Sexy Ghost (Lily ABO) - Chapter 4

Since last time, Cai Hua, or rather, the person behind her, kept their word: everything inside and outside the hotel was completely cleaned. This also served as a warning: now that they had seized her impulsive weakness, she should no longer stir up trouble. Regardless of whether those people felt relieved, Xu Jinliang, for her part, found it all unnecessary, as she was now even more numb than before, especially after realizing she had lost her sense of taste.

When even eating held no meaning, she knew her will to live was almost gone.

Why wasn’t she happy? How could she feel something, even pain, like the pain Cai Hua inflicted upon her.

Yes, the pain Cai Hua caused her was enough to make her break down and go mad at the time, but the aftereffect of that pain was an endless void.

Her psychologist was completely useless because that person said, “I’m just a psychologist; I can’t give you a systematic examination and treatment. You need to go to a hospital.”

How could that be? How could she go to a hospital? Even if it meant dying, she wouldn’t go and be labeled as a patient. She wasn’t sick; to her, she was the normal and excellent person, and everyone else in this world was sick!

“Thank you, Factory Director! I’ll take them, hehe.”

Xu Jinliang snapped back to reality and smiled gently. “I should be thanking you. I still feel very sorry for losing your gloves.”

The young man walked away, smiling, holding the new gloves she had given him.

Death, not scary at all. But she still wanted to feel happiness once, not a substitute, but the real kind. She wondered if this wish could be fulfilled before she died.

As expected, someone couldn’t sit still and arranged to meet Xu Jinliang; it was Director Zhang. They met at Xu Jinliang’s home, and Director Zhang sought credit, saying, “Do you know that if it weren’t for me, those people would have pushed you out? Do you know what the outcome would be?”

Xu Jinliang had known since her youth how much emotions and feelings could affect a person. She never truly understood them but that didn’t stop her from studying them and ultimately exploiting them.

The few of them were partners but also recent enemies. However, the fact that these few people banded together to checkmate her didn’t that just show they were afraid?

Director Zhang continued, “I know, I know, we’re on the same side, but this time I made you sad, didn’t I? You have to understand me, your pace is too fast, I really can’t keep up.” His implied meaning was that he realized he couldn’t control Xu Jinliang and was truly scared, afraid that this woman, if she went crazy, would ultimately implicate him.

“Idiot.”

Director Zhang got angry and questioned her, “What did you say?”

Xu Jinliang mocked him, saying, “You’re an idiot. They don’t dare to touch me. Do you think only your hands are dirty?”

Director Zhang’s face fell, and he didn’t speak.

He naturally knew that he wasn’t the only one who had engaged in shady dealings with Xu Jinliang, but being manipulated by fellow “victims” was more comfortable than being manipulated by this crazy woman.

Xu Jinliang: “Even if you guess that I’ve manipulated more than one person, you absolutely cannot confirm who I am more inseparable from, who will firmly want to get rid of me, and who will want to protect me. The ace is still in my hand. If I don’t play my card, none of you dare to gamble. It’s your fragile trust that prevents anyone from putting me to death.”

He said “good” several times, clapped his hands, and said, “You’re amazing. Once you infiltrate, you can’t be driven away; you’re more terrifying than a parasite. So let’s continue the game, but no matter what happens to us, even if we lose our lives, we have loved ones and children to cry for us. And you, you’re just a walking corpse, even if you’re alive.”

Director Zhang was merely speaking his mind in a fit of pique to feel a moment of satisfaction, and then he left. But first Cai Hua’s visit and questioning, then Director Zhang’s sarcasm, left Xu Jinliang unable to remain calm.

The knife went straight for the wound!

After Director Zhang left, the mask of expression on Xu Jinliang’s face cracked inch by inch. She lunged forward, falling heavily to her knees, and began to clean every spot Director Zhang had stepped on and touched since entering the room. She wiped quickly, panting heavily. Her mind was a complete mess and she didn’t calm down even after finishing the cleaning. Looking at the spotless room, she began to scream and smash the room, turning the newly organized space into a disaster.

