Volume 1 - CH 9

The atmosphere was growing awkward.

Ponytail reacts first and immediately says, “we’re here to investigate the case of your missing daughter! We called out downstairs but there was no response for a long time, so we went upstairs to check. Sorry about that.”

The dollmaker’s facial expression visibly calms, saying, “is that so… I was sleeping, so I didn’t hear, perhaps,” he then begins to show a slightly more expectant face, “then, did you come up with anything?”

The dollmaker, named Wu Shen, should be in his 30’s, but looking at his tired, unkempt form, he could probably pass for being in his 40’s.

Ponytail smiles to say, “well, we’re here to ask you about it. We had collected clues, but we still wanted to ask you for more information.”

“Really?” Wu Shen quickly asks, “what clues did you collect?”

Ponytail says frankly, “perhaps we can talk about it somewhere else.”

“Sure, sure,” Wu Shen nods, looking slightly nervous, “this way.”

He is clearly really drawn to the information Ponytail said she has; he doesn’t know that they’re actually here to try to fish something out of him instead.

He brings Ponytail into the study, which is basically the only room that can receive a guest. Just barely.

The moment they step inside, Ponytail’s heart skips a beat. They combed through the room just now, which means decorations and books are all out of place. The letters are not where they were, either.

Fortunately, Wu Shen doesn’t seem to notice at all, making Ponytail sigh in relief.

After they’re inside, Quarrelsome is about to follow when he spies Glasses stealing glances at the corridor. He asks, “what’chu looking at?”

Glasses gives him a glance and asks coldly, “you don’t see anything wrong?”

Quarrelsome furrows his brows to say, “so what, can’t you say what’s wrong directly? Is it fun to answer a question with a question? I can tell you, ‘I, don’t,’ ho.”

Then he follows the two people into the room.

Glasses can’t help but roll his eyes and looks back at the corridor a little longer.

He kept track of the time carefully; it is well past five minutes. Therefore, while Ponytail was negotiating with Wu Shen, his eyes were darting across the corridor, looking for the girl doll.

Yet, it has disappeared, who knows when.

She isn’t here to kill him even after five minutes.

Glasses is confused and worried.

Before he entered this Nightmare, he was confident that he had information that other Missiontakers didn’t.

Now, he is faced with the fact that the situation is entirely out of his control.

The second floor of the Dollmaker’s… This nominally insignificant scene seems to belie some terrifying secrets.

After blanking out briefly, he takes a deep breath, and turns to walk into the study as well.

The moment he turns around, a little silhouette in a red dress, pokes its little head out from the stairwell at the end of the entrance. The glass beads that are her eyes watching the man’s back.

Glasses doesn’t notice, but he is the source of the video feed of the stream right now. Under their scrutinous views——And Xü Beijin’s too——They see it clearly.

Immediately the ‘AAAA’ comment barrages begin.

Xü Beijin was also spooked himself, cocking his head away to avoid his gaze.

Unfortunately, the screen is locked to his vision. He fails to look away, and instead, his sudden movement attracted Lin Qin’s attention.

Lin Qin, who was sitting there and blanking out, comes back to ask curiously, “what’s wrong?”

Xü Beijin awkwardly smiles and responds, “nothing… never mind.”

Lin Qin narrows his eyes and says, “I do not know what you were thinking about… But my instincts tell me, when you say ‘nothing,’ there is definitely something.”

“It’s really nothing.”

Lin Qin gives him a glance, which translates to, ‘sure, keep going.’

Xü Beijin “…”

He gives up.

He does want to conceal his thoughts, but Lin Qin is an instinctual monster. The people in the Tower were right, perhaps. Lin Qin perhaps isn’t particularly smart.

Yet his instincts are unbelievably sharp. Coupled with his supreme fighting power, at least in ‘Escape,’ he’s wholly unrivalled.

… Meaning, he is an especially effective counter to people like Xü Beijin – ones who don’t think what they say, and whose face doesn’t correspond to their character.

Like how the Missiontakers all take Xü Beijin to be deep, conniving, scheming, antagonistic, but Lin Qin isn’t at all deterred and is even excitedly inviting him to fight every time.

Or it might just be he’s that confident in his fighting strength.

Xü Beijin can’t help but wonder how the Tower would have such an unimaginable fighting power.

The Missiontakers all wonder about Xü Beijin, ‘the Monster that Never Sleeps,’ but isn’t it equally strange that someone with as much monstrous fighting power as Lin Qin came up?

As Xü Beijin becomes absorbed in his thoughts, his expression begins to turn stony.

Shortly, though, he snaps out of his thoughts and turns back to the stream, where the Missiontakers are talking to Wu Shen.

They say they’re going to talk about the clue, but after they begin to talk, Ponytail first asks, “I would like to confirm first. When your daughter has gone missing, you were making dolls on the second floor, and your wife… your ex-wife, was working?”

Wu Shen can only answer despite his impatience, “yes. I was making dolls in my workshop opposite this room that afternoon. It was always like this. On workdays, my ex-wife had to go to work, so xiao-Chun would play by herself in the store. She is a good girl, she doesn’t wander around.”

Ponytail nods.

It seems the room they haven’t explored yet on this floor would be Wu Shen’s workshop. The structure of this store is clear, now.

