Jade of Another World

Chapter 177 Parallel Transmigration

Lin Ning curled up on the hospital bed, her fingertips repeatedly tracing the faintly visible icy blue star trails below her collarbone. On the morning of the seventh day, when she was finally able to smoothly scan a QR code to pay for takeout with her phone, she dared to believe that this absurd drama spanning time and space had truly come to an end.

"Ningning, it's time to change your dressing." Her father pushed open the door, and the iodine bottle on the tray in his hand reflected her pale face. Lin Ning suddenly grabbed his wrist and saw the faint dragon embroidery on the cuff of her father's suit—the cloud and thunder pattern exclusive to the Great Yu royal family.

"Dad," she said, her throat tightening, "the embroidery on your cuffs..."

The father glanced down and smiled faintly: "Oh, a newly bought custom-made one." He turned to tidy up the clutter on the bedside table, and Lin Ning caught a glimpse of a faint burn mark on the back of his neck, the shape of which was exactly the same as the star trail on Nangong Jin's chest.

The afternoon sun slanted across the hospital bed as Lin Ning idly scrolled through short videos. When a clip from a period drama appeared, her pupils suddenly contracted—the actor playing the tyrant had a cinnabar mole on his ear, exactly the same as Xuan Yuanche's. Even more strangely, a line of small text floated across the screen: "This actor always reminds me of Nangong Jin from 'The Secret History of the Great Yu.'"

Her phone suddenly vibrated, displaying an anonymous text message: "The Jade Core is on the third shelf of your ward's locker." Lin Ning abruptly threw back the covers, the red rope around her ankle tightening abruptly, leaving the same barbed marks as Ouyang Qingchuan's. Inside the locker, half a bloodstained jade pendant was humming. When Lin Ning's fingertips touched it, the entire ward was suddenly enveloped in a temporal turbulence. She saw a modern nurse feeding her ancient self medicine, while Nangong Jin's reflection shattered into countless fragments of time within the medicine bowl.

"Miss Lin, are you alright?" The nurse's voice came from the void. Lin Ning suddenly woke up and found that the jade pendant fragments were embedded in her palm, and the seeping blood beads outlined the map of the Great Yu region on the tile.

Late at night, Lin Ning was startled awake by her phone notification. A news item had been pushed to her social media: "Archaeologists discover mysterious star trail patterns, suspected to be related to a thousand-year-old imperial curse." The accompanying image was the Twenty-Eight Mansions pattern she had seen in ancient times.

"Nangong Jin, are you still not going to let me go?" she whispered to the void, throwing the jade shard into the toilet. The moment the water flushed down, the entire hospital lost power. In the darkness, Lin Ning heard the emperor's hoarse laughter coming from the sewers: "Ning'er, have you forgotten what I said..."

The instant the call came in, Lin Ning realized the star trail in her palm had vanished. Trembling, she opened the wardrobe, only to find a blood-stained dragon-patterned cloak hidden in a secret compartment—the very garment she had worn the night she assassinated Nangong Jin. Embroidered on the inside of the collar in a slender, elegant script were the words: "The celestial orbit of Xuanji, forever together in all lifetimes."

Lin Ning staggered and grabbed the wardrobe for support. Suddenly, her ancient self's reflection appeared in the mirror. Both Lin Ning and Zhang Yin, from different timelines, simultaneously reached out to touch the mirror, and icy blue light bloomed at their fingertips. In that instant of overlapping timelines, Lin Ning saw Nangong Jin standing in a modern hospital corridor, giving her a familiar, chilling smile.

Lin Ning stood in the psychiatric ward corridor, clutching her registration slip. The smell of disinfectant mingled with a faint scent of ambergris. A historical drama was playing on the television in the waiting area; the emperor's act of overturning his desk overlapped with Nangong Jin's frenzied state. She suddenly looked down and discovered that the registration slip in her hand was stained with blood-red streaks.

Lin Ning strode towards the examination room, a silver needle in her hair suddenly becoming hot. "Doctor, I..."

Before he could finish speaking, the consultation room door suddenly opened, and the man in the white coat pushed up his glasses.

Lin Ning's pupils contracted sharply. The pearl earring on the doctor's left earlobe had a pattern that was exactly the same as the one on Xuan Yuanche's token of love. When he looked down at the medical record, the back of his neck revealed an ice-blue star trail pattern identical to that of Nangong Jin.

The doctor handed over a medical record form, a blood-stained ribbon wrapped around the cap of his pen. "Ms. Lin, where do you feel unwell?"

He suddenly looked up, a familiar dark glint flashing in his eyes.

Lin Ning's fingertips repeatedly traced the "illusion" section, "I always see..."

She suddenly grabbed the doctor's hand, and the dragon-patterned watch strap on his wrist was actually made from a modified black iron chain.

The electrocardiogram monitor suddenly emitted a piercing alarm, and Lin Ning was horrified to find herself lying on an ancient torture bed. The doctor picked up a syringe, the needle reflecting the cold glint of Nangong Jin's sword.

The doctor inserted the blood-stained jade fragment into the syringe. "Don't be afraid, this is a cure for spacetime distortion." He suddenly smiled like a kind father. "Ning'er, do you think modern medicine can break the curse of the Great Yu Star Orbit?"

Lin Ning struggled violently, tearing off the doctor's name tag. The name on the photo suddenly changed to "Nangong Jin," and the title column read "Order Controller." She staggered out, knocking over the medical cart, scattering metal instruments in the shape of the Twenty-Eight Mansions.

Lin Ning went berserk: "Who are you?!"

Suddenly, the fragments emitted a white light, and the image of the Great Yu Dynasty appeared on the walls of the clinic.

The doctor removed his glasses, his pupils reflecting images. "I am your doctor in every lifetime, your only salvation across time and space."

He suddenly grabbed her wrist and pressed the star trail pattern into her palm. Lin Ning woke up with a start, wincing in pain.

She sees her real self being wheeled into an MRI room, while her ancient self is carving the coordinates of a modern hospital into the core of a jade pendant. The two bodies overlap in the void.

Before losing consciousness, Lin Ning chuckled softly, "So... even psychiatrists are your pawns."

The lights in the MRI room suddenly went out, and Lin Ning heard heartbeats from two different time periods in the darkness. When the lights came back on, she found herself lying in an ancient imperial study, where Nangong Jin was drawing her blood with a modern syringe.

Nangong Jin injected the blood sample into the core of the jade pendant. "Ning'er, here, you can live forever in my arms." He suddenly lowered his head and placed a kiss on her forehead, the kiss carrying the scent of disinfectant.