Chapter 7: “Delete it”
Fu Heqing looked at the little skeleton on his bed without speaking, waiting to see what confession Mu Mu would offer.
But in truth, the whole incident’s cause and course were very clear—there was no room for excuses. He just wanted to see what this little skeleton toy might come up with.
Seeing that the artist hadn’t spoken, Mu Mu realized he was waiting for his “confession.” He thought he might try to come up with some clever excuses.
But Mu Mu thought and thought, and thought some more, and with no experience in lying, his mind went completely blank.
“What if I lie poorly and get caught… will he still go easy on me?” Mu Mu glanced secretly and, in a small voice, asked again.
Fu Heqing didn’t respond, but Mu Mu could feel his gaze becoming even sharper.
Unable to figure out what the other was thinking, he could only speak honestly. “Alright… I just got a little carried away.”
He recounted exactly how he discovered Shake and Drift Bottle, how he added friends through the game, and how he ended up arguing with someone online—every detail, without omission.
When he finished, Mu Mu looked at Fu Heqing and said, “I didn’t lie, see? I answered everything truthfully.”
Then he raised his five bony fingers, face earnest. “I’m being very sincere.”
Fu Heqing looked at Mu Mu, let out a cold snort, and asked, “You even went to argue?”
Mu Mu felt even more guilty. Just as he was about to reply, he was suddenly buried again under the lifted blanket into its soft, swirling folds. The next moment, he was lifted and placed back beside the pillow on the bed.
“From now on, you’re not allowed to go anywhere at night.”
“But we ghosts don’t need to sleep…”
Mu Mu tried to argue, but a look from Fu Heqing made his voice shrink smaller and smaller.
“Don’t make me repeat myself,” Fu Heqing said.
Mu Mu didn’t understand, but he was greatly shocked. “So… sleeping is something you have to learn too?”
Fu Heqing was silent for a moment, then calmly said, “Yes.”
Mu Mu: “!!!”
Feigning obedience, Mu Mu lay down beside the artist, imitating his posture, lying perfectly straight, and then closed his eyes.
Fu Heqing had taken medicine and, drowsy and passive, soon fell asleep.
He didn’t know how long had passed when Mu Mu suddenly opened his eyes again.
He suspected he had been tricked—he wasn’t sleepy at all, and simply could not fall asleep.
Mu Mu quietly glanced at the artist, who seemed to be sleeping soundly, and in a barely audible voice asked, “I can’t sleep… can I play on my phone? If you don’t say anything, I’ll take that as a yes.”
No sound came from beside him.
After two seconds, Mu Mu added, “I’m not making an excuse to play on my phone, okay?”
Saying that, he sneakily crept around to the other side of the artist’s bedside table and, after much effort, got hold of the tablet.
Mu Mu casually opened someone’s chat window and started typing rapidly.
But the moment he sent a message, he saw a small circle spinning endlessly on the screen, and finally a “Send Failed” alert popped up.
“What’s going on?” Mu Mu panicked, poking at the red exclamation mark repeatedly.
“What does this mean? No network… what do you mean no network?”
Mu Mu was extremely anxious and wanted to ask Baidu, but all that appeared was a 404 page.
He hesitated for a while, then finally put the tablet down, sneaked back to his original spot, lay down, and closed his eyes again.
Perhaps it was the guilt of a thief; the next day, Mu Mu didn’t dare mention it or ask about it, hoping to find an opportunity to subtly inquire, but that chance never came.
“I really want to play Drift Bottle…”
Mu Mu was lying bored on the little table, basking in the sun and watching the chirping birds outside the window, his mind filled entirely with drifting bottles on his phone.
He wondered what messages today’s drifting bottles might contain. If no one picked them up, would the bottles feel sad too?
As he thought about it, he suddenly wanted to experience what it felt like to be a drifting bottle himself.
A real drifting bottle would float along a river or the sea. Mu Mu had never seen the sea, and he didn’t know if he could even swim, so he decided to simulate it in the bathtub.
