Tian Zhu hadn’t tried to catch himself as he fell.
Just like so many times before, he accepted the violent attempt for what it was, allowing himself to fall backwards and only twisting his body a bit to brace himself for the impact.
Each floor of the building was quite high, and so the stairs weren’t exactly short. He heard a crack as he landed on his arm, accompanied by bursts of pain wherever he hit the ground. Arm, shoulder, waist and cheek – the cold stone hit his body.
Not too long later, he found himself in the hospital.
In general there was no reason for someone to stay at a hospital just because of a broken arm… but the hospital belonged to one of his father’s friends, and the director was very tolerant towards any and all of Ling Xian’s wishes.
“He was a bit unsteady on his feet all day”, Ling Xian sighed, perfecting the appearance of a worried older brother in front of the older female doctor. “He hasn’t been sleeping a lot due to stress lately. You know, problems with his studies.”
“Has he been taking in a lot of caffeine?”, the doctor asked, keeping her voice low so as to not disturb Tian Zhu, who was lying behind a partition.
Tian Zhu watched the silhouettes of the two people dancing on the thin partition from the other side, inside the bed. It was hard for him to stay awake – the caffeine had stopped working and the withdrawal resumed.
“Yes. It’s been worrying me a lot, but… I can’t control him.” Ling Xian shrugged helplessly. “Would it be alright for you to watch over him for a few days?”
The doctor had gotten her orders. Unless Ling Xian made a larger request, she should just agree. Giving away a bed was really nothing too bothersome for them, so she nodded.
“We will watch over him”, she promised gently.
Tian Zhu closed his tired eyes.
Funnily enough, caffeine withdrawal symptoms included tiredness and nausea, which worked very well with his actual withdrawal symptoms of being constantly sleepy and unable to eat.
Paired with a very limited monitoring, they’d not think to check further. Tian Zhu guessed that he’d be left alone – that is, locked up – in here for a few days, with a nurse bringing food and that was it.
This way, Ling Xian could keep him away from Shu Yun. Convenient.
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.
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Worried, he exhaled through his nose.
A broken arm would be an incredible hassle. Or would it be fixed inside the dream, just like his withdrawal?
He hoped that’d be the case. He’d hate being unable to move an arm, although an arm was still better than a leg.
Bruises could heal within two weeks, especially if he iced the bruises right away. The next game was a bit over a week away, so it might be a bit better by then.
Tian Zhu let his mind wander.
Whatever.
Left alone, he took out his phone. Aspen had been whining for a while, wanting contact again. Tian Zhu sent him a message first, then called.
“Good afternoon”, he started in a tired voice.
“Is it? Hi! How rare for you to call me! You sound tired?”
“Took a caffeine pill and the effects are gone now.” Tian Zhu yawned audibly. On the other side, he could hear Aspen move around and the rustling of a blanket. “Are you not in the bathroom?”
“Nope, I’m lying on the bed with my back to the camera. They can’t see me talk. Did you know that this phone is invisible to others?”
“I didn’t.” But it was a good piece of information.
The feeling of tiredness, exhaustion and nausea slowly came back. Tian Zhu sank deeper into the hospital bed and placed the phone next to his ear.
Eyelashes flickering, he started slurring his voice. “How was your day?”
For several seconds, there was no response. Then he heard someone inhale, pause, and exhale again.
A question like that was too weird for Tian Zhu, but Aspen decided against asking about it. He went along with it without digging for the reason.
“I’ve been watching some good movies and series lately. Do you like horror? There’s a series based on the dreams of the Gamblers, pretty interesting. Hardly similar to the actual situation, but still fun.”
Aspen paused. There was no comment from Tian Zhu, so he kept on talking.
“It’s a bit annoying when you’ve got nothing to do all day. I basically binge whatever series I watch, so I tend to wait until one is completed before I start it. The good thing is, no one disturbs me while I’m watching, so I can enjoy it in peace.”
Disturb…
Tian Zhu cracked his eyes open to glance at the phone on loudspeaker. His dry lips opened.
“Aspen…”
“What is it?”
“Why did you kill your family?”
The silence that fell continued on for so long that Tian Zhu wondered if Aspen would speak at all. There was a long sigh before Aspen opened his mouth again.
