Lin Gui stared at the girl for a long time.
In his mind, he quickly connected the pieces of the bizarre puzzle.
The mission that had been completed despite no one signing for it.
The glass bead that was far too clean.
And now, these invisible “senders”...
An absurd yet reasonable hypothesis suddenly flashed in his mind.
He spoke tentatively, his voice a little dry:
“Are you... Moro Troy?”
The little girl behind the windowsill nodded timidly.
She looked up at Lin Gui and confirmed in a small voice,
“Yes, I am Troy.”
“I 'stuffed' myself into the letter...”
“I just hoped you could bring me 'back' to my hometown.”
She paused, seemingly wanting to express her gratitude, but used an address that made Lin Gui freeze instantly:
“So... thank you, little brother.”
Little... brother???
Lin Gui's mouth hung open slightly, a look of utter bewilderment on his face.
He used the faint glow of the Eyes of the Netherworld to carefully size up Troy.
She was short, with a childish face and a slender build.
No matter how he looked at her, she seemed like a human girl of about twelve or thirteen.
Calling him... little brother?
Lin Gui's lips twitched a few times. He couldn't help but ask,
“How... old are you?”
Troy tilted her head, very seriously counting on her translucent fingers.
“Hmm... if I count from when I was alive...”
“I should be twenty-eight.”
Lin Gui: “...???”
He took a deep breath. “Are you sure you're not lying to me?”
Troy seemed a little embarrassed. Leaning against the window, she said to Lin Gui,
“Well... ever since I became like this...”
“My appearance stopped changing.”
“When I 'passed away,' I was about this age.”
She looked up, her eyes clear but holding a trace of time's passage.
“And that was already... sixteen years ago.”
“So counting by time, I'm twenty-eight now.”
She paused, her tone turning matter-of-fact:
“You look... twenty-something at most, right?”
“So, calling you little brother is correct.”
“Ah, haha... fair enough.”
Lin Gui rubbed his still-throbbing forehead, deciding to accept this form of address.
“Then, 'Big Sister' Troy...”
He looked at the ghostly girl by the window, who looked so childish but claimed to be twenty-eight.
“You said just now that you 'stuffed' yourself into the letter.”
“What exactly... was that about?”
Seeing that Lin Gui didn't seem angry, Troy grew a bit bolder.
She floated up, sat on the windowsill, and swung her feet casually.
“It's... literal.”
“I stuffed my 'true self' into the letter.”
“Then I left the letter on the post office counter.”
Troy floated by the window and began to ramble.
“If it weren't for finding those seven coppers to weigh down the letter...”
“I would have given it to you long ago.”
“I wouldn't have had to wait until you were almost leaving to send it.”
She seemed to have not spoken to a living person in a long time; once she started, she couldn't stop.
“Later, I was even afraid you'd peek...”
“So I specifically wrote a warning on the envelope.”
“Otherwise, if you found it empty... with only a glass bead inside...”
“You'd definitely think it was a prank.”
Lin Gui quickly raised a hand to interrupt her.
“Wait.”
“You said... 'true self'?”
“What is your true self?”
Troy blinked her translucent eyes.
“The bead, of course.”
Before her voice even faded...
A glass bead landed lightly on her open palm.
“Here, this is it.”
Lin Gui's pupils shrank slightly.
He stared at the bead, falling silent for a long moment.
This reminded him of...
The merman's soul sealed inside a glass bead at the bottom of the Silent Sea.
That soul had also mentioned that there were “many, many” such beads on the seabed.
But Lin Gui hadn't expected...
That inside the Wall of Sighs, in the ruins of Blackwater City...
He would see the exact same thing again.
The Silent Sea and the Wall of Sighs...
Was there some kind of connection between these two forbidden zones?
He temporarily suppressed the doubts churning in his heart.
Instead, he thought of another matter—
So, the reason the system mission was completed so mysteriously...
Was because he had personally pocketed the “recipient's” true self?
“In other words...”
Lin Gui pointed at the bead.
“The one I just picked up inside the room...”
“Is the true self of the person you wanted to 'deliver' to?”
Troy nodded vigorously, a happy smile breaking across her face.
“Yes! That's my brother's true self!”
“I didn't expect him to still be 'alive'...”
“I'm so happy.”
She paused, giving Lin Gui a slightly embarrassed look.
“He originally wanted to thank you in person.”
“But...”
She pointed at Lin Gui's eyes, which still swirled with gray light.
“Your eyes... are really too terrifying.”
“Oh, no, too terrifying for 'ghosts.'”
Lin Gui pointed to his Eyes of the Netherworld, which were still swirling with gray light.
“Why?”
He actually had a faint guess as to why, but he still wanted to hear the perspective of a ghost who had experienced it.
Troy floated a bit closer, tilting her head and carefully choosing her words.
“I... I can't really explain it clearly.”
“It's just... from the depths of the soul.”
“When your eyes turn like that and look at us...”
She shuddered slightly, as if recalling the feeling.
“We can't help but feel afraid.”
“It's like... being stared at by something of a higher order, something far more ancient.”
“There's an urge to kneel and submit.”
She raised her small, translucent hand, gesturing.
“That feeling is like—”
“The sign that appears when a 'Netherworld messenger' rises from the underground to drag disobedient ghosts down...”
“That's the only time such a sign would appear.”
She looked at Lin Gui, a trace of lingering fear in her eyes, yet also a hint of curiosity.
“That's why everyone is so afraid of you.”
“They all thought...”
“You were a 'Netherworld messenger' come to capture us.”
“Then aren't you afraid of me?” Lin Gui asked.
Troy shook her head, the timidness on her face dissipating significantly.
“No, I'm not.”
“Because I know you aren't a Netherworld messenger.”
Lin Gui raised an eyebrow. “Why?”
Troy floated a bit closer, her expression suddenly turning somewhat... mischievous.
She lowered her already ethereal voice, speaking with a touch of slyness,
“Because...”
“Netherworld messengers are also 'ghosts.'”
“And ghosts...”
She paused, her eyes curving as she flashed a knowing, slightly mischievous smile that didn't match her youthful appearance.
“...don't make babies with elves.”
Lin Gui: “......”
Smack.
Lin Gui slapped his forehead with one hand, his expression complicated.
It seemed that in the future, when he got intimate with Theia...
He would have to scan the surroundings with his Eyes of the Netherworld first.
To see if there were any ghosts crouching in some corner and peeping.
Eve coughed softly from the side.
Although she couldn't see Troy, she could hear the conversation between her and Lin Gui.
And she had heard the part about making babies with an elf.
Eve averted her gaze, the tips of her ears turning slightly red.
Obviously, she too had recalled certain scenes that were rather awkward to look back on.
Rate on N.U.
