Chapter 455: Truth-Seeking Fellowship

Maybe it was because he’d gone through too much yesterday and was too exhausted, but Lu Yibei finally managed to sleep soundly. By the time he woke up, it was already close to noon.

Half-awake, he reached under his pillow for his phone and glanced at it.

Time: 10:27

“Damn, it’s already this late?”

Lu Yibei let out a soft exclamation, sat up, patted his cheeks with both hands to wake himself up, and quickly crawled out of bed.

Just then, his phone suddenly rang.

It was a call from Su Mi.

After he answered, Su Mi’s voice on the other end was clearly tinged with anxiety.

“Lu Yibei, you finally picked up! Do you know how many times I’ve called you this morning? I was about to lose my mind.”

Lu Yibei curled his lips, unconcerned. “It’s the summer after high school graduation-if I don’t sleep in, how could I justify three years of hard work? Anyway, what’s got you so worked up?”

“Didn’t you tell me last night that some mysterious girl climbed through your window and broke into your house, and asked me to get my dad to check her background?” Su Mi asked.

Lu Yibei glanced toward the living room through his tightly closed bedroom door and nodded. “Yeah! She even came in through the bathroom window. What’s the problem? Is it inconvenient for your dad…”

“There’s a problem! A big problem!” Su Mi’s voice rose a few notches. “You might have actually run into a ghost!”

“Huh?” Lu Yibei was stunned, unable to process it for a moment.

“We checked her ID and found her basic info. Her name is Gu Xiliu, and she lives at BanShan Apartment…”

“Wait!” At this, Lu Yibei sensed something was off and interrupted, “BanShan Apartment? Isn’t that a condemned building? It’s been empty for years, right? How could anyone live there?”

Wasn’t her name Gu Qianqian? How did it become Gu Xiliu? The Gu Xiliu in his dream memories seemed to be someone else! Lu Yibei thought to himself.

“Exactly! No one’s lived there for ages!” Su Mi paused halfway, then lowered her voice mysteriously. “What I’m about to say next-don’t be scared!”

“Relax, I’m a professional. Even if you put a real haunting in front of me, I wouldn’t be scared,” Lu Yibei joked.

I’m the King of Hauntings in Hua City… well, in my dreams.

“You said it yourself.” Su Mi continued, “First, this girl Gu Xiliu disappeared over ten years ago. The records already list her as deceased.”

“Second, her family also went missing one after another a few years later.”

“And finally, do you know what the most important thing is?”

“What?” Lu Yibei asked.

“Before her family disappeared, they participated in a lot of Truth-Seeking Fellowship activities, even got arrested and have a criminal record!”

“Truth-Seeking…” Lu Yibei froze for a moment, then snapped back and hurriedly asked, “You mean that cult that caused such a stir a few years ago?”

Lu Yibei had long heard of the so-called Truth-Seeking Fellowship.

They were a bunch of lunatics who claimed the world was fake, and that only by leaving it for the real world could one gain true freedom.

Rumor had it the Truth-Seeking Fellowship was like a monstrous beast, devouring people whole, committing all sorts of evil for the sake of their pursuit.

But rumors were just rumors-sometimes even more deceptive than memories.

Lu Yibei thought back and realized he’d never actually seen the Truth-Seeking Fellowship commit any crimes himself; the occasional news just labeled them as a cult, without any concrete examples.

He avoided and kept his distance from the Truth-Seeking Fellowship simply because most people did.

After all, normal people instinctively keep away from madness and danger.

But now, after that incredibly real nightmare, after meeting Gu Qianqian face to face and feeding her five buckets of family-sized chicken, he suddenly found himself curious about the Truth-Seeking Fellowship.

Among a crowd of muddled people, the rare few who are awake become outcasts-so being awake becomes a mistake, and the awake are seen as madmen.

Maybe the members of the Truth-Seeking Fellowship are just a group of clear-headed “madmen,” and I’m becoming one of them, Lu Yibei thought.

“Yeah! That’s the one!” Su Mi said urgently. “So, that girl in your house is really dangerous-call the police, quick!”

“It’s not that serious, is it? Let me check things out first…”

“Then… then keep your phone on you at all times. If anything happens, call the police or contact us right away!”

“Yeah, got it!”

Lu Yibei hung up, turned to look at the living room through his tightly closed bedroom door, and fell silent.

Although he’d confirmed that Gu Qianqian-or rather, Gu Xiliu-really existed in this world, and wasn’t just a hallucination from a mental breakdown, he didn’t feel the least bit happy.

