parfum

Chapitre 29

"Alright!" Fei Xiao sighed, "Whatever you want to see, I'll give it to you!"

The three of them returned to Feixiao's apartment together; it was already past midnight.

Feixiao lit a candle, placed it on the table, reached out and took out the diary, placing it in front of the candle.

"Give me your hand!" Fei Xiao said to the two people sitting opposite him.

"What are you doing?" Bai Lan asked, puzzled, but still stretched out her hand.

"Didn't you write that in your diary?" Fei Xiao smiled at her.

"The things in there are like lyrics, how could they be written so clearly!" Bai Lan watched curiously as he tied his hand together with the hand of the man sitting next to him, and then pressed their hands down on the diary.

"Zijin, are you ready?" Feixiao said to Wang Zijin, "Just like when you entered Liu'er's memories a thousand years ago, you will be entering the memories of a girl with special abilities!"

“I understand!” Wang Zijin nodded to him.

"Take a look and leave. Don't linger. That girl is no ordinary person!"

“I know!” Wang Zijin repeated what he had just said and nodded again.

"What's going on?" Bai Lan didn't understand what they were talking about. But before she could get an answer, a wave of dizziness hit her head, and her consciousness blurred, as if she had been thrown into boundless darkness.

When I opened my eyes again, all I saw was a meadow in front of me, and a few houses on the other side of the meadow.

"Where is this place?" Bai Lan stood up and looked around. The scenery was familiar, as if she had lived here before.

"Ask yourself, this should be the house you lived in when you were little!" a voice said from the side.

Bai Lan listened for a moment and turned around. Behind her stood a man in a long robe, probably not yet thirty, with a beautiful beard, looking like an ancient scholar who had stepped out of a painting.

"Who are you?" Bai Lan looked him up and down, but couldn't recall ever seeing such a person in her memory.

The scholar bowed to her and said, "My name is Wang Zijin. Miss, this is my true identity!"

"But you weren't like this just now!" Bai Lan finally realized who he was.

"That was the physical body; what entered here is my soul. Finally, I can show my true face!" Prince Jin said, seemingly very happy. He took two quick steps forward, then turned back to Bai Lan and said, "Didn't you want to see your sister? Let's go!"

"Okay, okay!" Although Bai Lan was a little confused, she followed him toward the house.

The grass underfoot was damp and cool; everything here felt so real, unlike anything I'd ever imagined.

"Your sister seems to have a very pure heart!" Prince Jin said, looking at the clouds in the sky.

"Why do you say that?" Bai Lan was very curious. In her memory, her younger sister was a terrifying presence.

"Hehehe!" Prince Jin pointed into the distance: "How beautiful the scenery here is! The memories of that person I entered before were truly terrifying!"

"Really?" Bai Lan walked laboriously on the grass in her high heels, looking around. It was truly a beautiful scene, but since when had she not even had time to look at the blue sky?

The two walked one after the other to the front of those houses.

Bai Lan felt as if she had returned to her childhood. Yes, this was the place where she had lived before, but she had forgotten everything and had no memory of it at all. If she hadn't seen these houses now, she probably wouldn't even remember where she grew up.

"That house with the red roof is my home!" She had no memory of growing up in the countryside, but how did she end up in the city? She only remembered this house with the red roof.

“Let’s go in!” Wang Zijin said, walking to the house with the red roof.

"There seems to be no one inside!" Bai Lan was puzzled, as it seemed like there were only the two of them around.

"I guess your sister has forgotten everything!" Wang Zijin said, pushing open the door and walking into the courtyard.

"In that room at the back!" Bai Lan looked at the courtyard. She had indeed lived there. If she remembered correctly, the small house at the back was where she and her sister had lived.

As if remembering something, she strode ahead in her high heels, muttering to herself, "Yes, yes, this is it. How could I have forgotten everything?"

Wang Zijin looked at the woman and suddenly felt as if he were possessed, so he had no choice but to follow behind her.

The room was a bit dark, and the wooden window frames didn't let in much light. Bai Lan walked ahead, following the darkness to the door of a room. She turned back to Wang Zijin and said, "This is it!" Her eyes gleamed with a strange light.

