In the empty living room filled with various paintings, a ghost-like man is sitting in the living room thinking about life.
He has been to the most remote mountainous areas, to the chaotic border areas, to closed schools for Internet addiction treatment... Every time, others thought he would not come back, but he came back alive and well.
This time…
There was an extra dice in the game, and Lu Yanli said silently in his mind: Go for the odd numbers, don't go for the even numbers.
The dice rolled a number 6, and Lu Yanli stretched out his finger and turned it to 5.
6 means smooth, singular 5, you can go and have a look.
He went downstairs to change his clothes and prepared to go to the bar opened by Chu Xiu to eat and drink.
Lu Yanli and the Chu siblings were classmates since childhood, and they often visited each other for meals. When they grew up, Chu Xiu opened a bar and Chu Xian became an online novel writer. Their lives were as leisurely as their names. Only Lu Yanli often flew on the edge of life and death, giving them a headache, and often claimed that if he bought insurance, he should not forget to add his good friend's name.
"Have you had dinner?" Chu Xian was sitting at the bar. She was writing an outline on a tablet. She looked up and saw Lu Yanli coming by. She went to the front desk and brought him a small cake.
Lu Yanli: “…I forgot.”
Chu Xian complained about him: "You will kill yourself sooner or later."
Lu Yanli turned a deaf ear to him. After finishing the meal, he thought it tasted good and his stomach felt alive. He confidently asked the other party to bring a few more. The latter had a dark face. He was afraid that he would faint from hypoglycemia and affect the store, so he went to the kitchen to bring a lot of food to send.
"What are you busy with?" Lu Yanli asked while eating.
Chu Xian: "Preparing a new book, I have no inspiration."
"Is it a horror novel?"
"yes."
As the two were talking, Chu Xiu came out from the backstage. After seeing Lu Yanli, he poked him from behind and said, "Auntie called you and said that your call was not connected."
Chu Xiu knew what was going on. Once Lu Yanli started to become obsessed with painting, he might not be able to hear you even if you called him from outside his door with a loud speaker, let alone the phone.
Lu Yanli took out his phone and found several missed calls: "Did anyone say what it was?"
"Auntie, no, she said Lin Chu is looking for me."
"Lin Chu, she has contacted me." Lu Yanli gave a creepy smile, "I am going to take a new job."
"I think you are just trying to commit suicide." Chu Xian complained about him, "You are not young anymore, and you don't even have a girlfriend. You are just trying to commit suicide every day. When you buy insurance in the future, remember to write our names, okay?"
Lu Yanli snorted, "You talk as if you have a boyfriend." He stretched out his hand to poke Chu Xiu, "Give me a few more."
Chu Xiu had no choice but to go backstage and give him some snacks and drinks: "Where are you going this time?"
Lu Yanli: "I'll tell you guys when I get back. Maybe it's new material."
Chu Xian sighed: "I would rather not look for materials this way."
Lu Yanli knew that they were kind-hearted, so he didn't say anything and just dealt with it. Chu Xiu poked him again: "He Lou is in trouble, it seems like he is here to find me."
The Chu siblings often went to the Lu family to play, so they were naturally familiar with several subordinates of Lu Yanli's father who often went to the Lu family. Because they were of similar age, they had a good relationship with each other.
Sure enough, He Lou walked towards this side, but... it was just a few steps, but he walked slowly for nearly three minutes.
"Why is he always so scared?" Chu Xiu asked curiously in a low voice when he saw the other party's face full of resistance.
Lu Yanli: "Maybe I scared him."
There was no sense of guilt in his tone, as if the person who had slept on the bed in the police station morgue covered with a white sheet and sat up after the other party checked him, scaring the other party so much that he ran out of the door, was not him.
After hearing what he said, the brother and sister had indescribable expressions on their faces.
He Lou didn't want to go, because the first sight of Lu Yanli would remind him of that day that was filled with psychological shadows. But the company asked him for help, so he dared not refuse.
"Long time no see." He Lou greeted them politely, and after receiving a caring look, he sat in the booth one seat away from Lu Yanli, which showed his intention.
To be precise, Lu Yanli's father changed his mind, and he didn't want his son to be involved in dangerous tasks too much. But Lu Yanli's call didn't go through, and he thought his son was in a bad mood, so he called He Lou to talk.
"So, you can have a good rest..."
Before He Lou finished speaking, Lu Yanli interrupted him with a smile: "Okay, I understand."
He Lou's eyelids twitched. He always felt that the other party would not be so cooperative. However, Lu Yanli did not show any resistance. He smiled and agreed to everything he said. He comforted himself, maybe it was not necessary
After He Lou left, Chu Xian poked him: "Are you really not going?"
Lu Yanli: "I'm sick. Isn't it normal for a mentally ill person to go to the hospital?"
“… …”
"Okay, come back alive." Chu Xian knew that he couldn't persuade him, so he sighed, "I think you are really seriously ill."
"Yeah." Lu Yanli would not joke about his own life, "I'll go after the exhibition is over."