“You mean my trigger, huh?” He laughed dryly. “You don’t mind if I start the story a bit earlier, do you?”
Tian Zhu hummed to give his agreement.
“I… wasn’t a normal child in the first place. I started catching and killing bugs even when I was a kid – not ants or something like that. Cicadas, for example. Bugs that were loud. I was constantly running away from home to escape the cries of my two little siblings – newborns cry a lot, but I hated it. I didn’t know what to do about the noise.”
“There was one time… one time my parents weren’t in the room, and my little sister was crying again. I took a pillow and pushed it down on her – not to kill her or anything, I just wanted the noise to be more quiet. My mother caught me doing it. After that they sent me to some sort of therapy. I hated that place, but I quickly realized the discrepancy between my own thoughts and everyone else.”
“So I adjusted. I started getting along with people normally, forcing myself to endure it. I avoided staying at home, where it was noisy, and instead wandered around outside. At that time… I started going for bigger animals. Not out of malice, if that makes any sense.”
A short break.
“…Are you still there?”
“I’m listening”, Tian Zhu whispered back.
“I got attached to technology during my teenage years. I loved how easy it was to just push a button and mute it, or turn it off entirely. The first time I killed a bird, I started taking it apart like you’d do with a machine. I wanted to see what made so much noise. I was thinking, wouldn’t it be nice if you could mute living beings like machines, too? After that, hng…”
A sound as if someone messed up their hair.
“It’s like… God, it’s so hard to explain. I continued killing smaller animals. Not pets. Usually frogs, sometimes injured cats or birds I found. It calmed me. If I went after them, I didn’t go after the humans that irritated me. I could handle being normal during the day, then let everything out at night. Like revenge fantasies? Is that what you’d call it?”
“You used it as an outlet”, Tian Zhu agreed in an airy voice. “But something happened?”
“My older sister. She had a boyfriend – not a good guy. If you asked him, he’d have liked having a threesome with me too, and he made that painfully obvious every time we met. It pissed my sister off, to no end. She always said that I was seducing him and that I was a bastard for trying to steal her boyfriend. Then Christmas came.”
“Her boyfriend broke up with her on Christmas. She snapped, screaming at me like she was insane and crying. My little sister fanned the flames, saying that our older sister must be pretty bad in bed for him to go after a guy instead. Our parents… they were always distant from me – after all, they knew I wasn’t quite normal. I wasn’t mistreated or anything, but they tended to be on my siblings’ sides.”
Author’s Note
So now we finally hear a bit more about Aspen’s past….
I keep on forgetting to set schedules, sigh
Thank you for the chapter!! <3
We’re learning more about Aspen 💕
Thank you for the chapter! New reader btw😁
Anyways, it’s quite an interesting take on the whole unlimited flow
genre with their (mostly) unstable MCs, and your description of both
their mindsets feel natural. (Especially Aspen; most of the time the MCs
don’t have any problems with killing, but the reason given is only that
they are “such a badass” or a “complicated history”. Seeing something
that could be a real medical condition not being named but shown in his
thought process and actions is really refreshing, good job!) The
mysterys up til now are good, not the most complex ones but that works
perfectly with the length of the Arc and the main focus being on the
interaction between those two.Thank you for your hard work, can’t wait to see how the story unfolds
It’s my first time writing an Unlimited Flow and it ended up being waaaaay harder than I expected, so I’m always relieved to hear that the games aren’t boring C:
Anyways, it’s quite an interesting take on the whole unlimited flow
genre with their (mostly) unstable MCs, and your description of both
their mindsets feel natural. (Especially Aspen; most of the time the MCs
don’t have any problems with killing, but the reason given is only that
they are “such a badass” or a “complicated history”. Seeing something
that could be a real medical condition not being named but shown in his
thought process and actions is really refreshing, good job!) The
mysterys up til now are good, not the most complex ones but that works
perfectly with the length of the Arc and the main focus being on the
interaction between those two.Thank you for your hard work, can’t wait to see how the story unfolds.(oh, and could you maybe put a note on the first chapter or in the description on SH that this is where you post the latest chapters? I would have liked to read those first chapters on here too to support you better)
Aspen’s sister shouldn’t have cling to that kind of man. Disgusting scum.