After Entering a Romance Reality Show Disguised as a Man to Win Over All the Female Leads - Chapter 24.2

She had been tricked by that “female staff member” from who knew where earlier. Somehow, her signature had inexplicably ended up on a marriage contract.

Perhaps that “female staff member” was in league with Mu Shuiqing. She might even have been a ghost too.

And now was Mu Shuiqing’s seventh day after death. More importantly, it was the seventh day after Mu Shuiqing’s nineteenth birthday.

To write that metaphysics novel, Rong Yu had specially looked up all kinds of books on mysticism and Taoism.

In ancient records, people believed that the dead would return home on the seventh day after death to visit the family they could not let go of in life.

Those who died naturally before reaching adulthood or within five years of becoming an adult were called tongzi, or short-lived ghosts.

Tongzi were generally believed to be immortal spirits, ghosts, or gods reincarnated to undergo tribulation, so they often suffered many disasters and hardships.

Ancient texts recorded that tongzi were generally beautiful in appearance, suffered misfortune from childhood, and brought hardship to their families. They were weak, sensitive, and could live to twenty-three at most.

The fate of a tongzi basically ended in years ending with three, six, or nine. Nineteen and twenty-three were great calamities, and most could not survive them.

A tongzi dying at nineteen was called returning spirit.

Rong Yu pressed down her thoughts and tightened her left hand around the red cord. She continued looking at the phrase on the marriage contract—

“Mandarin ducks return in spirit, delight of fish and water.”

Suddenly, she heard a huge clap of thunder outside the window.

Thunder rang through the sky in broad daylight. The flash lit up the whole room for two seconds before everything returned to normal.

Immediately afterward, a fine drizzle began falling from the sky.

The rain was like icy silk, striking the ground and splashing points of light. Some drifted with the wind onto the floor-to-ceiling window beside Rong Yu’s bed, staining the clear glass with mottled curtains of water until nothing could be seen clearly.

Rong Yu lowered her head and looked at the red cord in her palm for a while. Then she raised her hand and tied it around her wrist.

Some livestream viewers did not understand.

[Ahhhhh, Little Brother Rongrong, you really aren’t afraid of death!]

[What do you know? This is called fun. We really are part of their play. very loud]

The instant Rong Yu finished tying it, another clap of thunder sounded outside the window.

Amid thunder and lightning, the lights inside the room began flickering, as if something were interfering with the room’s wiring.

Rong Yu quietly sat on the edge of the bed, waiting with interest for Mu Shuiqing’s arrival.

Until lightning split the sky and bright fire burst through the heavens.

The light outside the window flickered twice. Outside Rong Yu’s floor-to-ceiling window, as expected, a faint figure in a red wedding dress flashed into view.

Phoenix crown and embroidered bridal cape, bright and intricate. A pale face reflected by vivid red lips.

The hazy curtain of rain blurred the “person” outside the window. Her features could not be seen clearly. Only that thick, blood-like red could be made out.

Before the livestream viewers’ screaming comments could be sent, the red-clad figure outside the window vanished along with the end of the thunder.

Comments:

[Help, ahhhhh, I’m home alone, ahhhhh!]

[1111, me too, holy crap. So scary. Where’s the bullet screen protection? Hurry, bullet screen protection!!!]

But Rong Yu was not afraid.

She knew the person outside the window was Mu Shuiqing.

So she put down the square box and its contents, got up, and walked toward the floor-to-ceiling window.

She moved close to the window glass being continuously washed by rain and leaned forward to look outside.

The instant she stood beside the room window, Rong Yu heard a high, eerie sound of suona and drums.

The pitch was excellent and the range broad, yet it was deliberately played into a strange, demonic tune.

It sounded like ghosts and monsters leaning beside one’s ear to laugh darkly, ferociously twisting and tearing at the eardrums. Hearing it made one’s back go numb, as if wrapped in icy seawater.

Hearing the sound, Rong Yu looked over.

She saw two rows of brightly dressed paper figures with two blotches of plateau-red painted on their faces. They were carrying a bridal sedan chair wrapped in vivid red silk and standing directly in front of her window.

The front row of paper figures wore white and held all kinds of instruments and bells. The rest wore red. Some carried trays filled with gold bars and jewels, while others carried the sedan chair. But all of them had exaggerated smiling faces painted on.

Their eyes were pure black and took up almost one-third of their faces.

Compared to the paper figures usually seen, they were already quite large, almost 1.6 meters tall.

But the sedan chair was not large. From the inside, it looked only half a meter long and wide. It seemed somewhat too narrow, so small that even a seven- or eight-year-old child would find it cramped.

