Chapter 35: I Want to Fly Higher!

Huacheng, in a small park by a river.

The night was long; the garden itself was decadent but overgrown with shrubs and weeds that grew wildly, entangling each other. Mice scurried between the shrubs and walked through the shadows.

In the dark corner, something surged silently, twisting reality into various weird shapes.

In the public toilet in the corner of the park, the two gates were tightly shut, and rusty chains hung on the gates.

Suddenly, the dark and dilapidated park was illuminated with light…

The mice fled in a hurry upon seeing this, and the next moment, a girl’s screaming could be heard in the sky.

“F*ck! How do I stop this thing? Sh*t, sh*t, sh*t…”

Her shouts grew closer, and like a meteorite crashing into earth, the ball of fire crashed straight into a flower bed in the centre of the park.

Thick smoke filled the air, and fallen leaves and dead branches were crackling with embers.

When the dust settled, a slender leg emerged from the pit.

“This is so disgusting! Bleh!”

Lu Yibei spat out a tree root as she crawled out of the pit.

Back at the resort, all she knew was to run away. First things first, her new body…

This was the perfect place, really—an empty, abandoned park in an urban area. Nobody would see her.

Before this, she didn’t know how she even managed to fly, let alone land, which led to her crashing straight into the flower bed.

Fortunately, her new body seemed durable.

Sitting naked by the ruined flower bed, she got up and walked towards the public toilet.

Standing in front of the mirror at the sink, she raised her hand to wipe at the dust that had accumulated on the mirror. The outline of a petite girl was reflected by the light of the fire behind her.

She didn’t want to believe it but moved closer.

Her long, pink hair hung down her shoulders, and beneath her bangs was a heart-warming and petite face. Her pristine skin blushed with a healthy glow, and her scarlet eyes burnt proudly.

She was petite, not thin, and well-proportioned with hints of baby fat.

She stroked her bare chest, and the smoothness of it made her feel shame.

“She” is indeed a “she,” but she wasn’t dreaming at all.

She blushed, and perhaps due to the shame, the colour of her hair gradually turned red, and the temperature around her started to rise a little too much…

The stagnant water left in the sink boiled and evaporated almost instantly, which brought her back to her senses.

What’s going to happen in the future? She thought.

‘The girl in the dream did mention that the sun would restore my original appearance…’

‘But what was she not able to say to me?’

She really needed someone to ramble her concerns with but found that there was absolutely nobody with whom she could share her struggles.

‘If Dad was still alive, he would just laugh and tell me not to worry about it.’

‘…which is exactly how Shui would respond.’

‘I could talk to Sumi, but I don’t think we’re that close… Besides, the girl told me not to tell anyone about my new identity.’

She couldn’t help but sigh as she stared into the mirror.

Time to return to the hospital, she thought. “Maybe I’ll be restored to my original appearance once the sun rises. However, if I don’t change back, how could I pretend nothing had happened?’

That was true. The Night Division wasn’t dumb. Looking at Jiangli’s serious face just now, it seemed that she wanted to die with her!

When she left, she didn’t notice that the image in the mirror remained. The girl in the mirror stood motionless before trembling and sobbing to herself.

It was a ghost in the mirror, lurking for prey. After years of not having prey, it couldn’t believe that a high-levelled threat would come to visit it. It praised the gods that it was still alive.

Lu Yibei stood outside the toilet and thought for a moment. She assumed a superman-flying pose and leapt upwards.

Sure enough, with the sound of earth and rock shattering beneath her, her whole body shot through the sky like a cannonball.

Dozens of seconds later, some residents swore they could hear the screams of a girl echoing through the night.

She once again plunged straight into the earth. She lay in the pit for a long time before having the strength and dignity to crawl out.

It seemed that she couldn’t fly anymore—an improper method, perhaps? Or did she run out of fuel?

There was no way she could run back to the hospital naked. Someone would see her for sure.

She shook her head violently at the thought of herself running through the street naked. She swore she could feel smoke coming out of her ears in embarrassment.

‘How about… I try again?’

“Boom!”

She once again crashed straight into the earth. In video games, once you learn a skill, you know how to do it immediately, but that doesn’t exist in reality.

