Chapter 28: Supplementary Text

Qi Wu stared blankly at Xie Xishu.

After a long while, he opened his lips, and his voice came out stuttering.

"To... to date you."

He paused, then suddenly stiffened his neck, glaring at Xie Xishu with a mix of urgency and impatience. "...Is that not allowed?"

It was only at this moment that Xie Xishu realized that even after turning into a monster, the other party was still capable of blushing. At the very least, the Qi Wu standing before him looked as if he were about to boil over.

Xie Xishu hesitated for a long time before tentatively offering a reminder.

"I’m a boy."

"I know."

"Are you... gay?" Xie Xishu asked with hesitation.

Qi Wu’s reply was exceptionally blunt: "No."

Xie Xishu: "Then—"

"I just like you. Among boys, you’re the only one I want to date."

Xie Xishu pursed his lips, speaking instinctively: "So you would still like girls..."

He remembered how, because of Qi Wu’s handsome looks and the dangerous aura he exuded, many girls at school had been quite infatuated with him—but before Xie Xishu could finish his thought, Qi Wu’s reply interrupted his train of thought entirely.

"If you were a girl, I’d like you too."

He fell silent for a second, seemingly realizing his previous statement was ambiguous, and added a dry, supplementary explanation: "Anyway, it doesn’t matter if you’re a boy or a girl. You’re the only person I like. I... I just want to be with you."

Xie Xishu: "..."

The youth gazed blankly at the boy before him who had long since mutated. He bit his lip, appearing lost and bewildered.

Xie Xishu’s silence set Qi Wu’s heart racing. He became increasingly restless and agitated. He stood before the youth, feigning composure, yet he felt as if time had never dragged on so slowly. His heart hammered violently against his chest—Qi Wu even suspected that if he hadn’t already mutated into a monster with such formidable vitality, he would have already suffered cardiac arrest from the sheer intensity of his agitation.

Why did I just say that out loud?

Qi Wu questioned himself frantically in his heart. And why, suddenly, did it jump to the topic of dating?

Although he had been desperately analyzing his own complex and strange feelings for some time now, the moment he thought about this, all the questions that had troubled him for days were suddenly resolved.

Why did he want to desperately kiss those pale lips?
Why did he always want to be pressed against him, every moment of every day?
Why was he so irritable because of the other’s distant, guarded, and feigned-friendly attitude?
Why did he want to make him happy?
Why did he want to protect his safety at all costs?
Why did he want to possess him exclusively?
...

It was in that very instant, a flash of insight, that Qi Wu realized with horror that he did indeed... he really wanted to date.

To date Xie Xishu.

Yet, at the very moment he found the answer, he had already blurted it out in front of Xie Xishu.

Qi Wu realized he hadn’t even done the most basic preparation: those idiots he used to hang out with knew at least to bring bubble tea for months when chasing a girl, or bring a bouquet of roses when confessing.

But him? Before this, he had only given Xie Xishu a carton of orange juice.

Oh, and he had shoved a knife into his hand, telling him to hack off his tentacles, which had successfully scared the crybaby in front of him into bursting into tears all over again.

...

[Damn it—]

Before Qi Wu noticed, the fissures on his body had split open involuntarily, revealing several taut, slightly trembling tentacles.

His already fragile human form looked somewhat terrifying because of this, even though it was purely an instinctive reaction: a monster’s newly developed organs could capture the subtle scent of "prey" more keenly without mimicry, using it to judge the other party’s condition.

Xie Xishu stared at Qi Wu for at least half a minute.

Qi Wu noticed that Xie Xishu’s body temperature had risen significantly at first, and his ears had started to turn slightly red (causing his heart to further challenge his physiological limits), but soon, the youth’s face turned deathly pale, and the scent he radiated became tinged with a bitter, astringent quality.

"...Something is wrong with you." Xie Xishu murmured. "That’s why you... why you like me."

The youth’s voice was hoarse and weak, sounding more like a terrified self-muttering.

Qi Wu froze in place. His pupils instantly constricted into thin lines.

"Bullshit," he said. "Is it abnormal to like you? What could possibly be wrong with—"

Xie Xishu interrupted him somewhat stiffly. "Did you hear what I said earlier?"

Qi Wu’s throat tightened, his spine unconsciously tensing. What had Xie Xishu said before?

Qi Wu dared not admit it at this point. He had been in such a state of extreme agitation at the time that he hadn't paid any attention to Xie Xishu’s words. Facing the youth’s terrified expression, Qi Wu began to rack his brain to recall.

