I want to just drift through life in Type-Moon.

Page 125

Moreover, she, who should have been a "vessel," was taken to Japan by her grandfather. Ji Qiaoqiao, who had escaped the fate of being a "vessel," appeared here in this state. She had already pieced together what had happened.

"Do you hate Grandpa?" Lingling asked, watching Ji Qiaoqiao's retreating figure.

"I don't hate him, because my father not only made me grow up healthy and happy, but also made you, Lingling, grow up healthy and happy. He is a great father. I only hate fate."

"What happened after that?" Lingling looked at "herself" in the divine cage, and "Tianyi," who had been held tightly by He Xian and was struggling, and suddenly felt powerless.

"————, the matter is very simple. I took your place, bringing the stillborn child that should have been your brother's or younger brother into this place, and then became a [vessel] in the presence of my husband," Ji Qiaoqiao said calmly.

"And then?" Lingling knew things couldn't be that simple, because if that were the case, where did Ji Qiaoqiao's body go? And she had mentioned before that her body had become nourishment, so what were those nourishment used to nourish?

Time froze again. Orange looked at Ji Qiaoqiao in reality with confusion, wondering why she had stopped, and why so much time had passed. What was the so-called shocking truth?

"Xiao Cheng, what are your thoughts after seeing this?" Ji Qiaoqiao asked with a smile.

"To whom?" Orange put her glasses back on and asked softly.

“Lingling and me in that story.” Ji Qiaoqiao glanced at Youzhu, whose head was hanging down.

“Lingling is naive, while you are crazy.” There was no contempt in Chengzi’s eyes. “I think the one in that cage is Lingjun, and the stillborn child came back to life because of what you mentioned before, something that Lingjun’s grandfather got from the family. If I’m not mistaken, it should be a heart, right?”

"Smart, I didn't expect you to already know." Ji Qiaoqiao gave her an approving look.

"If this is the truth that I can't accept, then you underestimate me." Orange smiled back, then looked at Aoko.

"Qingzi, I think I've guessed what 'Lingjiang' means. It must be Lingling, right?" Orange, who felt she had seen through everything, narrowed her eyes slightly.

However, before she could continue speaking, Yuzhu suddenly pulled her back.

"Youzhu?"

Orange turned around in confusion, only to see Youzhu staring intently at Ji Qiaoqiao, asking, "You guys are really crazy! Not just once, but twice!"

Orange was completely confused by what Ji Qiaoqiao was saying. She didn't understand what Youzhu meant, but just then, Ji Qiaoqiao gently clapped her hands.

"Clap clap clap..." The crisp applause echoed in the vast universe.

"Kuonji Yuzu, how did you guess that? The most crucial key is missing, and even Touka, who is smarter than you, couldn't figure it out." Ji Qiaoqiao looked at Yuzu with a strange expression. "Although we are both holders of fragments, the way you use [One] is completely different from ours. Yuzu, what exactly did you see?"

The cryptic conversation made Orange feel uncomfortable, but she wisely didn't press for details. Only after Youzhu pulled her back did she realize that she and Ji Qiaoqiao were too close. What was even stranger was that Qingzi hadn't said much before, and this unusual behavior often indicated danger.

"Orange, listen to my instructions in a bit, then go and pull Aoko over here!" Yuzhu's voice suddenly rang in Orange's mind. Orange looked at the back of Yuzhu's head without making a sound, then pinched Yuzhu's arm to indicate that she understood.

“I recognized this person—” Yuzhu deliberately followed up on Orange’s question, pretending to answer. Then, a mournful cry of a black-tailed gull suddenly rang out without warning, and Ji Qiaoqiao’s figure seemed to be out of place as if there was a bad signal.

Orange ran to Aoko's side at subsonic speed without even taking a running start, and then picked her up.

The mournful cries of the black-tailed gulls ceased at that moment, and Ji Qiaoqiao's figure returned to normal. She looked at Youzhu with a surprised expression, and then fell silent.

Aoko, who had been pulled back, remained motionless in Touko's arms, showing no reaction whatsoever.

"Qingzi? Qingzi!" Orange was extremely anxious when she saw her younger sister like this.

"Slap her," Youzhu suggested to Chengzi while keeping an eye on Ji Qiaoqiao.

Upon hearing Yuzhu's words, Orange didn't hesitate and slapped Aoko across the face with all her might.

