Chapter 1: Little Skeleton Toy
“A ghost! There really is a ghost!”
With a scream, the quiet night in the villa was instantly lit up.
Mu Mu, just about to bend down to pick up a paintbrush from the floor, was startled. Like a puffed-up cat, he scrambled away in panic, clumsily maneuvering his new little body.
But the hallway was empty. All the doors were closed, leaving no place to hide.
Plop! A tiny skeleton toy fell over on the spot, playing dead in a futile act of self-deception.
After all, the villa’s servants didn’t dare come over to check, and Mu Mu was just about to decide to cheat his way through, when he suddenly heard another set of footsteps.
Thump, thump, thump…
Unhurried, steady, and strong.
Mu Mu immediately scrambled up again, tilting his head to listen carefully for a moment, then once more began running around in a frantic, aimless panic.
Until he pushed open an unlocked door, slipped into a small cabinet with practiced ease, and peered out through the crack.
The footsteps grew closer. When they reached the doorway of the room, they paused for a moment.
The next second, all the lights in the room turned on, and a tall man appeared in Mu Mu’s line of sight.
Today, he was wearing just a crisp white shirt—neat and sharp—his demeanor serious, and the intensity between his brows carried the commanding air of a top executive, as if slipping on a suit jacket would make him ready to chair a board meeting.
Sure enough, it wasn’t a servant. It was the owner of the villa.
This man, who could easily be mistaken for a domineering CEO, was named Fu Heqing. His true profession was that of a painter—a truly remarkable painter.
One whose works were always auctioned off for huge sums.
Yet, this remarkable painter had, because of him, lost his last remaining servant.
Thinking of this, Mu Mu felt a surge of guilt and self-reproach, but more than anything, he felt a deep sense of unease…
He lurked furtively in someone else’s house, unable to repay them in any way, yet constantly causing trouble and frightening people.
The painter glanced around the room and placed a pen on the table—the one Mu Mu had left behind in the hallway.
Then he fished another object from his pocket and set it down on the table with a crisp clink.
Mu Mu’s attention was instantly drawn.
After lingering for a few seconds, curiosity finally got the better of him. He slipped out of the little skeleton’s body, reverting to his ghostly form.
A light, transparent spirit body—the kind no one could see.
As Mu Mu drifted past the mirror, he paused briefly. The surface remained blank, reflecting nothing.
Not even himself.
He floated leisurely through the air, drifting out of the cabinet and weaving through the bookshelves. Only when he neared the desk did he slowly poke half his head out.
The moment Mu Mu appeared, Fu Heqing’s gaze immediately fixed on him, scrutinizing him inch by inch like a hunter sizing up its prey.
Feeling that intensely invasive stare, Mu Mu instantly retreated back into the bookshelf. After a few seconds, he cautiously peeked out again, his eyes darting around in alarm.
The room held no other soul, and the painter remained bent over his desk, eyes fixed downward.
Strange.
The panic in Mu Mu’s eyes shifted to confusion.
He peered around for a long moment before cautiously retreating once more.
The instant Mu Mu vanished, Fu Heqing’s eyes flashed with disappointment. He reached out again, flicking an object on the desk that clinked softly.
Then he left the room, switching off the light.
Mu Mu returned to the cabinet, burrowing back into the little skeleton toy’s body.
This little skeleton toy was exquisitely crafted. Every detail mirrored the human body, and almost all its joints could move. It was the vessel Mu Mu had finally found after wandering the human world for who knows how long—a body he could possess.
For the first time, Mu Mu had a tangible form he could touch, and he was overwhelmed with joy.
He tried to run using the newly installed limbs, but his two legs ran independently of each other, like a zombie on the loose. Any servant who happened to witness him was terrified and quit on the spot, one after another.
“I really am a terrible fellow…”
Every time he thought of this, Mu Mu couldn’t help but scold himself.
He loved lively, bustling surroundings, yet he had caused the painter here to become increasingly isolated. He felt utterly guilty.
