Chapter 249: Clues

That scrap of cloth seemed to drift between two worlds—Yu Sheng didn't know why he would judge it that way, but upon seeing it trembling half-virtual, half-real in the corner of the wall, the association sprang unbidden to his mind.

The other end of the cloth didn't seem to be fixed very firmly, and when Yu Sheng pulled it over he didn't feel much resistance; when he drew it to "this side," he clearly saw the surface of the cloth instantly solidify, the previously blurry edge contours snapping into focus at the same moment, and simultaneously the wind swirling in the room strengthened a little—but only for an instant, before it returned to its original state.

Was it because his act of "pulling" the object to "this side" had briefly strengthened the connection between the two sides? Or was it simply that the wind on the "other side" had genuinely picked up for a moment?

Brief thoughts turning in his mind, Yu Sheng's gaze fell on that scrap of cloth.

It looked as if it had been torn from a larger piece of fabric, the edges appearing ragged; the cloth itself was very light and soft, yet very strong—tearing it off would have required great force, which spoke to some extraordinary weaving craftsmanship.

Yu Sheng flipped the scrap over and saw that its other side was printed with beautiful pale-gold patterns, those golden patterns arranged along the edge of the deep-blue fabric like a string of stylized characters, emanating a mysterious air.

After studying it for a while, he took out his phone, found the photos he had taken of that "iron lump" back then, zoomed in to examine the runes on the iron lump's surface, and compared them with the patterns on the cloth.

Yu Sheng felt the two styles seemed somewhat similar, but he didn't dare jump to conclusions—after all, he wasn't a professional in this area.

Just then, a flurry of hurried footsteps finally came from the direction of the corridor, interspersed with some puppet's flustered commotion: "Hey, you said he just opened the door and left, and we still have to run all the way to the platform to open a teleportation gate… your tail is blocking my face… huh, why is it so cold in here, did the heating stop or the window… wu cao ah?!"

Yu Sheng turned his head and saw Hu Li appear at the doorway; Eileen, 66.6 centimeters tall, shot out from between Hu Li's tail and skirt hem like a little rocket—she hadn't seen the situation in the room at all, and ended up stepping on the ice and snow on the floor and sliding forward, the next instant accompanied by a shriek as she slammed into the opposite wall; that *pia-ji* sounded crisp, oh so crisp…

A moment later, Eileen climbed up from the floor and took a deep breath—Wutong Road No. 66 was instantly filled with the melodious sounds of birdsong and blossoms, that puppet's little mouth as if slathered in laxative…

But when Yu Sheng went over and casually picked her up, she quieted down.

"What the hell is going on here, what's happening, how did this happen…" Eileen, held by the collar and dangling in midair by Yu Sheng, stared wide-eyed at the room, "this is even more outrageous than last time, I'm telling you, a full-on blizzard blowing through, right… hiss!"

The little puppet belatedly hugged her arms and shivered, then turned to glance at the scene reflected in the mirror: "Cold, cold, cold, Yu Sheng, you still have to buy me two down jackets…"

"Where am I supposed to find down jackets that fit a 66-centimeter puppet!" Yu Sheng glared at the little puppet, "And you're a puppet—are you even afraid of the cold?"

"Just because I'm not afraid of the cold doesn't mean I can't be afraid of the cold, right?" Eileen wriggled, "I just can't be frozen to death easily, not that I can't be frozen stiff… ah, thanks, silly fox~"

A cluster of pale-blue fox fire drifted over, circling around Eileen and quickly driving away the surrounding chill; more blue flames swirled around Hu Li, who surveyed the room as she entered and replied, "I'm not silly, you're far dumber than me."

"This is what I just picked up from the corner of the wall," Yu Sheng said, holding up the cloth strip in his other hand and waving it before Eileen and Hu Li could start bickering, "I feel like its previous state was like it was drifting 'between two worlds'; just now I compared it with that 'iron lump' in the photo, and the patterns on the two have some similarities."

Eileen was indeed instantly diverted; she snatched the cloth strip from Yu Sheng's hand and began studying it—of course, she couldn't make head or tail of it.

"The iron lump we handed over to the Special Service Bureau last time hasn't gotten back to us yet, and now there's another scrap of cloth," the puppet Miss muttered, "what do we do? Give it to them again? I just feel like they're not that reliable either…"

"We can't find anyone more reliable either; we can't exactly go grab a couple of 'masters' peddling fake antiques off the street, right?" Yu Sheng shook his head, "And these kinds of 'strange objects' can't be figured out in a short time anyway, so it's normal there's no reply… anyway, we'll still have to show them eventually; maybe if they put it together with that iron lump from before, they'll be able to figure something out."

Eileen drew out a long "oh," while Hu Li walked over from the side, curiously looking at the mirror that was reflecting the cave scene, her expression gradually growing somewhat serious.

"Silly fox, what are you looking at?" Eileen curiously raised her head, "something weird in the mirror?"

Hu Li frowned and looked for a long time, as if she really had discovered something: "Benefactor, do you think these are footprints?"

"Footprints?" Yu Sheng was startled by the words and quickly walked over, "where?"

"These," Hu Li pointed at the cave in the mirror, her face serious, "there's a big rock here, and on the snow beside the rock there seem to be footprints; over here there are also traces of something being cleared away, looks like someone has been here."

