Little Pink Starfish

After getting scolded by Fat Cat, Yuan Yuanyuan slumped on the couch, falling into a dazed silence. Her thoughts were swirling around one thing — Si Qun’s hair being Gu…

Right. Ordinary butterflies don’t spin silk.
If he does, then he must be something different, something extraordinary.

Yuan Yuanyuan had a strong feeling that this whole matter was anything but simple.
All the hair Si Qun had ever lost was now in his brother’s possession, and it was that same brother who had turned him into the dull-witted version of himself.
The lives of the older generation must have been full of blood and storms — way more intense than the current generation’s petty scuffles. She and her peers probably weren’t even worth raising an eyebrow over by comparison.

She glanced at Fat Cat, who was flicking his tail nearby.
“Do a lot of people know about this?” she asked.

“Huh? About what?” Fat Cat blinked. “Oh, you mean the Gu King’s hair being made of Gu worms? Eh… I’m not exactly sure either. But if I had to guess, that’s probably what it is.”

…So you were just guessing too.
Yuan Yuanyuan felt a bit deflated. But thinking about it, his guess actually made a weird kind of sense.

“Hey, Fat Cat, can you guess anything else?” she asked eagerly, leaning closer.

“Well, I can guess that the Gu King you’re talking about is Li Si Qun,” Fat Cat said, licking his paw.

Little Ying sat nearby, clearly confused, tilting her head as she tried to follow the conversation between Yuan Yuanyuan and Fat Cat, but she clearly didn’t understand any of it.

Yuan Yuanyuan flinched dramatically in response to Fat Cat’s words, drawing a smug chuckle from him. Little Ying remained bewildered.

“Come on,” Fat Cat said, “just admit it’s Li Si Qun. Butterfly yokai, Gu King — it all points straight at him. You couldn’t have made it more obvious.”

“It is him…” Yuan Yuanyuan admitted. After that cold smirk from Fat Cat, she realized there was no point pretending anymore. He’d already caught Si Qun visiting her, and he knew they worked side-by-side in the tavern’s kitchen. There was no sense in keeping up the act.

“Did someone say something to you?” Fat Cat’s first reaction was exactly the same as Li Zi Jie’s, which made Yuan Yuanyuan give him a tight, sarcastic smile. Fat Cat just shook his head.
“Don’t look at me like that. We’re just worried about you.”

“I feel like I’m the only one you shouldn’t be worried about,” she muttered.

Little Ying flitted between the two of them.
When asked what she was doing, she replied, “I don’t really know what you’re talking about, but it all sounds super intense…”

The injuries on Yuan Yuanyuan’s hand still hadn’t faded. The red marks were still vivid, and with time, even more tiny blood spots had started to appear.

She gently touched the injury with her other hand. Since Fat Cat could make these guesses based on TV dramas, maybe she should take a cue and come up with a few wild theories of her own.

Gu, after all… she’d first encountered the concept in wuxia novels.

The most well-known version was the Love Gu from southern tribes — the one where every girl had her own Gu, and if she fell for someone, she’d implant it in the man.

The trope had been used so often that the original source was hard to track down.
People always focused on the tragic love story of the man and woman, but no one ever paid attention to the Gu worms, those poor things stuck in the middle.
This time, Yuan Yuanyuan decided to focus on the worms themselves.

There were many different interpretations of Gu.
One common version involved splitting a creature in two, or two people each taking half — and it often had to be swallowed.
But based on her recent encounters, it seemed that Gu could also be absorbed — maybe even through the skin?

She imagined the head of the Li family lighting Si Qun’s hair on fire to release Gu, and calling over a group of people to stand in the smoke. That didn’t sound too far-fetched anymore.

But one question had haunted her from the start — or at least, she had a theory but couldn’t quite wrap her head around it.

Why had she been the most seriously injured?

If the Gu poison affected everyone, it should’ve worked on others too. After all, when she first encountered it, the entire room passed out — and yet, she had nearly died.
She’d fought tons of powerful yokai before without being hurt this badly.

