Chapter 31 – A Chance Encounter

Opening the door to the convenience store and walking inside.

Such a simple and ordinary sequence of actions — and yet at this moment, Yu Sheng found it almost unbelievable. The shock of opening so many strange doors just moments ago had been so tremendous that even now he suffered a kind of door-opening aftereffect, to the point where even the sight of the shelves and the shopkeeper made absurd thoughts bubble up unbidden in his mind —

Could this be some kind of mimicry? An anomalous pocket dimension disguised to look exactly like the little convenience store in his memory? Those shelves looked ordinary enough, but who could say whether the bottles and jars on them were filled with eyeballs soaking in formaldehyde, and that shopkeeper across the way — maybe after exchanging greetings he’d suddenly pull a chainsaw-sword from his trouser pocket and charge forward, cutting him down right at the checkout counter…

Fortunately, those absurd thoughts only rattled around in his head for a moment. Yu Sheng quickly calmed himself down, first confirming that he had indeed entered a perfectly normal convenience store, and roughly working out under what circumstances he could “open a door ordinarily and correctly.” He then gave a nod to the young shopkeeper across the counter. “Here to buy a few things — do you have instant noodles and compressed biscuits by the case?”

“Got instant noodles, the unopened cases are stacked under the stairs up to the second floor over there. Take a look at what kind you want,” said the young shopkeeper. Though he found it a little odd that Yu Sheng had stood frozen the moment he walked in, he quickly dismissed the thought, raising a hand to point at the iron ladder not far away. “No cases of compressed biscuits left. Middle row on the left shelf — see it? That’s all of them. Not many people buy that stuff, so I don’t stock much.”

“Alright, help me pack up all the biscuits, I’ll go grab a case of instant noodles… and throw in two packs of sausages, the big ones.”

“Sure.”

The young shopkeeper acknowledged with a sound and turned around, grabbing a large shopping bag to load up the shelves, chatting casually as he worked: “Buying so many instant noodles and compressed biscuits all of a sudden? Eating just this stuff isn’t good for you — my wife nags me about it every day.”

“Keeping them at home as backup supplies,” Yu Sheng replied offhandedly.

The shopkeeper didn’t say anything more, packed up the large bag of goods as requested, and headed toward the checkout counter. Just then, the glass door of the convenience store was pushed open again — both panels swung open together, and the door hinge on one side let out a teeth-grinding screech.

The shopkeeper, who had been counting compressed biscuits and tallying the bill, immediately looked up at the sound. “Hey, that door’s broken — there’s a notice stuck to it.”

“Oh, I didn’t notice,” said the young man who’d pushed his way in. He had black hair, was dressed in casual clothes, and had an unremarkable face. He glanced back a little awkwardly at the half-panel glass door that now appeared unable to swing back on its own, then turned around. “Do you have instant noodles by the case?”

At that moment, Yu Sheng was walking out from between two rows of shelves with a case of instant noodles in his arms. He heard the commotion at the checkout and glanced over, but quickly looked away.

“Oh, that kind is fine,” said the young man with the short black hair, pointing at the case of instant noodles in Yu Sheng’s arms. “I’ll take a case of those too.”

The shopkeeper didn’t even look up. “Front right side, under the stairs. Go grab it yourself — I’m ringing up the other customer first.”

Yu Sheng brushed past the young man, settled his bill at the checkout counter, and then, carrying a large shopping bag in one hand and hoisting the noodle case on his shoulder with the other, stepped out into the deepening darkness of the night outside the store.

Li Lin found the instant noodles he was looking for under the stairs the shopkeeper had mentioned. Just as he bent down to pick up the case, he felt his pocket vibrate. He pulled out his phone and saw a message from his team leader.

He glanced toward the checkout counter, then looked down at his phone screen and typed a quick reply: “I’ve already settled in, just heading out to buy some things.”

The phone buzzed twice. A new message popped up on the screen: “Noticed anything unusual?”

Li Lin typed back: “Nothing. I’ll walk around on the street tomorrow, make contact with the local residents.”

After sending the message, the young Special Operations Bureau agent hesitated for a moment, then followed up with another: “Roughly when will the unit’s ‘deep-diver’ arrive? Who’s being assigned?”

This time it took a while before the phone vibrated again: “Xu Jiali. Arriving tomorrow.”

Li Lin stared at the message on the screen for a moment, and was just about to type a question when he saw his superior send another message: “He just got back from Aymein-IX. Something came up over there — his mission ended early. He’s currently at the bureau doing his debrief and full examination. He’ll be deployed to your location tomorrow.”

After reading the messages on the screen, Li Lin’s lips twitched. He typed quickly: “Sending him straight to duty after just finishing an outside assignment? Can’t even give the guy half a day off?”

“Xu Jiali requested it himself. The situation he ran into over there was a bit unusual — he’s got some post-immersion aftereffects and needs to keep wearing his stabilizer for the next few days. So it made more sense to just shift his post-assignment leave to next week. Things on your end shouldn’t be too active in the short term, so his time with you can basically count as rest. You two can talk it over in detail when you meet tomorrow.”

