Dad, I'm Hungry
"It's also possible that the 'calamity' was too weak... and was completely killed with just one swing of the axe," Li Xiuchun put forward another possibility.
Chen Tan didn't reply. He stared at the figure in the pool of blood for a long time, then turned around and took out a kitchen knife from the kitchen.
"What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to cut open his chest and see if his heart is still there," Chen Tan said hoarsely. "At least I need to know... whether I killed a monster or a chance of redemption given by God."
He knelt down beside Chen Ling's body and used the blade to reluctantly cut open the chest. Li Xiuchun beside him turned pale and rushed into the kitchen, vomiting violently.
A few minutes later, Chen Tan slowly stood up.
"How is it?" Li Xiuchun asked.
"It's empty," Chen Tan said, looking at the empty inner wall of the chest. He seemed to let out a sigh of relief. "He doesn't have a heart."
"No heart? Then how did he..."
"I don't know."
Chen Tan paused. "No matter what it was... it's dead now."
"What should we do with the body?"
"Hide it in the cellar... There are Enforcers outside now, and we can't send it out."
Chen Tan dragged aside the corner of the living room table and opened the thick wooden board on the ground. There was a dark and narrow underground space underneath.
In this era without refrigerators, relying on the natural heat preservation effect of the cellar to store food was the best choice. He was about to throw Chen Ling in when he saw the hideous wound on the neck and stopped.
"Go and get A Yan's opera costume," Chen Tan said. "No matter what it was, this is still Chen Ling's body... Without a coffin for burial, at least dress him in decent clothes."
At the mention of that opera costume, Li Xiuchun trembled slightly.
"But last night... he came back wearing that costume..."
"It's just a piece of clothing," Chen Tan was about to retort, but thinking of the terrifying scene when Chen Ling came home last night, he didn't insist. "Forget it. Let it be then."
Chen Tan threw Chen Ling's body into the cellar, covered the wooden board, and then pressed the table on top of it, finally finishing the matter.
Next, Li Xiuchun started to clean the bloodstains in the house. Although these things made her feel extremely nauseous, she still pinched her nose and continued.
Knock, knock, knock——
Suddenly, there was a rapid knock on the door.
Li Xiuchun, who was cleaning the room, felt her heart skip a beat. She suddenly turned her head to look at Chen Tan.
"Is someone here?"
"Leave it alone for now. Pretend that no one is at home."
Li Xiuchun nodded. The two of them held their breath in the living room, and only the dull knocking on the door continued to echo.
But the knocking on the door showed no sign of stopping. Instead, it became more forceful. Then, a deep voice came from the door:
"The Enforcers are asking questions! Open the door immediately!"
Upon hearing the word "Enforcers", the two of them immediately turned pale. After a moment of hesitation, Chen Tan gave Li Xiuchun a look, quickly changed his top, and walked towards the door without fastening all the buttons.
Creak——
The door opened a crack.
Chen Tan sidled out and closed the door behind him. "What can I do for you, Enforcers?"
Drizzling rain fell from the gloomy sky. Two figures in black and red uniforms stood outside the door, looking a bit gloomy.
"Why didn't you open the door after knocking for so long?"
"I was sleeping just now. It took me some time to get dressed," he said with an embarrassed smile.
The two Enforcers glanced at his unfastened clothes and relaxed their expressions a bit. "Is this Chen Ling's house?"
"...Yes."
"Where is he?"
"He went out in the morning and hasn't come back yet."
"When he comes back, give him this notice," one of the Enforcers took out a document from his pocket. "Now, the entire areas of District 2 and District 3 are under lockdown. All the reserve Enforcers who passed the written test are temporarily recruited to gather. He is also on the list of those to be summoned.
"At 7 o'clock tomorrow morning, gather at the Enforcers' headquarters in District 3 on time. If he doesn't go, he will be regarded as automatically giving up the quota."
Chen Tan's heart skipped a beat, but he still took the notice calmly and nodded.
"Okay, I will definitely pass it on."
The two Enforcers turned and left, and Chen Tan let out a sigh of relief in his heart.
He pushed the door and entered the house.
Screech—— Screech——
As soon as he entered the house, a harsh metallic scraping sound reached his ears, as if someone was scratching a blackboard with sharp nails, making Chen Tan feel terrified instantly.
At this time, Li Xiuchun was huddled in the corner, shaking all over.
When she saw Chen Tan come back into the house, her almost collapsed eyes finally looked up. She slowly stretched out a hand and pointed towards the kitchen...
In the kitchen, a figure in vermilion red was facing away from the two of them, with its head lowered, as if chewing on something.
At the sight of that figure, Chen Tan's mind went blank instantly!
It was a young man whose neck was almost severed. The scarlet flesh was healing at a visible speed. He was holding a kitchen knife in his left hand and a blood-stained axe in his right hand, and he was stuffing them into his mouth at the same time...
It seemed that he had noticed Chen Tan opening the door and coming home. In the kitchen, the figure wearing the big red opera robe slowly turned around.
It was Chen Ling, Chen Ling who had lost his heart and was almost beheaded.
His cheeks were slightly puffed out, and he was vigorously chewing on the remnants of metal and wood. His glazed eyes were like those of a beast, strange and eerie.
"Dad,"
A voice came from behind him. "I'm hungry..."
...
Chen Ling had a dream.
It was an afternoon shrouded in dark clouds.
As usual, after finishing his physical training at the martial arts field in the suburbs, he pushed open the door of his house, sweating profusely.
It wasn't his birthday that day, but on the dining table at home, there was a cream cake... The orange candlelight flickered in the dim living room. Two figures were sitting at the table, with red-rimmed eyes.
A cream cake, worth 200 copper coins, was something their family could never afford on a daily basis.
He was very puzzled and asked what day it was.
His parents told him that it was the day when his younger brother A Yan was about to have an operation.
He was very happy to hear that. His younger brother's congenital heart disease had been a nightmare for their family. In order to cure his younger brother, his parents and he had run around everywhere, begging for help, but all the clinics were helpless.
A few days ago, his parents said that they had found a hospital in District 2 and sent his younger brother there. They were confident that they could cure him.
Hearing this good news, he happily finished the cake, but soon his consciousness began to grow hazy, and he fell face down on the table. The last thing he saw was his mother Li Xiuchun covering her mouth and crying bitterly.
"I'm sorry... I'm really sorry," he heard his father's whisper. "A Yan's illness requires a heart... You will be willing, won't you?"
He opened his mouth, as if wanting to say something, but finally fell into a coma.
Then, he felt himself being stuffed into a bag. The rain pattered on the surface of the bag. After a long time, he was finally carried onto a certain table.
He felt his chest being cut open, and something was taken out of it.
After that, he was put on a piece of clothing and moved to a certain place in the heavy rain. The thick soil gradually covered his body, and everything around him fell into darkness and silence...
...
In the darkness, Chen Ling's eyes suddenly opened.
Spotlights came on one after another above his head, illuminating the figure in red clothes lying in the center of the stage. After a moment of trance, Chen Ling supported himself on the ground with both hands and staggered to his feet.
"Damn it... Why am I back again?"
Chen Ling's face was a bit pale. His gaze subconsciously fell on the screen in the center of the stage, and his pupils suddenly shrank.
[Audience Expectation Value +1]
[Audience Expectation Value +1]
[Current Expectation Value: 67%]
[Actor connection lost detected. Performance interrupted]
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[Current Expectation Value: 17%]
[Warning! Warning!]
[The audience is starting to intervene in the performance!]