Artifact Report

Chapter 51 Mai Minghe: It's Hard to Return Home

Mai Minghe has a hard time returning home.

She walked barefoot on the streets of Blackmore City in the early morning. She felt cold all over, especially her toes, which seemed to be glued on and could fall off at any time.

At first, she could still feel a layer of dust on the soles of her feet, and when she stepped on something suspicious and sticky, she would slap and scrape her soles vigorously. But after walking for a while, Mai Minghe gave up - the streets of Blackmore City were not clean at all, just like spitting on a fire to put it out; she cared about this and couldn't get home until dawn.

Before crashing into the screen, Jonah grabbed her shoulder one last time, and it still hurt; even though the guy let a bug take over his place, his grip was quite strong.

I thought the biggest difficulty in returning home from the nest would be whether I could get rid of Jonah.

She crashed into the screen before Jonah could catch her, and indeed returned to the human world; but unexpectedly, the place she fell out of was not her home.

I have lived my whole life, but I never thought that when I am old, I will suffer new kinds of torture in new ways.

Mai Minghe sighed inwardly as he walked past several drunks on the street, his expression unfazed, amidst the whistles of several drunks. "Girl! Why are you walking down the street in your pajamas? Doesn't your boyfriend want you to stay the night?"

Intellectually, she knew that she was a young woman and it was not safe for her to walk alone on the streets of Blackmore City in the early hours of the morning.

But emotionally, Mai Minghe couldn't muster the energy to be afraid.

"Hey!" One of the drunks caught up, reached out and pulled Mai Minghe's arm, mumbling, "Brothers are calling you... Don't go, it's so uncomfortable walking barefoot. Come with me... We'll give you money."

Mai Minghe stopped and looked past him at the building behind him.

"Where's the pharmacy here?" she couldn't help but ask. "It's been open for decades. When was it demolished? How did it become a real estate agency? I've never seen this building before..."

The drunk man looked back blankly. "...Huh?"

"The old man at the pharmacy, raising his granddaughter alone, had a very hard life. I'd guess he'd be dead by now..." Mai Minghe shook his head and continued walking. "I haven't walked this far in seven or eight years. Sigh, I can't even recognize the place I've lived my whole life..."

The drunk man stood there blankly, watching her walk away, and did not chase her.

If he really caught up with her, Mai Minghe would like to talk to him. She always felt that only by speaking out what was in her heart could she put things in order.

For example, as she walked along, she summarized and felt that the rules for entering and exiting the nest were as follows: if she hit the screen, she would fall into the nest; in the nest, if she hit the screen again, she would fall into Blackmore City again.

But the place where she fell out was not necessarily the place where she entered the nest, nor did she have to fall out of the screen - she just fell into a trash can in a residential building out of thin air, and when she rolled down from the lid of the trash can, she found that she was still one kilometer away from home.

It seems that the passage does not require precision, and the place where the person is put back is fine.

During the time I was walking home, I had no idea what had become of that boy named Jonah. How could I let a bug take over such a good child?

Besides, people can't stay in the nest for more than seven days, and Jonah doesn't have much time left.

I have to find a way to find the Morgan family... They all have that, oh yes, the Internet now, or I can go to the library and ask the administrator to help me look for it on the Internet?
She was lost in thought, and as she walked, she suddenly stopped when she saw the low-rent apartment where she had lived for decades.

A police car was parked at the door of the apartment building, and its police lights flashed red and blue on the wall.

Even though it was the dead of night, there were still a few people standing around watching the fun. Some of them were Mai Minghe's neighbors who lived in the same building, and some were just idle people who lived nearby.

The security in this area is not good, with many immigrants and low-income people, so it is not uncommon to see police cars in the middle of the night. Mai Minghe recognized one person from the crowd at a glance: it was a middle-aged lady who lived downstairs from her. She was very nosy, but correspondingly, she was also very enthusiastic.

"...they came down the fire escape in the middle of the night and were groping around outside the window. It was terrifying!" Mrs. Smith grabbed the officer's arm and refused to let him go. "I don't believe you're talking about looking for someone," she said. "I know that old lady on the second floor. She hasn't left her bed in years. How could she possibly fly away in the middle of the night?"

"What does it mean?"

The female nurse turned pale with anger and said, "We are legitimate nurses. How could we steal from you? We came here because we received an emergency call for help, but the old lady suddenly left alone. How could we not look for her?"

The male nurse was thinking about another problem.

