The door, which had been tightly shut, now stood open by a narrow crack, and half of Grandmother's face was visible through the gap.
Despite the lack of light, Nan Yue could see that face, as aged as withered tree bark, wearing a grotesque smile and covered in terrifying livor mortis as she watched her from the crack.
Grandmother didn't even care that she had been discovered.
She remained with one ear pressed against the door, her cloudy eyes fixed on Nan Yue.
Nan Yue's breath hitched for a moment as she stared back at Grandmother across the small distance.
In the next second, Nan Yue felt Grandmother's eyes snap wide, filled with an excitement akin to a predator finding its prey.
Nan Yue knew things were about to go wrong, for she had broken a rule.
According to the rules Grandmother set for Amin, she should have been asleep by now, but she had been caught awake.
Nan Yue quickly closed her eyes, but it was too late.
An agonizing, piercing pain shot through the wrist she had left outside the covers.
It felt as if... something had taken a deep, hard bite.
Nan Yue almost screamed from the pain, but she gritted her teeth and endured it.
If she made a scene now, even if Grandmother couldn't kill her today, she would likely lose half her life.
A chilling coldness spread from the wound throughout her body.
Nan Yue's forehead was drenched in sweat from the pain, yet she remained motionless, pretending to be fast asleep.
Something approached her, but Nan Yue felt no breath and no warmth.
The dead possessed neither.
She only knew the thing was close because the stench of rot suddenly intensified.
Grandmother's decay had worsened, and Nan Yue estimated the house would be uninhabitable by tomorrow.
Even with her eyes closed, Nan Yue could imagine Grandmother right beside her, perhaps with her own blood still dripping from the old woman's lips, waiting for her to show a weakness before attacking again.
"Amin... Amin..."
Grandmother's voice had become shrill and eerie, completely unrecognizable from before.
"Are you asleep?"
"Children who don't sleep at this time will be punished."
Nan Yue didn't say a word, doing her best to steady her breathing and forcing herself to ignore the agonizing pain in her wrist.
She didn't know how long passed, but the stench of rot never faded, and Nan Yue had no intention of opening her eyes.
Grandmother would wake her when it was time, and she didn't want to open her eyes once before then.
The pain in Nan Yue's hand had numbed her entire arm.
She suspected Grandmother's teeth carried some kind of cadaveric toxin.
Fortunately, her reaction had been fast, for if she had been even a second slower in closing her eyes, she might have been bitten on the neck.
If the toxin had spread there, she would have died on the spot.
Though she was pretending to sleep, Nan Yue's mind was racing.
The narrative was clear now and the background was defined, but she was even more uncertain about how to leave.
The story was different from what Amin had thought, as Grandmother wasn't just sick, she was dead.
If it were just a case of mental illness, she could have found a way to escape.
But Grandmother was a corpse, and the outside world wasn't even real.
Perhaps this wasn't even a real home, but just an illusion or something else.
...Wait.
Nan Yue's breathing slowed for a fraction of a second.
Not a real home?
The television was fake, so could the sofa be fake as well?
What about the walls? What about the floor?
Could it be... that the entire house was something burned for the dead?
Nan Yue's heart rate accelerated uncontrollably as a theory began to take shape.
However, to avoid getting herself killed, she needed to confirm it.
After an indeterminate amount of time spent in a daze, a sinister voice whispered in Nan Yue's ear.
"Amin, it is time to get up."
Nan Yue had to mentally prepare herself before opening her eyes, yet she was still startled by the sight before her.
Grandmother was crouching by her bed, her hands and feet on the ground like a giant spider.
Only her head was tilted upward, her wide, bulging eyes locked onto Nan Yue.
The livor mortis on Grandmother's face had multiplied, forming dense, ink like patches that obscured her features.
Her face was sagging and wrinkled, as if it might slough off at any moment.
The lips that had always held a grotesque smile were gone, leaving only a black hole that leaked saliva.
Grandmother had completely lost her human form.
Nan Yue steadied her emotions, but her brow furrowed as she stood up.
She looked at her left hand.
Her wrist bore a tooth mark deep enough to see the bone, and the wound was already rotting and black, emitting a foul stench.
She couldn't use her entire arm, and the lingering, sharp pain made her wish she had a knife to hack the limb off.
Nan Yue endured it, as her threshold for pain had always been high.
She got out of bed as if nothing had happened and performed her simple morning wash.
While she did this, Grandmother followed her, crawling on the floor and walls, monitoring her openly.
Nan Yue knew she was running out of time.
She turned and said to Grandmother, "Grandmother, please sit down. I will go serve the porridge."
Grandmother perched sinisterly on a chair, her eyes never leaving Nan Yue.
Once Nan Yue entered the kitchen, she kept her back to Grandmother to hide her movements.
Holding her breath, she used a light motion to ignite the gas stove, and a flame flared up, bringing a searing heat.
Everything felt just as it did in reality.
Nan Yue hesitated, but time waited for no one, so she reached her hand toward the fire.
As she drew closer to the flames, she felt a roasting pain that made her want to give up.
The water here was real water, so perhaps the fire was real fire too?
But Nan Yue had only this one path left, so she gritted her teeth and thrust her hand into the dancing flames.
Strangely, the high temperature she had felt on the periphery vanished once her hand was fully inside.
The fire licked the back of Nan Yue's hand gently, without causing a shred of pain.
Nan Yue's eyes lit up.
She had found her way out!
Almost the instant she discovered this secret, Grandmother's sinister voice echoed from behind.
"Amin... what are you doing?"
Nan Yue knew the best time to leave would have been during Grandmother's afternoon nap.
But she couldn't wait any longer, as the pain in her left hand was already starting to migrate toward her chest.
Besides, Grandmother was in such a state that there was no telling if she would even nap.
Once night fell, Nan Yue would be a dead woman.
She didn't answer Grandmother.
Instead, she moved quickly, using a rag to catch the flame and then wiping it across the counter.
The fire spread instantly.
Nan Yue's theory was correct: this house was a massive paper house.
No matter how realistic it looked, it would ignite at the slightest touch of fire.
The flames spread at an unimaginable speed, sweeping through the entire kitchen until everything in sight was a sea of fire.
It would still take a moment for the fire to consume the entire house.
Sensing a gust of wind behind her, Nan Yue quickly dove to the side and ran toward the area where the fire was strongest.
Her hair, which she had never cut and usually wore in a long braid reaching her knees, was bitten off by Grandmother.
Her hair fell loose, but Nan Yue had no time to mourn its loss.
She looked back to see Grandmother clinging to the ceiling, no longer resembling a human being at all.
Rate on N.U.
