Cauchemar

Chapitre 8

"So how have you managed all these years?" Su Yang asked curiously.

"There's some food in the cellar. For a half-dead person like me, I can just gather some firewood and cook some porridge."

Su Yang suddenly remembered the pot of rat soup he had seen in the kitchen. A thought struck him, and he couldn't help but ask, "When I came in just now, I saw a pot of soup in the kitchen. Was it the one you cooked?"

The old man laughed. "Did I scare you? That's Big Black, the one the black cat you saw before caught. I haven't had any meat in a long time, so I killed it to improve my meals. Would you like to try some?"

Su Yang hurriedly waved his hand, "No, no, no, you should keep it and eat it slowly." He remembered something else, "By the way, why are you sleeping in a coffin?"

“It’s getting cold, and that’s the warmest place. Besides, someone like me who’s nearing the end of my life might lie down one day and never wake up again. And then there’ll be no one to collect my body. So it’s more convenient for me to lie in there than to rot in bed.” The old man squinted at the window. “It’s almost dawn, and I’m tired. Help me to sleep, kid.”

Su Yang silently helped the old woman's frail body out of the room. By the sliver of light filtering through the roof tiles, they groped their way to the coffin in the hall. He watched as the old woman slowly climbed into the coffin and lay down fully clothed. A strange smile appeared on the old woman's face as she looked at Su Yang and said, "Alright, child, you should go back now."

Su Yang hesitated for a moment before remembering to say goodbye to the old man. "Then please rest well, I will come to visit you more often when I have time."

"You will never see me again," the old man uttered, then looked at Su Yang again before closing his eyes and falling asleep.

Su Yang went downstairs, filled with doubts.

Stepping out of the dark and gloomy old house, Su Yang found that the sky was already beginning to lighten. The cool morning breeze caressed his face, giving him a sense of returning to the world, but also making him doubt his earlier encounter with Grandma Zhu Su on the third floor, as if it had never existed. The darkness, the oppression, the terror there—it all seemed like images from another world, like an expired roll of film. You could see faint images on it, but you couldn't make out what was being depicted, whether those characters and stories had ever truly existed.

Apartment 602, the Man-Eating Apartment, Part 11 (3)

Bathed in the morning light, all the shadowy objects in the courtyard revealed their true forms. The trees and flowers, glistening with dew, bore none of the oppressive gloom of the night. "The places I walk are no different from those of the past, but the people are different." Su Yang recalled this Zen saying, and it was indeed true. The world's phenomena haven't changed much in the first place; all the joys and sorrows, the partings and reunions, are created by the human heart. Like the waxing and waning of the moon, merely the effect of the moon and Earth's orbits intersecting, yet people insist on imbuing it with feelings of vicissitude and change, thus giving rise to all sorts of sorrow and resentment. However, if people were heartless, they might be spared much grief and fear, but life would lose its richness and vibrancy, its meaning diminished.

Su Yang strode lightly across the grassy path. Passing the well, he longed to peek into the water to see if it was his own face reflected on the surface, or that of the four-eyed monster. But before he could even get close, a chill ran down his spine. "Looks like something really eerie," Su Yang thought, his scalp tingling. He quickly walked around it.

Upon exiting the gate, Su Yang was surprised to find Liu Changge and several factory workers pointing and whispering anxiously at the entrance. When Liu Changge saw Su Yang, he was initially startled, then his face lit up with joy. He ran over, grabbed Su Yang's arm tightly, and shook it, exclaiming, "Thank goodness! Thank goodness! Teacher Zhang, you're alright! Are you really okay?"

Looking at his sincere expression, Su Yang felt a surge of emotion. He took Liu Changge's hand in return and patted his arm, his heart filled with a thousand words, yet unable to express them.

The other colleagues from the factory swarmed around, bombarding him with questions: "Teacher Zhang, what did you see?" "Teacher Zhang, there weren't any ghosts in there, were there?" "Teacher Zhang, we were worried about you all night..."

