Chapter 36
Having secured the merman doll possessing Xiao Zhou’s spirit, the iron door leading back to the hall could finally be opened once again.
As soon as he opened the door, Si Chen froze. The burned out hall looked completely new. It even had electricity.
A red number appeared on the display screen of the elevator. It was stopped at the first floor.
In the entire hall, the only source of light was one pale lamp hanging near the elevator. When the wind blew, it swayed.
At the reception desk, a woman in a nurse uniform had her back to them. Her skin was an abnormal bluish-gray.
Because he detected no energy fluctuations, Si Chen walked over to her with confidence.
Yu Lian, who was following behind, turned pale, “No! Dad! There’s someone in this fucking hall!”
Si Chen walked over to take a look. It was just a mannequin at the reception desk.
It wore a wig that looked to be made of fiberglass. Its eyes and a mouth were crudely drawn with a black oil-based pen.
The Xiao Zhou merman doll in his hand made a sound, “Ugly, thing.”
Yu Lian: “…Damn it, how is this doll still able to talk?”
Maybe because he’d been punctured, Yu Lian couldn’t maintain his original human form. The slightest bump caused his body to deform. For a while his arm would drag across the ground and for a while, his neck would loll to the side.
In Si Chen’s opinion, Yu Lian’s exaggerated form was scarier than any ghost.
The nurse mannequin was facing the elevator, an exaggerated smile on her face.
There was a note in her pocket.
Si Chen took it out and took a look. It was a patient’s medical bill. On it was written a bunch of medicines with vague names, the nursing fees, diagnosis and treatment fees. It came up to 20,000 yuan monthly.
The rehabilitation center was fully enclosed and the hospitalization fee was not cheap.
Si Chen crumpled up the bill and threw it into the trash can at the corner of the reception desk.
He originally wanted to leave immediately but he unexpectedly discovered that there was a measuring scale on the receptionist’s cabinet. It appeared to be used for weighing medicines.
Si Chen put the merman doll on it and weighed it. The scale displayed its weight. — 180 grams.
Xiao Zhou was very puzzled, “What are, you doing?”
Si Chen: “…Occupational habit. I’m sorry.”
When he first entered the laboratory, Si Chen often weighed materials and ingredients.
The merman raised the trident and thrust the fork into the keyhole of the reception desk drawer.
Two completely different supernatural forces confronted each other and in the end, the trident prevailed.
The small drawer was pried open and inside were sheets of banknotes.
Xiao Zhou wanted to pick up the banknotes but his hands were ball-shaped like Doraemon’s, so he had to say to Si Chen, “You guys, take it.”
Si Chen didn’t withdraw the money immediately. Instead, he squeezed Xiao Zhou’s other hand rather curiously.
Sure enough, the top of the hand was loaded with a magnet. No wonder it was able to hold the trident.
To some extent, the design of this doll was quite scientific.
The drawer contained ten 2,000 denominated bills. It was translucent white, printed with a pattern in the shape of a heart, with chains running across the surface.
Paper money is no longer seen in modern society. Everyone now uses electronic currency with the ins and outs of where that money came from clearly recorded.
Si Chen has only seen similar things in popular science books.
At the bottom of the paper money, was printed a row of small characters: LEGAL TENDER FOR THE HOUSE OF THE MIND.
This further confirmed Si Chen’s guess that ‘The House of the Mind’ did not only pertain to this rehabilitation center.
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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Si Chen didn’t insist. He once again dialed the rehabilitation center’s number.
This time, two phones rang. One came from the left; the other, from upstairs.
This ringing sounded pressing, as though urging them to their deaths.
Before them were two choices.
The first one led to the cafeteria on the left; the second took them to the elevator and upstairs.
Si Chen originally planned to take Yu Lian to the cafeteria, but was suddenly held back by Xiao Zhou.
Xiao Zhou pointed to the kitchen knife in Yu Lian’s pocket and said word by word, “This is, the knife, of the cafeteria, cook’s wife.”
Si Chen suddenly realized why that old granny seemed so familiar with the way to the rehabilitation center.
Yu Lian’s legs trembled. “Father, this cook sounds like someone from the rehab center. Maybe we shouldn’t go recruiting someone like that…”
Xiao Zhou thought for a moment. “Go. The cook, has, a key. No, eating.”
Si Chen took a deep breath.
He opened the iron door on the left and was met with a blast of foul smelling hot wind.
It was a standard cafeteria, with a total of fifty dining tables, which can accommodate 200 people to eat at the same time.
As they walked in, the lights in the cafeteria automatically turned on. Most of the lights were concentrated around the dining area.
There were many dolls in the cafeteria.
On the red dining tables were button-eyed dolls in patient attire. On the blue dining table were dolls in other clothes, including doctor’s uniforms, nurse’s uniforms and sanitation worker’s uniforms.
