Chapter 40
Chapter 40
See? See? She’d said she couldn’t keep working herself to death. This world belonged to people with energy to spare, the sort who could do eight hundred jobs a day without even getting out of breath.
She couldn’t. The moment she got tired, she turned into this ghastly wreck.
She needed looking after. Regular massages, scalp treatments, spas, facials… Never stand when she could sit, never sit when she could lie down. Only a life of leisure would keep her qi and blood replenished.[^qi-blood]
“Ugh… still have to shower…”
With a sigh, Lin Yinxi turned on the shower. The water in the employee dorm was cold. She endured the chill and washed herself clean, then dragged her exhausted body onto the hard single bed and pulled the covers over her head.
Right now, even if the sky fell, it would have to wait until she’d had some sleep.
Sleep always came quickly to people with little energy.
Almost as soon as she closed her eyes, Lin Yinxi’s consciousness sank into boundless darkness.
…
Bzz… Bzz…
After an unknown stretch of sleep, the phone beneath her pillow began to vibrate.
Lin Yinxi frowned in misery. With great difficulty, she reached under the pillow and fumbled for her phone.
The time on the screen was 10:10 a.m.
The Fishhead Supervisor had posted a whole string of part-time jobs in the group.
Lin Yinxi immediately zeroed in on the highest-paying one.
[Part-time position: Merfolk Performance Handler.]
[Location: Whale Shark Hall, Zone A.]
[Start time: 10:30 a.m.]
[Duties: Assist in transferring the new merman, E-77, from the small tank into the large tank.]
[Risk warning: This task requires one person to dispense bait and guide the merman into the tank, while another operates the control panel to align the tank gates and release the water.
The new merman is unstable. His teeth contain toxins, and a bite may cause limb mutation. He is highly aggressive. Under no circumstances allow him to leave the tank, or he will attack visitors and employees indiscriminately.
The aquarium does not provide employees with workplace injury insurance. Employees bear sole responsibility for any accidents that occur during work.]
[Part-time pay: 800 Rabbit Coins.]
One look at the picture beneath the designation E-77 wiped away all of Lin Yinxi’s drowsiness.
Wasn’t that Chen Fei?!
A reward as high as 800 Rabbit Coins meant mortal danger.
The jobs were first come, first served.
Whoever registered with the Fishhead Supervisor first got the job.
Thinking of the unknown ticket price, Lin Yinxi didn’t hesitate. She sent the fishhead a private message and accepted the job.
After her shower yesterday, she had tossed her dirty clothes into the bathtub to soak.
So unfair.
Before leaving, she still had to wash them and hang them up to dry.
Thank goodness her roommate Song Qianli had left behind two large suitcases and a wardrobe full of blue uniforms.
Now they all belonged to her.
Lin Yinxi picked a blue uniform in her size and put it on.
After checking that her dark blue wristband was securely in place, Lin Yinxi left for Whale Shark Hall in Zone A.
Whale Shark Hall had temporarily closed to move the merman. When Lin Yinxi reached the area above the panoramic tank backstage, she saw two familiar faces.
Xu Haitang and Chu Yanran.
Xu Haitang was also wearing a blue uniform that didn’t quite fit. She was even paler than yesterday and needed support just to walk.
Chu Yanran wore an ordinary cleaner’s uniform. Looking listless, she stayed close to Xu Haitang and supported her.
Chu Yanran’s eyes lit up at the sight of Lin Yinxi. “You’re alive! Thank goodness!”
Lin Yinxi walked over. “Why did you take this job?”
Seeing it was Lin Yinxi, Xu Haitang’s tense shoulders relaxed a little. “We need money for tickets,” she said weakly. “This job needs two people working together and pays as much as 800 Rabbit Coins, so I took it.
Yanran doesn’t have permission to accept jobs. I used my wristband to take the tank-monitoring task and brought her in disguised as a cleaner.”
Chu Yanran nodded.
She stared at the cylindrical tank holding Chen Fei, her expression filled with endless sorrow.
Work came first.
Lin Yinxi said, “Haitang, you seem terribly anemic. How about this? I’ll dispense the bait and guide him. You work the control panel, connect the two tanks, then release the water.”
“All right.” Xu Haitang really didn’t have the strength to dispense the feed now.
Lin Yinxi picked up the feed prepared nearby and climbed onto the feeding platform at the top of the tank.
Xu Haitang operated the machinery.
The gate at the bottom of the tank slowly opened.
Accompanied by the low rumble of flowing water, an enormous dark shape swam up from below.
It was Chen Fei. Or rather, the new merman designated E-77.
He was even more deformed than he had been in the infirmary yesterday.
The dark skin on his upper body had grown glossier, and his muscles bulged grotesquely. Gills had sprouted on either side of his neck, while scales covered his abdomen.
The parts that had once been human had mutated.
Yet the thick fish tail forming his lower body was exquisitely beautiful.
The whites of his eyes had disappeared.
From beneath the water, his entirely black eyes gazed affectionately at everyone who came near him.
Chu Yanran covered her mouth. Too emotionally involved to see clearly, she looked at his gaze and kept feeling he still had some humanity left.
Lin Yinxi put on gloves and tossed a bloody piece of approved feed bearing a blue stamp into the feeding opening.
Chen Fei’s enormous tail struck the water. He burst to the surface and caught the meat in his mouth.
As he opened his mouth, Lin Yinxi saw his serrated teeth.
Xu Haitang said, “Feed him slowly. I’m opening the valve on the large tank…”
Xu Haitang and Lin Yinxi worked seamlessly together.
Lin Yinxi used the feed to lure Chen Fei from the small cylindrical tank toward the large tank in the exhibition hall.
But as the pieces of meat dwindled, Chen Fei grew increasingly frenzied.
No longer satisfied with dead meat, he fixed his pitch-black eyes on the living people on the feeding platform, especially Chu Yanran, who still had feelings for him.
He swayed his beautiful tail at Chu Yanran and reached out both hands, trying to entice her.
“You’re not my Feifei anymore…” Chu Yanran hardened her heart. The words were both a warning for the merman to stay away from her and a reminder to herself not to let him deceive her.
Perhaps Chu Yanran’s words had provoked Chen Fei, now a merman.
The water in the tank began turning red at a visible rate.
“This is bad! The water’s turning red!” Xu Haitang immediately told Chu Yanran, “Your cleaner identity is fake. You haven’t received an employee wristband, so you still have to follow the visitor rules. Quick! Turn your back on the tank!”
A little flustered, Chu Yanran turned around.
In a daze, she felt Chen Fei embrace her from behind.
Such a warm embrace. It was as if she could smell sunshine and the beach.
“Don’t turn around!”
The moment Xu Haitang finished speaking, the merman slammed into the tank.
Water began leaking from the gate.
Because the control panel was connected to the tank, the impact also knocked the extremely weak Xu Haitang out of her seat. She hit her head.
Lin Yinxi hurried to take over the control panel.
Crack…
The glass of the tank split.
Looking at the cracked tank, Lin Yinxi felt the corner of her eye twitch. Aaargh, why had that damn Chen Fei built so much muscle? Couldn’t he be a nice, delicate merman?
It was leaking, leaking! She was about to crack too.
[^qi-blood]: Qi and blood are traditional Chinese concepts used to describe the body’s vitality and nourishment.