“I died?..”
Tong Qian subconsciously raised a hand and touched her own cheek.
There was only one face. The sensation was real, the skin warm.
She stood frozen in place, disbelief written all over her face. Just now, she had been completely unable to sense the fierce ghost inside her. She had never expected that she had truly turned back into an ordinary person.
Before she could sort out her thoughts, a flash of scarlet light flared before her eyes, and the scenery around her twisted and changed. When her vision cleared, Yang Jian had already moved her out of the room, leaving her standing alone in the familiar surroundings of the villa’s living room.
Looking at the familiar environment around her, Tong Qian felt dazed for a moment.
She had only looked into the mirror, and then she had turned back into an ordinary person. Yang Jian had even said that she was already dead. What exactly had happened...
Before long, Yang Jian came down the stairs carrying a bulging golden body bag. The surface of the bag was uneven, faintly revealing the outline of a distorted, agonized human face. He casually sat down on the sofa and set the bag by his feet.
“My time is limited.” The scarlet Ghost Eye on his forehead was observing Tong Qian’s current condition.
“While I’m still here, you can ask me a few questions.”
“I died?” Tong Qian’s voice was a little dry.
“That’s right.” Yang Jian nodded.
“Tell me, what exactly is going on?”
Tong Qian murmured to herself, but she did not feel panic. This was already her second time coming back from the dead.
Yang Jian opened the can of Coke on the table and took a sip, then said, “You died during this mission. That mirror can revive you once. Consider it a one-time insurance policy I bought for the members of the team.”
“Mirror? Revival?”
A trace of confusion flashed across Tong Qian’s face. In her memory, all that remained was the blurry image of Zhang Han asking everyone to take turns standing in front of that old mirror before they set off.
“However, revival has some restrictions. Your memory will only remain at the moment you looked into the mirror, so naturally you know nothing of what happened afterward.”
He pointed at the body bag by his feet.
“Likewise, the price of reviving you was releasing an unknown fierce ghost.”
Tong Qian lowered her head and examined these hands, this body.
“This body... is still Zhao Lei’s...”
“Of course. The mirror only guarantees that it revives you in the state you were in when you looked into it.” Yang Jian’s tone was calm and unruffled.
“If you don’t like it, you can consider getting surgery.”
“No.” Tong Qian shook her head.
“That’s not what I mean. Being able to come back to life again is already extremely fortunate for me. Many people who face fierce ghosts might not even get the chance to react. Thank you, Yang Jian...”
“You don’t need to thank me. I said it before, this counts as a benefit for joining the team. Besides, your current state has also given me some other conjectures about that mirror.”
The Ghost Eye slowly swept over Tong Qian. Her physical condition was completely laid bare before Yang Jian’s eyes.
This was an utterly ordinary male body. The head that Yang Jian had previously forcibly spliced onto it had, after revival through the Ghost Mirror, become strangely compatible, as though Tong Qian had been born this way. In other words, the current Tong Qian was a genuine man.
But at this moment, Yang Jian thought of another problem. Zhao Lei’s body had already been revived once, but it had been revived with Tong Qian’s consciousness.
If he let the current Zhao Lei look into the mirror again, what would happen? Would he be imprinted into the mirror once more to await the next revival, or would it fail, or even trigger some unforeseeable strange incident...
Taking it a step further, if Tong Qian or Zhao Lei were given another body, how would the mirror determine the rule of “looking into the mirror”? Was it based on an intangible consciousness, or did it purely obey the similarity of the physical body? If it was the latter, perhaps Yang Jian could exploit a bug in that mirror, and might even be able to accomplish the miracle of infinite revivals.
Tong Qian was silent for a moment before saying, “Then am I now completely an ordinary person?”
“Yes.” Yang Jian confirmed, “A completely ordinary person. At least so far, no one revived through the mirror has shown any abnormalities, myself included.”
A trace of astonishment swept across Tong Qian’s face. She had not expected that Yang Jian had also been revived once.
She got up and walked to the glass, looking at this brand-new body of hers.
“I’ve turned back into an ordinary person now. To you, I no longer have any other use.”
“You’re wrong.” Yang Jian shook his head.
“An ordinary person who has personally experienced multiple supernatural incidents and crossed the line between life and death twice—your experience and understanding have value in and of themselves.”
His tone remained calm as he continued:
“Being alive is what matters most, isn’t it?”
Tong Qian’s fingers gently brushed the two sides of her cheeks, where extremely faint marks still remained. Looking closely, they resembled two blurred facial masks.
One seemed to be crying, the other smiling, except their positions were completely opposite to when she had been alive. This was merely the physical appearance replicated by the mirror; it no longer contained any supernatural power.
She let out a soft breath. “You’re right. Being alive is what matters most. I still want to do some things that are right. In this era of fierce ghosts reviving, I want to do my best to save some innocent people.”
She turned her head and looked at Yang Jian with a calm, open gaze.
“After dying twice, I’ve understood some things as well. I won’t be like before, futilely trying to shoulder everything. I’ll act within my means and save those... who are worth saving, and who still have a chance to be saved.”
Yang Jian quietly looked at Tong Qian. He could sense that these words came from the bottom of her heart.
People were always growing, whether it was him, Zhang Han, or Tong Qian. Struggling again and again on the edge of life and death in supernatural incidents, fear tempered every one of them.
Yang Jian had gone from a high school student who liked fighting into an existence that could make the supernatural circle tremble with a shake of his leg. Although he still liked fighting, when facing supernatural incidents, this kind of growth was the fastest and most direct.
And Tong Qian, too, had changed from that overly idealistic sense of justice into someone more clear-headed and resolute.
Casually tossing the Coke can into the trash, Yang Jian said, “You can continue staying at my company and working for me. Of course, your salary will be much lower than before.”
“But there’s another option: Headquarters.”
The Ghost Eye stared at Tong Qian as Yang Jian continued, “A ghost controller suddenly turning back into an ordinary person—I think Wang Xiaoming would definitely pay special attention to you.”
During the last Hungry Ghost incident, Wang Xiaoming had known that Yang Jian possessed some sort of method for revival. But Wang Xiaoming also knew that Yang Jian definitely would not tell him, so the matter had remained shelved all this time.
“But regarding the fact that you were revived through the mirror, you cannot mention it to anyone.”
Yang Jian’s tone suddenly turned icy, carrying a trace of killing intent. “Otherwise, I don’t mind modifying your memories, or... killing you directly.”
“Don’t harbor any wishful thinking. As long as I want to, I can leave a medium on you anytime, anywhere.”