Chapter 344: How Can You Say I'm a Monster?

The meaning of a late-night snack goes far beyond the taste of food; what matters most is the precious friendship contained within it. This emotion is the richest, most delicious seasoning in cooking.

The last time I ate something this delicious was last time.

So, when the late-night snack was interrupted by her father's phone call, Feng Yuhuai felt a bit apologetic about it.

She squatted down so her line of sight was level with Xiao Juan's, and apologized very seriously:

"Sorry, Xiao Juan. My father really doesn't know how to pick a time to call. If I don't answer, he'll keep calling. Older men are just like this, with no sense of boundaries toward their children at all—it's suffocating."

Xiao Juan looked at Feng Yuhuai with brimming tears. The other person's tone was still gentle, even gentler than usual, and that face was still sweet, even more charming because of the red lipstick.

But Xiao Juan only felt as if she had fallen into an ice cellar, with not a bit of warmth left in her heart.

Seeing Xiao Juan not speak, Feng Yuhuai reached out and tugged at Xiao Juan's arm, twisted like a rope, as if acting coquettish between close friends:

"Don't be angry. How about this: I'll have my father come apologize to you personally. If that's not enough, I can have my mother come too. How about that, hehe—"

Xiao Juan didn't feel much pain on her body, because Feng Yuhuai had thoughtfully used a red thread to block her pain sensation. She only felt her body as if soaking in a hot spring, soft and numb.

But her heart, her soul, felt as if being fried in an oil pan, the pain was extreme.

Xiao Juan used all her strength, her stiff tongue haltingly uttering a weak voice: "Why—, why?"

Feng Yuhuai was stunned, her mind turned for a moment, before she realized what Xiao Juan was asking. She answered very seriously:

"Because I'm hungry. When you're hungry, you have to eat. In our bedroom, what I like most is you. Can you bear to watch me starve?"

Xiao Juan tilted her head. Her left eyeball, dried and dehydrated, fell out of the eye socket. The black, hollow eye socket stared straight at Feng Yuhuai:

"Yazhi, did you eat—Yazhi?"

A strong look of nostalgia appeared on Feng Yuhuai's face. A hint of unspeakable sorrow seemed hidden in the corner of her eye. She nodded sadly:

"Yes. That was the first time I went hungry. I was too panicked then and didn't really taste it. Every time I recall it, I still feel I owe Yazhi."

In Xiao Juan's remaining beautiful eye, sorrow and grief overflowed. After a long silence, she finally squeezed out a few words with difficulty:

"How—did—you—be—come—like—this?"

I don't know if it was because tonight's late-night snack was especially delicious, but Feng Yuhuai felt her mind regain clarity, as if the split brain matter had merged back into one, regaining its former wholeness.

Her words became fluent again, and her expression regained its former liveliness and vitality.

Feng Yuhuai reached out, her fingertip lightly brushing Xiao Juan's trembling eyelashes. In this quiet night, she shared with her close friend the secret buried deep in her heart:

"I remember that day. Yang Tuo took me home, and then I left him in that room. I thought I could escape. As it turned out, I did escape, but I was taken to that black clinic, and then I became like this..."

Feng Yuhuai sighed long and hard. Her pupils strangely turned into two rotating coils:

"Do you know? When I realized that the source of all this was actually my brother, I simply hated him to the core. I called him several times, wanting to invite him out for a meal. Unfortunately, he never answered my calls."

"But you're the best, Xiao Juan. I call you, and you obediently come with me. Hehe—"

"But later, I suddenly didn't hate him so much anymore. On the contrary, I began to be grateful to my brother. Because if it weren't for him, I would never have had the chance to taste such delicious food, food that can touch the soul."

Feng Yuhuai lightly licked the bloodstain remaining at the corner of her lips. Then, with a sincere yet complex emotion, she asked her close friend:

"What do you say, Xiao Juan? Do you think I should hate my brother, or should I be grateful to him?"

Xiao Juan opened her mouth, unable to speak.

At this moment, Feng Yuhuai seemed to suddenly remember something. She quickly picked up her phone, opened the news page, and pressed the mobile phone screen against Xiao Juan's face, while smiling dreamily:

"My annoying father still wants to deceive me. Actually, I knew this afternoon that my stupid brother got into trouble. It seems he killed someone, and then was discovered by the Patrol Bureau. He's going to be arrested."

"Killing someone is such a small matter, and even my stupid brother managed to mess it up. Xiao Juan, you tell me, how could I have such a stupid brother? Hehe—"

Xiao Juan widened her bulging eyes. She felt her eyeball gradually dehydrating, becoming shriveled. Feng Yuhuai before her eyes was also slowly becoming blurred.

In a daze, she seemed to see, atop Feng Yuhuai's head, a vague red shadow crouching there.

That shadow looked like the ragged cloth doll Feng Yuhuai often placed by the bedside before, later lost by accident.

That cloth doll was crouching on top of Feng Yuhuai's head, its bright red mouth open, as if gnawing on her head.

It was eating Feng Yuhuai, just as Feng Yuhuai was eating me?!

The light in Xiao Juan's eyes gradually dimmed. She looked at the cloth doll, which seemed to smile weirdly at her.

Xiao Juan weakly closed her eyes. Using the last bit of her faint strength, she whispered softly:

"Yuhuai, monster..."

No one could know. Before Xiao Juan was eaten, her last words—were they cursing Feng Yuhuai to become a monster, or reminding her that there was a monster on top of her head?

But Feng Yuhuai decided it was the former. The smile on her face froze instantly, like frost suddenly arriving in winter. A sinister shadow crept out between her brows and eyes.

She raised her hand and pressed it against Xiao Juan's head. Countless red threads surged, decomposing Xiao Juan's body into new blood threads, then, like pulling silk, they were all drawn into her own body.

"Xiao Juan, I treated you as my closest roommate. I secretly told you all my secrets. How can you be so cruel as to call me a monster?"

A strange anger appeared in Feng Yuhuai's eyes, but it soon calmed down, turning into a light hehe laugh:

"However, I don't blame you. Once you merge into my body, you will completely understand me. We will be as close as before, forever inseparable good friends, just like Yazhi. What do you say, Yazhi?"

Amidst the hehe laughter, Feng Yuhuai's shoulders split open, revealing a human face woven from red threads. It was unmistakably the shape of Lu Yazhi. She was showing a line-like weird smile, as if welcoming and embracing a close friend not seen for a long time.

In an instant, those intertwined red threads all melted away like a receding tide, gathering back into Feng Yuhuai's body, as if they had never appeared.

On the ground, only a puddle of abandoned clothes and a phone with a bright screen remained.

The phone's wallpaper was a photo of several close friends leaning on each other. That frozen image complemented the heads leaning on each other on her shoulder at this moment, like an eternal painting speaking of friendship.

Warm, beautiful, never parting...

End of Chapter