She opened the always locked room. Inside, there was a child’s bed, suitable for a child of about ten years old. Her 1.84-meter frame curled up on it, and even when she tried to make herself as small as possible, parts of her still hung off the edge. She clutched the blanket to her chest, sobbing, “Mom, Mom, hug me, Mom…”

Her eyes ached from crying. As she blinked, she saw a belt on the table opposite. The layout was very strange; the tables and chairs were child-sized, but there were no books or stationery on them. On the tabletop lay a belt woven from colorful ropes, with a metal buckle that perhaps had sharp edges for aesthetic design. Such an item should not have been in a child’s room. Moreover, the placement of the belt, when viewed with the overall layout, seemed to be—enshrined. Because directly behind the belt, in the center, was a black and white photograph, which could be considered a memorial photo.

Xu Jinliang’s eyes weren’t on the photo but focused on the belt. She got off the bed, picked up the belt, and frantically wrapped it around her neck. She tightened it, climbed to the edge of the small bed, looped the other end around the bedpost, and then used her body weight to try and suffocate herself.

She was hanging herself, sitting by the low child’s bed.

No physical pain could stop her. Her eyes rolled back and bulged, her face was swollen and purple with bl00d, and the sound of her throat bones grinding…

Suddenly, everything broke.

The colorful rope belt, unable to bear the strain, tore in the middle. Xu Jinliang fell heavily to the ground, bl00d mixed with saliva bubbling from her mouth, and large gulps of air refilled her lungs.

She rolled over and lay on the floor, looking helplessly at the ceiling, murmuring, “Mom, why still don’t you want me? Are you so afraid of me being by your side? Not even in death.” Saying that, she rolled onto her side and curled up, slowly drifting into unconsciousness.

Xu Jinliang had a dream, a dream – this was one of the few times she could recall dreaming since she could remember.

It was a bright and sunny place. The sunlight felt very comfortable on her skin, and the air smelled dry and warm. In front of her wasn’t an asphalt road, but flat earth, overgrown with unknown wildflowers and weeds except for a path trodden by people. Xu Jinliang didn’t follow the path; instead, she walked into the tall grass. The deeper she went, the taller the weeds became, brushing against her body as she passed.

She reached out and plucked a wild flower. Its yellow petals were in full bloom. She bit off a petal with her lips and chewed it in her mouth. It had no special taste, just the earthy smell of plants and a slight bitterness. Xu Jinliang didn’t swallow it; she spat out the petal and started running forward…

She ran through the grass and soon saw a figure ahead on her right, walking along the small path.

“Mom?”

She was puzzled because the woman’s back resembled her mother’s in her memory. It was somewhat similar, but she wasn’t sure. She also wasn’t sure if this was a distant memory from her time with her mother. Because she didn’t remember her mother ever taking her to the countryside, she simply followed at a distance without making a sound.

The small path wasn’t straight. The woman followed the winding road, which was slower than Xu Jinliang walking a straight line through the grass. Consequently, Xu Jinliang was attracted by other sights.

Down the slope was a clear small river, and by the riverbank was a white mass. Xu Jinliang squinted, gradually making out that the white mass was a person. The person was wearing a white cloth dress, with arms and thighs exposed, and their skin was also white. Lit by the sun, from a distance, they looked like a white shadow. Xu Jinliang temporarily forgot the woman walking on the path and slid straight down the slope towards the riverbank. As she got closer, she saw more clearly.

It was a very young woman. Most of her white cloth dress was wet, and almost all the fabric on the front clung tightly to her body. Her hair and face were also wet; it was hard to tell if it was water or sweat from the heat. Her cheeks were pink, and her limbs were full. Xu Jinliang’s eyes were almost glued to her, watching the woman squat down, stand up, squat again, and stand up again. Her body’s curves were perfectly outlined, and her vibrant energy was more intense than the sunlight.

