With darkness obscuring his vision, his thoughts grew all the clearer.
He pressed his fingers to his temples, his head bowed slightly. A graceful curve of his neck showed above his collar. Under the pale moonlight, his skin was as white as jade.
A sudden, sharp headache seized him. Xia Ye frowned, pressing his slender fingers hard against his temples with intense, forceful pressure.
His fair skin had begun to redden faintly beneath the force of his touch.
Without a word, Chi Zhou turned up the car’s temperature.
Warm, humid air flowed gently through the vents. Xia Ye lifted his head from the throes of pain, his bright but sightless eyes turning toward Chi Zhou.
“Chi Zhou, I suspect my life is a lie.”
He could hardly call it a suspicion.
He was already certain that his life was a lie. At least the first fourteen years of it were. Perhaps the warmth he remembered had never existed at all.
Calling it a suspicion was just a way to comfort himself.
“Can memories be fabricated?” Xia Ye asked.
He didn’t actually need Chi Zhou to answer. He already knew what the answer would be.
Xia Ye’s voice was low, like a rain-soaked cloud hanging heavy in the sky.
Something unbearably heavy weighed upon him. Faced with such overwhelming grief, grief so vast that he hardly knew how to comprehend it, Chi Zhou felt that anything he said would sound hollow and meaningless.
Xia Ye didn’t need lightweight, empty words of reassurance right now.
The off-road vehicle pulled into an emergency stopping bay, and its amber hazard lights began flashing.
Chi Zhou brought the car to a stop.
Reaching across the seats, he drew Xia Ye into his arms.
It was a perfectly proper embrace. His arms were strong and firm, yet he held Xia Ye only loosely around the shoulders.
Just right. The sort of embrace one might offer a friend.
And yet it was gentle and steady, asking nothing of the person receiving it.
Chi Zhou rested a hand on Xia Ye’s back and patted him lightly, his movements slow and reassuring.
“At least your present is real,” he said softly. “And I’m real, too. I’m right here with you.”
Xia Ye said nothing.
He buried his face against Chi Zhou’s chest and bit down hard on his lower lip.
The faint taste of blood spread between his teeth, forcing back the tears that threatened to gather in his eyes.
Only a muffled whimper escaped his throat, fading before it could become a sound.
He had no idea how much time passed. Perhaps a few seconds, perhaps several minutes. Eventually, Xia Ye spoke.
“I’m fine.”
“Okay.” Chi Zhou lowered his voice, gentle and indulgent. “I know.”
A faint trace of laundry detergent lingered on his uniform, clean and dry, with a comforting warmth reminiscent of cedar trees in the sunlight.
It felt safe.
In his world of complete darkness, Xia Ye couldn’t see a thing.
But Chi Zhou’s scent filled the space around him. He could hear the steady, powerful rhythm of Chi Zhou’s heartbeat, solid and reassuring.
Gradually, the turmoil in Xia Ye’s mind subsided. His fragmented memories receded like the tide drawing away from the shore.
Several different strands of memory still circled in his mind, but the pain in his temples had eased.
“I’m really fine.”
Xia Ye pulled away from Chi Zhou’s embrace and turned toward the window, pretending nothing had happened.
“I wasn’t crying.”
He wasn’t sure whether there were tears on his face, but at least from this angle, Chi Zhou wouldn’t be able to see his expression clearly.
“Mm.” Chi Zhou kept his eyes on the dashboard instead of looking at Xia Ye. “I didn’t say you did.”
He always had a way of showing kindness that touched Xia Ye more deeply than he could explain. Xia Ye knew this well.
—
The off-road vehicle sped back onto the highway. The night was quiet, almost completely silent.
They had left the Longgu Town toll station behind. The little town had returned to its former tranquillity, and everything was gradually returning to normal.
Modified by the research institute, the vehicle was extraordinarily fast, nearly matching the highest-grade maglev cars available.
Beyond the windows, the streets blurred into streaks of light and shadow.
Xia Ye pictured the white buildings in his mind. In the interstellar era, people had abandoned traditional reinforced concrete structures in favour of more efficient, convenient nanomaterials. Sheets only 0.003 millimetres thick could be fashioned into skyscr4p3rs that soared into the clouds, creating a futuristic landscape brimming with technological elegance.
Xia Ye had always loved observing these buildings.
Their pristine whiteness, inorganic textures, and mathematically harmonious lines gave them a beauty that seemed almost divine.
“Could you tell me about him?”
Amid the gentle blue-toned music, Xia Ye’s voice had finally settled into a calm, even tone.
