Translator-Rhapsodite
Editor-CherryApple, Proofreader-adjective
The one-legged tin soldier emerged from the maze of cluttered bookshelves with a scowl on his face and Jiang Fang in tow. Nan Zhou was seated on the floor near the chess table.
He had one foot pressed against the crack of the door, worried that the door might suddenly close.
The light coming through the door was like a vine, climbing along with his ankles and wrists, casting a bright streak of brilliance on his body, giving them the impression that he was made of light itself.
Jiang Fang’s book was laid out on his lap, closed.
Nan Zhou was sitting close to the mummified corpse.
The dry corpse sat on the bench, frozen like a statue.
No one knew how long it had been trapped here.
Its clothes were rotting, skin peeling off, barely maintaining a human frame.
Because it had been facing the chessboard for so long, its back was hunched over as if it were carrying a very heavy load.
Even so, as the light streamed in, it ignored the skin and flesh peeling from its body, struggling to lift its face from the chessboard, yearning, greedy, and full of desire for the light outside.
This was as far as it could reach with all its strength.
When Jiang Fang came out, Nan Zhou was trying to strike up a conversation with it:
Nan Zhou, “How long have you been here?”
Corpse, “……”
Nan Zhou, “A long time, you should’ve been a player too.”
Corpse, “……”
Nan Zhou, “Do you understand me?”
Corpse, “……”
Nan Zhou, “Hello?”
Nan Zhou’s perseverance made his face, which normally looked so cold as if he did not eat human fireworks, look extremely vivid and welcoming.
The one-legged tin soldier put Jiang Fang down, jumped step by step, and went back to the depths of the bookshelf to find Li Yinhang.
Since the game was over. Jiang Fang, who was slowly regaining his memories from the book, smiled lightly and stepped forward, “What are you talking about? Can I join in with you?”
Nan Zhou stopped his one-sided conversation with the corpse and looked at Jiang Fang, “That was a very dangerous situation, you were careless.”
Jiang Fang completely undid the scorpion-tail braid that had come loose during the chase, and while re-braiding it, he said lightly, “The plan was only for my memories up until nineteen to be eaten, at worst up to twenty-two.”
However, the tin soldiers who patrolled every half an hour became a variable that changed the course of the original plan.
The safest play would’ve been if they could turn the game within the half hour when the soldiers weren’t patrolling.
Nan Zhou still disapproved of his risky move, “You could have waited a little longer.”
Jiang Fang shrugged indifferently: “There can only be three winners. I just waited for the right opportunity. If I missed this chance, who knows how long it would take for another ideal ‘checkmate’ situation to occur again?”
Saying that, he gently tilted his head and gave Nan Zhou another brilliant and matchless smile, “Besides, I trust you.”
For some reason, Nan Zhou wasn’t quite willing to face him.
He replied vaguely, “Well…”
He returned Jiang Fang’s book back to him.
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.
Aljcu Mjcu abbx la. “Glv sbe qffx ja la?”
Rjc Itbe rtbbx tlr tfjv, “Rb.”
Aljcu Mjcu, “……” Kmt.
Lf mbeivc’a vfmlvf ktfatfg tf kjr tjqqs bg ogeragjafv.
Ktlr kjr jc jvvlalbcji yfa atja Aljcu Mjcu rfa obg tlwrfio bearlvf bo atf lcrajcmf.
Lf yfa bc Rjc Itbe’r meglbrlas atja tf kbeiv ifa tlw qffx lcab tlr rfmgfar.
Ever since he got reunited with Nan Zhou on the bus, Jiang Fang had been wondering whether to tell him about the past or to start from scratch.
Some things couldn’t be explained in words, he wanted to let Nan Zhou know, but was afraid of how he would react to it.
Therefore, he chose to take a risk through the game and entrust his thoughts and memories to Nan Zhou.
He gambled that Nan Zhou would open it.
But, once again, he lost.
