10
“Aria, you will be the next one.” The shadow’s voice was as firm as an oath.
“Is that so?” I remained as calm as an old monk in deep meditation.
I slowly opened my mouth and said, “I have one last question.”
“What would you do if those people didn’t let you leave?”
The shadow suddenly widened her eyes.
She understood my words.
A panicked expression flashed across her face.
“You’re panicking, looks like I’ve guessed right again.”
The shadow lunged towards me.
Sage and Leo reacted incredibly fast, grabbing her from left and right, pinning her firmly against the wall.
Jasmine even flashed in front of me, attempting to block the shadow from approaching me.
The shadow was furious, struggling wildly.
I took in her reaction fully, and couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief: “Shadow, let’s try again, shall we? Let’s see what happens if you don’t return to my body on time?”
The night was long, the shadow and us were at a standoff until near dawn when she became hysterical.
Her veins were bulging, her body seemed to have inexhaustible strength, ramming like a small bull.
However, Sage and Leo held her down tightly.
The disparity in strength was too great.
The shadow’s struggles were in vain.
The moon set in the west, the sun rose in the east.
The first ray of dawn broke through the clouds, the shadow’s body seemed to be diluted, her color gradually fading until she disappeared bit by bit before our eyes.
At the same time, the sunlight stretched my shadow long on the ground.
I raised my hand, making various gestures, and the shadow followed, making the same movements.
My shadow had returned.
Leo collapsed sitting on the ground.
“Phew-” He let out a long breath, “Finally dealt with it.”
It sounded like he had just survived a calamity.
He raised his face, looking expectantly at Jasmine, like a little dog trying to get a reward.
Jasmine ignored him coldly.
We were all very tired, regardless of appearances, we sat cross–legged on the ground.
“Aria,” Sage sat beside me, poking at my shadow playfully, and asked softly, “She’s really gone this time, right?”
My gaze also fell on the shadow: “Who knows?”
There was never any knowledge point in textbooks telling me how to determine if one’s own shadow is normal or not.
I could only use the clumsiest method to try and verify the answer.
I set an alarm.
Every hour, the alarm would ring once.
When I woke up, I would wave my finger to see if there was my shadow on the wall.
I checked every day, and the shadow was always there.
Slowly, I accepted the fact that the shadow had returned to normal.
Sage also stopped staying with me every day.
She decided to resume her habit of going home on weekends.
Her family had urged her many times.
On the day she went home, she was very worried and repeatedly reminded me: “Call me if anything happens, okay?”
She repeated this sentence three hundred times, until I found it annoying.
In the middle of the night, she called again.
The words to scold her were on the tip of my tongue, but I heard a familiar voice from the other end: “Aria, you’re so good at guessing, why don’t you guess why Sage’s phone is in my hand?”
My mind exploded, and after a while, I found my voice again and called out: “Shadow?”
Smug laughter came from the other end: “Aria, I can’t kill you, but I can kill Sage.”
“I’ll give you half an hour. If you show up in front of me, I’ll let Sage go. How about that?”
“Not coming.” I said firmly, without a hint of hesitation.
The shadow choked hard: “Aria, I understand you, you don’t need to act tough. If you don’t show up, I’ll send you photos of Sage’s decapitated body.”
“Is that so?” I bumped my elbow against Sage beside me, “Say something, let her hear.”
Sage, who had been holding back, burst into thunderous laughter.
Her laughter came through clearly to the shadow’s ears on the other end.
The other end fell into a long silence.
I could imagine what expression the shadow might have now.
I slowly revealed the answer to the shadow: “Sage installed a camera in the dorm, your every move is under her watch!”
“She didn’t even tell me about installing the camera.”
“I didn’t know, so naturally you couldn’t have known either.”
“You were only wary of me, you didn’t guard against her.”
“You pretended to disappear, quietly lying low, waiting for an opportunity to strike again.”
“You took advantage of Sage leaving school, when only I was left in the dorm, to appear again, using my phone to delete all of Sage’s contact information, disguising yourself as her.”
“You wanted to trick me.”
“But, shadow, the moment you went out to set things up, Sage shook me awake.”
“Guess what, she never went home at all.”
I could hear the shadow’s rapid breathing.
Panting like a bull.
Completely losing composure.
I unhurriedly delivered the final blow: “I’ve always believed the way to eliminate you is to prevent you from returning to my body.”
“Since holding you down and forcibly not letting you return didn’t work.”
“Let’s try a second method, what if you can’t find me?”
“Shadow, Sage and I are not in the dorm right now.”
The other end suddenly held its breath.
This reaction gave me great pleasure.
I announced with a smile: “Shadow, the game of hide and seek starts now.”
Through the surveillance, we saw the shadow frantically searching in the dorm.
She kept muttering: “Where is it? Where is it?”
She opened the wardrobe, pulling out all the clothes inside.
She lay on the floor, stretching her neck to look under the cabinets.
She lifted the blanket on the bed, finding no one, angrily swept everything to the floor.
While the shadow was searching for me all over the world, Sage and I had already left school under Jasmine’s escort and moved into her luxurious house.
The three of us lay side by side on a sofa bigger than a bed, drinking champagne and enjoying delicious private chef desserts.
In the dorm surveillance, the shadow was in a impotent rage.
In Jasmine’s house surveillance, Leo was kneeling on the ground, crying and begging for forgiveness.
However, Jasmine only passed him one sentence: “Already broken up, don’t bother, get lost quickly.”
Leo’s tears were worthless in her eyes.
Opposite the sofa was a large floor–to–ceiling window.
We watched the sun rise, and the shadow’s body began to burn.
The fire on her body couldn’t burn anything else, only burning her into air.
I raised my hand, waving it back and forth in the sunlight.
My shadow also waved back and forth.
“This time, the shadow should have completely disappeared, right?” Sage asked.
I blinked my eyes.
Has it disappeared?
Who knows?
(The End)