Gu Qianqian and her family’s connection to the Truth-Seeking Fellowship, which claimed “the world is fake,” made him feel uneasy, as if a cloud had settled over his heart.

Could the “real world” the Truth-Seeking Fellowship sought be the same as the one in his dream memories?

But if the memories in my dreams are real, then what about everything I’ve seen and experienced?

There’s Ms. Wang Meili here, childhood friend Ah-Hua, my good buddy Su Mi… but what does the “real” world the Truth-Seeking Fellowship talks about have?

As Lu Yibei pondered, the first things that came to mind were the seven limited-edition Bai Xiaohua figurines and Jiang Li at home, then the pesky little sister and Qing Ji, followed by the jacket, Meng, Du Sixian, Uncle Zhang Shan, and the little Haunting at home… After a long while, he reluctantly and unwillingly added Bai Kai.

So, does that mean there are more people waiting for me over there? Lu Yibei wondered.

After a moment, Lu Yibei got up, ready to check on Gu Qianqian.

He walked to the bedroom door, one hand holding his phone ready to call the police at any time, the other gripping the doorknob. His heartbeat quickened slightly, and he unconsciously held his breath.

He slowly turned the doorknob, trying not to make a sound.

When the door opened just enough to let him see the situation outside in the living room, Lu Yibei waited quietly for a moment. Seeing nothing unusual, he finally pushed the door open and left the bedroom.

In the living room, the near-noon sunlight poured in, bright and dazzling.

The chair on the living room balcony was empty; Gu Qianqian had already disappeared.

Only the snapped wires on the floor and five empty family-sized buckets on the coffee table proved she had ever been there.

Lu Yibei paced over to the empty chair and saw a note with childish handwriting on it, frowning.

The note read: [Lu Yibei, I’m going to find my family! If I find them, I won’t come back! Left by Gu Qianqian]

Staring at the note for a while, Lu Yibei frowned and muttered, “So what she means is, if she can’t find them, she’ll come back, right?”

Muttering to himself, he put down the note Gu Qianqian had left, picked up the snapped wires, his brow furrowing tighter and tighter, his heart tightening.

Suddenly, he thought of another abnormal and bizarre thing…

Lu Yibei stared at the snapped wires in his hand, feeling somewhat heavy-hearted.

Last night, Nanling Rao Hua suddenly appeared in his home carrying braised pork, catching him in the act of feeding Gu Qianqian.

At the time, he was completely flustered, just wanting to muddle through, but he overlooked an important detail.

Although Nanling Rao Hua most likely couldn’t see Gu Qianqian, she should have been able to see the wires tied to Gu Qianqian.

Late at night, a bunch of wires floating above an empty chair, vaguely outlining a human shape-this was already in the realm of the supernatural.

Her gaze had clearly lingered on the chair, yet she showed no fear or surprise, as if she hadn’t seen those wires at all.

This situation made Lu Yibei feel as if not only was Gu Qianqian a figment of his imagination, but even the whole series of events that happened when he interacted with her were just imagined.

And at the time, his mind was wound so tight that he didn’t notice this abnormality.

Lu Yibei had read some stories about split personalities before. In those stories, the protagonist would often do things unconsciously under the control of a hidden personality.

When they came to, they would think the things they did unconsciously were done with someone else, or had nothing to do with them at all, but happened to someone else.

Of course, there was another possibility: just like the information he got from Su Mi, Gu Qianqian’s real name was Gu Xiliu.

After she went missing, who knows what she went through, something went wrong in her mind, and then she broke into his home last night.

“But, Ah-Hua also asked me to use magic to make the humidifier disappear…” Lu Yibei muttered.

Nanling Rao Hua’s behavior was like she saw Gu Qianqian, and also saw her swallowing the chicken drumstick, but deliberately didn’t expose it, as if playing a prank.

After thinking for a moment, Lu Yibei decided to ask directly.

He took out his phone and dialed the number. Soon, Nanling Rao Hua’s familiar voice sounded in his ear.

“Hello, Yibei? Are you already out playing basketball?”

“Yeah, it’s me. I haven’t left yet!” Lu Yibei replied, then said seriously, “Ah-Hua, before I go out, I want to ask you something.”

“Love you…”

Lu Yibei’s eye twitched. “Can you be serious?”

“Hahaha, sorry, I couldn’t help it, it just slipped out,” Nanling Rao Hua laughed on the other end. “Go ahead, ask.”

“Yesterday…” Lu Yibei opened his mouth, took a deep breath, and said, “Last night, when you came to my place to bring me braised pork, did you see a girl tied to a chair with wires?”

The girl I saw at the intersection during the day… Lu Yibei added silently in his heart.

