After Accidentally Eating the Horror Boss - Chapter 2

I slept straight through until morning. The room was quiet, and I was alone.

The handsome ghost seemed to have been nothing more than my imagination.

Once I was fully awake, I felt my way toward the cafeteria.

Unfamiliar with the place, I got lost again and slipped on the stairs several times.

Just as I was about to fall, someone caught me by the arm.

“This way.”

He led me all the way to the cafeteria and even kindly fetched my food for me.

“Thanks.” I thanked him between bites.

“You’re welcome,” he replied. “It is the administrator’s duty to help employees with problems they find difficult to resolve.”

Me: “…”

Out of politeness, I introduced myself anyway. “Hello. I’m Cui Ye.”

The person across from me did not answer. Silence settled around us, broken only by the scrape and clink of bowls and chopsticks.

This was my first time facing a boss alone.

My nerves got the better of me. I did not dare say anything else for fear of misspeaking and offending him.

When I finished eating, he took me to Holding Area Three.

Someone came out. “You must be the new guy. I’m Chen Zui. You…”

Chen Zui’s voice cut off. He froze in the entrance to Holding Area Three.

Beside me, Fang Huan released the arm he had been supporting.

“Have a productive day.”

“Thank you.”

The administrator left, his footsteps fading around the corner behind us.

Only then did Chen Zui come over to me.

“You two know each other?”

“No.” I pointed at my eyes. “I lost my glasses and can’t see very well. Is there anywhere around here that can make me a new pair?”

“No…” Chen Zui looked me over as if he wanted to ask something else.

In the end, he said nothing and turned to lead me inside.

A keeper’s work was not particularly difficult. It mostly consisted of cleaning the holding area and feeding the test subjects on schedule.

There were, however, several special rules to remember.

“1. The test subjects live in harmony. Everything you see is part of their normal social interaction.

“2. The test subjects’ eyes are dark brown, not red. If a test subject’s eyes turn red, do not make eye contact.”

“These two points are important.” Chen Zui tapped the rules for Holding Area Three, which hung on the wall.

“One more thing.” Chen Zui raised his arm and showed me his wrist.

I leaned in close and narrowed my eyes before I could make out the tiny writing printed there.

“This is your mental contamination level. Getting close to anomalous creatures makes it rise.”

“Rest can lower your mental level. Whatever you do, don’t let the contamination level reach one hundred.”

Chen Zui tapped his temple.

“You’ll go insane.”

With Chen Zui guiding me, I successfully entered the holding area.

The moment I went in, I walked straight into an abnormal incident.

Two blurry shapes were running and chasing each other.

Only when I drew close to the barrier dividing the area could I barely make out what the test subjects looked like.

They resembled humans, yet did not. Their torsos were human in shape, but their heads were enormous, their limbs powerfully built, and long, slender tails dragged behind them.

I saw the smaller one being driven into a corner, where it clutched its head and whimpered.

The sound was shrill and wretched, breaking off again and again.

Remembering the rules, I looked away and did my best to ignore the abnormal scene beside me.

But it happened far too often, and the screams of a living creature were impossible to shut out.

I could not help wanting to say something to Chen Zui.

He seemed to know what was coming and spoke first. “Did you forget the rule?”

“They’re only playing.”

“Besides, breeding season is almost here, and the test subject you mean is female. Don’t make such a fuss.”

“And come on, cleaning this place day in, day out is boring. What’s wrong with enjoying a show when the test subjects put one on for free?”

Chen Zui leaned against the wall and watched the scene in the holding area as if it truly were a performance.

“Enjoying it?”

I could not understand what there was to enjoy.

The scene only made me feel stifled and sad.

Something seemed to tremble faintly inside my body.

Me: ?

I looked down at myself but saw nothing unusual.

Once Chen Zui had watched his fill, he carried a load of fresh feed into the holding area and dumped it in.

The test subjects clustered together and came over, devouring the feed in huge mouthfuls.

The smaller one had been chased into the corner and did not dare approach.

The enclosure was a mess. Great clumps of withered yellow weeds mixed with some unknown liquid, giving off a peculiar smell.

I shoveled the mess into a small cart and hauled it out, load after load.

The area grew quiet. But if I listened carefully, I could hear a whisper so faint it sounded like sleep-talking.

The test subject pressed itself against the barrier, both hands clamped tightly around the bars separating us.

“Why won’t you do anything? Why are you pretending not to see?”

“Shit! When did it get over here?” Chen Zui cursed under his breath. “Get out, now!”

His warning came a moment too late.

The test subject’s eyes glowed red, gradually brightening from a dark crimson to the vivid scarlet of blood.

The next second, a piercing scream erupted beside me.

Chen Zui’s body folded and twisted in midair. At last, as if crushed beneath some tremendous weight, he was driven deep into the floor.

I could not see the details, but I saw a great splash of brilliant red.

I stood stunned for a moment, then instinctively glanced toward the test subject.

Its red pupils were like whirlpools capable of dragging everything into their depths. They seized my gaze.

When it saw me looking, it grew even more excited. Its chest heaved rapidly as it waited for what would happen next.

Nothing happened.

“…” It started muttering again. “Why won’t it work? Why isn’t anything changing?”

Still mumbling to itself, it reached out and tried to drag me over.

Because of my nearsightedness, I had failed to notice how close I stood to the barrier. It caught hold of my shirttail with ease.

The tremendous force yanked my entire body against the bars.

Then a pair of hands smelling of grass and blood seized my head and forced it up.

It made me look straight into its eyes, even using its fingers to pry my eyelids open.

After several attempts, there was still no change.

Its expression shattered. It lost control.

“Why won’t it work? Why doesn’t it work on you?”

After giving it some thought, I answered,

“Maybe because my prescription is almost minus ten diopters.”

“And I’m a little cross-eyed.”

The test subject: “…”