He surrounded the police from the other side and repeatedly explained the situation: "...This incident is definitely not a mistake on our part. Please remember this and make sure to explain it clearly to our hospital. Her grandson was watching her at the time, and we were all about to leave. It's no longer our responsibility to provide care. If you find that the old lady really fell downstairs..."

Yes, Mai Minghe suddenly realized a problem.

The thief is undoubtedly a pseudo-hunter, or at least has some connection with the hunting profession.

He knew that he had followed the passage into the nest; but the other two caretakers present were ordinary people who knew nothing about the nest, just like himself not long ago.

All they knew was that there was an old lady in the room, but she was gone in the blink of an eye - how to deal with this situation?
It’s quite interesting to think about it this way: so many artifact hunters, so many of their clients, yet they manage to keep the existence of their nests and artifacts a secret, without letting the world know a single word.

Millions of ordinary people are busy struggling to survive in this world day by day, completely unaware that outside of their daily lives, there is a dark fantasy world.

"I know, I know, Mrs. Smith, right? Go back. This is a misunderstanding. No one wants to steal from you."

The police finally managed to free themselves from their encirclement, opened the car door, and said to the male nurse, "The family has already said that they won't hold you responsible. We'll see how he contacts you next time. A living person wouldn't just disappear like that. I think the old lady was unconscious and wandered off somewhere. We've also reported it, and we'll send a few more officers over right away to search the area... Okay, okay, everyone disperse."

Family members, you mean the thief, right?

Mai Minghe thought of his adopted grandson, but after stretching his neck to look around, he couldn't find any trace of the thief.

As the police got into the car, the rest of the people dispersed; in a blink of an eye, Mai Minghe was the only one left on the roadside.

The police car drove past her, and the policeman in the car glanced at her - Mai Minghe's heart just jumped, as if she was the one who did something wrong and felt guilty - but the policeman immediately turned his eyes away, picked up his mobile phone, took a look at it, and pressed it to his ear.

Mai Minghe breathed a sigh of relief.

That's right, they couldn't have imagined that this young woman who looked to be in her twenties was the old lady they couldn't find no matter how hard they tried...

As she passed Mrs. Smith's door, she turned carefully and silently and went up the stairs.

Mai Minghe wanted to go home quickly, wash his feet, and change his clothes. If he wanted to save Jonah, he had to wait until dawn so that he could ask someone to help him. It was the middle of the night and the library was not open.

But she could not go any further on her way home when she was still a few steps away from her door.

The door of the house was pried open and was half open, not closed tightly.

Through the crack in the door, she heard the sound of footsteps, which occasionally creaked when they stepped on the wooden floor in front of the kitchen; amid the footsteps, the thief's voice clearly said "hmm".

Mai Minghe stood still, caught in a dilemma.

"you left?"

The thief's voice came from behind the door, and it was very clear in the middle of the night. "The caregiver has gone home too? What did you tell them?"

Who was he talking to on the phone? The room was silent for a few seconds, and the thief breathed a sigh of relief. "Thanks to you for cleaning up the mess this time. Yeah, I was mainly worried about those two caregivers..."

Mai Minghe's curiosity and desire to explore were all aroused at this moment, and he quietly took a step forward.

The person on the phone said something that put the thief's mind at ease, and his voice relaxed a little: "You're right. If it weren't for that woman downstairs insisting on calling the police, I think the two caregivers would just want to make a big deal out of a small matter and wouldn't have investigated it further. Yes, your aftermath is really professional... Exactly like the real thing. If I hadn't called, I would have been worried too."

Mai Minghe got goosebumps all over her body and suddenly realized who was on the other end of the phone - just now, she had seen the person who called.

"Yes, just send the bill to our house..."

The thief seemed to have heard a tricky question and paused before continuing, "Hmm? No, I don't know how the old lady suddenly discovered the passage..."

He is lying.

Once he put the tube into a person's body, he could make that person see the illusion of opening a passage.

Mai Minghe recalled the scene at that time and felt that everything was clear: the thief wanted to use the "vacuum cleaner" to take away her passage, but when the "vacuum cleaner" was working, it also allowed her to see for the first time how to open her own passage.

As if summoned, she was called to the TV by the passage and then crashed into the nest.

While she was thinking, the thief's next words were half a second late before they penetrated Mai Minghe's thoughts and entered her mind.

"...Wait, there's someone outside my door."