Only then did Su Yang realize that after Liu Changge escaped, he felt deeply uneasy and worried that Su Yang might be in danger alone at the Zhu residence. So he gathered a group of colleagues from the factory, intending to go and check on Su Yang together for courage. However, before they even entered the Zhu residence, they heard a strange sound, like a baby crying, or an old person sobbing, interspersed with low, wild animal growls. Terrified, none of them dared to step inside, and they kept watch outside the door all night, praying for Su Yang's safety. At dawn, they found that the strange sounds had disappeared. They discussed going in to look for Su Yang, but before they could decide, they saw Su Yang emerge unharmed.

"Teacher Zhang, do you know who made those terrifying sounds?" Wang Xi, the youngest among the group, asked curiously.

Su Yang was a little confused. "I didn't hear anything inside last night. I only met Zhu Su's grandmother. She lives alone inside, or to be precise, she lives alone in a coffin on the third floor."

Everyone looked at each other in bewilderment. Liu Changge mustered his courage and asked, "Teacher Zhang, are you sure you're not mistaken? Is she really Zhu Su's grandmother?"

"She said so herself." Su Yang was a little confused, and briefly described Grandma Zhu Su's appearance to them. "Is it her? Is there a problem?"

Liu Changge wrapped his clothes tighter around himself. "Teacher Zhang, according to your description, that person should be Zhu Su's grandmother. But we haven't seen her for many years. We thought she moved away with Zhu Su and her family a long time ago, or... she might be dead."

"Oh, I see." Su Yang said with relief, "She didn't go with Zhu Su and the others, but stayed at home and relied on the leftover food stored in the cellar to make a living. She also occasionally catches some rats to eat. By the way, the bucket you saw last night should be the one she usually uses to fetch water."

"How is this possible?" Liu Changge murmured, "How come no one has seen her in all these years?"

"This..." Su Yang scratched his head. "I'm not quite sure either. Maybe it's because her daily routine is different from normal people. How about this, I'll take you inside to look for her, then everything will be clear, right?"

Liu Changge looked at Su Yang, then at the puzzled looks on the faces of the others around him, and made up his mind. "Alright, we'll go in with you to find Zhu Su's grandmother."

Su Yang chuckled at them, then led the way by pushing open the gate of the Zhu residence again and taking them straight up to the third floor.

"Grandma, Grandma..." Su Yang called out.

With a "meow," a black cat darted out of the darkness, its emerald green eyes glaring fiercely at the group of uninvited guests.

Those in the crowd who were easily frightened couldn't help but scream. Su Yang paid no attention to the emotions of others, only immersed in his own shock, because he smelled a very familiar scent, almost identical to the stench he had smelled in Zhu Su's house years ago—the stench unique to the dead! Su Yang's heart began to sink, lower and lower, until it plummeted to freezing point. He trembled as he approached the dark coffin in the hall. With each step closer, the smell grew stronger, and his heart tightened, almost suffocating him.

Seeing Su Yang's nervous expression, the others felt even more apprehensive and cautiously followed him as they approached the coffin.

For a moment, Su Yang felt as if the coffin was hell itself, and with each step he took closer, he was one step closer to hell, and once he reached it, he would be plunged into an abyss of no return. His palms were icy cold, his face was covered in cold sweat, and even his breathing became rapid and uneasy.

Finally approaching the coffin, Su Yang discovered that it wasn't as he had seen it before, with the lid on the ground. Instead, it was mostly covered, with only a small gap at the rear. Therefore, unless one walked to the other end of the coffin, it was impossible to see what was inside. But even with just those two steps, Su Yang had no strength to move another.

The others stared at Su Yang with suspicion and disbelief; the air seemed to freeze. Finally, a brave man stepped forward. He gritted his teeth and flung open the coffin lid. Everyone screamed in terror. The timid Wang Xi was so frightened that he ran down the stairs, stumbled, and tumbled all the way down.

Apartment 602, the Man-Eating Apartment, Part 11 (4)

Su Yang stared intently at the old man in the coffin. The old man before him bore no trace of life. While the withered appearance of the old man before him had startled him, the gruesome sight before him chilled him to the bone! It was impossible to tell how long the old man had been dead; all his flesh had decomposed into putrid liquid, soaking in strips of indistinguishable fabric crawling with maggots. Even more horrifying was the old man's face; it seemed to have been bitten by some animal, half of it missing, revealing stark white bone. The only remaining intact feature was an eye on the other side of his face, sitting in its deep socket, seemingly gleaming with a mysterious, cold light, coldly staring at Su Yang, as if it held many unspoken words.