The character "福" (fortune/blessing) was pasted upside down on the door, most of the red color had faded, turning into a pale grayish-pink. The wooden door was extremely old.

Prince Jin looked through the door and suddenly felt a rush of breath. "Look and leave, don't linger!" He remembered Fei Xiao's words; was that the terrifying girl Bai Lan had described behind the door? What kind of girl was she?

Bai Lan, standing before him, extended a hand painted with red nail polish and gently pushed open the door. The door creaked open. Prince Jin held his breath, fearing some terrifying monster might emerge from within.

But there was no one inside. The empty room contained two beds, two cabinets, and a desk.

"Why is no one here? Why is there no one at all?" Bai Lan went inside and looked around for people, but everything seemed different from what she had imagined.

"Something must have happened in this room!" Prince Jin looked at the furnishings in the room, which seemed to be filled with a terrifying atmosphere.

"Why? Why do you say that?" Bai Lan was also a little scared when she heard what he said.

"What else could it be?" Wang Zijin replied, "Only here do I feel this oppressive atmosphere; it's completely different from the scenery outside!"

After he said that, Bai Lan realized that this place was indeed very scary. The dark wooden bed and brown cabinet were exactly the same as she remembered, but they looked particularly frightening today.

Before the prince could answer, the sound of two girls laughing and joking came from outside.

"Someone's coming! Let's hide!" Wang Zijin said, grabbing Bai Lan and hiding her in a closet filled with bedding. Bai Lan, holding her high heels, stepped onto the bedding, barely daring to breathe.

Through the crack in the door, you could see two identical girls with braids walk in.

The two girls were about twelve or thirteen years old. One was wearing a red coat and the other a blue coat. They were twins.

How could they be twins? Or had he simply forgotten what Bai Lan had said? Looking at the two children's identical faces, Wang Zijin suddenly felt a sense of dread, an inexplicable terror.

The two children went into the house without saying a word and tidied up their things.

"Baiyu, what are you thinking about again?" The girl in the blue dress asked curiously when she saw another girl pick up a pen, sit down at the desk, and start writing in her diary.

"Another person is going to die!" the girl at the table said solemnly. When Wang Zijin saw the girl's expression, he was also startled. Her face really seemed to be tinged with the color of death. No wonder her parents were afraid of her.

The girl in the blue dress quickly said to her, "Don't say these things. Today is the Mid-Autumn Festival. Your parents will be unhappy if they hear this!"

"Sister, don't worry!" Bai Yu turned to her sister and said with a detached expression, "Today, I might be the one who dies. I saw it; my blood was flying!"

"So this girl in blue is Bai Lan from when she was little?" Prince Jin glanced at Bai Lan beside him, seeking confirmation. But what he saw startled him. Her face was deathly pale; her heavily made-up face was devoid of color, her eyes fixed intently on the crack in the door, watching everything unfold outside. Seeing her like this, Prince Jin swallowed hard, swallowing the words he was about to say.

Bai Yu picked up the diary and continued, "It's all fate; no one can escape it." There was a melancholy look in her eyes.

Bai Lan, dressed in blue, walked up to her younger sister and ruffled her hair: "Don't think about it so much, you'll be fine!"

"Sister!" Bai Yu glanced at her sister: "We are twins, but we cannot die together. When I die, leave my bones behind, and I will stay with you forever!"

“How could that be? Aren’t you still going to play the piano? We’ll always be together!” her sister comforted her.

Wang Zijin observed that the girl lacked any liveliness; she was like a walking corpse, and every word she uttered was about death. It seemed that being able to see one's future was not a good thing at all.

Just then, a woman's voice came from outside: "Come out and eat wedding cakes, your older cousin is getting married!" The two girls responded and were about to go out.

Wang Zijin waited for them to leave so he could squeeze out of the narrow cabinet. He had just breathed a sigh of relief when he felt Bai Lan's hand suddenly grab his wrist, a cold and hard hand.

"What's wrong with you?" Wang Zijin was startled when she grabbed him like that.

"Wedding cakes? Wedding cakes?" Bai Lan muttered to herself, her face pale. "Those wedding cakes, don't eat them!"

"What's wrong? What did you remember?" Wang Zijin asked her in a low voice. This woman had been acting increasingly strangely ever since she entered this room.

