Chapter 274 Epilogue - New World Arc (Seventy-One)
After saying those incomprehensible things, the young man turned and left without looking back.
That decisive demeanor made it seem as if Yu Qingzhou's previous slightly excessive behavior was nothing more than a one-sided illusion.
However, there was still some warmth left on my shoulders and back... especially near the back of my neck.
All around was quiet, and he felt like someone who had been abandoned on a deserted island.
Yu Qingzhou stood there, clenching the envelope in her hand in a daze.
The envelope was somewhat worn.
The date on the signature is December of a certain year.
Yu Qingzhou frowned, only then realizing that she had forgotten to ask the other person what day it was.
However, judging from the age of the paper, although it is well preserved, it is obviously quite old.
As Yu Qingzhou pondered this, she pulled out the letter.
The yellowing of the pages confirmed Yu Qingzhou's earlier thoughts.
The vigorous and elegant handwriting is somewhat similar to, yet not quite the same as, Dr. Shen's handwriting on the notebook I glimpsed earlier, perhaps because it was written with a brush.
You can still faintly smell the faint fragrance of plum blossoms mixed with the ink.
Looking at the signature, the name in the signature column is indeed Shen Yun.
Naturally, this kind of deep charm is not the same as that kind of deep charm.
Yu Qingzhou wasn't foolish enough to think that way.
It just so happens that many years ago, Shen Yun wrote such a letter, and after who knows how many years have passed, it has been handed to him by Shen Yun again. How can this not be considered a coincidence?
He then discovered that it was less of a letter and more of a suicide note.
Because it was stated from the beginning that the writer would be no longer alive when the recipient received the letter.
Please forgive me for not being able to say goodbye in person.
Because of my own cowardice, I made many mistakes, and for that I received the corresponding consequences.
I should have lived a long life, enduring the pain of guilt and loneliness. But I gradually realized that was impossible.
Because of your existence, I have begun to indulge in a terrible delusion.
If none of this had happened, if I had made the right choice from the beginning, we—him and me—might be like this now.
But that's the reality; the past cannot be changed.
You are you, you are not him, and you shouldn't be treated as him. This is extremely unfair to both of you.
Therefore, I will lay everything out here and return the right to choose to you.
You can make your own decision after learning the truth. Just like he did back then...
Yu Qingzhou continued reading.
The initial content was quite ordinary, using only a few words to explain the entanglement between the letter writer and "him"—that is, the letter writer's junior brother.
Then, things began to take a fantastical turn.
This happened some time after the junior apprentice had encountered misfortune, and the letter writer, on the advice of his mentor, threw himself back into his work.
During the final excavation of an underground ruin, the letter writer accidentally triggered a mechanism and entered a stone chamber where a coffin was placed.
The coffin was cold, chilling to the bone.
The body inside the coffin was not incorruptible, and the pale face was none other than that of the junior brother who had gone missing in the avalanche.
Up to this point, everything could still be explained by excessive coincidence. However, when he subconsciously reached out to touch that familiar face so close to his face...
But I felt the texture of a living person's skin.
It was cold, but it still retained a soft texture, something a long-dead corpse could never achieve.
Before he could recover from his shock, he met a pair of dark eyes again.
The corpse in the coffin actually opened its eyes!
Not only that, but she also stared at him with a blank look in her eyes, her expression and demeanor clearly indicating that—
He blurted out his junior brother's name.
[Metaphorically, a light boat?]
As those pale lips opened and closed, a faint, wispy sound echoed in the silent stone chamber.
Upon hearing this, he was deeply shaken. For a moment, he couldn't tell if he was going mad or dreaming...
In that moment of distraction, the person in the coffin returned to their previous quiet state.
His eyes were closed, and his mouth was not open.
But he was absolutely certain that what he had just witnessed was not a hallucination.
Because in the hand hanging by the side of the corpse, there was clearly still a piece of his clothing being clutched. Just like something an anxious person might do in their sleep.
After a brief moment of thought, he made a crazy decision.
He didn't tell anyone about his discovery, but instead returned the way he came, carefully concealing any traces along the way.
Since it happened in the middle of the night, everyone else was fast asleep and no one noticed that he had gone out alone because he couldn't sleep...
He smuggled the body out of the coffin.
At that point, it seemed inappropriate to call it a corpse anymore.
Because the latter's state is becoming increasingly vibrant, with body temperature, blood oxygen, brain waves, and other bodily indicators approaching those of a person in deep sleep.
But there was no heartbeat.
Is it possible for a person to survive if their heart stops beating?
In the past, he would never have believed it.
But the facts are right in front of us—
It's not just a matter of no heartbeat; in fact, this person's chest is completely empty.
A heartless person...
A living, heartless person...
Most importantly, this person has the same face as his deceased junior brother...
Or perhaps, this is actually his junior brother.
His junior brother hadn't died at all; he just hadn't known why he'd reappeared in front of him in this way...
Such an absurd statement was something even he couldn't convince himself of.
But in any case, his stagnant life was changed.
He began to look forward to going home, and to each reunion.
Even though, since returning from there, he had never seen the other person open their eyes or heard them utter a single word.
He would talk to the person, meticulously clean their body, and carefully tidy their hair and clothes.
Talking to the other person on a sleepless night, then dragging your tired body back to your room, even though you never get a response, brings an indescribable sense of peace.
Then one day, he struggled to wake up from a terrifying dream of an avalanche.
Still shaken, I looked around blankly, only to meet a pair of all-too-familiar eyes.
"Yu Qingzhou..."
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