It did not look like something for a person to sit in. It looked more like something where an object would be placed.

Facts proved Rong Yu’s guess was right.

A strange gust of wind suddenly blew in from afar.

That cold wind forced its way into the room through the unopened window glass, lifting Rong Yu’s curls and the hem of her sleepwear.

It also lifted the bright red curtain of the bridal sedan, revealing a silver porcelain jar neatly placed inside on a cushion embroidered with red-bottom mandarin-duck patterns.

The fine, dense rain in the sky was still falling, but it did not wet the paper figures or the bridal sedan before her.

Just as Rong Yu looked at them, the two rows of paper figures suddenly turned their heads together. Those strange, smiling faces simultaneously met Rong Yu’s gaze.

The cold wind around them wailed and howled, but the bodies of the paper figures remained completely still.

The livestream comments were full of viewers screaming.

[Ahhhhhhh, help, ahhhhhhh!]

[Little Brother Rongrong, run! Why are you standing there in a daze?]

Perhaps because Rong Yu knew all of this was fake, an illusion in Lian Langsheng’s brain world, she not only felt no fear but even found it somewhat interesting.

She looked at the scene outside the window for a long time.

Suddenly, the paper figures and bridal sedan all disappeared from where they stood. Even that twisted, flamboyant suona and drum music vanished along with them.

Rong Yu rubbed her eyes and opened them again, but still saw nothing.

Only then did she finally confirm they had disappeared.

At exactly this moment, there was a knock at the room door.

Rong Yu looked through the peephole and discovered that her takeout had arrived, so she immediately opened the door to get it.

The delivery person was a tall, thin young man.

When she opened the door, he was staring at her room door with a deathly pale face and wide eyes.

Seeing Rong Yu push the door open, he was startled. With trembling hands, he handed lunch to her. His face looked as if he wanted to say something but stopped.

Just as Rong Yu thanked him, took the lunch, and prepared to close the door, the young man gathered his courage and took half a step forward, speaking softly to her.

“Um, just now, I saw a woman… a girl in red…”

It seemed he had not originally intended to use that word, but he did not dare say the word “ghost,” so the corners of his mouth twitched.

“She seemed to enter the room.”

There was another sentence he had not said—

While the door was closed.

But everyone could understand what he meant.

In the hotel corridor, the yellowish light tubes flickered on and off. The two people inside and outside the room had different expressions.

Rong Yu nodded, her face so calm it was as if she had not understood what the young man was saying at all.

She only said, “Thank you. I understand.”

Then she raised her hand and closed the door.

Carrying the takeout she had ordered, she entered the room and placed the food on the wooden table. She looked around the empty room, wondering how exactly Mu Shuiqing was hiding her figure.

The hotel room was full of frosted glass doors everywhere. Although one could not completely see what was behind them, if there were anything inside the room, it should have nowhere to hide.

But when she looked around, aside from her luggage and the package Mu Shuiqing had sent her, the room was clean and empty. There was nothing else.

Surface-level safety instead meant invisible danger.

The livestream viewers waited nervously for something terrifying to appear.

Yet they saw Rong Yu calmly open her takeout and start eating. She could even eat while playing on her phone, logging into the livestream platform—

Fat Cat Internet Video Platform—

and entering the livestream room to interact with viewers.

After joining the program, the guests’ accounts had been bound and registered by the program team. Rong Yu’s account had automatically been renamed to her real name. The moment she entered the livestream room, a conspicuous golden entrance notification appeared, and everyone in the livestream saw that she had come in.

Comments:

[Awoo, awoo, Little Brother Rongrong entered the livestream!!! Also, I’m really convinced. Are you not scared at all?]

[I almost don’t dare watch anymore. If not for Baby Yu being this calm O~_~O.]

[Qingqing sister, your love was misplaced after all. You actually chose a horror script, you straight-ball girl!!]

Rong Yu found it funny and raised her hand to type on the screen.

Rong Yu: It’s quite interesting. Besides, I can’t see it anyway. If I can’t see it, I can pretend the horror doesn’t exist.

She chatted back and forth with the livestream comments, completely unlike someone inside an artificial haunted house scene. There was not the slightest panic on her face.

Only, Rong Yu’s account seemed to have been given some other special effect in this script. Previously, she could see the livestream content in the livestream room, but this time, she could see nothing at all.

The place where the image should have been was pitch-black. On the whole screen, she could only see the gifts sent by viewers and the comment section crazily scrolling.

She ate while chatting with the viewers. For a while, the atmosphere was not so frightening anymore.

