Chapter 171: Stay and Play With Her

Neither of the two men said a word. Instead, they simply drew their weapons in silence.

By this point, both of them had already realized something was deeply wrong with this little girl.

Last time, she’d inexplicably tried to get close to them out of nowhere — and now here she was, suddenly appearing all over again, just as strangely as before.

They both remembered clearly enough that after entering the theater, there hadn’t been a single seat available for a little girl anywhere in the rows in front of or behind them.

So then — exactly how had she come to be here at all?

The answer, honestly, seemed obvious enough.

Now she was standing here asking whether they’d enjoyed the show, and neither of them believed for a second that there wasn’t something deeply suspicious going on beneath the surface.

"Why won’t either of you answer me? Brother, sister — did you two enjoy the play?"

The little girl smiled and took a step closer, tilting her head slightly as she studied the two of them.

"No. We didn’t."

The instant Lin Yun finished speaking, she swung the stick in her hand straight at the little girl.

The girl made no attempt to dodge — she simply stood there, unmoving.

The stick passed clean through her body without making contact at all.

"It’s useless, you know. You can’t hit me." The little girl kept smiling the whole time, her expression innocent and disarmingly cute.

Lin Yun’s face darkened at once. If they genuinely couldn’t land a single hit on her, this was about to get considerably more complicated.

"What exactly do you want from us?" Song Xizheng demanded sharply, clearly caught off guard by just how unsettling this little girl had turned out to be.

The girl giggled softly. "Nothing much, really. I just wanted to ask — did the two of you enjoy this particular play?"

"It was quite an interesting one, wasn’t it?"

"Some people forget themselves entirely. Some remember everything perfectly. And some are simply drowning in pain the whole way through. Don’t you think that’s fascinating, in its own way?"

"And wouldn’t you agree it makes for a wonderful storyline, watching two best friends slowly turn against one another like that?"

The little girl turned to face the stage once more.

The curtain had reopened at some point without either of them noticing, revealing the actors and puppets still standing there in place.

Every single one of them stood with their heads bowed low, utterly lifeless, simply waiting for their master’s next command.

The little girl lifted one hand, palm facing downward, and gave her fingers a small, deliberate flick.

Up on stage, the Lily of the Valley puppet raised its hand in perfect sync, then lifted its head as well.

Its expression remained blank throughout, performing a handful of small movements entirely at the little girl’s command.

"See? Puppets really are so easy to control. Just the slightest tug on their strings, and they’ll do absolutely anything you want them to. Isn’t that fascinating?"

The girl turned her head back toward them.

"Why aren’t either of you saying anything? Oh, I bet I know — you two probably just don’t care much for puppets, do you? What a shame, honestly."

"Well, no matter. There’s plenty else to enjoy around this amusement park. I’m sure you’ll find something more to your taste eventually."

The little girl paid no real attention to how they felt about any of it and simply carried on talking to herself regardless.

By this point, she seemed to have found herself a delightful new toy to play with, entirely ignoring the two of them now as she went back to fiddling with the puppets up on stage.

Lin Yun and Song Xizheng exchanged one more glance, and then Lin Yun turned and started walking briskly toward the exit.

This little girl clearly wasn’t any kind of decent person at all. Who knew what she might do next if they lingered any longer?

Since she could summon and control puppets out of thin air, and since nothing they did seemed capable of actually harming her, running was clearly the smarter option here.

The little girl, of course, noticed the two of them fleeing, but she couldn’t have cared less. So what if they left now? There was still plenty of time left, after all.

Once you’ve set foot on her turf, none of you are ever truly leaving.

Every single one of them, she decided, ought to stay behind and play with her eventually.

The two of them walked briskly, not even bothering to collect their little red flower on the way out, heading straight for the exit of the puppet theater. It was the baby-faced attendant from before who eventually caught up with them, sticking the little red flower onto their collars before finally letting them go on their way.

"Sister Lin, that little girl..."

"Shh!" Lin Yun quickly clapped a hand over Song Xizheng’s mouth before he could finish.

She suspected that little girl might be the very same "little master" the gopher children had once mentioned so cryptically before.

After all — she could appear inside a puppet theater out of nowhere, summon and manipulate puppets with no visible strings attached, and spout all sorts of unsettling nonsense without a second thought.

