Chapter 23 – Suspicious Points

After a quick check of the television’s condition, Yu Sheng determined that the thing had simply frozen up.

A classic problem that cheap smart devices developed after prolonged use — ‘Oh my, I’ve been running for two hours straight, my CPU is overheating / my memory is throwing errors / my power supply is too hot / nothing’s really wrong, I just felt like crashing…’

Yu Sheng couldn’t help but feel a pang of nostalgia for the tough, durable old-fashioned televisions he remembered. Back in the day, household appliances weren’t nearly as finicky as these modern smart devices. Sure, they had fewer features, but he felt like all these assorted smart functions weren’t particularly useful either — every so-called artificial intelligence behaved more like artificial stupidity…

“Just cut the power, wait two minutes, and restart it,” Yu Sheng mused inwardly, casually switching off the television and turning to Eileen. “The quality on this thing isn’t great. Leave it on too long and it’ll freeze up on its own.”

“So are you going to get a new one?” Eileen’s eyes immediately lit up. “Get one with voice control, then I can change the channel myself. Even when you’re not home, I could watch TV…”

“You’ve got some nerve making demands, haven’t you?” Watching this person who made herself entirely at home, Yu Sheng was so exasperated he actually laughed. “You’re freeloading at my place and I haven’t said a word about it, and now you want a new TV? What have you contributed — money or effort?”

“I…” Eileen opened her mouth, her face genuinely flushing a little, her words becoming halting and evasive. “I — I, I don’t have any money, but I’ve been helping you fill in your knowledge about the Otherworld! That counts as being a consultant, at least…”

“A consultant whose memory isn’t all that great, who can’t even be sure whether what she says is reliable,” Yu Sheng said with a dismissive curl of his lips. “If I hire you as a consultant, I’d need to find another consultant to consult on your behalf.”

Eileen’s face turned red, but after all that time she couldn’t find a single rebuttal, and could only bow her head and stew in silent frustration — though her disposition was quite good, and after three seconds of sulking she bounced back, lifting her head to look at Yu Sheng. “Then once you get me out — however that ends up happening — I’ll work to pay you back. Besides, aren’t you going to keep dealing with the Otherworld from now on? I can be your assistant! I can fight for you — that should count for something, right?”

Yu Sheng genuinely hadn’t thought about this — in truth, he’d never once considered what would happen if Eileen actually made it out of the painting one day. He raised an eyebrow at her words. “You? Are you sure?”

“Hey, let me tell you, don’t underestimate me! I’m Alice’s Doll!” Eileen planted her hands on her hips and stood up from the chair, looking insufferably smug. “A living doll is blessed — in the Otherworld, I’m far more capable in a fight than those so-called investigators and spirit detectives or whatever they’re called…”

“And then you got shoved into a painting, is that right?”

Eileen’s eyes instantly turned red — though her eyes were already red to begin with. “You… you you you… just wait until I get out, you’ll see! Don’t turn your head away!”

“Alright, alright, I believe you, I believe you.” Yu Sheng laughed and turned away, waving his hand helplessly.

Truth be told, he had never taken this doll too seriously from the start. After all, she was stuck inside the painting. Although she was freeloading at his place, she wasn’t eating his rice, and even laid flat on the floor she took up less than half a square metre of space — hung on the wall, she was out of the way entirely. Aside from watching television, she barely consumed any resources at all, and bickering with her was a decent way to pass the time. Not to mention, she really had filled in a considerable amount of knowledge about “the other world” for him.

As for this person’s talk about working off her debt or becoming his sidekick enforcer after she got out of the painting… he’d take it at face value for now.

The television screen lit up again. Yu Sheng pressed a few buttons on the remote and found some mindless urban drama.

Eileen wasn’t picky about television programmes at all — after all, even Teletubbies was more interesting than staring at wallpaper.

But just then, as Yu Sheng looked at the television screen in front of him, he suddenly thought of something he hadn’t paid attention to before.

“Eileen.” He turned around and looked at the puppet girl in the oil painting.

“Hm?”

“I remember you said you’d been sealed in the oil painting for a very long time, right?”

“Yeah, for many, many years — I can’t even remember when I got in…”

“Then how do you know so much about all these modern things?” Yu Sheng asked in all seriousness. “You even know about smart televisions with voice control?”

He had found a gap in Eileen’s words and behaviour.

But it wasn’t actually that large a problem — there were many explanations that could account for it. For instance, she might have learned about the changes in the world by observing the dreams of people nearby, or she might have been hung in other modern people’s homes before arriving in this house. Yu Sheng figured Eileen’s answer would probably be something along those lines.

But what Eileen gave him in response was a blank “Huh?”

