Pa.s.sage ending in “~” can be interpreted with an off-hand motion, like an acknowledgement or if a question then head tilt.
Translation: Razorace
Editing: Zeph
Special thanks to: Sove, Parth37955
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Then Suddenly It Became Abnormal!
Hao Ren stared stupidly with a blank expression at the strip of paper in front of him; on it, a rural place in the suburbs was highlighted. He could not be any more familiar with the location …… wasn’t that just his home?!?
“What are you doing looking for this place?”
Hao Ren didn’t know why a girl he was meeting for the first time was holding onto his address. To be honest, he was somewhat excited, but he was also somewhat self-conscious and not completely conceited as he was certain that he had used up all his luck in romance before his third year of elementary school with the girl who sat beside him. Therefore, his face remained nonchalant – only curiously looking at the beautiful girl in front of him.
Figure wasn’t bad, appearance wasn’t bad. Even though her height left more to be desired, her lively and cheerful atmosphere could totally redeem a point…… [TL: Casual speech monologue]
“I’m looking for a house to live in of course!”
The girl answered in an extremely crisp and straightforward manner.
“I looked the entire day – really couldn’t find it and only then I decided to try asking someone – though there’s only you left in the park that I can ask.”
Hao Ren always felt that the fast paced intimacy from girl in front of him was too much, but his attention was still quickly captured by the three words “looking for house”. As the drowsiness due to sleeping on a summer afternoon slightly cleared up, he abruptly remembered: Oh, I’m a landlord to begin with. Just two days ago I posted an advert in the city about a place to lease… then was this girl in front of him looking for a place to stay?
It had been a while since operating; today I could finally receive rent again!
Hao Ren folded and returned the slip of paper: “Of course I know this place, I’ll take you.”
The beautiful girl’s face immediately revealed a joyous expression. She stuffed the paper in her bag, and said while patting it: “Thanks a~! I’ve really looked for ages……”
Hao Ren stood up while stretching. Just as he thought of exiting the park, a sudden realisation overcame him and he finally remembered something was not quite right: “Eh, hold on! You said you looked for this address in the city centre for a whole day?!”
The beauty nodded vigorously, and permeated with endearing straightforwardness: “Un un [confirmation sound], that’s right! This place is pretty hard to find.”
“Of course it’s difficult!”
Hao Ren almost lost control over his tone of voice. He suddenly had a hint of suspicion on whether the beauty in front of him perhaps knew him and had a grudge against him and expressly came over today just to toy with him.
“Did you not notice the South District written on the address?! South District! You looked for an outer district in the centre of the city for an entire day?”
“What, but it says White Rock Building on the slip,” the beautiful girl lifted her finger and pointed at some arbitrary direction. Hao Ren knew that it was where some commercial building was situated within the city centre, “Is White Rock Building not in the city?”
Hao Ren immediately froze, and only after a while did he react: “It’s South District White Rock Road, not the metropolitan White Rock Building!”
He even refrained from saying the other half of what he was thinking: “This girl, it can’t be that you only look at the first two words when reading place names?”[This makes more sense in Chinese, since it’s the first two characters, therefore disregarding the vital character which defines the inherent properties of the place, ex. Street, plaza, district, building etc.]
“Aha,” The beautiful girl quickly reminisced, only then did she show some embarra.s.sment, “I forgot, usually I’m kinda careless. Then you know this South District’s White Rock road right? Hey, then take me there~”
Hao Ren still thought that somehow, there was something not quite right about the girl in front of him, but he was someone who was too lazy to dwell on such things. Furthermore, the other party was only a client who was looking for him due to tenancy. As a landlord over the last two years, he was more than used to not meddling in the tenants’ business. Therefore, he pointed at the entrance to the park: “You need to take a bus, South District is pretty far away from here, it’s pretty much going to be night by the time we arrive. Oh, by the way, I’m the landlord of the house you are looking for; the house you are looking for belongs to me.”
