1 Chapter 1: Mystery Book

A girl panted as she took each step towards her new place.

She was carrying a large box, and it seemed like the box will fall any moment now. She stopped for a while, adjusted her grip on the box and continued walking towards her house.

The girl dumped the box in front of a house. F013 was engraved on the iron plate nailed on the door of the house.

The girl stretched her sore hand and massaged it. She knew that it would ache some times later considering that she made six trips from her car to her new studio apartment.

The first trip was relatively easy on her as she had all her energy to lift the box. But her energy depleted with each trip and thank god she was smart; she left the lightest box for the last trip.

The girl came to City L because she and her best friend, Pretty Mei Zhen, yes, that's her real name, partnered up to open a bookstore café in here. She will be in charge with the bookstore and Pretty will be in charge with the café.

Her hometown is only an hour drive from City L, but the girl thought that she could focus better if she stayed nearby to her store. She searched for this studio apartment herself, so she was delighted with it.

It was such a relief that the apartment complex only had one floor so she could manage to lift all her things.

The studio apartment she rented was a one-bedroom house in addition to a living, kitchen and dining area. The exterior of the home was so much like those houses you always see in anime.

A house like those in anime - That was the main reason why the girl chose the apartment complex to settle for in City L.

The girl loves anime, and she aspired to live her life like those in the anime. A life where she had a handsome neighbour, and they fell in love. Or maybe, having a secret rendezvous at night since they lived next to each other.

The girl giggled. She was pleased with herself. As someone who is 25-year-old and likes anime, she did not ask much for her love life.

She turned to F012, where her first potential male lead in her love story lived. The door was very plain and it even looked as if the house was vacant for quite some times already.

Then she turned to the next house, F014 had a very different door colour from the rest of the houses. F014 had a grill installed at the front door, repainted the door from cream colour to brown wood, and it even had a bell.

Not wanting to think about the occupants in the house next to her, the girl took out her keys and tried to unlock the door.

The girl had five keys in total, and all of them looked identical. She fumbled to try each key because her hands were sore.

"Ugh, shut it! What kind of landlady dump the keys to me without even labelling them?" The girl whined to herself, and after a few attempts, the door went unlocked with the last key.

All her boxes were scattered in front of her house. The girl sighed and felt that having a man to help out during this time of need would be very helpful. Thinking back to what happened this morning, the girl gritted her teeth and cursed her younger brother in her heart.

The only man in the girl's life would be her younger brother. Her father passed away three years ago while she was still struggling in university. She is single, and no man seems to be interested in her for the time being.

Even the only man in her life refused to help her moving boxes. Her brother felt that going to battle fight with this PUBG teammates was more important than helping his elder sister moving boxes. The girl could not even count her elder sister in. Her elder sister was married to a businessman somewhere in Borneo Island and had been absent from her life for about five years now.

While the girl was whining over her miserable first day of moving into her new house, the door on her right opened. The girl turned around to see a pale man with a thick-rimmed spectacle emerged from the door.

The pale man froze when he saw the girl.

The girl smiled at her new neighbour. Even with the thick-rimmed spectacle, the man is good-looking. The girl opened her mouth to greet the man, but before she could say anything, the pale man took a step back and slammed the door shut.

"What the hell?" The girl paused and then she realised. "Sorry, mom. Forgive me, mom."

Knowing that involuntary cursed escaped her mouth, the girl slapped her lips a few times. If her mom heard her cursing, her mother would be very disappointed in her. The girl looked at F014 with a frowned. Isn't the man too rude? Even if he was surprised to see a beautiful lady in front of him, he should not shut the door to her face.

The girl rolled her eyes towards F014 as if the occupant could see her. The eye-rolling made her feel much better, so she started lifting her box into her house.

While the girl was carrying her fourth box inside the house, she heard a loud thud coming from her front door. Thinking that someone might try to run over or kicked her last box, the girl put the fourth box hastily on the floor and sprinted to the door to check her belonging.

When the girl opened her door, she caught a glimpse of F014 shutting her door.

Did the man from F014 try to do something to her box?

Even though there was nothing expensive inside the fifth box, the box contained her few electrical appliances and her favourite pillow. Her mother hated the pillow because according to her, the pillow was rude and impolite.

On the pillow, a cat with a smug smile and was giving a middle finger was printed on it.