Song Xizheng gave her an "okay" gesture in response, and only then did Lin Yun finally release her grip.

"So, what do we do now, then?"

"Didn’t I already show you that information last time? Just pick something, play it out, and move on."

The performance they’d just watched had run considerably longer than expected; by the time they finally stepped back outside, it was already somewhere around three or four in the afternoon.

Following the rules Yan Yue had originally given them, the two of them quickly cleared the drop tower ride and collected their little red flower without issue.

They didn’t bother lingering anywhere else in the park after that, splitting up instead and heading their separate ways back toward the shelter.

Just as Lin Yun approached the area near the pirate ship, a young child suddenly stepped in front of her, stopping her in her tracks.

"Sister, have you seen a teddy bear anywhere? About this big, really cute, wearing a little dress?"

The child held up both hands to indicate roughly how big the bear was, then looked up at Lin Yun with obvious hope.

Lin Yun shook her head. "Sorry, I haven’t seen anything like that."

"Okay. Thank you anyway, sister."

The child’s head drooped slightly with disappointment, offering a quiet thanks before stepping aside to let her pass.

Lin Yun didn’t dwell on the exchange for long and simply continued on past the child without another thought.

Taking advantage of a moment when no one seemed to be watching, she slipped quietly back into her shelter.

She collapsed onto the sofa, pressing her fingers against her temples, and let her thoughts drift for a while.

Sang Biao and Tuan Tuan had both come rushing over eagerly, hoping for another round of affectionate cuddling, but the moment they caught sight of her state, they froze in place instead.

Tuan Tuan: Boss, what do we do here?

Sang Biao: If you truly love her, just stay by her side quietly!

Tuan Tuan: Got it, understood!

The two of them crept carefully onto the sofa and nestled in close beside her, their tails occasionally brushing lightly against her hand.

Lin Yun felt something soft and furry against her palm and reached out instinctively to grab hold of it. Glancing down, she realized it was Tuan Tuan’s tail she’d caught.

"What exactly are you two up to?" She gave one of their heads an absent little rub.

"Youyou, did you have a good time out there today?" Sang Biao settled comfortably into her lap.

Tuan Tuan quickly shifted position too, mimicking the exact same pose.

"Not really. Just had a lot on my mind, that’s all."

"Oh. Okay, then."

Since Lin Yun clearly didn’t feel like discussing it further, Sang Biao wisely chose not to push the matter any further.

Cats, after all, had little interest in the complicated affairs of two-legged creatures — best to just let the humans sort out their own business in their own time.

When it actually came down to fighting, though, cats could be remarkably fierce when they needed to be.

After mulling things over for a moment, Lin Yun pulled up her personal panel and quickly typed out a brief summary of the play she’d just watched, sending it off to Song Zhenzhen.

By the time Song Zhenzhen made it back to her own shelter and read through the message, she was thoroughly stunned by what she found.

Song Zhenzhen: "Whoa, I’ve actually stopped by the visitor center a bunch of times and seen that Lily of the Valley girl in person before! I genuinely never would have guessed she used to be a survivor herself!"

Song Zhenzhen: "Oh my god, wait — was that balloon the clown NPC gave us earlier supposed to be some kind of hint this whole time?"

Speaking of the balloons, something suddenly clicked in Lin Yun’s mind. Right, come to think of it — had that clown NPC actually managed to figure everything out back then?

In the play, the clown NPC’s memories of Earth hadn’t been entirely erased — he’d still retained fragments of them somehow. But exactly how had he managed to piece it all together in the first place?

Still, Lin Yun felt fairly confident that the clown NPC meant them no harm whatsoever.

"Sang Biao, Tuan Tuan — where’d those two balloons I brought back a while ago end up, by the way?"

[They’re out in the backyard!]

The ghost vine, having somehow climbed its way onto Lin Yun’s head without her noticing, suddenly piped up to answer.

"You little troublemaker, why do you always insist on climbing all over me like this?"

[Heheh. I’ll go grab you a balloon real quick.]

At the time, the two smaller pets had been worried their own claws might accidentally pop the balloons, so after playing with them for a little while, they’d eventually handed them off to the ghost vine instead.

The ghost vine, delighted with its new find, had ended up tying the balloons off out in the backyard, occasionally climbing aboard just to let itself get carried along for the ride.