“I thought I knew him well, but now I’m not so sure.”
He had once believed his father was the best father in the world.
Brilliant, wise, seemingly omniscient and omnipotent. It had felt as though there was nothing in the world he didn’t know.
He had always worn a white shirt with a khaki sweater, his tie meticulously knotted.
In the impoverished, chaotic District Twelve, Xia Ye’s father, with his gold-rimmed glasses, had been a symbol of knowledge, respected by everyone around him.
Until those letters shattered everything.
Now Xia Ye didn’t even know whether he should still call the man his father. Perhaps he hadn’t been his father at all.
—
Xia Ye had phrased his question indirectly, but Chi Zhou understood whom he was asking about.
The highway was silent beneath the night sky, with only the artificial stars glittering overhead.
It was a good night for a conversation.
After a moment of thought, Chi Zhou began speaking about a man he both knew and barely knew. “I didn’t interact with him much. By the time Colonel and I joined the military, he was already leading several major projects.”
He chose his words carefully, offering a straightforward, objective account.
“Dr. Xia was highly accomplished in mecha engineering. He led the development of the Alliance’s first-generation mecha, Iron Cavalry, and Prometheus was also his creation. He held a very high position at the research institute and was, without question, the Alliance’s foremost mecha engineer.”
“What did he work on before the ‘shared-sensation’ project?” Xia Ye asked.
He already knew that his father had been extraordinarily talented in mecha engineering. Anyone who saw Scarlet Dawn Lotus would recognise it as a groundbreaking masterpiece.
But the shared-sensation project involved neuroscience and human experimentation. It clearly belonged to a different field from mecha engineering.
“Dr. Xia’s most famous project was probably the Gene Sequence Modification Program,” Chi Zhou replied. “It was supposed to dramatically improve human physical capabilities and extend the human lifespan.”
“The Gene Sequence Modification Program?”
The name was unfamiliar. Xia Ye was certain he had never encountered it in any published research or reference material.
“Yes.” Chi Zhou nodded. “The program originated two centuries ago. I only know a few rumours about it.”
“Apparently, it caused an enormous uproar throughout the Alliance. Many people found the ethical issues behind it unacceptable, and protesters staged sit-ins outside Alliance Headquarters day and night. To calm the situation, the Alliance issued Dr. Xia a red-card warning. The Gene Sequence Modification Program never progressed beyond human experimentation.”
“I see,” Xia Ye murmured.
From those few scattered details, he had already begun to piece together what must have happened.
Clearly, the shared-sensation research was, in some way, a continuation of the Gene Sequence Modification Program.
“The research institute protected Dr. Xia and allowed him to continue working on mechas,” Chi Zhou said gravely. “But he never gave up. He used himself as a test subject for the Gene Sequence Modification Program, becoming the first genetically modified human.”
Xia Ye wasn’t surprised. “He was a madman.”
“Yes, he was. Dr. Xia was the first modified human in Alliance history. When I met him, he looked no older than thirty, but people told me he had already lived for more than a century.”
Chi Zhou continued, “The Gene Sequence Modification Program was remarkably effective. Wealthy people who couldn’t awaken were desperate to get their hands on it. The Alliance couldn’t stamp it out, no matter how hard it tried, so it eventually classified the program as top secret, hoping to bury the research in the passage of time.”
“He probably never abandoned his obsession with genetically modified humans…”
Xia Ye murmured, almost to himself.
“My sister and I were just his experimental subjects.”
He asked Chi Zhou no more questions. Instead, he said, “Can I open the window?”
Chi Zhou gave a brief acknowledgement and tapped the touch panel with his slender fingers. The window beside the passenger seat slowly descended.
The vehicle’s automatic air-purification system activated as it opened. By the time the fierce wind rushing in from outside reached the cabin, it had been softened into a gentle breeze.
Xia Ye let the night air wash over him. Moonlight cast a faint glow across his face.
He tried to look at his hands, spreading his fingers and then curling them into fists. He repeated the movement several times, but his world remained completely black.
Shared sensation.
He was seeing through Xia Zhi’s eyes.
The Leader’s mental attack had triggered their shared sensation, forcing him to share Xia Zhi’s vision and leaving him temporarily blind.
For his sister, the world looked exactly like this.
Xia Ye lowered his head, his expression unreadable.
He finally understood what Chi Zhou had been trying to tell him.
He wasn’t a monster—but that didn’t necessarily mean his sister wasn’t one.
—
Three hours later, the off-road vehicle entered District One.
