The restroom was filled with the scent of blood—Qi Wu’s blood. Even the smell of the boy’s blood was thicker than others’. That strong, sweet metallic scent seemed to materialize, seeping into Xie Xishu’s lungs with every breath.
Not only that, but the smell seemed to wrap around him, seeping through his pores into his body. Xie Xishu felt like vomiting.
“You…what exactly…do you want?”
Weakness, lack of oxygen, extreme fear, overwhelming shock…all these emotions tangled together, so intense that Xie Xishu felt close to fainting.
As the top student, he had lost all ability to think at this moment. It wasn’t until he spoke that he realized his voice was tinged with sobs.
“Why do you keep…keep staring at me…”
Qi Wu didn’t answer. His pitch-black eyes remained fixed, unblinking, on the boy’s unnaturally pale face.
The fear had drained all the color from Xie Xishu’s fair skin, which was now covered with glistening droplets—whether from tears or sweat was unclear.
[Ah, if I could just lick it…]
Qi Wu’s lips were pressed tight in an attempt to restrain his restless tongue, and the sound of his heavy, labored breathing became more and more pronounced in the blood-scented restroom.
Then, all of a sudden, he started walking toward Xie Xishu, step by step, under the boy’s horrified gaze. The deep red blood flowed down his face, soaking his shoulder and chest. And as the distance between them shortened, Xie Xishu couldn’t help but see things more clearly—he saw the terrifying wound on the boy’s forehead, a wound he himself had caused.
It could only be said that Qi Wu’s luck today had been rather poor.
Compared to him, Xie Xishu was nothing more than a weakling. Yet in his panic, the bottle Xie Xishu smashed against Qi Wu had somehow caused more damage than expected.
Some tiny green glass shards were still deeply embedded in the torn flesh of the wound, and right in Qi Wu’s black hair, there was a deep gash.
A small piece of scalp, still attached to hair, had peeled off and now dangled from Qi Wu’s forehead, swaying slightly as he moved. Xie Xishu could see the dark red flesh on the inside of the skin flap, and amidst the blood, a faint glimpse of white bone.
But Qi Wu looked like he wasn’t feeling any pain at all.
Of course, the boy’s cheek did twitch slightly, but that twitch wasn’t due to pain. Rather… rather it was something that made Xie Xishu feel terrified, cold sweat streaming down his body.
At that moment, he had completely lost the courage to struggle, just like a rabbit caught in the headlights, frozen, unable to move. He could only stay still as Qi Wu slowly came to a stop right in front of him.
Qi Wu raised his hand toward Xie Xishu.
His fingertips were covered in blood, and when they touched Xie Xishu, they felt especially sticky.
Then, Qi Wu’s fingers slowly stroked over Xie Xishu’s skin, along the contours of his eyes, wiping across the small patch of skin beneath them.
Qi Wu wiped away Xie Xishu’s tears.
His movements were slow, but his strength was immense. Xie Xishu had initially just been shedding some physiological tears due to his intense fright, but under Qi Wu’s nearly rough rubbing, even more tears involuntarily flowed out.
“Mm—”
It hurt.
Xie Xishu couldn’t control himself and let out a pained whimper.
But the next moment, he was shocked to see Qi Wu retract his hand, and then the boy, right in front of him, placed that tear-stained finger into his mouth, sucking it greedily like a baby.
“So… so sweet.”
A low, vague, almost trance-like moan escaped from between Qi Wu’s lips.
Immediately after, Qi Wu’s body swayed, then he collapsed to the ground, brushing against Xie Xishu’s arm as he fell.
Dark red blood slowly flowed from where his head hit the ground, forming a small puddle on the floor.
*
Xie Xishu’s memory of how he got home that day had a significant gap.
Maybe it was because he was too scared, or perhaps his brain activated some natural defense mechanism. Either way, no matter how much Xie Xishu tried to recall it afterward, he couldn’t remember anything that happened after that scene in the bathroom.