The patient dolls were very crude; they were dirty, with frayed threads all over. The staff dolls were much made more delicately, they even had smiles on their faces.
There was only one cook in the dining area. He was wearing an apron and a tall chef’s hat. He was in the middle of cooking, stirring the hot soup in the pot.
The cook was already very old, his face spotted with livor mortis and his movements stiff.
Si Chen passed him and went straight to the phone in the corner.
He picked up the receiver and Doctor’s voice came over, “The cafeteria of the House of the Mind Rehabilitation Center has always been a stage for publicity. It’s clean, tidy, bright and everything is kept in order. We contracted the best local catering group to do the cooking and gave our center’s patients the best care.”
The doctor let out a strange laugh. “It’s dinner time now. I welcome you to experience dining in our cafeteria, our esteemed guests from afar.”
Si Chen hadn’t spoken yet, but the cook had already sprang into action.
He took out two palm-sized rag dolls from the vegetable basket and pressed them down on the cutting board.
The cook was old and wrinkled, but his hands were the hands of a young man, plump and moist, fair and tender, full of vitality.
He pulled off the butcher’s knife from where it was stuck on the chopping board and chopped up the rag dolls in his hand like they were vegetables.
The chef’s knife skills were superb; his hands were stable as he chopped up the ingredients.
The dolls wailed in pain, the sound was so shrill that it could tear apart one’s soul. They had been cut into clumps of pink cotton wool, which looked like pork that had been run through a meat grinder.
Xiao Zhou’s voice turned furious and he raised the fork-like trident in his hand. “Save…save! Kill!”
The cooking area was blocked off by transparent glass and locked. Like a shield, it protected the person inside.
Si Chen punched the glass.
The glass trembled but didn’t shatter. The chef’s hand paused briefly from its chopping but he didn’t even look up.
The cut dolls were thrown into the bubbling soup and a strange aroma soon wafted out of the pot.
Yu Lian’s nose twitched: “…It smells so good.”
After having the Eternal Life Abyss implanted inside him, Si Chen’s sense of taste and smell had undergone some changes. Especially when it came to food.
He too smelled the aroma but to him it smelled like spoiled crayfish fried in gutter oil. The good smell was there but it couldn’t hide the rotten smell underneath.
Si Chen turned his head sideways. Yu Lian was staring intently at the pot. He kept gulping, swallowing down his saliva. “…Father, aren’t you hungry? I’m so hungry.”
Desire for food is the most basic and primitive desire of human beings.
A person may choose to commit suicide by jumping off a building but he would never choose to starve himself to death.
In some ancient and backwards places where divorce is not allowed, there is even a custom that both parties could divorce after 5 days of refusing to eat.
The desire to eat caused by hunger could truly drive people crazy.
Si Chen instinctively sensed something was wrong.
He said, “You, go out.”
Yu Lian’s eyes were bloodshot. “Father, the food’s going to be ready soon. Why do you want me to go out? I’m so hungry.”
There was an eerie smile on the chef’s face.
This just shows that “Mother, hungry. Food, food” is a fate that no good child could escape, not even stray ones.
Si Chen looked at the doll in his hand. “What’s going on?”
Xiao Zhou replied slowly “I, can’t smell, it.”
Si Chen has seen people addicted to dopamine tablets. When addicts want a hit, they forget even friends and family; they would sell their soul to whichever drug dealer gives them their dopamine tablet.
Yu Lian displayed somewhat similar symptoms to early addiction.
Saliva was already dripping from the corner of Yu Lian’s mouth.
Si Chen picked him up and proceeded to take him out of the cafeteria. But Yu Lian put up a fierce struggle. “What are you doing? Father! I want to eat too! Do you want to have it all to yourself?”
The aroma was getting stronger and stronger.
Yu Lian’s eyes had gone completely red.
As soon as Si Chen put him down, Yu Lian scrambled, wanting to go back to the cafeteria for his dinner.
Si Chen was now angry. “I thought you were scared of ghosts! Now you want to eat food that a ghost prepared! You’d actually dare you eat it?”
Yu Lian turned a deaf ear and even bit down hard on Si Chen’s wrist. A strange howling sound came from his mouth.
When all was said and done, Yu Lian was still an Evolutionary on the Second Step and his bite still stung.
Si Chen backhanded and then punched him in the face.
Half of Yu Lian’s face went numb and his mouth went slack.
Because of the excruciating pain, he briefly regained lucidity.
Although he was somewhat of a joker, Yu Lian himself was not stupid.
Yu Lian spoke with difficulty, “Si Chen, tie me up.”
Actually, even had he not said anything, Si Chen was already planning on doing it anyway.
