The Creatures That We Are

Chapter 554: Ex

The short, overweight, ugly, and mentally challenged man jumped around in front of the fire sweeping across the mountain, holding a burnt piece of wood in his short, thick, and rough hand, unbothered by the fact that the heated wood was burning his skin and flesh.

“We’ve come this far. There’s no turning back.” Madam Wu responded before turning to Cockroach. “You saw how Cockroach was the only one who could survive consuming the holy water Hyena made, and his intelligence decreased after every consumption. We would surely lose control if we took the holy water. Then I’d rather die.”

Xing Kong cursed and said hesitantly, “Will Su Xi really give us true holy water after giving birth to the Divine Scion?”

“Who knows?” Madam Wu said honestly. “Without true holy water, we won’t be able to level up past our limit, and we’ll always be vermin in the ditch, to whom the Godbearer Cult wouldn’t spare a ticket for. We have to take the gamble.”

“Look!” Xing Kong looked up, noticing something.

High in the air in the nearby city, a private helicopter could be seen.

“Ha, they come quickly.” Xing Kong stood up. “We can go now, right?”

“Yeah, take Blood Amber and go west down the mountain. I’ll take Cockroach and go east. We’ll meet each other at our usual meeting spot.”

“Got it.” Xing Kong quickly left.

Madam Wu turned around and called out impatiently, “Stop playing, Cockroach. Time to go home and eat!”

“Eat! Yay! Eat...” Cockroach threw away the wooden stick in his grasp and turned to go to Madam Wu.

...

Blood Amber was hiding in a dark cavern. It had been a tourist sight on the Green Mountain before, but after a landslide, it was blocked off, which made it a good hiding spot.

Red light flickered from outside the cavern. It seemed that the blazing fire was spreading quickly.

“Why’s taking them so long?” Blood Amber complained in her spacesuit.

As the last resort of the team, she rarely showed up with the others, but would instead hide somewhere near their base. If her teammates were at a disadvantage, they would discreetly message her, and she would take off her helmet and breathe.

Yes, all it took was for her to breathe for a moment, and all intelligent lives around her would be infected with her virus, going weak and starting vomiting blood in great pain.

What others didn’t know, however, was that breathing normally without her helmet hurt her just as much.

Every intake of air felt like sulfuric acid, burning her throat and lungs and making a mess of her organs like a saw.

She missed her old life.

Back then, she hadn’t awakened, and she was nothing but a regular girl. She grew up in a family where both parents worked, and just like most girls, she looked average and got average scores.

When she was little, she loved anime like Sailor Moon, and in middle school, her obsession shifted to shojo manga and romance novels. In high school, she started going to concerts and got obsessed with celebrities. Going into college, she remained single and spent her days writing fanfics of her favorite couples. Once she had enough savings from her part-time jobs, she would go to concerts with her classmates or travel to a city with great internet fame, enjoying tasty food and milk tea, as well as taking pictures at famous sites.

After graduation, she started working as a copywriter at an ad company, doing overtime and attending meetings every day with no time for anything but sleeping.

It did occur to her that such a life was boring, and she wanted to resign to go on an impromptu trip, but she never mustered enough courage.

One day, Blood Amber ordered delivery, and the young man delivering her meal was late. She was so hungry that her stomach hurt, and in a moment of anger, she left the first negative review she had ever written in her life.

When the delivery man arrived late and apologized to her, both his face and body were covered in wounds.

He said that his cat passed away yesterday, and he hadn’t gotten any sleep the previous night. Today, when riding his motorcycle, he thought he had heard the meows of his cat, and distracted, he fell. That was why he was late.

Blood Amber wasn’t sure what to do. She quickly retracted the negative review and hurriedly comforted him, giving him an orange.

The young man in his twenties took the orange in the hallway and burst out crying. His cat was named Orange.

“Sorry, sorry, really, I’m so sorry...”

Blood Amber didn’t know why she was apologizing, and so many times at that.

What then?

They added each other as friends on WeChat and texted each other every once in a while, making small talk and asking after each other.

And then?

They became friends, going out to eat or go to an expo every now and then, complaining to each other about their lives as a little cog in a big corporate machine.

And after that?

They got together. Neither of them started the conversation, but one night, when the young man walked Blood Amber home, they walked past the green belt of a community, the air smelled faintly of the fragrance of osmanthus. They walked shoulder-to-shoulder, and their moving hands found each other, unbidden. Once their fingers intertwined, neither of them let go.

