Fan Yingying could hardly stand. She gripped Fang Chen’s arm tightly, inadvertently causing him pain.
As the elevator doors slid open at that precise moment, Gao Cheng found himself caught in an inner conflict, unable to retreat or advance, as he stood within, witnessing the scene before him. “You guys…”
Fan Yingying released her hand, leaving visible fingerprint marks on Fang Chen’s arm.
Gao Cheng walked out, saying, “Why did you make the young lady cry?”
Fang Chen didn’t answer, but instead pointed to the opposite door and asked, “Do you remember who lives here?”
Gao Cheng was puzzled. “Auntie Wu and Uncle Wu, right? What’s wrong? Is Auntie Wu stirring up trouble again?”
*
Fan Yingying’s home was decorated in a way that adorned it with a cozy ambiance. Fang Chen didn’t know how to handle a lady’s tears, so he could only sit and patiently wait for Fan Yingying to finish crying.
Gao Cheng, feeling a bit dumbfounded, quietly asked Fang Chen, “What’s going on? Did you bed her and not wanna take responsibility for it? And now you’re even bringing me along… Is it to seek my moral support?”
Fang Chen furrowed his brows. Just as he was about to say something, Fan Yingying beat him to it.
“That day… I saw…”
Fan Yingying recounted seeing the couple sprawled in a pool of blood.
Gao Cheng widened his eyes, glanced at Fang Chen, and then back at Fan Yingying. He became attentive, putting away his usual unserious demeanour.
“But I didn’t know… I was scared and only had a quick look,” Fan Yingying cried intensely. “I thought it wasn’t them. Besides, there were many people at the scene. The ambulance would’ve arrived pretty fast, too…”
This situation was entirely different from what Fang Chen encountered.
With tears in her eyes, Fan Yingying asked, “Are they… dead?”
“…I don’t know.” Fang Chen was now much calmer after having experienced the panic of the previous day. “I saw them too. They had no sign of breathing.”
Fan Yingying trembled.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
“Well… Car accidents are truly unforeseeable. Did the ambulance come? Ah, even if it did, it wouldn’t have helped if they were already dead… Did the police come?” Gao Cheng was still not fully grasping the situation, his words coming out incoherently.
Fang Chen remained silent, while Fan Yingying buried her face in her hands and cried again.
Gao Cheng couldn’t understand why Fan Yingying was so distraught. It wasn’t as if the couple who died were her relatives, so why was she crying so miserably?
“I feel that something’s off… No one has mentioned this matter. In the past, they would always gather downstairs for a chat, but these past few days, no one has been around.” Fan Yingying resided on the first floor, so she was used to being awakened by lively conversations in the mornings, but recently, it had been unusually quiet. She felt very frightened, especially after witnessing the scene of the accident with her own eyes, coupled with the fact that the couple living opposite her hadn’t returned for two consecutive days.
The wind chime hung on Fan Yingying’s balcony tinkled when the wind blew. Amidst the warm breeze, there was a hint of chillness mixed in. Fang Chen spoke almost mechanically, “I’ve asked many people, and they all say they don’t remember there being such a household on the first floor.”
Gao Cheng: “What?”
Fan Yingying shook even more intensely. She had a vague idea; otherwise, she wouldn’t be this afraid.
“No one remembers them,” Fang Chen redirected his gaze towards Gao Cheng. “I initially thought it was my sanity acting up.”
A quiver passed over Gao Cheng’s facial muscles. “Come on, how can a living person… Oh no, dead.” He realized belatedly and continued, “Anyway, they can’t just be forgotten for no reason, right? Besides, don’t we still remember them?”
“Yes.” Fang Chen’s gaze remained calm. “So, it’s not an issue with my mental; there’s definitely something amiss going on here.”
Gao Cheng swallowed nervously. “Are we telling horror stories now?” He still couldn’t believe it.
A tempest of strangeness descended upon Fang Chen. Fan Yingying’s hand unconsciously gripped the edge of the chair, and she exerted a slight force on her tiptoes, as if ready to run at any moment.
The wind chime tinkled, breaking Fang Chen free from the uncanny stillness. His heart was pounding wildly.
He didn’t know what was happening to him. Lifting his head, one could feel a sense of bewilderment and helplessness in his eyes. He asked again, “Who else lives on the sixth floor and above?”
No one answered because no one knew.
“Have you guys heard any noises during the night?” Fang Chen reached out and knocked twice on the table—‘Knock, knock.’ Fan Yingying had a strong reaction, retreating a considerable distance along with the chair she was on. Gao Cheng’s complexion also changed.
“One night, I saw two people in the corridor.” Fang Chen closed his eyes, images of blood-stained white ceramic tiles and the dim white light of the elevator surfaced in his mind. His face turned pale as he continued to recall, “There was a lot of blood. One was dead, and the other alive… I thought I was in a dream.”