Until Rong Yu finished eating, went to rinse her mouth, and came back while reading comments and cleaning up the bowls and chopsticks on the table.

Suddenly, she saw the livestream comments unanimously screaming madly.

Rong Yu held down the comments to stop them from scrolling before finally seeing the content clearly:

[Behind you! Rongrong, ahhhhhhh!]

Rong Yu turned around, but still saw nothing.

In the next second, however, an extremely gentle touch landed on her shoulder.

It seemed that someone had placed a hand on her shoulder. Then it slowly moved down, following her arm and gradually approaching her wrist, joining palms with her.

That soft, icy touch was extremely faint and light, gentle as a breeze.

Rong Yu only exerted a little force to squeeze that hand, and the feeling of being covered by clouds and mist disappeared again, as if nothing had happened.

If not for the comments Rong Yu saw on her phone screen:

[Rongrong, can’t you see it?! Ahhhhh, it’s right behind you!]

[Sister upstairs, Baby Yu really seems unable to see it.]

[Holy crap, program team, what skills do you have that I don’t know about? You can even do invisibility???]

[Although, but, knowing that Rongrong can’t see it and only we can makes it inexplicably more exciting. What’s going on, ahhhh?]

[+111. Is this something we can say? covers mouth]

[+1008611]

Rong Yu wanted to read a little more, but her phone suddenly made a crisp click, as if someone had pressed the lock screen.

Yet she still did not see Mu Shuiqing’s appearance.

The room was silent. There was only Rong Yu’s breathing.

She stared around for a while. Seeing that Mu Shuiqing truly did not seem to intend to appear, she turned and finished organizing the lunch bowls and chopsticks, then threw them by the door, planning to toss them out next time she went out.

Then she lifted the quilt, got into bed, and continued making up for sleep.

The things she had experienced in the past few days were more exciting than everything she had experienced in the past several decades since childhood.

Although the things she had done did not make her feel physically tired, she had, in a way, been continuously using her brain to work inside Lian Langsheng’s brain world.

Her body had no reaction, but her mind felt especially tired. Her consciousness was so weary that she always could not help wanting to sleep.

And so, not long after lying down in bed, Rong Yu’s consciousness began to gradually scatter. She was already somewhat drowsy.

But while she was half-asleep and half-awake, her ankle suddenly went cold.

An icy hand slipped in beneath the lower edge of the quilt. Its fingertips pressed against her ankle, then gradually moved upward.

It lightly brushed past her calf, knee, waist… finally lingering at her neck, lifting her head and rubbing her lips.

The quilt bulged into a human shape, yet no figure could be seen at all.

Different from the coldness of seawater on He Jiao’s body, the coldness of the other party’s fingertips was more like a chill seeping out from the bones.

Just having her lips touched gave Rong Yu the feeling of being entangled by a snake. The places being touched seemed to fall into an ice cellar.

She frowned and turned her head away, but she could not drive away that maggot-in-the-bone touch. The other party’s figure seemed to seep through every gap. Between breaths, Rong Yu felt as if her entire person were being tightly wrapped up.

She wanted to open her eyes, but no matter what, she could not wake up.

That half-dreaming, half-waking state made her feel as if her soul had wandered beyond the sky, yet she could still clearly perceive every inch of her body’s reaction.

The room temperature dropped sharply. Even under the quilt, she was so cold she trembled.

Rong Yu was so cold she could hardly bear it. Her long brows furrowed with discomfort.

In the next moment, the pressure trapping her body suddenly loosened. The thick cotton quilt was pulled upward, completely wrapping her up.

The warmth on the bed that had gradually lowered rose again. That warm feeling made Rong Yu unable to help letting out a breath of relief.

The floor-to-ceiling curtains closed automatically, blocking all the glaring light outside the window. The room immediately sank into darkness.

The camera could only capture the darkness filling the room. Nothing could be seen clearly.

The excited viewers in the comments instantly froze.

[Ahhhhh, you—you’re turning the lights off again!!]

[I want to see! I want to ship the CP! Let me see, .]

In a daze, Rong Yu felt something cold and damp approach. Threads of chill blew across her shoulder.

The thing that had been pressing on her just now was now tightly hugging her through the quilt, clinging to her without the slightest gap. It buried its head in the hollow of her neck, soft red lips pressed closely against the side of her neck, carefully searching for her lips.

“Rongrong…”

When that icy touch pressed against the corner of her mouth, Rong Yu finally heard Mu Shuiqing’s muffled, slightly wooden voice.

“…I missed Rongrong so much.”

Author’s Note:

[F. Chang’an. X’s comment summarized some super interesting names!! But it got deleted by the review system, ahhhhh.]