Xu Jinliang unconsciously tightened her hands because she was fantasizing about how soft those lotus-root-like arms and legs would feel if she held them.

Then came another splashing sound, and the woman squatted down again to look. It was then that Xu Jinliang moved her eyes to observe elsewhere. It turned out the woman was washing a large sheet. The repeated squatting and standing motions earlier were likely because the sheet was large, and the woman was shaking it out with these repetitive movements.

Observing others. This behavior occupied much of Xu Jinliang’s early life. What felt different this time was that she didn’t need to focus on observing specific details with any particular purpose; instead, she was completely and involuntarily drawn in.

At this moment, she still didn’t understand the meaning of this spontaneous behavior of hers.

Watching the woman struggle to shake the sheet, Xu Jinliang’s feet automatically stepped forward. In an instant, she snapped back to reality and stopped herself, retreating into the shadows to suppress the urge to help.

She hid in the shadows, staring expressionlessly at the woman.

Gradually, a rustling sound of footsteps began, and before the figure even got close, curses could already be heard, “You little whore, I knew you were here!” The footsteps were initially slow, but then the person probably heard the splashing water or saw something and quickened their pace.

Xu Jinliang frowned and completely hid in the shadows.

She peeked out with one eye, coldly watching everything. It was then that she saw the middle-aged person’s appearance. It was indeed not her mother, just someone with a slightly similar build.

The middle-aged person had initially only been sarcastic, but when she saw what the woman was washing, she instantly lost her temper and started to hit and curse, “You filthy whore! Did you sleep with her? That’s your mother’s partner, you inhumane slut! I’ll beat you to death!”

The middle-aged woman grabbed the soaking wet, heavy sheet and shoved it towards the woman’s face, saying, “This is my partner’s bedsheet. I’ve slept at her house so many times, how could I not recognize it? You’re snatching your mother’s partner, are you even human?” She forcefully slammed the drenched sheet onto the woman’s body, then pressed her entire body down, pinning her own daughter beneath her and beating her.

At first, it was slaps, then fists. Xu Jinliang saw a few drops of red bl00d splatter on the rocks by the riverbank.

The woman groaned in pain, but she didn’t utter a single protest, as if she was silently accepting it.

Xu Jinliang had no reaction, feeling neither pity nor anger for anyone. Suddenly, she only felt that if someone with such a soft physique were to be beaten badly or die, it would be a bit of a shame.

Immediately after, both women rolled into the river. One moment, the woman in the white dress surfaced; the next, the middle-aged person surfaced.

Xu Jinliang’s heart suddenly tightened, and her thighs twitched twice. She pressed her hand down, but still held back all movement.

The woman in the white dress was almost drowned by her mother. This woman struggled desperately, bursting out of the water and screaming hoarsely, “Mom!”

The middle-aged woman punched her in the temple, cursing, “Don’t call me Mom, you damned little whore!” Before she could land her second punch, her hand was seized tightly by another hand. She turned her head in shock.

The person was very tall, standing tall enough to cast a shadow. Their arms were long, and they could grab her wrist from the riverbank.

“Who are you? Get lost, it’s none of your business.”

With a strong pull, Xu Jinliang dragged her out of the water. The shorter middle-aged woman was no match for her strength and fell awkwardly onto the rocks. Then, the heavy, wet bedsheet was thrown over her face. Xu Jinliang completely wrapped it around her head twice, then pulled the edges tight and tied a dead knot.

Disregarding the middle-aged woman’s wailing, she threw her head-first into the river. The middle-aged woman tried to struggle to her feet but was held down tightly by Xu Jinliang.

Whether from exerting too much force or from excitement, the muscle below the corner of her eye twitched joyfully.

Pressing down on a struggling person… pressing down on a person struggling for life…

Suddenly, Xu Jinliang awoke with a start. She was lying on the floor of a room in her own home, her hands still raised in a pushing motion.