Somehow, every time Jiang Fang wanted to gamble with Nan Zhou, he was bound to lose.
Jiang Fang laughed to himself. When he took back the book, his fingertips gave a subtle shake.
Probably because the book was forced to eat nine-tenths of his memory and now forced to vomit it out, all in less than a few minutes, it was in a bad mood.
As a result, Jiang Fang’s memory was restored slowly.
There was a touch of unfamiliarity when memories were re-injected into the brain, thus Jiang Fang took some time to adjust and understand.
The story was written from the third-person perspective.
Among the countless fast-flashing memory fragments, Jiang Fang found strange and unfamiliar contents in his memories after he was nine years old.
——He seems to have owned a magical treehouse with a floor area of about twenty square meters on a huge tree.
“The house was built by Jiang Fang and his parents.”
“The house had an endless supply of desserts and fruits, countless toys to play with, and endless books to read. There were also photos of Jiang Fang’s family, a warm and cozy fireplace, the softest bed in the world accompanied with the softest blanket.”
“And every time he encountered painful things, he would hide here.”
“When he was sad, the sky would cry with him.”
“The rain fell on the wooden roof, and a warm fire burned on the tame charcoal, creating a calm and comforting white noise.”
“He slept peacefully to the sound of the rain and the fire.”
“Once he woke up, all the pain would fade away.”
Jiang Fang frowned slightly.
The contents of this memory contradicted his logic.
His original home was in a city.
A few kilometers away from home, there was a park with a forest.
When he was a child, his father had taken his mother and him for picnics there.
But after he turned nine years old, he had no such memories.
He ran around both through the surface and undergrounds of Kiev.
He had to send his mother to a sobriety and drug rehabilitation center, so where was the room to buy a bed and blankets for himself?
Even if such an ideal harbor did exist, he would have no time to live there.
As for the photos with his parents, they were clearly a fabrication.
After a drunken night out, his mother burned all the pictures of him and his father in the house.
The ten-year-old Jiang Fang tried to hide the last photo in his wallet, but his mother, who was on the verge of madness, took it away.
He could only watch as the photos, along with the wallet his father had bought him, were swallowed up by the fire.
In a sense, children needed this kind of safe haven treehouse where they could run to after being hit and heal their wounded hearts.
……
Although, the source of this strange memory could be easily traced back.
Jiang Fang’s silver eyes lowered slightly, and a warm feeling crawled up to his heart.
Someone, after receiving his book, wanted to create a warm memory for him.
The false memory of him covered with the world’s softest blanket, sleeping in the world’s softest bed, was a gentle memory drawn in a lead-gray color.
… The gray was very similar to the pencil that Nan Zhou used to draw sketches.
There was a flood of warmth that poured into Jiang Fang’s heart.
The slight stinging pain hidden behind the warmth made him almost a little panicky.
To conceal the sentiment in his heart that was on the verge of breaking through, Jiang Fang deliberately put on a face of indifference and asked with a smile, “Still lying?”
Nan Zhou sighed softly.
It seemed that this book did not absorb and assimilate the memories that didn’t belong to the original owner.
So, he said honestly, “I didn’t peek.”
“I used the table of contents to find the chapter where you were nine years old and wrote in the blank space with a pen. The rest of your story, I had it covered and didn’t even take a glance at it.”
Jiang Fang did not expect that the more he talked to Nan Zhou, the more he could not restrain the feelings in his heart.
When it came to love, he just couldn’t admit that he liked someone.
So, he somewhat unconsciously began to pick at the holes of that wonderful story, “How could someone light a fire in the treehouse?”
Nan Zhou, “I told you, it was a safe fireplace and the fire was from charcoal.”
He emphasized it twice.
Jiang Fang, “Desserts and fruits, you’re the one who wants to eat it, right?”
Nan Zhou, “Yes, that’s a very happy memory.”
Jiang Fang, “When a person is sad, the sky will not rain specifically for them. Besides, when it rains, the treehouse will become wet and damp.”