Su Yang felt as if his very soul had been taken away by that eye, his mind a complete blank. He let Liu Changge and the others drag him out of the Zhu residence. As soon as they were outside, everyone started vomiting violently.

Soon, the police arrived. Preliminary investigation results indicated that the elderly woman likely died of natural causes, approximately two years ago. The cause of death on one side of her face was still unclear – whether it was caused by the cat's hunger or by the rats becoming her meal.

Su Yang stared blankly at the police investigation report, while Liu Changge and the others peeked at him with a look of utter terror, as if they had seen a ghost. A thousand thoughts churned in Su Yang's mind, only to evaporate one by one, leaving only vague traces. Su Yang felt as if his brain was about to explode. He clutched his head, let out a low groan, and squatted down.

Seeing Su Yang's pained expression, Liu Changge walked over sympathetically and patted him on the shoulder. "Teacher Zhang, don't think about it anymore. Maybe... you just encountered the ghost of Grandma Zhu Su. That house wasn't very clean to begin with."

Su Yang suddenly raised his head, startling Liu Changge. Su Yang's eyes were bloodshot as he stared intently at him, asking, word by word, "You say there really are ghosts in this world? Ghosts? I don't believe it!"

Su Yang stood up and rushed into the Zhu residence like a madman, startling everyone. The two policemen guarding the gate couldn't stop him and chased after him desperately.

Instead of barging into the room, Su Yang went around to the backyard. The backyard was almost as desolate as the front yard, overgrown with weeds. The most striking feature was a huge poplar tree in the middle of the yard. Su Yang pounced on the tree, pushing aside the tangled weeds and digging at the ground with frantic movements.

Those who witnessed this scene felt a chill run down their spines. Liu Changge felt an even greater unease: Had Teacher Zhang suffered too much trauma and gone mad?

"Teacher Zhang, what are you digging for?" Liu Changge cautiously approached Su Yang, keeping a distance of half a meter. He was afraid that if Su Yang really went crazy, he would suddenly attack him.

"Shovels, do you have any shovels?" Su Yang's face was ashen, and beads of sweat seeped down his face, mixing with the color of the soil, making him look even stranger.

Someone found a rusty shovel in the yard and handed it to Su Yang. Su Yang took the shovel without a word and began digging frantically. The others exchanged bewildered glances.

After digging about two feet deep, a skeleton was unearthed from the soil. Everyone screamed in shock. Su Yang turned ashen-faced. He threw down his shovel, slumped to the ground, and stared blankly.

The police arrived immediately and cordoned off the scene. One of the officers looked at the bones, then at Su Yang, and finally couldn't help but ask, "How did you know there was a body buried under the tree?"

Su Yang said expressionlessly, "It was Zhu Su's grandmother who told me last night that Zhu Su's mother's old lover was killed by Zhu Su's father more than 20 years ago and buried here."

Everyone stared at Su Yang in disbelief. But their astonishment paled in comparison to the shock that gripped Su Yang's heart. "Could there really be ghosts in this world?" Su Yang murmured to himself.

He closed his eyes, replaying his experiences from the early morning in his memory, bit by bit. He still couldn't accept it; Grandma Zhu Su, who had been talking to him just half a day ago, had suddenly become a corpse that had been dead for two years. "Maybe, maybe it was just a dream, a dream I had after I passed out." He gave a bitter laugh. They say life is but a dream, a dream like life, but which is more real? Zhuangzi dreamed he was a butterfly, but could he tell if he was Zhuangzi dreaming he was a butterfly, or the butterfly dreaming it was Zhuangzi? And what about me, Su Yang? Am I in reality or in a dream? If I'm in reality, why am I experiencing this chaotic and fragmented scene that only exists in dreams? If I'm in a dream, whose dream have I intruded into? Or rather, did Grandma Zhu Su visit Su Yang in reality, or did Su Yang visit Grandma Zhu Su in a dream?

His head was throbbing with pain, but he couldn't make heads or tails of it. Su Yang felt like he was on the verge of collapse. He suddenly remembered the well; Grandma Zhu Su had told him that Zhu Su's freak was soaking in it, and he himself had actually seen its grotesque face. "That's it," he thought, "maybe he can prove whether I really saw a ghost, or if it was all just an illusion."

