Cat 253: The Only Living Person
by CristaeChapter 253 The Only Living Person
Yan Jiyun hopped on one foot for a while, then squatted down again, waiting for the pain in his toes to subside.
For the moment, Ninth Master couldn’t help; he crouched beside him, waiting for the wave of pain to pass. “Does it still hurt a lot?”
Yan Jiyun’s tears welled up from the pain, reddening his eyes. He nodded meekly, aggrieved. “Yes, it hurts.”
“Take off your shoe and let me see. Did you hit your toenail or somewhere else?” As Ninth Master spoke, he was about to help him remove his shoe.
Yan Jiyun plopped down on the tombstone he’d just kicked and took off his shoe. Ninth Master didn’t mind the dirt in the slightest and took off his sock for him.
As expected, he’d stubbed his toe—it was quite red. Ninth Master knelt on one knee, resting Yan Jiyun’s foot on his own knee and pressing gently on the bone of his toe. Yan Jiyun didn’t cry out, so the bone was fine; the nail was intact too. Ninth Master gazed at Yan Jiyun’s foot a little longer; just like his hands, it was very fair, with hardly a callus upon it.
Yet, at that moment, an oddly inappropriate thought crossed Ninth Master’s mind. “Yan Jiyun, shouldn’t you trim your toenails?”
Yan Jiyun, whose pain had only just begun to subside, fell silent: “…”
He hurried to put his socks back on.
Any longer and Ninth Master would probably drag him off for a proper pedicure.
[“Wanna Be a Human” Livestream Chat Room:]
“Hahahaha, I can’t believe it—it really was about trimming toenails! Ninth Master, seriously?!”
“I could feel that pain just listening. My toes hurt in sympathy.”
“Is Cat Cub’s jiojio all right? Is it swollen? Does Ninth Master need to carry him so he can walk now? I hope to see what’s playing in my head next.”
“Hahahaha, I saw everyone else instinctively curl their feet back. Cat Cub must have really kicked hard; his brows were all scrunched up.”
“Cat Cub really knows how to put on a show—something cute every five minutes! I love him to death. I won’t watch any streams without Cat Cub from now on.”
“Ninth Master’s move there was a bit risqué. He was actually cradling Cat Cub’s foot and inspecting it!”
“I agree. If it weren’t for this being a graveyard, I’d be imagining a hundred thousand words of bedroom fanfiction with Ninth Master and Cat Cub.”
“Sis, I’m with you! I hate that Cat Cub is so oblivious. Can’t he think a little further?”
“Am I the only one curious about what mysterious treasure Cat Cub’s foot hit?”
Yan Jiyun put his socks back on, though even after the pain ebbed, it still felt tender. This time, he’d definitely kicked hard—the burning throb lingered.
He pouted and sat on the ground, unwilling to get up.
Ninth Master started helping him put his shoe back on, then suddenly realized something. “Didn’t you have on a different outfit this morning?”
Though both were dress shirts and slacks, something wasn’t the same. He remembered Yan Jiyun’s morning shirt had cufflinks, but this set was clearly much lower in quality.
A jolt of anxiety went through Yan Jiyun. Was Ninth Master eagle-eyed?
That morning, when he’d turned human in Ninth Master’s elegant house, his clothes matched the master’s standards. But when he’d changed back in the police station’s restroom, the outfit’s quality took a nosedive, about on par with the forensic scientist’s—so much for the salary.
Yan Jiyun smoothly denied it. “This is what I wore this morning. Maybe you just misremembered.”
Ninth Master had been with Yan Jiyun the whole time; changing clothes would have been impossible, and Yan Jiyun had no reason to do so. He chalked it up to his own mistake.
He reached out a hand to Yan Jiyun, helping him up as he spoke. “Maybe I misremembered.”
Yan Jiyun had received a mysterious quest, but had delayed because of his injury. He spoke casually, “I have a hunch there’s something hidden under this tombstone.”
The tombstone was solid stone, weighing at least a hundred pounds.
Yan Jiyun managed to wrench it up with some effort. Ninth Master figured he must have a grudge against the gravestone and moved to help. With the two of them, it rose much more easily.
Gu Wenzhu and He Yuanle came over.
Gu Wenzhu asked, “Anything new?”
Yan Jiyun questioned them, “Did you guys get a quest prompt?”
Both Gu Wenzhu and He Yuanle shook their heads.
He Yuanle asked, “What quest?”
Yan Jiyun replied, “Then maybe I alone triggered mine—it’s a side quest, follows from the treasure map quest.”
Gu Wenzhu and He Yuanle hadn’t received the treasure map side quest, so they didn’t get this one either, but since they were all on the same team, no one minded. A side quest was just extra.
He Yuanle poked at the dirt under the tombstone with a branch. “It’s wood underneath.”
They were still unsure how Wei Liu had turned the whole town of Jiangnan into its current state, but that didn’t stop them from looking for answers in the Chen family burial ground.
Ninth Master, as an NPC, had been thoroughly optimized against sensitive words, thanks to players’ reports, so he found nothing amiss in Yan Jiyun and his teammates’ odd conversation.
Brushing all the soil aside, they found a wooden door, large enough for a grown man to pass through.
He Yuanle exclaimed, “There’s actually treasure down here?”
Yan Jiyun replied, “Who knows what kind of ‘treasure’ this time.”
Gu Wenzhu noted, “This is already a place for the dead—there can’t be more bodies hidden here.”