‘I can’t continue like this,’ she muttered. Glancing at the banana leaves around the impact area, she suddenly had an idea.

A few minutes later…

Her body was wrapped in banana leaves, and she nodded in satisfaction.

“Surely this is enough cover!”

As she walked through the streets, she remembered something important. She immediately ran towards the nearest public restroom and looked in the mirror, attempting to squeeze out a smile.

“Damn it.”

Not even her newfound powers could cure her facial paralysis. However, she saw her reflection trembling violently before running away.

“?”

In the midst of panic, she could see the ghost in the mirror running away, leaving two trails of flames behind her before…

Flying…

That night, with the help of the ghost, Lu Yibei learnt how to fly.

At 6:37 in the morning, the Huacheng Central Hospital was quiet under the night sky.

A figure flew in the sky, generating gusts of wind. Soon, it fell, getting closer and closer to the roof of the inpatient ward.

Just as Lu Yibei was about to reach the roof, she bumped into something.

An invisible barrier blocked her way, and since she was flying towards it at a high speed, she was caught off guard and landed face-first into the barrier.

From the impact, she was once again naked and suspended right above the roof.

Before she could recover from the impact, a dazzling silver-blue light bloomed before her.

Countless cards flew towards her in the light, bombarding her body like a storm.

She hurriedly bounced backwards in mid-air and landed on the terrace in the distance. She flew out once again, albeit unsteady, and smashed into a dense canopy not far away as she hung upside down on a thick branch.

“…”

She saw stars and felt like her bones were about to fall apart.

“The patient I admitted two days ago was suffering from night disease again. Fish eggs were observed growing in his blood vessels; how scary!”

“There’s nothing we could do. The only thing we can do is help him relieve the pain.”

He could hear a conversation approaching the window by her tree. She sat straight up immediately and disappeared into the dense leaves of the tree.

“W-wait, what’s that?”

“W-what? Don’t joke around…”

“No! Somebody was hanging on the tree outside the window!”s

“Alright, I’m taking my leave.”

“N-no! You’re supposed to accompany me to the bathroom!”

“There’s a urinal in the study room!”

Hearing the conversation below her, Lu Yibei couldn’t help but apologize silently.

Eyeing the building carefully, her eyes narrowed.

‘What happened to me just now? Was it a barrier?’

No matter what it was, she was sure that it was probably to prevent any strange things from entering the hospital.

She felt as if she was being segregated, but it wasn’t until then that she realized that she had become a monster herself.

‘How am I going to get back inside?’

‘And how did that man even enter the hospital in the first place? How did he get inside undetected and kidnap me?’

“Big problem. A very, very big problem,” Bai Kai uttered in his car endlessly.

Ten minutes ago, Bai Kai arrived at the resort. He saw An Qing and Jiangli’s unconscious bodies by the fire and immediately took them back to a safe area.

He provided them with pure silver; the silver itself relies on Primordial Spirits to function, and the resulting liquid looks a lot like mercury. It was used to heal psychic users.

The two woke up in an instant, and after listening to their accounts of what happened, Bai Kai was full of doubts.

“So, you’re telling me that the witch spared you.”

“Impossible,” Bai Kai continued. “A witch needs to consume after she is born. There is zero chance that she will just… let you go.”

“Are you doubting me?” Jiangli coughed.

“N-no. It’s just abnormal.”

“Alright, alright,” An Qing said as she wiped soot away from her skin. “Both of us survived. Isn’t that good?”

“An Qing’s right. Now, we need to find out the witch’s motives.”

The four of them nodded, but An Qing felt a vibration on her owl badge.

“Everyone,” she announced. “We have to turn back.”

“What? What’s wrong?”

“No, no, nothing’s wrong,” An Qing rubbed her forehead. “We just…”

“…we left Gu Xiliu behind. She’s currently crying alone because everybody disappeared.”

Everybody in the car was silent for a few seconds, and bursts of sighs echoed in the carriage.

T/N: Starting this month, I’m going to try and see how I get on with posting one chapter a day. My other novels will stay at their release rate for now. Maybe in the future my other CN novel will go to a daily release as well, but since I’m not as proficient in Korean or Japanese as I am in Chinese, I can’t do a daily release for any novels I do in those languages.