Irene looked down at her right leg, whole again, first cautiously rotating the joint left and right, then put on her sock and, holding Yu Sheng's hand, slowly rose to her feet.
"Are—are both legs the same length?" The little doll looked up and stared fixedly at Yu Sheng. "I didn't do any guided reshaping this time, just spirit infusion and fusion. Help me take a look..."
Yu Sheng rolled his eyes. "Of course they're the same length. I just fixed up the surface for you—I didn't cut it off and reshape it."
Irene breathed a sigh of relief and took a few steps back and forth across the table on her short little legs, finally breaking into a smile. "I can run around again! Yu Sheng, your craftsmanship isn't bad this time. Maybe you've actually got a talent for making dolls?"
"Thanks for the compliment..." Yu Sheng replied offhandedly, then watched as Irene, her mobility restored, hoisted the picture frame onto her back again, hopped from the table onto the empty chair beside it in a couple of bounds, then backed down off the chair to the floor and began darting in circles across the open space of the attic.
Before, every time Irene went tearing around like this, Yu Sheng had found it far too noisy and chaotic—especially since she'd always crash into all sorts of things and leave the house a mess. But for some reason, this time, watching Irene running all over the place, he no longer felt that irritation; instead, a strange sense of accomplishment slowly rose in his heart.
"A talent for making dolls..." Yu Sheng muttered, glancing down at the scraper in his hand and the jar of filler putty that was nearly used up, suddenly unsure whether Irene had just been flattering him or genuinely meant the praise.
He wasn't sure whether he had any talent for making dolls, but he suddenly found himself recalling those two lotus root segments he'd carelessly worked on that had successfully undergone "spirit infusion."
It seemed Irene had completely forgotten all about that.
Just then, a burst of footsteps from the direction of the stairs cut off Yu Sheng's wandering thoughts, and cut off Irene as well, mid-run around the attic.
Yu Sheng turned his head and saw a pair of fluffy white ears poke up from the top of the stairs, followed by Hu Li, looking this way and that, her face full of nervousness and curiosity.
The fox spirit girl was wearing a set of pajamas that looked a little too big for her, her silver-white hair still a bit damp. She had probably followed the scent to find this place; seeing that both Yu Sheng and Irene were there, a happy smile immediately spread across her face. "Ah! Benefactor, and Irene too—you're both here!"
Then she noticed that Irene's hands and feet had already "healed," and was instantly overjoyed. "Irene, your hands—they've grown back?"
"Yu Sheng fixed them for me!" Irene happily raised both hands to show Hu Li, then hopped in place. "My legs are fixed too!"
"Benefactor, your magic arts are amazing," Hu Li said, staring dumbfounded at the fully restored doll; when she turned her head toward Yu Sheng, her face even held a trace of reverence. "You can use the Netherworld Passage, reshape bodies and bring them back to life, and you even know how to craft puppets."
Yu Sheng thought it over—the "Netherworld Passage" this fox was talking about was probably his ability to "open a door," and it seemed she'd taken Irene for a puppet doll that he had crafted.
The next second, Irene, catching on, indeed jumped up and began making a huge fuss. "What do you mean, a puppet?! I'm a living doll from Alice's Cottage! A blessed one, do you get it?! You wild fox—if you don't understand, don't just spout nonsense!"
Hu Li listened blankly to the little doll's racket, then immediately lowered her head. "Oh, I don't understand. I won't talk nonsense anymore."
Irene stopped her shouting abruptly, halfway through, looking rather dazed. She was used to bickering with Yu Sheng; this was the first time she'd ever met someone so honest and straightforward who didn't wrangle and make a scene right back at her. Her mind suddenly went blank on what to do, and she just froze in place.
And right after that, Yu Sheng suddenly noticed something.
He stared at the space behind Hu Li, a bit taken aback. "...Where's your tail?"
Irene also caught on, belatedly noticing that all the tails behind Hu Li had vanished.
"I put them away," Hu Li said with a smile, turning slightly to the side; then came a "whoom," like a treasured blade being drawn from its sheath. Brilliant light suddenly flared behind the fox spirit girl, and a great mass of fluffy, bushy tails bloomed open with a bang. "The door was narrow, and they kept bumping into things, so I put them away."
Irene, standing right beside her, let out a startled "Yikes!" and was instantly flung through the air by that great burst of suddenly appearing tails, tumbling and scrambling several meters across the floor.
Hu Li let out a cry of alarm and rushed over, fumbling to haul Irene—who was cursing up a storm on the ground—back to her feet.
Yu Sheng watched from the side, utterly dumbfounded, but his first reaction was one of relief. "You scared me half to death—I thought you'd fired all your tails off..."
Then another odd question popped into his head. "...Why do your tails go 'whoom' when they come out?"
Hu Li thought about it. "It could be a 'bang' too."