Thinking of this, Su Yang mustered his spirits and said to the police officer beside him, "Is it possible for you to drain the well in the front yard?"

The policeman was startled. "What are you trying to do now?"

Su Yang twitched his lips mockingly, "Find another corpse."

The policeman stared wide-eyed at Su Yang, as if he were a devil. But it was no surprise; the town was usually peaceful, but now two murders had suddenly appeared. The first had been confirmed as a natural death, only to have Su Yang unearth an old skeleton, and now another murder was about to occur. It was no wonder the whole town was in chaos. The policeman gasped, "Whose body is it?"

“The baby. Zhu Su’s baby.”

The police officers' tense nerves gradually relaxed. Almost everyone in town knew that Zhu Su had given birth to a monster and then her father had thrown it into the well, and no one had ever thought anything of it. Killing a monster of unknown origin was considered by the townspeople as eliminating a menace, not a murder. "What do you want with it?"

Apartment 602, the Man-Eating Apartment, Part 11 (5)

Su Yang gave the policeman a cold look. "Don't you want that little soul to rest in peace, but instead want it to sink into a dark, sunless well forever, never to find release?"

The police officer was speechless for a moment. "Wait a moment, I'll go ask my superiors."

Su Yang sighed, typical of Chinese bureaucratic style. "No need," he wearily stopped the policeman's calls, "I'll go down the well to retrieve it."

"You?" The policeman looked at Su Yang in astonishment, increasingly feeling that Su Yang was a devil. "Could he really be possessed by a ghost?" The policeman couldn't help but shudder.

Su Yang said no more. He walked to the front yard and bent down to look at the well. The afternoon sun was a little warm, but the well platform was still icy cold. Su Yang could even feel a chill seeping into his bones from the bottom of the well. The bottom of the well was calm, like a cold eye that had seen through the vicissitudes of life, clearly reflecting Su Yang's pale face.

Su Yang tested the well rope; it was quite sturdy and could easily support a person's weight. He took off his shirt, tied the rope around himself, and nodded to the police officers and Liu Changge and the others who were standing there dumbfounded. They suddenly realized what was happening and hurriedly stepped forward to help, grabbing the rope and lowering Su Yang into the well little by little.

The well was about four or five meters deep. Su Yang quickly reached the water's surface. He felt waves of cold air rise from his feet to his head, and his brain began to buzz. He gritted his teeth and yelled at the people above, "Keep releasing it!"

Su Yang shivered involuntarily the moment his body touched the well water. It wasn't just the water's coldness; he could clearly feel a force pulling him down. He gripped the well rope tightly, took a deep breath, and struggled to maintain his balance, slowly lowering himself into the water.

The well water wasn't very deep, but the bottom was covered in a thick layer of silt. Su Yang stood at waist-deep in the water, poking at the silt with his toes, sensing for anything unusual. But to his disappointment, there was nothing. He only heard his teeth chattering. Furthermore, he increasingly felt unbalanced, as if something was pushing or pulling him. Finally, he lost his sense of control and tumbled into the water.

Immersing his head in the icy water, Su Yang instantly sobered up. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained," he thought. Holding his breath, Su Yang submerged himself and reached into the water. Perhaps due to years of soaking, the well walls were slippery, and touching them felt strangely uncomfortable, like a person afraid of snakes grasping one. Suddenly, Su Yang felt a weight under his hand, as if something was gripping his arm. Startled, he instinctively opened his mouth to scream, but instead gulped down a mouthful of water. The water had an indescribable fishy stench, and his stomach churned instantly.

Su Yang suppressed the pain in his heart and pulled with all his might. With a "splash," he crashed into the other corner of the well wall, his head emerging from the water. When he saw what he was holding, he screamed and hurriedly threw it away—it was a child's arm, seemingly just torn from the body, the joints a bloody mess, but strangely, there wasn't a single drop of blood.

For a fleeting moment, Su Yang seemed to hear the cry of a baby, or perhaps laughter, a strange, jagged sound that echoed against the edge of the well, creating countless reverberations that sounded like needles pricking the ears, sending chills down one's spine. Su Yang frantically shook the rope, signaling the people above to pull him up.