A two-storey building. The first floor is the storefront. There is likely another bathroom and kitchen that’s buried within the mountainous pile of boxes and dolls and trash.

The second floor is the living area with a bathroom, bedroom, study and workshop. Wait, wouldn’t a child’s room be missing… Ponytail glances around a bit.

In terms of area, this study/bedroom was likely the master’s bedroom? That makes the smaller room next door xiao-Chun’s room?

After xiao-Chun has gone missing, the father moves over to sleep in his daughter’s room…

For nostalgia’s sake? It sounds really perverted, though.

Ponytail ‘tch’s inside but continues asking, “and, was there no CCTV in your store?”

Wu Shen looks embarrassed, saying, “the camera… broke. It broke a pretty long time ago, and because we never actually used it, we didn’t fix it…” He says, looking frustrated, “it’s all my fault. Sigh, it’s all me!”

“Please don’t blame yourself. I believe xiao-Chun wouldn’t wish for you to be like this either.”

Wu Shen seems slightly out of it. After his daughter has gone missing, it is apparent his mental state has been impacted. From both his diary and his letters to his friends, it is easy to see he has become utterly lost.

Suddenly, he buries his face into his hands to cry, murmuring xiao-Chun’s name with a scratchy voice. His body curls up. It is painful to watch.

Ponytail patiently waits for him to calm down.

A long while later, Wu Shen wipes his tears away to reply with a tone that is still slightly hoarse, “I apologise… After xiao-Chun has gone missing, I often have these episodes,” he lowers his head to hide his reddened eyes, adding, “perhaps, it really is the Heavens’ punishment for me…”

“Why do you think the Heavens are punishing you? If you didn’t do anything wrong…”

“No, I did wrong,” Wu Shen suddenly raises his head and widens his eyes, “I did something wrong!”

Ponytail is shocked by his bloodied eyes, but still reflexively asks, “what is it?”

Wu Shen grits his teeth to say, “I should never have married that woman! If only I didn’t marry that woman, then xiao-Chun wouldn’t… wouldn’t…”

Quarrelsome reflexively counters, “if you didn’t marry her, xiao-Chun couldn’t have been born in the first place!”

Wu Shen trembles and freezes, then, his neck slowly turns in his direction. He is looking at Quarrelsome with a terrifying expression.

Quarrelsome can feel a chill seeping down his back. The man sure did end up going insane because of his missing daughter… pitiful.

His wife killing xiao-Chun, or, xiao-Chun running away from home due to her mother’s wrath, may be mere guesses of Wu Shen.

And, all the man can do is to throw useless tantrums here, blaming his missing daughter on his wife… But fundamentally, the day xiao-Chun went missing, he was in the store. He failed to look after xiao-Chun. It’s his responsibility.

The situation has turned frigid.

Suddenly, Wu Shen stands up, and points at the door, saying “get out.”

Ponytail seems spooked, saying, “Mr Wu, we…”

“Get out!” Wu Shen, with widened eyes, grim expression and veins popping on his neck, yells, “I’m telling you to get out! How could people like you ever find xiao-Chun!”

The insane father has chased the three Missiontakers out of his store.

They still seem dazed even after they have been hustled out.

Quarrelsome seems slightly embarrassed, saying, “no… really, did he just…”

It was his quarrelsome retort that set off Wu Shen… Still, his attitude seems over-the-top. Is the rift between the man and his wife already so deep?

Ponytail seems to be in thought. She begins walking while saying, “something is off with his emotional state. I suspect…”

Quarrelsome asks, “what?”

Glasses mockingly says, “tch, really need to spell it out for you? This father, who loves his daughter so utterly-nutterly much is also a suspect.”

“He too?” Quarrelsome is genuinely surprised, saying, “he looks like he’d kill whoever dared hurt xiao-Chun any… what could he have done to her?”

Ponytail reminds him, “don’t forget that one of the information we got was that, the day xiao-Chun went missing, she was in the store alone with Wu Shen. Although everyone seems to have conveniently ignored his suspicion because he is her father, why can’t he be the ‘thief crying out “thief”‘?” (TL: Chinese saying meaning the perpetrator yelling out about his deeds)

Quarrelsome seems astounded, saying, “it… I suppose it makes sense.”

Glasses gives him a glance, speechless, and asks Ponytail, “why did you even team up with this guy? For his stupidity and obedience?”

Quarrelsome gives Glasses a ferocious glare.

Ponytail can’t be bothered with their argument again, so is murmuring to herself, “the bookstore owner, the dollmaker, the dollmaker’s wife… who could have laid their hands on xiao-Chun?”

Xü Beijin is also listening intently.

While it is paining him that Ponytail listed him alongside the couple, but he really is curious now about the development and truth behind this Nightmare.

He watches the stream while listening in… when suddenly, something feels off.

Where are they going? Does it look like, they’re heading for the bookstore?

… Then he’s going on camera? And will have to be exposed to the viewers? Wouldn’t they be convinced that this ‘bookstore owner next door’ is even more like the perpetrator???

Panicked, Xü Beijin tries to fiddle with the video source.

Unfortunately, he’s too late.

As Glasses has just come into view in the entrance. The viewers of the stream also end up seeing the man behind the bookstore counter.