Irene, who had just been pulled up and was about to resume cursing, was struck dumb by this, staring blankly at Hu Li. "...You do your own sound effects?!"
"Before a fox reveals her tails, she must make a sound, to warn the people around her to dodge," the fox spirit girl said, as though it were only natural. She now spoke far more fluently than when they'd first met, but there were still some strange pauses. "But you—didn't dodge."
Irene flew into a rage on the spot. "How would I know about these weird 'rules'?! Just where did a fox like you even come from?!"
Hu Li thought it over carefully, then shook her head, somewhat downcast, her ears drooping along with her mood. "I—don't remember."
This time it was Irene's turn for her expression to freeze; the little doll turned her head away awkwardly. "Don't take it seriously, I just said it offhand..."
Yu Sheng came over to Hu Li's side and, after thinking seriously for a moment, spoke with great earnestness. "Don't be too down. That doesn't mean you can't go back—maybe you'll find your home someday."
Hu Li's ears pricked straight up at once. "Benefactor, your Netherworld Passage—could it send me back?"
"His door can go anywhere—sometimes he yanks it open and ends up crawling right into somebody's alchemy furnace," Irene put in, standing with her hands on her hips, looking smug as though it were her own skill. "Maybe one of these times it'll open onto a door that leads to your hometown."
At that, she seemed to suddenly think of something, and turned her head toward Yu Sheng again. "Hey, so should we go check out that alchemy furnace from last time again? There were immortals and the like over there—what if it's Hu Li's hometown? Or even if they've just heard of it, that'd work too—after all, they feel like they're all part of the same system..."
At that, Yu Sheng looked troubled. "Given how things were last time... the other side will probably come straight at us."
"Oh, fair enough. If I were the one on the other side of that door, I'd want to beat you to death too."
Hu Li listened to the two of them going back and forth, her gaze shifting between them, her face full of confusion.
Seeing this, Yu Sheng cleared his throat twice and said, somewhat stiffly, "We're discussing who to ask about your background. Don't worry—I'll help you look for it, slowly."
"Benefactor, there's no need to trouble yourself so much," Hu Li said; this time she understood, but only shook her head gently. "If we find it, all the better. If we don't, that's fine too, because... I don't remember what my hometown looks like, so even if I went back, there'd be no one there I know."
As she spoke, she reached into her tails and rummaged around, fishing out those two sharp canine teeth, a gentle, faintly comforted smile appearing on her face.
"I've already found my mom and dad, so it's all right even if I don't go back."
"...It's good that you can think that way," Yu Sheng said with a soft breath, nodding to the fox spirit girl. "So what plans do you have from now on? Have you thought about the future?"
Hu Li looked a little lost; after hearing Yu Sheng's words, she was stunned for a good while before slowly shaking her head.
"I... don't know," she said in a small voice, her tone as uneasy as a young animal leaving its nest for the very first time. "It's my first time leaving that valley. This place is nice, but everything here is strange, and I... don't understand any of it, and I don't know where to... find food. Mom said a fox must never be ungrateful, but I don't know what I can do to help you, Benefactor."
Her speech was still a bit jumbled and disjointed, but Yu Sheng could understand all of it.
He smiled, comforting this rather frightened, anxious fox.
"Then from now on, just live here. I've got a spare room—and plenty of food, so you don't have to worry about going hungry. As for what you can do... from now on, help me fight. Let's leave it at that for now."
Yu Sheng mulled it over carefully, feeling that he didn't really understand what this fox was capable of. People said a fox spirit repaying a kindness could change one's fate, but from the looks of it, having her help write some C code, draw an illustration, or throw together a PPT was probably out of the question. This girl's subsonic headbutt and that move where she fired off her tails, though—their power was truly astonishing, and she'd be a rare top-tier fighting force when dealing with foreign domains in the future. When that time came, Irene could handle the crowd control, Hu Li could charge in and hit things, and he could just relax on the sidelines and cheer them on—truly a lovely arrangement.
Hu Li, however, only looked puzzled. "Fight?"
"From now on we'll be coming into contact with more foreign domains," Yu Sheng said slowly. "Just like that valley, there are many more similar 'anomalous spaces' scattered across this world, hiding all sorts of dangerous entities. There might be others trapped inside, the way you were, or there might be people who come to us for help for one reason or another. And I myself... have my own reasons for continuing to deal with other foreign domains and entities. In short, I need helpers."
Hu Li listened, but suddenly looked a little nervous. "Then... will we get trapped again?"
Yu Sheng was taken aback, but soon the fox spirit girl's unusually genuine reaction brought a smile to his face. "Have you forgotten about my 'Netherworld Passage'?"
Hu Li was stunned for a moment, then a smile slowly spread across her face at last.
She nodded happily. "Okay, I'll help you, Benefactor—I'll fight!"
Chapter 60