Just as his body emerged from the well water, Su Yang suddenly heard a deep sigh, a familiar sigh. It was the sigh he had heard at Zhu Su's house. Su Yang jolted awake and shouted upwards, "Put me back in!"

The icy well water quickly reached Su Yang's waist. He pressed his lips together, took a deep breath, and plunged himself back into the water, his hands groping at the bottom. Soon, he felt a slender hand. This time, the hand exerted no force, and Su Yang easily grasped it, then surfaced. It was indeed the baby's hand. The people above, having probably noticed, lowered a bucket of water.

Su Yang put his arm into the bucket, and the bucket was pulled up, wobbling slightly. Su Yang held his breath again, submerged in the water, and felt around on the well wall with his hands. Suddenly, his fingers touched something that looked like seaweed. He exerted a little force, and felt something fly out from a gap in the well wall. Su Yang surfaced and saw it was the corpse of an infant missing an arm; he was clutching the baby's hair. Incredibly, the infant, having been submerged in the well for so many years, seemed reborn; its flesh and bones had not decayed at all. Su Yang noticed four wide-open eyes embedded in its eye sockets and forehead, each eye displaying a different expression: hatred, pity, anger, and a smile, strangely juxtaposed.

Su Yang silently gazed at the baby, a strange sense of joy welling up within him, as if he had accomplished a mission. He carefully cradled the baby in his arms, gesturing for the well rope to pull him little by little away from the icy water and back into the sunlight.

Everyone on the well's edge stared at the four-eyed baby, their faces showing disbelief. Liu Changge clutched his chest, muttering, "How could this be?"

Su Yang collapsed wearily onto the grass in the yard, letting the warm sunlight embrace him tightly. He closed his eyes and heard a faint voice calling from the depths of his heart: "Go back to Guangzhou, it's time to go back to Guangzhou."

Apartment 602, the Man-Eating Apartment, Part 12 (1)

Su Yang returned to his residence, changed his clothes, packed some luggage, and went straight to the train station to buy a train ticket to Guangzhou. He knew that returning to Guangzhou would likely lead to his doom; perhaps before he could unravel the mystery of Zhu Su, he would already be in prison. This gave him a sense of tragic grandeur, like the line from the poem: "The wind howls, the Yi River is cold; the hero departs, never to return."

Lying in his sleeper berth on the train, listening to the monotonous clanging of the tracks, Su Yang tried hard to think of a starting point for his journey. He racked his brains, but couldn't come up with a single clue. All along, it seemed Zhu Su had been subtly controlling him, while he had been in a state of avoidance. Now that he truly had to take the initiative, he really didn't know where to begin. Finally, he drifted off to sleep.

He slept soundly for what seemed like forever. When Su Yang opened his eyes, he found that the train had arrived at Guangzhou Station. He hurriedly grabbed his luggage, got off the train, and exited the platform. Standing in front of Guangzhou Railway Station, looking at the surging crowds in the square, he felt a sense of loneliness for the first time in his life. He had lived in this city for more than three years, but now he felt so out of place, so alienated from it. Su Yang thought for a moment and decided to try to gather some clues from the police first; perhaps they had already found a way to solve the Zhu Su case.

Su Yang randomly boarded a bus, picked a seat, and stared blankly at the tall buildings and huge advertising signs flashing past the window, feeling as if he were in another world.

The bus crossed an overpass and turned a corner. The hustle and bustle of the city gradually faded away, and the scenery before him gained a touch of suburban tranquility. Su Yang suddenly realized that the route was somewhat familiar. When the bus passed an archway, he suddenly remembered that this was the road leading to Buyun Garden.

A sense of unease and apprehension welled up in Su Yang's heart. "Could it be that Zhu Su is behind this again, secretly manipulating me into getting on this bus?" Su Yang recalled his experience two years ago when he landed in Qinglan Town. Back then, he had also boarded the bus without any particular purpose, only to find himself in Zhu Su's past world. Was he repeating the same mistake now? He wondered what dangers awaited him ahead.

"But isn't this also my destination? The one who tied the knot must untie it. All the terror originated from Zhu Su, so her home is definitely the most worthwhile place to explore." Su Yang understood this and felt much more at ease.

