Novel Bin Chapter 94 - The Cycle of Karma, What Goes Around Comes Around (8)
Chapter 94 - The Cycle of Karma, What Goes Around Comes Around (8)
translator: baumkuchen (unedited)
After having their dinner, at a bit past seven, the Gan siblings moved into Chi Xiaochi’s room, even bringing a single bed along.
On the matter of sharing a room, Gan Tang’s attitude was very polite and modest. “We’ve troubled you.”
In comparison, Gan Yu was refined in manner, but the words coming out of his mouth sounded as if he, this guest, was feeling right at home, “Don’t be polite, just take it as if I and Tangtang don’t exist.”
Chi Xiaochi of course didn’t bother being polite. He was the first one to get up and take a shower.
Other than the matter of Xi Lou forcing him to put on sunglasses when bathing being a little annyong, Chi Xiaochi didn’t run into any horror movie scenario like the showerhead running with blood or a head appearing in the toilet bowl. When he came out, he couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief.
After walking out of the bathroom, entirely refreshed, he changed into a bathrobe and got onto the bed. He placed his wet hair over the edge of the bed, letting water drip off it as it pleased, as he held the script above his face and carefully read through each page of his script.
Going by Chi Xiaochi’s personal experience, this movie, was trash of the trash.
In the script, six former high school schoolmates reunited in the castle owned by the rich second generation male lead ten years after their graduation. They did every death-seeking thing they possibly could, summoning the pen spirit, the four corners game. It even included taking a bath, having sex, and other such contents that skirted the line of legality. The relationships between the men and women were even more chaotic, with so much leg spreading it was like they were doing rhythmic gymnastics.
This damned group of brats were so thirsty, he finally managed to attract a calamity.
People started disappearing from the group, and before they disappeared, a few low-level horror movie scenarios like a female ghost suddenly appearing behind them, words appearing on the mirror and ketchup being smeared on the walls occurred.
Then, there was the much-loved bitchfight within the group, and all kinds of walling and screaming.
Of course, everyone knows that there are no ghosts in domestically produced horror movies.
There was someone behind all the disappearances, the character of the “little blind guy” Song Chunyang was playing. His eyesight was very poor. He wore a pair of glasses with lenses as thick as bottlecaps all year round, and when he lost his glasses, he wouldn’t even be able to see the way in front of him clearly. Ever since high school, he had been the target of everyone’s mockery and pranks, and was the rich second generation male lead’s lackey.
Relying on the all-purpose godly tool of the hallucinogen that appeared in every domestically produced horror movie, as well as a fake wig, a white dress, he cosplayed as a female ghost, in order to take revenge for his girlfriend who had been raped by the drunk male lead and taken her own life ten years ago.
As for those people who disappeared, none of them died, they were just tied up in the ancient castle’s basement.
This made Chi Xiaochi strongly suspect that the main goal of the “little blind guy” wasn’t to take revenge, but to have a round of tense and exciting bondage play with these people.
When he flipped to the last page of the script, Gan Yu sat down on the other side of bed, wiping his wet hair with a towel.
He asked, “Done reading? How do you feel about it?”
Chi Xiaochi let the script fall onto his face. “All kinds of mixed emotions.”
With his position in the entertainment industry, he already hadn’t had to see such an eye-searing thing in a long time, so he needed some time to recover.
Gan Yu grabbed a pen and picked the script up off of Chi Xiaochi’s face like he was pushing up a veil. “There’s printing ink on the pages, it’s not clean. Be careful of hurting your eyes.”
Chi Xiaochi opened his eyes and looked over, squinting. His gaze fell right onto Gan Yu’s uncovered chest and abs.
Chi Xiaochi’s own physique was quite good. With his pair of natural model’s legs of more than 1.2 metres, he looked graceful no matter how he positioned himself. After being in this job for a long time, he’d seen too much of all kinds of beautiful bodies. However, when the seasoned Chi Xiaochi saw Gan Yu sitting on the side of the bed and wiping his hair, he still couldn’t help taking many a second look.
He thought, this kind of body was so good that he should go exchange it for money. Wrapping it up in a white lab coat was basically blasphemy to the Creator.
Gan Yu didn’t actually have any awareness of himself. After his hair was no longer dripping, he picked up the script and gave it a look.
Even though the siblings weren’t participating in the plot, they had gotten their own copy of the script from the crew members.
Just in case, they proofread the lines of both scripts from start to finish, in order to see if there were any differences from script to script.