Aoko, whose head had been slapped to the side, regained her alertness, and her hair returned to its usual brown color from bright red. Touching her swollen face, she looked at Orange in front of her, confused. After realizing what had happened, she glared at Orange with eyes blazing with fury, "You bastard Orange! You'd better die!"

However, Orange, who was scolded, was not angry at all. Instead, she hugged her tightly with a look of relief, "Qingzi, you're finally awake!"

"???????" Qingzi was speechless, completely bewildered. Although the stinging pain on her face told her that she had indeed been hit, it seemed that there was a reason why Orange hit her.

Youzhu breathed a sigh of relief when she learned that Qingzi had regained consciousness. She looked at Ji Qiaoqiao with a knowing gaze, "Chengzi is right. Your obsession with your children has driven you mad. Deliberately showing us these things was just—"

"You can't say it out loud, little Youzhu." Ji Qiaoqiao spoke again, but unlike her previous stunning beauty, she now exuded a chaotic aura.

"Aoko has woken up, which means this is the last time. Next time I will try to borrow your body, Yuzhu. Please take care of me then."

Ji Qiaoqiao bowed gently to the three of them and then disappeared in the blink of an eye.

When their vision blurred, they reappeared in front of them in the familiar hospital room. Their positions hadn't changed at all. If it weren't for the fact that Qingzi's face was still swollen, they would have thought that everything before was an illusion.

In the quiet ward, the three looked at each other, none of them speaking first. The rain continued to fall outside the window. Just as the unbearable silence made the atmosphere increasingly oppressive, a flapping sound of wings rang out.

A crow with bright red eyes landed on the windowsill and asked, "What just happened?"

Orange knew who the crow was, but that didn't mean she had to answer truthfully, since this person was also within her guard: "A little accident, what happened outside just now?"

The crow tilted its head and preened its feathers. "This floor was emitting a blue light just now, and I couldn't fly in no matter what I tried."

"Blue light? It must be cyan light." Orange recalled everything that had happened before. Qingzi suddenly activated her fifth magic, and that's probably why the light appeared.

Just as the crow was about to ask more questions, Qingzi suddenly raised her hand and struck Yue Zhengling hard in the chest. The fist hit the [Boundary Ring].

"What are you doing!" the crow cried out angrily.

"Aoko!?" Arisu cried out in a panic.

"It wasn't me!" Aoko answered loudly.

"Cough cough cough—" A violent cough made everyone in the room freeze, and the three people and the bird suddenly turned their gazes to Yue Zhengling.

The person who had been asleep for a year and a half slowly opened their eyes, stared blankly at the ceiling, and said in a hoarse voice—

Chapter 277 The Story You Don't Know

The person who had been asleep for a year and a half slowly opened his eyes, stared blankly at the ceiling, and said in a hoarse voice, "Where is this?"

Everyone could clearly hear Yue Zhengling's voice, but Chengzi and Qingzi didn't know what he was saying because he was speaking Chinese.

The only ones who could understand in the ward were Yuju and Nero Chaos's crow clones, but the crows didn't interrupt; they just stood on the windowsill and watched quietly.

So Zhu answered him, "Is this a hospital?"

"Hospital?" Upon hearing someone answer him, Yue Zhengling turned his head with difficulty and looked in Youzhu's direction. He did not rush to ask any more questions, but instead looked around at his surroundings.

"Why am I in the hospital?" After looking at Orange, Aoko, and Yuzhu with unusually unfamiliar eyes, he tried to sit up, but no matter how hard he tried, his body wouldn't obey him.

Seeing his intention, Youzhu walked to the window, helped him up, then placed a pillow behind his back and continued to answer in Chinese: "Because you were seriously injured before, do you remember what happened before?"

Orange silently watched Youzhu's movements, while carefully observing the awakened Yue Zhengling. The way the other person looked at her just now was unusually unfamiliar, as if, no, as if she didn't recognize her at all, which was impossible in theory.

Whether on the train back then or in another world, Yue Zhengling quickly recognized her, and the strangest thing was why he spoke in Chinese the moment he opened his mouth.

"Seriously injured? Me?" Yue Zhengling's gaze was unfocused, and his expression was filled with confusion.

Just as Yuzhu was about to speak again, Orange walked directly up to Yue Zhengling, bent down to look at him, and said in Japanese, "Ling-kun, do you recognize me?"

