Jade of Another World

Chapter 178 Back Again?

The scent of ambergris wafted through the curtains, and Lin Ning's fingertips sank into the gold thread patterns of Nangong Jin's soft armor. The smell of disinfectant from a modern hospital still lingered in her hair, while her face, pressed against the emperor's chest, radiated an icy blue light, casting their shadows onto the gilded curtains, twisting into an entangled, boundless chaos.

Lin Ning suddenly bit down on the dragon tattoo on his collarbone, "What did you inject me with?"

The bitterness and bloody taste on the tip of the tongue have a strange overlap with the taste of ancient arsenic.

Nangong Jin grabbed the back of her neck and pressed her into the deep blue mattress covered with tributes from the Western Regions. His dragon-patterned court robe was wide open, revealing the same ice-blue star trail on his chest as Lin Ning's—a mark of the curse of time and space. It was a testament to their inseparable entanglement.

Nangong Jin chuckled softly, like the hum of an instrument. He ran his fingertips over her temples, where ancient imperial physicians still had gold needles inserted.

Lin Ning suddenly realized that she was wearing a hospital gown, but with Nangong Jin's black iron jade belt tied around her waist. The ticking of an electronic clock came from outside the bed curtains, eerily synchronized with the sound of the night watchman's clapper.

Lin Ning's fingernails dug into the inside of his wrist. "So it was you? The one who had the doctor inject me?"

She suddenly trembled violently and saw her modern body convulsing in a hospital room, while her ancient self was pointing silver needles at the emperor's throat.

Nangong Jin pressed her hand onto the dragon bed, bit her earlobe, and dripped blood onto the Twenty-Eight Mansions chart on the dragon bed. "Now you are my favorite concubine. Going back, you will only be a vegetable in a modern hospital ward."

Lin Ning smelled the aroma of rose-flavored poria cocos paste, her favorite dessert from the modern world. A young eunuch from the imperial kitchen brought in a food box, but she noticed that it seemed to contain nutritious meals from the hospital.

Lin Ning grabbed the spoon from the food box and noticed the characters "璇玑" (Xuanji) engraved on the handle. "You even want to control my sense of taste?"

Nangong Jin placed her hand on his heart, feeling the overlapping heartbeats of the two timelines. "Ning'er, haven't you noticed? Everyone you've met in the modern world is a projection of me in that timeline."

Lin Ning suddenly tugged at his belt and saw the dragon pattern on his chest.

Lin Ning seemed to have touched a fragment of the jade pendant. She plunged the fragment into his carotid artery, and black blood gushed out along with modern anticoagulants. "Since you want to be my doctor," she said, tasting the salty, metallic flavor of the blood, "then heal all my hatred for this world."

Suddenly, the jade pendant burst forth with blinding white light, and Lin Ning felt her soul being ripped away. In her final moments, she saw Nangong Jin crumble simultaneously in two different timelines: in ancient times, he clutched his chest and laughed maniacally, while in modern times, he frantically entered star trail codes in an MRI room.

Before fading from consciousness, Lin Ning chuckled softly: "Nangong Jin, guess which time and space I'll wake up in this time?"

Lin Ning opened her eyes abruptly, as if jolted by a flood, the smell of disinfectant hitting her face. Her father stood in the light, holding a thermos, the dragon embroidery on his suit cuffs faintly visible under the lamplight. She subconsciously touched her neck, where the teeth marks from Nangong Jin's bites still remained, and the modern intravenous catheter was bleeding.

Lin Ning grabbed her father's wrist, her fingers brushing against the familiar patterns on the black iron armor.

"Dad, you today..." Her father placed the jade fragment into her palm, and the fragment suddenly fused into her skin.

"Ningning, it's time for dinner." As he turned around, the burn mark on the back of his neck flashed with an icy blue light, exactly the same as the star trail on Nangong Jin's chest.

Lin Ning looked down at the steamed sea bass in the lunchbox, and the fish bones suddenly transformed into Nangong Jin's dragon-patterned soft armor. Trembling, she picked up the fish meat, only to find that the texture of the fish meat was actually the star trails of the Twenty-Eight Mansions.

Lin Ning stabbed the chopsticks into the tabletop, the wooden splinter piercing through the spatial rift and embedding itself in the wall of the ancient imperial study.

"Who exactly are you?"

The father's wicked smile: "I am your salvation in every time and space, and also your eternal calamity." He suddenly ripped open his shirt, revealing the fading star trails on his chest. He had transformed into the appearance of Nangong Jin.

Before losing consciousness, Lin Ning chuckled softly, "So... even family ties were a lie of yours."

She plunged a blood-stained jade shard into her father's heart, the blood outlining a time-space key on the CT scan.

The electrocardiogram monitor emitted a piercing alarm; Lin Ning died simultaneously in two different timelines. In reality, her pupils dilated, while in ancient times, she was plunging a silver needle into Nangong Jin's throat. In the gap between the overlapping timelines, her father's figure gradually blurred, revealing the outline of an imperial robe embroidered with dragon patterns.

"Ning'er, this is just the beginning." (Nangong Jin)