He looked at his bishop father unhappily. Such an offensive look would usually lead to a reprimand from him, but today he was particularly good-tempered. He squatted down and looked at him in a friendly manner, smiling very lovingly: "Your dress looks very nice today. Your mother was right. You dance more beautifully than she did when she was young."

"Twelve years old..." the bishop sighed, "What a wonderful age, perfect for dancing."

The bishop asked him with a smile: "Do you want to dance in the castle in the sky? That is the most suitable place for you to dance now."

The Castle in the Sky was where she went to dance before. He had long wanted to help her dance so that she wouldn't have to work so hard. So his eyes lit up and he nodded without hesitation: "I'll go!"

"Don't go!!" His voice and her hysterical refusal came out almost at the same time.

She looked at the bishop with tears of fear in her eyes, and her voice trembled: "You promised me that as long as I am your name card, you will never bring him to the island!"

"Let me think, how long have you been doing business cards..." The bishop casually scanned her body, with a hint of disdain and disgust in his eyes, but he remained polite on the surface, as if he was just regretful. "Of course I will abide by the agreement with you."

"But as a business card, no matter how beautiful you are now, you are a little old."

The bishop smiled calmly: "You know, no one likes old business cards. Your beauty has made everyone tolerate you until now, which is not easy."

"You are thirty-three, after all."

"It's time for me to get a new business card." The bishop looked at him, who was still wearing a light gauze. He sighed with satisfaction, as if he had seen a delicious fruit beyond his imagination, "Will you go to the island tonight and dance for me for your mother?"

He agreed.

So he was taken to the island by the bishop, just like Salome in the story of Salome - he played the role of Salome, danced for his nominal father, and then came back.

So this is dancing. No wonder her clothes are torn every time she comes back, he thought while taking a shower. But he didn't think there was anything wrong with dancing like this, or he couldn't understand what it was. But after he finished showering, he still ran to talk to her happily, just like she did when she finished dancing.

The bastard bishop father told him that as long as he went to the island from time to time at night to dance for different people, she would never have to dance again.

He agreed very readily.

After all, dancing like this is still very tiring, he thought with a sigh like a little adult - fortunately he can dance, and he can support her by dancing in the future.

She wouldn't have to get hurt and wouldn't have to suffer so much.

As he thought about this, the smile on his face grew happier, and he knocked on her door just like he did every night when he listened to her stories.

Then he was stunned. He saw her lying on the bed, looking more haggard than ever before.

Her eyes were empty as she looked at him in his pajamas, and the bruises and wounds underneath. She took two trembling deep breaths and wanted to pretend nothing had happened and give him a smile as usual, but in the end she couldn't control herself and covered her face and cried.

"I'm sorry!" She collapsed and howled heartbreakingly. She hugged his back tightly, tears dripping down her cheeks. "I'm sorry!"

"I shouldn't have let you come into this world!!"

"sorry!!"

“It’s all my fault!!”

He stood there in a daze, his shoulders still wet with her tears.

There were many things in this world that he could not understand, just like he did not understand why after he helped her dance, she became even more haggard than when she danced on her own.

Every time he came down from the island, no matter how clean he washed to see her, she could still quickly see the traces of his dancing on him, and then wither away little by little.

"It's not hard for me." He expressed himself awkwardly, "Don't worry about me, it's just dancing, it's nothing, they all praised me as the best dancer on the island."

She looked at him with a very complicated look, as if he was a child who knew nothing, and then forced a smile: "Yeah."

“You’re the best looking.”

She smiled and cried: "You are the most precious."

But no matter how he persuaded, comforted, or did anything, she became more and more haggard day by day, as if she had a serious and incurable illness. In the end, when he came down from the island, he didn't even dare to look at her, for fear that she would look at her with those dead eyes, but she still forced a pale smile on her face to comfort him.

Finally, when he was fourteen, no matter how hard he tried, she became so ill that she could not be saved.

In just two years, she went from being such a bright and beautiful person to being decadent and dead.

He stayed by her bed, turned his face away, and tried hard to maintain a cold and hard appearance - this was the only way to avoid crying and making her worry.

She lay on the hospital bed, her face pale as she held his hand, and suddenly she smiled as if relieved: "I never understood what I should do."

"I don't want to stay here and become something that binds you. I feel like I'm a burden, but I know I'm not in your heart. I'm your faith, right?"

"——Just like you were to me back then."

"I'm afraid that if I leave you, you'll completely lose your way, but I'm also afraid that if I don't leave you'll keep falling in the wrong direction."

"But now God has freed me. He has made the choice for me." Her eyes were full of tears, but she smiled with relief. "Leave the Castle in the Sky, leave here. You dance so beautifully. There are bigger places for you to perform on."

"Besides those beasts, there will be many people who really watch your dance and appreciate your beauty - they exist, I have seen them."

She left, and one quiet afternoon he sorted through her belongings and found among them a photograph of her sitting on the bishop's lap, smiling brightly.

