"Indeed, you are still going to step onto this stage after all? I'm telling you, you'd better not die. Otherwise, everything you've been pursuing… will lose all meaning."
The young adult Aventurine shook his head, his tone carrying a mocking sense of regret.
"Heh, but there are some things that must be done, aren't there? There are always certain matters I need to figure out personally. That is also the meaning of why I've kept living until now…"
"Sigh, so it really is like this after all? Well, I suppose I should say—as expected of me? Hahaha… Actually, I am not your past. I am your future. In other words, I am you from the future."
"I already knew your identity from the first moment I saw you. However, rather than calling you my future self, I would much rather call you… the Fool!"
Aventurine looked at the young adult Aventurine before him with a smile. A moment ago he had a gentle expression, but then his tone suddenly changed as he directly revealed the other party's identity.
"The Fool? What are you talking about? I don't think my past self would make such a joke." The one claiming to be future Aventurine frowned.
"Heh heh, Masked Fool, stop playing these meaningless jokes. I've already seen through your identity, so please return to your original appearance, Miss Sparkle."
The one claiming to be future Aventurine opened his mouth but could not say anything more. After a moment, he finally spoke in a clear, bell-like, pleasant female voice.
"Little Peacock, you really are such a boring person…"
As the words fell, a dreamlike pink-red glow bloomed across the body of future Aventurine. Immediately afterward, our beautiful, peerless Miss Sparkle revealed her true form.
"When did you find out? I thought my disguise was quite good."
Sparkle placed one hand behind her back while the other lightly tapped her lips. She tilted her cute little head slightly and asked with great curiosity.
"Heh heh, I didn't recognize you."
Aventurine spread his hands and chuckled.
Sparkle: "????"
Seeing Sparkle's somewhat stunned expression, a rare look of delight appeared on Aventurine's face.
"Fool, I must say, your concealment was extremely good—in every aspect."
"You played the role of a 'phantom' that only I could see, and you even used special methods to erase your own presence. I have to admire that."
Aventurine looked at the stunned girl before him and spoke eloquently.
"I must say, you understand me very well—well enough to make one feel uneasy. It was as if you truly were my past self, forcing me to believe you really were a hallucination. Of course, that is indeed what I thought at first."
"Tsk!"
Hearing this, Sparkle crossed her arms in displeasure and stared fixedly at the crazy gambler before her.
She had thought that with her level of disguise, Aventurine would never have recognized her. In fact, he really hadn't recognized her—he had only bluffed her based on instinct or intuition, and she had actually jumped out.
"Little Peacock, should I say you truly are the last remaining orphan of the Kigania? Sweet words with a dagger hidden behind them, sharp-tongued and quick-witted. You really are a natural-born liar. Even I was fooled by you."
"Hahaha, receiving praise from the Masked Fool counts as bringing honor to my family."
Toward Sparkle's sarcastic praise, Mr. Aventurine merely smiled, taking it as an honor rather than shame. Then again, that made sense—after all, he was Kakavasha of the Kigania.
"Hmph! Glib-tongued."
Sparkle snorted disdainfully.
"But speaking of which, Little Peacock, Miss Sparkle here managed to obtain quite a lot of useful information from you earlier. It wasn't a wasted trip after all, hehe~"
"Useful information?" Aventurine smiled, then continued, "Miss Sparkle, did you really think I would reveal useful information to an unidentified phantom? Therefore… all the information you obtained is fake. Even if it wasn't fake, it was all meaningless and valueless information."
Aventurine naturally would not reveal his plans to a suspicious phantom. The reason he had acted so trusting earlier was precisely to use the opportunity to feed the phantom some false information, thereby lowering its guard and exposing flaws.
Thinking of this, Mr. Aventurine slightly lowered his head, wanting to see a shocked or gritted-teeth expression on Sparkle's face.
However, to his surprise, Sparkle's face at this moment did not show any of the expressions he wanted to see.
The corners of the girl's mouth curved up slightly. One hand gently stroked her smooth chin, her eyes full of playful amusement.
"Oh? Is that so?"
Sparkle smiled lightly and took two steps forward with her fair, delicate legs, stopping roughly one and a half meters away from Aventurine.
It is worth mentioning that, given Sparkle's natural playful personality, in the past she might have gotten even closer. If the person being teased was a girl, she might have even pressed her entire body against them.
But now? She had already become someone's possession. Although not officially yet, she still needed to mind her behavior a little when outside, right?
"Little Peacock, why did you think I was using leading questions to obtain information from you?"
As she spoke, Sparkle's gaze slowly moved downward and finally landed on the box at Aventurine's waist that held the cornerstone.
"You…!"
Seeing this scene, Aventurine immediately understood what the other party meant. He hurriedly took the cornerstone out of the box and carefully observed the flow of energy inside it.
However, no matter how many times he checked, Aventurine could not find anything abnormal.
"Fool, what exactly did you do to my cornerstone?"
Aventurine's tone was cold and his gaze unfriendly. He knew the Masked Fool would not be so kind-hearted. It was likely that when this fellow helped repair his cornerstone, she had secretly added something into it!
However, just as Aventurine was feeling extremely angry inside, Sparkle's next words left him dumbfounded.
"Nope~"
Sparkle smiled mischievously and winked at Aventurine, then added, "Sparkle didn't do anything to it. I didn't tamper with your cornerstone at all. As for your plan… Aventurine, you're underestimating the power of Causality too much… Deducing from physical evidence or related objects—this is also the power of Causality."