Chapter 12: Eat it

Apartment Building No. 5 (12)

What a huge moth.

Jiang Mian blinked.

She looked at Zhi.

Countless eyes were watching her as well.

“Jiang Xuan?” a voice came through the earpiece. “Don’t stare at Zhi.”

“Jiang Xi?”

“Can you hear me?”

Jiang Mian’s expression remained unchanged as she spun the elliptical object in her hand.

One eye narrowed, she took aim—

Thunk!

A precise hit!

The hammer struck the giant moth.

At that instant, Jiang Mian turned and ran toward the sixth floor.

The wind rushed past her ears.

Jiang Mian mobilized all her strength and sprinted at top speed.

The strands of hair hanging by her ears fluttered behind her.

She heard the flapping of wings, followed by a wave of foul stench.

Countless specks of stardust drifted around her, blinking at her incessantly.

Jiang Mian ran straight to the sixth floor, pushed open the door, and smashed another lamp on that floor.

Clatter—

Darkness swallowed everything like a tide.

Sparks of light spread like a galaxy, as if someone whispered in Jiang Mian’s ear.

She couldn’t catch the words.

Jiang Mian dashed toward the source of the light.

The wind brought by the moth’s wings nearly brushed her scalp.

The whispering turned into mumbling, as if countless voices chanted behind her.

Turn—turn—turn—turn—turn—turn—turn—turn—turn—

…Ha, uncultured bugs.

The corridor before Jiang Mian suddenly stretched long, rippling like ocean waves.

The walls were crawling with countless moths, their innumerable eyes fixed on her.

The voice of Luo Chenyi in her earpiece was clear and steady: “Jiang Mian, don’t turn around.”

Like a beacon in the darkness, a moon in the night.

Jiang Mian bit her tongue hard.

The pain weakened the invading hallucinations.

The ground no longer undulated, but she still couldn’t see the end.

Xiao Qing stood inside the elevator, watching in terror.

Help!

What is that thing?!

She didn’t dare look longer and kept shouting into the mic: “Jiang Mian, can you hear me?”

The mother moth was enormous; the corridor barely contained Zhi’s body.

Just as the mother moth’s wings nearly brushed Jiang Mian’s shoulder, a rushing sound exploded beside her ear.

Jiang Mian lowered her head and slipped beneath the whip-like limbs.

With a fierce dash, she plunged into the elevator.

Xiao Qing grabbed her and quickly pressed the door-close button.

The chaotic murmurs were the angry cries of the moths.

Xiao Qing’s eyes clouded over.

Luo Chenyi: “Wake up, Miss Tu.”

Like a hand breaking through the white fog, Luo Chenyi pulled Xiao Qing back.

She looked at the door-open button inches from her hand, cold sweat trickling down her back.

“Thank you…” Xiao Qing hurriedly turned to check Jiang Mian’s condition.

Everything Jiang Mian saw was still twisted.

The elevator ascended.

Jiang Mian pressed her back against the car wall.

From her perspective, she was leaning against a sticky flesh wall.

Jiang Mian kept gasping for breath.

A figure appeared before her and pressed on her shoulder.

Pain.

Jiang Mian inhaled sharply.

Her shoulder had been burned through, the smell of scorch lingering.

Luo Chenyi sprinkled some powder on her shoulder.

Jiang Mian opened her eyes and met Luo Chenyi’s gaze.

In her line of sight was a slightly smaller moth.

Jiang Sheng: “…Pfft.”

“It’s just a bug.”

She laughed, her shoulder trembling. “How is this like a bird?”

Xiao Qing looked at Jiang Mian with concern. “Jiang Mian… are you okay? What are you saying?”

The small moth spoke in Luo Chenyi’s gentle voice: “The reason they are called ‘bugs’ is because Zhi cannot survive on Earth by themselves.

They are rejected by Earth and can only seek hosts like a virus.”

“Bugs are the easiest to come into contact with.

Most Zhi parasitize bugs but hate being called bugs themselves.”

“In the eyes of the Gods, ‘bugs’ are too simple and lowly, while the Gods are supreme.”

Luo Chenyi’s eyes lightened, like flowing water pouring spiritual energy through Jiang Mian’s eyes into her consciousness.

It felt as though warm water washed over her from head to toe, sweeping away all discomfort.

Jiang Mian: “…Even if they’re called birds, are moths really bugs just because they can fly?”

“Ridiculous monsters.”

Ding—

They reached the seventh floor.

Jiang Mian didn’t have time to continue the conversation with Luo Chenyi.

“Xiao Qing, stick to the original plan.

Stay inside the elevator.”

Xiao Qing’s spirit was low.

The seventh floor was filled with mental contamination.

It was safer for Xiao Qing to stay in the elevator and be ready to open the door for them.

Jiang Mian and Luo Chenyi frantically searched the seventh floor.

No one knew how long the property management could delay the mother moth.

The property service center was easy to find.

It was an apartment with a plaque hanging on the doorknob.

The door was locked and required a key.

Luo Chenyi lifted her long leg and kicked the door open in one strike.

“—” Jiang Mian was impressed with Luo Chenyi’s assistance.

Satisfied, she entered and searched each room for a flashlight.

The flashlight was inside the cabinet of the bedroom on the far right.

Besides the flashlight, there were some daily supplies and food.

With time pressing, Jiang Mian grabbed a compressed biscuit and left.

Luo Chenyi glanced and said, “Jiang Mian, you head back to the elevator first.”

Luo Chenyi planned to search for the “egg.”

Mother moths always placed their eggs in places the Gods considered safe.

The seventh floor was the territory the mother moth occupied in Apartment Building No. 5.

