The Odd One Out

Chapter 15

The curtains in this inn are dark curtains of thick cloth that do not let in light. Even when Summer gets close she cannot see what is outside through the thick fabric. Summer chose the middle of the two curtains and held her breath as she cautiously pulled a slit to look out.

What the hell is all this?

Against the backdrop of the dark, rainy night, the clear glass window was thickly packed with pale 'human' faces, pairs of red eyes staring dead into the room as if trying to see through the opaque curtain and find the person they were looking for.  As the faces pushed and pushed, Summer even saw a few familiar silhouettes inside: "her parents", Oriella, the company's minister...... Thanks to her fuzzy memory, her brain automatically matched their features as soon as she saw them. automatically matched their numbers. She watched their mouths open and close, and there was a vaguely familiar call ringing in her ears:

"Summer, where are you? Come on, tell Mommy, where are you? If you don't come out Mommy is going to get mad! Be good......" This is "her mother".

"Summer, Daddy's coming to take you home, come on out! Daddy's taking you to eat meat......" This is "her father".

"Summer, why didn't you tell me you were off work? Why didn't you answer my calls? We're best friends, aren't we? Where are you? Come out and let's go play together." It was Oriella.

"Summer, come back to work. The company needs you, I need you ..... Stop hiding and come out ......" This is the minister.

"Summer......"

"Summer......"

......

There were many, many more voices which tirelessly called her name, trying to find her. Summer's body was stiff as stone, afraid that they would find her. She was so close to these ghostly faces that she could even see bean-sized raindrops sliding down the pale, eerie faces and see the greedy, anxious light in their eyes.

Summer dared not act rashly, her mind quickly thinking of countermeasures. It was a good thing that these ghostly faces really could not sense her in the room, as Yimin had said. They clung to the window and called out for a while before hooting and crowding again, rushing to the next place in a flurry of thunder and lightning.

Only when they were no longer visible did Summer pull the curtains tighter and move away from the window to Zheng Yimin's side, reaching out to untie his hands and apologising, "Yimin, I'm sorry for having offended you so much earlier."

Having said that, she made sure she was in a position where she could attack and defend, after all, she hadn't actually seen this man strike yet, and she couldn't afford to be defensive. Yimin waved his hand unconcernedly, "I understand." He moved his wrist and pulled out a small white porcelain vase from his pocket, "While those ghosts and monsters have now gone elsewhere, we'll rest here, for now. Tonight, I'll go and treat the wound first."

Summer was about to get up and retreat for a while when something else suddenly occurred to her and she asked in a rush, "Yimin, you said that none of the others was alive except for me and you. But when I opened the room before......" she couldn't stop worrying: "The owner of this inn knows that I am here, will they find us because of this?"

"Don't worry, I took care of that female before I came up here, they won't be able to find us."

Summer was relieved to leave, giving space to Yimin. she waited until he had taken care of the wounds on his body before coming out of the bathroom. Yimin collected his things and sat down on the floor without bothering to change his chair, "Now let me tell you how we can leave tomorrow. As I said earlier, you need to be in here at a specific time to get in, and by the same token, you must also be out at a specific time, heading for the direction of the birth gate that meets the real world."