Chapter 46
Chapter 46
Inside the hospital ward at night, the heart monitor beeped rhythmically.
Qin Ying sat on the hospital bed, her damp hair clinging to her forehead.
Dean Tan and two other doctors were surrounding her for an examination, occasionally asking about her physical condition.
Old Miao and Yin Minmin stood at the foot of the bed, waiting.
“We still need to keep her under observation.”
In his decades of practice, Dean Tan had never encountered a situation like this. He couldn’t say for certain what Qin Ying’s current state was.
Before leaving, he could only leave instructions for Qin Ying to remain in the hospital for further observation.
Once the doctors left, Qin Ying finally touched her neck.
She didn’t feel much pain, though her body temperature was still on the high side. She asked, “Did I try to choke myself while I was asleep?”
Yin Minmin shook her head and handed over a digital video camera.
She was very thoughtful; knowing what Qin Ying would want to see, she had already rewound the footage.
Qin Ying took the camcorder and pressed the play button.
In the recording, her eyes were tightly shut, her light chestnut hair splayed across the pillow.
She hadn’t woken up no matter how much Yin Minmin and the others shouted or nudged her.
It wasn’t until Laodao splashed a cup of ice water onto her face that her eyelashes fluttered slightly, showing signs of waking up.
Clouds of doubt filled Qin Ying’s mind; she felt as if she were on the verge of grasping something.
She rewound the footage again and again, repeatedly watching the six minutes and eighteen seconds of video from when she was asleep.
Yin Minmin took a pack of tissues and helped dry her damp hair.
Qin Ying’s hand suddenly froze.
She saw her own lips moving on the screen, as if she were mumbling something.
She asked Yin Minmin, “Minmin, what did I say while I was asleep?”
“Was it like Zhang Tao, shouting ‘a life for a life’?”
Yin Minmin shook her head. “You didn’t shout. It sounded like you were calling for… Han Lie.”
Who was Han Lie? Yin Minmin watched Qin Ying’s expression carefully, her mind wandering through various possibilities.
Qin Ying lowered her head, staring at the blanket on her lap.
So, she really had seen Han Lie in her dream.
And that blood-red wasteland that appeared in the dream…
If none of that was just a hallucination from being half-asleep, then… the Dream-Embracing Grass and the Ghost-Shadow Vine!
Qin Ying handed the camcorder back to Yin Minmin and turned to look for her phone.
She moved a bit too quickly, and a wave of dizziness washed over her.
Old Miao, who had been standing nearby, said anxiously, “Qin Ying, you still have a fever. Don’t rush.”
Qin Ying didn’t answer. Her fingers tapped rapidly on her phone screen.
Sure enough, she soon found an entry for Dream-Embracing Grass on a search engine.
To her surprise, the Dream-Embracing Grass wasn’t recorded in the *Classic of Mountains and Seas*, but in another collection of strange tales-the *Records of the Cavernous Obscurity*.
Volume Three of the *Records of the Cavernous Obscurity*: “There is the Dream-Embracing Grass, which resembles a cattail and is red in color. During the day, it retracts into the earth, and at night, it emerges. If one carries its leaves, they shall know whether a dream is an omen of good or ill fortune.”
Qin Ying clicked on the entry for cattails. After a careful comparison, the red plants as tall as three people she had seen in her dream were extremely similar to cattails; it was undoubtedly the Dream-Embracing Grass.
She searched for Ghost-Shadow Vine next, but this time she found nothing.
The Ghost-Shadow Vine was not recorded in any ancient texts.
Seeing her fall silent, Old Miao thought she had fallen asleep again. He walked over anxiously and asked, “What’s wrong?”
His hand was already reaching for a nearby water cup, having decided that if Qin Ying showed any sign of falling asleep again, he would splash the water on her.
Before he could act, Qin Ying suddenly looked up. “I saw a strange plant in my dream.”
She pulled up the description of the Dream-Embracing Grass on her phone and showed it to Old Miao.
“Dream-Embracing Grass?” Old Miao scanned it, his expression flickering with suspicion. “Are you sure?”
Qin Ying nodded. “I’m sure.”
“Besides that, there was also a strange vine, but I didn’t see it clearly in the dream.”
