A Manual for Surviving a Weird World

Chapter 364 Obsession
"I can't figure it out." Xia Yubing shrugged, her brain not as sharp as Ning Zhe's: "If you can't figure it out, then I'm even less likely to."

After saying that, Xia Yubing threw the pillow she was holding onto the bed: "I'm going to take a shower, I'm all sweaty. Want to come with me?"

"I'm afraid you'll get handsy." Ning Zhe casually handed her the clothes in his hand: "Go by yourself."

"Fine, I'll go by myself then." Xia Yubing grabbed her clothes, turned around, and got out of bed. Before leaving, she didn't forget to hug Ning Zhe's neck and give him a quick kiss on the lips, taking advantage of the situation before slipping away.

With a wife like this, even wolfberry can't cure her. Ning Zhe put on his coat and took out a small, palm-sized notepad from his inside pocket.

This is Plumeria's usual notepad, used to remind herself of which move she made and when.

The rule of the chessboard is: when a player takes back a move, the time on the chessboard will rewind to before that move was made.

The time allotted for taking back a move isn't a fixed 5 minutes; it's just that Plumeria is used to making one move every 5 minutes for easier memorization. If you take back a move after a 10-minute interval, the time on the board will immediately rewind by 10 minutes.

As for whether there is a limit to the time it takes to undo a move, Plumeria herself doesn't know.

Ning Zhe opened Plumeria's notepad, and sure enough, there were already lines of elegant and beautiful English letters on it, but these letters were upside down, as if they were seen in a mirror.

This is not 'Plumeria's Notebook', but rather a reflection of Plumeria's Notebook in Mirror World 3-7. The original notebook is still in its owner's hands.

Ning Zhe took the notepad, got out of bed, and went to the wine cabinet. He read the notes in the notepad by the reflection in the glass of the cabinet door.

In her notepad, Plumeria briefly recounted her and Melinda's previous experiences, including Katya's faked death, Julius's arrival, the car accident they had on their way to the old town, and the strange male driver who was dazed and painless, only thinking about going home.

"This driver looks familiar." Ning Zhe's gaze fell on the wine bottles in the cabinet through the glass, his eyes deep. "And that Katya, how did she manage to evade Fenwu's pursuit?"

As an ascendant who had survived several encounters with Fenwu, Ning Zhe knew how ruthless Fenwu was. Even with his meticulous mind, he had repeatedly narrowly escaped death at Fenwu's hands.

This Katya is merely an Awakened One, yet she managed to survive Fenwu's assassination attempt; she must be quite remarkable.

Perhaps it was the intuition he had developed from long-term exposure to strange events, or perhaps it was the 'inspiration' he had stolen from Bai Zhi, but Ning Zhe's thoughts were racing. He felt that the car accident that Plumeria and the others had, and the dazed man, might have some connection with Katya, who had escaped death from Fenwu.

The sound of water droplets hitting the floor came from the bathroom, a gentle patter like a light rain. The soft yellow light cast a voluptuous, shapely figure on the frosted glass, highlighting her curves. Ning Zhe pulled a pen from his pocket and wrote a single word on his notepad:

【read】.

Before long, the pages of notes filled with writing slowly turned to ashes in Ning Zhe's hands, drifting away between his fingers without any warmth.

Plumeria tore off the notes with writing on them and burned them. Ning Zhe put the paper and pen back in the inside pocket of his coat, opened the liquor cabinet, intending to take out a small bottle of sweet water, but suddenly, he froze, his outstretched hand stopping in mid-air, motionless.

Because at that very moment, the instant his fingertips touched the cabinet door, he saw something he should never have seen there.

The smoky-colored liquor cabinet reflected Ning Zhe's handsome face, as well as the English labels on the bottles behind the glass door. With the help of the ambient light, he could see the messy round bed and sofa behind him, and a half-open door.

A white figure with disheveled hair peeked out from the crack in the door. Her ashen face, the flower wreath on her head, and her violet eyes were faintly visible as she gazed silently into Ning Zhe's eyes through the reflection in the glass cabinet.

Ning Zhe recognized those eyes; they belonged to someone who had long since died, to Sally Sally, who had lost her life to a gambler, and whose body should still be in the opera house.

The door in the reflection slowly opened, and Sally, who had long since died, walked in from outside. Her eyes were still beautiful, but they had lost the bright and lively look of when she was still a girl. She was dazed and confused, as if she were sleepwalking, and slowly walked towards Ning Zhe.

Ning Zhe looked back and saw that the door was still closed properly, and the lock was locked from the inside, indicating that it had not been opened.

"Yes, Sally Sally died at the gambling table. The gambler's casino is located in the mirror world where he is imprisoned, so Sally Sally's body is naturally there, not in the real world."

Ning Zhe turned his gaze back, watching the girl in the reflection of the smoky glass cabinet approach him step by step. Her steps were slow and stiff, like a corpse driven by some kind of mechanical force, her eyes were chaotic and aimless, almost like...

"He's just like the man Plumeria mentioned in the note." Ning Zhe muttered to himself indifferently and expressionlessly, "It seems that man is dead too."

Like the ghosts in folk tales who cling to their lingering attachments from their past lives, these people, who should have died long ago, linger in this world. But…

"If the male driver insisted on walking to the old town after his death in the car accident in order to return to his home at 151 Apostle Road, then why would Sally Sally, who had already died at the gambling table, come here? What does she want to do?"

Ning Zhe stood quietly in front of the wine cabinet door, the sound of water still dripping from the bathroom, and the girl's 'ghost' behind him drew closer and closer.

Finally, she reached Ning Zhe from behind. In the reflection of the cabinet door, their bodies were pressed tightly together. Sally's hands, like two small snakes, slowly crawled up his shoulders. She stood on tiptoe and brought her lips to his ear, and then Ning Zhe heard the voice of the dead:

“Father, I’ve come to find you.”

The rising steam drifted and filled the air. The bathroom door opened, and Xia Yubing, wrapped in a bath towel, walked out. She immediately saw Ning Zhe standing motionless in front of the wine cabinet, and walked over with a smile, bringing with her a sweet and refreshing fragrance.

"Want some wine?" The beautiful woman, fresh from her bath, reached out and opened the cabinet door. Her gentle gaze swept over the labels on the bottles of wine as she said, "I can't hold my liquor well; I only like soft, sweet drinks. What about you?"

Ning Zhe nodded: "Me too."

(End of this chapter)