"Ren," Lian Zhen whispered... his past-self, his forest-self, his war-torn self... his voice trembling against my skin, "the sin I committed… the reason you-"
Click.
The door opened.
A rush of cold air slashed through the room.
I jerked upright.
Lian Zhen's arms tightened around me for a single heartbeat...
and then...
He vanished.
Not walked away.
Not phased out.
Vanished.
As if the air swallowed him whole.
My breath hitched.
My palms stung from gripping empty space.
A shadow fell across the doorway.
The tall man in the black suit… the one who bought me here… stepped inside casually, like he hadn't just ruined the entire world I knew.
His voice dripped into the silence.
"What are you doing on the floor?"
I froze.
My lips parted.
But no sound came.
Lian Zhen...my Lian Zhen...my ghost, my general, my past, my warmth...
he was gone, first time in weeks... he said he would not disappear again.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
"Lian Zhen…?" I whispered into the empty air.
The suited man paused.
His brows twitched.
"I'm right here."
I blinked.
He stepped closer...his shoes barely whispering against the carpet.
And with each step… a strange cold crept up my spine.
"Why are you calling me like I'm hiding?" he asked.
I stared.
He stared back.
Confusion flickered across his face, genuine and sharp.
And then he asked the question that ripped the world apart.
"…and who told you my name?"
My lungs collapsed.
My vision tilted.
"No-no-no-no-"
My voice broke into pieces.
The room blurred at the edges.
"H-he's a ghost-no-he's someone else-someone who lives h-here-he-"
My tongue tangled, choking itself.
The man...this real-world Lian Zhen, this stranger... looked completely lost.
"Ghost?" he repeated softly, as if testing the word.
I nodded helplessly, tears burning my eyes.
His jaw tightened.
"This mansion is mine," he said slowly. "And I've lived here alone for years. Alone. Are you saying it's haunted?"
His voice wasn't mocking.
It was concerned.
Almost… worried.
But I couldn't breathe.
The memories, the warmth, the food, his arms, the kiss, the past...it all swarmed me like a storm of stinging insects.
He continued, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly.
"Ren… if you don't want to work here anymore, you can tell me directly. You did keep the mansion spotless-"
He stopped mid-sentence.
Because I broke.
I didn't just cry.
I collapsed.
My knees hit the floor with a dull thud.
My hands shook uncontrollably as they clawed at the carpet.
I wasn't crying like someone sad.
I was crying like someone whose reality had been torn in half.
He hesitated before kneeling, placing a cautious hand on my shoulder.
"Ren… what happened?"
"I'm not lying…"
My voice trembled violently, slipping between sobs.
"T-that Lian Zhen… h-he was a general… I was a p-prince… he took care of me… h-he-"
For a moment, I sounded like a child defending an imaginary friend.
But this wasn't imaginary.
It wasn't.
His hand froze.
"For god's sake-" he whispered, struggling to keep his composure. "I'm Lian Zhen. That's my name. And what prince and general are you talking about?"
My heart flipped.
My stomach twisted.
My head throbbed like someone hammering inside my skull.
"I…"
I couldn't breathe.
"…don't know."
I didn't know anything anymore.
I scrambled to my feet and ran...stumbling, gasping...toward the table where I'd left the book…
The book that started everything.
The book with the silver lock.
With the portrait.
With the eerie pages that changed themselves.
I grabbed it with trembling hands...
And froze.
Because the lock was gone.
The ancient cover had turned into cheap paperback.
The embossed symbols had turned into printed letters.
And the title wasn't written in ink from centuries ago.
It was written like any modern novel at a secondhand bookstore.
My heart pounded against my ribs...painfully, violently.
"No…" I whispered.
I ripped through the pages, searching for the portrait of me as a prince.
The one where my birthmark glowed like gold.
Where my eyes looked ancient and innocent at the same time.
Where Lian Zhen stood behind me in armor.
But the pages were blank of him.
Every page now held…
A normal story.
A fantasy novel.
Printed.
Mass-produced.
Empty.
Like the forest never existed.
Like the memories were stitched from fever and loneliness.
My breath cracked.
He stepped closer behind me.
Very carefully, he touched my shoulder again.
"Ren… you should rest."
Rest.
As if rest could fix this madness twisting into my bones.
Rest wouldn't bring the food back.
Rest wouldn't bring the ghost back.
Rest wouldn't bring the touch… the voice… the memories…
Maybe they were illusions.
Hallucinations.
Dreams of a lonely boy in a mansion he never belonged in.
Maybe they were never real.
The thought struck like lightning...
sharp
white
merciless.
"No…"
My voice fractured.
"It was real…"
But reality didn't bend for me.
It laughed.
Mockingly.
I tore away from him, running downstairs.
Almost falling.
Barefoot.
Shaking.
The kitchen lights flickered on...
Cold.
Empty.
Silent.
I opened the fridge.
The fridge that used to be full of breakfast dishes.
Steaming buns.
Congee simmering with ginger.
Handmade dumplings shaped imperfectly by ghostly hands.
Now...
Empty shelves stared back.
A few old condiments.
Dusty frost.
Nothing else.
My throat closed.
I backed away, stumbling, clinging to the counter just to stay upright.
Everything he cooked…
everything he prepared…
everything he cared about…
Gone.
Like it had never existed.
Like he had never existed.
I felt something inside me die a little.
I ran back upstairs.
Back to the bedroom.
Back to the only place that still smelled faintly of him...
Lavender.
Steel.
Autumn leaves.
I searched for my phone.
The one I'd dropped on the bed earlier.
Gone.
Gone.
Everything that tied me to the ghost...
vanished.
I sank to the floor.
And broke again.
"I-it can't be fake…"
My voice cracked into a whisper.
"It was all real-he was real-he held me-he kissed me-he-"
But reality didn't care about my desperation.
The walls were silent.
The shadows were empty.
And I was losing myself by the second.
Behind me, the tall man...Lian Zhen, the real one, the stranger one...stood in the doorway watching with a mixture of concern and… fear.
Genuine fear.
Like maybe I was the ghost haunting his mansion.
He stepped forward slowly.
"Ren…"
He crouched beside me.
"Do you still want to work here..."
He didn't finish.
Because my eyes rolled back.
The world tilted sideways.
My body collapsed into his arms.
And everything...
everything...
went black.
END OF CHAPTER