Chapter 28: "Hunger"
Falling, being thrown up, and then falling again, endlessly repeating this process in an extreme cold and emptiness. His thoughts were churned into a mess, and the chaotic perceptions were like sharp knives carving in his mind, until his consciousness almost broke. Only then did a feeling of suddenly being freed from drowning finally come, waking Yu Sheng from that cold and dark infinite fall.
He suddenly sat up from the bed, and then his whole body lost its balance. He tilted and almost fell to the ground. At the last moment, he grabbed the corner of the bedside table and managed to support himself, feeling the world spinning in his head.
The sharp and continuous throbbing pain made him even suspect that his brain was really boiling.
But fortunately, this feeling did not last too long. When he really woke up, the unbearable feelings in his head subsided like that dream, leaving only some unpleasant impressions.
Yu Sheng sat on the edge of the bed and panted for a few breaths. He looked up at the window and saw that the setting sun was gradually approaching the rooftops of the distant urban area, and the sky was gradually darkening.
"…A whole day has passed…" he muttered with some surprise. He supported himself on the bedside table and got up. He first went to the table and poured himself a glass of water, then patted his face, trying to recover some spirit from that restless sleep, left the bedroom, and came to the first floor.
"I really didn't expect this 'violent awakening' to be this uncomfortable," as soon as he came to the dining room, Yu Sheng complained to the oil painting on the dining table. "I thought it would just be a little dizzy or my heart would pound for a while. Damn it, I almost threw up last year's New Year's Eve dinner when I opened my eyes…"
After he finished complaining, Irene didn't immediately reply with a string of babbles as she usually did. Instead, she was very quiet. Yu Sheng immediately felt something was wrong. He turned his head to look at the oil painting on the table and saw that Irene was paralyzed in the chair covered with a red velvet blanket as if she had malfunctioned. She was hugging a teddy bear and staring blankly at the upper left corner. Occasionally, her eyeballs would roll, followed by her getting up and dry heaving.
Yu Sheng: "…How did this 'violent awakening' make you so miserable too?"
Irene looked up at him. She was about to speak when she felt like she was going to throw up again—however, as a doll who had been sealed for who knows how many years, let alone New Year's Eve dinner, she didn't even have any stomach acid in her stomach (in fact, Yu Sheng even suspected that she didn't even have a stomach). So she could only lie on the side of the chair and feel terrible, retching as if her head was about to shake off in the next second.
After a long time, this hapless doll finally recovered. She looked up at Yu Sheng and said, her voice as weak as if she were on her deathbed, "It wasn't me who 'woke us up.' It was you."
Yu Sheng: "…Huh?"
"Your last shout scared that fox awake. I didn't even react!" Irene looked grief-stricken. "Why did you shout so loudly!"
Yu Sheng was a little stunned, but he finally understood what she meant. He scratched his head awkwardly. "I didn't know. I just wanted to remind Hu Li. I felt that her state was very dangerous."
"Then you were right," Irene said, then "urgh"-ed and lay on the side of the chair again. After dry heaving twice, she recovered and looked at Yu Sheng with annoyance. "Alright, the good news is that you successfully woke that fox up before she sank deeper. Although she 'ejected' us when she woke up, she herself should be able to stay awake for a while."
Yu Sheng walked over, pulled out a chair from the dining table, and sat opposite Irene, his expression gradually becoming serious. "Then what's the bad news?"
Irene didn't speak for a moment. After a few seconds of silence, she nodded lightly. "You should have guessed it too—she can't hold on for much longer."
Yu Sheng frowned and didn't say anything.
Yes, he did feel it. He felt it when he was trapped in the valley. The hunger and madness that were deeply buried in Hu Li's heart, like some kind of growing evil, were constantly eroding her. Although he didn't know what it was at the beginning, when he confronted that flesh-and-blood monster for the last time, he noticed that the "hunger" was not as simple as it seemed on the surface.
And what he had just seen in the depths of the dream just made him grasp Hu Li's situation more accurately.
"If you want to help that fox, you'd better take action as soon as possible," Irene said from the side. "The one that's seducing her is trying to turn her into some kind of… 'nutrient.' The purpose of that thing is not to kill people. 'Madness in hunger' is what it wants—that fox's will is so strong that she has been able to resist until now. This is incredible, but the longer she persists, the more 'nutrients' she can provide when the 'transformation' occurs… things will be very troublesome, very, very troublesome."
