Chapter 43: The Artificially Hollowed-Out Layer

“Calmed down?”

“Mm.”

Yu Wangxiao picked up the decanter, poured two glasses of red wine, and pushed one of them to him.

“We’ve never had a proper talk. You’re highly defensive. I understand that. But your recent actions have left you with no room to retreat. So now, you only have two choices.”

Yu Lin wiped his face with the wet towel prepared on the dining table, pulled out a chair, and sat back down. Suddenly, he felt a wave of strength-draining fatigue surge through his limbs and bones. He glanced at Yu Wangxiao, who was still calm, then at Lin Jiangye, who had quietly lowered his head to eat, and suddenly laughed. “Say it. What choices?”

“Talk. Talk about what Yu Chaoyuan did while he was alive, and everything from the past that you deliberately ignored. Say everything clearly now. If you feel uncomfortable, Lin Jiangye can temporarily avoid it.” Yu Wangxiao’s tone was smooth, yet it carried an unquestionable meaning. “I won’t hide what I went through, and you have no right to deny its truth.”

“What’s the other choice?”

“If you won’t talk with me, then go see a doctor. I’ll recommend you a psychologist. You must see them once a week. Mandatory in-person appointments. No absences.”

“…Then I’ll choose the first one.” Yu Lin drank the red wine in his glass in one gulp and spoke quietly, not very comfortable.

He greatly disliked this state of being manipulated, but Yu Wangxiao had left no room in his words. Usually, in such a situation, defying this person was absolutely not a wise choice.

Before Yu Lin could speak, Lin Jiangye had already prepared to avoid them. Regarding Yu Chaoyuan’s “preferences” and the pain they might have caused, this was actually an extremely sensitive matter, a rather heavy private topic. It was not suitable for him to take the initiative to discuss, and even less suitable to announce in public.

Of course, more importantly, Lin Jiangye found Yu Lin annoying. If he were not eating, he would already want to punch Yu Lin twice.

So he picked up his soup bowl, stood, and left the table. He lowered his head and kissed Yu Wangxiao’s cheek. “It’s fine. You two talk. I’ll go see Du Ning.”

“Be careful.” Yu Wangxiao squeezed his hand. He did not stop him, nor did he hide any intimacy in front of Yu Lin.

As for whether Yu Lin’s expression was ugly, that had nothing to do with him.

Du Ning’s room was on the second floor, the same floor as Yu Lin. Although they were mother and son who could not live peacefully with each other, Yu Lin had never expressed opposition.

Fortunately, the old residence was spacious enough. With two square corridors between them, if the two wanted to speak to each other, they would probably have to shout for the other to hear clearly.

So as long as they deliberately avoided each other, they could go forever without meeting.

Lin Jiangye walked while drinking soup. The warm health soup spread through his stomach, yet instead made the air in the corridor feel even colder, with an indescribable eeriness spreading.

Du Ning lived at the deepest part of the square corridor, in the corner with the worst lighting. Even the attached nanny room had better sunlight.

This was not deliberate abuse. Rather, she herself had long since displayed the traits of a living dead—overly strong light would make her very easily enter a stress state, becoming highly aggressive, her reason almost completely lost.

After drinking the warm soup in one gulp, Lin Jiangye gathered his spirits and calmed himself as well. He stood at the door and looked through the small window at the woman bound with restraint straps, then gently knocked.

There was no piano sound, only overly chaotic breathing and heartbeat echoing in the silent room.

Du Ning abruptly woke, turning her head with a fierce expression to stare at him. The “grk, grk” sound of grinding teeth came from her mouth, her masseter muscles swollen and tense, ready to strike.

It seemed that at this moment, she was not suitable for normal communication. But that was fine. Lin Jiangye had wanted to make close contact with her while she was in a mad state, to see whether he could resolve Du Ning’s abnormality without harming her life.

He was not doing it out of kindness, but because his impression of Du Ning’s scent was not very good. It smelled truly strange, like vitality trapped in a mire and unable to break free, slowly moving toward withered, dried-out rot.

Lin Jiangye did not like eating it.

Although he usually did not care whether something was meat or vegetable, he still had his preferences.

Whether it was a super-good person on the verge of becoming a Buddha on the spot, a treacherous villain who had killed countless people, or ordinary people who lived happily with empty heads, Lin Jiangye would hook them away at the first moment. When eaten, each had its own flavor.

There was only one kind of soul he did not like—an elderly person over eighty who had been paralyzed in bed for at least five years.

If he had to describe it, it was that half-dead old-person smell, displaying to the fullest the endless pain, numbness, and rot a person could not express. Eating it was like biting into a burst bitter gallbladder; it could make him uncomfortable for several days. Lin Jiangye truly could not appreciate it.

“Are you Yu Ling or Du Ning?”

He pressed down the door handle, his footsteps very light as he slowly approached her step by step, then half-squatted again.

Bang!