In truth, Qin Ying hadn’t seen the Ghost-Shadow Vine in her dream at all, but she had to find a way to relay the information she had received from Han Lie, so she chose this approach.
“That vine and the Dream-Embracing Grass seem to have a symbiotic relationship!”
Qin Ying threw back the covers and tried to sit up. “How is Zhang Tao doing now?”
As she stood, a sudden chill washed over her, and she couldn’t help but wrap her arms around herself.
“Zhang Tao is out cold. We can’t wake him up at all.”
Old Miao answered as he watched her, frowning. “Lie back down first.”
Qin Ying shook her head. “There’s no time.”
She felt unwell all over, leaning weakly against the edge of the hospital bed.
“Whatever was inside Zhang Tao has chosen me as its next Parasitic Host.”
The Ghost-Shadow Vine and Ghost Shadow that Han Lie had mentioned in the dream made it impossible not to think of the ‘Zhang Tao’ who had been peering into the ward before falling and vanishing.
Could that lifeform-the one that couldn’t be captured by modern surveillance-be the Ghost-Shadow Vine?
Back in the emergency room, Zhang Tao had broken free from his restraints and lunged directly for her, twisting his neck to blow that medicinal-smelling breath in her face.
From that moment on, Qin Ying had been ensnared in the game.
“The Zhang Tao peering in from outside the ward was here for me.”
“It’s like…”
“Like a mother coming to check on her cub,” Old Miao interjected, his expression grim.
Qin Ying felt her head throb even harder at his words. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes at him. “Could you find a slightly less terrifying way to put that?”
Old Miao didn’t take the bait. He rested his chin in his hand. “So the shadow at the Sewage Treatment Plant was also there to see Zhang Tao?”
Qin Ying nodded. “Exactly.”
As she spoke, she used her feet to reach for her slippers. “We have to investigate further up the chain!”
Judging by Zhang Tao’s current comatose state, the previous Mother Body should be in a dream-induced sleep somewhere as well.
“Do you have the connections to borrow a police dog? Take the powder from the floor of Zhang Tao’s ward and the dog, and we’ll go to the Sewage Treatment Plant to find that Scavenger Granny Zhang Tao mentioned.”
Qin Ying stood up, leaning on Yin Minmin’s arm. In the air-conditioned ward, that simple movement made her shiver with cold.
Seeing her lips turn pale, Yin Minmin asked, “Sister Ying, should I pour you some hot water?”
Qin Ying was about to agree, but she suddenly remembered Zhang Tao wearing a padded jacket while smoking in the sweltering heat.
She took a shallow breath and flatly refused. “No, no need.”
As she spoke, Qin Ying pulled off the jacket Yin Minmin had draped over her shoulders. She shuddered under Yin Minmin’s puzzled gaze.
Old Miao, however, twitched his lips as realization dawned on him. “It’s related to the temperature?”
“Does that thing need high temperatures to grow?”
“It’s just a guess.” Qin Ying licked her dry lips. “So, the police dog?”
Though she didn’t want to trouble her uncle, her life was on the line. If Old Miao and the others couldn’t handle it, she would have to call Qin Zhiguo.
Old Miao replied, “No need for a police dog. My Rat Scout, Tantan, is just as good!”
Qin Ying didn’t waste words. “Let’s go!”
There was no time to lose. Old Miao went home to fetch Tantan.
While he was gone, Qin Ying changed back into her own clothes and sat in the hospital lobby, clutching a bottle of ice water and gulping down cold cola.
In the middle of a sweltering July, she sat on the lobby bench shaking like a leaf.
In theory, the round trip to Old Miao’s house should have taken twenty minutes, but in just eight, he slammed on the brakes of a battered minivan right in front of the hospital entrance.
Once she got in, the fat Rat Scout, Tantan, who had been crouching in the front seat, was so startled by Qin Ying that it scurried into the gap between the front seats.
On the way, they met up with Laodao and Wen Hao, who had taken the discovered powder for testing.
The two vehicles drove one after the other toward the Sewage Treatment Plant.
Inside the car, the air conditioning was cranked to the lowest setting. Qin Ying’s lips turned from white to a bruised purple at a visible rate.
Meanwhile, in the World in the Box.
Han Lie galloped through the night toward the marsh where the Dream-Embracing Grass grew.