DEG - Chapter 9
Chapter 9: The True Culprit
Pushing down the chaotic thoughts, at least Jiang Xun was standing before her, alive and well.
So Luo Nanqiu chose to take a step back, rubbing the wound on Jiang Xun's neck. "Alright."
"The Imperial Military has always been like this, secretive and sneaky." She rolled her eyes, her tone critical and dissatisfied.
Only then did she look up at Jiang Xun. "So your second ability drew the 18-year-old me."
After getting a nod from Jiang Xun, she asked, "Then how old are you now?"
Jiang Xun smiled, her eyes curving. "Guess."
Luo Nanqiu had no patience for such annoying habits. She tugged on Jiang Xun's now-long hair.
Jiang Xun deliberately yelped and grimaced, trying to evoke Luo Nanqiu's pity.
She could tell that Luo Nanqiu was extremely agitated right now.
But why should her current self have to atone for the trouble her eighteen-year-old self caused Luo Nanqiu?
So she answered honestly, "Twenty-four."
"I was the youngest colonel in the Empire, you know." She blinked, her gray eyes full of pride and cunning.
She entered the military academy at eighteen and became the youngest colonel in the Empire at twenty-four, despite the countless deliberate obstructions from her rivals, despite having no powerful faction to back her.
Still, countless media outlets speculated.
She, Jiang Xun, would become the youngest general in the Empire.
Luo Nanqiu's hand unconsciously lost its strength. Her long, thick lashes drooped, hiding a torrent of emotions.
She had already done the math in her head.
She and Jiang Xun were the same age.
But twelve years later, Jiang Xun was only six years older than her.
What about those six years?
Could it be that Jiang Xun was in a coma for six years, completely unaware of that time?!
She also said this was a holographic game, that this wasn't her body!
In her other hand, Luo Nanqiu had already snapped two ribs of the fan she was holding.
Her mind went blank for a moment, and she spoke purely on instinct.
"Is that so? Ah Xun, you're truly amazing." Her voice was soft and gentle, sweet as if coated in honey, and a single sentence was enough to make Jiang Xun's tail wag.
"Of course. Back then, the interstellar media even said I was the most likely young talent you would marry."
It was unclear what she was so proud of.
Luo Nanqiu listened, her smile radiant.
She took Jiang Xun's hand, her fingers resting on the wrist, feeling the pulse of the blood vessels.
A sky-high wave of doubt threatened to overwhelm her. She pulled Jiang Xun to the bedside.
"Aren't you sleepy?"
Luo Nanqiu understood Jiang Xun.
She usually had a very good temper, only getting grumpy when she was extremely tired and suddenly woken up.
The moment Jiang Xun leaned against the bed, her eyelids began to droop. "I am."
"Nanqiu, before this mission, I had another really tough one," she mumbled, as if complaining. "I haven't rested in so long."
Jiang Xun naturally leaned against the side of Luo Nanqiu's neck. The familiar presence, the familiar scent and body temperature, were the prelude to a peaceful sleep.
She heard Luo Nanqiu snort indignantly. "Serves you right!"
Then, she manually turned Jiang Xun's head, placing it gently on the pillow. Her movements were extremely light.
"I'm going to change first."
Luo Nanqiu said. She couldn't possibly sleep in such an elaborate outfit.
When Luo Nanqiu finished changing and came out of the card, the room was already clean.
The dead man had been tossed outside the door by Jiang Xun, who had then washed her hands with extra disgust. Even her neck was still damp from being recently rinsed with water.
She was still forcing her eyes open, leaving half the bed for Luo Nanqiu.
"Why aren't you asleep yet?" The moment Luo Nanqiu saw her like this, she knew Jiang Xun still had something to say.
"Nanqiu." Jiang Xun grabbed Luo Nanqiu's forearm, shaking it unconsciously. "Aren't you curious about our future selves?"
Of course she was curious, but Luo Nanqiu felt that Jiang Xun probably wasn't clear on the things she wanted to know either.
"Are you going to talk to me all night then?" Luo Nanqiu retorted.
"No, I can only tell you a little," Jiang Xun said, feeling she was being a bit of a tease.
"For example?"
"For example..." Jiang Xun's voice was already starting to slur.
She lay on her side, hugging Luo Nanqiu's left arm tightly, her voice like a sleepy murmur. "You're my girlfriend. We promised that we'd go public after I finish this mission."
Luo Nanqiu suddenly hit her head on the headboard, her consciousness yanked out of a vortex. "What do you mean?"
Her voice was stiff, as if she'd been knocked dizzy by a pie falling from the sky.
But the only response she got was the sound of Jiang Xun's breathing gradually steadying.
She had fallen asleep.
Luo Nanqiu: ...
She pinched the philtrum below her nose, feeling like she was about to suffocate.
Once her mind cleared, her first thought was to scorn her future self for being so pathetic.
Although her current self was also light-headed from hearing such news.
She understood Jiang Xun. Her long-term, secret observation allowed her to know the meaning behind every one of Jiang Xun's small gestures.
There were some things Luo Nanqiu found difficult to say, yet she yearned for a response.
Unfortunately, Jiang Xun was a block of wood who took everything for granted and never thought too deeply.
That left Luo Nanqiu, the one with the complex mind, to analyze Jiang Xun's every thought and intention behind her actions over and over again in her head.