It was as if his brain had completely shut down.
When his self-awareness returned, he found himself wandering down the street in a daze, his expression vacant and his steps unsteady.
He had nothing with him, no backpack, no belongings of any kind.
Clearly, he hadn’t gone back to the classroom after leaving, and he didn’t think he had the strength to attend any more classes. He had probably skipped the entire day.
But strangely, he didn’t care at all. He felt numb.
Beside him, the evening sun was slowly setting, its golden-red rays casting a blood-like glow over the entire world.
Every part of Xie Xishu’s view seemed to be bathed in an eerie red light.
He slowly came to a halt.
“Wow, look at the sunset today, it’s so red, cough cough cough…”
“Yeah, cough cough… so pretty, I’ve never seen one like this before. Wait, let me take a picture for my Moments.”
…
Snatches of conversation from passersby drifted into Xie Xishu’s ears. Two girls were standing by the side of the road, holding up their phones, snapping pictures of the bloated, massive red sun on the horizon, which looked like it could fall to the earth at any moment.
Xie Xishu forced his eyes to move slightly and glanced at them.
Maybe because of the flu going around, both girls were wearing thick masks, and their occasional coughing blended into their lively conversation as if they were long accustomed to it.
Yes, there had been a flu outbreak in A City recently.
Almost everyone had been coughing during their conversations.
It was nothing unusual.
Xie Xishu told himself that.
However…
Bathed in the sunlight, the two girls were coated in a thick layer of dark red.
Xie Xishu couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong with the only part of them exposed, their eyes. Their pupils seemed unusually small at that moment, reduced to tiny black dots, while their irises, under the red sunset, reflected a kind of murky, beast-like glow.
At that moment, Xie Xishu shivered uncontrollably, and the thick, bloody scent of Qi Wu seemed to rise again in his nose.
He covered his mouth in pain, hunching over.
On the street during the evening rush hour, his actions stood out as strange and odd, attracting suspicious glances from several people around him. But Xie Xishu didn’t expect any of them to come to his aid. After all, if this were during the day when he was still in school, someone probably would have helped him. Back then, he looked like a harmless student. But now, he was covered in patches of dried blood, his face pale and his expression vacant—he clearly looked like something was wrong…
“Are you okay?”
But the next moment, a pair of hands suddenly reached out and firmly grabbed Xie Xishu’s arm.
Xie Xishu bit down hard on his teeth to stop himself from screaming.
He slowly turned his head and found that the person holding him was a young man.
The man was dressed in a suit, with a briefcase tucked under his arm, looking like a typical office worker who had just gotten off work.
He looked like all the other harmless, average, featureless workers in the city. The fact that he reached out to help someone like Xie Xishu undoubtedly meant he had a rare kind and caring heart. However…
For some reason, Xie Xishu found his expression strange.
Maybe it was because of all the previous scares, or maybe it was just that his poor ability to handle pressure had flared up again, causing his mind to collapse and spiral into paranoia.
Xie Xishu thought.
Otherwise, why would he feel like there was a familiar, sticky, damp look in this stranger’s eyes?
Just like… Qi Wu.
“I-I’m fine,”
Xie Xishu said dryly, trying his best to pull himself together and respond.
As he spoke, he tried to withdraw his arm from the young office worker’s grasp.
But he didn’t move at all.
Through the thin shirt and the man’s thin chest, Xie Xishu could feel the man’s heart beating madly.
“But you look so weak, little student. My house is just nearby. Why don’t you come and rest at my place?”
…
The man tilted his head and stared directly at Xie Xishu. His murky voice sounded like he was sleep-talking, but his eyes were sharp, gleaming with a strange cold light.
“Let go of me,” Xie Xishu rasped.
This time, he almost used all his strength to pull his hand free, and he actually succeeded.
But even then, the man, with his sweat-soaked and slippery hand, still tightly gripped Xie Xishu’s wrist.
