Chapter 035: Look How Happy He Is Drinking

Staring at the gentle, pitiful little girl before him, Li Tianque felt his whole being ripple with emotion.

Yet, as he regained his composure, despite the joy in his heart, he reminded himself that they had only just met and he mustn't appear as foolish as a pig.

Dani, however, had no such reservations. With a bright smile, she took Li Tianque’s hand and pulled him into the room, skipping along as she chirped, “Brother, I’ve prepared a sumptuous dinner to welcome you! Heehee, you have to finish it all!”

Dragged by her towards the dining room, Li Tianque noticed that the decor was distinctly girlish, nearly identical to the rooms of Lolita girls in those short video clips, sweet and adorable.

The pink room played delicate anime music, with countless plush dolls and cushions lazily strewn across the thick shaggy carpet. Flanking the sofa were tall glass cabinets filled with exquisite figurines.

Curiosity got the better of him, and Li Tianque voiced his most pressing concern, “Dani, I heard there was a haunting here recently. What’s that all about?”

Dani responded almost instantly, as if she had anticipated his question. “No, you must have heard rumors! This villa district is very safe! Otherwise, how could I dare to live here alone?”

“Oh… so that’s how it is…” Li Tianque thought to himself that it made sense—a child living alone in a grand villa out in the wilderness wasn’t exactly safe.

Although the security system here was quite advanced, it was still a luxurious residential area for the wealthy, easily targeted by ruthless criminals, and news reports often featured stories of villas being robbed.

If Dani dared to live here alone, either the place was truly safe, or Lü Mou had given her enough reason to feel secure.

But at that moment, Li Tianque failed to consider another possibility…

Hand in hand, Dani led him into the dining room. Her hand was soft and delicate, like a bar of soap fresh from the water, slippery and gentle, stirring waves in any man’s heart.

Before they even reached the dining room, Li Tianque was already enveloped in a tantalizing aroma.

Having left Shian Pest Control without eating, Li Tianque was famished, and as he glimpsed the lavish dinner spread on the table…

Li Tianque nearly vomited.

The scent of the food had conjured countless delicious dishes in his mind.

But when he saw what lay before him, he felt as if he’d gone mad; hunger vanished entirely, replaced by a heavy stone lodged in his stomach.

For on the table, instead of culinary delights, there were all manner of metal parts!

The table was set with four dishes and a soup, arranged beautifully but with a bizarre appearance.

One plate was stacked neatly with rusty screws, coated in ketchup. Another featured wires arranged in the shape of a brain, with broth trickling over them, and two broken batteries leaking fluid at the side of the plate.

The other two dishes were similarly grotesque, as if they’d been assembled straight from an appliance repair shop.

But the most outrageous was the bowl of soup, which looked like aged corpse oil, shimmering with grease and flickering with electric sparks.

Li Tianque retched, but the alluring aroma still found its way into his nostrils, making it impossible to suppress his appetite.

“Heehee, brother, what’s wrong? Are you feeling unwell?”

“I…” Li Tianque was momentarily speechless.

Dani’s smile never faltered. She raised her eyebrows and, using her cat-paw spoon, scooped up a mouthful of soup and drank it heartily, smacking her lips. “Brother, you should try it! It’s just a bit bland, but still delicious!”

Sizzle… sizzle…

Strange electric sparks danced at Dani’s lips, making Li Tianque’s scalp tingle. He frowned and said, “Dani, I don’t know how you’re built, but I’m just an ordinary human. Are you sure I can eat this? Do you have any regular food—bread would do. If not, I can go buy some! Or… maybe we should just order takeout!”

“No way! Takeout can’t reach here, and you don’t have a car. Going to the nearest store would take an hour round trip, and then we wouldn’t have time to sleep! You should try it, really, it’s delicious! Every time Brother Lü Mou visits, he eats happily!”

Li Tianque stared at her in disbelief, thinking to himself, “I don’t believe you…”

But what surprised him more was that, from the little girl’s words, she seemed even more eager to sleep than he was…

This was too hasty.

“No, no, I’ll pass. I’ll just endure. I won’t eat…”

Li Tianque waved his hands hurriedly. Though he refused, his saliva involuntarily began to flow.

For some reason, the dishes made from metal parts, despite their grotesque appearance, gave off an incredibly tempting scent, one he had never encountered before.

Dani now looked a bit unhappy, pouting as she filled a cute porcelain bowl with screws and circuit boards. “You’re so annoying, brother! If you won’t eat, I’ll feed it to Grandpa instead!”

“Grandpa?” Li Tianque was taken aback. “Is there someone else here? Didn’t you say you live alone?”

“Heehee, his presence is negligible, doesn’t count. But Grandpa is very obedient, and he loves my cooking—unlike you, such a picky eater!”

Picky eater?

Li Tianque flushed with embarrassment. It wasn’t about being picky—it was about survival.

He’d narrowly escaped death and had no intention of dying from food poisoning.

Dani, carrying the little bowl, left the dining room.

Li Tianque followed, assuming that the “pet” she mentioned was the terrifying shadowy creature outside, the monster that nearly tackled him earlier.

But to his surprise, Dani didn’t take the food outside, but instead brought it to a room at the end of the corridor.

Before they even entered, Li Tianque heard muffled groaning from within.

He frowned, recognizing that the sound wasn’t from a pet, but rather a person in pain.

When he followed Dani inside, he saw that the voice was indeed human.

On the large bed lay a gaunt figure, so emaciated that gender was indiscernible, face haggard and flesh sunken.

More accurately, it was no longer muscle, but a thin layer of skin stretched over a skeleton. The eye sockets were deeply hollowed, the eyeballs shrouded in mist, glowing faint blue.

The contours of the face were standard Western features, yet the figure wore a thick cotton jacket—one commonly seen in rural dramas—creating a jarring contrast.

Swathed in heavy blankets, one arm extended outward, with three needle marks on the withered hand, three IV drips attached, the infusion bags filled with pitch-black liquid, vague and surreal.

Li Tianque hadn’t noticed at first, but after a moment, he recognized from the markings that the black liquid in the IV bags was the same substance used to suppress the Nightmare Eye on his own head: black active iodine.

But the simultaneous injection of so much black active iodine was unnerving.

While Li Tianque was still staring in astonishment at the dying man on the bed, Dani approached, used a mouth expander from the table to pry open his mouth, and poured all the “food” from the bowl inside. The man on the sickbed showed no reaction, only letting out muffled groans.

Could this man… be the zombie the taxi driver spoke of?

Li Tianque swallowed hard, staring at the scene in terror. Just as he was about to intervene, Dani turned to him with an innocent smile and said, “See? He’s so happy drinking it!”