Fan Yingying let out a heavy sob.
Gao Cheng’s expression grew even grimmer. “Now that you mention it, I haven’t seen Nie Shi for a long time…”
Who’s Nie Shi?
Fang Chen opened his eyes, wearing that same vacant expression. “Who lives opposite me?” That day he took the elevator with his neighbour and even had a conversation, but who was he? Fang Chen suddenly couldn’t recall his appearance.
Gao Cheng’s face twitched, his voice trembling. “Darn, don’t scare me. Isn’t Nie Shi the one who lives opposite you?”
Fang Chen turned to look at Fan Yingying, who nodded fearfully. “I remember him… He’s pretty tall, and he doesn’t like to talk much.”
Fang Chen thought back carefully, but there was only a vague silhouette in his mind. As Fan Yingying described him, the outline gradually became clearer, giving off a hint of familiarity.
“I don’t want to live here anymore,” Fan Yingying interrupted Fang Chen’s train of thoughts. Her eyes were brimmed with tears once again. “I can’t take it anymore. I want to move back home and live with my parents.”
Gao Cheng scratched his head. “Then let’s end it here for now? It’s getting late, and I’m about to be late for work.”
No matter the scale of the incident, even if those strange occurrences came rushing at them, life still had to go on.
Before leaving, Fang Chen asked, “Do you remember your parents’ phone number?”
Fan Yingying was momentarily caught off guard by his question. “Of course.”
Only his memory seemed to be affected.
Fang Chen pursed his lips and nodded. “That’s good then.”
Fan Yingying didn’t dare to stay alone, so she came out with the two. She attended a nearby university and had no classes that morning. As they walked, she gave her family a call.
Gao Cheng boldly stopped someone to inquire about the couple on the first floor, but the response he got was the same as Fang Chen’s.
Gao Cheng carelessly wiped the sweat off his forehead and forced a smile. “It’s really strange, huh?” But he still held onto a glimmer of hope—maybe that person he just asked didn’t actually know that couple at all in the first place?
They parted ways at the intersection. Frankly speaking, Fang Chen didn’t feel that he could continue working in his current state. But other than work, should he just stay at home? The coldness pressed against his cheek from last night seemed to penetrate deep into his bones through his skin and flesh, and just the thought of it made him shiver uncontrollably.
He couldn’t remember anything and had nowhere else to go.
Fan Yingying had already called her family and was walking alongside Fang Chen. She secretly looked at his side profile and couldn’t help but move closer.
She wanted to converse more with him.
“Do you think Auntie Wu and Uncle Wu… are really dead?”
“I don’t know.”
“I live right across from them… for a while, I used to hear them arguing.”
Fang Chen finally turned to look at her.
Despite her fear, she couldn’t resist continuing speaking, “About the matter concerning their daughter and the house.”
The couple’s voices were indeed undeniably loud; she could often overhear their arguments.
They had two children, both already working. The younger son seemed to be involved in electronic mechanics and had spent quite a fortune to open a shopfront. Eventually, he incurred losses and borrowed a high-interest loan. The debt ultimately fell on the elder daughter’s shoulders.
Fang Chen listened in silence.
Occasionally, Fan Yingying would find that Fang Chen was quite frightful, like now. As she narrated this matter, she felt a strange calmness from Fang Chen.
But something was undeniable; she had been captivated.
Later, when the younger son wanted to buy an apartment, the couple gave him their accumulated wealth. They even asked the elder daughter to contribute a portion. Perhaps due to immense pressure, the elder daughter took her own life in the rented apartment.
Fang Chen thought of Mrs. Wu’s expression when she talked about her daughter. She felt aggrieved for not receiving compensation from the landlord, yet she appeared extremely indifferent to her daughter’s death.
“I’m the only child of my family, so my parents dote on me a lot.” While speaking, Fan Yingying began to sense the oppressive atmosphere. “They give me whatever I want… I can’t imagine such favouritism.”
Fang Chen’s pupils were light in colour, transforming into a beautiful amber in the sunlight. His delicate and soft hair, along with lips naturally curved upward, could easily charm others. It was especially so when he gazed at others with those eyes that occasionally showed a dazed expression, capable of softening people’s hearts.
Fang Chen had glanced at her several times as she was speaking, and a gentle rosy hue appeared on her cheeks.
However, unbeknownst to her, Fang Chen was simply marvelling at Fan Yingying’s unpredictability. Just moments ago, she was terrified, and now she was discussing the deceased couple. It appeared that her mental fortitude exceeded his own.
The bright sun hung high above their heads. They themselves were very strange too, it was just that neither of them seemed to realize it.
Okay, now 3 persons remember old couple
Thank you for your translation 💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙
Ty for translating!