

Being bound meant being born together, a lifelong companionship.

It was the most romantic and cruel promise a bound ghost could make.

To be born together, to accompany each other throughout life, and if one couldn’t accompany the other, they would both be destroyed.

They knocked on the door first, but it was up to the player to open the door and decide if they truly wanted to be bound.

And now the puppet had to decide whether to open the window or not.

The first time, it knocked on a door, and a player opened the door for the puppet. But after the door was opened, they lived in two separate rooms, each in a pitch-black room. Was that companionship?

The second time, a boy proactively knocked on the window and came to the puppet.

He was exquisitely beautiful, and when he smiled with his peach blossom eyes, they sparkled with a radiant luster.

He would embrace the puppet, and then a continuous flow of a black substance that made it warm would enter its body.

That substance, upon careful examination, could be felt as the primal energy. (T/N: Primal energy refers to a fundamental and elemental form of energy that is considered to be the essence or core energy in various belief systems or spiritual practices. It is often associated with the basic life force or vital energy that permeates all things and is believed to be the foundation of existence. Primal energy is sometimes described as the purest and most potent form of energy, representing the fundamental building blocks of the universe. It is thought to have transformative and nourishing qualities capable of bringing about profound effects on physical, mental, and spiritual levels.)

For human babies, the primal energy came from the mother’s womb.

For ghosts born in an infinite game, the primal energy should come from the game’s main system. Yet, this boy’s body contained such surging energy.

He said to the puppet, “I’ll come back to find you in the middle of the night. You need to open the window for me.“

Just like before, it sat in the darkness, waiting for the system announcement that would grant lucky points to players.

After the system announcement ended, the puppet turned around and sat by the window.

The children’s room was small and cramped, with a tree stump clock on the wall next to the window.

One o’clock.

Two o’clock.

Three o’clock.

“Hi.”

The oil-painted puppet was overall dirty gray, with a wooden face carved into a smiling expression. The deep purple mouth formed an exaggerated curve, mingling with red, green, and black oil paints.

It looked somewhat like a clown, with a laughing expression that didn’t convey happiness, creating a sense of eeriness.

It looked at the clean and beautiful boy in front of the window, and its stiff finger joints twitched.

After watching for a while, it stood up and opened the window for the boy.

A chilly, pungent air, pale moonlight, and his words entered the dark children’s room simultaneously.

“If you don’t shake your head to refuse, I’ll take you away.”

The oil-painted puppet stood stiffly by the window, looking down at him.

Only given two seconds.

Ning Su stretched his arm to embrace him, and like a gust of wind, they slid down from the vines and landed in the small garden.

This small garden had players accompanying their ghost friends to play during the daytime, but the oil-painted puppet came here for the first time.

It felt a bit lost, like a socially anxious poor person entering an upscale restaurant for the first time.

Ning Su held the puppet and put it on the swing, sitting beside the other and gently swaying together.

After the oil-painted puppet adjusted, it bent the wooden joints on its fingers, producing a series of creaking sounds, aged and stiff.

It resembled an old, neglected robot.

While feeding it, Ning Su asked, “You haven’t eaten for a long time, have you?”

He stared into the eyes of the oil-painted puppet and negotiated with it. “I’ll feed you every night if you help me with a favor. Can you do that?”

The oil-painted puppet looked at him, and its artificial eyes emitted a pale light under the moonlight.

Ning Su pointed towards the large iron door and said, “Can you try if you can open that door?”

The oil-painted puppet rigidly looked at the iron door, the way to escape.

Ning Su reassured it again, “I just want you to try. I won’t leave tonight, and I’ll come play with you tomorrow night.”

The oil-painted puppet jumped off the swing and walked towards the iron door.

Ning Su followed closely, saying, “First, try if you can squeeze through the door crack by yourself, then try if you can open it for someone else.”

The oil-painted puppet glanced back at him, turned sideways, and took a step outward through the door crack. When it took that step, it saw the boy’s pair of peach blossom eyes seemed to brighten a bit, becoming more beautiful.

The boy pulled him back in and said, “Try if you can open the door?”

The oil-painted puppet stood silently for a while as the boy held its arm.

The pale moonlight spread down, casting two shadows very close to each other on the stone floor.

The boy’s hand was fair, while the oil-painted puppet’s arm was dirty—a kind of stubborn dirt seeped into the wooden texture of the oil paint, difficult to remove.

Ning Su lifted it up, and the oil-painted puppet could now reach the handle.

The wooden hand grasped it and exerted a little force.

Creak—

Countless insects crawled up the iron door.

There was a person with their back to the moonlight, casting a shadow at their feet.

Ning Su placed down the oil-painted wooden puppet and turned around to greet the person behind him, saying, “Gu Witch, you’ve come to appreciate the moon too.”

Little Gu Witch changed out of the dirty clothes she wore when she first entered the instance, covering her entire body with a clean black cloak.

However, her hair remained dirty and oily, hanging heavily on both sides of her face, partially obscuring it.

In the pale moonlight, she had a witch-like appearance, as if she had stepped out of a dark fairy tale.

Black insects crawled up Ning Su’s feet.

“Ning Su, let me ask you again. Are you willing to come to the fifth floor?” A hoarse voice emerged from the coarse and rough words.

