Dying In The Male Lead’s Arms Every Time I Transmigrate

Chapter 42 I’ll give you two paper dolls

On the next day after school, Ning Meng ran into the skinny boy from the shadow play troupe at the school gate.

Upon spotting her, the thin boy’s eyes lit up, “Hello…thank you.”

Hearing his words, Ning Meng turned around and realized that Shi Qi was standing behind her noiselessly.

Shi Qi lowered his head and pressed his voice down, “Don’t you want to know the specific reason? Let’s follow him.”

Ning Meng asked in a low voice, “We won’t be in any danger right?”

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She really wanted to know the relationship between the shadow play troupe and these people. How were those paper dolls able to come to life? Why were they able to take away the soul of a person?

But the prerequisite of knowing all of this was safety.

She was not a fool. She wasn’t going to do something like sending herself into a pit.

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Fbk Ck aykple y caso yde pbssj bkp blye pzktbvzu.

Mbl csu bwaaklezu pbssj bkp blye kd alqwvl zkjl y ayvvzl, “R…R osd’v byax usw, vawzu! Zsw pyhle xl yde taydery!”

Gqvlaoyaep, vbl vball rlsrzl oldv vs vbl nyql zsnyvle srrspkvl sq vbl pnbssz. Mblal olal sdzu y qlo rlsrzl kdpkel yde vblu lhld bye rakhyvl assxp qsa xsal nsdqkeldvkyzkvu.

Fkdnl kv oyp bkp qkapv vkxl nsxkdt vs vbkp jkde sq rzynl, vbl csu oyp y ckv nywvkswp.

Gqvla oykvkdt qsa y obkzl, bl prsjl okvb y zso hsknl: “Tlzzs…Yu dyxl kp Eld Fbldt, yde vbl sdl clqsal kp xu taydeqyvbla.”

Lkdt Yldt alnyzzle vbyv vbl sze xyd oyp dsv yd saekdyau rlapsd pkdnl bl oyp yczl vs pll vbyv pbl oyp ekqqlaldv. Tsolhla, kd pwnb y ckt nswdvau, kv oyp dsaxyz vs qkde rlsrzl okvb wdkiwl yckzkvklp.

Fbl vbswtbv qsa y obkzl, yde ypjle, “Ebu eke usw blzr xyjl rwrrlv qktwalp qsa vbspl rlsrzl? Ohld blzrkdt vblx byax svblap?”

Fbl bye oydvle vs ypj vbkp iwlpvksd vbyv eyu.

Judging from the conversations of those few people, it was obvious that the pair were being controlled by them and that they had to make paper dolls according to their orders, taking away the souls of people to control and command.

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It felt as though they didn’t know each other, so how did they get involved? Moreover, this kind of ability that should have certainly been kept secret, had become known to them.

When Wen Sheng heard this, his face immediately turned pale, “It’s all my fault… It’s all my fault… it was my mistake, I harmed Grandpa.”

It took a long time for him to calm down and he started narrating what had happened not too long ago in a low voice.

Both him and his grandpa had come from a small village. The village was not by any means big and there were only a dozen households that managed to survive natural disasters.

This village was rich in shadow puppets, and almost every household could perform a show or two. It could be regarded as a scenic town. Sometimes tourists would pass by, but there were still very few in number and they were also very poor.

Shadow puppets shouldn’t be made with paper dolls but the village was poor, so they could only use the cheapest paper to make things to pass the time.

His grandfather had a relatively special ability. Once he drew eyes on the paper dolls, those paper dolls would come to life. They had always concealed this ability so the village people had no knowledge of it.

With this ability, whenever they were unable to support themselves, they would draw eyes on the paper dolls at night and those paper dolls would then follow their commands.

Not far from the village was a mountain with many animals. These paper dolls were able to catch some small animals like rabbits, and bring them back.

In this way, they would be able to occasionally have meat. They would also take the fur to a far away market to sell and get money to buy materials used to make puppet figures, including paper.

Since it would usually take a few paper dolls to catch a rabbit, to have two return at night would already be considered very lucky.

