Dimensional Hotel-Chapter 233: Fairy Tale

It was a lifeless embryo.

Yu Sheng had no idea how to explain his conclusion. He did not have the knowledge or experience to judge whether this strange lump of flesh before him was alive or dead. No one knew what “Angel’s Fetus” should look like or how it should function. Yet the moment he saw this bizarre mass, the answer appeared in his mind.

He knew it was dead. It had no breath, no blood flow, no thoughts, no soul. From the start, there was never any chance it would be born and grow as a living being.

But the thing was still growing, little by little. It was hard to see with the naked eye, yet Yu Sheng felt he could hear tiny sounds of growth within it—like small bubbles popping. This dead Angel’s Fetus grew bigger by the minute, silently preparing for a birth it should never have.

Yu Sheng sensed both the lifeless state and the ongoing growth of this strange organism. He felt confused and torn. He could not tell if the information flooding his mind was some “truth” he had discovered, or if it was knowledge forced into him by Anka Aila. He stood there in a daze, trying to sort out the contradictory messages in his mind, until Anka Aila’s voice rang once more:

“I can’t see ta very clearly. It’s been this way for a long time.”

Yu Sheng looked up at the broken umbilical cord that stretched from the dead fetus into the air.

The calm, gentle voice continued inside his head without a hint of malice:

“Our connection is weak. It’s an ancient glitch from long ago, back when I wandered through the void. I’m not sure about ta’s current state, but I have tried my best to send ta nutrients. My Creators said this is my most important mission.

“You are there, and you have your eyes. You can see ta, can’t you?

“Tell me—are they doing all right? Have they…grown up?”

Yu Sheng opened his mouth. He took two steps closer to the silent “fetus” but then cautiously pressed his lips shut.

He did not know what impact his answer would have. He only knew that the gentle voice belonged to a Dark Angel.

So he kept silent, trying to use the connection between him and Anka Aila to sense the other side and gain a bit of control.

Suddenly, the calm voice broke the silence:

“…Ta is already dead, isn’t it?”

Yu Sheng felt his heart stop for a beat. He inhaled sharply and stood there, body tense.

After that, Anka Aila fell quiet for a very long time. No one could guess what this ancient, strange, and unfathomable mind was thinking.

When enough time passed, Yu Sheng finally made a move. He reached out toward the dead Angel’s Fetus.

A dead Angel’s Fetus was still a kind of “dead being.”

Yet this being had never truly lived or thought—never even had time to form awareness before it died. [What can it show me in a conversation?] Yu Sheng wondered. [There is no mind or soul in this hollow shell, so what is there to reveal?]

He did not know. Still, he wanted to try speaking with this “child,” if at all possible. ƒreewebɳovel.com

Darkness fell.

Unlike any previous Conversation With The Dead, Yu Sheng saw no movement from this odd lump of flesh. It did not open its eyes or mouth. Nothing came to greet him but a vast darkness and emptiness.

However, at the center of that void, he thought he saw a faint glow.

Yu Sheng walked toward that glow and finally saw what it was.

His expression shifted slightly, though he was not really surprised. It was a book.

An old, tattered Fairy Tale Book, as if countless children had flipped through it again and again. Its title read: SquirrelKnight Takes You to Read Stories.

Yu Sheng looked around. In that endless black void, this Fairy Tale Book was the only thing that existed.

He hesitated, then carefully picked up the battered book and opened it.

Its pages were filled to the brim.

Just as Squirrel had once described, the book was crammed with the wild, imaginative stories of Cursed Children. Missing paragraphs and blank pages caused by poor printing were now covered in scribbles, pinyin, and doodles of all kinds. Some “stories” were only two or three sentences long, hardly making sense. Even the children who wrote them might not have known what they intended if they looked back on them later.

Yu Sheng flipped through the pages and sensed something.

He lifted his head. Yet there was only darkness around him—nothing but this Fairy Tale Book in his hands.

Still, Yu Sheng frowned. He could feel a faint “presence” hovering nearby. He couldn’t see it or hear it, but he sensed that ta was here.

He realized there was a “listener.”

That presence had not been born into the world yet. In theory, there truly should have been nothing in this darkness. And yet someone was listening.

A small audience was ready. It was time to tell a story.

Holding the Fairy Tale Book, Yu Sheng took a slow breath and sat down in the darkness, legs crossed.

He knew what to do.

Gently, he turned to the first page of the worn book and cleared his throat:

“Long, long ago…”

Far away, the Dark Spire that kept releasing Demons collapsed with a crash. It was the third time it had fallen tonight. The Demons spilling from its tower were struck by Titan Summoning’s lightning and burned to ash in the blink of an eye.

Little Red Riding Hood gasped for breath. One hand rested on the wreck of an armored vehicle, while the other covered a wound on her arm. She peered through her bangs at the battlefield.

The Red Dragon dived for the fourth time, plunging straight down onto the Prince’s anti-air defenses. Farther off, the Royal Knight Corps was locked in a fierce struggle with the Red Queen’s troops, both sides battling for a strategic high ground.

Wolf packs darted through the smoke and shadows, assassinating Witches who slipped into trenches and outposts, or carrying intelligence back to Dorothy’s hastily built command post.

The black Forest had been scorched into a wasteland, each inch burned at least twice.

Little Mermaid kept playing BGM.

Perhaps the twisted nature of this dream had wrecked everyone’s sense of time, because Little Red Riding Hood felt that this war had lasted for months—or even years.

Then she noticed something: the fallen Dark Spire was not regenerating the way it had before.

Far across the battlefield, defeated Witches also failed to reappear out of thin air.

As time passed, everyone on the field noticed these changes.

King was the first to approach, bounding over to Dorothy’s ruined armored vehicle and climbing on top. It stood on its hind legs and peered into the distance. After a while, it looked down at Little Red Riding Hood uncertainly:

“It seems like the enemy is really thinning out. My Knight Corps is taking out their last batch of soldiers.”

Little Red Riding Hood blinked, unsure what was happening. A second later, some long-buried memory broke through her thoughts. She suddenly looked up at that giant rift in the center of the black Forest—the one now visible to everyone.

High above the forest, the huge shadow cast by Anka Aila began drawing back into the rift.

“…And after that, they all lived happily ever after.”

Yu Sheng finished the last part of the story in his memory and gently closed the book.

The darkness around him did not respond.

[Is there really a listener here? Did ta truly exist? Did these stories have any effect?] Yu Sheng was not sure. He had simply wanted to try.

He stood and waited quietly in the dark, hoping for something to change.

He waited a long time, nearly giving up, until he thought he heard something—like the faint laughter of an infant.

Yu Sheng was not sure if he really heard it. There was no time to find out, because the moment that tiny laugh drifted by, the darkness collapsed without a sound.

In the space of a blink, he found himself back in the pale, foggy illusion. The lifeless Angel’s Fetus still lay before him. His hand was still pressed against it.

All at once, Yu Sheng saw countless thin cracks appear across the surface of the Angel’s Fetus. The lines expanded and multiplied in a flash. In silence, it crumbled to fragments, then to sand, then to dust. Finally, it dissolved into particles finer than ash and vanished into the air.

Yu Sheng’s eyes went wide. He had no idea what was happening and stood there at a loss. Then he heard Anka Aila’s quiet voice in his mind, breathing a soft sigh:

“…So my mission has ended.”

Yu Sheng frowned, about to speak, when the pale fog rippled all around him.

Colors returned as the haze melted away, dreamlike. Yu Sheng saw streaks of swirling light and shadow. Then he felt himself plummet as if down a long tunnel, falling and falling for what felt like years. A moment later, his mind blurred and he landed somewhere—though it was as if gentle hands had caught him at the very end, placing him lightly on the ground.

Dizziness and confusion filled Yu Sheng’s thoughts. He could not open his eyes for a while. Then, as his ears rang, he heard someone calling his name. Something furry brushed against his face, slightly damp.

Yu Sheng opened his eyes and saw a large red-brown tail swishing in his field of view.

This novel is translated and hosted on bcatranslation