I Heard Them Call Me a Monster… So I Ran Until I Broke

Chenlian walked out of the room and took two steps toward the light source.
Her head ached as if pricked by needles.
Waves of weakness washed over every part of her body.
She couldn’t muster any strength.
Her sense of balance seemed impaired as well.
Her legs trembled uncontrollably like a marionette with cut strings.
Chenlian controlled her frail body, swaying left and right, barely maintaining her balance as she took a third step toward the light.
Finally, powerless, she leaned against the wall, gasping for breath.

At that moment, faint voices drifted up from downstairs.
Someone was downstairs!

[Fuzi! Fuzi must be down there!]
Chenlian gritted her teeth.
Her purple pupils reflected a faint glimmer.
With determination, she took another step.
One step, two steps…
On the tenth step, Chenlian finally reached the stairwell.
Gasping, she slid down the wall and collapsed to the floor.

The faint light she had seen from afar was harsher up close than she had imagined.
The voices downstairs had stopped at some point.
Suddenly, a girl’s angry shout made Chenlian’s exhausted heart jolt.

“What nonsense are you all spouting!”
The shout, clear even from a distance downstairs, was followed by words she could only faintly make out.

“Turn Chenlian into a non-human? Increase the mutation rate?”
[Chenlian? Is she talking about me? Non-human… I don’t really understand, but does it mean I’m different from Fuzi and the others?]

“Isn’t the memory loss… and the physical transformation enough?”
[Memory loss…? Come to think of it, I don’t seem to know anything. Where I am. My own name. My past. How I ended up there…]

“Or… die of a serious illness.”
The last words were very quiet, but Chenlian heard them clearly.
[I… will become a non-human (monster) and then die?]
Chenlian’s eyes widened.
Fear gnawed away at her spirit.

“I have no intention of handing Chenlian over to strangers like you.”
[Strangers? Does that mean Fuzi doesn’t actually know me at all?
That person, so gentle and caring like a mother… is actually completely unrelated to me, just looking after me for some other reason?]
Chenlian’s heart was on the verge of collapse.
She clutched her head with both hands.
Her frail body trembled uncontrollably.

The subsequent conversation mostly went in one ear and out the other.
But finally, Fuzi’s oath-like, resolute voice steadied Chenlian’s heart.
“Even if it costs my life, I will transfer Chenlian to a safe place!”

[What…!?]
Chenlian unconsciously stood up and took a step backward.
[Why?… On what grounds… would you risk your life for me?]
Fuzi’s gentle smiling face surfaced in Chenlian’s mind.
But suddenly, the image went dark.
Then, an image appeared of Fuzi lying on the ground in pain.
A pool of black liquid slowly spread outward.
Her lips moved slightly, as if trying to say something.
Then… as if relieved, she smiled and slowly closed her eyes…

[No…]
Chenlian took several more steps back, still clutching her head.
Her face was full of terror.
Her pupils gradually lost their luster.
She felt her blood boiling.
Her heart raced wildly.
She could hear the violent pounding in her ears.
Strange sensations surged from all over her body.
Fear, panic—like dark tentacles reaching up from the ground, climbing over Chenlian’s body.
She was at the breaking point.
[No~~!]
Chenlian screamed in her heart.
Suddenly, she spun around and sprinted backward at a speed beyond what ordinary eyes could track.
[No! No!]
Driven by fear, Chenlian unconsciously charged into the room, then slammed straight through the window, leaping out…
She landed smoothly in a crouch, then continued running with all her might without any delay.
She just wanted to get away from this place as fast as possible…

Head down, running recklessly,
her pink long hair fluttered behind her in the wind like a comet’s tail.
But this comet had no idea where it was headed.

She didn’t know how long she had run.
Finally, exhausted, Chenlian stopped.
She panted heavily.
Tiny beads of sweat covered her forehead.
She bent over, resting her hands on her legs.
Her pink hair was somewhat disheveled, a few strands even sticking to her sweaty cheeks.

After resting for a good while, Chenlian lifted her head and looked around.
An unfamiliar environment.
Faint light from the roadside illuminated a rusty, wide-open gate ahead.

Inside the enclosure wall was a dilapidated, abandoned building.

There were some cracks in the stone walls.
On the right, a metal staircase led to the rooftop, its reddish-brown rust spots clearly visible under the dim light.
It had obviously been a long time since anyone had used it—or maintained it.

Chenlian dragged her exhausted body through the gate.
Then she slowly climbed the stairs, gripping the handrail.
Her hands gradually became coated with rust flakes, but Chenlian was in no state of mind to care.

Only five stories high, it took Chenlian nearly five minutes to reach the rooftop.
The rooftop was open-air, with no railings to protect one’s safety.
Chenlian quietly walked to the edge.
Her dazed eyes gazed into the distance.
She could see tall buildings standing far away, countless lights still glowing.
Faint car horns drifted over.
In the distance was the vibrant night view of the city—full of life even at this hour.
But here, she was in a desolate ruin far from any human presence.

The cold night wind blew through Chenlian’s thin, light-blue hospital-issued patient gown, making her small body shiver.
As if to keep warm, she crouched down, curling into a ball, hugging her knees, burying her head, and sobbed quietly.

