White, thick, and delicious like candy.

Night is Lacey's favorite thing, because only at this time can she avoid those hideous adults, play freely, and forage for food freely.

In the daytime, the horrible creatures would look fierce at the sight of her, and then let out a terrifying scream like a beast, waving the terrible rusty weapon in their hands, grabbing stone tools from the ground with sharp bulges like devil's horns and throwing them at her, beating her with strange cries of excitement, admiring the pain inflicted on her, admiring her bloody embarrassment.

It's scary - the outside world is scary.

She really wants to go back to her father's warm embrace, and she really wants to listen to her mother tell that warm nursery rhyme.

But...... There was no going back, and on that calm and peaceful night, Dad suddenly became so scary and terrible, and then Mom hid Lacey, and then Dad killed Mom, and then Dad was killed by a monster that broke in from the door, and only Lacey was left, and Lacey was left alone in the cupboard, not found......

As a result, Lacey was left alone.

No family, no friends, alone.

Lacey began to wander.

She had been to many places, but none of them could accept her, and the way the adults treated her more and more roughly, from turning a blind eye at first, to beating and scolding, and now throwing stones at her when they saw her, becoming like the brutal demons in her mother's story.

And...... The face is equally abominable.

The pale and bloodless face, the bruised tendons, the interlaced canine teeth that don't look like humans—

Why, why wasn't this noticed before?

Lacey couldn't help but wonder.

But the seven-year-old girl soon put her doubts behind her, and she ran freely in the night, looking for something to eat like a puppy, and the world without adults was so beautiful for her, and the pale mist was sweet and glutinous, as if her mother had given her candy a long, long time ago, and filled with sweet memories, so that she always remembered and longed for happiness in contentment.

She was a simple child.

As long as you can eat enough every day as you do today, you will be very satisfied.

Simple children are easy to feed.

Dad always patted her on the head and praised her like this—I heard Dad say that a long, long time ago, our family also had a very large cultivated field, and as long as we ploughed our share of the field every day, we could harvest a lot of grain in the autumn, and not only could we eat half full every day, but also eat real meat once a year at the harvest festival, not the kind of stinky and hard jerky bought from hunters, but fragrant, greasy, just smelling, just looking at the appetizing pork— It's a delicious delicacy that only the best people have the chance to take a bite of.

However, that time has passed.

Whenever she asked her father, why the arable land in the family was gone, why the delicious little jerky was stinky and hard, and what kind of meat was that fragrant, greasy pork?

Dad always sighed, then touched her head and didn't speak.

Lacey would often be alone on the rooftop looking up at the white night sky and wondering—why is this happening, why is the world like this?

She also asked her mom this question.

But Mom was just silent at this time, and then patted her little cheek and said: When Lei Lei grows up, Mom will tell you the answer.

Pity...... Lacey will never get a chance to know the answer.

Daddy - Killed Mom.

To this day, she still remembers the way her father looked when he came back from the mine that day, silent, his eyes bloodshot and scarlet light, savage and rude to his mother, a rotten stench when he opened his mouth, and he spoke as if his throat had been cut, and it sounded as if some mollusk was imitating human sounds, which was terrible—Mom was a little frightened, and after a few words she hid her in a locker, and then there was a suppressed roar like a beast in the room.

Worried, her mother told her not to come out no matter what happened, and ran into the room—for some reason, followed by the sound of an argument and the screams of monsters.

Lei Lei was a little frightened, and opened the closet a little by a slit.

Mom had fallen in a pool of blood at the moment, and the whole person was torn in two like a broken rag doll, and discarded on the ground at will, red blood flowed all over the ground, and her eyes were dull and she lost her lustre.

And then—

Monsters appeared.

It was a terrible monster two meters tall, with a father's face on top of it, covered in thick white hair, and a pair of scarlet eyes full of tyranny, and it was gnawing on one thigh with its bloody mouth while looking around with a fierce gaze.

Lacey was so frightened that she held her breath and didn't dare to speak.

But the monster spotted her through the crack, grinning and bleeding its mouth, and approached her step by step.

- Mind goes blank.

In absolute fear, Lacey gave up thinking.

Until—

The gate slammed.

A monster, a black monster appeared.

The monster was as terrifying as the demon in the bedtime story her mother had told her, even more twisted than the bad guys in the story who gave nightmares - it had a human-like form, but it was definitely not human, a head shorter and much thinner than the monster with his father's face, but the deformed arms that hung almost to the ground, and the densely packed eyes and slits that seemed to have been sewn on his chest, were filled with the deepest malice towards humanity.

Moreover, it has no head.

Or rather, its chest is its head—in the middle of a dense circle of eyes, there is a vertical slit, but it is not an eye slit, but its mouth.

A large mouth with a blood basin that is almost shoulder-width apart.

The black monster opened its mouth and let out a roar that nearly toppled the house, and then with a force of its hands and feet, it jumped up like a flea, and—

With the rain of blood falling from the sky, the white monster that killed the mother died.

Its head was swallowed whole by that terrible mouth, and the headless corpse crashed to the ground.

The black monster made a creepy chewing sound, and Lacey closed her eyes in fear, and even exhaled carefully, not even daring to make a sound, and for a moment, there was only the undisguised swallowing sound of the monster in the hut.

I don't know how long it took for the monster's eating to come to an end.

The world is calm again.

Or dead silence.

For Lacey, her world ...... It's dead.

Mom is dead, Dad is dead, and Lacey is left alone—no family, no friends, alone.

Even so, she did not feel melancholy...... Because, Lei Lei is an easy child to satisfy.

As long as she can avoid the hideous adults like now, play freely, and forage freely, she will be very satisfied and can live happily.

Life is such a simple and simple happiness for her.

Of course –

Occasionally, there are accidents.

Lacey hid in the grass and watched the three outsiders below, somewhat apprehensive—she hadn't seen them before, but it was the first time she had seen them at this point in time—and they were exceptionally beautiful compared to the menacing-looking adults and the terrifying-looking hunters.

It's not just about the appearance, it's more about the soul.

Wanting to get closer to them, closer to them - for the first time in a long time, Lacey had the urge to feel alive for the first time.

So, she started running.

Perhaps it was the survival of the wild that strengthened her physique, her body was much more powerful than when she was young, and she ran so fast that even the adults who grew closer and closer to the monsters often couldn't keep up with her escaping pace, and could only be left far behind.

Closer, closer.

- Through the fog, she finally saw the stranger in front of her.

What a beautiful human being!

The whole body is surrounded by light, warm light, bright light, cold light—even if you look at it from afar, there is a feeling that your soul has been purified.

Like basking on the sunny side in winter, Lacey is a little lazy.

Maybe......

Can they communicate?

Suddenly there was a flash of inspiration, and Lacey rolled her eyes, and then quietly followed behind the stranger.

How do you greet them, jump out of the grass and wag your tail at them, or stop them in front of you and say hello to them?

Lacey, who hadn't spoken to anyone for a long time, was a little distressed.

But soon, those troubles will not count as troubles.

Because—

One step quicker than she was determined was the action of the stranger.

As if sensing her tailgating, the three strangers who were covered in a faint light suddenly stopped their steps, and one of them walked in her direction.

That's great.

She thought to herself with some excitement.

In addition to the terrible adults, she finally saw other humans again, humans who could communicate.

- Perhaps, today is her lucky day.

The little girl thought happily.

As Dad said, she was a simple, easily satisfying child.

A happy child.