Upon hearing that, the girl immediately showed an expression of shock and totally turned melodramatic: “AH? For real?”
Just as Hao Ren nodded, the high-tension girl nearly leaped from the excitement: “Yaaa, what a coincidence! How’s it possible that there’s such a coincidence, landlord we must be bound by fate huh?!” [Imagine an airhead smile here – the dialogue gives off the impression]
Hao Ren rubbed his forehead. From the beginning, he had already thought the girl in front of him was kind of out of it, and finally he couldn’t help but voice what he didn’t want to say: “You……aren’t you afraid of getting abducted? What if I tricked you?”
This was already a pretty tactful way of putting it, and to be honest, he really thought the girl in front of him was kind of dumb……no, really dumb! Looking for the address in the city centre notwithstanding, also to believe a stranger after two to three sentences and what’s more was that she was about to boldly let said stranger guide her to some remote rural district. What was wrong with the self-awareness of girls these days? Was her luck extraordinarily good or were human traffickers taking it easy recently? Just why hadn’t this girl been abducted already?
Hao Ren mumbled excessively in his head, but not more than a few seconds had pa.s.sed, the r.e.t.a.r.ded girl (no problem referring to her as such, right?) seemed to just now realise and cautiously looked at Hao Ren: “Abduct? Then are you a trafficker, do you intend to abduct me?”
Hao Ren: “…… Of course not!”
He reckoned that he should take some distance from this girl. If not due to the other party being a “customer”, he definitely wouldn’t have conversed with an idiot for so long!
r.e.t.a.r.d girl satisfyingly nodded her head: “Then it’s fine, I’m really scared of being cheated. Hey, then let’s go?”
Hao Ren feebly let out a sigh, his steps as he left the park suddenly felt extraordinarily heavy.
The two timely boarded the bus headed towards the suburbs and the whole journey was not at all boring: Hao Ren found that his new tenant was not only quick to warm up to others – but she had a capricious temperament, suspected r.e.t.a.r.dation, and on top of all that wouldn’t shut up! Listening to the other party chat in high tension the whole way – from the current status of second rate celebrities both home and abroad to property prices of second rate cities – there was pretty much nothing she did not discuss[1]. Hao Ren didn’t even know from when it started. Anyhow the other party didn’t feel at all awkward or found it difficult to continue; as long as he nodded along, the r.e.t.a.r.ded girl could somehow find the power to continue and blahblah [originally text: “balabala”]…. But this was not a huge problem, listening to her yap could be used to relieve boredom, and furthermore, Hao Ren used this chance to roughly understand the state of his new tenant. This was an essential lesson for landlords: to understand as much as possible about the tenant in the shortest time, only then could some troublesome matters be avoided.
r.e.t.a.r.d girl’s surname was Liu, with her full name being Liu Lily [in Chinese, surname comes in front when addressing full name], and she very benevolently told Hao Ren to just call her “Lily”; she was a self-proclaimed wandering vet c.u.m casual author. (who knew what kind of profession a casual author was) She had just moved from another city and intended to live here in the long-term. She wasn’t particularly picky about where to stay, as long as it was clean and sheltered from the weather. The work had a lot of freedom anyway……
Based on this information, Hao Ren judged that his new tenant had a lot of pioneering spirit. She was currently not in stable employment but that wouldn’t cause any trouble for him and as a result, he was rather satisfied. To be honest, no matter how you looked at it – such a young girl couldn’t possibly bring him much trouble, even though her character was kind of air-headed……but that was her own problem right? Hao Ren just needed to act properly as the landlord.
In line with the prediction from earlier, just as the bus with the super long route “kengchi kengchi”[bus chugging to a stop sound], came to a stop in front of a small stop sign in the South District, the sky had pretty much completely darkened.
Even before he could take a breath as Hao Ren led Lily off the bus, he could already hear the latter pester loudly: “This here is White Rock road~?”