But she didn’t know that three young thugs were walking up the stairs below…

* * * *

“So what exactly is that ability?”
Ye Qing asked Hadi.

“The ability can’t be guessed. But what can be confirmed is that this ability cushioned Chenlian’s landing force.”

Ye Qing fell back into thought.
[What kind of ability is it? The other Variant the doctor mentioned had hyperopia. So is Chenlian also a physical enhancement? …Wait, no! This isn’t the time for that!]
Ye Qing shook his head vigorously.
“Doctor, let’s put this topic on hold. Let’s focus on finding Chenlian!”

“Mm~, our topic just now was actually the search for clues, you know,”
Hadi said with a smile.

“Huh!”
Ye Qing looked surprised. But Hadi had already started operating the car’s built-in interface.
The screen displayed a blue-toned, line-based mini-map.
Three dark blue circles were blinking and moving continuously in different directions across the map.
Above the three circles were labels: Number 1, Number 2, Number 3.
Number 3’s location matched the current position of the Toyota he was riding in—meaning Number 3 was this car.
Number 2 was heading in the opposite direction, south—that was Sister Fuzi.
So the remaining Number 1 was Yuxuan.
Were they numbered in the order they had left?

But why had Yuxuan gone to the city? Was she planning to run around asking random passersby for information?

“Um, Doctor, this thing can make calls, right?”
Ye Qing asked Hadi, who was driving while looking around.

“Yes, just press the corresponding circle. Ah, by the way, Number 3 is us, Number—”

“I already figured that out. Number 2 is Sister Fuzi, Number 1 is Yuxuan.”
Ye Qing answered before Hadi could finish.

“Oh! Young lad, you catch on fast!”
Hadi praised him sincerely.

But Ye Qing ignored Hadi and pressed Number 1.
The interface showed a request to communicate with Number 1.
The moment the connection was established, a voice came back from Lin Yuxuan’s side.
“Hello? Can you hear me?”
Lin Yuxuan’s urgent voice. No background noise from the city streets—was the audio being filtered?

“Hey, Yuxuan! How exactly do you plan to find Chenlian by running into the city?”

“How? Just like this—asking people as I go!”
Lin Yuxuan answered, slightly out of breath.

[Ah, just as I thought!]
Ye Qing sighed helplessly.
“Hey! The city is so far from here. There’s no way Chenlian has the stamina to run all the way there!”

“Huh! What are you talking about, Ye Qing? I managed to run here myself!”
Lin Yuxuan said impatiently.

“That’s you! How could Chenlian in her current state run this far?
Wait, you ran there? That’s 10 kilometers from here!”
Ye Qing was even more exasperated.
[Ah, having a childhood friend like this—even吐槽 makes me tired.]

“Then what do you suggest we do?”
Lin Yuxuan refused to back down and asked, a little angry.

Ye Qing scanned the geographic environment around Lin Yuxuan on the map.
“Turn around, for starters. Search in less populated areas!”

“Got it!”
Lin Yuxuan agreed readily and hung up.

[Honestly!]
Ye Qing sighed helplessly again.
[Come to think of it, she ran 10 kilometers in half an hour!? But wait…]
Suddenly, something occurred to Ye Qing.
He started operating the interface fixed in the center console, pulling up the map’s distance scale.
He adjusted it so that 1 cm on the map equaled 1 kilometer in reality.
Then he centered the map on New Moon Villa District—the villa where Hadi and Fuzi lived—positioning it at the intersection of the 5th marks on both axes.
The map was 10 marks in total on each axis, meaning the displayed area covered a 5-kilometer radius around the villa.

Ye Qing began examining the geographic environment within this range.
Currently, only Number 2—Sister Fuzi—was within this area.
[Looks like she’s still searching the vicinity carefully. She hasn’t found anything yet. Does that mean Chenlian isn’t in that area?
But an average person runs at about 10 km/h. It’s been half an hour—so if running continuously, that’s about 5 kilometers.
Given Chenlian’s physical condition, even with her ability, 5 kilometers is probably the limit.
Yuxuan ran nearly 10 kilometers… Is she even human? Anyway, never mind that.
If it’s 5 kilometers, then Chenlian should be somewhere on this map.
If I can find a geographic feature that looks suspicious, there’s a high chance Chenlian is there!]
Thinking this, Ye Qing began examining the map carefully.
But how was he supposed to read a map that was nothing but lines?
Other than distinguishing buildings, roads, and other features, the most important details—the actual appearance of buildings and roads—weren’t displayed.

“You can view real images, you know. Though they’re stored images, not real-time footage,”
Hadi said, as if reading Ye Qing’s frustration.

“Hah!”
Ye Qing was momentarily stunned, but then started clicking on the outlined shapes on the map—the buildings.
He quickly scanned images as they appeared and disappeared one after another.
Finally, he spotted an abandoned industrial area and started searching within it.
But the first image he saw—he clicked it, let it fade, then immediately clicked it again.
“Mm~!”
A dilapidated building with an external staircase on the right.
“No doubt about it! This is it!”
Ye Qing snapped his fingers as if hitting the jackpot.