Gan Yu read out each line one by one, while Chi Xiaochi listened to each line one by one.
Gan Yu drank water as he read. His voice which was moistened by water was surprisingly pleasant to the ear, rather close to 061’s in terms of sound quality and his custom of reading out books. It was neither too fast or too slow, seeming to scratch at one’s ears, making them feel both itchy and pleasant, and making it impossible for Chi Xiaochi to not think more of it.
But seeing Gan Yu, who’d also finished washing up and was carefully listening to the two compare scripts, Chi Xiaochi once again felt like he was thinking too much.
After confirming that both scripts were trash produced from the same batch, Chi Xiaochi stuck out his head to look at Gan Yu’s script.
When he got closer, he asked that question once more in a low voice, “......Is it you?”
He kept feeling like Gan Yu was 061. This kind of feeling was too strong, making it so that he couldn’t help but want to repeatedly check.
Gan Yu closed the script and placed it on his lap. “No.”
Chi Xiaochi raised his eyebrows. “Do you know what I’m asking?”
Gan Yu turned to look at him. He smiled slightly.
His slightly hoarse voice were like slightly blunt cat claws, slowly and lightly scratching at Chi Xiaochi’s heart. “I don’t know, but I’m guessing that you’re about to be up to mischief again.”
This clearly was avoiding the question, but Chi Xiaochi could hear something close to tacit agreement in those words.
He said, “You——”
Suddenly, a woman’s scream, sounding like her heart was being torn apart, sounded from the other end of the corridor.
As Chi Xiaochi was about to get up, Gan Yu, pushed a hand against his wet hair, gently pressing him back onto the bed, then rubbed it. “I’ll go look.”
After that, he called Gan Tang, “Tangtang, stay here with him.”
Gan Tang, who’d changed into a black singlet and hot pants, nodded gently.
The moment Gan Yu pushed open a door, a person rushed straight over and threw their arms around Gan Yu.
Gan Yu held his hands behind his back, and looked at the visitor with a slight frown.
When she found that the person she was hugging was remaining silent, Guan Qiaoqiao, her hair a mess and tears streaking down her face, looked up. She was stunned for a moment. “Who are you?”
Gan Yu placed one elbow against the doorframe. “You come to my room, and ask me who I am?”
Chi Xiaochi instantly entered acting mode. He pulled on his clothes and put on a pair of slippers. “Doctor Gan, who is it?”
Upon hearing Song Chunyang’s voice, Guan Qiaoqiao let out an expression like she’d been saved. With tears in her voice, she called out, “Chunyang! It’s me!”
Chi Xiaochi walked over to the door. “Qiaoqiao, what’s going on?”
Guan Qiaoqiao reached past Gan Yu and grabbed Chi Xiaochi’s wrist. She said in a small voice, “Chunyang, come over.”
Seeing Chi Xiaochi’s look of confusion, Guan Qiaoqiao was both scared and shocked. Her throat sounded like it was being strangled by someone, as hoarse and as unpleasant as a hen with a broken voice box. “......Come over, quickly come over.”
Gan Yu put down his arm that was blocking the door, but still stayed between Chi Xiaochi and Guan Qiaoqiao.
He said concisely and comprehensively, “Together.”
Guan Qiaoqiao couldn’t care less about that hint of warmth between the two. Her entire person had already been wrapped up in mud-like panic. Dragging Chi Xiaochi by the arm, she hurried over to her room.
The moment he entered the room, Chi Xiaochi felt an intense feeling of being watched.
That kind of feeling, without a doubt, came from the picture hanging in the room.
Unlike the picture Chi Xiaochi had seen just several hours earlier, in the boundless blizzard, a distinct human-shaped silhouette had already appeared on the horizon.
If there was truly a ghost in the picture, before, it could still have been a vague, harmless silhouette, but now, it had already grown eyes, and had firmly locked onto its prey.
Guan Qiaoqiao’s entire body trembled. She grabbed Chi Xiaochi’s arm, tightening her grip. “It’s even closer than just now, she’s coming!”
In just the time it took for Guan Qiaoqiao to take a shower, the black dot seemed to have bloomed on the paper, a head, a pair of shoulders and a body birthing a basic form.
What was even more terrifying was, in the moment she locked eyes with the photograph, she felt a line of sight projected from within it.
This kind of gaze filled the entire space like air, seeping into her bones. Even if she escaped from the room, she would be able to feel eyes staring coldly at her from all directions.