Immediately energized, Mu Mu jumped down from the little table and went off to find a large bottle.
But no matter how much he searched the mansion, he couldn’t find a bottle big enough to hold a little skeleton. So, he had to settle for an alternative—a waterproof transparent box would also work.
Fortunately, the artist had many transparent boxes, probably used for storing paint, all stacked in a corner of the storage room.
Next, Mu Mu carried a box into Fu Heqing’s bedroom and got into the bathtub.
“Sure enough, the biggest bathtub in the whole mansion still belongs to the artist,” he said, as he started filling it with water. Then he placed the box—carefully chosen to fit him perfectly—onto the surface of the water.
At first, the water was shallow, and when Mu Mu jumped in, the box sank slightly and touched the bottom. He slipped in steadily and even managed to close the lid on top.
As more water filled the bathtub, the little box floated smoothly.
Mu Mu sat inside, bobbing and drifting up and down, and suddenly found it quite fun.
If he were really put into a river or the sea, he might actually float far away and be picked up by someone.
Mu Mu’s heart raced with excitement.
While Mu Mu was thinking about how to convince the artist to help him sail far away, he lost his balance inside the box, and the whole thing flipped over.
The plastic box was waterproof, but water leaked through the seams. Soon, more than half of the box was filled, and it could no longer float. Slowly…
It sank.
The side that landed on the bottom happened to be the box’s open lid.
Mu Mu was stunned. Luckily, the little skeleton toy didn’t need to breathe—and neither did a ghost—but the bathtub quickly filled up, and the water level alarm started beeping.
“Artist!”
“Can you hear me, artist? Help! The room’s flooding!”
“Big flood incoming!”
“Help!”
Mu Mu’s voice was never very loud, and with the box and the surrounding water muffling him, plus the master bedroom being on the third floor while the studio was on the second, even if he shouted until his throat hurt, there was no way anyone could hear him.
Desperate, Mu Mu prayed, hoping that by the time the artist came to bed that night, his bed wouldn’t be underwater.
After a short while, the water-level alarm beeped for a few minutes and then automatically shut off the water valve. Mu Mu breathed a huge sigh of relief as he realized the water was no longer spilling over.
As long as it didn’t flood the room, it was fine. As for himself—he was sure he could be rescued when bedtime came!
Mu Mu waited with this hope, and by dinnertime, Fu Heqing came upstairs and lifted him out of the bathtub.
By now, Mu Mu was completely soaked, every part of him submerged in water.
Fu Heqing placed him on the sink and took a few towels from the cabinet.
Lowering his head, Mu Mu braced himself for a scolding—but the artist only asked, “Was it fun?”
There was no emotion in his voice, just an ordinary, casual question.
“It was fun… but not that fun,” Mu Mu replied.
Mu Mu quietly glanced at Fu Heqing and, in an almost inaudible voice, shared his thoughts.
“When I see drifting bottles, sometimes I wonder… when they float in the sea, how do the messages inside feel? Do they get excited every day?”
“But just now, when I was trapped underwater, I realized it’s not entirely about excitement.”
“It has to wait for someone to open it, but it doesn’t know exactly when that will happen. It must feel a bit bored, a bit lonely.”
Mu Mu’s voice was low, almost empathetic. But the next moment, his tone shifted, and he continued:
“But I’m different. Just now in the water, I knew the artist would come to rescue me.”
“At the latest, it would’ve been when he went to sleep, but he came even faster than I imagined!”
Fu Heqing looked at the chattering Mu Mu and draped a towel over his head.
Mu Mu grabbed the towel, imitating the artist’s hand-drying motions, wiping his hands and then his body.
Since his clothes were completely soaked, Mu Mu took them all off, then imitating Fu Heqing earlier, wrapped a towel around himself like a robe.
Fu Heqing casually tossed the wet clothes into the dryer.
“Mm.”
Regarding Mu Mu’s feelings, Fu Heqing simply said, “Next time you want to play in the water, go to the pool on the fourth floor.”
“The one that looks really dangerous?”
