Chapter 25: The Fox in the Dream

Irene’s reaction didn’t seem fake.

In fact, up to this point, Yusheng hadn’t detected a single insincere moment from this doll. Every word and action radiated a sort of pure, earnest sincerity, as if her head were genuinely solid—either her acting skills were extraordinarily convincing, or her mind truly was steadfast and sincere.

Yusheng cautiously favored the latter possibility.

Then he described to Irene the appearance of the deceased doll and that enormous “shadow monster” which seemed to have perished alongside it. Her answer remained the same: “I don’t know.”

Frowning, Yusheng sank into deep thought.

Irene couldn’t help but grow curious. “Hey, why did you suddenly come ask me all this? Weren’t you supposed to be upstairs sleeping?”

Yusheng hesitated briefly but ultimately decided to share the strange changes in that room with the doll before him—it didn’t involve any of his secrets and might even concern Irene herself. Speaking up could help unravel the mystery.

“There’s been some trouble with the room upstairs…”

He recounted everything he had just witnessed upstairs, and, unusually, Irene didn’t interrupt once. Instead, she listened with wide eyes, then remained stunned for a long moment before finally drawing out a long “Wow—”.

Yusheng immediately felt that even telling her hadn’t brought them closer to solving the enigma.

“Looks like you don’t know what’s going on either,” he sighed. “You’ve never seen that mirror before, right?”

“No, I haven’t,” Irene nodded confidently. “But I feel like your house is getting stranger and stranger.”

“You don’t have to tell me—I feel the same,” Yusheng sighed again. “Doors might suddenly open to anywhere, some rooms change their layouts out of nowhere, and the mirror could reflect scenes from who knows when or where. It’s a wonder I used to think this place was quite livable. Sigh…”

Irene’s crimson eyes stared at Yusheng’s expression without blinking. After hearing his grumbling, she hesitated before asking, “So… are you planning to move? Not live here anymore?”

Yusheng remained silent for a moment but had indeed considered that.

After all, he could tolerate a haunted mirror appearing now and then, mysterious furniture, dubious appliances, or a complaining doll sealed inside an oil painting—it was almost like adding some spice to life, since he wasn’t afraid of death. But the idea that opening a door might suddenly drop him into some alien land—that was a real problem, not something to just endure.

For Yusheng, the most dangerous aspect of those alien worlds wasn’t the peril itself, but the uncertainty of ever returning. This alone made him seriously contemplate moving elsewhere.

Seeing Yusheng silent, Irene fell quiet for a moment before continuing on her own: “If you find a place you like, just tell me first. I’ll figure out how to get myself into their neighborhood and help bring down their housing prices…”

Yusheng was taken aback. “I was just joking back then… Don’t you think this is insulting to the ancestors of dolls and your sisters?”

“I just thought it over carefully and feel your plan makes a lot of sense,” Irene said earnestly. “Besides, I’d be helping you bring down the housing prices—surely that counts as a favor for living in your house, right?”

Suddenly, Yusheng realized she was just worried he’d leave her behind if he moved out abruptly.

But he didn’t call her out on it and merely shook his head. “Let’s not talk about that now. I might be considering it, but I’m not planning to move just yet. Don’t worry, if I do, I’ll bring you along. A painting doesn’t take up much space.”

“Oh, alright then!” Irene brightened immediately.

But soon, a trace of worry returned to her face. “Um… did the dead doll you saw in the mirror have her eyes closed?”

“…I don’t think so,” Yusheng recalled. “Why do you ask?”

Irene opened her mouth, looking a little sad. “When a living doll is broken, if her eyes are closed, it means her soul has returned to the garden of Alice’s cottage, where we can be reborn. But if her eyes remain open… then she’s still ‘there’.”

Yusheng froze and suddenly regretted answering without thinking. He should have asked first.