Mai Minghe was suddenly startled and subconsciously looked down. He saw that under the light in the corridor, he cast a blurry shadow, which fell just in front of the door.

Gotta go quick—

However, before she could turn around, the door was opened by the thief; when she looked up, her eyes met the thief's.

Aside from the faint sounds of traffic coming from his phone, there was silence between the two of them.

In a split second, Mai Minghe felt as if another self had taken over her reaction: she looked at him blankly at first, then seemed to calm down and smiled at the thief.

"I just took out the trash," she whispered. "Did you just move in?"

The thief frowned slightly and glanced at her face twice.

After she finished speaking, without giving him a chance to think, Mai Minghe walked away as if her home was just in the corridor in front.

Even though she looked decades younger and had taken off her pajamas, she still didn't dare let the thief's gaze linger on her for too long - when she passed by her door, she could almost feel his eyes passing over her dirty feet.

After taking two steps out, Mai Minghe still didn't hear the thief coming back; she turned around and saw the same pair of eyes again.

"What's wrong?" She also frowned and said, "Oh, you left the door open just now."

"Huh? Oh, thank you."

The thief was stunned for a moment, and probably realized that it was indeed inappropriate for him to stare at a young woman in the corridor in the middle of the night. There was still some doubt on his face, but under Mai Minghe's unflinching gaze, he finally shrank back - this time, he closed the door.

As soon as the door closed, Mai Minghe turned around and ran away.

She didn't care whether her footsteps would wake Mrs. Smith, and rushed down the stairs. Just as she reached the corner of the stairs on the first floor, she heard a door upstairs being suddenly opened and slamming against the wall with a "bang".

Then, a second pair of footsteps was heard in the corridor.

The thief might not have thought that he had become younger; but he must have noticed some clues that made him suspicious - it seemed that he could not return to this home for the time being.

Mai Minghe rushed out of the building, but did not continue running on the road; she dodged and went into the alley behind the building, squatting behind a half-person-high trash can.

After about ten seconds, she really heard footsteps; she took a quick look from behind the trash can and saw the thief looking back and forth on the street, and then he walked away in one direction.

After several minutes, there was no one on the street.

Mai Minghe didn't dare utter a word. She slowly stood up, crouched low, and backed away, step by step, under the shelter of the trash can. She was worried the thief was still nearby. Occasionally, she stepped on a piece of cracked hard plastic, and the pain made her bite her lip hard, but she didn't make a sound.

Following the alley behind the building, she finally distanced herself from her home little by little.

When the sky turned pale, Mai Minghe stood on the street in a daze, not knowing where to go.

As long as she waited patiently, the thief would give up sooner or later. He couldn't stay in her house. But where should she go before he left?
How to find the Morgan family, this goal seems to be getting further away.

The most urgent thing right now seems to be to find a pair of shoes for myself.

In this case, there is a place that is most suitable: not only can she find shoes to wear there, but she can also ask for clothes and a few pieces of bread to eat - there is a charity shelter near Blue Blue Community College, where homeless people often go there to receive relief supplies.

Isn't she just a homeless person now?

The rescue station was not close, but Mai Minghe had no choice but to walk forward barefoot.

She didn't have a watch and didn't know the time, but when she finally got close to the place, it was already bright outside. The traffic jam during the morning rush hour had thinned out again and the flow of traffic had resumed.

Mai Minghe didn't see the moment the black Mercedes-Benz door suddenly opened.

When she realized that a tall shadow jumped up on the road and strode towards the subway station opposite, the black Mercedes without a driver had already lost control - it staggered onto the sidewalk, and with a bang, crashed into a tree a few steps in front of her.

A woman with purple dreadlocks in the car seemed to have been hit hard. She struggled to open the door while muttering to herself angrily, "...When I get back to Jiapai, I'm going to change the contract!"

　Today's chapter is too long. I didn't expect to write so much. I guess it's a celebration of the release!

　　Really, I can't save a single word...

　　(Currently) the timelines of the three protagonists are finally about to be unified!
　　PS: My cat is fine!
　　The doctor asked me if my cat had fleas. I confidently said no, because I never leave the house. Then the doctor took a small comb and combed it a few times. The fleas on the comb were even more confident than I was...

　　No wonder my daughter has such severe hair loss, it turns out she is allergic to fleas

　　There's still a big project to do when I get home. I have to spray everything, take the fabrics apart and wash them, and use a steam mop to mop the floor...

　　I really don't worry about having too much time to kill...

　　
　
(End of this chapter)