After the assistant had people install the surveillance cameras, he immediately reported to Xie Ningwan. Xie Ningwan sat in his company office and opened the surveillance feed.
There were three camera feeds in total: the living room, study, and bedroom. Xie Ningwan pulled them up one by one onto his computer screen and observed them carefully.
For the time being, nothing suspicious appeared. Everything looked exactly the same as when he had left that morning, with no changes.
It was also possible that the assistant had only just left, and the “person” or “thing” hiding in the house did not dare to act rashly.
Xie Ningwan dragged the surveillance feeds to one corner of the screen for easy monitoring at any time. He then continued with his work, occasionally glancing up at the feeds.
A long time passed, approaching the end of the workday, but the cameras still captured nothing suspicious in their ranges.
Xie Ningwan enlarged the feeds, rested his hands on his chin, and swept his gaze across the three screens. Darkness deepened in his eyes as he fell into thought.
The many strange phenomena that had suddenly appeared in his home recently—the shifting and missing items, the television turning on by itself, the messy bed sheets…
Xie Ningwan had keenly noticed the anomalies. At first, he suspected that he had been too fatigued lately and was suffering from neurasthenia.
Later, after discovering the marks on the guest room bed, he suspected the villa’s maintenance staff. But the assistant’s investigation confirmed that all the on-site maintenance personnel were proper and supervised each other, with no one overstepping.
As the anomalies became more obvious, Xie Ningwan’s first thought was that someone had secretly hidden themselves in the villa.
He had considered calling the police, but first, the villa district had strict security, requiring identity verification for entry and exit, making the chance of a thief slipping in extremely slim. Second, only scattered small items had gone missing—ones he had recently worn—and the most important computer and safe in the study showed no signs of being touched…
‘Could it be a little wild cat?’ Xie Ningwan frowned.
It could have slipped in through a window or door crack, secretly jumped onto the guest room bed to sleep and mess up the sheets, then stealthily carried off his cufflinks and tie clip. There was some possibility.
…But would a wild cat turn on the television and tune it to SpongeBob SquarePants for itself?
Song Yaoyao sprawled on the sofa, sleeping soundly. He had no idea that his slacking off today had temporarily saved him from disaster.
He also did not know that he had let the nonexistent little cat take the blame for him.
.
In the evening, Xie Ningwan returned home.
He opened the door and stood in the entryway, taking in the entire living room at a glance.
The television was off, and nothing unusual appeared in sight. Xie Ningwan calmly followed his usual routine: he entered, took off his coat, then went upstairs to the bathroom to shower.
However, as he passed the sofa, his footsteps paused slightly.
Had these throw pillows been arranged like this before?
Xie Ningwan imprinted the positions of the throw pillows on the sofa in his mind with a sidelong glance. While recalling their positions from before he left that morning and from the afternoon surveillance, he continued upstairs.
Song Yaoyao had woken up before Xie Ningwan returned. He now rubbed his eyes and trailed behind him, unaware of the slight pause.
He followed Xie Ningwan into the bathroom. After Xie Ningwan undressed and entered the shower, Song Yaoyao pulled Xie Ningwan’s shirt over his head and rummaged through the laundry basket.
With the successful experiences from the previous thefts, Song Yaoyao grew bolder: “What good stuff is there today…”
He rummaged out a platinum tie clip.
“Awesome!”
Song Yaoyao loved these small, shiny trinkets the most; they were very convenient to hide under his pillow.
He “stole” the gleaming tie clip and tucked it away back to his room.
Soon after, the sound of water in the bathroom stopped. Xie Ningwan emerged from the shower wrapped in a bathrobe. As he sorted his accessories, his fingers paused upon discovering the missing tie clip. He fell silent for a moment but was no longer surprised.
He returned to the study to work.
Xie Ningwan originally planned to pull up the surveillance on his computer screen to check for anomalies from when he left the company until he got home. But for some reason, he paused for a moment and instead opened the company reports.
Shortly after, a little ghost slipped in through the door crack, floated over to the computer, and glanced at it.
Upon seeing the familiar spreadsheets and complex numbers, he lost interest and floated away.
In the bookshelf, the storybook from last night that Xie Ningwan had read and returned to its place sat sandwiched between several books.