With great difficulty, he managed to dredge up that sentence from his memory—

["I’m not afraid of you; I’m afraid of myself. I suspect that I can attract monsters."]

*

Now it was Qi Wu’s turn to have a subtle expression.

"And what of it?" the boy’s voice was rough. "Don’t we already know this? You’re an uninfected, a living person. It’s been done to death in movies and games. Anyway, for someone like you, any zombie or monster would want a bite—" He paused, his eyes drifting slightly. "That’s pretty normal, isn’t it..."

Xie Xishu’s breathing became heavier than before. "That’s not what I meant."

His throat felt dry. Before today, he had never imagined he would actually tell someone else that terrible suspicion.

"I had a dream..."

Then, Xie Xishu told Qi Wu everything he had seen in his dream, word for word.

"...Actually, I didn’t want to believe these things either, but these past few days, the more I thought about it, the more afraid I became. You might not know, but my mother’s job used to be researching viruses."

"Mhm."

"My mother always worked at a public virus control center, but later, she was fired."

When it happened, Xie Xishu had just graduated from elementary school. After his mother was fired, the atmosphere at home had been gloomy for a long time, so much so that even now, he still remembered that dark, oppressive period.

As a sensitive child, Xie Xishu had almost instinctively started paying attention to his mother’s every move. He didn’t know why his mother had been fired from a job considered an “iron rice bowl,” only that the uncles and aunts who used to come over for dinner stopped appearing.

"Then one night, I heard someone arguing at home. I climbed out of bed and opened the door a crack to look into the living room. I discovered that in the middle of the night, one of my mother’s very close friends had come over and was arguing with her in hushed tones. I had never seen my mother so irritable and angry."

"That aunt had never been so fierce either... she kept scolding my mother for playing with fire, saying my mother had been led astray by my father and had gone crazy, which was why she ended up getting fired."

"She also said it was a good thing my mother had left the research unit. My mother’s expression at the time, how should I put it... I almost thought she was going to grab a fruit knife and kill that aunt right then and there."

"Fortunately, my mother didn’t do it in the end. The aunt slammed the door and never appeared again. My mother found me later and scolded me severely."

*

A few months later, Xie Xishu discovered that his mother had a new job. It was at a completely independent private research institute—and some time after that, Xie Xishu found out that his father had also quit his original unit and followed his mother to the same institute.

At this point, Xie Xishu lifted his head, looking at Qi Wu with fear: "...Qi Wu, do you know? Actually, I noticed when I was very young that I don’t look like my father or mother at all."

*

Xie Xishu’s voice was weak. As he spoke of his childhood, the look in his eyes made Qi Wu’s fingertips itch.

He didn’t know why, but he suddenly wanted a "cigarette." Because it would help him suppress that craving.

He wanted, so very much, to reach out and wrap that person—who was falling apart and only held together by a thin shell of his original form—entirely within his own body.

Fortunately, having learned from past experience, Qi Wu’s reason managed to prevail.

"So you think that because your body was weak when you were a kid, your parents might have used you for experiments, which led to... well, led to the mutated monsters now being unconsciously drawn to you." He summarized in a deep voice.

Xie Xishu didn't speak, just nodded with a pale face.

"So you think that’s why I fell in love with you?"

After a few seconds of hesitation, Xie Xishu nodded again.

"Fine..."

Qi Wu took a deep breath, then suddenly tugged at the corner of his mouth and smiled. Hearing that cold laugh, Xie Xishu’s heart began to sink into his gut—

"If that’s what you want to think, that’s fine."

Then he heard Qi Wu say: "I have just one question."

"Hmm?"

"Do you agree?"

Xie Xishu finally found it strange at this point. He raised his eyes to look at Qi Wu in confusion, meeting those eyes that were frighteningly focused.

"A-agree to what?" he heard himself murmuring in panic.

"Agree to date me?"

Qi Wu’s expression was strange, looking like he was irritated or even angry, but faintly, it seemed to reveal a touch of nervousness.

And Xie Xishu stood there, stunned.

He really hadn’t expected that after hearing the backstory and the suspicion he had pondered in his heart for so long... why was Qi Wu still fixated on this damn "dating" thing?!

Now, even Xie Xishu started to stutter.

"I... that... but..."

Seeing Xie Xishu fumbling for a long time without a complete response, Qi Wu abruptly raised his eyebrows and forcefully took over the conversation.

"Forget it. I’ll just leave it at this—I, Qi Wu, like you, and I want to be your partner."