Dad, I'm Hungry

"Maybe that 'Calamity' had just been too weak... and one swing of the axe killed it completely." Li Xiuchun proposed another possibility.

Chen Tan did not answer. He stared at the figure lying in the pool of blood for a long time, then turned and retrieved a kitchen knife from the kitchen.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm cutting open his chest to see if his heart is still there." Chen Tan's voice was hoarse. "At the very least, I need to know... whether I killed a monster, or the salvation God gave us."

He knelt beside Chen Ling's corpse and painstakingly cut open its chest with the blade. Li Xiuchun's face went pale. She turned and rushed into the kitchen, vomiting violently.

A few minutes later, Chen Tan slowly rose to his feet.

"Well?" Li Xiuchun asked.

"Empty." Chen Tan looked at the bare inner walls of the chest cavity, seeming to breathe a sigh of relief. "He has no heart."

"No heart? Then how did he..."

"I don't know."

Chen Tan paused. "Whatever it was... it's dead now."

"What do we do with the body?"

"Hide it in the cellar... The Enforcers are everywhere outside. We can't get it out."

Chen Tan dragged aside the corner of the living room table and lifted the heavy wooden planks in the floor, revealing a dark, cramped underground space.

In this era without refrigerators, using the cellar's natural insulation to store food was the best option. He was about to throw Chen Ling inside when he saw the grotesque wound on his neck and stopped.

"Go get A-Yan's opera costume." Chen Tan said. "Whatever it was, this is still A-Ling's body... We don't have a coffin to bury him in, but at least let him wear something decent."

At the mention of that costume, Li Xiuchun trembled slightly.

"But last night... he came back wearing that outfit..."

"It's just a piece of clothing." Chen Tan was about to argue, but when he recalled the horrifying sight of Chen Ling returning home last night, he did not insist. "Forget it. We'll leave it like this."

Chen Tan threw Chen Ling's body into the cellar, covered it with the wooden planks, then shoved the table back over them. Only then was it finally done.

Next, Li Xiuchun began cleaning the bloodstains from the house. Though the sight made her nauseous without end, she pinched her nose and kept going.

Knock, knock, knock—

A rapid knock suddenly sounded at the door.

Li Xiuchun, who had been cleaning the room, felt her heart skip a beat. She abruptly turned to look at Chen Tan.

"Someone's here?"

"Ignore them for now. Pretend no one's home."

Li Xiuchun nodded. The two held their breath in the living room, with only the dull knocking echoing without end.

But the knocking showed no sign of stopping. Instead, it grew heavier and more forceful. Then a low voice came from outside the door:

"Enforcers conducting inquiries! Open the door immediately!"

At the word "Enforcers," both their faces turned white. Chen Tan hesitated for a moment, then gave Li Xiuchun a look. He quickly changed clothes and headed for the door without even fastening all his buttons.

Creak—

The door opened a crack.

Chen Tan slipped out sideways and closed the door behind him. "Officer Enforcer, what can I do for you?"

A fine drizzle fell from the gloomy sky. Two figures in black-and-red uniforms stood outside, their expressions somewhat grim.

"We knocked for so long. Why didn't you open the door?"

"I was sleeping just now. It took me a while to get dressed." He gave an awkward smile.

The two Enforcers glanced at his unfastened clothes, and their expressions relaxed slightly. "Is this Chen Ling's home?"

"...It is."

"Where is he?"

"He left early this morning and hasn't come back yet."

"When he returns, give him this notice." One of the Enforcers pulled a document from his coat. "Districts Two and Three are now under full lockdown. All reserve Enforcers who passed the written examination are being temporarily summoned, and he is on the call-up list.

"Tomorrow morning at seven, report to the District Three Enforcer Headquarters on time. Failure to appear will be treated as voluntarily forfeiting his place."

Chen Tan's heart jolted, but his expression did not change. He accepted the notice and nodded.

"Alright. I'll make sure he gets it."

The two Enforcers turned and left. Chen Tan let out a sigh of relief inwardly.

He pushed open the door and entered the house.

Scrape—scrape—

The instant he stepped inside, a piercing sound of metal grinding reached his ears, like sharp fingernails scraping across a blackboard. Chen Tan's hair stood on end.

Li Xiuchun was huddled in the corner, trembling all over.

When she saw Chen Tan return, her nearly shattered gaze finally lifted. She slowly raised a hand and pointed toward the kitchen...

In the kitchen, a vermilion figure stood with its back to them, head lowered as if chewing on something.

At the sight of that back, Chen Tan's mind went blank!

It was a boy whose neck had nearly been severed. His crimson flesh was healing at a visible rate. He held a kitchen knife in his left hand and a bloodstained axe in his right, stuffing both into his mouth...

As though sensing that Chen Tan had come home, the figure in the kitchen, draped in a bright red opera robe, slowly turned around.

It was Chen Ling—Chen Ling, who had lost his heart and had nearly been beheaded.

His cheeks bulged slightly as he chewed hard on fragments of metal and wood. His unfocused pupils resembled those of a beast, eerie and chilling.

"Dad."

A voice came from behind him. "I'm hungry..."

Chen Ling had a dream.

It was an afternoon blanketed by dark clouds.

As usual, after working out at the martial arts training ground in the outskirts, he pushed open the front door, drenched in sweat.

It was not his birthday, yet a cream cake sat on the dining table... Orange candlelight swayed through the dim living room, and two figures sat at the table with reddened eyes.

A cream cake cost two hundred copper coins, something their family ordinarily could never afford.

He was confused. He asked what day it was.

His parents told him that today was the day his younger brother A-Yan was to undergo surgery.

He was delighted to hear it. His younger brother's congenital heart disease had been the nightmare haunting their family. To cure A-Yan, his parents had run everywhere with him, begging for help, but every clinic had been helpless.

A few days earlier, his parents had said they had found a hospital in District Two and sent his younger brother there. They were confident they could cure him.

Overjoyed by the news, he finished the cake. But before long, his consciousness began to grow hazy, and he collapsed onto the table. The last thing he saw was his mother, Li Xiuchun, covering her mouth as tears streamed down her face.

"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry." He heard his father murmur. "A-Yan's illness needs a heart... You'd be willing, wouldn't you?"

He opened his mouth, seemingly wanting to say something, but ultimately fell unconscious.

Then, he felt himself being stuffed into a bag. Rain pattered against its surface. After a long time, he was finally lifted onto some sort of table.

He felt someone cut open his chest and take something from inside.

Then, someone dressed him in a set of clothes and transferred him somewhere through the heavy rain. Thick earth gradually swallowed his body, and everything around him sank into darkness and deathly stillness...

In the darkness, Chen Ling's eyes suddenly snapped open.

Spotlights lit up one after another overhead, illuminating the red-clad figure lying at the center of the stage. After a brief daze, Chen Ling braced himself against the floor and shakily stood up.

"Damn it... Why am I back here again?"

Chen Ling's face was somewhat pale. His gaze instinctively fell upon the screen at the center of the stage, and his pupils suddenly contracted.

[Audience Anticipation +1]

[Audience Anticipation +1]

[Current Anticipation: 67%]

[Actor connection lost. Performance interrupted.]

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[Warning! Warning!]

[The Audience is beginning to interfere with the performance!]