Nan Zhou, “I know. But the sound of falling rain will make people feel calm. I wanted it to rain in your story, so, it will rain.”
Jiang Fang laughed, “That’s a fairy tale, not reality.”
Nan Zhou, “I know.”
“But, I want to give you fairy tales.”
Jiang Fang was dumbfounded.
He laughed and rubbed his head, saying in a serious tone, “How did you grow up so fast ah~”
How could there be such a delicate flower blossom in that lonely, miserable, unclean, dark, never-ending mud puddle?
Nan Zhou showed his usual seriousness and replied, “I’m getting older every day.”
Nan Zhou thought for a moment, and combined with his own experience, he said, “Some fairy tales are false, and some may be true. But if you don’t believe in them, they will never be true.”
Jiang Fang stared at the tear mole under Nan Zhou’s eyes.
The fairy tale he once believed and later refused to believe was now standing in front of him, alive.
Warm cheeks and bright eyes.
In the end, Jiang Fang only smiled sincerely.
“Okay, I’ll believe it.”
The memories of the treehouse were gradually corrected and erased from Jiang Fang’s memory.
But the warmth it gave him stayed in his heart.
Like a warm and fluffy kitten that was pawing at his heart.
Suddenly, from the maze of bookshelves, the one-legged tin soldier crookedly poked its head out from above one of the bookshelves.
Annoyed, it said, “Please tell your friend to come out properly and stop hiding! I explained to her that the game was over, but she wouldn’t listen to me!”
Nan Zhou found that Li Yinhang still hadn’t come out.
At a time like this, she was quite scared out of her wits.
It wasn’t a safety guarantee from her teammates. She thought it was fake, a trick to lure her into a trap.
Even though the sounds of leather boots chasing behind her had disappeared, she still did not believe anything that the tin soldier said and ran through the bookshelves like a rabbit, weaving and hiding between bookcases.
The tin soldier relied on one leg, so he couldn’t catch up to her.
After a long rest, Nan Zhou’s fatigue had also eased a lot.
He stood up, after instructing Jiang Fang to watch the door, he stepped forward towards the maze of bookshelves.
While passing by Jiang Fang, he accidentally bumped into his shoulder.
Jiang Fang, who was slightly distracted, failed to hold his book and it fell to the ground with a thud.
Jiang Fang indicated that he would pick it up and let Nan Zhou go first.
So Nan Zhou quickly walked towards the depths of the bookshelf.
Jiang Fang’s book tumbled to the ground, spine first.
The book was facing upwards, and a page was presented.
There were still some words on the page that had not disappeared yet.
When Jiang Fang was about to bend down to pick it up, he couldn’t help but freeze when he saw the words on it.
[“Boss, we can do anything you want, but letting him out, no way.”]
[“He’s a BOSS of an instance, you can’t treat him like a human just because he has a human face, right?”]
[“He’s in your backpack now, so of course, you have the final say. But why do you have to let him out? This is the safest way.”]
[How can you be sure that he won’t hurt us?]
[I’ve never played “Eternal Day” and I’ve never killed him, but he’s the instance BOSS with the highest death rate, and everyone knows that. Boss, don’t make it hard for us, okay? You want us to believe that he will have good intentions towards us players?”]
[Jiang Fang was silent and thoughtful as he heard the collective protest of his teammates.]
[A moment later, he said, “Then I’ll let him out after a while.”]
Jiang Fang lowered his eyelashes, he picked up the book and pinched the seam of the book, holding it firmly in his hand.
As if it was a past he couldn’t bear to look back at.
Aww, he had ZhouZhou in his pocket! 😂
And it was really sweet, how he wanted to make a fairy tale real for Jiang Fang. 🥰Thanks for the chapter!
Thank you for the chapter!
Thank you for the update!
Thank you for the update ❤️💯
Ahh this story is so good! I barely slept because I couldn’t out it down ahah.
Thank you for your hard work!