Daomu Biji: A Thousand Faces

The fridge was so huge that she could walk in and out of it. She pulled out the shelves on one side and hid inside of it. Her skin was pressed up against the inner part of the fridge, so it quickly became numb. But the cold temperature gradually calmed her down. 

She began to recall what had happened just now—at the moment the lights flickered, there was another person in the house.

Having inspected the house so carefully before, she was certain that there was no one here except for her. Unless it was a prank. Otherwise, the person must’ve suddenly appeared at the exact moment the power went out.

It was exactly what Boss Xie had said.

It was possible that it was a prank, since the frequency of the power outages was both long and short. The person could’ve been hiding somewhere in advance since she wasn’t too familiar with this house’s layout.

Is this a reality show?

Ah Tou took a look at her tattoo-covered arms. No, tattoo artists couldn't appear on reality shows unless they were foreign shows. And even if it was a reality show, she wouldn't allow the program to release her clip unless she got a good fee for it.

Three hundred thousand. I’m willing to accept it if it’s three hundred thousand yuan. After tax, of course.

But there was no way that this was a reality show. Her pores were contracting because of the cold, but it helped keep her calm. At first glance, the figure of the "ghost" just now wasn’t normal at all. A reality show didn’t need to be so detailed as to find someone more than two meters tall just to play a ghost. 

Ah Tou recalled the figure a little more and broke out in goosebumps again. She was certain that what she had seen was an evil thing.

It was very dark in the refrigerator and she didn’t dare move for fear that the “thing” would teleport into the fridge and appear right next to her face.

Wait, there seemed to be something in the darkness right beside her. She pushed herself deeper into the fridge.

With a hum, the refrigerator’s compressor started running again. It appeared the power was back on. As all the lights outside came on and shone into the fridge, Ah Tou froze for a moment. Considering that she was a girl, Ah Tou had remained relatively calm during this whole incident. But at this time, Ah Tou immediately realized that she hadn’t closed the refrigerator door properly. 

The light was coming in through the crack in the door, and she could see out of the corner of her eye that someone was standing outside, peering into the fridge. Ah Tou screamed. The refrigerator door was immediately opened and the light turned on. 

Boss Xie was standing outside.

Ah Tou continued screaming and threw everything she could get her hands on at him. Boss Xie caught them all one-handed and said, "Please get out of my fridge. You’re stepping on all the condiments my friend made for me. I don’t know how to make them myself."

Ah Tou looked down at her butt and found that she was sitting on a pile of plastic bags. What condiments? Black truffles? Ah Tou crawled out. She knew that black truffles were very rare and expensive, but when she picked up a bag, she found that it contained some sort of pickled vegetable. 

"Side dish for instant noodles?"

Boss Xie lifted her up and began inserting the shelves back into the fridge. As he started cleaning everything up, Ah Tou shouted, "There really is someone here!"

"I've seen it several times myself." Boss Xie put everything back in order and then pushed her out of the fridge. Ah Tou took a look at the breakfast bar but there wasn’t anyone on it.

The power seemed to be stable, but she was too afraid to go near the bar.

“Relax, there won’t be any more power outages tonight. I’m familiar with the pattern now.” Boss Xie walked out of the fridge, rolled his sleeves up, and began washing his hands. "You can start drawing now."

"You—why did you guys go out and leave me alone here?" The first party had also come back and Ah Tou noticed that she looked pale. She glanced at Ah Tou and seemed to be saying: sorry, but I don't want to stay here, either.

“That ‘thing’ doesn’t show up if more than two people are here,” Boss Xie said. “This house is collateral from one of my clients. I’m temporarily staying here to get away from things in Beijing, but I didn’t expect to encounter this kind of problem."

As he spoke, he handed Ah Tou her drawing pad and a pen.

"I heard that you never forget a face. Please proceed."

Ah Tou walked around the breakfast bar—there was no sign of anyone standing on it—and sat down at the table. It was much better having two more people here. She stared at the drawing pad and thought that the whole thing was ridiculous, but she was afraid of going home alone now. 

Boss Xie skillfully made her a cup of coffee.

"Wait a minute, you said you’d help me find someone. How did you know I'm looking for someone?" Ah Tou suddenly remembered her question from earlier.

“There are some people you just can’t randomly track. Although you can't find them, they’ll definitely know you’re looking for them. They’ll be curious about you at first and do a reverse trace so that they can observe and test you. If you have bad intentions, they’ll act against you before you can even find them," Boss Xie said. “As far as I know, the person you’re looking for has been watching you. Your willfulness, curiosity, and the way you think you can face all kinds of challenges in the world without being awed by them have been an insult to this person. So, it’s very likely they’ll act against you.”

"Does that guy think he's Hannibal?" Ah Tou was naturally disgusted. "Or are you guys making him out to be Hannibal? What, do you also charge an entrance fee?"

"We work in the same industry and have business connections. Of course, I’m offering you this information in exchange for your—"

Boss Xie knocked on the drawing pad.

Ah Tou took the pad and decided to compromise. She closed her eyes and began to recall what she had seen before. 

Even if she hadn’t seen it clearly at the time, she could still remember it. She had a special ability where she could reconstruct a certain moment in her mind after it had happened and analyze it in detail. 

Of course, her teacher didn’t recommend it, because no matter how many details one saw at a single moment, the brain could easily fill in the missing parts through artistic interpretation. So, you sometimes wouldn't know if you actually saw it or if your brain was just filling in the image. 

If you saw too few details, then too many parts would be filled in and the rendering would be completely distorted.

As Ah Tou recalled that face, she made a few strokes on her drawing pad. She was surprised to find that it was the face of an ordinary man. 

There was nothing special about it. It was a human face, but more specifically, it was the face of a Han Chinese. Ah Tou had thoroughly studied human faces, so she could tell that the person was about thirty years old and looked very ordinary. 

She drew it quickly and filled in more details. He was a southern Han with high cheekbones.

This face is scarier than a ghost. Who is this?

Boss Xie obviously didn’t know, so he took a photo of Ah Tou’s drawing after she was done and put it in an online facial recognition program. The program searched for a long time, but didn’t find anything.

"You're not messing with me, are you?" Boss Xie asked. "He looks like a fisherman from Chaoshan (1)."

Ah Tou shook her head and carefully recalled the incident again. Then, she suddenly looked up at the ceiling and pointed to a certain spot. "He didn’t appear alone. There was another ‘thing’ hanging there as well.” 

The house had extremely high ceilings and its roof was like those thatched cottage hotels you’d see in Southeast Asia (2), with many of the lights attached to the ceiling.

Ah Tou was pointing to a circle of beams. Nothing was there right now, but in her memory, another person had been hanging there at the exact moment that the lights turned on again. 

****

TN Notes:

(1)Chaoshan: a region in the east coast of China, east of Guangdong

(2) Probably something like this: