Chapter 839: The Second Sheet of White Paper

Huo Yun made an exclamation after hearing it all.

"Well, that really does sound a bit like a haunting!"

"Especially when you were standing in front of the elevator door, suddenly feeling an icy pair of hands on your neck, you didn't hear anything at all back then?"

Huang Kaiyu shook his head.

"No, really, not a thing. If last night I'd heard any footsteps behind me, or even the tiniest sound, I would have turned back right away. After what happened before, I'd be on guard."

"But there really was no sound behind me at all."

Huo Yun ate his apple, about halfway through, and said, "Maybe it actually was some kind of ghost. After all, a lot of people have died in Alice Apartment, and resentful spirits could be tangled up together."

Huang Kaiyu let out a short laugh, "I don't buy into ghost stories."

Huo Yun smiled, "Alright, kidding aside. Whatever you encountered last night wasn't a ghost. If it were, it wouldn't have used a blunt instrument to crack your skull open."

"It's just that one thing puzzles me."

"I asked Zeng Yan. When he found you, you were already lying in a pool of blood, with blood all around. And there was no one else there."

"That lets us conclude one thing: the person who cracked your skull had plenty of time to kill you. So why did he spare you?"

Huo Yun couldn't figure it out. "Could it be you pissed someone off in the apartment recently? But only a minor dispute?"

Huang Kaiyu shook his head. "Shouldn't be."

Huo Yun finished his apple. "I'm going to the bathroom."

Huang Kaiyu, wearing a hospital gown, got up from the bed and sat on it.

He said, "Huo Yun, where's my phone?"

Huo Yun pursed his lips, "Over there."

With that, Huo Yun left the ward.

Huang Kaiyu reached over to the white-and-blue hospital bedside cabinet and took his phone.

He pressed the power button. The phone screen seemed fine. He swiped, and he breathed a full sigh of relief.

For someone like Huang Kaiyu who needs to feed many stray cats and dogs, every penny counts. If the phone screen had been cracked or broken, repairing or replacing it would cost enough to buy a lot of cat and dog food.

You have to budget carefully.

Since the phone wasn't broken, he planned to unlock it with his fingerprint. Like many others, the phone had a tight hold on him; being without it for a moment made him anxious.

Just as he was about to use his right thumb to unlock it,

he suddenly made a small sound.

He flipped the phone over. On the back was a plastic phone case.

The pattern was cartoon cats and dogs.

He rubbed his thumb across the back of the case, then picked the phone up with both hands and held it level with his eyes.

"Looks like there's something inside the phone case."

He opened the back of the phone case and found a folded piece of paper tucked into the gap between case and phone.

No wonder it felt odd when he touched the phone.

This paper definitely wasn't put there by him. He unfolded it, and on the white sheet were dense characters in blue ink:

Huang Kaiyu, I heard you raise a great many cats and dogs?

Now I give you two choices. Choice one:

You give me ten cats and dogs for free. Of course, I can tell you what I want to do with them. I like to play games with such little animals.

Of course, the games are rather dangerous, so they might all die.

Choice two: I know you are a lab rat, so you should know other lab rats, right?

Now you choose: do you protect your cats and dogs, or the other lab rats?

If you contribute one lab rat to me, I will never bother you again.

If you give me cats and dogs, I will gradually increase the quantity.

So, I think it’s more cost-effective for you to give me one of the other lab rats.

Of course, you can refuse both options. If you choose neither, then I will make you—this lab rat—pay the price. I didn't kill you this time; this is only a warning and a reminder. You should understand I can kill you at any time.

Those were all the blue-ink words. Although the note was short, it left Huang Kaiyu frozen in place, both hands holding the paper filled with blue characters as if he were a statue.

"Ah, this apple is good, I'm going to eat another one."

Huo Yun's voice suddenly sounded.

Huang Kaiyu hurriedly slipped the white paper under his pillow.

When he looked up again, he saw that Huo Yun had apparently not noticed the paper.

He finally relaxed.

After Huo Yun came back, Huang Kaiyu said he wanted to be discharged.

Huo Yun asked if he wouldn't stay a few more days, after all his head was cracked open.

But Huang Kaiyu said, "If I stay one more day in the hospital, I lose ten thousand. Will you give me that?"

Huo Yun awkwardly made a noise without answering.

Huang Kaiyu said, "Even if you gave it to me, I wouldn't accept it."

So there was nothing to be done. Huo Yun had to handle the discharge procedures. Of course, before leaving the hospital, he needed to speak with Huang Kaiyu's attending doctor.

The attending doctor naturally opposed Huang Kaiyu's discharge. His head wound wasn't actually that severe, but the doctor recommended he stay for observation a few more days. Huang Kaiyu insisted on leaving and the doctor had no choice but to tell him to come back for checkups regularly and to return immediately if anything felt wrong.

By a little past eleven in the morning, Huang Kaiyu returned to Alice Apartment.

Back at Alice Apartment,

Huo Yun wanted to escort Huang Kaiyu back to his home in Building No. 2.

But Huang Kaiyu refused.

He asked Huo Yun to go to his former residence and help feed his cats and dogs.

Huo Yun said he was crazy, hurt as he was and still worrying about those cats and dogs.

But once Huang Kaiyu asked, Huo Yun had no choice and agreed, and immediately went to help.

When Huang Kaiyu saw Huo Yun leave, he breathed easier.

He walked step by step back to Building No. 2.

Standing by the elevator again,

there was no trace of the pool of blood that Huo Yun had described from when Huang Kaiyu had been lying on the ground last night.

The tiles were clean, as if nothing had happened at all.

A few minutes later, he arrived home.

The moment he stepped inside, he felt a weight lift.

He walked to the living room sofa, poured a glass of plain water from the glass coffee table, and gulped a few mouthfuls.

When he set the cup down,

he suddenly noticed a folded white sheet on the transparent glass coffee table.

That white paper gave Huang Kaiyu a strangely familiar feeling. He reached into the right pocket of his pants and found an identical folded white sheet.

On the new sheet, also written in blue ink:

Have you made your choice? Deadline: tomorrow at 2:30 a.m.

Whether it’s a lab rat or ten cats and dogs, have them tied up.

Bring them to the middle area of the first floor of the apartment library.

If you don't complete it, you will die. Believe me.

Huang Kaiyu's hands shook violently.

He had once thrown someone into a meat grinder and his hands had not trembled.

But now, two sheets of white paper alone shook his mind and soul to the core.

"If I die, what will happen to my cats and dogs?"