Chapter 225: [Blessed with Longevity] Meeting in Secret
The nurse offered no further comment, raising her hand to cover her nose.
The odor below wafted past in periodic gusts.
She cast a glance at Bai Cha and the young boy sitting on the ground together in a joint daze, then swept her eyes across the surroundings.
Security personnel were stationed a short distance away, alongside two doctors seated over there.
A few other patients had nurses accompanying them as well.
Consequently, she spoke directly to Bai Cha: “Since he gets along so well with you, keep him company here for a bit while I go use the restroom.”
Bai Cha nodded.
The nurse departed in a hurried rush.
Bai Cha looked toward the young boy. Today, the child wasn’t idly playing with his plush toy, merely holding it tightly in his arms.
Once the nurse had left, the plush toy moved on its own.
Bai Cha watched as the head of a little black puppy squeezed out from the top of the plush toy’s head.
Viewed like this, the scene was remarkably eerie.
Bai Cha reached out her hand and patted the dog’s head.
The young boy reached out his hand and patted it as well.
Bai Cha examined the young boy’s condition closely; his eyes were vacant and dull, entirely devoid of expression, his reactions to the external world exceedingly sluggish—virtually nonexistent—and he uttered not a single word.
The little black dog opened its mouth once more, staring at Bai Cha with eager, pleading eyes.
Bai Cha: “…”
“How am I supposed to help you? You’re already right by his side, yet you still can’t go back? Have your two souls fused together?”
The little black dog snapped its mouth shut and nodded.
“Can they still be separated?”
Opening a pair of round, glossy eyes, the puppy looked at the young boy, then extended a paw from inside the plush toy to pat the boy’s hand. Following that, it squeezed its eyes shut and tilted its head, before snapping its eyes open to look back at Bai Cha.
Inability to speak was like this; after pondering carefully, Bai Cha asked, “By killing you?”
The puppy nodded.
Bai Cha looked at it with a somewhat complex gaze. Zero impurities lingered within the little black dog’s eyes; it had been a mere puppy when it died, yet it was still guarding its little master.
She stroked its head, and then a Dodder Vine slid noiselessly into its head.
The little black dog shivered—whether out of fear, pain, or something else entirely.
It refrained from uttering a sound from start to finish, likely because its little master resided inside its mouth.
As the Dodder Vine entered the little black dog’s body, Bai Cha sensed that two distinct souls indeed inhabited its form.
Carefully controlling the Dodder Vine to avoid touching the other soul, the portion of power belonging to the little black dog was rapidly absorbed.
Aware of its impending demise, it turned its head back to gaze at the young boy once more.
The other party remained oblivious as ever, yet closed his fingers around its paw.
The puppy’s figure faded bit by bit, vanishing completely in the end, leaving behind a orb of white light in the center, within which the curled figure of a young boy resided.
Gentle power flooded into her body, subtle though it was.
What caught Bai Cha off guard was that this actually counted as a sacrifice as well.
She even caught sight of a few memory fragments.
The grandfather had picked up the little black puppy from the roadside, bringing it home to keep his grandson company.
Inherently spiritual, the little black dog noticed its little master’s soul had gone missing, searching continuously around the vicinity of the house.
The grandfather died of carbon monoxide poisoning. The door to its little master’s room had been shut tight with the window open, leaving him unharmed.
It perished alongside the old man.
After death, it still remembered to search for its little master’s soul, wandering endlessly near the house—yet finding itself unable to enter that home.
Later, when its little master was sent to the nursing home, it traveled back and forth between the two locations. Finally, one day, it discovered its little master’s soul; eager to return it, it opened its mouth and swallowed the soul whole.
And then they could no longer be separated.
Until it encountered Bai Cha.
The very first time it saw Bai Cha, it had caught sight of the true form of Bai Cha’s soul.
As a gesture of gratitude, it gifted its memory of the way Bai Cha’s soul looked to her.
For Bai Cha—who had been continuously plagued by her dual identities—this gift proved immensely useful indeed.
Because this instance had been working tirelessly to convince her that she was Li Yun, leaving her alone to stubbornly insist she was Bai Cha—a reality that felt quite overwhelming at certain moments.
Letting out a soft sigh, she reached out her hand, caught the orb of white light attempting to return to the young boy’s body, and shoved it back inside the plush toy.
Following that, she drove the Dodder Vine through the plush toy’s eyes, blocking the white light’s attempts to return to the young boy’s physical form.
Now was not the time.
The child was far too young; if he failed to act his part well, his fate would be ghastly.
The two remained huddled together all along, no one paying mind to this corner.
Giving the young boy’s head a final pat, Bai Cha stood up as she watched the nurse walking back over.
The nurse wore a face mask.
“Thanks.”
Bai Cha nodded as well, walking toward the perimeter fence.
Returning here today, the aura of the Tai Sui indeed lingered below as expected.
Bai Cha resumed picking roses, observing meticulously as she picked.
She caught sight of zero thread-like strands.
Chang Yashi walked over as well, reaching out to pick a rose and handing it to Bai Cha.
The two locked gazes.
“Thank you,” Bai Cha offered a word of thanks.
A short distance away, medical staff were already approaching.
“Why were you admitted here?” Bai Cha asked with casual indifference.
“I have fantasy disorder—frequently fantasizing that I live another life, at times unable to distinguish between the two lives.”
This sounded somewhat similar to dissociative identity disorder.
Chang Yashi asked, “What about you?”
“Pretty similar to you—I have dissociative identity disorder.”
“Oh… a guy in the adjacent ward shares the exact same condition as you. I didn’t see him today, though.”
Bai Cha’s flower-picking movements didn’t pause for even a second; stripping the thorns off the picked flowers, she said, “He probably went for treatment then?”
Shrugging, Chang Yashi copied her actions in stripping thorns as well.
“Who knows? I heard yesterday that his condition was rather severe.”
“Sigh, do you think we can ever get better?” Chang Yashi let out a sigh, looking toward the roses blooming along the fence.
These roses were exceptionally beautiful, yet they blocked all hope of escape as well.
“Hang in there a bit longer—maybe we’ll be cured tomorrow?” Bai Cha put on an encouraging, cheering gesture.
The medical staff had arrived beside them by now.
The two appeared thoroughly natural.
Exhaling a soft breath, Chang Yashi raised her head to look at the sunlight.
“If I can get better tomorrow, then I’ll certainly work hard!”
She offered Bai Cha a bitter smile once more.
“My apologies, I’m far too pessimistic. I’ll head over there first so I don’t drag you down.”
Bai Cha nodded.
“Keep it up! No need to be too sad—maybe a solution really will present itself tomorrow. Here, take these flowers. Hopefully they bring you something lovely. Oh right, you might want to try handing out flowers to others like I do—it makes your mood so much better~”
Saying this, Bai Cha distributed several stems of flowers in her hands to her—neither more nor less, exactly nine stems in total.
Displaying a touch of moved emotion, Chang Yashi accepted the flowers.
“Rest assured, I will pass this hope along!”
With faces brimming with positive energy, the two went their separate ways.
The medical staff sized the two of them up, catching zero anomalies; seeing Bai Cha remaining focused on selecting flowers while Chang Yashi admired her blooms as she walked toward the ward building—handing flowers to people along the way—they retracted their gazes and returned to their respective posts.