Le Zhengling slowly turned her head to look at Chengzi, as if pondering who she was. After a long while, she slowly said, "Do I know you? And, Lingjun, is that my name?"

These words were spoken in Japanese.

Upon hearing this answer, Orange first breathed a sigh of relief, then gasped, "You don't remember your own name?"

Le Zhengling shook his head, then showed a pained expression and swayed to the side. Youzhu, quick-witted and agile, immediately supported him.

At this moment, Aoko also came over and asked anxiously, "Rin-chan! What's wrong? Does it hurt somewhere?"

Le Zhengling's forehead was covered in cold sweat. He opened his mouth several times to speak, but no words came out. However, perhaps due to the pain, he trembled and raised his hand to cover his heart.

Seeing his actions, everyone felt a sense of foreboding. Sure enough, before they could do anything, Le Zhengling spat a mouthful of blood onto the white sheet, staining it with a bright red spot, and then collapsed onto the hospital bed.

Everyone froze. The moment in the intensive care unit seemed to slow down for a few seconds, as the three girls shouted simultaneously:

"Listen to me!"

"Ling-chan!"

"hear!"

Aoko reached out to press the call button, but was blocked by a black wing. A black raven had appeared at the head of the bed at some point.

Looking at Yue Zhengling, whose breath was already so weak that he was on the verge of death, Qingzi's eyes were filled with negative emotions: "Get out of the way!"

The crow still moved aside, but as it did so, it spoke up: "If you think the hospital can solve the kid's problems, then go ahead and do it. But I advise you to think carefully about what will happen if people find out the kid has woken up."

Upon hearing this, Aoko abruptly withdrew her hand. She knew what the crow's warning meant. This hospital was the magic workshop of Tsbia Eltnam Oberon, and the other party had designs on Ling-chan. If he knew that Ling-chan had woken up, things could change drastically.

Meanwhile, Orange, who had calmed down, took off her glasses and said to Yuzhu, "Reinforce the barrier here, leave the rest to me."

Youzhu nodded, then closed the window and drew the curtains, turning the ward into a sealed room. Then, the barrier patterns hidden in the ward suddenly lit up and turned golden, indicating that it had entered the highest load operation state.

Without saying a word, Chengzi laid Yue Zhengling down, unbuttoned his shirt, reached out and moved his hand away from his heart, placing her own palm on top of his.

As a Grand Doll Maker, Orange has roughly figured out the secrets of the human body. If she wanted, she could even create the "human prototype," namely the "Adam" and "Eve" from mythology.

Even after reaching this level, Orange still couldn't fully analyze Yue Zhengling's body. Long before she obtained the memories of her other self from another world, she had examined Yue Zhengling's body inside and out several times.

From the outside, Yue Zhengling's body is no different from a human's, but from a magician's perspective, one would find that his body is not normal at all.

As a puppeteer, Orange discovered during the first examination that Yue Zhengling's body did not grow to this point naturally; the most obvious difference was that the heart did not belong to Yue Zhengling.

Furthermore, the images that Ji Qiaoqiao had shown them earlier also explained part of the mystery. Le Zhengling was originally a stillborn child. Dead people don't grow, but his grandfather and Ji Qiaoqiao used some means to implant this strange heart into his body. They then used the bodies of their blood relatives as sacrifices to give Le Zhengling the nutrients to grow. Through tuning methods, they maintained Le Zhengling's growth and made him grow to this size.

But everything has its limits. This heart, which had been maintained for so many years, either reached its limit or the person responsible for regulating it failed to appear. In any case, the heart began to have problems.

Just now, Qingzi was controlled and struck this heart, squeezing out its last potential. Although this revived Yue Zhengling, it also put his life on its final countdown.

Moreover, the strike was quite clever; if I'm not mistaken, it was delivered through the pendant on Yue Zhengling's chest.

Orange desperately wanted to know what Qingzi was hiding, but it seemed there was no time now. Her hand surged with magic, instantly blocking the blood flow in Yue Zhengling's body while simultaneously preserving his life. "Lingjun, there's no time to explain now. In short, your heart is failing. If you don't want to die, I'll try to save you right away."

The pain in Yue Zhengling began to lessen when Chengzi injected magic into him. He looked at Chengzi, panting, his eyes filled with distrust.

"Hey kid, do you remember me?" the crow asked, hopping onto Orange's shoulder.