“Why are you so rude? Look, I’m just trying to help you, after all, you… you…”
The man’s nose twitched, and his lips involuntarily parted.
“You really smell nice.”
His face was almost pressing against Xie Xishu’s body.
The foul stench of his breath, mixed with cigarette smoke, hit Xie Xishu, making him let out a roar.
“I told you to let go of me!”
Then, instinctively, he kicked the man, landing squarely on his thigh.
Perhaps this was the one time in Xie Xishu’s life he should be grateful for the long hours and the exploitation by capitalists.
The man, who was unaccustomed to exercise, stumbled backward from Xie Xishu’s kick, falling to the ground. The greed on his face vanished instantly, replaced by a look of fear and confusion. He raised his face, staring blankly at Xie Xishu.
“S-Sorry, I… I didn’t mean anything, I was just…”
Xie Xishu didn’t wait for him to finish. The intense sense of danger forced out the last bit of energy from his body. He bolted, running as fast as he could towards his home, leaving the strange man far behind.
By the time Xie Xishu finally reached home, he was utterly exhausted, on the verge of collapse.
His school uniform was covered in dried blood and some kind of sticky, filthy residue that was hard to describe.
Without even looking in a mirror, Xie Xishu knew he must look like a beggar who had just crawled out of a filthy ditch.
But despite his usual fastidiousness, at that moment, he didn’t even have the strength to drag himself to the bathroom to take off his clothes and shower.
As soon as he closed the door behind him, he collapsed onto the floor.
“Woo… woo…”
His phone was long gone, so Xie Xishu fumbled around on the sofa until he found his tablet, which he usually used for studying.
It took him longer than usual to unlock it because his fingertips were covered in some kind of sticky substance, and the fingerprint sensor couldn’t recognize them.
After a lot of effort, he finally opened the tablet and tapped on the messaging app. Seeing the familiar contacts, Xie Xishu bit down on his knuckle, hesitating for a long time before finally summoning the courage to tap the “video call” button.
But just a second before the electronic sound could ring, he stared at those four characters, his face suddenly changed, and in a panic, he quickly hung up, switching to a voice call instead.
“I can’t let them see me like this. Mom and Dad would worry.”
In the empty, silent living room, the boy’s nervous muttering echoed.
“Beep—beep—beep—”
The electronic tone repeatedly reverberated in the room, which was gradually growing darker.
“Beep—beep—beep—”
Suddenly, the tone stopped.
“Mom…” Xie Xishu reflexively called out, but in the next second, he saw the words “The user is temporarily unavailable” appear on the screen, and he bit down hard on his lip.
Even though he knew before calling that this account’s voice call would never connect, seeing those words still made tears uncontrollably well up in his eyes.
How stupid.
It was as if a voice inside him was quietly mocking Xie Xishu.
Even if the call went through, what was there to say?
He couldn’t even describe what had happened.
Some boy stared at him for no reason, and he felt overwhelmed and terrified?
That boy returned a long-lost school uniform to him in the bathroom, and in response, he smashed a bottle over his head?
Then what…?
Xie Xishu found himself biting his fingers again. But this time, instead of the familiar comfort of pain and the taste of blood, he was hit with a wave of extreme panic. His heart felt like it was being squeezed by an invisible hand, and he almost screamed out in terror.
It was only after looking around at the familiar furniture and realizing that he was at home, not at school, that he finally let out a breath of relief.
…
He couldn’t remember what had happened after the bathroom incident, but the lingering panic and helplessness in his body kept reminding him—it was definitely nothing good.
Maybe forgetting was the best option.
But…
He was so scared.
He was afraid that in that moment in the bathroom, when he lost control, he might have killed Qi Wu.
__
Author’s Note:
Qi Wu isn’t dead.
He fainted purely because tasting the tears was too overwhelming.
(After all, he’s still in his developmental stage.)
