Chapter 51 – Butterflies in the Stomach 1

The exhibition came to a successful close but afterwards Xu RenDong couldn’t help but keep thinking about the scene of Lian Qiao killing him. He didn’t know what was wrong with him. Was it a stressful illusion caused by too much anxiety, or was it something that really happened between him and Lian Qiao?

That’s right, when he was in the matryoshka world, he had actually been suspicious of Lian Qiao in the beginning because Lian Qiao could accurately find all the dolls every time, just as if he had read the script. At that time, he persuaded himself otherwise by reasoning that “Lian Qiao was good at playing games”, but now that he thinks about it, it still felt a bit inexplicable.

After all, who in their right mind would treat this kind of thing as a game when they first encounter it? This was a terrifying world that could really kill people.

What was more suspicious was the two different states of being that Lian Qiao would switch back and forth between when faced with ghosts. One moment he was so scared he was hiccuping and trembling, but the next moment he could pick up the crowbar and fight a ghost. These two states of? being were completely different and separate from each other.

And even if there was a ghost chasing after him, and even though he had his eyes closed, Lian Qiao could accurately find the right path in the snow. He could even set a trap for the ghost on the way. So could his so-called fear only be something that he was making up? Otherwise how could it be that he didn’t even take a single wrong step?

All in all, there are too many suspicious things about Lian Qiao.

However, at the very beginning, it was Xu RenDong who rescued Lian Qiao himself. If he didn’t do anything, Lian Qiao would have been tragically killed by Brother Sledgehammer.

It wasn’t that he thought Lian Qiao should be grateful to him for this and so should never betray him. It was just that..

How could he put it? It was like a bird that he had personally taken out from its nest. So regardless, he would feel affection towards it. Even if the bird pecked him, he wouldn’t be able to bear to dash it to its death.

...But what if the thing he rescued was not a little bird, but a frozen snake?

Recalling the murderous look in Lian Qiao’s eyes as he held the dagger in his hands, Xu RenDong couldn’t help but feel a chill from the bottom of his heart.

So what should he do now?

His conflicted mood lasted for a long time but Xu RenDong still couldn’t find any answer in his heart. So these days, he subconsciously avoided Lian Qiao and stayed at the company to work overtime as much as possible. In the eyes of colleagues in the office, Xu RenDong suddenly turned back into an iceberg. Don’t think about ordering bubble tea together, he would even take his lunch and eat it alone in the stairwell.? Everyone began to look at Liu JiaQi with suspicion, wondering if something had happened between them.

Liu JiaQi: It’s not me! I haven’t done anything!

Soon Friday arrived again. There wasn’t much work to do and Xu RenDong’s colleagues were all chatting about where they planned to go during the weekend. Xu RenDong felt unable to fit into this atmosphere so he returned home early.

Back home, it felt extremely stuffy. He opened the windows, loosened his tie and sat on the sofa with his eyes closed. In summer, the cicadas cried noisily and the sound was hoarse and unrelenting. Xu RenDong leaned on the sofa and gradually fell asleep. When he woke up, the sky outside was still bright. He looked at the time, it was six o’clock in the afternoon. Only about twenty minutes had passed since he got home and sat down.

Did he only sleep for twenty minutes? He thought it had been for a long time..

Xu RenDong felt energetic. He stood up and moved around. Suddenly he felt that something was wrong.

It was too quiet and there wasn’t any sound. Where were the cicadas?

An intense anxiety hit him like a heavy hammer. His heart thumped until he walked to the window, looked out, and finally confirmed that his fears had become reality.

On the road, the traffic was at a standstill.

People’s faces still have the expression they held before time was frozen. Some were laughing and others were irritated, but they were as still as specimen samples tacked to a board. The more life-like their expressions were, the more weird they look now in this still-life world. It felt like everyone had turned into a dummy and that these dummies appeared like they could move the next second.

Xu RenDong heard his breathing gradually quicken. He turned around slowly and finally and reluctantly looked at the silver-white elevator in the corner of the living room.

Didn’t Lian Qiao say that the next instance would be a month from now? Then how..

That’s right, it seems it has been a month.

