Chapter 190: Red Maple Boarding School (27) – “The Red-Clad God Silently Descends”

The Girl had grown up in Red Maple Boarding School for as long as she could remember, quiet and docile as a deaf-mute child.

When teachers and children saw her, she was usually sitting alone in a sunless corner, quietly sucking her fingers and staring at passers-by with wide, watery eyes.

As she grew older, her strangeness gradually surfaced.

She seemed to suffer from a peculiar form of anorexia; while other children wolfed down scarce meals, she would swallow only a symbolic mouthful or two and hand the rest to classmates to finish.

A teacher once caught her crouching in a gloomy corner sprouting mushrooms, scooping the soft earth beneath the fungi into her mouth. When the teacher stepped forward to stop her, she realized her behaviour was intolerable and quickly hid her muddy fingers behind her back, putting on a shy, innocent smile.

More than that, The Girl could see things others could not and hear whispers inaudible to normal ears. Once, when it was her turn to sweep the Graveyard, she suddenly knelt before a small Yellow Flower and muttered strange sounds no one could understand.

At first the teachers thought she was simply playing, like any child inventing an invisible friend—just a naïve fancy that she could talk to flowers and grass.

Until one day a teacher nailed Forty-Seven to a cross and, shortly after, saw that eerie Bad Kid step down invisible stairs in the dead of night.

The teacher, horrified by the sight, instinctively looked away, only to notice The Girl standing among the forest of tombstones, eyes as bright as ever, biting her finger and spitting out a string of odd syllables.

According to Ms. Medina, who understood the indigenous tongue, those syllables meant “The God is leading him.” Strangely, no one had ever taught The Girl that forbidden language.

The teachers knew that in this magical land anything bizarre was possible, so they were convinced The Girl possessed some kind of spirit-vision. Rumours sprouted and quietly spread: she was a “Witch” watched by the Gods, able to cast eerie spells and, as the nursery rhyme foretold, bring curses.

Ms. Medina dismissed such talk. While brutally punishing The Girl to cure her of eating dirt, she coldly declared: “Since she can speak, we should teach her the language she truly ought to learn.”

In severity Ms. Medina outdid the other teachers. Under her tutelage The Girl gradually “normalized”: she finished every cafeteria meal and spoke fluent English.

Only The Girl herself knew she merely buried her secret cravings deeper, doing things more carefully and covertly, sneaking from the dormitory at dead of night to lick the damp earth outside the kitchen and hum the songs she had known from birth.

On June 1st Mr. Thorson proposed a Baptism for the “good children.” The Girl was on the list, but after offending Ms. Medina she was thrown into the Isolation Room.

In that cramped black cell she curled in a corner, yet felt no fear of loneliness, for she could see through the cement walls into other rooms—her sight even pierced the Maple Forest to reach the school crowded with teachers and students.

She sat quietly, licking dust from the floor, watching the distant crowd with curious eyes.

In the following days more and more children were shoved into the Isolation Room. She heard words like “insomnia syndrome” and “quarantine” she could not fully grasp. She only saw Purple Smoke above the children’s heads, symbolizing pain, mixed with eerie little Yellow Flowers.

She remembered Yellow Flowers and yellow butterflies were linked to the God she had once seen; whenever the flowers bloomed across the land, the God would arrive together with the yellow butterflies.

Grand wars and deaths may exalt mighty righteous gods; tiny sorrows and yearnings can likewise attract a glance from an evil deity.

Bad Kid Forty-Seven also knew this secret. Lying on the ground drawing Rune-like characters, he was in fact performing a Ritual, praying to the Evil God.

He was nearing success; Yellow Flowers and butterflies crept over broken walls, following at his feet to claim every inch of soil, announcing the God’s imminent arrival.

Unfortunately not everyone could witness miracles. When Forty-Seven told several children what he had seen, he was quickly branded a “Liar.”

But as the Plague spread, the once-ridiculed “lies” were revived and, coloured by reality, became truths the children swore by. Fear fermented into anger over time, and hatred always seemed to lend tremendous courage.

The Girl watched the Purple Smoke above the children turn into black, signifying malice. They cursed Forty-Seven for summoning the Evil God and bringing disease, denouncing him as the most damnable demon. Forty-Seven never said a word, only a haze of meaningless gold floating around him.

Silence earned no equal quiet; curses and abuse intensified. In the lead-grey concrete room vicious words rained down, and The Girl—her senses painfully acute—heard them all, feeling an instinctive, inexplicable fear and loathing.

Through the thick cement wall she watched Forty-Seven hugging his knees in a corner, Yellow Flowers covering every inch, burying the pale corpses of mushrooms while light-butterflies fluttered overhead, sprinkling golden dust.

At one moment all sounds receded; heaven and earth fell into dead stillness.

The Girl’s eyes suddenly widened.

She saw, in that damp little room, the red-clad God silently descend, filling the gloomy air with light… Outside the Memorial Hall for Indigenous Victims, Chang Xu and Shuomeng walked one behind the other through the Maple Forest.

The two had visited the Graveyard, but apart from a half-remembered ballad they found no useful clues. With time to spare, they decided to head for the legendary Isolation Room first.

