Chapter 318: 314 Butterfly

The little girl's words pierced through his body like a bolt of dark lightning; Huang Zhengdao trembled all over, feeling a chill and a sense of dread spreading in all directions.

Perhaps the little girl was only speaking in jest, but Huang Zhengdao had never forgotten why his good friend Ji Jian had gone missing; although it was claimed publicly that Ji Jian's whereabouts were unknown, in truth, everyone who knew the inside story of Ji Jian's disappearance had already passed a death sentence on him in their hearts.

Huang Zhengdao had gone missing due to unknown Abnormal factors; if the little girl's words were not a joke, then what she had just said was truly a scene she had witnessed.

That unknown thing that had abducted Ji Jian was now eyeing him too?!

His insomnia, his physical state... perhaps they were not stemming from ordinary changes.

When a person begins to consider things in the worst possible direction, their spirit gradually begins to lose balance and collapse.

Just as Huang Zhengdao was steadying his mind, wanting to open his mouth to ask the girl what exactly she had seen, what that bug looked like, and what the face of the person she saw being devoured by the bug looked like—as he wanted to ask this mysterious girl about countless doubts—the figure of a middle-aged man appeared behind the girl.

"Yuning, it's time for us to go back." The man held a bag of medicine in his left hand and a bag of steaming breakfast buns covered in condensation in his right; he spoke to the mysterious girl in a gentle tone, and his gaze shifted along with Huang Zhengdao's eyes as they looked toward him; the man revealed a friendly smile and nodded at Huang Zhengdao.

Huang Zhengdao knew that this man was the father the girl had spoken of; looking at the other man's appearance and the scene of him standing side-by-side with the girl, he felt an even stronger sense of mystery and eeriness from this pair of father and daughter.

There was a temperament about them that was vastly different from the people around them, including himself.

"Okay, Daddy." Li Yuning stood up, took the breakfast from her father's hand, took her father's hand in a natural motion, and then smiled to bid Huang Zhengdao farewell, "It was nice chatting with you, goodbye, Uncle."

Seeing the two turn to leave, Huang Zhengdao felt a bit panicked, yet he wanted to speak but hesitated; some people around had already noticed his strange reaction, and the social etiquette and morals he had learned over twenty-some years told him not to casually disturb a father and daughter he did not know, but the thought that missing them would be like giving up his own life was so intense that his heart felt flustered, and he did not want to just part ways with them after this chance encounter.

As if sensing Huang Zhengdao's dilemma and helplessness, Li Jiahong, as if he had eyes in the back of his head, turned around with an "Ah," as if he had suddenly remembered some important matter, and smilingly took a Business Card from his pocket and handed it to Huang Zhengdao.

Huang Zhengdao blankly took the Business Card, only to hear Li Jiahong say to him with a smile: "If you have any needs, come to the shop where I work."

After saying this, Li Jiahong and his daughter said goodbye again; the two did not walk fast, but to Huang Zhengdao, they were like the sun and moon that he could not catch up to, slowly moving away from before his eyes.

Huang Zhengdao looked down at the Business Card in his hand and fell into deep thought.

Lin Ling's Shenqi Miaomiaowu?

Is this... a toy store?

Where is the address, where is the contact number?

Huang Zhengdao felt a moment of suffocation, but it was not out of fear; rather, it was frustration and speechlessness, feeling as if he had been toyed with and fooled; this mishap also suppressed his original "extreme wild imaginings."

Successfully obtaining the medicine and returning home, Huang Zhengdao followed the doctor's orders and began taking the medication after lunch; while putting water in his mouth to swallow the medicine, he looked at his messy, unmade bed and thought silently to himself, "After taking the medicine, I should be better, right?"

Comforting himself this way, he nevertheless felt an inexplicable, fearful resistance toward keywords related to sleeping, such as bedding and sleep.

He had gone to see a doctor and take medicine for the purpose of treating insomnia, but now he had developed a fear of sleep itself, and instead did not want to fall asleep.

But, people should praise great science and be grateful for the medicine that saves lives and heals the wounded.

After finishing his meal and taking the medicine, whether it was the effect of the drug or the drowsiness that had been awakened after a full stomach when he hadn't slept enough, Huang Zhengdao sat on the sofa feeling drowsy, his eyelids fluttering.

Gradually unable to resist the closing of his eyelids, his hazy, illusory field of vision also slowly turned dark.

Before Huang Zhengdao fell asleep, his last thought was, "Can't hold on anymore, sleeping."

Click!

A tongue-clicking sound pulled Huang Zhengdao, whose consciousness was floating in the deep sea, into a space of clarity; Huang Zhengdao saw in a daze an evil, gigantic mountain of flesh lying in a blood-colored space; the mountain of flesh was alive, and it seemed to have sensed Huang Zhengdao's presence; one end of its body lifted up and slowly turned toward him.

Just as Huang Zhengdao was about to see the front of that mountain of flesh clearly, he felt a sense of emptiness beneath his feet, as if he had missed a step and fallen into a cellar; that feeling of weightlessness made his hair stand on end, and at the same time, the scenery of time and space around him switched rapidly.

But this sense of imbalance did not last long; before Huang Zhengdao's fear of falling reached its peak, he felt the solid sensation of stepping on the ground beneath his feet, and his pounding heart slowly calmed down.

Huang Zhengdao looked blankly at the wooden house that had suddenly appeared before him; the crudely made shop sign had the bright, glaring characters "Lin Ling's Shenqi Miaomiaowu" written on it; he immediately remembered the father and daughter he had met at the hospital during the day, and subsequently discovered that he was holding that Business Card in his hand.

Realizing that he had most likely really "run into something evil," Huang Zhengdao was a bit panicked, but seeing the forest filled with thick fog all around, there was no retreat to speak of, so he could only bite the bullet and walk into the Forest Cabin before him.

When Huang Zhengdao woke up, he was dazed to find that it was still as bright outside as before, but when he looked at the time on his phone, he discovered that time had actually gone backward; he rubbed his eyes carefully, only then to suddenly see clearly that time hadn't gone backward, but that he had slept for a whole day, and it was now nine o'clock on the morning of the second day!

"My Friday just passed like this?" Huang Zhengdao was stunned, and also felt a bit heartbroken, feeling that it was a huge loss not to have been able to utilize his rare time off.

His stomach was a bit hungry, his gut was making sounds of dissatisfaction, and the tightening sensation of his stomach wall was uncomfortable; he rubbed his stomach, only then discovering that he was still holding something in his hand.

Looking closely, he realized it was a butterfly specimen, only the pattern on the butterfly's body was somewhat eerie, and at first glance, it even looked a bit like a human face.

Seeing the butterfly, Huang Zhengdao trembled all over, "This isn't a dream... did I really buy this butterfly specimen back from that Forest Cabin?"

He had thought the experience of shopping in the Forest Cabin was a dream, but he had not expected the things from the dream to turn into reality.

Huang Zhengdao wanted to take the butterfly specimen away and put it to one side, but was shocked to discover that this Human-Faced Butterfly specimen had suddenly come to life; it flapped its wings once, floated from his palm to the back of his hand, and immediately after, he felt a chill on the back of his hand; in the blink of an eye, that Human-Faced Butterfly had actually turned into a tattoo on the back of his hand, merging with his skin, impossible to scrape off.