Chapter 197 The Player
Upon hearing the name of the Hidden Immortal Sect, Pipa was startled.
He knew, of course, that was the sect Yu Qingzhou had joined in her previous life. But he truly hadn't expected to hear that name from Shen Yun's mouth at this moment.
A strange sense of disorientation rose in my heart.
My previously calmed emotions were subtly disturbed again without me even realizing it.
Loquat has so many questions, about her current situation, about the circumstances before her...
But he had no way to express it.
It seemed that the moment Pipa faced Shen Yun, she lost control of her body.
It felt like going back to the past, observing the past through Yu Qingzhou's eyes in a dream. Yet it felt even more real.
Just you wait and see.
A voice suddenly rang in my ears.
Pipa, filled with doubt and uncertainty, tried to turn her head in that direction, but she couldn't control her body with her own will. She only caught a glimpse of a blurry figure out of the corner of her eye.
That is...
The truth you seek is hidden within.
The voice continued speaking, unhurriedly, as if it were someone telling a story.
Pipa felt like she had heard that voice somewhere before; both the tone and the voice had a strange familiarity, but she couldn't quite place it.
This is not the first time this has happened.
There's always a vague feeling about loquat, as if the more he knows, the more he forgets.
It's like painting on a canvas with limited space; in order to fill in more new content, you have to fade or erase the existing parts.
Of course, there could be another situation.
That is, in order to obtain the covered parts on a canvas that has been repeatedly painted, the later added pictures must be erased accordingly.
At first glance, it seems like there's nothing wrong with it.
But what if the loquat itself was originally made up of those erased parts?
If the truth is the painting hidden at the bottom, layered and concealed, then when everything comes to light, will the person who is the loquat still exist?
—Or perhaps, can I really still remain rational?
Pipa felt genuinely skeptical. In fact, when asked the same question, his answer now was clearly very different from when he first entered this place.
For example, his mother's death... Before coming here, Pipa could answer with absolute certainty that his mother had an accident during an argument with his father and died suddenly.
However, at least two versions of the memory are currently surfacing in Pipa's mind simultaneously—
What's frightening isn't that they coexist in Pipa's mind, but that Pipa herself is gradually starting to lose track of which memory came first and which came later.
In other words, he has begun to confuse which part of his memories belonged to the original loquat who entered this space, and which part was created by the influence of what he saw and heard in this space-time.
The colors that peeled off the canvas did not disappear silently; instead, they all adhered to the loquat. They were unwilling to simply vanish, and like living creatures, they wriggled and enveloped it, slowly swallowing and digesting it...
A terrifying scene inexplicably appeared in Pipa's mind.
The self that was encased within it was completely devoured, but what remained was a shell made up of those living memories, identical to the original self.
The shell remained quietly in place, unchanged from the moment it was swallowed.
After an unknown amount of time, the shell seemed to blink, then twisted its neck from side to side, and then started walking.
The shell's steps were somewhat stiff, as if it couldn't immediately adapt to its current form. After walking a short distance with its hands and feet moving in unison, it suddenly stopped and adjusted its posture.
When you lift your foot again, the awkwardness in the movement disappears.
Not only the way it walks, but also the mottled patches of color that were originally covered all over its body move and adjust on their own as it walks... like insects with different roles in a nest, which begin to find their original positions in an orderly manner when the time comes.
Before long, what was originally just a vaguely human-like shell completely transformed into the shape of a loquat that had been eaten.
From behavior to lifestyle, they are exactly the same as the real person, and can even easily recall memories that even the loquat herself might not remember.
—Who can say that thing isn't a loquat?
Similarly, who can say that he, who is now ambiguous about the past and has even lost control of his body, is the real Pipa?
The loquat felt frustrated.
Although he had similar experiences before, at that time he subconsciously knew that he was dreaming.
I know that dreams always have an ending... but now, Pipa is a little uncertain.