He used the iron chains and tied up Yu Lian like he was a piece of ham. His arms and legs were also pulled out and tied together. Finally, Si Chen gathered the ends in a knot.
Si Chen took the kitchen knife that Yu Lian had been carrying as a weapon.
Leaving him in hall wasn’t safe so Si Chen carried him back with him to the cafeteria.
By now, the cook had already finished cooking the meal.
With a ball of cloth stuffed in Yu Lian’s mouth, Si Chen threw him onto a dining table in the cafeteria. He was screaming, tears, saliva, and snot dripped all over his face.
The cook fished out the stewed meatballs from the boiling soup. They were red, thick and juicy. He poured the stewed meat and soup over a cup of steaming white rice.
The rice though wasn’t rice, it was clearly wriggling maggots.
The rich aroma spread.
As a human, Si Chen had to admit that it smelled delicious; it was only that the ingredients were so unappetizing that he couldn’t even imagine eating it.
But the Eternal Life Abyss obviously didn’t think so. “Smelly, stinky!”
The cook didn’t know why but Si Chen seemed completely unaffected; he was even sharpening a kitchen knife as he waited to one side.
The cook’s movements became more and more sluggish.
Only that as the canteen’s cook, sooner or later, he had to finish and serve the meal.
Yu Lian twisted and writhed atop the dining table. He fell off the dining table and squirming, tried to crawl towards the cook’s window.
The final touches, chopped green scallions, were sprinkled on top.
The chef finally stretched out his hand, stiffly opened the glass partition’s window and quickly flung the dinner plate through the opening.
He hurriedly withdrew his hand, trying to put down the partition once again.
However, a slender, white hand had firmly grabbed onto his fingertips.
A thick layer of grease covered the cook’s hands, a natural lubrication.
If it wasn’t for the Eternal Life Abyss, appearing through the gap in the back of his hand and holding tightly onto the hand, the cook might have even slipped away.
The pitch-black tentacles of the Eternal Life Abyss wrapped around the back of the cook’s hand like vines.
The cook let out a piercing shriek. Instantly, all the dolls in the cafeteria came to life.
They raised their forks and knives, skipping towards Si Chen.
Xiao Zhou popped up from Si Chen’s coat pocket and also let out a scream.
His voice still sounded harsh but it sounded way better than the cook’s.
The dolls in the hospital gowns froze.
They suddenly turned around and stabbed their cutlery into the bodies of the worker dolls around them.
Not only were these worker dolls made with exquisite workmanship, their weapons were also sharper.
However, the number of patient dolls was simply overwhelming.
The worker dolls were beaten up until their faces were blue, black and swollen. White cotton balls flew out of their bodies.
The patient dolls were crying and laughing. The whole cafeteria was thrown into chaos, filled with the sounds of clashing knives and forks. It sounded like numerous dishwashers at work in the kitchens.
The rings on the tentacles of the Eternal Life Abyss were tightly attached to the cook’s skin. Not only did its tentacles have mouths, they also had eyes.
The Eternal Life Abyss’ eyeballs rolled around, stopping at Si Chen’s face.
There was a strange taste in Si Chen’s mouth, as if he were gnawing on piece of smoked pigskin that had gone from over-smoked to charred.
This High-Dimensional Creature was already old and didn’t have much meat.
Soon, it shrank into a ball of shriveled skin; like a sea fish after being exposed to the sun.
The Eternal Life Abyss let go and spat out a few small bones. “Yucky!”
After a while, it wrapped its tentacles around Si Chen’s neck. It was slippery like a snake. “Mom, Pretty.”
The Eternal Life Abyss twisted itself into little waves.
If only it didn’t look so completely wrong, Si Chen could have happily acted like a doting mother to his filial son.
He patted the Eternal Life Abyss’ tentacles and said, “Go back.”
The dark tentacles that came out slowly retracted back into Si Chen’s hand.
Although it hadn’t been very tasty, the Eternal Life Abyss was still satiated; though it did feel that this meal was an insult to its stomach.
Si Chen held the arm that looked like dry wood in his hand and pulled the cook out through the window.
There, in the middle of the dried out cook’s chest, was a golden key.
Baby got to eat a little but is still hungry. Baby will eat all the bad guys that are tasty. Thanks for the update 🤣❤️🤣❤️🤣
Xiao Zhou is cute~ A little merman doll holding a trident with the power of its magnet hands and communicating with the other dolls to assist Si Chen? Wonderful! I hope he either becomes a companion even outside the instances, or that after defeating the Doctor, his soul may be able to rest in peace and reincarnate into a happy family.
Thank you for the chapter!
Oh, golden key sounds like something from fairy tales
Thank you for your translation 💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝💝
The eternal abyss is so cute, can’t wait for more interactions! Thanks for the chapter!!
Yes, you are a pretty boy🤭
Thanks for the chapter 🌹