Paintings of Terror

Chapter 61: I’ll Take You Guys Out of Here!

Translated by Eve

Edited by EB

The words on these notes were very small. Most of them were actually drawings. Ke Xun admired the artistic talent of these two people. With just a few strokes, they were able to sketch out vivid, life-like images. They were able to instill emotions in these simple drawings.

For example, there was a drawing of a bespectacled boy standing in front of the cafeteria. There was a clock that showed 11:40 with its hands. It probably said: I’ll wait for you at the entrance of the cafeteria at 11:40.

Another example: There was a drawing of two girls. One girl had long, flowing hair while the other girl looked confident with her short hair. Next to each picture was either the letter A or B. It was probably asking: Should I leave my hair long or should I cut it? You have to choose one!

What were the two of them doing now? Did the man return from overseas? After being separated for so many years, were they able to be as sweet and harmonious as they had been back then? Just thinking about it made one sigh.

There were also childish doodles under the pile of notes. They obviously came from a young child. There were drawings of ducks, dinosaurs and monsters. It seemed like the mother had also saved her son’s drawings from his early years.

She seemed like a very considerate mother.

Mu Yiran picked up one of them. There was a rather complicated robotic skeleton depicted. It looked like an alien or some high-tech being. There were also many little people admiring it. Some of the little people didn’t look quite human either. If their skin was peeled off, they would probably look like the robotic skeleton.

This could be considered magic realism, Mu Yiran thought. Suddenly, he heard Ke Xun exclaim: “Fuck! There’s a clue here! So it’s been hiding here all along!”

Old Man Li Taiyong was currently sitting on the sofa in the living room waiting for news. When he heard Ke Xun’s words, he looked over.

Ke Xun flipped the magic realism style drawings over and let everyone see what was written on the back. There was a string of words written in pencil: Mom, I went to draw in Room 616. I already ate lunch.

“Room 616 and 411 belong to the same family!” Ke Xun was excited, “And this family is related to art!”

Mu Yiran read the lines of text over and over. “If I’m right about this, they likely rented room 616 to use as an art studio.”

“No wonder there wasn’t any furniture inside 616 before. If it’s a studio, it was probably pretty empty. Of course there wouldn’t be any home furniture.” Old Man Li Taiyong was about to stand up but the ground began to tremble.

The speed at which the world darkened sped up. Ke Xun opened the door and rushed out. He saw that the opening above the atrium was only as big as a sewer hole now.

“They must have reached the atrium’s opening, which caused the world to speed up the process of breaking through the ground.” Mu Yiran helped Old Man Li Taiyong up. “Let’s head to Room 616. The signature or seal is likely in there.”

Old Man Li Taiyong waved a hand. “I’m slow. You two should hurry on first!”

Ke Xun had already come back into the room. He bent down, his back facing the elderly man. He planned to carry the other. “Come on. It’ll be faster like this.”

“This…” Old Man Li Taiyong didn’t bicker with him. He got on top of the young man’s seemingly strong back. The three of them then made their way to the sixth floor hurriedly.

The entire building had started to shake. They could feel the upward force running throughout the apartment complex. It seemed like it was trying to break through some kind of barrier.

.

Just as they approached the door to 616, Wei Dong and them ran out. “No good—we can’t get a steady footing up there. We nearly fell off!”

It was clear that they had just come back from their attempt in climbing out the window. Wei Dong also intended to get a broom to sweep away the shards of glass from the window.

“The clues all point to the seal being inside Room 616!” Ke Xun held onto the nearly deformed door frame and let the elderly man down from his back.

Mu Yiran had already entered the room. He started to investigate the room.

Zhu Haowen was skeptical. “I’ve already searched the entirety of this room. There’s no way I missed anything. That is, unless we need to pry the floorboards apart.”

Mu Yiran acted like he didn’t hear him. He continued his search. Qin Ci also joined in.

“I believe that Haowen er is a meticulous child.” Old Man Li Taiyong struggled to walk into the room. “If the seal is inside this room, it has to be somewhere we have yet to search.”

Mu Yiran didn’t stop his actions but his eyes started to scan the room. They were so close. Unfortunately, humans sometimes fail the final step.

Ke Xun walked over to the heating unit that was encased with a wooden frame which had floral engravings carved into it. He ignored the pain and punched it a few times. He then yanked the wooden planks off with his bare hands. “We probably haven’t looked here yet.”

Xin Miao had appeared in the room with them at some point in time. She watched everyone curiously but didn’t speak.

The floor continued to quake. The room was nearly pitch black. Everyone felt a terrifying feeling of asphyxiation.

Only Xin Miao’s expression remained unchanged.

Mu Yiran adjusted his breathing and coolly examined the entire room. His gaze fell on the wallpaper on the walls. “Tear the wallpaper off!”

Everyone got to it. However, the lack of oxygen drained their strength. After much difficulty, they managed to pull all the wallpaper off of the living room. Everyone was gasping for air like dying fish.

All of a sudden, one of the room’s walls collapsed. Ke Xun’s reaction speed was the quickest. He shoved Mu Yiran, who was closest to the wall, away. Unfortunately, he wasn’t quick enough in his own escape. One of his calves was trapped beneath the brick wall.

