Ten Thousand Books, But Only One You

Side Story: 03 - Sleep Paralysis

Chapter 3: Sleep Paralysis

Something was pressing down against him, causing Shi Ruijie to unable to move. At the back of his mind, Shi Ruijie knew that he was in a sleeping state. But he just could not wake up. Was this the phenomenon known as sleep paralysis?

It had never happened to him before so he naturally felt anxious. He tried moving a finger, then a toe, and after a few minutes passed, he discovered that he had broken out of it. As soon as he could move again, he rolled over onto his side and reached for his phone on the bedside table.

4:00AM.

It was too early for him to be awake, but he could no longer return back to sleep. Leaving his bedroom, he headed for his study where the three books still sat on his table. There was one thing he had to find out—how did Li He die in the book?

Snatching up the book, his eyes tore through the pages hungrily, desperate for answers. He stopped flipping the pages when he got to the part of the book where Li He was arrested and tortured in prison. After Li He was sentenced to death by poison, he was taken back to his residence and placed under house arrest. During this time, Princess Yong'an secretly met with the protagonists of the novel, Liu Yijun and Xu Ruoxue, who were the friends that Li He made when he was in disguise outside the palace. Wanting to save their friend, Liu Yijun and Xu Ruoxue enlisted the Emperor's help in a last-resort plan to fake the death of Li He. The Emperor then acted out a play of betraying and abandoning his brother. With the help of Princess Yong'an, who found herself in the Emperor's political camp after marrying the Emperor's best friend under an Imperial Edict, the whole bunch of them fed Li He a fabled medicine that would stop his pulse and heartbeat from being detected for a couple of hours. Li He was revived a few hours later by his friends after he was smuggled out of the palace. After that, the trio continued on their quest of upholding social justice and taking down the evil officials and ministers in the palace.

Shi Ruijie closed the book and slid it on the table, feeling faint. All that anxiety and painful struggling in his dream was for naught? He scoffed. To think that it was just a ploy to rescue Li He!

He did feel slightly cheated and hoped that when Li He woke up, he did not hate Princess Yong'an too much. As he was gasping for air earlier, Shi Ruijie had felt the torrents and torrents of hatred that Li He had against Princess Yong'an and her relatives. It was... rather unpleasant for him. Especially now that he realised that Princess Yong'an was not just a minor character in the book, but was actually a tritagonist.

His gaze fell on the name of the author which was printed on the book cover. Picking up his phone, he dialled a number after seeing that it was ten minutes past 6AM. The call connected and a male voice sounded on the line.

"Dapeng, please help me to look into an author called 'Yu Juan'— 'Yu' meaning 'extra', and 'Juan' meaning 'volume' or 'Juan' for the verb 'roll'. I also need you to investigate into the sender of this mysterious parcel I received last night. I'll send you a picture of the delivery information."

***

While waiting for his assistant in the Association to report his findings, Shi Ruijie studied the other two books closely. Both books were also by the same author, Yu Juan. Snow Path was a xuanhuan novel while Dear White was historical fiction set against the backdrop of the Chinese Republican Era. Having experienced life in the Tang dynasty only last night, he was apprehensive about reading another story set in the ancient times. A little espionage thriller at the moment interested him more.

Dear White followed the tumultuous lives of secret agents and spies loyal to different organisations and countries as they try to outwit each other to further their organisation's values, goals and mission. The structure of the novel was relatively simple. From enemies to lovers, the male protagonist teamed up together with the female protagonist to carry out an important mission of delivering a highly-classified information from one base to another, while in disguise and attempting to evade the police, foreign agents and enemy organisations. Ultimately, the good and righteous will triumph over evil and peace will be restored to the war torn country, but not after the shedding of innocent blood and the noble sacrifices of comrades and loved ones.