Mu Mu immediately recalled the huge outdoor pool—the kind of infinity pool that online influencers rave about and many people try and fail to visit. Excitement lit up his face.
“Can I row a boat in the pool?” Mu Mu asked eagerly, looking up at the artist.
“Yes.”
Fu Heqing nodded and took the clothes back out of the dryer.
Mu Mu grabbed them, discarded the towel, and quickly changed back into his dry clothes.
Fu Heqing watched Mu Mu’s completely unselfconscious movements. Even though he was using a toy body, under the little formal suit was just a standard skeleton frame.
But the way Mu Mu dressed himself, attaching a little bell to his waist, felt no different—as if the clothes were merely ordinary decorations.
As he slipped his little suit onto his body, Mu Mu exclaimed, “Wow! Really?”
Fu Heqing looked at the non-human before him, his eyes deep and unreadable, and slowly said, “But you have to report to me in advance.”
“No matter where you go, no matter what you do.”
As he spoke, he observed Mu Mu’s reaction, a subtle, hard-to-describe meaning lingering in his expression.
If this were a normal human, hearing this might provoke anger, astonishment, or incredulity, leading them to refuse immediately.
But Mu Mu just shook his head. “Okay! It’s a deal!”
Fu Heqing’s breath caught slightly. Then he stared at the little skeleton in front of him and smiled.
“All right. It’s a deal.”
Mu Mu kept his sparkling gaze fixed on the artist after speaking.
Fu Heqing raised an eyebrow slightly. “What, having second thoughts?”
Mu Mu immediately shook his head, a bit shy, a bit hesitant, and asked softly, “Since it’s a deal between us… can I request to play on your phone?”
His youthful voice carried a soft, pleading charm.
“The kind that can access the internet,” he added.
Fu Heqing immediately understood—he guessed that this little skeleton toy had secretly been online again last night.
He glanced at Mu Mu, fidgeting with his fingers and looking guilty, but didn’t expose him. He simply said, “Maybe the internet fee ran out.”
“Internet fee?”
Mu Mu repeated the keyword and, in the process, learned something new.
“Okay,” Mu Mu said. “I know—anything with some kind of fee is basically tied to money. But ghosts don’t have money.”
Immediately, he wore an expression of extreme disappointment, looking pitiful enough to tug at anyone’s heart.
Fu Heqing watched as Mu Mu’s once-exaggerated performance had gradually become convincingly real. He sighed and handed his phone to the little skeleton.
Instantly, Mu Mu put on another rapid-fire display of expressions—faster than flipping through a book.
They set a time, and when that time came, Mu Mu proactively returned the phone to Fu Heqing.
“I just played a game. The other games can be deleted, but in this one, I built a beautiful house. If I delete it, my house will disappear. So can I keep this one?”
As he spoke, he handed Fu Heqing’s phone back and forth.
Fu Heqing took the phone and remained silent. Mu Mu immediately cheered and thanked him.
“Thank you, Artist!”
Fu Heqing said, “I haven’t said anything yet.”
Having just played on the phone, Mu Mu’s little world was extremely satisfied. He nuzzled against Fu Heqing’s sleeve, pouting playfully, and said, “You didn’t say no, did you?”
“I’ve already figured you out,” Mu Mu added, a hint of pride in his tone.
“You didn’t say no, which means yes. If you ask too much, you’d just get unhappy.”
Fu Heqing’s expression didn’t change.
“Oh? And what if I had wanted to refuse just now?”
Mu Mu looked at him with complete certainty. “If you didn’t agree, you wouldn’t have taken the phone, you would have just said…
“Delete it.”
Mu Mu pinched his throat and imitated Fu Heqing’s cold, indifferent tone, issuing the command himself.
**TN
Drift Bottle is a social/chat app with mini games, here’s the Baidu LINK
How they typically work:
- You write a message and “throw” it into the virtual ocean.
- Other users randomly pick up those bottles and can reply.
- You can also pick bottles to read and respond to messages from others.
- Interaction is often anonymous, making it more like a mystery chat.