However, the next moment, the voice from 'himself's' body solved one of the many problems without him even realizing it.
Because Pipa clearly heard the other person say, "...Yu Qingzhou, my name is Yu Qingzhou."
Now that the other party has claimed the name Yu Qingzhou, Pipa can naturally retain her current identity without worrying about potential confusion.
The question that arises is, if this person is indeed Master Yu, who cultivates magic in the Hidden Immortal Sect, how could he appear here?
He remembered that Yu Qingzhou in his previous life should have been an orphan.
Having lost the protection of her parents at a young age, she was fortunate to be taken in and raised by her master and senior sister, which allowed her to survive and grow into an adult, and also enjoy a seemingly carefree childhood.
However, when he met his master and senior sister, he was probably still an infant in swaddling clothes. The master and disciple named him Yu Qingzhou after seeing the embroidery in the swaddling clothes.
There was no way that she would introduce herself, not to mention that the person in front of her was clearly Shen Yun, not Senior Sister Yingxue, so why would she go back to the Hidden Immortal Sect?
Going to Fancheng would be more appropriate...
Pipa was secretly grumbling to herself when she suddenly heard Yu Qingzhou speak again. He said just two simple words, but they made Pipa pause in surprise.
Because he heard the child softly call out "Sister"...
—Where did this older sister come from?
Pipa was puzzled. At least within the field of vision of this body, there was no young girl who seemed to fit the description.
One could see Shen Yun's fair and flawless face, her dark eyes slightly lowered as she quietly looked this way, her eyes flickering with uncertainty, as if she were thinking about something.
Just as Pipa was feeling confused, another cautious "sister" came from behind her.
This time, Pipa saw clearly that there was only Shen Yun in her field of vision, so the two words could only be directed at the latter.
Sister... Yu Qingzhou actually called Shen Yun, whom she met for the first time, "sister" when she was little?!
Seeing this, Pipa felt a sudden dizziness, as if struck by a thunderbolt, leaving him scorched and raw.
This...this—
Couldn't Yu Qingzhou see the other person's Adam's apple?
Doesn't she think that for a young woman in her prime, her deep, resonant voice is a bit too low?!
Clearly, none of this was within the child's consideration; he simply looked at that exceptionally handsome face, met those unreadable dark eyes, and displayed a frankness beyond his years.
If Pipa hadn't been able to empathize, she would have thought Yu Qingzhou was incredibly bold.
In fact, his hands were already clenched so tightly that they couldn't be clenched any tighter, and his back was also soaked.
He's... nervous.
As for why she was nervous, Pipa couldn't explain it either, and could only wait and see.
After all, there's nothing else I can do right now.
However, I don't have any particular worries about loquat.
Because whether it was Shen Yun, whom he knew, or Yingxue, whom Yu Qingzhou admired in his previous life, they were both within his trustworthy range.
As expected, Shen Yun did not show much displeasure when she heard these two somewhat presumptuous terms of address.
Instead, he suddenly reached out to the child.
Suddenly everything went black—it turned out that Yu Qingzhou had subconsciously closed his eyes tightly. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, with little room to dodge.
The next moment, Pipa felt a gentle pressure on her head and smelled a familiar, cool fragrance of plum blossoms.
"Judging from this, he's not that brave."
A deep, low voice sounded nearby. It was a sentence with no particular intonation, yet it seemed to carry a hint of a smile.
The child felt a strange itch in his heart and ears, and couldn't help but open his eyes out of curiosity. He met those deep, cold eyes and couldn't help but gasp for breath.
For a fleeting moment, he felt as if a whirlpool was swirling in the deep pool, with a mesmerizing attraction that almost made him fall right in.
However, it only lasted for a moment.
The boy withdrew his hand and stood up straight again, reverting to his usual aloof and unapproachable demeanor.
However, there seemed to be an inexplicable complexity in the way he looked at the children.
Immersed in the unexpected joy of being gently stroked on the head by a pretty stranger, some children, reluctant to leave, naturally didn't notice these minor details.
