Chapter Sixty-Five: I Hate Myself
Luo Linglan held a cloth and bent down to carefully wipe the wine stains on the floor while also clearing away the empty wine bottles.
She remained silent, her grip on the pull-tab can tightening to the point where her hand trembled slightly from the effort, even deforming the can; the veins on the back of her hand visibly pulsed.
After taking a deep look at the sleeping man, Luo Linglan’s figure vanished once again into the shadows.
The scene abruptly came to a stop.
This scene felt so familiar.
Some faint resentment lingered in Sumu’s heart, unsure whether it belonged to Luo Linglan’s memories or was drawn from her own similar past.
But one thing she was certain of was that Luo Linglan, while packing away the wine bottles, shared the same resentment she felt towards that careless and reckless guy.
The pull-tab can in her hand wasn’t sharp, but Sumu immediately tossed it aside, letting it roll on the floor.
The fact that Luo Linglan could remember the words on the wine bottles so clearly likely meant she harbored immense disdain for them.
Whether it was an illusion or not, the rolling wine bottle seemed to leave behind a moving trace of words on the ground, crooked and slanted.
Sumu rubbed her eyes and looked closely, finding the words still there, and tilted her head to read them.
“After my mother left, my father became an alcoholic. He always said that family was his shackles, but little did he know that when the shackles were removed, it would turn into this.
He thought that without my mother and me, he could recklessly pursue the so-called martial arts championship.
However, both he and we knew this was merely an excuse to escape, just as he used alcohol to avoid the reality of my mother’s death.”
Fortunately, my dad is still alive; otherwise, things would have been even worse.
Although she thought this, Sumu didn’t feel any sense of relief in her heart.
After all, she barely saw him all year; it was pretty much the same.
The words she had been staring at suddenly dissipated, and Sumu came back to her senses.
“Sumu, can you search for anything similar? I have some guesses now.”
It was Tang Nai; did she also see the earlier content?
Sumu instinctively nodded and began moving around the martial arts hall, intentionally avoiding the areas stained with wine in her memory, heading toward what should have been the sandbags, but it was now completely empty.
At that moment, she turned her gaze towards the inner room where Luo Linglan had exited. What was behind that closed door?
“Speaking of which, I haven’t encountered Ning Xi yet.”
“How could she appear in Luo Linglan’s memories? She should be in a dream layer, where there are fabricated memories created by the Combat Department along with some of Magical Girl Ning Xi’s memories. It’s not really of much significance.”
“How do you know everything?”
“Don’t worry; I know much more than you do.”
Listening to Tang Nai’s confident tone, Sumu couldn’t help but curl her lip.
Who would believe that?
With these thoughts, Sumu stepped over the threshold of the inner room, seeing the scene inside for the first time.
A small lamp on the bedside illuminated the entire room, and the walls were adorned with various awards and photos, featuring both Luo Linglan and that middle-aged man.
On the table lay a shattered mirror, with a few traces of blood remaining in the cracks. When Sumu looked at it, instead of her own reflection, it showed Luo Linglan’s stunning face.
This startled Sumu, prompting her to look again several times.
Not to mention, she was quite beautiful.
“I didn’t expect Sumu to like mature types.”
“Shut up, I’m just looking.”
The jagged cracks in the mirror made Sumu somewhat uncomfortable, leading her to subconsciously change her angle to attempt to shift her reflection away from the cracks.
But the gathering point of those cracks always seemed to converge at the corner of Luo Linglan’s right eye, resembling a sharp scar oozing blood.
Or perhaps what lay beneath the shattered mirror was that cross-shaped scar.
Sumu put down the mirror and, tracing the splattered blood, found a small carving knife that had fallen in the corner.
The curved blade showed signs of having endured great force, and that sharp edge seemed just right to fit into the crack of the mirror.
Instinctively, Sumu tried to insert the carving knife; it fit perfectly, but the next moment, looking at the Luo Linglan in the mirror as if stabbed by the knife, a wave of daze washed over her.
Another memory?
A sharp pain suddenly exploded from her right cheek.
The view was washed in bright red, and Sumu instinctively tried to cover the wound where the hot flow poured out, but her movements only continued, forcefully expanding the scar.
In the next moment, she finally saw herself clearly.
The black-haired girl in the mirror had blood flowing from the corner of her eye, looking terrifying as if shedding tears of blood, but with her cheeks, the scene appeared even more tragic.
Luo Linglan was indeed crying, mourning the death of her last close relative.
I hate myself.
She never expected that the man who said, “I will keep trying,” and always drank excessively would end his life in such a hasty manner.
She had challenged her father to a duel.
She wanted to inherit this martial arts hall, not simply watch this man continue to squander it.
Luo Linglan obtained the inheritance of the martial arts hall as she wished, but it was not just because she won.
“Severe cerebral hemorrhage; the patient has been drinking heavily for a long time, and their cardiovascular system is too weak. It’s likely already too late to save them.”
Clearly, soft cushions were laid out, and it shouldn’t have been such a heavy fall; why did it happen…
Luo Linglan calmly signed the critical illness notice and walked down the familiar road peacefully.
The bustling traffic around her seemed farther away for the first time.
In the deep night, she woke up as usual, but did not hear the sound of clinking wine bottles.
She realized she wasn’t prepared to lose her father yet.
He was once a good father.
How many times had she been awakened by nightmares? She had lost count; whenever she dreamed of her father, a voice constantly reminded her.
He’s dead, dead at your hands.
Luo Linglan could no longer bear the torment inside and snatched up the carving knife from the drawer.
The blade sliced across both horizontally and vertically, easily tearing through fragile skin, but the pain and self-harm did nothing to alleviate her burden.
The mirror on the table faced her blood-stained visage; the person in the mirror was her father’s killer.
Is that me? Don’t joke around.
Luo Linglan suddenly plunged the carving knife into the mirror, piercing right through it, the blade twisting under the force of the impact, and then it was heavily thrown into the corner of the room.
Photos from the past surrounded her; each one had her, each one had him, all staring at Luo Linglan, as if pitying this poor girl who had lost her reason.
She dazedly picked up the mirror again and gazed into it, tears spilling uncontrollably.
That’s right, it’s me.
I hate myself.
The end of the memory remained painfully torn; when Sumu was finally extracted from it, that intense emotion still enveloped her.
She had tried to escape from this memory more than once, but ultimately she endured and watched on.
And now, the aftereffects were exaggeratedly overwhelming.
“Sumu, you’re crying so hard. I’m going to take a picture to show you.”
“Hey, don’t take pictures!”