It was just as the light of dawn began to brighten the sky. The sun already hung high overhead, radiating its light without a hint of fatigue.
Pedestrians crowded the sidewalks on either side of the street, carrying cups of coffee and bags of breakfast as they hurried to work.
The entire city was slowly stirring to life.
Chi Zhou brought up a map on the display and activated autopilot.
A mechanical voice sounded from the vehicle. “Autopilot engaged. Destination: Senming Middle School.”
The vehicle merged into the traffic and sped precisely toward its destination.
Chi Zhou tapped the touch panel twice. The vehicle gave a slight shudder as the seats slowly shifted, transforming into two sofas.
Xia Ye gripped the armrest. “What’s going on?”
Unable to see the interior, he could only feel that the seats had turned in a different direction. The storage cabinet that had been there before was gone, replaced by a square, low coffee table.
“Breakfast,” Chi Zhou said calmly, opening a drawer. “We won’t have time to eat later.”
Xia Ye gave him a strange look. “I didn’t take you for someone who cared so much about healthy living.”
Chi Zhou hardly seemed like someone who kept a regular routine. He was constantly away on assignments, spending three hundred and sixty days out of the year on missions, and he almost always had a cigarette in hand. Nothing about him suggested that he was in the habit of eating breakfast on time.
“Only occasionally,” Chi Zhou replied with impeccable courtesy. “You, however, need to eat breakfast.”
He handed Xia Ye some bread and milk. The bread was soft, with a faint sweetness, and the milk had been warmed to just the right temperature.
Holding the cup, Xia Ye protested, “It’s not as though I have to eat breakfast every single day…”
His voice lacked conviction. In truth, the irregular meals he had eaten over several consecutive days during the Longgu Town mission had repeatedly left his stomach aching.
Chi Zhou was clearly well aware of his physical condition.
“Have you forgotten what the doctor told you?” Chi Zhou asked disapprovingly. “Even I remember, and you’re telling me you’ve forgotten?”
Xia Ye: “…”
The doctor Chi Zhou meant was the medical robot in a white coat they had encountered years ago in District Twelve’s black market.
Xia Ye hadn’t expected Chi Zhou to remember such a minor detail. All he could do was mutter, “Who said I forgot?”
—
By the time breakfast was over, the off-road vehicle had arrived at the school gates.
In the interstellar era, maglev vehicles had become the norm, and cars powered by gasoline were rarely seen.
Although the research institute had modified the off-road vehicle and equipped it with the latest systems and every conceivable function, its exterior remained stubbornly old-fashioned. It looked like something salvaged from a junkyard in District Twelve.
The moment they stopped, the school guards noticed the vehicle.
The students at Senming Middle School were all from wealthy or influential families. A vehicle like this was a rare sight.
One of the guards knocked on the window, his manner far from polite.
“You can’t park here! You’ll be fined—”
He was still grumbling when the window slowly descended.
A slender, clearly jointed hand held a thin piece of paper between its fingers.
The guard’s expression changed instantly.
“Sir, you are…?”
Chi Zhou smiled casually. “The Special Operations Department is here on official business. Please let us through.”
The school’s ornate iron gates slowly swung open.
Xia Ye’s heart began to pound.
The closer he got to Xia Zhi, the more frightened he felt.
His expression remained impassive, but his hands were clenched tightly together. His knuckles had gone white, betraying the emotions he refused to show.
“Don’t worry,” Chi Zhou said. “The Leader’s territory has already collapsed. It won’t be able to manifest again for a while. Your sister is safe.”
He could sense Xia Ye’s state of mind. Once again, a dark, oppressive cloud seemed to gather around him.
Xia Ye murmured, “Mm,” then asked, “She’s a vessel, isn’t she?”
Chi Zhou didn’t want to lie to him, so he silently nodded.
The truth was obvious.
After the Leader had declared that he would find the right person, Xia Ye had seen Xia Zhi lying inside the Leader’s core. Afterwards, he had shared her memories and watched her walk into that vast expanse of fog…
There was no denying it. The truth was staring them in the face.
For many years now, his younger sister had been more than just his younger sister.
He simply needed to hear it confirmed one more time.
“Chi Zhou,” Xia Ye said quietly, “I failed to protect her. I thought I had been good to her.”
His reflection appeared in the car window. He was wearing Chi Zhou’s military-issue wool coat, which was much too large for him.
The collar concealed half his face, hiding the clean line of his jaw. The coat’s structured shoulders hung loosely on his slender frame, and his narrow shoulders had slumped in defeat.
Xia Ye looked fragile.