In the photo, she doesn't know what her future will be like, but she is smiling happily.

He didn't like this photo, but there were too few photos of her, not to mention one where she smiled so happily, so he suppressed his disgust and kept this photo - he had originally planned to cut the photo behind her into pieces, but in the end he couldn't bear to burn or damage this photo, fearing that it would really be damaged, so he kept it so disgustingly.

He buried her in the flower field, then stood alone in the sunlight for a long time, and suddenly turned around and left like a madman.

His tears flowed freely as he ran.

She told him to go somewhere farther, so he had to go.

But he failed, and the bishop quickly captured him. The entire island was surrounded by Vatican ships, and he had nowhere to escape.

He had lived on an isolated island between the sea and the sky since he was born. After she left, he had nowhere to go and no one to rely on.

After his sixty-seventh failed escape attempt, he was severely beaten and forced to receive guests on the Sky Island. He looked at the bishop's back and had a strong urge to pick up the fork on the candlestick next to him and stab his so-called father to death.

But he knew it was impossible, as this family was guarded by at least three or four people from the Vatican.

When he was about to perform on the stage again, the bishop, who had always been arrogant to everyone, suddenly became terrified and said, "What?! That gentleman went to the island?!"

"That gentleman doesn't like outsiders. Clear the place quickly and get everyone out! Only receive him!"

He knew who were the people in the inner circle. Any one of these people would be able to call the shots outside. But now, for a guest whose name he didn't even know, they were driven out of the inner circle like a dog being kicked out of the house.

No one cared about him either. He was just thrown aside with his hands and feet tied up.

This was the first time he had seen such treatment in the more than two years he had been on the island.

The bishop bowed his head respectfully and welcomed someone in. The man, who was tied up and thrown aside, tried hard to lean his head and look over.

The man was wearing a raincoat, a poncho, and long boots. He held a black whip in one hand that hung down to the ground, and had a grimace mask on his face. All guests coming to the inner circle had to wear masks with voice changers inside, so they could conceal their identities and hide the fact that they had come to the Sky Island.

But everyone can recognize the regular customers.

"I haven't been to this island for a long time." The man's voice was very soft and smiling. It came out from the voice changer in the mask. There was a buzzing sound and it was not very clear. "You seem to have turned this island into a stage?"

Facing this man, the bishop did not even dare to raise his head, sweating profusely: "It is thanks to you that you sold the island to us."

"Don't be nervous. I don't care about the seller's business. Since I have already sold this floating island to you, you are the owner and I am the guest." The man smiled and said, "I came here today because I encountered a sad thing, so I wanted to find someone to accompany me."

"I heard that you have a membership system, but I don't have a business card and no one to introduce me. I just came up like this. I'm offended."

The bishop shook his head wildly, then raised his head with shining eyes: "Of course you don't need these!"

"What kind of people do you need to accompany you? We have everything here."

The man smiled and said, "I'm good at imitating others."

The bishop and he, who was lying on the ground, were both beaten.

——On the entire island, no one is better at imitating people than him.

Because he is considered a top star, he has all kinds of customers coming to him with various requests. He has been immersed in a role-playing atmosphere for the past two years and has mastered the skill of being able to imitate the feeling that the other party wants as long as the other party gives him a photo to imitate.

So he, who had just been beaten, was brought up again by the bishop to be cleansed because of the request of this strange guest and was sent to the room.

The bishop warned him sternly that if he dared not behave himself and did anything to this gentleman, he would take out her bones buried under the flower field, grind them to dust.

So he suppressed his restlessness and sat in the room, hoping that tonight's "dancing" would end soon.

This strange guest did not rush to ask for anything like the other guests did when they entered the door. Instead, he slowly untied his cloak, placed the poker card he had drawn on the island on the table, and then sat down on the wide sofa opposite him.

The room was very dark, with burgundy velvet curtains hanging all over it. Only the candlesticks on both sides were lit with red candles as thick as wrists, emitting a blurry light. With this little light, he could hardly see the numbers on the poker cards that the guest had placed on the table.

——This is a spade card, but I can’t tell exactly which part it is.

The guest's face and figure were even less clear. He sat in the shadow of the velvet and candlelight. All that could be seen was the outline of a human figure sitting there with legs crossed, and faintly visible in the candlelight were black leather gloves and a black bone whip casually draped over his knees.

It was raining outside the island, and there was water on the man's gloves and whip.

He was used to customers who brought their own supplies and was ready to be whipped, but this customer suddenly asked him a very strange question:

"Do you like water?" the guest asked him softly.

He paused and said, "I like it more."

So the guest laughed and said, "Me too."

"But the child I'm closest to hates water, but he was born in water."

"I gave him life, but he couldn't give birth to a soul as I wished and inherit my position." The guest's voice was very soft, as if he was telling him a story, "and when he finally agreed to give birth to a soul, he was leaving me."