Yu Sheng listened with a grim expression, supplementing the information he had gathered so far based on Irene's description. But suddenly he noticed something and looked up at the frame opposite him.
"Irene," he said with a serious face, "do you… know something? About the situation in that valley, and the things in the valley?"
Irene hesitated for a moment, first shaking her head, but then nodding lightly.
"I don't remember most of the things, including what's going on with that valley. I don't remember any of it. But I seem to have some impression of the situation that fox encountered. I should have read about it before."
As she spoke, she frowned and paused briefly, as if trying hard to search for useful content from her fragmented and incomplete memories.
"…Entity-Hunger, I think that's what it's called," Irene said as she recalled. "It's an entity with clear malice and high danger. It is generated in a sealed area, the environment in the area is poisoned, and hunger spreads. It itself is very aggressive, but what's more dangerous is its 'influence.' People who are noticed by this entity will fall into a terrible hunger, and their willpower will be greatly tested. I don't remember the specific victim incidents. I only remember that it was… very dangerous and had harmed many people. And what's worse is…"
Irene stopped and looked into Yu Sheng's eyes.
"Hunger turns people into beasts, while devouring their dignity and life. Most people probably can't resist it, and those who fall will also become a part of Entity-Hunger, endlessly."
Listening to Irene's narration, the expression on Yu Sheng's face gradually tightened, and a heavy sense of oppression weighed on his heart. And just then, he suddenly thought of another thing—
When he was fighting that flesh-and-blood monster, the impulse to eat in his heart!
Could it be that he had also been affected by "Hunger"?!
Yu Sheng's heart tightened, and he immediately spoke quickly, "Wait, what are the main 'symptoms' after being affected by 'Hunger'?"
Irene looked at him with a strange expression. "…Of course it's 'hunger'."
"That's not what I mean. I mean…" Yu Sheng quickly waved his hand and organized his words again. "For example, when I saw that monster, I really wanted to take a bite, and I even thought that thing tasted pretty good. I even stir-fried two dishes when I came back. Could this reaction also be the effect of 'Hunger'?"
Irene's expression visibly went blank. The first thing she thought of was the "local specialty" that Yu Sheng had brought back, and the four dishes and one soup that were appealing in color, scent, and taste.
"That's right, you even ate it…" the doll muttered, but then she suddenly reacted, and her tone changed. "No! Of course not! The effect of 'Entity-Hunger' is to make you go crazy with hunger and go bite others, not to make you go bite it! It seduces people into madness, not by using itself as bait!"
Irene's shout startled Yu Sheng, but he immediately understood the logic—although hunger and appetite were closely related, when it came to "Otherworlds" and "entities" based on strict rules, these were two distinct definitions, especially when an entity had active malice, its influence would be strictly in accordance with its rules.
To put it plainly, if Yu Sheng had really been affected by "Hunger" when he was in that valley, then he should have gone to bite Hu Li—not the monster that was the source of the seduction.
Of course, the first time he bit that monster, there was a bit of reluctance in it. Let's not mention that.
Thinking of this, Yu Sheng was relieved. He confirmed that he had not been eroded by that strange entity, and he also recalled that he did have a normal feeling of fullness after eating dinner before he went to sleep. He felt greatly relieved and let out a long breath. "That's good. It seems I'm still quite normal."
Irene was stunned when she heard this and muttered in a low voice, "No, I think you're already not normal just by having an appetite for that thing…"
Yu Sheng waved his hand indifferently and then changed the subject. "So, that monster with a very abstract appearance but a pretty good taste is 'Entity-Hunger,' right? If I kill it, Hu Li will be freed from its influence—I know entities can't be completely killed. I mean temporarily killing it."
"Actually… I'm not sure either," Irene's reply was a little hesitant. "'Hunger' is a relatively special entity. The monster you saw was its 'materialization,' but according to my understanding, the real 'Hunger' actually permeates that entire valley. Do you understand what I mean? What you saw was just its 'tentacles' for foraging and sensing the situation. Its main body… as the name suggests, is the ubiquitous hunger in the valley."
Yu Sheng listened, his expression gradually becoming dazed.
Yes, he understood.
"Damn it, a rule-based one?!"