"Yiyi..."
"Yiyi..."
A faint call awakened the little girl from her sleep.
Gloomy deep night.
In the small square bedroom, a little girl with long black hair was sleeping on an oak bed.
A grayish-white quilt covered her up to her shoulders, barely revealing the washed-out lotus lace of her nightgown.
The little girl appeared to be only seven or eight years old, with delicate features, a slightly high nose bridge, and two red pimples on her chin. She seemed to be just beginning to understand the world around her.
Upon hearing the sound, she slowly opened her eyes from her slumber, straightened her torso, and looked around.
The room was pitch dark except for a dim moonlight vaguely casting light at the foot of the bed.
At the foot of the bed.
There.
Stood a dark figure.
The upper body of the figure was submerged in darkness, its face unclear.
But she could feel it, it was quietly watching the little girl.
"Mom?"
The little girl cautiously uttered a word, asking.
She grasped the quilt tightly with both hands, her expression tense, sensing something was off.
The surrounding was eerily silent, only her voice piercingly sharp and conspicuous, faintly echoing around the room.
"Remember... Yiyi, no matter what sound you hear, you must hide in the secret chamber, and don't come out until the white stone turns black..."
The figure whispered softly.
"Never..."
"Don't come out..."
After speaking, she slowly turned around and silently walked towards the door.
The wooden door opened noiselessly, and beyond it was pitch darkness, as if welcoming her, quickly swallowing her completely.
"Mum... Mummy!!" The little girl seemed to sense something, fiercely threw off the quilt, and got up wanting to chase.
Bang!!!
A loud sound, accompanied by a great vibration, burst sharply near her ear.
Hiss!!!
The little girl abruptly opened her eyes, arching her chest from the bed, taking a deep breath.
It had just been a dream.
Her eyes widened in fear, her pupils dilated, her consciousness slowly cleared from the groggy dream.
Bang!
Another loud sound.
The whole room seemed to tremble and sway.
The wooden door of the room trembled violently, emitting one thud after another, as if a giant beast were wildly ramming it.
Bang! Bang! Bang!!
The enormous thuds seemed about to completely shatter the door.
Fine cracks slowly emerged and spread across the surface of the door.
The girl snapped back to reality, recalling the voice she had heard in her dream.
"Mum..." For some reason, tears suddenly filled her eyes, a pain indescribable rising in her heart.
But hearing the loud noise and recalling the words, she quickly threw off the quilt, jumped down from the bed, and glanced at the wooden door.
Crack!
The wooden door suddenly broke open, and shards of wood splintered inward, scattering on the brown earth floor.
The girl's body shivered, her heart thumping wildly, her face pale as she quickly bent down and crawled under the bed.
She crawled a few times under there, found a hidden black mud board, grabbed the handle, and laboriously pulled it open.
Under the mud board was a small square space just large enough for her to curl up in.
Within the space, the walls were embedded with white stones of various sizes.
The stones were irregularly shaped, but they all had one thing in common: a complex red symbol was engraved on each surface.
The girl hurriedly crawled in, covered the mud board above her head, and as darkness enveloped her, she shivered and hid in the small space, curling up tightly and listening to the noises outside.
Strangely, as soon as she hid, the thudding outside completely ceased.
It was as if all she had heard was an illusion.
Silence.
No sound at all.
The only thing audible was her own breathing.
The little girl tightly covered her mouth, afraid that her breathing was too loud and might alert something outside.
The immense fear and tension slowly wore down her frail body.
As time passed.
Slowly, the girl fell into a daze.
She didn't know how long it had been.
An hour, or maybe two.
"Yiyi..." A familiar calling voice woke the girl from her slumber.
She moved her body, seemingly trying to make herself more comfortable.
"Yiyi?"
"Yiyi, where are you? Mommy's back."
The voice outside was again faintly heard.
Gentle and familiar.
The terror in the girl's heart seemed to have lessened a lot after her sleep.
Hearing the sound, she quickly moved, wanting to go out.
But suddenly she remembered something, glanced at the white stones embedded in the wall, and through the tiny light coming from the air holes in the mud board, she noticed they hadn't turned black.
According to her mother, it would only be completely safe when the white stones turned black.
The girl's initial desire to go out abruptly halted.
"Yiyi, it's daytime outside now, it's safe, you can come out."
The voice spoke again.
"Don't worry, with the light, those things won't dare come in. Mommy's here, you can come out."
The girl calculated the time, usually around this time, mom should be coming back.
Every time she hid in this small space and slept, she would see her mom when she came out.
This time it should be no exception.
As for the white stones embedded in the wall, perhaps it was just that too much time had passed, and during the day the stones remained white.
The girl thought for a moment. Then, she looked up again and peered outside through the ventilation hole in the mud board.
She saw a faint white light indeed outside.
The dawn broke.
Finally, she felt relieved.
"Here I come!"
She responded.
"Mom, I'm here."
She started to move her body, reaching upwards with her small hands to push the mud board above her head.
Soon, she pushed open the mud board, struggled to pull her head out of the small space, and returned under the bed.
Then she looked outside.
"!!??"
Outside.
It was still dark.
Wasn't it supposed to be daylight?
The little girl's scalp tingled instantly.