The only theory that made any sense to her was this:
She had already been infected before.
Like in the southern tribe tales, Gu poison worked best between the one who planted it and the one who received it.

But that only raised a bigger, more baffling question:

When was she ever infected?

Yuan Yuanyuan couldn’t answer that, so she set the thought aside.
But somewhere deep inside, an absurd possibility had taken root.

…Maybe it was because she used to like touching people’s hair, and without realizing it, she’d been infected.

If that was true, then…

She really was asking for it.

Yuan Yuanyuan sat there, looking tragically resigned.
She had no words for this — but it seemed like a pretty big mystery had just been half-solved.

Elsewhere, the TV show was still airing in sync with the manga. Though rough in quality, it had captured people’s attention. It was different enough that folks began noticing what was missing from their current world — a kind of nostalgic magic.

Sometimes, when Gao Ling went out with her friends, she couldn’t help overhearing their discussions about the show.
With these kinds of young idol dramas, people always ranted and criticized beforehand, only to completely reverse course once it aired.
“I love it now!” mode activated.

Her friends would rave about how “faithful” the adaptation was, how “respectful” it was to the source, and Gao Ling had to stifle her laughter.
If anyone saw her smirking, she’d just wave it off and say it wasn’t intentional.

“You’re always like this,” one hot-tempered friend scolded her today.
“If you don’t like it, fine! But what’s with that smug face?
You think you can find a more ‘authentic’ monster than the ones in the show?”

Gao Ling’s eyes drifted upward — just then, a figure resembling a spider yokai darted across the skyline.
It was swift and silent in the city shadows, and something about the moment struck her as hilarious.

She paused for three seconds, then nodded seriously.

That nod nearly drove her friend to a full meltdown. She almost grabbed her bag and stormed off — only to be coaxed back by the others.

Sometimes Gao Ling wanted to show off and say, “Come on then, let’s go to Yuan’s tavern and see a real monster!”

But she was too cowardly for that.

Besides, even if she wanted to go back… she couldn’t.

Last time, she’d kind of… stumbled in by accident.
Now? Even if someone invited her, she didn’t think she could find her way back in.

Then, suddenly, she remembered another place where she had once seen yokai.

The memory hit her out of nowhere.
It was such a clear, sunny day that the thought floated into her head as if on a breeze.

She’d only been there once — a long, long time ago.
She turned and said to her friends, “Let me take you to a clothing shop.”

“Sure!” they all chimed in.
Even the sulky one who had just gotten angry was finally persuaded.

Gao Ling led the way, fully energized.

The owner of that clothing store — she remembered him.
He had once saved her life. He had a gentle temperament, tolerated her mother’s rambling, understood human society pretty well, and always had a long smoking pipe — the kind that gave off serious yokai vibes.

She wasn’t even sure why she thought of him today.
She couldn’t recall the exact location of the shop anymore… but she figured she could find it.

Gao Ling wasn’t usually this mischievous, but the drama had left her in a weirdly defiant mood.

Hmph!
Back when I was watching Yuan fight, none of you even knew who he was!
Hmph!
Back when I was spying on Yuan, you all didn’t even know what yokai WERE!
Hmph!
Back when I was risking my life… where the hell were you?

Fueled by this petty, triumphant energy, Gao Ling marched ahead, leading her group straight into the Infant Zone — though in human society, it had a different name.

She couldn’t remember the way perfectly, but she had a trick…

That shop — you could only see it if you could see yokai.

So she walked along, pointing to random buildings and asking if her friends could see them.
Some thought she was being weird, but she didn’t care.

Then suddenly, after pointing at one overgrown yard, something changed.

Her friends — who had been saying “Yeah, I see it” — now said,
“Huh? I don’t see anything.”

Gao Ling froze.

She looked at the wild, overgrown lot in front of her.

It wasn’t like this last time she came… was it?

She took a step forward, trying to figure out what was going on.

And then — BAM.
It felt like someone punched her in the back.

Her vision went black.
She collapsed to the ground.
And remembered nothing more.