Chapter 066

Chapter 66: Morning at Yu Sheng’s Home

Yu Sheng woke up and saw Irene sprawled at the foot of the bed, her arms and legs everywhere, while her picture frame rested on the nightstand, leaning against the wall.

He sighed. Last night he still failed to kick this doll out. Every time he tried to carry her to the door, she started making a huge fuss, and it gave him a pounding headache.

He sighed again, and since Irene showed no sign of waking, he stretched out his foot and nudged her twice.

Yu Sheng said: “Get up. If you don’t, I’m taking your frame and sending you back into the painting.”

Irene finally stirred. She slowly pushed herself up, hair a messy bush and eyes half closed, and said, “Good morning… hey…”

Yu Sheng snapped back: “Morning my foot! It’s almost noon! Do you know how many times you rolled around on the bed? You’re a doll. It’s weird enough that you sleep at all, and your sleeping posture is outrageous!”

Irene rubbed her eyes, stretched, and mumbled, “Don’t be so salty. I’m so pretty. You get to share a room with me and you’re still not happy…”

Yu Sheng stared at the tiny thing who was only 66.6 centimeters tall, cold sweat beading as his temples throbbed, and said, “Your body is small, but your face is bold. Do you hear yourself?”

Irene did not care. She crawled over with her hair all over the place, dipped her head, and said in a very righteous tone, “Help me comb my hair.”

A vein jumped at Yu Sheng’s temple. He rolled out of bed, ran to the bathroom for a comb, tossed it onto the bed, and said, “No. Do it yourself.”

Irene gripped the comb with both hands. It was about as big as her head. She rolled her eyes hard and said, “Look at me. Can I comb it myself? I can’t even hold this thing with one hand. Maybe make a comb just for a doll…”

Then came a nonstop stream of complaints: “Usually when my hair gets messy I can only use my hands,” and “On the first day I had to sleep on a chair,” and “No one cares about a doll’s feelings,” and on and on until it felt like sparks were popping in his ears.

Yu Sheng groaned and said, “I must have owed you in a past life.” He snatched the comb from her, lifted her, and set her on the nightstand. He said, “Sit here. Don’t move.”

Irene instantly smiled in triumph and, swinging her legs while sitting on the nightstand, said, “You made this body. It’s normal to cover aftercare.”

Yu Sheng, now combing Miss Doll’s hair with a grumpy face, said, “‘Aftercare’ is used like that?”

Irene sniffed and said, “It’s fine-hey, be gentle, do not yank it out. Doll hair is precious.”

He let out another long sigh, but he managed to smooth the pillow-tangled mess. Then he slung the frame over her shoulders, turned, and went to wash up.

From outside the bathroom, Irene called: “Yu Sheng! What’s for breakfast?”

With his mouth full of toothpaste foam, he mumbled: “I’ll make some noodles in a bit, just enough to fill up-then we head out the door.”

An “oh” answered from outside, and the doll finally went quiet.

But Yu Sheng felt that Irene’s sudden quiet only meant she was planning something bigger. [My spiritual intuition was thumping.]

[Though to be honest, it’s weird to say spiritual intuition thumps in a case like this.]

Yu Sheng finished washing, dried his face, and looked up at himself in the mirror.

He looked alert and well, even with a hint of an unconscious smile.

He realized he had not seen this version of himself in a long time, and for a moment he felt dazed.

He still remembered how, not long ago, he had lived uneasy days in this vast and unsettling city. For more than two months he fell asleep tense and pressured, spent his nights restless with many dreams, and woke up exhausted. He washed his face only once every few days, and the reflection in the mirror always looked listless.

But now, he saw an energetic young man whose eyes held some hope for the future. He did not look like someone who had been kicked all night by a restless doll.

He chuckled and whispered to himself: “[My whole mindset really is different now.]”

Then Irene howled from outside the bathroom: “Yu-Sheng! Did-you-fall-in-there? I’ll get Foxy to fish you out-”

Yu Sheng’s smile froze. He yanked the door open and saw Irene standing on the floor with the frame on her back, beaming up at him.