Under the fox Miss's guidance, Yu Sheng finally noticed those details he had once overlooked.

Light, shallow footprints and snowmelt traces were scattered near the cave entrance; although they had become hard to distinguish with the passage of time, they were undoubtedly traces left by a person—and not too long ago.

"…on the other side, there's activity, and someone came by recently," Eileen blinked, looked at the mirror, then lowered her head to look at that scrap of cloth, "and this time's cloth strip, the 'iron lump' we saw last time… what exactly is that cave? Does someone come by periodically to throw things inside?"

Yu Sheng naturally had no answer.

And just then, he noticed the swirling snowstorm in the room was rapidly weakening.

The cold began to recede; the snowflakes that had appeared out of thin air through the walls, when they blew onto his face, became a mere illusion of a wisp of coolness; the scene in the mirror seemed to be veiled in a thin mist, and then the mist dissipated, the cave scenery in the mirror vanished along with it—and the cold wind in the room stopped completely.

"…Benefactor, the snowstorm on the other side has stopped," Hu Li murmured softly.

Yu Sheng raised his head, looked toward the corner of the wall, and saw the accumulated snow dissipating into thin air, while the "cloth strip" in his hand, just like the mysterious metal part last time, remained unchanged. "The connection has been severed," Yu Sheng said thoughtfully, recalling the scene he had seen in the room last time, his brow slightly furrowed, "Could it be… that when a blizzard appears on the 'other side,' the connection opens?"

No one could answer his question.

Yu Sheng left the room with Hu Li and the puppet, carefully locking the door once again.

"I'll have to buy a camera later, install it in the room, pointed right at that mirror," he said standing at the doorway, "the kind with cloud storage and playback."

"Better buy several, cover every corner," Eileen nimbly flipped over, climbed onto Yu Sheng's shoulder, and said casually, "I suspect that when the 'connection' opens, it's not just the mirror that changes—did you notice? The snowflakes blew in directly from the opposite wall and the corners of the ceiling… of course, I suspect even if we install cameras, they probably won't capture anything useful."

"Anyway, let's install them first."

Yu Sheng muttered, then turned and went back into the room, carefully placing the cloth strip he had pulled from the "other side" on the bed and spreading it out, the patterned side facing up; he took out his phone and took several photos in a row.

"You guys think Bai Liqing at this time…"

Yu Sheng had only gotten halfway through his sentence when Eileen directly poked his head: "She's definitely sleeping, are you even human? It's four in the morning! At least pick someone else to torment…"

"Alright, fair enough, she does seem to hold quite a grudge." Yu Sheng thought it over, felt Eileen had a point, and turned to open "Border Communications" on his phone, found the strange-objects discussion board, and—just like last time—made a post—

No errors, first release, all content in one place!

"I found another strange thing again, still a mysterious object that appeared in that snow-drifting room from last time, a damaged piece of cloth, the dimensions are… there are patterns on the surface… for other details you can refer to my previous post."

Yu Sheng's thinking was simple: anyway, no one recognized this thing, and sending it to the Special Service Bureau wouldn't yield results anytime soon, so he might as well cast a wide net and ask around everywhere—posting costs nothing, and what if some expert bites one of these times?

The facts proved that experts sleep at four in the morning too.

Nearly half an hour after the post went up, not even a single click.

Yu Sheng waited and waited until drowsiness welled up; he lay down on the bed and prepared to take a nap first, but just as he was about to close his eyes, his phone buzzed.

Hu Li, who had just turned around and hadn't yet walked toward the door, spun around on the spot and came back, staring wide-eyed at the words popping up on the phone screen; after making them out, she nodded to Yu Sheng: "Benefactor, someone replied to your message, someone called 'Sinful Disciple Three Thousand.'"

"What timing…" Yu Sheng picked up the phone on the nightstand, and just as he was about to tap it open, he suddenly realized something and looked up in astonishment at the fox Miss, "Wait, you can read these characters now?!"

"Mm," Hu Li nodded, "I can recognize most of the everyday ones now."

Yu Sheng: "…When did you learn them?!"

Hu Li took out the old phone Yu Sheng had given her before: "While fiddling with this, I picked it up along the way; and also watching Eileen curse people online, I learned quite a bit."

Yu Sheng was utterly shocked: "You this… I was thinking I'd wait until the 'Fairy Tale' business died down and I had time before figuring out how to teach you all this—your learning ability is a bit too strong, isn't it?!"

Hu Li said nothing, just scratched her hair and grinned foolishly at Yu Sheng.

Yu Sheng then turned his gaze to Eileen, who was off in a daze beside them.

The intelligence low-ground of Wutong Road No. 66 had no idea what had happened, turning her head to stare blankly and innocently back at Yu Sheng: "What?"

Yu Sheng, with a look of loving-kindness, reached out and patted the little puppet's head: "Nothing, go play by yourself."

"Oh."

Yu Sheng opened the message sent by "Three Thousand Sinful Disciples"—since the other party had replied to his last post in the thread previously, this was the first time he had reestablished contact with this person.

The message sent by the other party contained only a single image.

It was another fragment of fabric—its edge patterns were exactly identical to those on the strip of cloth in his hand.

(End of Chapter)