What about even after that?

The young man moved into Blood Amber’s studio, and they kept a stray cat they picked up in the community as a pet, naming it Pomelo.

Every morning, the young man would wake up at seven to prepare simple breakfast and milk for Blood Amber. After feeding the cat and cleaning the litter, he would wake Blood Amber up and put on a helmet, leaving home to make deliveries.

Blood Amber would wake up to the cute purrs their cat made, washing up and having breakfast before getting changed for work. Then she would catch a subway to her company.

After work, whoever returned home earlier would prepare dinner—more often than not, it would be her boyfriend.

They would sit on the sofa with their bowls and turn on the laptop to put on a lighthearted drama that didn’t require thinking, which would serve as their electronic side dish. They would watch the drama as they ate and laughed every once in a while.

Then it would be late. They would wash up, feed the cat, clean up the mess, and go to bed in each other’s embrace. Before going to sleep, they chatted, mostly about the mundane matters in life, but also their dreams about the future; they wanted to go to the Snow Nation to see the aurora in three years, go to the Island Nation to watch cherry blossoms, and go to Naldives to enjoy the sight of the ocean.

Half a year into their life of cohabitation, they were suddenly driven out of the flat by the landlord, and the two moved out in a hurry, feeling tired, wronged, and pathetic.

So they started saving. They planned to save up enough to buy a house in two years. They wanted to have a home in Li City.

Things seemed to be getting better, and they were filled with hope.

But one day, Blood Amber got sick.

At first, she was simply feeling nauseous and dizzy, running a low fever. Then she started suffering from constant vomiting and diarrhea, which severely undermined her normal life.

She went to the hospital for blood tests, scans, and all sorts of check-ups, but no one could ever give her a diagnosis.

She remained sick, and her condition fluctuated without a pattern. She lost her job soon and became bedridden at home. Her pain grew more and more, and her condition declined nonstop.

Later, even her boyfriend had to stay at home to take care of her, unable to work.

That put Blood Amber under greater pain and guilt, and she lost control of her emotions. She threw a tantrum all the time and refused to eat, threatening to kill herself... Finally, her boyfriend had enough, and he left after slamming the door shut.

Sickly, Blood Amber lay on the bed crying. She was soon wallowing in regret and fear. She felt like she was going to die, and she called her boyfriend to apologize to him, asking him to come back and not abandon her.

He relented, saying that he would be back in a bit, and that he would buy her favorite egg tarts on the way.

Not long after, the doorbell rang. Blood Amber dragged her hurting body to the door to open it. Outside stood a graceful older gentleman.

He said unceremoniously, “Ma’am, according to my observation, your Patient is reaching level 2 soon, and it will hurt you and those around you. You have two options.”

“First, you may come with us and work for us. We can help reduce your pain and allow you to live with dignity.”

“Second, you may stay here and wait for your boyfriend to return, but then your Patient will kill him, or he can turn into a monster and kill you.”

Back then, Blood Amber didn’t understand what Edmond was talking about at all, but strangely she believed he was telling the truth.

During her days of illness, she had a strange feeling that she was different from others, that she was special—even though her being special only brought her endless pain.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“You may call us the Tails,” the man answered with a smile.

Blood Amber decided to leave. She grabbed a post-it note and wrote a message, sticking it to the fridge: I’m gone. Don’t look for me. Consider me dead.

Later, she often asked herself if she regretted the decision.

Living with dignity meant being trapped in a special device that merely sustained her basic functioning and lessened her pain somewhat twenty-four seven. It looked like she was always wearing a heavy spacesuit.

But then she realized that no matter if she regretted it, she hadn’t had a choice back then.

Six years passed. Her ex-boyfriend must have forgotten about her. Perhaps he had married a normal girl, and they worked different jobs while keeping a cat and paying the mortgage together.

Would he still wake up at seven o’clock every day to heat toast and milk, feed the cat, clean up the litter, and wake up his wife before going to work?

Was Pomelo still alive? Did he still remember Blood Amber, the ex who had suddenly gone missing?

“Blood Amber.” Xing Kong walked into the dim cavern.

“Are we going?” Blood Amber broke out of her reverie and asked through the helmet of the spacesuit.

“Ha, look who’s here?”

As if in response to the words, a man walked out from behind Xing Kong.