Chi Zhou parked in front of the academic building and switched off the engine.
“This isn’t your fault.”
Xia Ye made no reply.
Hearing the sound of the car stopping, he reached for the touch panel with his long fingers and fumbled around helplessly. The door still wouldn’t open.
A wave of frustration washed over him.
He rarely felt this way. Most of the time, Xia Ye was barely troubled by his emotions at all, as though he were somehow immune to them.
“Come on,” Chi Zhou said from his right. “Let’s get out and find Xia Zhi.”
At some point, he had gotten out of the car and walked around to the passenger side. He opened the door.
Then, as naturally as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world, Chi Zhou supported Xia Ye’s palm and guided him out.
“…Sorry to trouble you.”
Xia Ye was deeply uncomfortable with being cared for like this; he hated having to show weakness.
—
The military academy had arranged for Xia Zhi to attend one of the prestigious private schools in the Upper Seven Districts. Every building on campus was designed in the Baroque style.
Ornate arches and towering stained-glass windows could be seen everywhere. Even the trees had been pruned into elaborate ornamental shapes, and a lush green lawn occupied the centre of the campus.
At the far end of the lawn stood a Gothic church.
The atmosphere was tranquil–almost unnervingly so.
It was too quiet. The silence was so profound that they could hear the wind blowing and the leaves rustling.
Though Xia Ye could no longer see, his hearing had become more acute.
He listened carefully to the surroundings for a while before asking, “Have we… not encountered any students on the way here?”
It wasn’t a school holiday. The students should have been on campus.
By seven or eight in the morning, classes should have already been underway, and the school ought to have been buzzing with activity.
Yet he couldn’t hear a single conversation or the sound of anyone playing around. Only his and Chi Zhou’s footsteps echoed along the path, as though everyone else had vanished.
It made no sense.
Chi Zhou didn’t answer. Instead, he asked another question.
“Xia Ye, when you came here last time, did you see anyone else?”
Xia Ye shook his head. “No. It was a holiday that day. My sister said everyone had gone out.”
“Is that so?” Chi Zhou prompted. “This is a boarding school.”
Only then did Xia Ye realise something was wrong.
A school this large had more than a thousand students and teachers. It was impossible for all of them to be away at the same time.
He recalled his last visit to Xia Zhi: the deserted campus, the teacher who had agreed to meet him but never appeared, the golden sunlight spilling across the walls, and the strange ambiguity in Xia Zhi’s tone as she spoke.
Everything about that day had been unsettling.
His ‘younger sister’ had lied to him.
After a long silence, Xia Ye finally said, “I understand what you mean.”
They seemed to have entered Senming Middle School, but there was no guarantee it was the real school.
This place was Xia Zhi’s domain.
—
“Gege.” A sweet voice rang out behind them, tinged with a hint of complaint. “You’re so late.”
Xia Ye turned around. His sightless eyes seemed to take in the familiar white wall before him.
He should have been unable to see anything, yet the scene was extraordinarily clear.
The sunlight was pale gold, casting a gentle glow over the wall. Countless strange symbols flickered in and out of view, forming an eerie inscription.
Xia Zhi stood beneath the wall. Confusion clouded her delicate face, her fine eyebrows drawn together as though she couldn’t understand what was happening.
“Gege, why did you bring someone else with you?”
She looked deeply hurt, clutching the hem of her skirt with both slender hands. Her fingers gripped the fabric so tightly they seemed almost twisted out of shape.
“Didn’t we agree? I was going to wait for you.”
Xia Ye’s vision was unstable. Before he could get a clear look at Xia Zhi’s face, the world suddenly spun around him.
In the next scene that appeared before his eyes, he saw something uncanny.
He saw himself; through Xia Zhi’s eyes, he could see himself.
His face was pale, and a thin layer of sweat dampened his black bangs, which hung on either side of his face, obscuring his vacant gaze.
His light brown eyes looked like lifeless glass beads.
The black coat enveloped his entire body, making him look noticeably frail.
Chi Zhou stood one step in front of him, his posture protective.
“Are you hurt?” Xia Zhi asked. “Why did you bring someone else with you?”
She seemed angry, yet at the same time, she seemed sad.
The complicated emotions hidden in Xia Zhi’s words made Xia Ye frown slightly.
He felt that…this was his younger sister.
The familiar girl who had grown up alongside him.
The girl who would carefully hide away her candy, then excitedly present it to him.
The girl who would rush forward with her thin arms raised to protect him whenever he got into a fight.
The girl who had treated him like a god and followed him everywhere.