This time Jiang Mian didn’t hesitate.

She turned and ran back to the elevator.

The intense fighting sounds downstairs passed through the walls.

Jiang Mian and Xiao Qing crouched inside the elevator for a moment.

Only when the mother moth won and flapped back to the seventh floor did Luo Chenyi return.

She came back empty-handed.

But it didn’t matter.

He had made enough of a mess on the seventh floor to infuriate the mother moth.

Its eyes spilled tears as if it were dying of rage.

A terrifying chase ensued.

On the way back, Xiao Qing’s admiring eyes often fell on Jiang Mian.

She couldn’t help but ask, “Jiang Mian, aren’t you afraid?”

Jiang Mian: “No… not really.”

In fact, Jiang Mian didn’t know what fear was.

She seemed born without the sense of fear.

She could feel pain, hunger, and fatigue.

During the chase and when facing the mother moth, the only feeling missing was fear.

But being special didn’t necessarily mean good.

Xiao Qing: “A boss is a boss.”

Because Luo Chenyi never showed fear either, Xiao Qing became used to it and didn’t think Jiang Mian’s behavior was odd.

Luo Chenyi’s long eyelashes fluttered as he glanced at Jiang Mian’s calm face, then at her injured shoulder.

The fifth floor arrived quickly.

The three knocked on door 524 as fast as they could.

Fortunately, Mama opened the door quickly, otherwise Jiang Mian would have had to have Luo Chenyi kick it open.

Xiao Qing closed the door behind them and casually asked, “Jiang Mian, you don’t have the key?”

It seemed every time they had to rely on the “Degenerate” to open the door.

…Fire Shield Degenerate was strange; he really opened the door every single time!

Jiang Mian: “…She doesn’t remember where she put the key.”

Back home, Mama saw the flashlight in Jiang Mian’s hand and actually breathed a sigh of relief.

Xiao Qing was embarrassed — what had they been forced into?

Jiang Mian held the flashlight and approached Mama.

“Do you recognize this?”

Mama’s expression was blank.

Her cloudy eyes stared vacantly at Jiang Mian.

Jiang Mian: “Mama?”

Mama pulled the corners of her lips, as if wanting to say something.

Her throat felt stuffed with cotton.

In the end, she made no sound.

She turned and walked back to her room expressionless, gently closing the door.

Jiang Mian stood still, glancing sideways toward the direction Mama left, trembling slightly in her hands holding the flashlight.

Mama seemed to want to say something.

Xiao Qing: “We have to hurry… the mother moth is furious.

If we don’t leave soon, it’ll be dangerous, right?”

She spoke cautiously, afraid Jiang Mian would be upset that her mother couldn’t leave with them.

Although Jiang Mian had lost her memories, it looked like she still cared about her mother.

Jiang Mian scoffed, “Wait for me a moment, then we’ll leave.”

She handed her flashlight to Luo Chenyi standing beside her.

Xiao Qing and Luo Chenyi politely refrained from asking more.

Jiang Jun turned and walked straight toward the bedroom that had never been opened.

524 was a three-bedroom apartment.

In the notes, she had a mother and a father.

But since she had consciousness, she had never seen her father.

Jiang Mian pushed open the door that had always been shut.

This time, Mama did not stop her.

What met her eyes was blood all over the floor.

Like the scene of a brutal crime.

It seemed someone had been killed.

Blood spilled everywhere, severed limbs discarded.

The bed sheets and blankets hung messily on the floor.

The tabletop cracked in the middle.

The wardrobe was scarred from top to bottom with suspicious claw marks.

A complete mess.

…The smell was far from pleasant.

Jiang Mian glanced around and stood on tiptoe in front of the only relatively intact wardrobe in the room.

She yanked it open.

Inside the wardrobe’s compartment was a box.

The moment she opened the box, a violent spasm struck Jiang Mian’s stomach.

The hunger surged a hundred times worse than before.

An oval-shaped gelatinous object lay inside the box.

Suddenly a few words flooded Jiang Mian’s mind, overwhelming her entire consciousness.

Eat it!

Eat it!

Eat it!

Eat what? How do I eat it?!

Jiang Mian, confused yet hungry, picked up the oval object.

It looked like the egg Luo Chenyi had been searching for.

She didn’t know how to eat it.

Just as she was about to take it to Luo Chenyi—

Black tendrils burst from her palm.

They were solid entities made of dense black mist.

They gripped the egg tightly.

Jiang Jing: ?

The egg visibly shrank and disappeared amid the tendrils’ suction.

Jiang Mian: ???

At the same time, the hunger in her stomach gradually subsided.

It was as if she had feasted and felt full for the first time in her life.

Jiang Mian decided never to mention that Mama had strange eating habits again.

Being full was an incomparable comfort.

Outside the door, Luo Chenyi knocked because Jiang Mian had been inside too long.

Jiang Mian lowered her eyes and observed the tendrils in her palm, twisting and writhing as they were filled.

She shook them vigorously.

The tendrils swayed like grass blown by the wind, then turned into a black mist.

In Jiang Mian’s confusion, the mist reformed into a slender rope-like tendril, coiling around her arm.

Jiang Mian’s face was blank.

She had eaten the egg.

The hunger that had churned relentlessly inside her vanished with the egg’s disappearance.

Her body felt warm.

All her negative effects were swept away.

She felt unprecedented fullness.

Luo Chenyi’s voice came from behind the door: “Miss Jiang, are you ready to leave?”

Jiang Mian blinked the familiar tendrils, a little guilty.

Luo Chenyi seemed to say that the egg was the foundation of the moth’s nest…