Chapter 5: A Visitor in the Dead of Night

Tanya’s hand, poised over the doorbell, suddenly froze. Her entire body was icy cold now, and she dared not risk her life by pressing on recklessly. Inside, she found herself blaming the agent—who said the owner of the house was a gentle, kind, and helpful soul?

The sharp, rattling sounds coming from the room made Tanya regret her impulsive actions. If only she’d known the owner’s temper was so volatile, she wouldn’t have frantically pressed the bell to urge them.

“Be strong—nothing could be worse than this,” she whispered to herself, as if preparing for a job interview, demanding composure. She smoothed her snowy white dress, hoping to leave a good impression on the unseen owner.

Yet she knew she’d probably botched her first step. Her desperation to find shelter had made her oblivious to how urgent her ringing sounded, and she’d managed to annoy whoever was inside.

Her harrowing time wandering the city had left her with an intense need for a safe haven.

At last, the old door creaked open. Before Tanya stood a man, his face pale, a bead-sized crimson stain below the left corner of his mouth. He wore black, his right hand hidden behind his back, concealing something.

She sniffed lightly, catching the scent of blood. Her peculiar experiences had made her exceptionally sensitive to its presence.

Without thinking, Tanya blurted out, “Sir, you’ve got… ketchup on the corner of your mouth!” As if proud of her own cleverness, she waited expectantly for praise.

She realized too late what she’d said, but luckily swapped blood for ketchup at the last moment, avoiding a grave mistake. She silently gave herself a thumbs up for her resourcefulness.

Chu Ning, however, remained unmoved, replying only with a curt, expressionless “Oh.” His tone was so flat it was astonishing.

This was Chu Ning’s way of dealing with people: no matter what was said, a vague reply would suffice and spare him any awkwardness.

He stood there, wooden and contemplative, pondering the strange words—was this some secret signal? Or did he really have ketchup at his mouth?

Wait… ketchup?

Chu Ning seemed to realize what the girl in white meant, and his first impression of her was cemented in his mind: regret. She looked rather delicate, but her mind was clearly broken.

She’d called blood “ketchup”—she must be mad.

“How many steps does it take to put a dead elephant in the refrigerator?” he asked, launching an unrelated topic. He was startled by his own brilliance—his mouth had spoken as if out of control. It was like the British habit of starting conversations with the weather, except his topic was more peculiar.

“Ah! Three steps, only three steps!” Tanya cried out in surprise, unable to ponder his deeper meaning. Like a student eager to answer, she quickly gave the reply she knew.

As a member of the younger generation, she kept up with the times and, by chance, knew a few old jokes like this one—especially such a classic.

Schizophrenia manifests as muddled thinking, omissions and obscurity, frequent breaks in thought, and unrelated insertions, making communication difficult for ordinary people…

Chu Ning recalled the information he'd recently looked up online, his gaze vacant as he pondered the question. He mechanically refuted Tanya’s answer: “You’re wrong—it’s four steps!” He was adamant, trusting in his own experience.

“It’s three steps, please don’t joke, sir!” Tanya protested, stretching out her gloved left hand, counting the steps one by one.

As a familiar joke, her memory couldn’t possibly fail her; she would never forget a joke that had left such an impression.

“Open the refrigerator, put the elephant inside, then close the door!”

“You’ve missed a crucial step—you have to chop up the corpse! When I stuffed the body into the fridge earlier, it was in the way and needed handling, so putting it in requires four steps. I’m not wrong!” Chu Ning coldly corrected the classic joke, wiping his chin with the back of his right hand. Listening to others was one of his few virtues.

As for why he didn’t use his palm—the trembling Tanya before him had already given the answer. If he let go of the blood-stained boning knife in his hand, he’d have no defense against the suspicious woman in front of him!

A visitor at midnight was never a good omen!

Noticing the tense atmosphere, Tanya instinctively took several steps back. She was about to bow in apology but stopped mid-action—seeing the gleaming knife in the moonlight, she realized such a gesture would be putting her neck on the line.

After much deliberation, she apologized politely, disregarding any lack of sincerity due to missing gestures: “Sir, I’m sorry to have interrupted your meal! I’ll leave now, and come back tomorrow to bother you… or rather, never again. I’ll find somewhere else to stay!”

Faced with Chu Ning’s unfriendly demeanor, Tanya hurriedly changed her farewell, lowering her head in disappointment and retreating warily, putting distance between herself and the extremely dangerous Chu Ning.

Having just experienced the sensation of human death, she had no desire to taste that despair and helplessness again. In her heart, she noted that in the world of monsters, ketchup meant blood, and good people meant bad.

Chu Ning, too, was labeled with all manner of negative descriptors: ruthless, evil, a murderer without a blink. He killed as casually as slaughtering a chicken, brazenly doing as he pleased, never considering the consequences of his actions.