Mu Mu reproached himself, but he didn’t want to return to those lonely days where no one paid attention to him, and all he could do was talk to himself.
So, Mu Mu secretly tried to help the painter with what little he could, to make amends. He turned his attention to the desk and huffed and puffed as he climbed up.
Soon, the edge of the desk revealed a tiny skeleton head poking out.
A faint dim light above the desk flickered the moment it caught sight of the little skeleton, silently recording everything.
“So this is what the painter placed here,” Mu Mu exclaimed with delight as he looked at the pen the painter had set down. Beside it was a small red bell shaped like a rose.
He bent down and picked up the little bell, cradling it in his hand to examine it. The bell was the perfect size for the little skeleton’s palm, and in his hand, it gleamed like a bright red gem.
The red-rose design matched the little burgundy dress perfectly, making the skeleton toy look even more delicate and playful.
Mu Mu shook the bell a couple of times, clearly delighted, but no matter how much he liked it, he placed it back in its original spot.
Then, Mu Mu began helping the painter organize the desk.
—
Fu Heqing returned to his study. On the computer, a video was looping.
At a glance, it was clearly footage from the hallway surveillance camera.
In night-vision mode, everything that had happened in the corridor that night was captured with perfect clarity—
A chibi-proportioned little skeleton, dressed in a lovely burgundy formal suit. It had an oversized chibi-style skull, a cute smile on its face, and quietly pushed open a door before stepping out of the room.
This little skeleton toy moved stealthily through the corridor, accompanied by the click-clack of its stiff, uncooperative joints.
Every movement was strangely slow, like a child who had only just learned to walk, taking careful, unsteady steps.
The little skeleton’s original destination had been another room, but when it spotted a paintbrush lying on the floor not far away, it suddenly changed direction.
It walked over, intending to pick up the paintbrush, when its movement was abruptly interrupted by a sharp scream…
When Fu Heqing saw the little skeleton ultimately choose to lie down on the spot, he let out a soft chuckle. Dragging the mouse, he captured a screenshot from the final frame of the surveillance footage.
Holding the printed photo, he walked into the inner room of his study and pressed a hidden panel.
The bookshelf slowly slid aside, revealing a deeper secret chamber.
The room beyond was pitch-black. Even after the lights were turned on, it remained dim and oppressive.
Fu Heqing took the photo and walked over to a blank canvas, hanging the photograph upon it.
Beside this blank canvas, stretching along the wall, every painting was similarly adorned with a photograph.
The first photograph was labeled October 28.
Beneath the moonlight streaming in through the window, a cute little skeleton toy cautiously approached an equally adorable teddy bear.
But in the painting below it, the surrounding background was grotesquely twisted and spiraling, rendered by the artist in the bleakest tones imaginable. The only thing that retained its original colors was the little skeleton itself—its movements and posture exactly the same as in the photograph.
The second photograph was labeled October 25.
The background was the living room. It was still nighttime. A servant had seen the little skeleton and let out a piercing scream.
The canvas was just as gloomy. The servant depicted in the painting was grotesque and distorted, the entire figure even marked with a large, heavy cross.
The third… the fourth…
Every photograph, every painting—each one depicted the little skeleton.
At the very end of the row of paintings, dated September 25, the photograph showed an empty studio. But the painting beneath it portrayed a young man—
The portrait depicted a lifelike boy with delicate features and short black hair. He wore a simple white robe that covered him from collarbone to knees as he sat on a windowsill.
Yet the portrait was incomplete: nearly half of the boy’s face remained blank.
On the completed right half of his face, a large, round, catlike eye—more beautiful than obsidian—made him look innocent and harmless beyond compare.
So beautiful that he did not seem real.
And indeed, he was not real. The boy’s body in the painting was translucent, like a drifting wisp of spirit.
Fu Heqing did not know what the boy was, but at first glance he did not feel that it was a vengeful ghost or malevolent spirit. Instead, he seemed more like a fairy who had wandered into the mortal world by mistake.