She used the word “again” because the last time, both he and Shi Tianzhu had invited Ning Su to sit beside them, and Ning Su ultimately chose Shi Tianzhu.

“If the fifth floor is going against the sixth floor, then I’m not willing,” Ning Su replied.

The insects had already crawled up his lower legs.

“You also like her,” Gu Witch said in a low, hoarse voice, lifting her head slightly. “I thought you were different.”

Ning Su made a sound of acknowledgment. “Mm, I am indeed a little different.”

A moment of silence passed.

Gu Witch said, “I used to think the same.”

In all the instances where she and Shi Tianzhu appeared, all the players would first look at Shi Tianzhu, choose Shi Tianzhu, and follow Shi Tianzhu, and then they would notice her.

Only the boy was different.

When she, in his most unwilling and sordid form, appeared, she didn’t expect that there would be a boy who would voluntarily sit beside her, even when Shi Tianzhu was present.

Enduring the foul smell emanating from her and engaging in conversation.

He wasn’t pretending not to mind. If he were pretending, he wouldn’t enjoy his meals so much.

He took the initiative to greet her, even took hold of her arm and went to the restroom together.

However, things changed after Shi Tianzhu took the initiative to talk to him.

Gu Witch asked, “Why did you drag me to the restroom that day?”

Ning Su pursed his lips, reminiscing about the scenes in elementary school, where classmates would go to the restroom together and get along well.

Especially among male classmates, it was common for two girls to go to the restroom together, but if two boys went together, it meant they were good friends.

Ning Su said, “At that time, President Shi and Zhu Shuangshuang went to the restroom on the right side. I saw you were going to the restroom, and I was afraid you would go to the same one. I couldn’t tell your gender, and they were in there. I couldn’t let you go.”

Silence filled the garden.

Gu Witch stood there silently, her figure lonely. When a soft “heh” laughter escaped, it carried self-mockery and amusement.

So, it was for Shi Tianzhu and the girl named Zhu Shuangshuang.

He couldn’t tell ‘her’ gender. Did he ever consider what would happen if ‘she’ was a girl and got pulled into the men’s restroom? Even though at that time, the separation of restrooms by gender was not yet clearly defined.

The densely packed gu insects moved like dark tides, crawling up his lower body until they touched the oil-painted wooden puppet, where they halted.

Originally, Ning Su was holding the wooden puppet, but when the gu insects crawled up, the wooden puppet instead hugged Ning Su’s head, showing no intention of coming down.

Gu Witch silently watched Ning Su, ‘her’ cheek muscles seeming to tremble.

If something happened to the wooden puppet, ‘she’ would be in trouble, too.

“Well, then you can forget about your legs!”

The gu insects excitedly burrowed into Ning Su’s legs.

— That’s how it appeared to Gu Witch.

Slowly, ‘she’ began to realize that something was amiss.

It wasn’t the insects burrowing into his legs, sucking his flesh and blood. Instead, the insects were drunkenly rubbing against his legs.

The silence in the garden was terrifying.

Ning Su walked over to the witch and placed the oil-painted wooden puppet in ‘her’ arms. “Well, I am indeed a bit different. Goodnight.”

After saying that, he swiftly slipped away.

He ran incredibly fast, and the insects scattered along the way.

In the moonlight, the witch stood rigidly in place, and the oil-painted wooden puppet in ‘her’ arms remained just as stiff.

Room 507 returned to its original state once again.

Two pitch-black rooms separated by a door, with the oil-painted wooden puppet and the little witch sitting on separate beds.

Ning Su, who had said he was going back, glanced at the window of the children’s room and then looked into the room of the little witch.

“What are you looking at? Are you here to laugh at me?”

The little witch didn’t lift ‘her’ head. “My ghost friend was enchanted by you, my insects were enchanted by you. Are you satisfied?”

Since he had been discovered, Ning Su no longer hid. “I’m looking at how two very lonely individuals are still separated into two rooms.”

Ning Su knocked on the window. “Witch, please open the window for me.”

The little witch sat on the bed for a long time before the window in front of Ning Su was opened by the insects.

The boy skillfully climbed in through the window. “I thought about it, and I still wanted to come and apologize to you.”

“That day, when I pulled you into the left bathroom, it was because I leaned more towards you being a boy.”

He said, “In the future, I can still pull you to the bathroom together.”

The witch’s room was rarely lit.

Perhaps it was beneficial for ‘her’ gu cultivation, or perhaps there were other reasons.

The pallid moonlight seeped in, illuminating with limited effect, making it difficult to see each other’s features in the gloom.

Ning Su wore a pair of creamy yellow pants, becoming the brightest color in the room.

The corner of the Witch’s eye fixed on his trouser leg as ‘she’ mockingly said, “Boy? Do you think someone who can practice witchcraft, and is called a ‘witch,’ a man?”

In some remote villages where witchcraft existed, there was indeed a belief that witchcraft should be passed down through women and not men, which contributed to the rise of the term “witch.”

‘She’ thought the boy wouldn’t have an answer to this question, but unexpectedly, he replied, “Ah, I know. You were a girl when you were young, and you became a boy during puberty, right?”