It was an intense stare that made her spine run cold, holding a hint of a satisfied smile that made one’s scalp go numb, as if the thing it was looking at was prey that was exactly to its liking.
Guan Qiaoqiao couldn’t bear this kind of pressure. She screamed and ran out of the room, going to find Song Chunyang like she was running for her life.
Upon noticing the changes in the photograph, Chi Xiaochi was stunned for a long time. He turned, grabbed Guan Qiaoqiao’s arm and left the room.
There were already quite a few people who had heard Guan Qiaoqiao’s scream, even the NPC crew members had come to watch. Discussion flowed freely. She could be rated as the most outstanding walk-on of the year.
Chi Xiaochi helped arrange her clothing on her body. “Don’t stay there anymore. Go to another room to sleep.”
Guan Qiaoqiao trembled nervously. “She’s watching me.” Chi Xiaochi said, “Qiaoqiao, calm down a little. Look at me.”
Guan Qiaoqiao’s eyes were darting back and forth fearfully, trying to find the source of the line of sight from all the photographs on the walls. As if still trapped in a nightmare, she persisted, “She’s still watching me now——”
Seeing that persuasion was useless, Chi Xiaochi gave her a decisive slap across the face, at the same time, saying anxiously, “Qiaoqiao, calm down a little!!”
Guan Qiaoqiao was shaking all over from that gaze. Even the pain was unable to snap her out of her fear.
Chi Xiaochi didn’t hesitate any longer. He swung his hand over again, knocking her to the ground with his slap.
Guan Qiaoqiao tumbled to the ground from the force of the slap. As she held a hand to her bleeding mouth, her scattered gaze finally refocused.
Chi Xiaochi explained to Xi Lou, “See, this is what’s called physical calming.”
Xi Lou, “......” Very fucking physically calming.
Then, Chi Xiaochi wrung his hurting hand. “Feels good.”
Xi Lou, “......” Don’t say it, it really does seem like it feels really good.
Chi Xiaochi pulled Guan Qiaoqiao up from the ground. His emotions were actually even more agitated than hers. “Qiaoqiao, didn’t I tell you to move out of that room sooner?”
Guan Qiaoqiao, still sweating under the torment of that gaze which was coming from some unknown location, looked up at him in a daze. “You already knew ? ......When did you tell me?! Why didn’t you tell me?!”
“I told you.” Chi Xiaochi was just as nervous and panicked as she was. A thin layer of tears started to form over his eyes. “I saw that there was something wrong with your room this afternoon, but I couldn’t find you, so I told Old Yuan, if he bumped into you, to tell you to immediately move out to a different room——”
Guan Qiaoqiao was stunned. Her muddled mind finally became clear for a moment.
......Yuan Benshan?
When Song Chunyang had found Yuan Benshan that afternoon, he had told him about this?
Then why did he......
The flood of fear filling her heart finally found a spillway. She struggled out of Chi Xiaochi’s arms, rushed straight to Yuan Benshan’s door which had remained closed all this time, and started madly beating on it and kicking it.
But when she rushed into the room, she found that Yuan Benshan wasn’t in it.
That gaze still followed her like a shadow, coming from every picture, every crack in the wall, every window.
She circled around the room like a trapped animal for several rounds. Only when Song Chunyang’s figure appeared at the door, did she lunge over like she’d seen her saviour, resting her head on his shoulder as she broke out into loud wails.
Chi Xiaochi stroked her hair, but on his face was a cold facsimile of a smile.
He had just combed through many clues in his mind, and even found some points of suspicion.
When Song Chunyang was still alive, the balloon lady had also come to find him. However, after Song Chunyang lost his eyes, he managed to survive on his own for a full three days before dying.
It would be reasonable to assume that the crew would be constantly filming for this half a month. Song Chunyang had missed the first three days of shooting, and should have long since triggered a death flag. So why did he only die on the third day?
Chi Xiaochi speculated that on the first day they entered the production crew, the balloon lady had picked the target she was going to act against through some unknown criteria.
And three days, was probably the time it took for the balloon lady to gain the ability to move and kill.
If Chi Xiaochi’s speculation was correct, the balloon lady had already completely “set her gaze” on Guan Qiaoqiao. This meant, Guan Qiaoqiao had at most three more days to live, which could be used to fear, which could be used to wait for death.
So now, why not save some energy for tears.
......There’s still ample time ahead.
The author has something to say:
President Chi: Come, eat my fist and calm down a little.