Song Yaoyao wandered nearby, glanced at Xie Ningwan, then gently reached out—
Rustle—
The clear friction sound of a book being pulled rang out, and Song Yaoyao yanked his hand back.
Forget it.
He would not read it!
Song Yaoyao pushed the small section of book spine he had pulled out back into place and gave up on the book.
He circled the study once, returned to Xie Ningwan’s side, squeezed onto the armrest of Xie Ningwan’s chair, sat down, and accompanied him while looking at the reports. At the same time, he leaned in closer to absorb the fortune emanating from Xie Ningwan’s body.
Xie Ningwan worked very seriously. Song Yaoyao propped up half his cheek and leaned on the desk surface. He looked at the computer screen, then turned back to look at Xie Ningwan, pondering the important plot points about Xie Ningwan from the original book.
Although Xie Ningwan was already very formidable—the protagonist with the most fortune in the entire book—he still inevitably faced provocations and harm from his villainous uncle and cousins. He needed to take some action to help Xie Ningwan avoid those bad plot developments.
That night, Xie Ningwan no longer felt the heaviness in his shoulders, but he always sensed a faint chill lingering around him.
When he finally stood up late at night to return to his bedroom for rest, he turned his head and glanced toward the bookshelf.
…
The next day, Xie Ningwan proceeded as usual. He got up, had a simple breakfast, and headed to the company.
Song Yaoyao also proceeded as usual. After seeing Xie Ningwan off to the company, he stayed home with his own tasks.
Today, besides watching cartoons, Song Yaoyao decided to tidy his room. He would return the tie, tie clip, and other items he had stolen and hidden over the past couple of days to their original places, then swap in some new things.
Xie Ningwan arrived at the company, sat down at his computer, took the coffee and documents from his assistant, and flipped through them while sipping.
At home, Song Yaoyao pulled out the tie and tie clip from under his pillow in his room and took them back to Xie Ningwan’s walk-in closet.
Xie Ningwan finished signing the documents and faced the computer screen. His fingers tapped on the desk, and he opened the surveillance feeds.
Song Yaoyao leisurely draped Xie Ningwan’s tie around himself and floated toward Xie Ningwan’s bedroom.
Xie Ningwan first clicked on the surveillance feed for the most important room, the study, and examined it carefully. Seeing no anomalies, he switched the feeds one by one to the living room and bedroom—
In the bedroom, on the surveillance screen, a tie floated in midair by itself. On the other end, a tie clip also floated up, clipped onto the tie, and then they floated together into the walk-in closet. There, they separately jumped into the appropriate wardrobe and accessory cabinet.
Xie Ningwan: “…?”
The hand holding his coffee paused.
Immediately after, the closet door opened automatically, as if an invisible little shadow stood before it and pulled it open.
The invisible little shadow hesitated in front of the closet. It first took out a suit, held it in hand while pondering for a moment, then put it back and selected a shirt he wore close to his body.
Xie Ningwan’s expression remained impassive, but the hand gripping the mouse stalled: “…”
The invisible little shadow draped his shirt over itself and, just like when it entered, lightly floated out of the walk-in closet and bedroom.
Xie Ningwan instinctively switched the camera to the study, then to the living room.
The next second, the television in the living room suddenly turned on by itself. The little shadow wearing his shirt pounced onto the sofa, even pressing a slight dent into the soft cushions. Then it lay there motionless.
…
The familiar opening theme of the cartoon played, exactly the same as what he had witnessed yesterday when he unexpectedly returned home.
Xie Ningwan’s expression froze, and for a moment, he could not react.
He closed his eyes, wanting for the first time to doubt his own eyes. But when he opened them again, the invisible little shadow on the sofa in the feed was still wearing his shirt. It even rearranged the two throw pillows, stacking them together before leaning back against them.
If he had not seen it with his own eyes, Xie Ningwan could not have believed that there really existed an invisible entity of unknown origin in his home right now.
Looking back now, all those previous incidents of objects moving—the missing cufflinks, falling books… the strange events that made him suspect he was seeing things or suffering from neurasthenia—had been the work of this little ghost.
Right, and that guest room last time.
Xie Ningwan rubbed his forehead.
