Ye Yanran

Biodata

Power Progression

Background / History

Recruitment into the Special Affairs Office

Ye Yanran had recently graduated from the police academy when she volunteered for an internal talent-selection program. After being found resistant to the Living Dead’s aura, she joined the newly established Special Affairs Office. Unlike her three colleagues, she had no afflicted relative motivating her involvement 220.

As director, she led a four-person team consisting of Deputy Director Pang Wen, Secretary Qin Xiu, and technician Jia Le. All four handled fieldwork. The office existed specifically to address the sudden appearance of the Living Dead, whom its members regarded as patients suffering from an unknown illness 208.

Ye Yanran hoped to complete the assignment quickly enough for her colleagues to return to their former lives. Qin Xiu had been an elementary school teacher, Pang Wen a psychological counselor, and Jia Le a promising physics talent 234.

Taking in Ye Jiang

Three hundred years before the present-day story, Ye Yanran encountered Ye Jiang’s one-eyed, doll-like form in a villa. She mistook the deity for a Living Dead and brought her to the office’s hospital 220.

Despite receiving no response, Ye Yanran gave her a name, taught her to read, and told her stories. In the true past, Ye Jiang remained so unresponsive that the office never discovered how different she was from its other patients. Ye Yanran nevertheless treated her as a conscious person 232.

The name originated with wild ginger that the monster had watched. Ye Yanran first suggested “Jiang Ye,” then reversed it to “Ye Jiang,” giving the monster her own surname 218 219. Ye Jiang did not truly accept the name until after a funeral, when Ye Yanran unknowingly picked up her newly reshaped child form and showed her compassion. That tenderness moved the otherwise indifferent deity 220.

The City’s Catastrophe

The office eventually received a voluntary request to treat Jing Qiu, an elderly woman who had become a Living Dead. Ye Yanran was delighted: the request suggested that the public was beginning to trust their work. Before she departed, Ye Jiang warned her telepathically that the Living Dead were already dead 233.

At the estate, the team discovered that Jing Qiu had become an enormous centipede-like Polluted and massacred the people caring for her. The creature killed Qin Xiu, Pang Wen, and Jia Le, then wounded Ye Yanran and headed toward the city 234.

The hospital’s Living Dead also escaped and began killing civilians. Ye Yanran watched Living Dead No. 2 murder a family who had appealed to her for protection. By the time Ye Jiang found her outside the hospital, the experts were dead, their research lay scattered in blood, and Ye Yanran was overwhelmed by mental Pollution and self-reproach 234.

Sacrifice and the Blood Moon

Ye Yanran finally recognized that Ye Jiang was not a Living Dead. Ye Jiang offered her energy that would let her kill the attackers, warning that it would also kill her and bring fear rather than public acclaim 235.

A later revelation supplies the full choice: Ye Jiang could instead eliminate the city’s Living Dead herself, but could not keep doing so whenever new ones appeared. Alternatively, Ye Yanran could die in an experiment that might enable humans to awaken abilities. Ye Yanran immediately chose the experiment 236.

She transformed into an enormous aberration, destroyed the Living Dead, and died shielding the city with her body. Her remains became a mountain range later remembered through a story of a hero’s victory. Her choice led to Ye Jiang’s creation of the Blood Moon 235 236.

Reconstruction in the Watch Mountain Range

The Watch Mountain Range’s memory-based illusion reconstructed Ye Yanran’s era. Xiao Pei and Ming Xia identified her as a likely protagonist because her death caused time to rewind. When a living mask attacked her in the villa, Ye Jiang healed her, stabilizing the distorted spacetime 212 213.

Outside interference initially changed events. Ye Yanran provisionally recruited the present-day Ye Jiang after seeing her withstand Pollution, and later recognized the apparent lucidity of the one-eyed monster. The illusion forcibly redirected her toward the basement when her actions strayed too far from history 211 214 216.

After defeating Ghost Mother, Ye Jiang restored the damaged illusion and removed outsiders and their memories from its inhabitants. Ye Yanran’s story then resumed its historical course, including the catastrophe and her final sacrifice 232 234 235.

Her name also survived in Song Cen’s incomplete message: “Ye Yanran was right to insist. In this world, there are polluted who still...” The Ability Control Bureau’s officials could not identify her and only speculated that she might have been a forgotten hero 197.