Mu Yiran and Wei Dong rushed over to help Ke Xun pull his leg out. Wei Dong was close to tears from worry. “Ke er, can you still move your leg?”

“Enough talking. Pull!” Ke Xun didn’t say much. The more they spoke, the more oxygen deprived they would become. In addition, he was already very sensitive to stifling conditions like this. He almost couldn’t breathe.

“Young lady, come help us out!” Old Man Li Taiyong called out to Xin Miao. Right now, the girl was the strongest one of them.

Xin Miao was very obedient. She skipped over to the bedroom and lifted a corner of the wallpaper. Rip. She tore it off.

A giant image appeared in front of them. As Xin Miao continued to pull, the image became increasingly complete.

Although the room had changed shape—which meant that the picture was also deformed—they could still make out what it was.

——A ridiculously tall stalk of bamboo stretched across the entire wall. There were tiny windows on the stalk of bamboo. It was clearly an abstract depiction of the tube-shaped apartment!

There was a string of text written in juvenile handwriting next to the bamboo: I will take you guys out of here! Our Spring Bamboo Dormitory will soar into the skies! We’ll break out of our cage and shoot towards outer space!

Xin Miao squatted down as she finished ripping out the last part of the wallpaper. There was something that looked like a trail of fire that would come out of a rocket beneath the stalk of bamboo. It really did feel like it would shoot into space.

The painter’s information was written on the bottom of the stalk of bamboo: Luo Bing, 11 years old.

Everyone’s gazes congregated on the young signature. Instantly, a faint golden light began to emit from the painting. A deformed frame began to emerge from the warped wall.

“We did it….” An unknown number of people uttered these words, moved. Their voices were very weak.

The unit was nearly completely submerged in darkness. If they didn’t have the light, they wouldn’t even be able to see their arms outstretched.

Another wave of intense shaking ran through the ground. It looked like one of the corners of the painting frame would collapse. The entire frame now looked like a parallelogram.

“Let’s go.” Zhu Haowen was the first to step through the frame. In a blink of an eye, he disappeared.

They only had a moment. If the wall toppled over, their exit would be completely destroyed.

“Leave quickly!” Old Man Li Taiyong’s voice echoed through the air. At some unknown point in time, the elderly man had gone over to hold together the cracking picture frame. “Hurry!”

Under Old Man Li Taiyong’s frantic shouts, Qin Ci bent down and exited through the frame.

“Grandpa Li…” Ke Xun had yet to finish when Mu Yiran dragged him onto his back. With strenuous effort, he carried Ke Xun out through the picture frame that was so deformed it was only 1 metre tall.

“Young lady, you should leave as well! You might be able to be cured if you leave this place!” Old Man Li Taiyong almost couldn’t hold on. He was now squatting down, using every last ounce of his strength to keep to frame together. Because he was using an excessive amount of strength, the veins in his temples bulged out. “Take her out of here!”

Wei Dong gritted his teeth. He dragged Xin Miao with him and they crawled through the picture frame. The second he left, he heard a loud rumble, signalling the building’s collapse….

Light enveloped them, dispelling the nightmare.

Ke Xun was still lying against Mu Yiran’s back. His calf seemed to have lost all feeling. He didn’t know when it had started, but tears streamed down his face, soaking the back of Mu Yiran’s shirt.

Everyone stood in the exhibition hall in silence. When they managed to gather enough courage to look at the painting, they were unexpectedly met with warmth and light.

《Fifth in the Breaking Through the Ground Series》——Painter: Luo Bing, 2016.

The painting depicted the atrium courtyard of the Spring Bamboo Apartments. Every corner seemed to be bathed in sunlight. Although it was a painting of olden times, it was very colourful. It made people feel good.

The courtyard was filled with warmth and cheer. There were children skipping rope and housewives picking vegetables or washing clothes. There was also a boy sitting in a corner of the courtyard, painting on a canvas. The image on the canvas was a giant stalk of bamboo. The boy was in the middle of adding the windows on the bamboo.

In the painting, there were also two older men playing chess. One was the gatekeeper uncle, Uncle Zhang. The other was Old Man Li Taiyong, who had a kind smile on his face. Next to the elderly man was Xin Miao, who was performing a ballet move with a sweet grin gracing her face.

Wei Dong looked down at his right hand. He had been holding Xin Miao with his right hand when he had crawled out. The space around him had grown increasingly large so he had gotten up to run. But as he ran, the resistance from the person behind him had grown lighter and lighter. By the time he made it back to reality, the girl had already disappeared.

Right now, all that was left in the palm of his hand was a small, blue bow-shaped hair clip. It was the same one Xin Miao wore in her hair.

“They look really happy in the painting,” Mu Yiran said.

Ke Xun didn’t say a thing.

Qin Ci’s expression was heavy but the only thing he could say now was: “We should take Xiao Ke to the hospital. His leg might be fractured.”

Eve: This is one of my favourite endings. My heart aches a lot for Li Taiyong and Xin Miao, but there’s also so much hope. I’m also glad that they are at least happy and at peace inside the painting. The world needs more kindness. More people like Grandpa Li. Now I’ll have to excuse myself because even though it’s a hopeful end, it still hurts.