“It’s written on the sign South District Stop! White Rock road is an old street[2], also one must go via footpath. You’ve seen bus drive down alleyways?”
“Oh…… haha, I get confused easily, landlord please be tolerant okay~?” Lily laughed dryly. “Blahblahing” the whole way here, and as if she single-sidedly felt more intimate with Hao Ren, she turned to observe the surroundings, slightly knitting her brows, “it’s pretty deserted here.”
The bus stop was situated beside a road which at a glance felt somewhat aged and the surrounding buildings were all of the style from twenty to thirty years ago. The road surface was full of pit-holes; the small, narrow shop fronts facing the street were already closed and the cramped five storey flats of days bygone stood behind them. Only from these details, it could reflect just how desolate and stale this place was. This street and the surrounding area could already be considered the only “downtown area” in the South District. Sometimes, even Hao Ren himself would wonder whether or not this area had already been forgotten by modern society, but at the end of every month the br.i.m.m.i.n.g confidence in society would renew: don’t worry, the water provider won’t forget you[3], the electricity provider won’t forget you, the gas provider won’t forget you, even telecommunication and insurance providers won’t forget you.With so many people constantly worrying about the you who resided far into the suburbs, what was there to not like……
“Let’s go quickly,” Hao Ren signalled for Lily to follow, “this city’s security is not bad, but it’s quite rural after all. When it gets dark, the occasional drunkard hangs about outside. Let’s first get you settled at my place. That’s right, let me remind you, try not to run around at night – if you’re safe, then it saves me some trouble.”
Normally, these sentences should not be said. As a landlord, saying these sentences could very easily scare away tenants or cause misgivings, but Hao Ren had always had an honest personality. Even though it was troublesome, but even more so than that he didn’t want to trick others or take advantage of them. Therefore he readily explained this point clearly. This was also one of the reasons why he couldn’t rent out the house recently: some people finally came to view the house, but they were all scared away.
Yet Lily – this pet.i.te, tender looking girl – fundamentally didn’t pay it any mind: “Don’t you worry landlord~ I’m really strong in a fight.”
Hao Ren reckoned he definitely met an abnormal person tonight: “I’m not talking about this…… hai[*sigh*] let me be straightforward, are you not even a bit afraid of meeting someone bad, hah?”
As a half stranger whom he had just met for a day, Hao Ren knew that he shouldn’t meddle so much in others’ business, but this was the first time in his life meeting such a weird girl. She was capricious, overly intimate and unguarded to an idiotic extent, and as a good person he honestly couldn’t take it anymore.
However Lily only happily and nonchalantly swung her hands[4]: “Landlord you’re really a good person, though I’m not scared of baddies~. My strength is extraordinary and my battle power is also high; all the bad people I met in the past ran away from my beating.”
Hao Ren couldn’t help but murmur: you’ve really met bad guys……the reason why you’re now so bold, unrestrained and unguarded was because you beat them all away?
Lily saw that Hao Ren wasn’t talking and thus chuckled to herself. She extended her hand and pulled her supersized luggage with her while catching up, only to hear a loud “gudong gudong” as the rubber wheels on the luggage case fell off, quickly disappearing into the distance.
“Ahaha, looks like the stuff is a bit heavy.” Lily scratched her head in embarra.s.sment.
“No, it’s cause the road has pits…” Hao Ren’s eyebrows stood[surprised expression], watching all the indents and protrudes on the dilapidated road, he couldn’t help but exhale. He thought that as a man he should do something, “Come, let me help you carry the trunk…… Eeeh da f.u.c.k, what did you put in here?!”
As soon as he extended his hand, he noticed something wrong with Lily’s luggage trunk. Its weight was so heavy as if it was filled with equal volume of concrete and he couldn’t even lift it as a ‘burly alpha-male’[5].
However, Lily did not notice the odd expression on Hao Ren’s face till the end, she only laughed heartily while she lifted and supported the large trunk single-handedly on her shoulder, the whole process was as relaxed as if lifting wool.
