Chapter 140

Chapter 140: Information That Couldn’t Be Passed On?

Bai Li Qing sat behind her desk, her gaze unfocused—like it wasn’t just her eyes that had gone blank.

After a long moment, she muttered under her breath, more to herself than anyone else, “How does he always manage to pull off something you’d never expect?”

Across from her, Song Cheng didn’t know what to say. He lowered his head and pretended he hadn’t heard.

Two seconds later, she repeated, “How does he always manage to pull off something you’d never expect?”

Song Cheng forced a strained smile. “Well… he’s an unexpected existence to begin with. But no matter what, we’ve pinpointed the cause of the abnormal space-time displacement again. The technical department can recalibrate the ‘signature parameters’ in their records and make them more accurate. That’s a good thing.”

“It is. And we also learned he can open a passage inside an abnormal otherworld.” Bai Li Qing rubbed her temple, sounding tired. “Forget it. Let’s move on.”

She looked up. “What was the conclusion on the sample we sent for testing last time?”

Song Cheng straightened and slid the files forward. “The analysis report on those hairs. We sent the ‘fox fur’ to three separate labs and also shared the data with major organizations, including the academy. The conclusion… you should read it yourself.”

Bai Li Qing scanned the highlights. Little by little, her expression hardened.

“Within the known universe, no matching species was found?” She raised her eyes to meet Song Cheng’s.

“It’s worse than that,” Song Cheng said. “We couldn’t find any biological tissue with a microscopic structure that matches. If we weren’t certain the samples came from a humanoid creature that can speak, move, think, and feel, the analysts would’ve assumed someone was playing a malicious prank.”

He pointed to a section in the report.

“The material making up those hairs isn’t a metabolic byproduct or growth product any known organism can produce. We can confirm more than ninety percent of it is organic, but it’s mixed with multiple kinds of unexplained inorganic ‘impurities.’ We don’t know what role those impurities play in a living body, and…” He hesitated, then continued with a strange look. “To this day, we still can’t identify what elements some of them even are.”

Bai Li Qing pressed her lips together. After a long pause, she said softly, “How does he always manage to bring out something you’d never expect…”

Song Cheng wiped cold sweat from his forehead. “Uh… strictly speaking, he didn’t cause this, did he?”

“But he’s the one who brought her out.” Bai Li Qing kept her finger at her temple. “What about the other side? Have organizations like Thousand Peak Spirit Mountain responded?”

“Yes,” Song Cheng said quickly. “They teamed up with several influential sects and launched a wide investigation, screening every spiritual fox clan they could find. Since they suspect Foxy’s experience might involve temporal tunneling, the scope was… huge. They checked anything remotely related. In simple terms, they considered both possibilities—‘famous a thousand years ago’ and ‘might become famous a thousand years from now’—not just what exists in the interstellar era.”

He flipped to another page. “Their list is here. Besides fox demons and foxkin demi-humans in the usual sense, it includes people with partial beast traits—fox ears, fox tails, a bit of fox fur. According to the messenger, if someone even smelled a little fox-like, they wanted to pin them down, make them fill out a form, and only then let them go. The conclusion was still the same: no match.”

Bai Li Qing’s hand paused mid-page. “Why did they make such a spectacle? In the past, when we asked for help, they were never this invested.”

Song Cheng spread his hands. “Because they heard there was a fox whose homeland could bring an entire clan to ‘ascend,’ and that the place was covered in immortals. Everyone’s desperate to know who’s been secretly hiding a full-population ascension from the rest. You know how fierce the competition is over there. Even if most cultivators who’ve reached the enlightened stage don’t fight over this anymore, what Yu Sheng described about Foxy’s hometown… it shook them.”

“It shook us too,” Bai Li Qing said, setting the file down with a slow exhale. “I understand. Keep the follow-up investigation going. Treat it as a long-term task. If that fox really came from outside…”

She stopped, then gave Song Cheng a slight nod. “You understand what I mean.”

“Yes,” Song Cheng said. “I do.”

—

On the way from the orphanage’s west building to the east building, Yu Sheng told Little Red Riding Hood everything he’d found in that dark little house—down to the marks beneath the bed, and every detail of what had happened to him and Hunter.

