From within the oil painting, the doll girl greeted Yu Sheng with cheerful surprise. Her voice carried a touch of unexpected delight—yet not the slightest trace of shock or terror at seeing a dead man return alive.
Yu Sheng was certain this wasn't just Irene being oblivious.
Sure enough, the anomaly lay with him. Then again, considering how many times he had died and come back in such a short span, it hardly seemed surprising for another bizarre thing to happen to him.
"Just stumbled my way through, but I made it back in one piece," Yu Sheng replied casually. He turned to pull the half-open door shut, then immediately looked down to check himself. He confirmed that not only was his body completely healed, but even the clothes he wore were fully restored to how they had been before.
Yu Sheng frowned. Factoring in Irene's current reaction, he felt that rather than "resurrection," it was as though the entire "event" of his death had simply vanished into thin air...
Seeing him zoning out by the doorway, the doll in the painting asked in confusion, "Yu Sheng? Are you alright? Why do you look so dazed? By the way, tell me how you got back! The connection kept cutting in and out, and there was always a bunch of chaotic noise on your end. I had no idea what kind of weird stuff you ran into in that foreign domain... Wait, what's that you're holding?"
Her reminder jolted Yu Sheng into realizing his hand was still clutching something tightly—it was a severed tail, weirdly misshapen and grotesque, covered in pitch-black scales.
The corner of Yu Sheng's mouth twitched. "Holy crap, I almost forgot about it... It's actually still here."
The thing was even slightly contracting and squirming in his grip, though it was clearly not as "lively" as before. It seemed that while this monster's severed appendage possessed astonishing vitality, it would still gradually die once severed from the main body.
A bizarre sensation welled up inside him. For a moment, Yu Sheng didn't even know how to explain where it had come from to Irene. After a brief hesitation, he carried the severed tail toward the kitchen, tossing out casually as he walked, "...Just some local produce."
The doll in the painting froze. "...Huh?"
By then, Yu Sheng had already dumped the severed tail into the kitchen sink. After verifying that it lacked the strength to crawl out, he stabbed it a few times just to be safe, then weighed it down with a pot lid—that way, even if it truly did crawl out, he would at least hear the lid hit the floor. Only then did he return to the dining room with lingering exhaustion, his heavy body sinking into a chair.
His head was in a jumble. There were far too many things to process, and more importantly, he was bone-tired.
Yet he forced himself to stay awake. Now was not the time to sleep.
From across the table, Irene watched him cautiously. "Yu Sheng, tell me about what happened to you in that foreign domain. And how did you..."
"I was just about to tell you," Yu Sheng cut in with a wave of his hand. He adjusted his posture and looked squarely at the doll in the painting with a solemn expression. "I've got a whole stomach full of questions. First, let me lay out what I ran into over there. I met a girl trapped in the foreign domain just like me, but she might have been stuck there for a very, very long time..."
Yu Sheng held nothing back, pouring out his entire experience in that night-shrouded valley to the doll across from him—including the information Hu Li had shared with him, as well as the chimeric beast that looked like an avant-garde amalgamation of flesh and blood.
Except for his "rising from the dead." He hadn't figured out how to explain that to her yet, so he left it unmentioned for the time being.
He knew full well that he still wasn't very familiar with Irene, let alone having much trust in her, but he had no other options. In this city, Irene was the only "anomalous individual" he had encountered and could communicate with so far, and the only person he knew who had any understanding of "things beyond common sense." Aside from Irene, he truly had no one else to discuss the foreign domain with.
He felt he ought to place a little more trust in this doll in the painting. After all, her attitude had been fairly amicable so far—aside from the moments when her foul language became unbearable.
Irene listened intently. The moment Yu Sheng mentioned the flesh-and-blood monster, her expression turned exceptionally grave. Several times she seemed on the verge of speaking, but held back, never once interrupting his account.
It was only when Yu Sheng's story drew to a close that the doll girl finally adjusted her posture. Sitting ramrod-straight in the chair upholstered in red velvet, she spoke in all seriousness: "First, I have to emphasize one thing. I don't remember much. This painting has eroded far too many of my memories, so the help I can offer you is very limited..."
Yu Sheng nodded. "I know that."
"Right," Irene acknowledged, her expression easing slightly. "Then I'll do my best to fill you in on what I know about foreign domains. First, you should already have a basic understanding of them—knowing they're a general term for certain 'regions' that deviate from order and defy common sense. But do you know that foreign domains also produce things known as 'entities'?"
"...Entities?" Yu Sheng asked, puzzled.