In order not to arouse any suspicions, the time interval between sending out paper dolls to catch rabbits was very long.

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People in their village generally don’t come out in the middle of the night, so no one had ever encountered such a thing. As for the source of the hare, they all thought that his grandson was the one who had caught them.

This kind of life lasted until a month ago.

A month ago, a group of big burly men appeared in the village, saying that they had come to sightsee. In the end, they ran into their village home and started staying there.

Those men also came together in a group, and had stayed at their house, wanting to eat and drink the best, using their money until it was almost depleted.

He couldn’t drive them away for he was only fifteen years old, and his grandfather was so old that he was simply not their adversary at all so they could only endure it.

The food at home was finished and there was no meat left as well. By this time, they could only order the paper dolls to gather food, moreover, they had to do it discreetly.

Wan Sheng’s voice carried a sobbing tone, “…That night, my grandfather and I drew paper dolls in a small room in the backyard, and when we drew eyes on a paper doll which came to life, we ordered it to go to the mountains to catch food….but we didn’t expect one of them to have caught us in the act.”

Ning Meng could imagine that when ordinary people saw such things, they would either run away in fear or want to take advantage of these things. Obviously, those people were of the latter kind.

Wan Sheng continued: “One person found out and called everyone else up… Soon after the paper man went out, they forced my grandfather to draw another paper doll and bring it to life again.”

His grandfather could only draw one or two at a time, otherwise he would become mentaly drained and he would have to sleep all day. That was why he cherished every drawing. That day, they forced him to paint three of them, causing him to fall unconscious the whole day next day.

Once his grandpa woke up, they were controlled by this group of people. At first, they strongly refused to paint for them. His grandpa knew that they would certainly use this ability to do sinister things.

What they didn’t expect was that they would use him to threaten his grandfather.

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Wen Sheng and his grandfather depended on each other growing up. His grandpa loved him very much. As such, he couldn’t stand watching those people beat his grandson up. After two days of being stuck in a stalemate, he finally agreed to draw paper dolls for them.

But because there were too few paper dolls being drawn every day, and they also died very easily, they were unable to achieve their goals, so the group of people began to torture them and asked them for other ways.

Wen Sheng glanced at the two people opposite him and sniffled, “Our village actually has a legend, an old saying that has been passed down. It was said that once the soul of a person is placed inside a paper doll, they wouldn’t need to be afraid of living or dying, sacrificing their lives to the maker of the paper dolls…I and my grandpa didn’t believe this saying but those people seemed to think it was true…”

This old saying had been circulating in their village for a long time. He grew up listening to this, but he had never seen it before.

There were a few children from the village who would, at times, play this kind of game but no one took it seriously and it was unknown when this saying had started being passed down.

When those few people heard it, they had taken it seriously and felt that this must be the way.

In the beginning, they wondered how to do this method all day long. They asked my grandfather to draw paper dolls all the time, and every time he finished drawing one, he would drip blood, be fed blood and he would use blood to draw. He used all kinds of ways.

Grandpa’s craftsmanship was so excellent, they kept making him experiment.

Later on,  they found a piece of music from god knows where, made his grandpa learn it, and even made him play the drums, coordinating both things. In the end, they managed to take the soul of a person from their group away one midnight.

The man was unconscious from then on, and was finally thrown into the mountain to be fed to the tigers.

The paper dolls with human souls were indeed much more powerful than paper dolls who were brought to life by drawing the eyes alone, they were just like real people. They could do anything and they wouldn’t get wet by water or burnt by fire.

The only thing was that, upon obtaining a soul, the paper doll’s appearance assumed that of the man who had had his soul taken.

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There were only a few people living in the village and the majority of them were elderly citizens. They reckoned that they weren’t of much use so they brought them to the big city to prepare to obtain more people’s souls.

However, people in big cities don’t watch shadow plays very much. No one watched them nor did they allow them to approach so they naturally did not succeed and those troupe members cursed them since they couldn’t hit them.

At this time, a school came knocking on their door.

Perhaps it was because this group of people kept promoting shadow plays everywhere that the school came to their doors to see a show. Those men thought that since there were plenty of people in a school, they didn’t need to involve the higher-ups.