Over time, while not always accurate, she could guess correctly most of the time.
Luo Nanqiu knew that the current Jiang Xun didn't want her to leave midway, so she deliberately dropped a piece of news that, in her eyes, in the eyes of the 18-year-old Luo Nanqiu, was incredibly unbelievable. She was dangling it in front of her, making her wait for her to wake up, wait for her to tell the rest of the story.
Luo Nanqiu could deduce that Jiang Xun probably hadn't seen her for a very long time.
She could also deduce... that their future selves still hadn't managed to get together.
But Jiang Xun missed her very much.
She wanted to keep her here.
So there was still a glimmer of hope!
Luo Nanqiu's heart instantly bloomed with joy. She tidied Jiang Xun's long hair, then looked at Jiang Xun's current face, which was almost identical to her original one.
Compared to whether they were really girlfriends or not, what Luo Nanqiu wanted to know more right now was Jiang Xun's current situation.
Why had Jiang Xun lost six years of her life?
Her thoughts sank back into the vortex.
She was terrified that the truth would point in a certain direction.
But wasn't Jiang Xun lying right beside her now?
Reason told her not to probe any further, but her emotions were sinking deeper and deeper.
She, who had always been results-oriented, wanted to see the so-called process. She still wanted to know why Jiang Xun was here.
The faint blue light from the Optical Brain's screen reflected off her porcelain-white skin. She once again searched the external web.
A search for Jiang Xun yielded nothing.
Deciding to go all in, she logged into Luo Nanqiu's private account again.
Originally, she had no intention of prying into the life of her future self.
But...
She wanted to know what Jiang Xun had gone through, to go from being the youngest colonel in the Empire to a person who couldn't be found.
Skipping countless work documents that needed her approval, she opened her memos. Again, she skipped countless work-related entries and found the single, hidden place.
She scrolled down, entry by entry, until she found the one from when she was eighteen.
That was the eighteen-year-old Luo Nanqiu, who had just written it yesterday.
"Sooner or later, I'll extend my business into the Imperial Military! You can guard against that useless father of mine, but you can't guard against me."
Luo Nanqiu felt relieved and continued scrolling up.
She knew her own habit of writing memos. They only recorded an emotion. Without knowing the full context, even she herself would be confused reading them.
She scrolled all the way to six years ago and finally found an entry she could understand.
"When she comes back, we'll go public!" Through the screen, she could feel the elation in that single line of text.
Realizing she had found a key part of the story, Luo Nanqiu's heart tensed.
She saw the next line: "With this status as a guarantee, the whole world will have to be our wingmen. Won't it be just a matter of time before the pretense becomes real?"
...
Luo Nanqiu: ...
It was just as she expected.
Unsure whether to be happy or to sigh, her heart hung in limbo. The content of the next entry immediately jumped into view.
"Why can't I claim her remains? I'm clearly the person closest to her in this world. We spent the most time together, we promised to always be together, we understand each other deeply, we have carved each other into our destinies. I love her the most. Why can't I claim her remains? Is it just because we have no legal relationship? They don't even love her."
Luo Nanqiu fell silent, her breathing uncontrollably trembling, her mind instantly fogging over.
Remains.
The question she wanted an answer to was now answered.
Luo Nanqiu's lips tightened, her fingertips trembling lightly.
The sound of breathing by her ear was the rein holding onto her last shred of sanity. She mechanically scrolled up, looking at the subsequent new memos.
"I'm going to kill them, kill them, kill them!!! They are all murderers!"
"How ridiculous. Her comrade-in-arms said: I really envy her for having a dear friend like you."
"They're no longer willing to sell me Jiang Xun's things. They said, do you want to become one of Jiang Xun's mementos? Am I not already one?"
"What murderer, what true culprit... it was me."
The records from six years ago came to an abrupt end.
More confusion erupted at the same time.
What did this mean?
What did she mean by... she was the true culprit?
Her mind was in utter chaos, leaving only mechanical actions.
The next memo was from three years ago.
"I've begun to avenge her."
Then there was the latest entry, dated one year ago.
"How wonderful. I got married."
The cold text carried an undeniable sense of relief, peace, and serenity.
Immediately after, the memos seemed to have been abandoned, with no new records.
Luo Nanqiu felt her entire body trembling. With a twelve-year time difference, she couldn't understand her future self.
"Ah Xun..." Her lips trembled unconsciously, a sound like a shattered dream escaping them.
What did she mean, I was the true culprit?
Why did I have to erase all traces of her existence?
Did my long-standing guilt turn my love into hatred?
Did I finally find peace? Did I stop loving her?
Question after question assaulted her mind. She could barely breathe, crushed by a heavy wave of self-loathing.
She had always been one to overthink, wrapping her true emotions in layer after layer.
The best way to remember something was memory, followed by her ability; she had written countless notes for Jiang Xun.
But only she could see them.
Countless people said they couldn't see through her.
She couldn't see through her future self either.
Did I... get her killed?
Her vision blurred. Luo Nanqiu mechanically gathered information.
She wanted to find more, more.
Perhaps the movement of her arm was too large, or perhaps a warm teardrop fell onto Jiang Xun's arm.
Jiang Xun hugged Luo Nanqiu's arm tighter, her slurred voice sounding out again.
"Nanqiu..."
"Why aren't you asleep yet?"
Comments
Post a Comment