Chapter 4

Chapter 4: A Strange World
Damn, that actually makes a lot of sense..
If one is already in a world full of monsters, with nowhere to escape and no power to resist, what else can one do besides accept it?
Despite countless questions still lingering in his mind, Xiao Xiao gradually suppressed the urge to continue asking.
Asking further might just annoy people.
Since she had already agreed to help explain things afterward, that would be enough.
If, if this world has truly become a world filled entirely with monsters, then what use would it be for me to keep clinging to her?
Yang Jia dropped him off at the entrance of the alley. Xiao Xiao looked at the empty street and surprisingly felt a slight sense of relief. He watched until the car’s taillights disappeared from view before slowly turning around and heading home.
He deliberately avoided the butcher shop that always emitted the sound of an electric saw cutting meat, quickly passed by the house where an old, hoarse record player was constantly playing, and then tensed his nerves as he went past the neighbor’s yard with three vicious dogs. All the way, it was so quiet that he could only hear his own heartbeat. In the dark corners and edges, there always seemed to be some sinister eyes quietly staring at him, letting out low laughter.
Just as he was about to push open the door, the anguish in his heart reached its peak, and he was somewhat afraid of seeing what his mother looked like.
This place was full of evil spirits…
Xiao Xiao recalled Yang Jia’s words, thinking of how Jiang Cheng had transformed into a twisted monster. After a long, long while, he finally steeled himself and pushed open the door to his room.
What met his eyes, however, was an unexpectedly warm and cozy light.
“You’re back?”
Mom was sitting on the sofa watching television. Seeing him come in, she turned down the volume a bit and said, “I’ve been telling you all along that you should go out and take walks more often.”
Recalling how she had looked just before leaving earlier, as if she was about to chop the kitchen knife into herself, Xiao Xiao felt a lingering sense of dread. He merely gave a vague murmur of agreement and prepared to head back to his bedroom.
“You brat, you won’t even say a word to me.”
Mom on the sofa rubbed her lower back and grumbled: “I can’t be bothered with you anymore. I made dumplings and put them in the fridge. If you’re hungry, just microwave them.”
“Playing games until so late every day, and you don’t even care about your health. Who am I supposed to rely on when I get old?”
“……”
“……”
Xiao Xiao’s hand paused as he pushed open the bedroom door, and he responded in a muffled voice: “I know.”
As he entered, it was as if he could still feel that concerned gaze, and recalling the chilling sensation from just moments before, he found himself momentarily unable to distinguish between truth and illusion.
Four years ago, after his parents divorced, he had been living with his mother. Later, that sudden onset of panic disorder tormented him, causing him to even skip the college entrance examination.
For almost four years straight, I’ve just been staying in my room, never even had a job.
Mom is getting older, but she has always taken care of me. Although there are occasional moments of disdain, what’s more is her heartache and companionship.
But if Mom has also become a monster, then are these memories also fake?
Is all of this just an act?
The moment Xiao Xiao closed the bedroom door, his body couldn’t help but tremble. He raised both hands forcefully and rubbed his face.
That night, Xiao Xiao didn’t dare undress. He lay on the bed fully clothed, waiting until dawn.
After sitting on the bed for a while, he got up. After experiencing such a tense situation yesterday, he had fallen asleep on the bed without even taking off his shoes, constantly on guard against something.
However, this entire night clearly had nothing happen, which was so normal that it felt abnormal.
When he tiptoed into the living room, he found the house empty and bare—”Mom” seemed to have already left. In the living room with its visibly aging décor, there was breakfast on the dining table that was apparently left for him.
It was a plate of pan-fried dumplings and a carton of milk.
Xiao Xiao couldn’t help but recall that Mom was a very frugal person. In her eyes, the only irreplaceable delicacy in this world was dumplings.
But she has been too tired from work recently and hasn’t made dumplings in a long time.
I didn’t eat a late-night snack last night, so she must feel sorry for me, but she was afraid I’d be too lazy to reheat it if I got up, so she simply fried the dumplings for me in advance before going to work…
But could the person who left me dumplings and the person who yesterday wished she could chop me into dumpling filling really be the same person?
Xiao Xiao looked at the plate of dumplings and finally decided not to try them. She washed her face with cold water and walked out the door with an empty stomach.
Passing through the small courtyard filled with green plants, she came to the alley. This was a dilapidated neighborhood, but compared to the towering buildings surrounding it, the space here seemed more spacious. All around were small two or three-story buildings or small bungalows with courtyards. Though located in the heart of a bustling city, compared to the densely packed tall buildings around it, this place seemed like a corner forgotten by the city.
Unlike the fear and confusion under yesterday’s dim night, this time, Xiao Xiao could see this world that had been absent for four years with perfect clarity, yet it felt somewhat bewildering.