“We don’t really know where the mirror is reflecting,” he said softly after a pause. “But since she appeared in the mirror, maybe she’s connected to this house. Perhaps one day we’ll find her. For now, don’t dwell on it—you’re still trapped here yourself.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” Irene sighed. “Sometimes sisters lose contact after leaving… it happens, it really does.”

Yusheng suddenly felt this doll wasn’t as carefree as he had imagined.

After chatting with Irene a little longer, he returned to the second floor.

He checked on the room at the end of the corridor again, confirming it remained as he had seen it earlier. He then ignored it and went back to his bedroom.

Pulling the curtains shut, he lay on his bed, tossing and turning for a long time. Though exhausted and sleepy, his mind was chaotic, making sleep impossible. Thoughts about recent events churned through his head like turbulent currents—about Irene, the valley under the night sky, knowledge of other worlds, the fox girl who had struggled to maintain reason and urged him to run, and… his own death and resurrection.

After an uncertain length of time, Yusheng gradually drifted into a drowsy sleep.

He felt his consciousness slowly sinking into a gentle, chaotic pool. Even in sleep, the chaotic “currents” swirled around him, and through the misty haze, he observed fragments of his memories and thoughts. Dim voices whispered at his ears until his awareness reached the bottom of this “pool,” and silence gradually enveloped him.

In his dream, Yusheng wandered beneath a dim twilight, walking across a vast wilderness where a small hill appeared in the distance.

He felt as though he had been wandering near that hill for a very long time, aimlessly, without knowing who he was.

But a sudden flicker of color in his peripheral vision made him stop.

Between the faint, murky sky and earth, Yusheng saw a patch of bright silver. Instinctively, he moved toward that silvery light. In the next instant, he found himself standing before it.

There lay a silver-furred spirit fox—at least two or three meters long when stretched out—quietly sleeping on the grassland.

Beautiful, graceful, serene.

A gentle breeze blew from afar, swaying the slender wild grasses and the silver fur of the fox. She showed no sign of waking, curled quietly with many thick tails wrapped around her—some held in her embrace, others draped like a blanket.

Yusheng stared in astonishment at the fox in his dream. At some point, he had become fully aware that he was dreaming.

After hesitating a moment, he stepped forward two paces and gently touched one of the fox’s front paws. “…Huli, is that you?”

The white fox remained asleep, unmoved by his touch or voice.

Yusheng called her name several times, even tried tugging her tail, but he couldn’t rouse Huli.

It felt as though she was not merely asleep but had her senses blocked by something.

Frowning, Yusheng stepped back a little.

Why did this fox appear in his dream?

He admitted that before sleeping, his mind had been cluttered with thoughts, including that fox trapped in the otherworld. But this was clearly not an ordinary “daytime thoughts become night dreams” case; he could feel that Huli was truly “here.”

As he pondered, Yusheng suddenly felt something and quickly looked down at his right hand.

A tiny bead of blood was oozing from his finger, surrounded by a faint ring of bite marks.

Those were from when he had snatched chocolate away from Huli, triggering her food-protective instinct and causing her to bite him.

Staring intently, he recalled the moment in the valley when he suddenly “saw” fragments of Huli’s memories and sensed part of her thoughts.

“Because of the blood?”

He guessed that her appearance here might be linked to her accidentally “consuming” his blood.

But then a doubt arose—if so, why didn’t the frog in the rain or the abstract flesh monster who had also fed on his blood appear here? That flesh monster had eaten from him multiple times, far more than Huli ever did...

Just as Yusheng’s thoughts began to veer into strange territory, he suddenly sensed something. Then, from the grass behind him came a low, mocking chuckle.

It sounded vaguely familiar.

Yusheng whipped his head around toward the sound and, the next instant, heard Irene’s exasperated complaint from the bushes: “I told you, don’t laugh, don’t laugh! You can’t just keep enduring it! See? We got caught…”

Expressionless, Yusheng stared at the oil painting frame stuck in the grass, inside which Irene was clutching a teddy bear and grinning foolishly at him, trying to play innocent.

“Watching TV’s boring, so I came to see what you’re dreaming about…”