Du Ning suddenly straightened violently, only to be pulled back onto the bed by the tough leather restraints with a huge snap, as though if it happened a few more times, the bed could be torn apart by her struggling.

Lin Jiangye was not afraid at all. Instead, he took the initiative to move closer, directly face to face with her. “I don’t understand. How about you say it a few more times, and I’ll try hard to translate?”

“Grk, grk… grk, grk…”

It was unknown whether Du Ning understood or not. In any case, she did indeed continue grinding her teeth in cooperation, her masseter muscles swelling from the force, and the heavy folds at the corners of her eyes trembling along with them.

“…No good. I still don’t understand. How about this? I’m going to do something very frightening to you. It might hurt a little. Sorry, okay? It’ll only take a moment.”

Lin Jiangye politely gave a warning. Then he rolled up his sleeves and used a wet tissue to briefly disinfect himself.

With one hand, he slowly pinched open her tense cheeks and locked her jaw to prevent her from suddenly biting down. With his other hand, he reached straight into her mouth.

The sound of grinding teeth abruptly disappeared. Du Ning glared at him angrily, but before she could understand Lin Jiangye’s sudden action, Lin Jiangye slightly bent two fingers and abruptly pressed them toward her soft palate.

The nasopharynx was the part of the human body connecting the nasal cavity and oral cavity. It lay between the soft palate and the skull base, a box-like cavity that opened in all directions.

Of course, this place was also extremely close to the brain. A little farther upward, and one only needed to pierce through the thin cribriform plate to touch the brain. Many people who suffered skull base fractures even had cerebrospinal fluid leak from their noses, a very horrifying sight.

Lin Jiangye did not need to break through her skull. He only needed to feel through the cribriform plate to know exactly what kind of soul was inside Du Ning’s head.

“Huff… huff…”

The intense pain made Du Ning struggle desperately. She breathed in mouthfuls through her mouth, spitting out several mouthfuls of bloody foam without care, yet the airflow was still severely obstructed.

Lin Jiangye stood unmoving. He flattened the fingers that had pierced through the soft palate, lightly pressing them against the skull base, then closed his eyes and carefully sensed. His expression gradually became grave, and an extremely familiar sense of déjà vu surged into his heart.

As expected, two souls. Both in very poor condition, messily stirred together, half-dead.

Because Du Ning’s head was about to explode. The tiny chamber could not possibly hold two souls. Ordinary humans did not have that ability.

She was probably enduring indescribable severe pain every moment. Her facial muscles were tense to the limit, and her skull was nearly collapsing under an invisible, powerful pressure. Instead, only by desperately opening her eyes could she slightly relieve this pain that felt as though it would burst her apart.

This terrifying power could not be seen by the naked eye. Even an MRI would not detect it. So for the past ten years, no one had been able to help her. They would only think she was a madwoman having hallucinations.

“Ah—! Ahhh!!”

The despair of being near death seemed to stimulate Du Ning’s potential. She finally used her dead-silent vocal cords and screamed while struggling madly.

“It’s already done. It’s fine. Don’t rush. I’m withdrawing my hand now.”

Lin Jiangye tried to comfort her while retracting his right hand as gently as possible. But he was not someone good at comforting others to begin with, and it seemed he only provoked her into even greater anger.

Bang—!!!

The instant Lin Jiangye had just let go, the bed collapsed.

A thickly made redwood bed had its bedboard smashed apart by Du Ning just like that. The mattress and bedding fell together, revealing a dark hole. Broken wood chips and fragments also began falling with crackles and snaps, making constant noise.

Luckily, the leather straps were tough enough to barely hold Du Ning’s limbs. Lin Jiangye was quick-eyed and fast-handed, bending down and reaching out to immediately pull her up.

The dim room inexplicably fell silent for a moment. The two sat on the floor and stared at each other for a while. Du Ning, covering her mouth, was the first to retreat. Fear gradually appeared in her eyes, nearly tangible. For some unknown reason, she did not even dare look at Lin Jiangye for too long.

“Hey, hey, don’t run. Careful not to fall down.”

Lin Jiangye hurriedly pulled her back again and blocked the hole with his own body, wiping the blood from his hand.

Then he took out his phone, turned the flashlight to the strongest setting, and shone it toward the center of the dark hole. He saw a messy pile of children’s toys, infant swaddling cloths, and all kinds of soft little clothes.

The hole was located between the floorboards of the first and second floors. It was an artificially hollowed-out layer. This was an extremely unprofessional and high-risk act. If the Yu family old residence had not used extremely extravagant materials during its initial construction, there probably would have long been casualties from floor collapse.

“…Mm?”

The flashlight illuminated the corner of the hole and suddenly stopped for an instant. Lin Jiangye could not help falling silent again, for the first time wanting to suspect whether there was something wrong with his eyesight.

The thin figure lying among the children’s toys wore beige clothing that looked very much like a hospital gown, and appeared extremely familiar. Lin Jiangye could not hear his breathing or heartbeat at all. Otherwise, he should have discovered long ago that he was lying here.