Appearance

• Hair: Short 201 207.
• Features: Delicate facial features 207.
• Usual bearing: Flippant and casual; this manner disappears when she seriously examines a threat 207.
• Final transformation: An enormous aberration whose body ultimately became a mountain range 235.

Personality

Ye Yanran is playful, talkative, and quick to improvise outrageous explanations. She teases Ye Jiang, makes exaggerated displays of hurt feelings, and eagerly clocks out when work is finished. Her casual manner can vanish immediately when a case demands concentration 201 207 209.

Her approach to the Living Dead rests on an unusually uncompromising respect for life. She insists that the office takes them in for treatment, not disposal. Even violent, unresponsive patients receive lessons and companionship; she refuses to favor Ye Jiang simply because she seems more promising 216 219 220.

She loves stories of wandering heroes and openly hopes that curing the Living Dead will become an achievement worthy of history. Yet recognition is not a condition of her courage: when warned that her sacrifice will bring no praise, she asks whether there is any greater price 219 235.

Her sense of responsibility also makes her vulnerable to guilt. She blames herself for the infant’s death during the villa operation and struggles with whether to tell its amnesiac mother. The later massacre devastates her because the beings she had protected slaughter both civilians and her colleagues 217 234.

Abilities & Skills

Resistance to Living Dead Aura

Ye Yanran possesses the resistance required for Special Affairs Office fieldwork 211 220.

• Can approach Living Dead whose aura endangers ordinary civilians 216.
• Still experiences intense cold, fear, breathlessness, and physical distress near a powerful specimen 208.
• Is not immune to hypnosis or mental Pollution: the infant traps her in hallucinations, and the city’s destruction later leaves her severely affected 210 234.

Combat Training

As a field operative, she has undergone combat training and carries a dagger 209.

• Uses her blade defensively while approaching a potential patient 216.
• Dodges attacks while continuing to teach violent Living Dead 219.
• Cannot meaningfully oppose the A-Rank centipede-like Polluted in her human state 234.

Teaching and Calligraphy

Ye Yanran teaches literacy, everyday knowledge, laws, and stories to the hospital’s patients 219.

• Uses primers, pinyin, books, and writing demonstrations 219.
• Has skilled brush handwriting and says she has won a calligraphy award 219.
• Continues teaching even when her students provide no response or attack her 219 232.

Leadership and Investigation

She directs the office’s field operations and evaluates unfamiliar supernatural incidents 207 208.

• Accepts the Cao An investigation because his purported prophecy may relate to the Living Dead 208.
• Recognizes Ye Jiang’s suitability for recruitment through her resistance to Pollution 211.
• Questions Xiao Pei closely when her claimed resistance suggests an unreported Living Dead encounter 215 216.

Equipment / Weapons / Items

• Dagger — Her chosen portable field weapon, carried strapped to her calf 209 215.
• Teaching materials — Books, literacy primers, paper, brushes, and ink used during hospital lessons 219.

Relationships

• Ye Jiang — Patient, student, and the deity whose name she bestowed. Ye Yanran’s persistent care deepened Ye Jiang’s interest in humanity; Ye Jiang later offered the power behind her final sacrifice 220 232 235 236.
• Qin Xiu — Secretary and field teammate, addressed as “Sister Xiu.” Her sternness frequently counters Ye Yanran’s flippancy. She dies in the centipede-like Polluted’s attack 208 234.
• Pang Wen — Deputy director and field teammate. Ye Yanran remembers his gentle manner and habit of placing small potted plants around the office 208 234.
• Jia Le — Technician and fellow field operative. Ye Yanran hopes he can eventually return to physics; he is killed alongside the other teammates 208 234.
• The mayor — A close acquaintance who attended the same school in a different year. The mayor entrusts the Cao An case to her because of confidence in her judgment 207.
• Xiao Pei — An outsider encountered within the reconstructed past. Ye Yanran initially treats her as a civilian to protect, while Xiao Pei recognizes the burden of responsibility she carries 213 216 217.

Notable Quotes

“I have to go upstairs and teach the other Living Dead. If I teach you, I have to teach them, too. I can’t play favorites.” 219

“Is that all? … There’s no other price? I simply won’t be praised?” 235

“I choose that!” — Accepting the fatal experiment that might allow humanity to awaken abilities. 236