Love, Gun, Cupid

The pale-skinned woman walked towards him. Lin Jiade's hand trembled, and the bullets in the reload magazine fell out. He simply threw away the pistol, grabbed the talisman, and chanted, "Sever all ties, may all your wishes come true..."

Before he could finish the last two words, the pale-skinned woman was already right in front of him. With a gentle grab, Lin Jiade's body went limp, and he felt his energy being completely drained, unable even to activate the weapon within the talisman.

Overwhelmed by chaos and fear, Jianlan managed to pull herself together, but Lin Jiade's energy had been completely drained. She had the spells but no energy to execute them, and could only helplessly watch as the pale-faced woman with the same features as her approached.

"Who are you?" Jianlan asked.

"I'm sending you a gift."

The pale-skinned woman flicked her wrist, and a blue fragment of soul materialized from her palm, disappearing into Jianlan's body. Jianlan froze for a moment, then her beautiful face began to contort, her features contorted, her ugly wrinkles filled with chaos and helplessness.

"Whose memories are these? Mine? No, why, why, why... things shouldn't be like this! I am Gladiolus, but why..."

Gladiolus spoke incoherently, eventually breaking into a wail. Since the dead cannot cry, her wailing turned into a piercing scream that went straight to the soul.

Lin Jiade covered his ears, but it was no use; the irritating shriek echoed in his mind. He slumped to the ground, panting, and said, "What...did you do?"

"I just want to make the imposter face reality, and I don't want to fight you, I just want you to listen to my story."

"I'm past the age of listening to stories!"

"You must listen, because you are my lifeline."

"What?!" Lin Jiade chuckled, speechless. "I am Miss Jianlan's destiny treasure; someone has assured me of that!"

The pale-skinned woman calmly said, "You bear the marks of a Celestial Observer. If it was a Celestial Observer who made this assurance to you, then it's not wrong, because I am Jianlan."

Lin Jiade looked at Jianlan, hoping she would angrily denounce the imposter who had impersonated her. To his disappointment, Jianlan remained in a frenzied state and could not utter a word.

Lin Jiade suddenly thought of a possibility: "Could it be that you two are core fragments of Gladiolus's soul? Miss Gladiolus expressed her concerns to me before, saying that the one who carries the true Gladiolus personality is Gladiolus, and so on."

The pale-skinned woman shook her head: "Like you, I once thought she was Korobochka, but she wasn't."

Lin Jiade snapped, "And who is Korobochka? Can you please stop being a riddle teller?!"

Unfortunately, Lin Jiade, who had been completely drained, only had the strength to put on a brave front. The pale-faced woman said, "The place where our life paths intersected was at West Ham Hospital on October 4th."

Chapter Sixty-Eight: The Worm IX

“I didn’t see you at the hospital on October 4th?” Lin Jiade said.

“We met. I was lying in bed being wheeled by medical staff when you came out of the ward.”

Once forgotten memories resurfaced, Lin Jiade suddenly looked up: "Wait, I remember now, you're that seriously injured woman?"

"This is exactly the story I wanted to tell you. It's a pity that young people these days are so hot-tempered and unwilling to listen to people properly."

The pale-skinned woman sighed and said, "I was once a member of a peripheral organization of the Empire, just like you. Back then, my registered name was Jianlan."

Because of something suspicious, my squad and I were wiped out, but I did not die completely. Instead, my soul returned to the Empire and began a second life as a baby.

This time, my name is Korobochka, the Empire's top-tier sorcerer, and I believed that until the incident on October 4th.

This incident brought back memories of my past life, and for certain reasons, I decided to betray the Empire, merge with the wrong secrets, and escape. However, I overlooked one thing: Gladiolus had a reason to betray the Empire, but Korobochka did not.

This is a strange phenomenon: Korobochka and I are essentially two personalities born from the same person in two lives, but they do not recognize each other and desperately fight for control of the body.

Korobochka gained the upper hand, so she attempted to kill me with magic. As a result, her magic transformed our shared body into a lich, her soul shattered completely, and my soul partially shattered and fused together with fragments of Korobochka's soul.

However, the body that had transformed into a lich was deteriorating rapidly, and by the time it reached the hospital, it was beyond repair. I needed to find something to serve as a phylactery to sustain my existence, and then you entered my life.

To turn you into a casket, I needed to establish a connection between your soul and mine. At that time, within that lich's body were my true form, Korobochka's completely shattered soul, and fragments of myself and Korobochka intertwined. And then, I made a fatal mistake.

Lin Jiade glanced at Jianlan and said, "So, the Miss Jianlan I know is actually a fragment of Korobochka's soul?"

“No, she is Jianlan, but Jianlan is not her,” the pale-skinned woman replied.

"?"

"The mistake I made in the process of transforming you into a life box was that I connected you with the part of my soul that was separated from and bound to Koroboch."