Weak, ignorant, and utterly without guard—beautiful in appearance.
As pure as blank paper, and just as fragile.
Gazing at the boy in the portrait, Fu Heqing picked up his brush and, guided by the memory of that fleeting first glance, slowly filled in the missing parts.
He stared at the completed painting for a long time. Then he hung it in the foremost position. Just as he finished, a loud noise suddenly came from upstairs, followed shortly by another loud crash.
It sounded like someone slamming a door after an argument—but one slam, two slams, three…
The sound of doors being violently shut traveled from one end of the corridor to the other. Sometimes, the same door would produce that sound several times in a row.
Listening to the commotion upstairs, Fu Heqing fell silent for a moment, then turned and left the secret chamber.
—
Just as Mu Mu pushed the door open and squeezed into the room, a powerful gust of wind went bang and slammed it shut behind him.
Every night, besides helping the painter with his work, he also patrolled the territory, checking to see whether any other wandering spirits were eyeing the painter’s villa.
But today, his patrol was especially difficult. The strong winds made opening and closing doors unusually hard.
Mu Mu went along the hallway, bang bang bang, shutting doors one after another. After resting for a long while, he finally decided to give up—he might as well go find his friends to play with instead.
“Little Bear, I’ve come to see you again.”
Mu Mu found the guest room and pushed the door open, toddling on his short little legs toward the two-meter-tall teddy bear placed in the corner. With practiced ease, he pulled open the zipper on the teddy bear’s back and crawled inside.
“Waaah, Little Bear, I caused trouble again today—I scared away the painter’s last remaining servant…”
While controlling the little skeleton’s body to roll around inside the teddy bear’s stuffing, savoring the soft, fluffy cotton propping him up, Mu Mu whimpered and rambled on about everything that had happened that day.
Little Bear couldn’t speak, and could only silently listen to Mu Mu’s endless chatter.
Outside the window, the wind never let up. Only after lightning split the sky did the heavy rain finally begin to fall.
“Wow, the weather is really nice today.”
Mu Mu pressed up against the window, gazing outside with unmistakable longing in his eyes.
The raging wind and torrential rain, mixed with flashes of lightning and peals of thunder, were nothing short of an audiovisual feast to Mu Mu.
Compared to thunder and lightning, Mu Mu liked even more the feeling of standing on the balcony and letting the wind and rain batter against him.
Although he couldn’t feel the cool chill humans talked about, the raindrops landing on his body made tiny, tiny tap tap tap sounds.
When he fell into puddles and sent up great splashes of water, the sounds were even richer.
Unfortunately, he had only managed to do these things once before being discovered by the servants, and rumors of the place being haunted gradually began to spread.
Yet every time a servant reported these incidents to the painter, the painter never seemed to believe them.
Watching the torrential rain outside, Mu Mu felt a sudden stirring of temptation.
“It’s fine. I’ll close the window again—put it back exactly the same as before.”
“Surely… it probably won’t be noticed.”
Muttering to himself, as if having finally made up his mind, Mu Mu climbed onto the balcony and fiddled with the latch on the balcony door.
The moment he opened it, a violent gust of wind surged into the room with a whoosh, scattering the books and loose papers in the guest room in every direction.
“Oh no—today it’s a south wind!”
Watching the papers whirl wildly through the air, Mu Mu ran and hopped about, trying to pick them up and restore everything to how it was when—
Suddenly, he heard a sound from outside the door.
Someone was knocking.
Bang.
The balcony window was slammed shut in an instant by some unseen force, and the papers drifted down from the air, settling across the floor.
The room fell into dead silence.
And the little skeleton was already nowhere to be seen.
No one knew how much time passed before Mu Mu cautiously drifted out of the teddy bear, his expression taut with nerves as he stared at the door, as though facing a formidable enemy.
He quietly phased through the door and looked outside.
There was nothing there.
Then he lowered his gaze—and saw something red, a rose-shaped… tiny bell.