A few days ago, Lian Qiao had reminded him that it was nearly time to enter the next instance. But he did not respond immediately. He hadn’t figured out how to face Lian Qiao so the matter was put on hold.

At this time the elevator really appeared in front of him and Xu RenDong suddenly panicked. What should he do if Lian Qiao was not by his side?

He wasn’t worried that he won’t be able to pass the instance without Lian Qiao. For him, as long as he dies a few more times, he will eventually find a way out. But what about Lian Qiao?!

Xu RenDong immediately ran to the door and tried to turn the doorknob but the doorknob was like a fake plastic toy and couldn’t turn it. He took out his cell phone again to call Lian Qiao and soon found out, to his despair, that the cell phone had no signal.

What could he do? Lian Qiao and him won’t enter the same world and Lian Qiao could die out there!

Although he suspected Lian Qiao, he had never contemplated Lian Qiao’s death!

At this moment, Xu RenDong’s inner panic had been replaced by regret. He blamed himself deeply and slammed his hand hard against the security door and it made a crisp banging noise.. It was clear that this was not the sound of the security door itself but instead of the invisible air wall. The air wall had completely isolated him from the outside world. He couldn’t get out and Lian Qiao couldn’t get in.

Time has stopped and he was imprisoned here. The only thing he can do is walk into his elevator.

He has no way to interfere with Lian Qiao’s world.

Xu RenDong took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. Right now, he could only hope that Lian Qiao can survive in his world out there.

Feeling almost numb, Xu RenDong walked to his elevator. He reached out to press the button. The silver-white button lit up and soon the elevator made a “ding” sound. The silver-white metal door opened in front of him.

Just as he was about to step into the elevator, from the corner of his eye he suddenly caught a glimpse of the backpack under the coffee table.

Wait, wasn’t that–

Xu RenDong immediately retracted his legs, turned his head and ran towards the coffee table. It was a large mountaineering bag with bulging compartments but the weight was not heavy.

This was the backpack that Lian Qiao had prepared for him.

Xu RenDong opened the zipper with a clatter and saw that it was full of food, dry food, snacks, water, and even a small bottle of Laoganma {chilli sauce beloved by Chinese peeps lol}. In the other compartment, there was a Swiss army knife, a flashlight, the brass key of unknown purpose, and..

Lamia’s eyeball!

Xu RenDong stretched out his hand and fumbled in the compartment and finally grasped the eyeball. He finally felt at ease: This showed that the other eyeball was with Lian Qiao and that they could contact each other!

Xu RenDong immediately equipped his eyes. After a brief period of discomfort, the vision of both eyes split into two immediately. On one side was the living room of the apartment he was in and on the other side it was pitch black and he couldn’t see anything.

“Lian Qiao?” Xu RenDong tried calling out but there was no response.

He hesitated for a moment then picked up his backpack again and walked into the elevator. The elevator doors closed behind him and the elevator quickly moved up, making a slight vibration.

The black vision of the left eye shook and soon an identical silver-white elevator appeared.

“Lian Qiao!” Xu RenDong was overjoyed. The fact that the eyeball didn’t react just now was because time was standing still. Before he walked into the elevator, his time had stopped flowing and so the Lian Qiao outside was also frozen. But once they entered the world of ghosts and monsters, they also entered the same timeline again.

The field of vision of the left eye was turning as if observing the elevator. Xu RenDong waited patiently for a while but Lian Qiao still didn’t speak. He thought it was weird and tried to call him again but Lian Qiao remained silent.

A bad thought rose in Xu RenDong’s heart. Before he could verify his guess, a mountaineering bag entered the left field of vision. Lian Qiao opened the zipper of the hiking bag, took out the phone from the inside and quickly tapped a line on the screen with his fingers.

“Brother RenDong, fortunately you brought your backpack! Can you hear me?”

Xu RenDong’s heart sank and thought;?It’s just as I guessed.?He sighed, took out his phone and tapped to answer: “I can’t hear you.”

Lian Qiao: “It’s over. As expected, we can only share vision and not sound.” There was also a frustrated emoji behind it.

When Xu RenDong saw that emoji, Lian Qiao’s frustrated face appeared vividly in front of him. His mood suddenly improved.