He saw the three large dogs from the neighbor’s house. One was foolishly chasing butterflies in the yard, another was desperately digging a hole in the ground, and the last one was lazily lying on the ground letting dirt pile up on its head.
There were no ferocious man-eating dogs. These three were so silly that they wagged their tails frantically whenever they saw a cat.
He saw the second-floor neighbor’s house, from which the eerie sound of an old record player had drifted down yesterday. White curtains swayed in the wind, and through the window, he could faintly make out a slender figure dancing gracefully to soft music.
In the butcher shop on the street, the boss wearing a leather apron held a cigarette in his mouth, smiling warmly and being particularly courteous to everyone he saw.
The sunlight was warm, and everything was peaceful.
Xiao Xiao looked at the elderly people chatting in this old alley and the little girl bouncing around, feeling as though he had stepped into another world, completely different from yesterday’s gloom and coldness.
His heart became considerably lighter, but he still didn’t dare to relax. With his hand in his pocket, he walked through the alley and came out onto the main street.
Looking up at this world, he felt somewhat unfamiliar with it.
Those towering commercial buildings that had sprung up at some unknown time, the light rail lines that cut across and ran through the middle of the city, those massive factories clustered around the city’s edges, and the pale, dim sun.
There were shadows of his memories, but it seemed somewhat different.
Yet what met his eyes was only a vast city without boundaries, not the gloomy and eerie ghost realm he had seen yesterday.
Before my eyes are only people of all kinds and lives of all kinds.
Busy or leisurely white-collar professionals walk down the street with coffee in hand, young girls rushing for the subway sprint along swinging their ponytails, and on towering billboards, hot and refreshing girls blow kisses to the city.
Everything seems to be running normally, different from my memories, yet somehow as it should be.
Is this sense of strangeness because I haven’t stepped outside for four years, or is it because this world has already been replaced, that there are so many things that feel unfamiliar to me?
Xiao Xiao was unable to carefully distinguish it for a moment.
He simply gazed at this vast and profound world, unable to question its reality.
All these people, living and breathing people, how could they possibly be monsters?
Perhaps everything was truly just his own illusion, and everything he experienced yesterday was merely his hallucination and imagination?
Xiao Xiao hurriedly lowered his head and glanced at the band-aid stuck on his hand. Suddenly, he exerted force and tore it off, revealing a deep wound underneath.
The reopened wound reminded him that this was not fake, so yesterday’s experience was also real—he had “killed” Jiang Cheng, and Yang Jia had put a band-aid on him…
But…
Thinking back on the past four years, those countless delirious murmurs that seemed both real and false, the torment of headaches that cut deep into his bones, the mutual intrusion of dreams and reality.
He suddenly felt somewhat afraid. What if yesterday’s memories were also fake?
What if he hadn’t actually “killed” any monster, but had simply punched a mirror, causing his hand to be injured?
Just like his mother—could her care for him also be something the monster had disguised?
The more he thought about it, the more agitated he became. He suddenly quickened his pace toward home.
But just as he pushed open the courtyard gate, he suddenly heard an icy voice:
“Where have you been running around all day again?”
“……”
Xiao Xiao looked up and saw his mother standing in the courtyard with a cold expression on her face, forcefully dumping the untouched plate of dumplings into the trash bin.
She was still wearing a supermarket sales associate’s uniform, as if she had just gotten home and hadn’t had time to change, but upon seeing Xiao Xiao, she couldn’t hide her dissatisfaction: “You won’t eat, you won’t come home.”
“You’re a grown man now, what exactly do you want to do?”
“You’re going to get married someday, you’re going to have children and take a wife, and you’re counting on me for everything. Do you expect me to wait on you for the rest of my life?”
“Go find your father, you two are cut from the same cloth. Go let him take care of you, he has plenty of money anyway!”
“……”
Xiao Xiao stopped in his tracks at the courtyard gate, staring fixedly at his mother.
He saw his mother pacing back and forth in the courtyard in agitation, constantly hurling the things in her hands, and when her fury reached its peak, she suddenly turned her head and glared at Xiao Xiao with hatred.
Beneath the skin, something rolled across like an eyeball moving.
“Whoosh…”
At this moment, Xiao Xiao suddenly felt a chill run through his entire body, and he staggered back a step.
But for some reason, deep in his heart, an unexpected sense of relief arose instead, and the confusion in his mind gradually dissipated.
She really is a monster, just like Jiang Cheng.
There’s no need to be confused or run away anymore. This world really is just as Yang Jia described it—monsters everywhere.
It’s just…
He looked at his mother, whose expression grew increasingly fierce, her skin seeming as though it would be torn apart by some writhing monster, and suddenly he felt a hint of hesitation…
What should I do?