Hao Ren stared with his mouth agape at the skinny little girl who was a whole head shorter than him easily lifting the trunk of at least hundred odd kilograms and walking at a blistering pace while supporting it on her shoulder. He was almost beginning to doubt whether or not there was something wrong with his perception, and only until Lily who was far ahead pestered him to hurry up in a loud voice did he recover. He mumbled as he walked: no problem, just born physically strong, I’ve watched enough variety shows day to day……
Just like this, the two walked on, one chattering non-stop and the other somewhat lost in his own thoughts. They left the main road in no time and turned onto a small road sunken in darkness: following this road to the end was the supposed “White Rock road” and Hao Ren’s sizeable inherited house was just ahead.
The sky was already dark and one of the two lamps at either side of the road was even broken. The surrounding was full of antiquated old houses, making the atmosphere here even more eerie. If not for the considerably lit moon shining down, even Hao Ren who was familiar with the surroundings would feel apprehensive walking outside. He couldn’t resist glancing at Lily who was standing beside him: this girl was still nonchalantly following beside him and furthermore she seemed to be in a good mood.
In the oppressive darkness of the night, on a small road lacking of human presence, in an unfamiliar environment, beside some guy of unknown origin, any of the above four factors would put a girl with correct sensibilities[6] on alert, but this “Liu Lily” didn’t show a hint of nervousness, was she really missing a nerve or something?
“Pulala—“
Just as Hao Ren’s worrying for the unfamiliar girl blew out of proportion and headed in a tangent, a series of odd fluttering sound of wings could be heard from above.
The sudden sound of movement while the surrounding was dead silent scared him. He quickly looked at the direction of the sound, just to see an eerie shadow instantly glide past the two elevated walls on either side of the path across the night sky.
That shadow seemed like a bat, but the size…… didn’t seem to be quite right?
“Heh……what’s this in the middle of the night.” Hao Ren didn’t want to lose face [dignity] in front of a girl [even though she’s an idiot?], therefore intentionally muttered out loudly to show that he wasn’t scared at all, then proceeded to look over at Lily, believing he would catch the look of said person scared frozen, however…
During that moment, he saw a pair of ears similar to a wolf’s pop up on Lily’s head!
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Footnote:
[1] The reason why the author specifically chose “second rate” celebrities and cities here is because the Chinese expression “二货” was just previously used to describe the girl, which literally translated means “second rate goods”, used as slang for those “naturally tend to do dumb/stupid things”, also has element of r.e.t.a.r.ded/air-headedness depending on context. Therefore it was intended as a pun.↩
[2] Yes, the author wrote road for the name and called it street in p.r.o.noun. Furthermore the phrase here COULD be interpreted as “traditional street”, if you imagine narrow lanes paved with uneven stones (in the north, where the author lives), or simply old dirt roads which may become difficult to traverse after the rain. However, from later chapters I feel like the author did not intend it to be that backwards of an image but just an aged street.↩
[3] In China, water costs money. You might wonder why I bring this up but where I currently live, water is free of charge.↩
[4] Those “maa maa”, the calm down action when your hands’ weight is supported by the wrist and you lift the wrist and flops the hands up and down.↩
[5] Replaced with text of similar meaning, literal text: “他五大三粗一个大老爷们竟然提不起来！” Traditional Chinese idiom with no direct equivalent in English. Hope the general idea gets across.↩
[6] The term author uses here is “三观正常”, which is a contemporary term, of which literally translates to “three views (are) normal”. This can be interpreted as the three principles which consist of “freedom”, “respect” and “baseline/tolerance (threshold)” can be considered to be normal, this is a theological concept that a person’s perspective on life can be reflected through their interpretation of the three principles. For example, someone’s idea of freedom is too liberal equates to deduction of respect/tolerance, which is reflective of his/her perspective of the world. But in this context, it can simply be interpreted as “world view” or “life perspective”.↩