Pipa saw everything clearly and also noticed the other person's muttering.
"He's a bit slow... but his aptitude is alright..."
The sound wasn't loud, and Pipa couldn't hear it very clearly.
However, from the few words spoken, it can be inferred that the boy's actions just now were not simply out of goodwill.
They had already offered to take the child away, but now they suddenly made a move to test him. I don't know why... Maybe they're worried about accidentally bringing back a mentally challenged person?
After all, it's quite laughable that someone of this age still can't distinguish between men and women.
Yu Qingzhou, however, remained completely oblivious. Her body temperature, which had subsided slightly due to the coolness around the boy, returned and crept up her cheeks.
He lowered his head, glancing at the hand the boy had used to touch his head, then unable to resist reaching for the spot on his head with his own hand.
Pipa sensed Yu Qingzhou's happiness, a deep-seated, secret joy.
I could feel it too; the way the other person looked at the boy was as if they were looking at the stars in the sky…
Realizing this, Pipa suddenly felt an indescribable emptiness. He had originally thought that the only person Yu Qingzhou would admire so carefully was Shen Yingxue.
But it turns out that Shen Yun is the same... It seems that there is no such thing as a unique option that can only be this person.
Pipa didn't know where this sense of loss came from.
Even though he repeatedly emphasized to himself that this metaphor of a light boat was not the same as that metaphor of a light boat, it didn't seem to have much effect.
This idea has even thrown loquat into a new vortex.
Since Shen Yingxue can be someone else, then Yu Qingzhou can also be replaced by someone else entirely. Because the plot is already predetermined: when to cry, when to laugh, when to fall in love at first sight with whom, and when to break up with whom…
If that's the case—
Who the characters in the play are and what does it matter?
Going left or right is just going through the motions; going left or right is an inescapable fate.
What a wonderful show! One act ends and another begins. On the surface, there seems to be a clear distinction between the stage and the audience, but in reality, everyone is a character in the play, both on and off stage.
The so-called cycle of cause and effect, the inescapable retribution—it seems to be so, but that's all there is to it…
The moment this thought arose in her mind, Pipa suddenly saw her own face and realized that she had unknowingly left her physical body and was floating in mid-air, becoming a bystander in the audience.
Pipa didn't know why this was happening.
This feeling wasn't entirely unfamiliar to him, because he remembered the dream in which he first met Lan.
She floated above the imperial city until she bumped into Li Nian, who was walking excitedly on the road, and was then led to Lan's bamboo house.
At that time, no one noticed his existence... except for Lan.
It seemed that immediately after touching the orchid, the loquat, which had been floating in mid-air like a ghost, suddenly solidified into a physical form.
Could it be...
Pipa subconsciously looked in a certain direction, and sure enough, in the place where Yu Qingzhou had seen the blurry figure out of the corner of his eye, he saw a figure.
He was overjoyed.
Her memory of Lan remained that last glimpse in the dark passageway.
At that time, Pipa made up her mind to find out the truth. Little did she know that she would have such a bizarre and tortuous experience.
Meeting an old friend at this moment, an indescribable feeling of grievance and sorrow welled up in my heart.
But before he could utter the name, he was startled by the face that rose from the darkness.
—That was actually his own face!
However, after calming down, Pipa realized that the face wasn't hers. There was no scar on her forehead, and the age didn't match…
It was a young man's face, and judging from his appearance alone, he should be the closest to Yu Qingzhou from her previous life, but Pipa still felt a sense of inexplicable unease.
Perhaps it was his eyes, or perhaps it was the air about him... Compared to the Taoist priest Yu in Pipa's memory, he seemed closer to Shen Yingxue when she was expressionless, yet he lacked Shen Yingxue's sharp, murderous aura.
I can clearly distinguish all the similar faces that I have seen in my dreams and in real life so far.
The moment their eyes met, he saw that face smile slightly.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