"I watched him grow up, but I never got his attention."

"It's such a sad thing." The guest handed him a piece of clothing, and said softly, "Tonight he will betray me forever for the sake of his soul."

"Can you play him and keep me company?"

He stood up hesitantly, not understanding what kind of play this man was going to play, but he still walked behind the curtain, took off his clothes, and changed into the set handed to him by the guest.

It was a very tatty orphanage outfit that looked like something a teenager would wear, complete with a bandage around the eyes.

The more he looked, the more confused he became. When he got dressed and walked out, he even wondered for a few minutes whether there was something wrong with this man's XP.

"Is this how you wear it?" he asked.

The guest smiled: "Yes, you are dressed beautifully."

He pursed his lips and sat down, and was very naturally about to move closer and lie on the other's knees, but the other party shouted to stop.

"Don't come over here." The guest said in a calm, even lazy tone, "Just sit there and don't look back at me."

He asked in confusion: "...Then what should I watch?"

The guest handed him a book: "Read."

It was a fairy tale book, but it was full of all kinds of murder details, and it was broken into pieces and then pieced together. He turned the book over and looked at the title - "Slender Man Murder Records".

So he just sat there, reading as the guest had told him, and the guest looked at him quietly. After a while, he couldn't help saying, "I just need to read..."

"Don't look at me." The guest said calmly, "He won't look back at me. You are imitating him, so don't look back at me either."

"Just read a book."

Outside the island, there was a sound of rain. In the dim candlelight, he was looking down at a torn and weird storybook. A strange guest was sitting opposite him, looking at him silently. The flannel was swinging back and forth between them very slowly.

It was such a quiet atmosphere that he was in a trance for a moment.

It seemed as if he was sitting on a lounge chair in the backyard of his own house, and she was watching him tenderly as he read a storybook, rather than playing a role and dancing for others in this dirty room on the island.

After an unknown amount of time, until he felt like he was about to fall asleep, the other person suddenly said with a smile, "Are you sleepy?"

He suddenly woke up and subconsciously denied: "No!"

"Sir, do you have any other requests?" he asked with all his energy, but still couldn't help yawning.

The guest opposite seemed to hear the yawn and chuckled.

For the first time ever, he blushed, calmed down and sat up again, then asked in a tense tone, "Do you have any other requests?"

——It’s finally time to dance, right?

"No, it's over tonight." The guest opposite replied with a smile, "You made me spend a very pleasant night."

He was stunned - wasn't it too early to say this?

"Why are you so happy?" He was so curious that he asked out loud, "I'm just reading a book here."

The guest smiled and said, "Because I use you to remember a soul that I cannot get and has betrayed."

"He would never accompany me so quietly." After the guest finished speaking, he stood up, picked up the whip and prepared to leave. The masked face turned back to look at him who was half-crouching on the ground with a confused look in his eyes, and smiled, "But you will."

"Thank you for your company tonight."

He almost stuttered, "No, you're welcome."

——This was the first time in his life that he was said thank you on this island.

"To thank you for making my mood go from bad to good tonight." The man smiled, "Is there anything you want to do?"

What a strange sentence this is. It is the first time he hears it.

He racked his brains to answer the guest, but in the end he just asked carefully: "Is this a reward, guest? If it is a reward, you have already paid it when you came to the island."

If that bastard Bishop knew he dared to take tips from his guests, he would burn down the garden she left behind.

"It's not a reward, it's a deal." The guest knelt on one knee and squatted in front of him. The masked face tilted slightly, as if smiling at him, "You made me feel better."

"My mood is a very precious thing, so you can make slightly more expensive requests."

His fingers slowly curled and tightened: "I, I don't feel like dancing this month."

The guest smiled and said, "Sure."

He gradually grew bolder: "I want to transport a person's bones and bury them in a real cemetery where no one can find them."

The guest just smiled and said, "Sure."

He lowered his voice again, looked at the guest very carefully, and made one last request: "I want to leave this island."

"Just for tonight, one night, okay? I want to go out and take a look."

The customer stood up, his expression suddenly turned cold, and he gritted his teeth in regret - he really asked for too much! It's not easy to find such a fool!

Then the next second, the guest extended his hand to him and said with a smile, "Sure."

He was completely stunned and stared blankly at the guest's mask.

"You don't hate water, do you?" the guest asked with a smile, "If you leave the island, do you want to go to the bottom of the sea?"

He placed his trembling hand in the guest's palm, then swallowed his saliva and said, "Yes."

What's wrong with this person?

What's wrong with him?

When he saw schools of fluorescent fish and whales flying overhead, he looked at the guest standing opposite him with a blank expression.

The guest smiled and said to him, "Isn't it beautiful?"

"So I don't understand." The guest put his hand on his chin and asked him as if he was deep in thought, "Why would anyone hate water? It's so beautiful underwater."

His mind was empty, with only one thought -

——Did he meet God?