The girl thought that the cat was cool, and she often flashes the Meow with a middle finger at her brother as a sign of anger whenever her brother disturbed her in the house. It made her brother angry every time, and she did not get the blame since it was not her who was giving the middle finger sign, it was Meow the pillow.

She lifted the box into her house quickly and put the box on the table near the sink. The book was slightly opened, so she inspected the box if anything went missing from the. To her surprise, nothing was missing; instead, the girl found a book inside the box.

A book that was not hers.

The girl wondered if the loud thud came from the book being dropped into the box. But who would do so without telling her? The man from F014? But why? It could not be a housewarming gift, right?

The girl took out the book and saw that there were a few drops of blood on the book.

"What the hell?" The girl threw the book to the table. The blood shocked her. When the girl tried to lift and look at the book again, the blood was not there anymore.

"Eh? No blood? Am I seeing things just now?" The girl laughed by herself.

Now there was this one thing people need to know about this girl. She has a habit that drove her mom crazy that is; she likes to talk to herself. The girl was always alone in the house when her parents went working when she was younger, so she developed the habit of talking to herself. After all, she needed a second opinion from experts. She told her mom that she needed an opinion from 'me, myself and I."

"What book is this? Oh, it's a short stories compilation. Since someone put it in my box, then from now, this book is mine, right?" The girl put the book aside, and since she already opened the box, might as well she took the electrical appliances out of the box since she will be using them shortly.

The second thing after the book that she took out from the box would be her Meow.

She took out the cat pillow from the box and saw that there were blood sprinkles on the pillow. Since the pillow was mostly white, the blood sprinkles stood out more even if the pillow was inside the box.

"The hell? Why are you so dirty, Meow?" The girl lifted the pillow and saw the blood sprinkles. Remembering what happened earlier, she did not trust her sight fully.

The girl rubbed her eyes to make sure that it was not an illusion. By the time she finished rubbing her eyes, the blood spots were still there. It was not an illusion, unlike the book.

The girl bought Meow the pillow to the sink and tried to rub off the blood spots from the pillow. As she was rubbing the blood spot under the running tap, she heard knocking on the door. She put Meow on the sink and went to open the door in case the person who placed the book on her box came to claim the book.

"Miss Lily Melody Zhang?" A man spoke right after Lily opened the door.

"Meow! That's right!" Lily blurted without thinking.

The man was taken aback by how Lily answered him. The silence was deafening and upon realising how weird she was acting; Lily was slightly embarrassed.

'Forget it. You heard nothing. Forget it. You heard nothing. Forget it. You heard nothing. If you could not forget about it, then at least pretend you heard nothing'.

Lily chanted those words inside her heart. She stared right into the man's eyes in case her mantra will influence him.

"I like Pokémon too; my favourite is Gengar." The guy smiled and handed over a package to Lily. "This is a package for you. Please sign here."

Because she was embarrassed by her previous action, Lily did not look at the paper and just signed on it. Then, she took the package and thanked the delivery man before she bid him goodbye.

She bought the package to the table and wondered who would send her a package. The number of people who knew that she moved into her new house can be counted with one hand. Even Lily herself did not know the exact address of the new home.

She scanned around the kitchen cabinet and found a knife. She took the knife and tried to open the package.

"Who is it that so stupid to wrap this package with three layers of duct tape? What is so important inside to make them wrap this thing with a freaking duct… Ahhhh!!!"

Lily was whining while she was cutting through the duct tape. She exerted a lot of strength in one push of the knife and the knife accidentally cut her finger.

"It hurts…. It hurts…" Lily waved her fingers around and stomped on her feet, another one of her habit that drove her mom crazy. Lily told her mom that she stomped her feet to make the pain go away, but no one's buying her excuse.

Lily took a closer look on her finger, and a lot of blood dripped from the small cut. Looking at the amount of blood flowing, she might drain all her blood in a few hours.

Lily wiggled her hands in an attempt to reduce the pain, but it did not make any difference. A few drops of blood messily sprinkled on the table and some on the book.

The pain magnified.

Lily was not sure if pain worked that way, but the pain was too much for her to handle, and Lily felt as if she was slipping slowly.

The only thing she saw before she passed out would Meow the pillow on the sink. And Meow was giving her the 'middle finger' sign.