Two days later, the exhibition was held as scheduled and attracted quite a lot of people.
"An Xingyu, I didn't expect that you would like this style of painting." In the gallery, Yi Zhenzhen asked curiously.
She and An Xingyu were in the next class, and because their parents knew each other, they had a good relationship. This weekend was a rare holiday, and they had planned to buy books together, but An Xingyu changed his mind and said he wanted to go to an art exhibition. Yi Zhen followed him out of curiosity.
She felt a little regretful.
The paintings in the whole hall have a gloomy and cold atmosphere. Yi Zhen is really a little scared, but An Xingyu is very interested in them: "Yes, I know this painter too. His style is very special and his understanding of life is very unique."
"You actually know each other?" Yi Zhenzhen opened her eyes.
She just wanted to complain that the painter who could draw such a picture might have a dark heart, but after hearing that An Xingyu knew the artist and they seemed to have a good relationship, she held it back.
"Yes, I knew him when I was a kid. My dad took me to his house." An Xingyu seemed to realize something, turned around, and pointed to the upper floor, "Look, that's where it is."
Lu Yanli was leaning against the railing and talking to someone when he heard a familiar voice downstairs. He turned around and looked down, raised the corner of his lips, and waved at the excited children downstairs.
Yi Zhenzhen shrank her neck: As expected, this painter looks scary.
"Not afraid?" Lu Yanli asked.
An Xingyu shook his head: "No, I think it looks good."
Lu Yanli smiled again. He could see that the other party really liked it and was not just being polite: "If you like it, will you give me one?"
"Is it okay?" His eyes lit up.
"It's OK as long as my family doesn't mind." Not everyone is willing to hang this thing at home.
“Yeah!”
An Xingyu finally took a painting back happily. Yi Zhen felt a little scalp-tingling when she really wanted to see that painting. She asked, "Are you really going to hang it in your room? It's pretty scary."
"I think it's good." An Xingyu gently stroked the outside of the packaged carton, "I like it very much."
"Well, your taste is really unique." Anyway, Yi Zhen really didn't dare to hang a painting of a tomb with a cracked eye in her room.
After seeing off all the visitors and selling a few paintings, the hall became much emptier. Lu Yanli looked around, walked up the stairs to the attic, and stopped at the door of his room.
When he opened the door, a huge picture of hell that was enough to scare anyone came into view. The setting sun shone in through the window, and the red glow spread over the sea of flames.
The room is full of bright red.
In the picture, there was a blank space of the evil spirit's face. Originally, Lu Yanli hadn't thought about what kind of face to fill it, or simply blurred it. But now he had a new idea. As soon as the inspiration came, he started to move without even changing his clothes, and slowly painted a clean and innocent face for the evil spirit.
Hell, filth and fire, clean face, the contrast between evil and innocence.
Lu Yanli was very satisfied. After packing up his things, he prepared to go to the mental hospital.
Before leaving, he remembered that he hadn't been home for a while and felt a little anxious, so he decided to go home first. In order to avoid being nagged, he dressed himself up like a living person.
But he realized that his mother's nagging would not be reduced in the slightest just because he dressed up carefully.
Seeing Lu Yanli, Lu's mother was overjoyed. She pulled her son to look left and right, and kept rubbing him, touching his hair and pinching his face. She said with disdain: "You have lost so much weight again. Is it because you don't eat well outside? I told you not to eat takeout all the time. They are not clean..."
Lu Yanli: "Really not..."
“No? How come you’ve become so thin again? Look at the dark circles under your eyes, have you not slept for a few days? Your arms are so thin, are you a little girl who wants to lose weight? And your hair…” Mother Lu didn’t listen to his explanation. She scolded him from head to toe, cooked a big meal for dinner, fed him a solid meal, and early the next morning, forced her son to carry a bag of apples before leaving.
"How long will you be gone this time?" Mother Lu asked, standing at the door.
Her son often went out of town, saying he was collecting folk songs, but in reality he did something dangerous. She wanted to persuade him, but it was difficult, so she could only make up for it from other places.
Lu Yanli had already taken a few steps, but hearing the reluctance in his mother's words, he stopped and turned around.
"One month, another month, then I'll go home and live." He gently hugged his mother, whose hair was already graying, and said in a relaxed tone, "Is that okay?"
"Okay, okay, go ahead, little brat."
"Well, I'm leaving now. Take care of yourself and go out more often."
Lu Yanli was carrying a bag of apples, his shadow stretched out by the setting sun. It was not until his shadow disappeared at the intersection that Mother Lu returned to the house.
Since he was determined to solve the problem as soon as possible, he would not procrastinate. Lu Yanli quickly bought a ticket and flew to the local area, and found the hospital on the same day.
He used fake identities in the past, and this time was no exception. He changed his appearance and consulted a doctor in the hospital. Although the instrument detected that there seemed to be nothing wrong with him, Lu Yanli was successfully admitted to a mental hospital for observation due to a series of abnormal behaviors during the conversation with the doctor.