THE DISOBEDIENT TOYNight time in the mountain was extremely quiet, the moon was as round as a plate, radiating a silver light over the terrain. The stream continued to trickle, now and then there were sounds of bird calls echoing across the mountain forest.
After Qiao Er exercised a little in the cave, she ate two steamed buns, drank some water, and eventually grew bored. She glanced several times towards the mouth of the cave, but the vampire never reacted.
Gathering her courage, she dashed outside. She used her fastest speed, but she was pulled back by the collar of her robe before even half of her body made its way out of the cave.. She was held back by something.
Under the moonlight, the vampire’s fangs grew long and terrifying. She looked at them for awhile as fear began to build up. But before she could act on her fear she was no longer able to speak.
The vampire was constantly snarling at her, it seemed to be furious.
Qiao-Er looked at his snarling face, and for some reason, all she could think of were the rhubarbs at the gate of her village. Before biting them, her face was like that too…
The vampire roared loudly, it lifted her up, carried her to a coffin and threw her inside. The moment he turned around, Qiao-er slowly crawled back up and tried to get out, but the vampire was wise and shut the lid of the coffin tightly with a “clack”.
The air inside the coffin was limited, after Qiao-Er stopped crying for awhile she started to grow uncomfortable, but she eventually settled down. By the time the vampire opened the coffin, it was already morning. Looks like it had left the cave at some point, as there were some mud at the sole of his feet.
Inside the hot coffin, it once again laid on top of her. Luckily, this time the coffin lid was not closed completely, allowing some air to flow inside. Qiao-er started to feel relieved, but the vampire was very heavy, making her almost unable to breathe.
After a long time without any sleep, Qiao-er slowly tried to drift to the dreamland, but the uncomfortable weight on her chest felt like a rock.
By the time she woke up, her food and water had been replaced. Chong Ling Priest was dancing happily “Last night East River village was disturbed by strange events. This means this vampire understands written words, we really did pick up a treasure this time!!!”
The Little Fourth apprentice was still puzzled “I have never heard of a zombie who can read.”
The Chong Ling Priest was in an extremely jubilant mood. He did not even scold his idiotic disciple and explained “The higher their cultivation, the easier it is to communicate with them. Look at those white corpses at the back, they are truly dead puppets. This one actually has a consciousness, so it must have some cultivation.” His hand stroke the body of the vampire inside the coffin while admiring in ways words cannot describe “Treasure, a rare treasure!”
Little Fourth was suspicious like always. He looked inside the coffin at the vampire who was currently stiffly weighing down on Qiao-er without a single movement. He touched the very same cold and tough skin. It really didn’t seem all that different from a normal vampire “I don’t know if that’s true or not…”
Because of his current great mood, next to Qiao-er’s food and water was a set of female clothing.
It had been days since her own clothes were washed, so she quickly grabbed them and headed deeper inside the cave. While changing, she discovered a difficult situation – Where was the underwear? Don’t tell me it’s not there.
The vampire was still standing in the same old spot. Qiao-er hugged her old clothes and tried to talk to it. “Hey…” She pulled on its hand. After a while, the vampire turned around and looked at her. She lift up the dirty clothes in her hands while trying to motion her intentions “I need to find a place to wash these. Wash – do you understand?”
The vampire turned around and continued to absorb the moonlight, it obviously did not understand at all.
Qiao-er hugged her clothes and tried to head out, but was immediately thrown back into the coffin again. The vampire leaned on the coffin while screaming loudly, its demeanor full of rage. The angier it became, the longer its nails grew. The nails had a dark black colour, they looked extremely terrifying.
Qiao-er was panicking while feeling scared, she could only retreat to a corner. The vampire screeched and attempted to slam the coffin shut. Qiao-er could smell the stench on her own body as she hugged her dirty clothes. It was summer, and it was easy to sweat. Thinking about the number of days she has gone through like this, her nose became slightly sour as tears fell down her face.
After crying another round, she discovered that the vampire became curious. It lifted its arm to wipe off the tears underneath her eyelid to observe it closely.