"After eating the wedding cakes, I never saw my sister again!" Bai Lan said, choking back tears.

At this moment, the two girls packed their things and left. The door slowly closed, and the room became empty again.

Wang Zijin hurriedly pulled Bai Lan out of the narrow closet. He straightened his clothes and said to Bai Lan, "Let's go. Didn't you see your sister?"

"No, no, I still have something to say to her!" Bai Lan stood on the ground, holding her high heels in her arms.

"But, but Feixiao won't let us stay any longer!"

"I want to ask her if my life is right or wrong?" Bai Lan said, forcefully pulling open the door and walking out of the room.

"Be careful!" Wang Zijin followed behind her. Why was this woman so reckless in everything she did?

Stepping out of the room, the corridor outside was still somewhat dark, and there was no one there.

"This family's wedding cakes are quite interesting, aren't they? Where did they all go to eat them?" Wang Zijin muttered as he walked into the courtyard.

Just as I was about to push open the door, I saw a middle-aged couple leading a girl back. It was the girl in the red dress. The three of them were leisurely walking back across the grass on the other side.

The girl had a calm expression on her face, while the features of the middle-aged couple were not very clear, but they looked very flustered.

"Mommy, where did my sister go?" the girl asked.

"My older sister went ahead of us; Mom had someone else take her to Grandpa's house!"

The little girl didn't say anything or ask anything. She lowered her head and followed her parents home. The three of them soon reached the front of the yard.

Upon seeing this, Wang Zijin and Bai Lan panicked and didn't know where to hide. They had no choice but to return to the room they had come from and crawl into the closet. The heat from where they had been inside hadn't dissipated yet, and now they were back. Wang Zijin and Bai Lan looked at each other and shook their heads helplessly.

Before long, the door was pushed open. Both of them were startled.

Two people entered the room immediately: a middle-aged man carrying a person in red clothes, followed by a middle-aged woman who hurriedly closed the door.

"Is she dead? Is she dead?" the middle-aged woman asked her husband, her voice trembling with tears.

"No, she just fainted!" the man replied.

"Why are we doing this? Why?" the woman said, as if trying to stop her husband from doing something.

"No, we must kill her!" The man turned to look at his wife. "And what about Bai Lan? You need to think about it. We can't let Bai Lan live in her shadow for the rest of her life!"

The woman clasped her hands together, remained silent, and watched as her husband did all this.

"Some people in the village know about this. They say that if she dies like this, she'll become a vengeful ghost, so we have to drain all her blood so she can't come back to take revenge on us!" The man said, taking out a small knife to cut the girl's carotid artery. His hand holding the knife was trembling uncontrollably.

Upon hearing their words, Prince Jin felt a chill run down his spine. Although he knew the girl had been murdered, he hadn't expected it to be in such a cruel way.

Bai Lan, standing beside him, grabbed Wang Zijin's arm tightly, her eyes wide, and cried out, "No, no!"

Upon hearing her words, Wang Zijin, emboldened by some unknown source, pushed open the cabinet door and jumped out. Even if it was just a memory, even if it was all fake, he couldn't stand by and watch someone kill someone in front of him.

The couple was trembling, unsure whether to strike, when they suddenly heard a sound behind them. Startled, they dropped their knife and screamed.

Upon seeing this, the prince took advantage of their momentary daze, rushed forward, grabbed the girl on the bed, and ran out. Bai Lan followed him out as well.

"Give me back my daughter!" the middle-aged woman shouted from behind.

Wang Zijin carried the girl and ran wildly, feeling only the wind whistling in his ears. He didn't care about anything else. He ran like this for an unknown amount of time, and it seemed that no one was chasing after him. His legs felt as heavy as lead, and he suddenly sat down on the ground.

Upon closer inspection, Bai Lan, with her hair disheveled, was standing next to her, carrying high heels in her hand.

"They didn't chase after us?" Wang Zijin asked her.

"No!" Bai Lan glanced behind her, smiled at him, and said, "Thank you!"

Wang Zijin gave a bitter smile. "Even if we save her now, what then? It's just a memory. In reality, she was still brutally murdered by her own parents!"