"In short, they're the 'natives' or 'products' of a foreign domain. An entity doesn't have a set form. Sometimes it might be a grotesque humanoid, sometimes a beast or monster, and sometimes even a ball of fire, a gust of wind, or a running stone. As long as it originates within a foreign domain, possesses clear 'activity,' and can react to outsiders, it can be regarded as an 'entity.'"
Yu Sheng gave a thoughtful nod.
"Entities are broadly categorized and vast in number," Irene continued. "Generally speaking, entities possess very obvious 'anomalous' traits. Born in foreign domains, they naturally defy common sense and are bizarre and dangerous. Most entities lack reason—or at least don't display 'thinking behaviors' comprehensible to humans. But there seem to be an extremely rare few that possess intelligence... I can't remember the specifics of that part.
"In any case, ninety percent of entities are dangerous, though their strength varies widely. Some entities might pose a hazard that only makes your nose itch, while others are so perilous that merely catching sight of them puts a human's life at risk. That's why people have theorized that 'entities' are a sort of foreign domain rejection response—antivirus programs generated by the foreign domain to eliminate intruders. According to this view, to the foreign domain itself, the investigators and lost wanderers arriving from the world of order and common sense are the true eldritch horrors..."
Yu Sheng listened silently, then suddenly caught on. "...In other words, the 'monster' I ran into was an 'entity' generated by the valley?"
"Most likely," Irene nodded.
"Can entities be eliminated?" Yu Sheng immediately asked.
"Entities can be killed, but they cannot be permanently eradicated," Irene said seriously. "Because strictly speaking, an entity is merely a 'generated product.' Kill one, and a new 'instance' will spawn within the foreign domain. They are manifestations of the foreign domain's operating rules. As long as the foreign domain exists, entities will continually spawn. Normally, though, generating an entity takes time, and there seem to be ways to suppress the operation of certain foreign domains to delay or even halt the generation of entities within them... As for the specifics, I can't recall."
"Can be killed, but cannot be permanently eradicated..." Yu Sheng murmured, suddenly feeling that matters were far thornier than he had imagined.
He wasn't afraid of dying.
And that monster seemed even less afraid...
Without realizing it, Yu Sheng had already taken it for granted that he would return to that valley and face that creature again. He had no idea where the thought came from, but by the time he noticed it, the notion—or perhaps some form of "intuition"—had already taken root in his heart.
"...Whatever. Being able to kill it temporarily is still something," he exhaled softly, looking back up at Irene. "Other than that, what else do you know about entities? Their weaknesses, for instance?"
"Entities have no universal weaknesses. Sometimes an entity's weakness doesn't even lie on its own body, but in the 'foreign domain' itself, or within the rules of that domain. Some entities... can even alter their own weaknesses," Irene said, shaking her head. "That's why exploring foreign domains and confronting entities is a professional, perilous line of work. I'd advise you to seek help from professionals if you can—not someone like me, who's trapped inside a painting."
Hearing this, Yu Sheng couldn't help but roll his eyes. "Easier said than done. Where am I supposed to find professionals? It's not like they paste flyers on utility poles..."
Irene replied, "Actually, they do."
Yu Sheng: "...?"
"They have ways to be contacted—though not necessarily through flyers on utility poles, of course," Irene added, nodding emphatically at Yu Sheng's dumbfounded expression. "Since foreign domains exist everywhere in this world, and foreign domains are so dangerous to ordinary people, naturally there's a large group of professionals dedicated to handling these matters. If nothing else, in a city this massive, someone has to be responsible for maintaining order above and below the surface, right? There are official specialized departments, as well as non-governmental organizations of all sizes. Even though I can't remember the details clearly, these people are definitely active all over the place...
"Of course, under normal circumstances they keep their distance from the lives of ordinary people, remaining hidden in the shadows. That's because many foreign domains possess uncanny and bizarre properties—such as 'activating upon being known' or 'actively gravitating toward those who fear them'—so ordinary people must be prevented from coming into contact with information regarding foreign domains as much as possible. But once some poor soul has already encountered one, or once a foreign domain reaction appears in the city, these professionals naturally have a set of methods to locate them quickly and pay a visit..."
Yu Sheng listened in a daze, then hesitated a moment before looking out the window.
"In other words, since a 'foreign domain reaction' has already appeared on my end, all I have to do now is wait, and these 'professionals' you speak of will take the initiative to come knocking on my door, right?"
"...Prob... ably?" For some reason, Irene's tone suddenly lost much of its confidence.
Yu Sheng caught the hesitation in her voice. "...Then why haven't they come?"
"Beats me! By all rights, they should've shown up by now!"
Chapter 20