Chapter 58: Yu Sheng’s Spirit of Exploration

The two Secret Service agents and the spirit world detective who called herself “Little Red Riding Hood” (on holiday leave) left. Yu Sheng exhaled lightly at the entrance, then turned and went back into the living room.

Eileen, who had been watching TV, immediately turned her head. “I thought you guys were going to talk for ages. Don’t you have a lot of questions you wanted to ask them?”

“I mainly wanted to get in touch with them. Anyway, now that Hu Li has been brought out, there’s no big rush for the rest.” Yu Sheng said casually, and his gaze fell on the coffee table.

The fox-girl, who had been sitting on the floor guarding a pile of food, felt his gaze, looked up, and smiled happily at Yu Sheng. “Benefactor!”

“You need to take a bath, and change your clothes at least.” Yu Sheng glanced at the pitiful Hu Li and said with concern.

That poor fox had been trapped in another realm for years. She’d still been a child when she first got stranded, and the clothes she was wearing now had probably been taken off some corpse long ago. Even a quick glance showed they didn’t fit, and they were now practically ragged shreds. She was also filthy, caked with dirt. Although there was water in that other realm and she must have had opportunities to bathe, living in the wild mountains far from civilization had left her tails matted and tangled.

Hu Li lowered her head and looked at herself.

She was probably used to her current state. She hadn’t even considered what would happen once she finally left that valley. Now, hearing Yu Sheng’s words, some distant memories and common sense slowly returned to her mind. She stood dazed for a long time, just like when she’d been gradually relearning how to speak, finally beginning to pull her thinking away from the “beast” state.

Yes, she needed to clean herself. She needed to change clothes. Her benefactor’s dwelling was this clean—she couldn’t dirty it.

She nodded firmly.

Yu Sheng turned to Eileen.

The little doll’s two arms were still broken. She looked pretty miserable too, but she seemed completely oblivious, happily watching TV. A stupid variety show had her in stitches.

Yu Sheng found it hard to ignore. “Should I fix your arms first?”

“You go take the fox to bathe first. She won’t know how to use the bathroom stuff,” Eileen said, waving her arms carelessly. “No rush on my end. You can fix them later.”

“Alright, I’ll come help you as fast as I can,” Yu Sheng nodded, then reached out his hand to Hu Li. “Come with me.”

Hu Li stood up, but hesitated, looking at the food on the floor as if she dared not leave it for a second.

Yu Sheng smiled at the sight. “Don’t worry, the food won’t grow legs and run away. Come back and eat after your bath. Eileen will watch it for you.”

But Hu Li was still hesitant. She glanced uneasily at the doll watching TV on the sofa, then suddenly bent down, grabbed two cans of eight-treasure congee and two packs of cookies from the plastic bag, and casually stuffed them into her tail. Only then did she turn and come to stand before Yu Sheng.

Yu Sheng’s smile was still frozen on his face. He stood there a little dumbly, not quite registering what had just happened. After two or three seconds, he stiffly turned his head to look at Hu Li’s big tail behind her.

“…Where did you hide them?”

Hu Li pulled the cookies and congee out of her tail, showed them to Yu Sheng, then immediately stuffed them back into her tail. She blinked her big eyes at him.

Yu Sheng was stunned. “You can use it like that?!”

“Mm.” The fox-girl nodded, still looking as if she had no idea what was going on but it was only natural.

Yu Sheng then remembered something else. “…Didn’t you shoot out one of your tails earlier?”

“It’s already grown back.”

Yu Sheng: “…?”

His head filled with question marks—was this what fox spirits were like?

But no one could answer his question. Eileen didn’t know any other fox like Hu Li either.

Yu Sheng forced a straight face, shook his head, and temporarily pushed those question marks aside. He grabbed the fox-girl and led her to the bathroom on the first floor.

“This is the water heater. For now, you don’t need to worry about it. Hot water comes out from here. This valve controls hot and cold. Turn it left for hot, right for cold. Pull up to start the water… The bathtub works the same way. The valve is here. This bottle is body wash. You can use the sponge next to it to make bubbles. Don’t squeeze too much. This bottle is shampoo… It should work for your tails too.”

Yu Sheng carefully and patiently explained everything in the bathroom to Hu Li, speaking slowly and making sure the fox-girl nodded in understanding before moving to the next item. Even so, he suspected she would still get flustered when bathing.

“Anyway, just know how to use the water. You can soak in the tub for a while. Towels and a bath towel are hanging next to the mirror cabinet. Make sure you dry off before coming out so you don’t catch a cold.”