Through Lamia’s eyeballs, the time axis of the two ghost worlds can be connected together. In this case, once the time on his side is reset, even the time on Lian Qiao’s side would be reset.

Xu RenDong gradually regained his equilibrium. He calmed down, raised his head and saw five words appearing out of thin air in front of him:

“Butterflies in the Stomach.”

{I should say now that the Chinese doesn’t differentiate between plural and singular, so it could also be “butterfly” (singular) in the stomach.? But since the english phrase is butterflies in my stomach (plural), I’ve gone with this in the arc.}

This was the prompt this time.

At the same time, he saw the tip from Lian Qiao:? ‘Skeleton in the Cupboard’. {LQ’s prompt is written in English. XRD’s in Chinese.}

‘Skeleton in the Cupboard?’ What does that mean?

Xu RenDong felt the vision on the left shake. Lian Qiao seemed very excited. He quickly typed on his phone with his fingers: “Skeleton in the Cupboard! {LQ translated it to Chinese}.?I learned about this from an article in the third volume of New Concepts!” {I think this is an English textbook, i.e. for Chinese people to learn English.}

Xu RenDong said: ” “

Lian Qiao: “It means that there is a skeleton hidden in the cabinet of a seemingly normal family. This is an English idiom and the extended meaning is ‘the ugly family secrets that outsiders don’t know’.”

Lian Qiao opened an Encyclopedia app on his phone and began to search for “Butterflies in the Stomach”. Soon, the search results appeared in front of Xu RenDong.

Butterflies in one’s stomach: refers to the feeling of flapping wings of a butterfly inside the stomach. It describes a constant feeling of fear, tension, and anxiety. The usage is similar to the Chinese “seven ups and eight downs” and “extremely uneasy”. It can also be used to describe the feeling of rapid heartbeat when the heart speeds up.

After reading this explanation, the two fell silent at the same time.

Although Lian Qiao’s “skeleton in the cupboard” sounded terrible, from a sensory point of view, Xu RenDong’s “butterfly in the stomach” felt even more uncomfortable. Just looking at these words can make up for the feeling of a butterfly flapping its wings inside the stomach and stirring up the gastric juice. Xu RenDong even felt itchy in his stomach as if a butterfly was really about to fly out of his throat.

At the same time, the metal door in front of him made a “ding” sound. The door opened.

Outside the door was a gloomy alley, the ground was full of garbage. Dirty black water flowed out of the garbage bags, flies were flying and a sour smell permeated the air. Above his head was a gray sky which was very gloomy and made people feel depressed.

In the left field of vision, Lian Qiao was facing a gorgeous vintage Gothic castle. The castle stood on the edge of the wilderness and behind it was a ten thousand feet cliff. Below the cliff was the sea and the dark gray water screamed against the cliff face. The entire castle looked about to crumble away.

Looking at it now, neither side looked any better than the other.

Even so, they had to keep moving forward. Xu RenDong took a deep breath and typed two words: “Let’s go.”

The vision on the left suddenly moved up and down quickly.

The visual fields of the left and right eyes were different. This sense of dissonance aggravated a feeling of dizziness. Xu RenDong was dizzy and almost vomited. He quickly realized that it was Lian Qiao nodding.

So he chose the fastest way to inform Lian Qiao: He also nodded vigorously.

Two seconds later, the field of vision of the left eye changed to the ground. Immediately afterwards, a mass of vomit appeared on the ground.

Xu RenDong: “..” How come you vomited just like this?

In the next second, a palm appeared in the left eye, quickly zooming in, obscuring the field of vision. The left eye went blank.

Xu RenDong: “..”

Lian Qiao was really considerate.

***

The author has something to say:

Last chapter, a lot of people asked why Lian Qiao was imagining himself as the one being penetrated.

Because RenDong is behind him, there’s no way Lian Qiao can imagine himself bending back 360 degrees to screw RenDong ahahhahahahaha.

Also the author is really good at getting locked.

Don’t spoil anyone! Don’t get spoiled! Please take care of others’ reading experience!

T/N: This is the only instance where XRD and LR are not physically together I’m pretty sure. It’s also the shortest arc at 10 or 11 chapters.