This bonded fragment contains my magical knowledge, as well as a portion of Korobochka's personality. If you activate your Soul Flame Vision, you can clearly see its bonded essence—blue and gray, representing me and Korobochka respectively.

The hospital was quite dangerous back then. I lost my magical knowledge, but luckily I still had Korobochka's knowledge of witchcraft and the secrets of error to use, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to turn you into a phylactery.

So you can understand now, right? From my perspective, the one who possesses my magical knowledge, incorporates parts of Korobochka's personality, and calls herself Gladiolus, is an absolute imposter.

Lin Jiade refused to believe it: "Do you have any evidence? Why should I believe you?"

The pale-skinned woman laughed and said, "Whether you believe it or not is your freedom. When I first met you, I thought the Empire had already grasped the situation here and was using the part of me that I had separated to track down my main body and reclaim the wrong secrets."

However, I was overthinking it. You seem to value counterfeits too much, which is why you haven't let the Empire know the real situation.

Lin Jiade retorted, "You've been the one talking the whole time. You just cast a spell on Miss Jianlan, making her lose her mind and act like she's going crazy, not giving her a chance to argue with you."

Bah! I don't believe a word of it!

The pale-skinned woman laughed and said, "Unfortunately, the imposter you trusted so much happens to be the one who corroborates what I said before."

Gladiolus's voice was dry and desperate: "Yes, I am not Gladiolus, nor am I Korobochka. I saw the lives that their respective identities represented, and I felt the connection between myself and Gladiolus's true self."

If Gladiolus is a book, then I am a fragment within it, bearing the marks of other books. I am Gladiolus, but Gladiolus is not me. I am the part of Gladiolus's soul that carries magical knowledge, and also the part of Korobochka that carries a part of his personality.

Because of the energy of the Corpse Demon spell and the magic of the Master, I was given this fragment of consciousness, which made me mistakenly believe that I was a complete and independent personality.

Then, I absorbed Korobochka's soul fragments and took her daily life as mine... But when I saw Korobochka's face clearly, I realized she didn't look like me.

Lin Jiade's face turned pale, but his emotions made him unwilling to believe it, and he continued, "If it was the fragment of Jianlan that made a contract with me, then why can Jianlan's main body and Korobochka's soul fragment still exist?"

The pale-skinned woman replied, "The fragment of Gladiolus is Gladiolus, the original Gladiolus is Gladiolus, and Korobochka is also Gladiolus. You have signed a contract with the fragment of Gladiolus, and as the original, I, as the second incarnation of Korobochka, will naturally benefit as well."

Lin Jiade said urgently in a trembling voice, "Three gladioli? That's a good lie. Anyone who didn't know better would think you were the author of 'The Three Spearmen'."

The pale-skinned woman corrected her earnestly, "It's 'The Three Musketeers.' I'm not the screenwriter of this book, but I know the author, Mr. Alexandre Dumas. He was a man who was obsessed with desire. His greatest hobby was going to theaters with high stages so he could sit in the audience and look up at the actresses' skirts."

I don't believe you for a second!

Lin Jiade felt dizzy and extremely irritable, but he understood one thing: no matter how good the enemy's rhetoric was, as long as he didn't listen to a word and kept his eyes open, he would not be persuaded by any sweet talk.

The pale-skinned woman seemed to see this and sighed helplessly: "I even convinced the fragments that separated from myself, but you are more stubborn than I imagined."

"Fine, I never intended to persuade you with words. My purpose in meeting you was simply to retrieve the fragments of my soul and restore my wholeness."

Lin Jiade still refused to believe it... No, seeing the confident and composed appearance of the pale woman, and then seeing the gray phantom's despair and helplessness, without uttering a single rebuttal, he was already seven or eight parts convinced.

He glanced at Jianlan, who seemed heartbroken and indifferent to the fact that the pale-skinned woman had walked up to him.

The chaos of Gladiolus was transmitted to Lin Jiade through the will link. Despair, sadness, confusion and helplessness turned into a vortex in his mind, spinning rapidly and making him feel agitated.

In the midst of the chaos, Lin Jiade felt a strong longing for his most trusted, beautiful, and powerful benefactor, Du Juan—he refused to hand over Jian Lan, even though she was a fragment of someone else's soul.

I've added an extra chapter today.

Chapter Sixty-Nine: Contract II

Just as the pale woman was about to touch the gray phantom, the cuckoo's interference crossed boundaries, with chains arranged vertically to form a pink wall, isolating interference from others.

"This feeling is like that of a celestial observer, but also..."

The pale-skinned woman cautiously retreated, observing from a safe distance as the pink chains encasing Lin Jiade and the gray phantom, now lost in cognitive disorientation, disappeared.