The Puppet in the Painting looked completely stumped by the question — it even seemed as though she herself was realising this for the first time. After staring blankly for a long while, she slowly turned her head. “I… I don’t know why?”

“You don’t know why?” Yu Sheng looked utterly taken aback.

“Yeah, I… really have been locked in this painting for a very, very long time — really, it could be decades — but… but I just know what the world is like now. Though I don’t know how I came to know, I…”

The Puppet in the Painting stumbled over her words, and by the end she seemed to even be doubting herself, trailing off hesitantly into silence.

Yu Sheng stared intently at Eileen’s expression, searching her face for any trace of deception.

“Do you remember how you ended up sealed inside this painting in the first place? And the things that happened before you were sealed — do you remember those?” he continued.

“I… only remember it was a curse,” Eileen said hesitantly. “This painting is also some kind of physical entity. I was supposed to come and deal with it, but instead I ended up being locked inside. The specifics of what happened I can’t remember clearly, and as for what happened before I was locked in… before I was locked in…”

The doll gradually fell silent, as though the fragmented remnants of past memories had tangled her thoughts. She recalled in a daze, and after a long, unknown stretch of time, she spoke softly, as if murmuring in a dream: “I am Eileen of Alice’s Cottage, one of Alice’s Dolls…” She raised her head, unease written across her face.

“Yu Sheng, that’s all I remember.”

Yu Sheng furrowed his brow deeply.

In that instant, his mind conjured up a flood of possibilities.

From the eerie to the conspiratorial to the absurd — but nothing plausible.

After all, he had no evidence or clues to resolve the mystery surrounding Eileen.

Eileen, for her part, looked exceptionally uneasy. She clutched the toy bear tightly in her arms, squeezing the plush toy out of shape. “Is my brain broken?”

Yu Sheng crossed out the conspiratorial scenarios in his mind.

Then he glanced up at Eileen and added ten percent more weight to the absurd ones.

“If you can’t remember, don’t force it — at least don’t try for now,” he said with a quiet exhale, shaking his head at Eileen. “Maybe it really is because you’ve been locked in for so long that your memory and logic have gotten a bit muddled.”

“Is, is that so?” Eileen nodded hesitantly, then seemed to genuinely relax a little.

Yu Sheng: “…”

No wait — how did she end up feeling relieved after learning that her memory and logic might have problems? Didn’t that just prove her brain really was broken? Had anything he just said actually comforted her at all?!

Yu Sheng was instantly filled with question marks, but to be fair, Eileen’s reaction just now had actually dispelled a fair amount of the suspicion that had surfaced in his heart moments ago.

Honestly, if the Puppet in the Painting had produced a perfect explanation for where her “modern knowledge” came from, Yu Sheng might have been even more suspicious. It was precisely that heartfelt “Huh?” she had let slip that made him feel as though everything about her seemed transparent and guileless…

Thinking this, he shook his head, and as he walked toward the Stairs leading to the second floor, he said casually, “Watch TV downstairs. I’m going up to catch some sleep.”

Eileen waved her hand. “Okay, okay, go on.”

Yu Sheng left the dining room and went upstairs, carrying the fatigue accumulated during his time in the Night-shrouded Valley, yawning as he made his way to his bedroom.

He was genuinely both tired and drowsy, and after eating and drinking his fill the urge to sleep was even stronger — he truly needed a good rest.

But when he came to the door of his bedroom, he involuntarily stopped, lifting his gaze toward the end of the corridor.

The Door that had once been sealed by some nameless force stood quietly within his line of sight.

The room at the end of the corridor — that was where he had found Eileen.

Yu Sheng furrowed his brow, his heart stirring, and he stepped toward it.

When he reached the door, he noticed that the handle’s position had already changed — the hinge and handle had been swapped around, now positioned in the “correct orientation” he had eventually discovered, the one that could successfully open the Door.

After a moment’s hesitation, he reached out and gripped the handle, turning it gently.

With a soft click, the Door that had once been impossible to open now swung open with ease, just like every other door in the house.

He pushed the Door wide open, and the scene inside the room came into view —

A simple, ordinary arrangement: against the wall to the left of the door stood a single bed and a bedside table; against the wall to the right were a wardrobe, a writing desk, and a Chair. The old Floor was somewhat faded, and the walls were covered in pale blue wallpaper.

Above the writing desk was a window, through which bright sunlight poured in, making the entire room feel bright and pleasantly warm.

And on the wall directly facing the door — in the spot where Eileen’s oil painting had once hung — there now hung a mirror.

In the mirror, Yu Sheng’s gradually astonished expression stared back at him.

(End of Chapter)