And yet, she wasn’t entirely his younger sister.
—
Xia Ye was certain that he knew Xia Zhi better than anyone else in the world.
Xia Zhi had always been the most obedient child. Even when their parents scolded her, she never talked back. Instead, she would wrap her arms around theirs and comfort them in her soft, gentle voice.
She was completely different from him.
Xia Ye had been stubborn from childhood, never willing to do anything he didn’t want to do.
His field of vision wavered. Xia Zhi seemed to be walking toward him. But since he himself was still blind, he could only see his own hand reaching out to clutch the hem of Chi Zhou’s coat.
The gesture clearly enraged his sister. Xia Zhi’s voice twisted unnaturally, rising almost beyond recognition.
“Why did you bring him with you?!”
Xia Ye lifted his head. His clear eyes were as sharp as a blade, piercing straight through the girl before him.
“You’re not my sister,” he said.
“I am! How could I not be your sister?” Xia Zhi’s tone shifted again, returning to the sweet, innocent voice of a young girl. “Gege, I’ve missed you so much. Have you been busy lately? I haven’t seen you in ages.”
Her voice was gentle and pure, with a hint of childish affection.
It was Xia Zhi’s voice.
Xia Ye was now certain the person he had met at Senming Middle School before leaving for Longgu Town wasn’t entirely his sister.
Locating Chi Zhou by sound, Xia Ye spoke softly. “They haven’t completely fused. My sister’s consciousness is still there.”
Chi Zhou nodded. His arm hovered protectively around Xia Ye, making his intentions unmistakable.
“They’re fighting for control of the body. At the moment, the Leader seems to have the upper hand.”
Chi Zhou studied the girl before them. This was his first time meeting Xia Ye’s sister in person, and she looked quite different from the photographs in her file.
In the photographs, she had been a timid-looking girl with downcast eyes and delicate features. She resembled Xia Ye so closely that it was obvious how closely they were related.
But the girl before him had something almost uncanny about her. She wore the purest white dress imaginable, yet her smile seemed false, like a mask she had put on for no apparent reason.
“Xia Ye.” Chi Zhou took the hand clutching his coat. “Can you use your Mental Domain?”
“Yes.”
His mental power had fully recovered.
It surged through his body, dozens of times more powerful than that of an ordinary guide. His snow leopard was restless, eager to fight and ready to spring into action at any moment.
“Open your Mental Domain and try to use it as your eyes,” Chi Zhou instructed steadily, resting a hand on Xia Ye’s back. “Look at her.”
The long blade, Heaven’s Path, vibrated inside its sheath. Chi Zhou rested one hand on its hilt and watched the girl without revealing his intentions.
‘Xia Zhi’ was clearly hostile toward him. A barrier enveloped the area within a ten-meter radius, standing between him and the girl.
She was obviously refusing to let him approach.
Chi Zhou didn’t want Xia Ye to take unnecessary risks, but he also couldn’t take away Xia Ye’s right to choose for himself.
“She’s waiting for you to go to her,” Chi Zhou said with a sigh.
Xia Ye expanded his Mental Domain until it encompassed the entire school.
A world constructed from lines slowly unfolded before him, and everything familiar returned.
His snow leopard stood beside him, rubbing its fluffy head gently against his leg as though it had missed him terribly.
Standing in this world, Xia Ye felt safe.
He lifted his eyes and looked toward his sister, just as Chi Zhou had instructed.
Within his Mental Domain, his vision consisted of structures and lines. It discarded superficial appearances and revealed the underlying truth of things.
Translucent lines converged from every direction, gathering at a single focal point to outline Xia Zhi’s face.
A face he had never seen before.
A face that did not belong to Xia Zhi.
Her soft, fluffy hair fell over her shoulders, and her slender neck looked as though it might snap with the slightest pressure.
Yet a long line ran along that fragile neck. It extended from her thin shoulder, climbing up her delicate, fawn-like throat, passing her small, exquisite chin, and ending at her smooth, pearl-like earlobe.
It was a line like sewing thread, as though someone were mending a broken doll. Stitch by stitch, it passed through his sister’s body.
This was the truth of the world, a reality invisible to human eyes.
She asked in confusion, “Gege, what are you looking at?”
In those pure white eyes, Xia Ye saw another pair of eyes.
Eyes that did not belong to this world.
The Author’s Note:
Don’t worry, don’t worry! His little sister won’t die.
Once the novel is finished, I’ll write some sweet little bonus chapters about the siblings’ everyday lives. (Lights a cigarette.)
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