Yan Jiyun was sure there was treasure; he just didn’t know what it might be. Perhaps it was exactly what Wei Liu had been after.
He suddenly asked his friends, “What do you think Wei Liu wants most?”
Gu Wenzhu replied, “How did he die? How did he come back? Why revive? Is it revenge or does he want immortality?”
He Yuanle said, “I think maybe he wants immortality.”
Yan Jiyun had no sure answer, so he gazed at Ninth Master, who returned his look silently. “What do you think?”
Ninth Master said, “We’re all paper people, so he must have killed before, taken his revenge already. Now, what he desires most is likely to become human again—and that would require some secret technique.”
Yan Jiyun found this logical. “But is he a criminal type? Why did he slaughter everyone in town and turn them all into paper figures?”
No one had an answer.
They pried open the wooden door; darkness gaped within.
All three players came equipped with flashlights. Ninth Master’s was one Yang Er had fetched from the car.
The four descended, Yang Er standing guard outside.
The air in the passage was ample; the farther they went, the wider it became.
Yan Jiyun cursed the scenario in his heart. Wasn’t the treasure supposed to be his reward? Why did he have to crawl through a tunnel—he felt a bit like a tomb robber.
The deeper they went, the larger and longer the tunnel seemed, stretching as if it would never end.
Yan Jiyun asked, “Can you tell which direction we’re heading?”
They hadn’t gone far underground, and Ninth Master’s compass came in handy. “We should be heading south right now.”
They walked another ten minutes without encountering anything. Not even a forked passage; everything was going so smoothly it made Yan Jiyun wary—was this really just a reward task from the scenario? The smoother it felt, the more cautious he became.
After five more minutes, they were blocked by a door.
All together, they’d walked about twenty minutes. This door was padlocked, the keyhole rusted over; clearly, nobody had entered in years.
This was Chen family territory—strange it hadn’t seen anyone for so long.
Yan Jiyun held his hand out to Ninth Master. “Give me your knife. Let’s pry it open.”
Ninth Master did have a knife, though for a moment he didn’t question how Yan Jiyun always seemed to know what he carried. He handed it over.
The old-fashioned lock was easy to break—one flick and it sprang open.
As this was Yan Jiyun’s quest, he switched on his flashlight and went in first.
Inside, it wasn’t completely dark; a slanted glass window in the ceiling let in a bit of light. Still, it wasn’t enough to see clearly, so the flashlight stayed on.
This seemed to be the tunnel’s end. Sweeping the light around, there were no jewels, no valuables, and no majestic sword planted in the center—nothing worth even a splinter.
Ninth Master followed Yan Jiyun in. “See anything?”
Yan Jiyun shook his head, disappointed. “There’s no treasure at all.”
In the corner were incense sticks, ceremonial paper, bowls, rice—offerings, but not the mysterious prize he sought.
Gu Wenzhu and He Yuanle also started searching the cramped two-square-meter room.
Yan Jiyun squatted in front of the pile of offerings, lost in thought. Ninth Master circled once, then pressed a finger to Yan Jiyun’s head. Yan Jiyun shook his head.
“Your hand’s dirty and you’re pressing it to my head.” He looked up, spotting a small wicker basket dangling from the ceiling. Suddenly he perked up. “Is there something hidden up there?”
The ceiling was high. None of them could reach it by hand; even jumping fell short.
Gu Wenzhu had an injured leg, He Yuanle was both thin and short, so it was up to Yan Jiyun and Ninth Master.
Yan Jiyun unceremoniously rode on Ninth Master’s shoulders, reached up, and just managed to seize the small basket—only to be choked by the dust it raised.
“Cough, cough, it’s all dust.”
Yan Jiyun handed the basket to Gu Wenzhu, who had stretched out his hands to catch it. Gu Wenzhu glanced at its contents.
Ninth Master set Yan Jiyun down. “You should have covered your nose with your sleeve. Don’t you have rhinitis? I’ve noticed you can’t stand strong perfume and cough when there’s dust.”
Yan Jiyun was startled by Ninth Master’s powers of observation, but nodded anyway, bluffing. “Yes, my rhinitis is pretty bad. I’ll be more careful next time.”
After climbing down from Ninth Master’s shoulders, he asked Gu Wenzhu what was in the basket. Gu Wenzhu pulled out a blue-covered book and shook off the dust.
Yan Jiyun remarked, “How has it been here so long without being eaten by bugs?”
Gu Wenzhu sniffed the cover. “It must have been sprayed with insect repellent.”
He Yuanle asked, “So what’s the book?”
Gu Wenzhu shone his flashlight on the cover; four big characters appeared: “Soul Returning Technique.”
The book described how to preserve a soul after death, then revive oneself.
There were several steps.
Step one: A paper human soaked in blood for forty-nine days.
Step two: Draw a soul-guiding talisman, stick it onto the paper figure and the dying person.
Step three: Transfer the soul to the paper figure—if successful, resurrection would follow.
Besides the method for becoming a paper figure, there was another—one to restore the paper figure to human form.
Turning paper back to human was much harder.
It required one special item: the birth date and Eight Characters of a living person.
At the end of “Soul Returning Technique” were several lines, listing someone’s birth date and birth data, and a note:
[He is the only living person in this town. Find him, protect him, and take him away from Jiangnan Town.]
[Congratulations, player has acquired the treasure: The scenario’s truest secret!]
[Congratulations, player has triggered Main Quest Four: Find the only living person.]