At this moment, the Kapok Squad received support from other teams. The seal on the cellar door became loose and the pale woman disappeared. Kapok took the lead and broke into the cellar, only to find a few bullet fragments on the ground.

The man in the tight suit slammed his fist into the ground, causing the soil to cave in and develop radial cracks.

"Lin Huang, he..." Yuki asked.

“He’s alright,” Mu Mian stood up. “He’s been teleported back to reality.”

"you sure?"

Kapok's voice sounded impatient: "I'm sure! And I don't think he'll ever rejoin the team!"

Why do you know so much about his situation?

The three mercenaries had the same question in their minds, but seeing Mian's condition, they dared not ask.

At the same time, Lin Jiade's vision blurred, and he fell onto his sofa, which creaked under the weight. He sat up halfway and saw Jasmine's concern and Du Juan's curiosity, but they did not approach him. Instead, they looked at his body with some unease.

Following their gaze, he looked down and saw Jianlan... no, he had once thought he was a fragment of Jianlan's soul stuck to him, helpless and confused, yearning for a warm and solid embrace.

But she had no physical form, so her phantom passed through Lin Jiade's body, embraced her own body, and only a cold sensation spread.

Gladiolus's figure began to blur. Lin Jiade recalled Gladiolus's second lesson: when the dead denied the meaning of their own existence, she moved from death to annihilation.

Lin Jiade desperately tried to grab Jianlan, but Jianlan looked at him and said in a weak voice, "I can't let this fragment of me return to the Azure Woman's original form, or she will become even stronger."

"I do not care!"

"Don't worry, in the event of natural death, our contract will naturally dissolve, and your body will be unaffected. If you're lucky, that original entity will also perish..."

“It’s a pity that the lady also transformed a life box in the Mirror Realm,” Du Juan said. “Besides, you promised me before that your existence no longer depends on you, but on Lin Jiade.”

"I'm sorry, I broke my promise," Jianlan said.

Du Juan looked at Lin Jiade, who was initially bewildered, but then his resolve gradually hardened. He reached out and said, "Miss Du Juan, I need to borrow something from you."

Du Juan smiled and said, "I know what you want to borrow, but do you know what doing so means?"

"Are you expecting me to just watch her disappear?!"

Du Juan turned around, reverting to her original form. Her pure white wings extended in front of Lin Jiade, who pulled out a .44 caliber revolver from her wings, aimed it at Jianlan, and pulled the trigger. The pink bullet, engraved with the magic of surrender, was fired. The moment it hit Jianlan, a gladiolus flower pattern appeared on Jianlan's chest.

"Jianlan, I want you to live!" he roared.

The death of Gladiolus has stopped. The command from Lin Jiade has locked away her negative thoughts, allowing her to reverse the process of death, and her spiritual body has returned to its previous semi-transparent state.

She looked at Lin Jiade in shock, and at the smiling Du Juan behind him, and suddenly realized that she had fallen into a trap dug by Du Juan. From the very beginning, this woman who called herself Cupid had been digging a pit for her.

Just as Lin Jiade was about to say something, his body, completely drained of energy, gave way and he collapsed onto the sofa, his vision went black, and he fainted.

At 1 a.m. on October 28, Gladiolus, who had barely calmed down, floated near the sofa. Jasmine sat on the sofa and yawned repeatedly. The door to Lin Jiade's bedroom opened, and Du Juan was channeling energy into him.

After looking at each other for a while, Jasmine looked at the pink gladiolus flower on Gladiolus's chest, opened her collar and said to Gladiolus, "Our shapes are a little different."

Both patterns were filled with pink, but the jasmine on Jasmine's chest was a lighter shade. Gladiolus didn't care about that; she whispered, "I'm sorry."

“There’s no need to recount what happened; we saw it all.” Jasmine pointed to the television. “Cupid used a spell, and we witnessed Lingard’s adventure firsthand, including yours.”

Jianlan raised her head, then slowly lowered it again, and said, "I'm sorry."

“You should apologize, but not to me, but to Lin Jiade,” Jasmine said seriously. “When you were collapsing because of the so-called truth shown by the enemy, denying yourself, and wavering to the point of no return, he was always protecting you.”

Gladiolus replied weakly, "Thank you for his protection, but... I might really be an imposter, a fake who separated from Gladiolus's original self and carried her magical knowledge and part of Korobochka's personality."

The ridiculous thing is, I took Korobochka's fragmented memories as my own, filling in the gaps in my mind to create my life, my destiny… It's utterly laughable. I have nothing; neither my personality nor my knowledge is mine.”

Gladiolus experienced a feeling colder than death, a kind of nothingness. When the pale-skinned woman showed a possibility that the memories and knowledge she had about herself might have come from someone else, Gladiolus began to doubt her own memories, then her own cognition, and finally her own existence.