By the time he finished, she looked like she’d been struck silent.

“I’ve dealt with the black forest for years,” she said at last, unable to hide her shock, “but I’ve never learned this much in a single day. So many Little Red Riding Hoods before me were swallowed by that ‘story’ without ever knowing what was happening…”

“Or maybe they found something in the end,” Irene said, swaying as she sat on Yu Sheng’s shoulder, “but there was no way to pass the message back to the real world. Like those marks under the bed. They were obviously left by a Little Red Riding Hood from a long time ago.”

“Those marks bother me,” Yu Sheng said. “And I have a feeling there are more traces like that elsewhere in the black forest. Maybe… not just in the black forest.”

Little Red Riding Hood’s eyes sharpened. “You mean…”

“Other subsets,” Yu Sheng said, stopping in the hallway. “The ones you mentioned—Cinderella’s ball, Princess Rapunzel’s tower. Aren’t similar things happening there?”

He looked at her, voice lowering. “Maybe another Cinderella or another Princess Rapunzel discovered something at the end of her dream. But just like in that little house hung with red cloaks… the ones who found the truth never got the chance to pass it back.”

Little Red Riding Hood fell quiet.

After a moment, Yu Sheng sighed, sounding almost wistful. “Now that I think about it… it really fits how childhood works.”

She blinked. “Why do you say that?”

“You write your childhood secrets in a diary, lock it up, and then when you grow up, you can’t remember the password that once meant everything.” Yu Sheng chuckled. “Those memories stop at the edge of childhood, and they can’t reach the you who’s grown. A lot of people are like that.”

For the first time, Little Red Riding Hood looked dazed. “Is… is that really how it is?”

“It is.” Yu Sheng smiled. “So sometimes you need a hateful troublemaker, a lord who doesn’t care about reason, to force that book open. A lot of the time, you end up becoming that hateful lord yourself. But since it’s so hard for you to grow up, I’ll do it for you.”

“…You make yourself sound like a bad person.”

“To fairy tale, I am the bad person.” Yu Sheng shrugged. “It doesn’t like me.”

Just then, a burst of commotion echoed from the corridor ahead, cutting them off.

A pack of children came racing through the hall, shouting over each other, with a few older kids mixed in.

Yu Sheng and the others hurried forward.

Little Red Riding Hood grabbed one of the older girls by the arm, all authority. “What happened?”

The girl looked tense and pointed down the hall. “Teacher Su fainted! They already took her to the infirmary!”

Yu Sheng froze. “Teacher Su fainted? Why?”

“I don’t know—I just heard,” the girl said quickly. She looked about thirteen or fourteen. “They said she was playing with the kids in the activity room. Then Xiao Xiao suddenly pushed the door open to greet her, and Teacher Su just… fainted.”

Yu Sheng went quiet.

Little Red Riding Hood went quiet.

Irene let out a delighted, horrified little, “Oh wow—”

“This…” Little Red Riding Hood said, turning her face aside in embarrassment, “…I really didn’t think of that. I was just happy. I should’ve had someone warn Teacher Su first.”

Yu Sheng spread his hands helplessly. “Saying that now won’t fix anything. Let’s go check on her.”

They detoured to the infirmary. By the time they arrived, Princess Rapunzel had already half-coaxed and half-tricked the curious children into leaving.

Teacher Su lay on the bed. She was awake now, just pale, and otherwise seemed fine.

Xiao Xiao sat nearby with her head down, shoulders drawn tight like she’d committed some terrible crime. Her eyes were red, like she’d been crying.

Yu Sheng suspected she’d cried from fear the moment the teacher collapsed.

“It’s nothing serious,” Princess Rapunzel said, walking over. “The doctor checked. Emotional agitation plus being badly startled. She just needs to lie down a little longer. Everything’s been explained—there’s nothing to worry about.”

She looked genuinely apologetic. “It’s partly my fault too. I shouldn’t have let Xiao Xiao push the door open like that.”

“I’m fine, I’m fine!” Teacher Su waved both hands. “I was startled, but now I’m just happy…”

As she spoke, she pushed herself up and looked at Yu Sheng.

“I remember… your name is Yu Sheng, right? I have something I want to say to you.”