“…”

There was a long silence on the other end.

After a while, Nanling Rao Hua suddenly burst out laughing. “Yibei, what are you thinking? Bringing a girl home at night and tying her to a chair with wires-that’s a crime!”

“If I saw that, even if it’s you, I’d have to call the police and have the officers arrest you.”

Lu Yibei, “…”

True, with this “heroine’s” personality, if she saw something like that, she’d definitely turn him in for justice.

“Yibei?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you okay?” Nanling Rao Hua asked gently. “If you’re really not, I can ask my dance teacher for leave and come keep you company?”

“Uh…” Lu Yibei was stunned for a moment. “I’m fine, it’s probably just the lingering effects of that weird dream from the day before. Yesterday there was still some left, but after a good sleep, I feel much better now.”

“Alright, let’s leave it at that for now! They’re calling me, I have to go!”

In a daze, Lu Yibei felt as if a pair of invisible eyes were watching him, an unseen hand reaching out to stop him from seeking the truth, from continuing to question Ah-Hua or Su Mi, and he shouldn’t expect to learn anything from them.

Ms. Wang Meili was off somewhere in a remote Alaskan sea, playing with king crabs, and her phone couldn’t be reached at all. At the moment, he had no other close person to confide in or ask.

He couldn’t exactly call the police and say, “I tied up a girl yesterday, and when I woke up this morning, she was a corpse and then disappeared,” could he?

The police officer would definitely send me straight to Yunkang Psychiatric Hospital! Lu Yibei thought.

Right after, he remembered that girl named Jiang Li, and a strange flutter stirred in his heart, as if reminding him that Jiang Li was also someone very close to him.

However, when he tried to dig deeper into his dream memories to find events that could prove his relationship with Jiang Li, those related memories suddenly became shrouded in mist, drifting away, impossible to grasp.

Everything became unclear.

This vexing sense of vagueness only stirred up the “competitive urge” hidden deep in his heart.

He wanted to know who Jiang Li was.

His intuition told him that she was someone as important to him as Ms. Wang Meili and Ah-Hua.

“……”

In silence, Lu Yibei vaguely felt that if he wanted to keep probing into his dream memories, he might have to try finding members of the Truth-Seeking Fellowship.

If he could find members of the Truth-Seeking Fellowship, he should be able to get some answers from them.

Aren’t they all about “truth”? They shouldn’t lie, right?

Gu Qianqian’s family were members of the Truth-Seeking Fellowship, and her home address was at BanShan Apartment…

So, should I go check out BanShan Apartment? Maybe I’ll even find Gu Qianqian there. If she really went to find her family, she should be there, right? Lu Yibei thought.

“Alright, that’s settled then. I’ll eat something first, then head out!”

He lightly punched his palm with his fist, stood up, and walked to the coffee table, ready to find something to eat from the leftover family bucket from last night to fill his stomach a bit.

Then…

“Damn! That Gu Qianqian even took some stuff with her when she left!”

—

1:05 PM.

Lu Yibei stuffed the toilet plunger into a backpack, then randomly shoved in a pile of jade charms that Ms. Wang Meili claimed could ward off evil, slung the backpack over his shoulder, and left the house.

After grabbing a bowl of zhajiang noodles(Fried Sauce Noodles) at a restaurant near the faculty housing, he flagged down a taxi, ready to head to BanShan Apartment.

“Sir, please take me to BanShan Apartment.”

After telling the taxi driver his destination, Lu Yibei instinctively glanced at his license info, and when he saw the name “Zhang Shan,” he frowned slightly.

Seriously, I can even run into you when hailing a cab in another world? Our quantum entanglement is pretty intense! Lu Yibei couldn’t help but complain inwardly.

Combining his dream memories with the current situation, he even suspected that if he traveled to some fantasy world and flagged down a dragon-horse carriage, the driver would still be named Konrad von Zhang Shan.

As if remembering something, Lu Yibei glanced at the driver uncle and asked, “Sir, do you like listening to haunting stories?”

The driver uncle glanced at Lu Yibei out of the corner of his eye, puzzled. “I do like them, but why do you ask?”

“Oh, it’s like this…” Lu Yibei explained, “I heard from a friend that if you tell haunting stories to you, the ride is free. Is that true?”

Anyway, in his dream memories, Uncle Zhang Shan would let him ride for free.

“Friend?” The driver uncle frowned.

Be honest, is this ‘friend’ actually you?

He grumbled inwardly but didn’t press further, changing the subject. “Can you repeat the question you just asked?”

“Do you like…”

“Sorry, I don’t!”

Lu Yibei, “……”