Grandpa’s performance was naturally very good. After the performance, the people in the school didn’t have much doubts. Instead, they brought them in and arranged accommodation for them.

Wan Sheng quietly glanced at the boy who had been keeping silent all this time.

He thought that this guy was amazing. He was able to clean those people up and he seemed to have done it effortlessly.

At this moment, Wen Sheng met his eyes.

He quickly retracted his eyes, not daring to look at him again, and secretly glanced at the girl across from him, feeling that she was much easier to get along with.

“They always wanted to take away the souls of the students during the performance, so that they could get a lot of paper dolls at once, and no one would be able to realize that they were the culprits… But a girl came over that day and insisted on watching the performance and even provoking them. They decided to give her a performance, making it so that she would never wake again…”

Ning Meng knew that this was the girl from Class 6, but she didn’t even think that this would be the reason.

Wan Sheng thought for a while, and said, “This method…can only be used on people watching the shadow play, and one had to sing a certain song for it to work…..In order not to make people doubt, they only let the paper doll with drawn eyes follow her, hide amongst her clothes, and then go to her dormitory at night…”

Ning Meng suddenly remembered the paper doll she saw that night when she was self-studying.

That might have been the same paper doll that was following the girl from Class 6 and was accidentally seen by her at the window, scaring her.

“The second… I heard them discussing that day, grandfather was experimenting and the girl secretly saw it. Later on, in order not to waste the paper doll that was made as an experiment, the paper doll was ordered to follow her and the result was her being out of luck…”

As Wen Sheng reached the end, his voice became smaller and smaller.

Now those few people were arrested by the police because they had committed a crime. He didn’t dare to tell the police about the matter of the paper dolls coming to life. His grandfather was already lying on the hospital bed, unable to draw any more paper dolls, and also having decided not to be involved in shadow plays any longer.

Naturally, they knew they were at fault in this matter. Fortunately, those souls were still able to return to their respective bodies. Of course, he didn’t know how the boy in front of him did it. And ultimately, those people woke up.

He surreptitiously took out two palm-sized paper dolls from his pockets, his face turned red as he said, “Grandpa asked me to give this to you…”

They were two paper dolls, one male and one female. The male paper doll wore red clothes and the female paper doll wore green clothes. They both looked like ordinary paper dolls.

As soon as they were placed on the table, the two paper dolls opened their eyes and started moving.

Ning Meng noticed that their eyes did not like the ones she saw last time, with white eyes and black frames. This time they looked similar to real people.

With their slightly big arms and legs, they circled around the table, their eyes rolling around. The table was too slippery so they kept falling but they would get back up and start walking again.

Wen Sheng said: “You can choose whether you want the boy or the girl. They can usually be used to entertain yourself but they won’t be able to carry out orders. They can get squashed and they can’t get wet by water nor can they get close to fire. If they come into contact with water, just leave them out under the sun to dry.”

These paper dolls were different from the previous ones as they were made separately. Grandpa had secretly made two of them after he came out of the police station and decided not to make any more paper dolls from thereon.

The two little paper dolls had reached Ning Meng’s side.

She put her index finger on the table, and the two paper dolls held the giant index finger with their little hands, trying to bite it but to no avail.

Ning Meng’s eyes lit up: “So cute.”

Shi Qi suddenly reached out to pinch them from behind.

The two little paper dolls who were pinched by his two fingers, hung in the air, swinging back and forth, their limbs flailing around. If they were able to speak, they would definitely be chattering.

Seeing this, Ning Meng couldn’t help laugh, the little paper dolls were quite cute.

She kind of wanted to see the two paper dolls lying outside, basking in the sun.

****

What’s so cute about paper dolls

You are much cuter than them

——”Shi Qi’s secretly hidden little diary”


T/N: The above diary was written by a reader shared in the author’s notes! She was very impressed with it XD


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Little Potato [Overlord & Translator]

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1 Comment

  1. WitteringBird

    Aw, that’s so cool! Getting acknowledged by the Author! And it’s also a very cute entry, so I can see why. 💕