Realizing something was wrong, she clenched her teeth and quickly squatted down, trying to shrink back into the small space.
Pat.
Pat.
Suddenly, a pair of pale feet wearing her mother's cloth shoes approached the bed and stopped.
"Yiyi... my dear daughter, where are you?" the soft and familiar voice came again.
The little girl dared not make a sound, covering her mouth tightly as tears streamed down her face.
But she dare not move; at such a close distance, any slight movement would make a noise in the quiet environment and could reveal her presence.
She suddenly remembered that her mother would definitely know about the small space under the bed.
So her mother could not possibly be asking where she was.
At that moment, she realized she might have been deceived...
Pat.
Pat.
Quickly, not getting a response, or perhaps the girl's response from the small space was too quiet to be heard, the feet slowly moved away from the bed and quietly left towards another direction.
The feet moved slowly, making barely any sound, and soon disappeared with the slight sound of a door closing.
All was quiet again.
The little girl kept holding on.
She wasn't sure how much time had passed. After hearing no sound for a while, she slowly exhaled and relaxed, retracting back downward.
The prolonged tension had left her body weak, a ringing in her ears, and her vision slightly blurred.
At this point, she couldn't hold on any longer and leaned against the inner wall of the small space, breathing heavily.
Once she was sure the danger was gone, the little girl waited a bit longer to confirm that there truly wasn't any noise before she laboriously crawled out of the small space, inching her way out from under the bed.
Thump.
Suddenly.
She bumped her shoulder against something.
The little girl stiffened immediately, a bad feeling washing over her.
She slowly raised her head, looking toward the upper right.
A woman in a ragged white dress with long hair was sitting quietly on her wooden bed, her left leg hanging down right over her shoulder.
The woman's long hair hid her face as she looked down at her. Through the slight refraction of moonlight, she could see the woman's pale lips marked by decay.
Whoo!!
The woman's decayed face suddenly came close, enlarging.
*
*
*
"This time, she didn't die."
In the darkness, a muddled voice came through.
It seemed to be a woman.
"She's still alive, um, just injured, very weak. Not to criticize you, but you always bring people back from the woods outside. We don't have much to eat here, and you have to take care of a sick person too..." the woman was speaking.
"No... no... it's okay... mom... told... me...." another voice stuttered gravely in response.
"Stop talking about your mom; listening to you talk is exhausting. Alright, I've stitched up your wound. Just make sure not to get it wet or infected. I'm leaving now." The woman seemed to be packing up.
"Okay... okay... thank... you..." the stuttering girl let out a silly giggle, akin to inhaling air.
"Don't mention it. If it gets too much, remember to drag him outside and leave him by the door; he should be gone by morning," the woman said helplessly.
"Thank... only you... help..." the girl gratefully spoke.
"That's the world for you. Everyone is struggling to survive; no one has the energy to care for others. It's just you; anyone else would probably have thrown him back out into the wild by now," the woman commented.
Yu Hong slowly gathered his strength in the darkness, strained to open his eyes.
He saw a shabbily dressed small girl, talking with a middle-aged woman with yellow skin.
The yellow-skinned woman was wearing glasses and a grayish white long-sleeved dress, stained with various marks.
All he remembered was that he was tired from work, came home, went straight to sleep, and then suddenly woke to some noise in the middle of the night, followed by a pain in his forehead, then knew nothing else.
"Here... is..." he tried to speak, but his throat felt like it was being cut, making it impossible to make a sound; only raspy breaths escaped.
At the same time, he could feel his forehead burning, his body overheated, and his eyes crammed with dry, hard eye crust.
It was an inflammation, definitely somewhere in his body, possibly his throat.
"Medicine..." the girl's voice reached him again.
After a clear door closing sound, everything quieted down.
The dirty girl struggled to move, retrieving a black metal box from a corner of the room.
"Medicine... can make better." She approached Yu Hong with the medicine.
With a click, she opened the lid revealing a lot of black charcoal inside, and within it, wrapped in paper were three pale yellow capsules.
However, the capsules showed fine mold spots on their surface, with light blue and green fungal fluff visible.
"This medicine, it can't be used, right..." Yu Hong's expression stiffened as he looked at her. Now somewhat more lucid, his throat seemed much better, and he could speak more smoothly, though it still hurt.
"And moreover, what is this medicine? How can you give it to me without knowing what's wrong with me or what disease I have? It won't cure me."
"First, tell me, who are you, where am I, and what exactly is going on?"
The girl holding the medicine looked confused; she opened her mouth, stammering and anxious, yet unable to make a sound.
Now closer, Yu Hong could clearly see her appearance.
Her skin was dark, covered with patches of dark yellow stains. She wore many layers of clothing from different seasons, her collar grimy and stained, and a strong odor of sweat emanated from her.
She looked like a beggar.
Perhaps many beggars were even cleaner than her.
From a distance, she resembled a mobile cart of black clothes.
Upon closer inspection, the girl's body was slightly deformed, her leg was lame, and there was a large tumor on the back of her right shoulder, its outline visible through her clothes.
She was under 1.5 meters tall, short and dirty, and moved slowly.
But those eyes, they were like clear gems, with very few impurities.