“…No way. Lin Jingyao? Are you still alive? Can you hear me?”

Lin Jiangye used the restraint strap with one hand to fix Du Ning, who was trying to flee, in place. While calling out loudly, he jumped down. The instant the soles of his shoes landed, a large amount of dust rose. Looking again at the plush toy by his foot that had become a gray little lamb, it was obvious this secret space had not been cleaned for a very long time.

The air was dirty and thin, and the space was very low and narrow. Lin Jiangye could not even stand up straight. He had to lower his head and bend slightly at the waist to move freely. If Lin Jingyao had been locked here forever and no one discovered him, he most likely really would have suffocated to death in frustration.

He touched Lin Jingyao’s pulse and discovered that his body was still warm, so he quickly turned him over and laid him flat.

Half-kneeling, he pinched open his mouth to check for a moment. Then Lin Jiangye began CPR without hesitation.

“Wake up! Don’t really die here. I don’t want to deal with the police for three days in a row.” While pressing Lin Jingyao’s heart at an even rhythm, he muttered with extreme speechlessness, “Hey, do you know how suspicious this will make our Yu Wangxiao look? If you want to die, can you not die in our house? Do you understand harming others and yourself? Forget it… You seem born to like harming others and yourself everywhere. There’s really no reasoning with you.”

Crack—

Several of Lin Jingyao’s ribs seemed to have broken. Lin Jiangye narrowed his eyes and confirmed that the broken bones had not temporarily pierced into his lungs, so he did not stop at all and continued irritably scolding him.

“Lin Jingyao, are you seriously sick? Couldn’t you obediently stay with Lin Yu in the sanatorium? He serves you like an ancestor, but you insist on running out to risk your life. Last night, not dying on the cruise counted as your good luck, so how dare you keep running around? Now you’re dumbfounded, right? I’ve discovered that you and Yu Lin are actually pretty well-matched. Both of you don’t know your limits when doing things. What use is there in me saving you? Honestly…”

“…Cough, I… cough, cough… I’m awake. No need, no need to press anymore.”

Just as Lin Jiangye was furious and immersed in pressing hard, a pale, powerless hand trembled as it rested on his arm.

Lin Jingyao’s face was white as he struggled to breathe, unable to move because of the stabbing pain in his chest. He tilted his head and spat out several mouthfuls of blood. It was very fresh; one glance showed it was trauma caused just now by heavy impact to the ribs.

“Alive?” Lin Jiangye raised his brows slightly, stopped moving, and wiped the blood splattered on his hands with Lin Jingyao’s hospital gown.

He did not like human blood that was not Yu Wangxiao’s. Lin Jiangye discovered that he was instinctively repulsed by it. He truly did not want to touch it at all.

Lin Jingyao saw his unconcealed little movement, froze for a moment, then only smiled weakly.

“…Mm, alive.” Lin Jingyao’s voice was very light. He opened his pitiful, wet eyes and stared at Lin Jiangye without blinking. “I heard everything Gege scolded me about.”

This direct stare made Lin Jiangye’s scalp inexplicably numb. For some unknown reason, he felt even more repulsed. “If you heard, I’ll scold you again. Seriously, is there something wrong with your brain? If I had discovered you a few minutes later, you might already be dead.”

“I’m sorry, Gege. Thank you for saving me. Really, thank you.” Lin Jingyao softly admitted fault, his attitude so good it was almost strange. None of the wariness and resistance from before could be seen.

He was like a trembling ball of cotton, lowering his head in helplessness, his eyes seeming to shimmer with water.

Lin Jiangye did not think too much. Without the slightest gentleness, he lifted him with one hand, measured the height between the bottom of the hole and the ground, then lightly bent his knees and jumped.

The two landed steadily at the edge of the hole, unharmed.

Lin Jiangye hurriedly let go of this troublesome person, turned, and busied himself preparing to treat Du Ning’s mouth injury. But Lin Jingyao cautiously tugged at the hem of his clothes.

Lin Jiangye paused, turning his head. “What else?”

“What should I do, Gege? I don’t like Lin Yu. I really don’t like him…” Lin Jingyao lightly leaned over, like a thin, weightless fallen leaf.

His voice trembled, carrying an obvious sob. His already-wet eyes were stained faint red.

“Is now the time to talk about this? Then who do you like?” Lin Jiangye was shocked by his train of thought. “Or can you still not let go of Yu Lin? Then I can only respect and wish you—”

“I like Gege.”

“…Mm?” Lin Jiangye suddenly began to doubt his own hearing.

“I like Gege,” he repeated softly again.

“I know you find me annoying, but I’ll be obedient in the future. I’ll listen to everything you say.” Lin Jingyao lowered his eyes, revealing his wet, long lashes. His tone was very light and very soft. “So…”

“Can you always be my gege? Please. Just my gege is enough. I don’t want anything else.”