Li Lin pursed his lips, sent back an “understood,” and then rose to his feet with the case of instant noodles and walked toward the checkout.

The shopkeeper behind the counter lifted his eyes to take a look, and while reaching for the barcode scanner started muttering again: “Eating just this stuff isn’t good for you — my wife nags me about it every day…”

Li Lin chuckled. “So I shouldn’t buy them?”

“That’ll be 62 yuan 80.”

……

Eileen heard the commotion at the front door — it had been pushed open from the outside — but she poked her head out from the edge of the picture frame to look toward the entryway and didn’t spot Yu Sheng’s figure for quite some time.

After another long while, she finally saw Yu Sheng ease his head into the doorway in an oddly furtive manner, peering around in all directions for a good while before stepping inside as gingerly as a thief, setting the large pile of purchases down on the floor, and then turning around to close the door.

Eileen watched the whole scene in silence, waiting until Yu Sheng had shut the door before finally speaking: “Yu Sheng, what are you doing? Why do you look like a thief coming home?”

Yu Sheng let out a sigh, muttering as he changed his shoes: “Don’t even get me started. I’ve got serious psychological trauma around ‘opening doors’ right now — I can’t take a step forward without checking three times first.”

Eileen listened, her gaze drifting down to the pile of things by the entrance.

“You bought a lot,” the doll-lady remarked with some amazement. “You should’ve taken a little trolley with you — one of those camping carts. They’re incredibly handy.”

Yu Sheng was silent for a moment, just staring down at the instant noodles, sausages, and compressed biscuits piled by the doorway. Then, as if he’d suddenly remembered something, he slapped his forehead hard. “I should have bought some liquid food! She’s been starving too long — she can’t eat this stuff right away… No good, I’ll go buy a case of eight-treasure congee first thing tomorrow morning… or should I go now?”

Eileen listened quietly, and it was only when she saw Yu Sheng genuinely preparing to head back out that she spoke up: “Tomorrow would be better.”

Yu Sheng had already changed back into his shoes, one hand on the door handle as he looked back. “She’s still hungry though…”

“Even if you buy it now, do you have any way to deliver it to that fox immediately?” Eileen looked straight at Yu Sheng. “And… honestly, I’ve been meaning to say this — even if you did send those supplies over, it would only provide temporary relief. The real problem over there isn’t the lack of food. It’s that entity called ‘Hunger.'”

Yu Sheng stilled.

After a brief moment of thought, he changed back out of his shoes, walked to the dining table, and sat down across from Eileen.

“That’s true — the main problem is ‘Hunger.’ Though being able to temporarily fill her stomach would still help… but let’s leave it for tomorrow. There’s really no rush for a little while yet. I need to first figure out a way to enter that valley reliably.”

Eileen noticed that Yu Sheng’s face had taken on a look of serious contemplation as he said the second half of that sentence, and recalling the fragmentary things he had hinted at when he’d contacted her earlier, she immediately sensed something acutely.

“…What exactly happened?” she ventured to ask. “You… don’t tell me you’ve already come up with a way to enter that valley?”

“Strictly speaking, it’s not a way into that valley specifically, but rather…”

As Yu Sheng spoke, he raised his hand right in front of Eileen and grabbed at the empty air.

He closed his hand around a door handle, and a door materialized abruptly in the air. The door itself was entirely unremarkable in appearance, but its edges trembled and flickered like a mirage. And then, under Eileen’s stunned gaze, Yu Sheng yanked it open.

The phantasmal door flew open, and Yu Sheng saw standing on the other side a female elf who looked like a grease monkey — she had a great mass of mechanical appendages on her back and a wheeled lower body, but her upper half was clothed in a silver-white gown.

She was standing in front of some kind of large machining equipment, and she turned toward him with a look of utter shock on her face.

The mechanical appendages behind the elf-lady grease monkey were still rapidly and precisely adjusting the large device on the platform — the device that was continuously radiating streaming light — while her eyes looked as if they were about to pop out of her head. She stared at Yu Sheng for two full seconds before letting out a shout: “So who the f*ck are you even…”

Yu Sheng slammed the door shut with a bang.

“…I didn’t expect that I could connect to the same place twice in a row,” Yu Sheng murmured, his face holding a trace of surprise mixed with contemplation. “Wait, that might actually mean… Let me try to reproduce it in a moment…”

He had barely finished muttering when Eileen across the table finally couldn’t hold it together any longer. The doll-lady looked as if she were about to fly out of the oil painting and bite someone: “What the heck was that just now?! What was that?! Huh?!”

“As you saw,” Yu Sheng exhaled, “it was a door.”

“I obviously know that was a door, but the point is —” Eileen drew a deep breath, and her whole self practically leapt off the chair. “What·on·earth·WAS·that?!”

(End of Chapter)