"Crows can talk?" Yue Zhengling's weak voice was filled with surprise.

"—It seems you really have amnesia," the crow said. "It's alright, this is for the best. If you don't want this girl to treat you, I'll ask you for the third time here: do you want to die?"

Despite the pain, Yue Zhengling clenched his teeth and shook his head forcefully.

"Very good, you still have the will to survive. Then let me ask you again, do you want to become inhuman?"

Le Zhengling's eyes widened. "What do you mean by 'inhuman'?"

“Vampires, fairies, demigods, immortals, these are the things.” The raven looked at Le Zhengling with its blood-red eyes. “You need to think this through. Your heart can’t take it anymore. If this continues, you will surely die.”

Le Zhengling fell silent, Qingzi shut her mouth, Youzhu looked at him with complicated eyes, and Chengzi held her breath. Everyone in the room was waiting for his answer.

"I want to live—" Yue Zhengling finally spoke.

Upon hearing this answer, Orange breathed a sigh of relief, while Crow closed his eyes, seemingly somewhat disappointed, but before Le Zhengling could finish speaking...

“But if I were to become a monster, I would rather die.” Yue Zhengling suddenly smiled.

"Aren't you afraid of dying?" The crow opened its eyes again, its tone somewhat raised.

"I'm scared, but I'm even more scared of not being myself anymore." It's as if we've returned to that night a year and a half ago, to the conversation between the boy and the man about death.

"The self itself has no meaning; what has meaning is how one perceives oneself. You know you've lost your memory, so do you think you are the same person now as you were in the past? Haven't you changed from who you were in the past?"

The crow posed this philosophical question. Over the past year and a half, he had been constantly reflecting on Yue Zhengling's answer to the question of "self." For him, who had almost become a chaotic consciousness in the past, "individual" was "collective." So why insist on which one was the true self?

But after eating that bowl of "Soul-Suppressing Noodles" again, he had a different perspective on the question, so he asked Yue Zhengling the question again and wanted to tell him the answer he had thought about.

“If you don’t even remember who you are, does that mean you are not yourself? The answer is no, because a year and a half ago, I asked you twice, and your answer was the same as now. This means that you are still you, and the deepest part of your soul has never changed.”

"The body is actually a cage. What determines whether a person is truly himself is his consciousness and soul. No matter how the external appearance changes, as long as the inner self remains unchanged, you are still you."

The crow hopped onto Yue Zhengling's pillow and pecked at his forehead. "You're afraid of losing yourself, but no matter how you change, you'll always be you, because your essence has always existed in the deepest part of your soul."

After hearing these suggestive words, Orange couldn't help but want to see Lingjun's origin, because she remembered that Nero Chaos had said that Araya Sōren had forcibly awakened Lingjun's origin, but Lingjun had been in a coma before, so she couldn't see his soul, and now was the best opportunity.

She activated her demonic eye without making a sound, and then looked at Yue Zhengling. However, as soon as her gaze touched Yue Zhengling's inner self, she couldn't help but let out a mournful cry.

"elder sister?"

"orange?"

Both Aoko and Aoko looked at her. She hurriedly closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and signaled herself to ignore it. Although she had some expectations, she did not expect that the truth would be worse than she had imagined.

“Qingzi,” Orange opened her eyes again and looked at Yue Zhengling, who was deep in thought, “What exactly are you hiding? Who exactly do you know, Lingjun and Lingjiang?”

Aoko was taken aback by Touko's sudden question. She hesitated for a moment, glanced at Le Zhengling, and said, "I know Ling-chan. As for Ling-kun, I met you on the train after this world started over."

Upon hearing this reply, Aoko and Touko both looked at Aoko. Aoko said, "So that's how it is? Re-creation."

Orange asked, "Qingzi, did you also gain memories of other versions of yourself?"

Aoko shook her head, looking at Orange with a conflicted gaze. "No, sister, I regained my memories. Ever since I met Lingjun on the train, I've found that I have an extra memory every day. I didn't know what the previous memory was about, but in my grandfather's cave, after my grandfather activated the fifth law, I realized that it was my future self in this world who threw her memories into my past self, which is this me."

Aoko tried her best to make Yuzhu and Chengzi understand her meaning, while Yue Zhengling also recovered from his reverie and listened silently to what the girls had to say. He had now realized that everyone here was not an ordinary person—including himself.

"Isn't it another parallel world?" Orange pressed.