Qiao-er crawled up to it and pulled on its hand once more. She softly spoke “I won’t run, I only want to wash my clothes, I want to bath, I stink…”
The vampire looked at her for a long time, its eyes glowing an intimidating blue light. Qiao-er thought for awhile, and then pulled its hand and lead it outside. The vampire followed her to a nearby mountain stream after they looked around. At this time, Qiao-er let go of its hand , sat down, dipped her clothes into the water and began to scrub them.
The vampire stood beside her. Seeing that she wasn’t trying to run, it lifted its head once more and continued to absorb the Qi from the surrounding.
Of course, the time it takes to wash a single set of clothes was not that long, so after she finished squeezing the clothes dry, she began to notice the sticky, uncomfortable feeling from her own body.
Sneaking a peek, she saw that the vampire seemingly did not pay her any mind. She silently took off her shirt and wiped herself using the clothes.
The spring water was especially clean and pure, after being used to hard work for sucha long time, she was relieved by the sensation of the refreshing water on her skin. She was originally a labor maid at Liu Manor at the western village. Since she was dumb and because of her slow reactions, her parents sold her and never came back to visit.
She lived at the Liu family for six years. All the other servants in the manor knew that her mind worked slow and happily dumped all the dirty, hard work on her shoulders.
She never noticed this, and continued to humbly work for all these past years.
After she disappeared, the Liu family would definitely report it. But from the outset, it would seem to be a simple matter of a maid running away, so after a few days everybody would have forgotten her.
Qiao-er wiped herself clean, and noticing that the vampire still didn’t plan to leave, she untied her hair, took off her shoes, pulled her pants up and washed her head using the clean water.
After she finished drying her hair, the vampire still looked at the moon as usual. She slowly wiggled a bit to the left, and seeing that there was no reaction, she sneakily wiggled away some more.
Like that until they were five, six steps apart, the vampire suddenly turned its head, it’s face frozen stiff with no expression. Qiao-er could feel its intense blue glowing eyes staring her down, keeping a tab on her.
She was scared, so she obediently shortened their distance again. It lifted its head and paid no mind to her anymore.
Like that, until the Yinshi hours (1), it moved and carried Qiao-er back to the cave on its shoulder.
Standing in front of the coffin, it dropped Qiao-er down. This time Qiao-er had learned, she pulled its hand toward a small tree nearby to air her laundry. It stood silently by, n.o.body could tell what it was thinking.
Finally, both of them returned to the coffin. Qiao-er crawled inside through her own accord, and it immediately laid on top of her once more, squishing her like a pancake.
The coffin lid was closed once more as the sky began to brighten.
In the morning somebody came to replace the water and food. Qiao-er looked through the gap of the coffin lid, and she could see that it was the priest apprentice Little Fourth.
Having finished his task, he opened the coffin and looked inside. Obviously, the vampire was still sleeping. He smiled beamingly and slapped Qiao-er, and Qiao couldn’t dodge it in time. After the slap, she tried to hide behind the body of the vampire.
The little priest smiled evilly, but it did not make any more trouble for her and left.
After making sure that he was really gone, she peeked her head out from underneath the vampire’s neck. She quickly thought of its fangs and turned around to look at its lips. She couldn’t lift it’s lips up to check, and couldn’t figure out where the fangs went.
She then digged her hand inside its mouth, wiggling all about trying to find them, but there was nothing to find.
Who knows when, but during this process the vampire woke up. It was midday, the sun was high in the sky and the vampire seemed to be in a lazy state of mind as it stared at her.
Qiao-er lifted her head and met its deep blue eyes head on. She grew startledand quickly pulled her hands out. There was no saliva inside its mouth, but there was a fishy scent.
Only now did Qiao-er fully comprehend what she just did, her hands casually wiping on the coffin side. There was no reaction from it, it just seemed sleepy, its eyes slowly narrowed as it stared at her.Then, it closed its eyes, no longer moving.