In late autumn the fiery red maple leaves lay thick on the ground, mostly withered, crunching softly underfoot. Gaunt maples thrust bare branches in every direction, hindering the players’ steps only slightly.

By the time they reached the guide’s so-called Isolation Room it was already nine in the morning.

A squat concrete house sat half-hidden among the maple trees, its surface already spider-webbed by expansion and contraction until it looked ready to crumble into rubble at any moment.

The deserted building exuded death; ugly mushrooms crawled over the walls like an old man’s wrinkled skin, their pale-green hue reeking of mortality and driving intruders away.

Shuomeng stared at the mushrooms, thought of something, and imperceptibly stepped back.

Chang Xu flicked the Fate Poker between his fingers and walked straight into the concrete house.

The place covered barely a hundred square metres and held no furniture—only a narrow corridor that wound like a sheep-gut maze, its floor slick with moss and dotted with filthy mushrooms.

Chang Xu crushed several mushrooms blocking the path; a putrid stench exploded through the stagnant air, reminding him of a corpse-choked drain.

Shuomeng produced a bottle of perfume from somewhere, sprayed left and right, and barely tamed the foul smell.

Tiny rooms lined both sides of the corridor—Isolation Rooms used to punish children.

Each room was dim and cheerless, starved of light; grotesque mushrooms carpeted the floors, and through the locked iron doors one could glimpse the squalor inside.

Chang Xu itched to kick the doors open and search the rooms.

But under the rule of “civilised visiting” he could only stifle the urge, studying the interiors through the barred windows set in the iron doors.

Something caught his eye; his gaze sharpened.

In the far corner of the last room, a pure-white ring lay quietly amid the mushrooms, shockingly bright against the green.

Above the ring, two shallow scratches spelled “Forty-Seven”.

Shuomeng, following silently, had also spotted the anomaly and recognised the ring’s formal name.

Rolling the unlit cigarette between his fingers, he offered his judgement: “This instance has at least two spaces—we agree on that. Looks like a friend in the other space is sending us a message, though I can’t guess what the number means.”

Chang Xu remembered that in the memorial hall’s photo wall the black-and-white memorial photo of Qi Si carried the number “Forty-Seven”.

Seeing “Forty-Seven” here could not be coincidence; Qi Si was probably trying to tell him something.

Yet the man had chosen a riddle Chang Xu could not read.

Thinking of Qi Si and Zhang Yiyu in the other space, Chang Xu felt a strange unease.

Would the two of them meet? Were they allies or enemies now?

Did Qi Si know he was in this space? If so, would he consider Shuomeng’s and his safety when he acted?

Chang Xu had seen Qi Si’s formidable scheming and deceit, and knew the man’s contempt for law, morality and public order.

A beast’s instinct warned him of a natural predator, yet unbidden images flashed through his mind.

In Rose Manor the young man lounged against the doorframe, red dress in hand: “Brother Chang, shall we check the third floor together?”

On the Hopeless Sea he sat beside Chang Xu, smiling: “Brother Chang, how about we share a room?”

At dawn the youth sighed: “As your friend, let me give you one last piece of advice…”

In the Clock Tower he said casually: “I could see ghosts when I was a kid…”

The first stranger ever to approach him—sharing a past, sharing traits, an outcast like himself, yet as elusive as a pale nightmare.

Veterans at the Investigation Bureau warned him: Qi Si is lying, he’ll kill you—beware, stay away… Like a captive beast returned to the forest, approached by another of its kind whispering: “We’re the same; stay with me in the wild.” Then the humans arrive to warn: the beast is dangerous, you belong with us, not the forest… Shuomeng knew little of the history between Chang Xu and Qi Si; the photo wall held hundreds of distorted black-and-white faces, and he could only pick out members of the Tingfeng Guild who had entered with him.

Seeing Chang Xu’s odd expression, Shuomeng assumed he too was puzzled by the number and continued his analysis: “I’ve wanted to say this—finding a way to read the indigenous script in this space is practically impossible. Centuries have passed; everyone who knew the language is dead, ghosts included. There’s no one left to ask.

To finish our main quest we’ll have to rely on friends in the other space. They’re in the Red Maple Boarding School’s past, where living indigenous people—or at least newly dead, communicable ghosts—are far more likely to exist.

I suspect there’s a method to shuttle between the two spaces. Our next step is to locate records that fill this gap in our clues.”

Chang Xu came back to himself and nodded agreement.

Neither had a clear plan for completing the quest “Decipher the documents in the memorial”; all they could do was keep searching for clues.

With time to spare, Chang Xu walked the full length of the narrow corridor and checked every room, but found nothing new.

Sunlight never reached the concrete house; a chill clung to the air, and within moments Chang Xu felt his hoodie soaked by the dank cold.

Though hardly frail, he still grimaced at the discomfort.

Shuomeng exhaled fog, rubbing his hands as he retraced his steps out of the concrete house.

Chang Xu followed soon after, crushing mushrooms underfoot, and headed back toward the memorial.

At nine-thirty the two returned to the Memorial Hall for Indigenous Victims.

The vast hall stood empty, its cold exhibits displayed in lonely silence.

Shuomeng pocketed his cigarette, stared at the ceiling and said: “While Ms. Medina is away, let’s head to the fourth floor. I have a feeling everything important is up there.”