Irene tilted her head back and said, “You stayed in there for over half an hour!”

Yu Sheng walked right past her, opened the bedroom door, and headed to check if the fox was awake.

As soon as he pulled the door open, he jumped. Foxy was standing right at the doorway, leaning in like a thief, looking unsure if she should enter.

Foxy also jumped at the sudden noise. She really jumped. The big mass of tails behind her went “poof” and flared out like a screen, and the two large ears on her head shot straight up.

After two or three seconds, the puffed-up demon fox relaxed. Looking a bit lost, she said, “Benefactor…”

Yu Sheng asked, curious, “What are you doing?”

Foxy quickly explained, nervous: “I woke up but did not know what to do, so I came to wait. But I did not know if you were awake, so I did not dare to knock on the door.” She glanced at him with worry and said, “Benefactor, are you all right? Did you fall in somewhere?”

Yu Sheng glared and said, “I did not fall anywhere. Do not listen to Irene’s nonsense.” He frowned, looked Foxy up and down, and asked, “You have been standing here waiting the whole time?”

Foxy said, “Mm.”

Yu Sheng said, “From now on this is your home. You do not need to be so tense. If you have nothing to do, watch some TV… oh, when I have time I will teach you how to use the appliances.” He turned toward the stairs and said, “Let’s go eat first. I’ll boil some noodles to get by. Today I’m taking you out to buy things.”

At the words “eat food,” Foxy’s eyes lit up so clearly you could see it. She almost skipped as she followed him.

Yu Sheng took two steps and stopped. He looked back at the demon fox, hesitating.

Foxy tilted her head and said, “Benefactor?”

Yu Sheng said, “I just remembered something. Your tail can be hidden, but what about your ears? If you go out like this… people will stare.”

At that, Foxy looked confused. Since arriving here, she had never left the house, so she had no idea how the outside world looked and could not imagine why this would be a problem.

But if the benefactor said so, she believed it.

The fox maiden rubbed her hands, reached up, took the ears off her head, stuffed them into her tail, and then hid the tail.

The hallway fell silent.

Yu Sheng froze mid-sentence, standing like a statue.

Irene’s scream shattered the quiet: “Ahhh-Foxy, what did you just pull off your head!”

Foxy produced the tail she used for hiding things, dug out a pair of fluffy ears, and said, “Ears.”

Yu Sheng’s eyes almost popped out as he said, “Those are detachable? They are fake?”

Foxy put the ears away and said, calm as ever, “They are real. A demon fox is good at shapeshifting.”

Yu Sheng muttered, “The demon foxes I know do not ‘shift’ like that…”

Foxy stared, amazed, and said, “Benefactor, you have met other demon foxes?”

Yu Sheng blinked, then cooled down at once and said, “…No.”

Foxy explained, serious and earnest, “A demon fox must study the refining method. The first step is to refine the self. When you practice well, it becomes shapeshifting. But my father and mother did not have time to teach me much. I learned only the basics. I heard from an immortal that a powerful demon fox can even turn into stories in books and shadows in history, and travel through past and present on people’s tongues, crossing the sea of stars in a breath. But I cannot.”

Yu Sheng listened, stunned. His imagination had to run at full speed to keep up with the fox maiden’s picture. His ears understood, but his brain refused to believe it. He still felt she might be making it up.

But Foxy’s harmless face did not look like a liar’s.

Irene rubbed her chin and muttered, “Something feels off. My memory is fuzzy now, so don’t trick me. Where did you get this ‘common sense’? You sure that immortal did not fool you? Tour guides will say anything…”

Foxy shook her head and said, “I do not know. But the way of changing truly was taught by my father and mother. It really is like this.”

As she spoke, she studied Yu Sheng again. In an instant, her hair and eye color shifted, copying his, and turned black.

Now she looked like a normal pretty miss, clearly a local of Boundary City.

The fox maiden looked at Yu Sheng with hope and said, “Like this, is it okay?”

Yu Sheng stared for a beat, then nodded, still a little dazed.

At least this time, her change looked normal enough.