Hu Li nodded vigorously. “Mm-mm.”

“Remember to take out the stuff you stuffed into your tail before you bathe… Actually, do whatever you think. It’s all packaged anyway.”

“Mm-mm.”

“I don’t have any girls’ clothes here. I’ll bring you a set of mine for now. You can make do with them. Tomorrow I’ll go to the mall and buy you new ones.”

“Mm-mm.”

Hu Li seemed to only be able to nod constantly. No matter what Yu Sheng said, she nodded.

Yu Sheng was pretty worried. At that moment, he kind of envied Eileen’s carefree attitude.

After a few more instructions and letting Hu Li try turning on the showerhead herself, he finally felt a little relieved. He brought a set of his own loose pajamas and set them by the door, then turned and left the bathroom, returning to the living room.

Eileen was struggling to climb back onto the sofa with her broken arms.

Yu Sheng: “…What are you doing?”

“I laughed too hard and fell off the sofa,” Eileen explained awkwardly as she climbed. “Hey, don’t just stand there watching. Come help me up.”

Yu Sheng took two steps forward, casually picked up Eileen along with her picture frame. “Alright, stop watching TV. I’ll fix you up.”

Eileen was taken aback. “What about the fox?”

“She’s taking a bath by herself,” Yu Sheng said casually. “I taught her how to use everything.”

“Can she handle it? She just broke free from starvation. Her brain hasn’t recovered yet, right?” Eileen hung from Yu Sheng’s arm and glanced doubtfully toward the bathroom. “She’s not going to blow up the bathroom…”

Yu Sheng hesitated at that, also looking uncertainly toward the bathroom. He could already hear the sound of running water. “Shouldn’t… be that bad, unless she suddenly shoots out a tail in the middle of washing.”

“Forget it, don’t think too much,” Eileen waved her arm, quickly becoming carefree again. “She’s not stupid anyway. She’s been surviving in the wild a long time. She’ll adapt fast. Upstairs, upstairs. Fix my arms first. It’s really inconvenient like this. Changing the channel is a pain.”

Yu Sheng said “oh” and carried Eileen up the stairs.

When they reached the attic, he turned on the light, removed the picture frame from Eileen’s back, and gently placed the little doll on the big table.

“You don’t have to be so careful. I’m not made of porcelain,” Eileen laughed at his cautious movements. “You won’t break me if you’re a little rough.”

Yu Sheng gave a strange look at the porcelain-like break on Eileen’s arm. “Can’t help being careful. The way it’s broken is seriously scary. Really doesn’t hurt?”

“It doesn’t. It hurt just a tiny bit when it first broke,” Eileen raised her arm to look at it. “But now that I see it, it is a bit freaky… Hurry up and fix it.”

She paused, then began to guide the procedure. “The process is similar to when you made the body, but this time you don’t need to make a torso, just arms. The spirit-infusion process is the same as last time—I’ll guide it. After the arms, fix the legs. I have a few cracks on my legs, but they haven’t completely broken yet. You’ll need to activate some alchemically treated clay to patch them. That part needs more care. It’s best if you use a spatula to shape it well. That’ll save me some effort…”

Yu Sheng listened to the little doll’s explanation, then hesitated a bit after she finished. “By the way, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you…”

Eileen: “Huh?”

“The clay I bought last time is actually all used up,” Yu Sheng spread his hands. “It’s too late to go out and buy more now.”

Eileen was stunned. “…Why didn’t you say so earlier?! Then why did you bring me up here and mess around?”

Yu Sheng reached into the drawer next to him and took out the lotus root he’d bought last time…

The little doll’s eyes instantly widened. She almost jumped up (but couldn’t because her legs were broken). “Hey! Are you obsessed with lotus root or what?! Didn’t I say—wait, why did you put lotus root in the alchemy table drawer?! You’ve been scheming this all along, haven’t you?”

“I’m just curious to see if it’ll work,” Yu Sheng admitted there was a tiny bit of scheming involved, but he chalked it up to scientific exploration spirit—same as when he’d studied how to cook “Hunger Entity” meat to make it tasty. It was all for research. “Let’s just try it. This lotus root was pretty expensive.”

“Try your ass!” Eileen glared with her crimson eyes. “Putting aside everything else, before infusing spirit, you have to mix your blood into the material. You could work it into a lump of dough. But a lotus root—how are you going to…”

The little doll stopped mid-sentence when she saw Yu Sheng pull a syringe out of the drawer.

Eileen: “…Hey, are you crazy?!”