Early the next morning, Yan Feng was awakened from his deep sleep by a series of knocks on the door.
"Xiao Yan, Xiao Yan, is Youfu in your room?"
"Aunt Cui, what's the matter?"
Upon hearing the knocks, Yan Feng slowly woke up and found himself sitting on the floor, leaning against the bedside, having slept there for the whole night again.
"Have you seen Youfu? I got up this morning and found it wasn't at home."
"No—" Yan Feng stretched lazily and was about to reply that he hadn't when he saw a scene that made his blood run cold.
On the floor in front of him were scattered uneaten pig's trotters and chicken legs, and the nearby floor and wall were splattered with blood and various pieces of internal organs.
Youfu had been torn to pieces by some unknown wild beast. Its head was lying sideways on the ground, with a pair of big eyes staring straight at him. The rest of its body was a horrifying sight, leaving only some skeletal remains.
"This..."
Yan Feng looked down and saw that his hands, clothes, and trouser legs were all covered in blood.
"I..."
"Xiao Yan, can you hear me?"
At this time, the landlady's voice came from outside the door again.
"I can hear you. Is Youfu missing?"
"Yes. When I was sleeping last night, I seemed to hear the sound of bones being chewed. Did you feed something to Youfu?"
"No, I didn't!"
"Oh, then have you seen Youfu?"
"No, I haven't."
"Okay, then I'll go look around nearby!"
"..."
As soon as the landlady left, Yan Feng instantly jumped up from the ground, rushed into the bathroom, turned on the faucet, and stood under the shower.
The tap water sprayed onto him, and the blood washed off dyed the bathroom floor bright red.
Only when all the blood on his body was completely washed away did he turn off the faucet, lean against the cold ceramic tiles, and slide down to the ground in a daze, with a dull expression.
"Could it be that I ate Youfu raw? How could that be?"
At this moment, he felt as if something was stuck in his teeth, making it very uncomfortable.
So he put his finger in and scraped, and to his shock, he found a thin piece of raw meat!
Looking at his loose trouser waist and the frayed T - shirt, his face finally changed.
"Damn it, what the hell is going on with me..."
Before he could finish speaking, he burped again, and the smell of blood made him feel disgusted. He instinctively waved his hand in front of his nose.
Everything in front of him made Yan Feng have to believe that he might have killed Youfu and then eaten it raw.
He tried hard to recall the details of last night, racking his brains but only remembering that he brought food home and called Youfu in to eat together. He had no memory of what happened after that.
In the end, he had no choice but to return to the room and carefully examine Youfu's body.
There were obvious claw marks and bite marks on Youfu's back and the back of its neck. There was half a thigh bone on the ground, with a pair of terrifying tooth holes on it, pitch - black, sending a chill down his spine.
"What on earth happened after I lost consciousness???"
Yan Feng had always been fond of all kinds of small animals, dogs included.
Looking at Youfu's terrified appearance, his heart was filled with unease and guilt.
"Youfu, you died so miserably..."
After mourning Youfu's body for a while, his mood finally calmed down.
Anyway, this matter must not be known to Aunt Cui. Otherwise, Yan Feng really didn't know how to face her.
He opened the suitcase standing beside the wardrobe, emptied the things inside onto the bed, and then picked up all the pig's trotters, chicken legs on the ground, and Youfu's remains and put them into the suitcase.
Then he took off his clothes, fetched a basin of water, and wiped away all the blood in the room. The changed clothes were also thrown into the suitcase, and then he closed the box.
After finishing all this, Yan Feng finally let out a sigh of relief.
At this time, he found that he didn't seem to be hungry anymore. Looking at himself in the mirror, the swelling on his spine had also subsided. No matter how he pressed it, he no longer felt pain. However, it was still very itchy, as if some kind of change was taking place inside.
Originally, he planned to go to the company to resign today. But since he felt that his body was a bit strange, he decided to wait a while and deal with Youfu's remains first.
Thinking of this, he changed into clean clothes, picked up the suitcase, and went out.
Aunt Cui should have gone out to look for Youfu, and her husband wasn't at home either.
The company where Yan Feng worked was in Xiufeng Square, very close to Mu Cuo. It was at most a ten - minute walk.
Parking was inconvenient in Mu Cuo. He had a black off - road Lynk & Co 01 parked in the parking lot downstairs of the company.
He went to the place where he parked, put the suitcase in the trunk, then drove to a hardware store nearby to buy a shovel, and then headed straight to an area near Jubao Mountain in the north of the city. He found a secluded place and planned to bury Youfu's remains there.
Along the way, the strange itch on his spine gradually spread to other parts of his body. The itch was like that of someone who doesn't exercise regularly and has run a few hundred meters on a cold day. It was unbearable as he couldn't scratch it properly.
When getting out of the car, he couldn't help scratching the back of his neck, but his fingernail was scratched off.
"Fuck!"
Looking at his tender fingertip without a fingernail, Yan Feng's scalp tingled, and cold sweat broke out.
He swallowed hard, then reached out and tried to touch the fingernail of his left thumb, and found that it could be easily broken off.
At this moment, a gust of strong wind blew, and several of his short whiskers were blown off, along with a few strands of hair...
For a moment, Yan Feng was stunned, as if his head had been caught in a door.
Cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy may experience hair loss because some chemotherapy drugs can't distinguish between normal cells and cancer cells. While killing cancer cells, they also damage the normal cells of the human body. The hair follicle cells that dominate hair growth may be damaged, leading to hair loss.
But Yan Feng hadn't started chemotherapy yet, and he was not only losing hair but also his fingernails.
He usually liked watching all kinds of science - fiction movies and guessed whether his genes were collapsing or his body system was completely damaged. He was afraid that next, his skin, flesh, and other tissues would start to fall off, and in the end, only his skeleton would be left.
After dealing with Youfu's remains, Yan Feng drove back, feeling extremely uneasy.
He wasn't this scared even when he was diagnosed with cancer.
"Could it be that Youfu was poisonous? Did I become like this after eating it?"
Thinking of some scenes in movies, Yan Feng was terrified that his body tissues would gradually fall off and he would end up as a skeleton.
After returning to the rental house, the strange itch in his body still didn't ease. Instead, it became more intense, and even his gums started to itch.
Later, he couldn't stand the itch anymore, took off his clothes, and started scratching randomly.
In this way, his hair, beard, body hair - all kinds of hair were scratched off by him.
He didn't go out in the afternoon and spent the time in fear.
As evening approached, all his body hair, teeth, fingernails, and toenails had fallen out.
Looking at his bare body in the mirror, Yan Feng was on the verge of a breakdown.
So many things had happened in the past two days. If it weren't for the fact that he had advanced bone cancer and didn't have much time left to live anyway, he might have gone crazy by now.
After the sun set, the terrifying itch reached its peak in a short time. Yan Feng felt that his body, from the inside out, even his internal organs, were unbearably itchy. He rolled on the floor in agony.
This process lasted for quite a while before the itching gradually subsided.
At this time, Yan Feng was sweating profusely and completely exhausted.
He managed to prop himself up and was about to go get some water to drink when he suddenly felt a sharp pain on his scalp, like being pricked by needles. Then it was his gums, fingers, and toes. Finally, all the pores on his body felt various degrees of pain.
"What's going on again? Is my skin and flesh really starting to fall off?"
Thinking of this, Yan Feng's face was filled with horror.
He walked to the mirror and, by the bright moonlight outside the window, got closer to check. He found that his bald head—was sprouting!!!