The sharp table knives pierced through the skin and the stick figure’s clothes were dyed red. Staring at the drawing waving in the Dreamer’s hand, Han Fei’s face darkened. Han Fei grabbed the boy by his shoulders and lifted him up to eye level. He looked into the boy’s young face. “It was you who called Xu Qin away so why is it that you’ve returned alone?” The most dangerous demon often decorated themselves as angels. In the cryptic world, do not give away your trust easily, not even to a child who looked perfectly harmless.
“Draw, draw…” Dreamer waved the paper repeatedly. The more frightened he was, the more he stammered. He was unable to complete a full sentence.
“Why would Xu Qin plunge her knives into herself? Where is she now?” Han Fei knew it was hard to communicate with the Dreamer. He put him down, reached into the boy’s pocket and placed the paper and pen before him. “Draw out what you want to say.” As if knowing that time was running out, the Dreamer started to make broad strokes on the paper.
Two stick figures with masks sat beside the dining table. The chopping block at the middle of the table was covered with chopped up human flesh. The two stick figures gestured at the chopped-up person and laughed. There were other stick figures in the background. One of them was a long-haired woman with a chef's hat. It was a quick color pencil drawing but there was something immensely horrifying about it. Han Fei glanced at Dreamer and thought to himself, ‘What exactly has this boy seen?’
Lee Zai bent his body to almost 90 degrees to see the drawing. His head was almost pressing on Han Fei’s shoulder. “Looks like someone inside the building has been killed? There are 9 chairs around the table but even including the chef, there are only 8 people inside the painting. The missing individual should be the one being served on the chopping block. Has anyone gone missing recently?”
“Missing? There’s only the writer! The missing writer has been eaten?” Holding the drawing, Han Fei turned to the Dreamer, “But what does this have to do with Xu Qin?” The Dreamer used the red pen to circle the chef. Then he added an arrow that began from the chef and ended at the dining table.
“They plan to eat Xu Qin next?” Xu Qin was a Curse Amalgamation, her greatest power came from her set of table knives. She could stab herself with all her knives to achieve her strongest state. All of the tenants must have ganged up on her for her to do something as drastic as this. Taking out Rest in Peace, Han Fei squatted beside the Dreamer, “Are you one of the two stick figures sitting around the dining table?”
The dreamer shook his head vehemently. He pointed at his face and stammered, “I, I have no ma, mask. Mine got stolen.” Perhaps to convince Han Fei further, the Dreamer picked up the pencil and added a doctor’s coat around one of the stick figures at the table. He pointed at the figure cautiously as he repeated the term, doctor.
‘One of the writer’s killers is the Doctor? That is different from the story in real life. Have there been changes in the cryptic world?’ Han Fei signalled for Dreamer to lead them to Xu Qin. Han Fei hadn’t fully trusted the Dreamer but he didn’t have much choice now. The sub personas of Spider appeared to have some kind of special ability, no matter how the space changed, they could easily find the right path, it was like they were one part with the building. There was so much less blood compared to yesterday, it felt like someone had given the place a good cleaning. Han Fei noticed this place was slowly matching with Fu Gui Factory Living Compound in real life. Dream was edging towards reality and the tragedy from the past would repeat itself.
Passing the many rooms and doors, the Dreamer finally led Han Fei to the 4th floor of this interconnecting cluster of buildings. They stopped before a normal-looking door. “Xu Qin is inside?” Han Fei had the Dreamer open the door. When he did, a mist of disinfectant rolled out from inside the room. Looking in, there were medicine bottles everywhere but more importantly, this place looked just like Spider’s room in real life!
“What is this place?” Han Fei turned to the boy. The boy coughed several times before answering, “Doc, doctor’s place. The chef, chef was here.”
“The Doctor’s place?!” Han Fei’s eyes widened. That could only explain one thing, during the last moment of his life, it was the Doctor’s persona who took over Spider’s main persona! That would explain why the Doctor’s place in the cryptic world mirrored the Spider’s place in real life. ‘The Doctor is the persona controlled by the butterfly? If that’s the case, he almost succeeded!’
Walking into the room, Han Fei had the uncanny feeling that he was back in real life. The medicine bottles and medical reports were very real. ‘The doctor’s responsibility is to heal all the other subpersonas, in other words, Spider was trying to cure himself. He was a patient. Indeed, if Butterfly corrupted the healer, the mental health of Spider would collapse.” The décor inside the room was similar to the one in real life, everything was where Han Fei memorized them to be. After checking the living room, kitchen, Han Fei entered the bedroom. He turned to the bookshelf and finally noticed something different from real life.
The places where the two books, Cattle Alley and House of the Butcher should be were instead two thick medical reports. Han Fei picked up a random one and started to read. The content and pictures instantly grabbed his attention.
“Recently there are more patients inside the alley. They show the same symptoms, coughing, fever, rashes on the skin and inexplicable itchiness. Based on observation, all the patients had bought packaged meat from Fu Gui Meat Packaging Plant on the night of the 4th.
“This is more than a case of food poisoning. Patients would show heavier symptoms one week after the surfacing of the illness. They would complain of increased itchiness and they would escalate to self-mutilation to stop the itchiness.
“In the 2nd week, most patients would show symptoms of hallucination and acousma. They claimed that something had entered their bodies and begged for surgeries to remove them. The patients’ weight showed no difference but they all lost plenty of muscle mass like something was eating them from inside.
“In the 3rd week, part of the patients’ skin started to crack and scars started to appear. A small number of patients showed skin ablation.
“In the 4th week, most of the patients have died. Their actual diagnosis is as follows.”
Seeing the reports, Han Fei’s heart squeezed, these were all lives. Closing the first report, Han Fei turned to the second one. The second one was as detailed as the first one and it recorded the changes to the doctor’s own body.
“February 4th, no visible change to the body…
“February 5th, itchiness on the skin.
“February 7th, first instance of acousma.
“February 15th, a drastic thinning of the body. The skin started to crack. Pain coexisted with the itchiness. The yearning to tear open the body increased.
“February 21st, gained a clear feeling of something inside the stomach trying to crawl out. Skin started to dissolve, I can see into my own internal organs.
“February 25th, none of the medicine works. The illusions and acousma have dominated my mind. Surgery cannot stop the mutation to the body. I shouldn’t have eaten the writer, I wonder in what form he would return next time.”