Su Yang got off the train at the station where Buyun Garden was located, found a small hotel nearby, booked a standard room, lay on the bed, and stared blankly at the ceiling. Perhaps due to the fatigue of the journey, Su Yang gradually drifted off to sleep.

He didn't know how long he had slept when Su Yang was jolted awake by a violent shaking. "An earthquake?" He instinctively opened his eyes, feeling the entire bed swaying, and a buzzing sound filling his ears. He tried to get up and run for his life, but found he couldn't move at all. What truly jolted him awake was the sight of a face floating above his bed. It was a human face! It had no support, floating in the air like a balloon. Su Yang looked closely and realized the face wasn't real, but rather composed of many dotted lines—a lifelike woman's face with long hair cascading down her head, obscuring most of her face, revealing only a pair of blood-red eyes! Staring motionlessly at Su Yang. Su Yang felt as if his heart had been stung by a bee, and he involuntarily clenched his fist. With that one movement, all the shaking stopped, and the illusion of the human head vanished.

Su Yang sat bolt upright in bed, finding himself drenched in cold sweat; the entire bedsheet was soaked. He wiped the sweat from his forehead, sitting in the darkness, able to faintly hear his own heartbeat. "Where did that illusion come from?" Su Yang closed his eyes, his mind wandering aimlessly. "And the shaking—was it an earthquake, or just a muscle contraction caused by excessive sweating, or was it really a ghost shaking the bed?"

He threw on a coat, walked to the window, and drew back the curtains. The summer night breeze rushed into the room, penetrating his body and drying his cold sweat. Across from the hotel was Buyun Garden, where Zhu Su had previously stayed. In the stillness of the night, the entire complex was shrouded in darkness, without a single light. Everyone was immersed in the tranquil dreams brought by the night, except for Su Yang, this lonely and solitary man, who remained awake, listening to the calm breathing of others, desolate and indifferent.

Su Yang grabbed his phone from the bedside table and saw the hands pointed to 1 a.m. His heart began to pound again. He realized that he had discovered the rocking bed around 12:50 a.m. That was exactly the time he first received Zhu Su's text message, "I'm outside your door," in the middle of the night. "Could it be that she just greeted me?" Su Yang looked out the window, feeling the darkness growing ever heavier, almost swallowing him up.

"Since they're here, I should at least give them a proper greeting." Su Yang smiled wryly and started getting dressed. He decided to go to Zhu Su's house now.

As Su Yang walked out of the small hotel, the receptionist gave him a strange look but didn't ask any questions. The night air in Guangzhou carried the murky scent of a big city, far less pure than the night air in Qinglan Town, while the atmosphere on the streets was noisier and more restless than in Qinglan Town. Cars frequently sped by on the road, leaving glaring headlight streaks on the retina; occasionally, one could encounter a few urban night owls hurrying home.

Su Yang tried to hide himself in the shadows of buildings and trees as he slowly walked towards Buyun Garden. Strangely, he no longer felt the tension he had felt at the hotel; instead, he felt an inexplicable calm. He felt as if his thoughts had ceased to belong to him; he walked mechanically, aimlessly, without a clear purpose or a thought. If one could truly live without thought, living like a walking corpse wouldn't be so bad, would it? Su Yang sighed softly. At least that way, he wouldn't be overwhelmed by a mountain of problems, nor anxiously awaiting a predetermined outcome.

If the streets still retained the warmth of the day, the neighborhood was utterly desolate and dark. The streetlights, already dimly lit, seemed to cower in the chill, their glow appearing even more ethereal and empty. Su Yang secretly regretted not wearing a long-sleeved shirt; now, the chill only amplified the eerie atmosphere.

Apartment 602, the Man-Eating Apartment, Part 12 (2)

Su Yang walked to the foot of Building 6. The rusty iron gate was tightly locked, seemingly warning every passerby: this is not a place for you. Su Yang stared at the closed gate for a long time, his mood gradually relaxing, as if he were silently smiling at Zhu Su: "I've come, but the people here don't welcome me, so don't blame me for breaking my promise."

Just as Su Yang was about to turn around and go back, the iron gate clicked open.

Su Yang stared in astonishment at the iron gate, a chill creeping over him, binding his hands, feet, and mind. He could almost see Zhu Su standing on the sixth-floor stair railing, looking at him smugly, silently grinning: "Since the door is open, then come in."