Illusion Report

The screen lit up. She saw that at some point she had received two emergency notifications, each marked with a yellow warning icon.

She read the two notifications over and over, countless times.

It turned out that shortly before her death, while she was still a living person, she had been conscripted into the "Nest Dominance Game." But that had been the very moment before her fatal accident; she hadn’t had the presence of mind to notice her phone, hadn’t even heard the alert.

After she died, it seemed even the Nest was puzzled.

"So, are you still human?"

The notification read, in a lighthearted tone, "Residents can’t be contestants, but you’re not really a resident anymore, are you? Seriously, this neither-human-nor-ghost thing is so hard to define. You’re really good at making trouble for us.

"How about this? We’ll count you as half a contestant. Sound good? You go find another living person to form a team, and we’ll let you keep your spot. If that living person happens to die, your team will still exist, and you can carry on under the team name... Hahahaha, isn’t that just like when a company’s founder dies, but the company itself lives on? You’re a real expert at finding loopholes, you cunning contestant, Brianna."

She clutched her phone, her knuckles white. Finally, unable to take it anymore, she flung it against the wall with all her might.

"What’s wrong?" Morando was at the door in an instant, as if she hadn’t been sleeping at all. "Are you okay?"

’If they let me be a contestant in the Nest Dominance Game...’

’Even if one connection broke, I could still be tied to this world by another.’

After a long moment, Brianna said in a low, breathless voice, "...It’s nothing. Nothing’s wrong at all."

She and Morando tried to make things work for another two or three months, but it was like everything had soured.

The thing that first drove them apart was, in hindsight, subtle and hardly worth mentioning. One time, Brianna leaned into Morando’s arms out of habit, an intimate gesture. But Morando flinched and pulled away.

By the time Morando realized what she’d done and hurried to pull Brianna back, Brianna knew she couldn’t keep forcing things.

’Because I’d said I didn’t want the residents to kill Morando, Morando would never leave on her own. She would just stay faithfully by my side, tormented day after day by the guilt of being unable to love me anymore.’

Brianna couldn’t wait indefinitely for some unknown Illusion to materialize out of thin air and save her from this hell.

’Seizing control is my only hope of escaping this neither-human-nor-ghost state. Whether I return to normal or just die, I’d welcome either outcome.’

’As for a teammate... my father is probably the most ideal and capable candidate.’

’Westley wouldn’t refuse.’

And Westley didn’t refuse.

The irony was, Westley had always wanted her to be a boy. Yet when she finally appeared before him as a man, Brianna found that the last shred of their biological bond as father and daughter vanished along with her old form.

’This male body doesn’t carry Westley’s genes. No genes, no bond—if there was ever any left to begin with.’

In her second week as his secretary, Brianna was removed as a beneficiary of her trust fund.

Westley told her that as his secretary, she would earn a generous salary and wouldn’t have to worry about her livelihood. But, he warned, she’d better not assume the secretarial position would be permanent if she failed to make any progress in the Nest Dominance Game.

...Almost two years had passed since then.

Brianna hadn’t revisited those memories in a long time.

It was as if the bullet that had scrambled George Green’s brain into a pulpy mess had also thrown her own thoughts, consciousness, and memories into a state of chaotic, fragmented upheaval, causing her to remember the past once more.

It wasn’t just her memory and consciousness that were in disarray. Her control over her body, her perception of time, her ability to feel hot and cold... everything had been pulverized by that single bullet from Chaisi.

She desperately tried to gather the dust within Green’s body, to mold it back into some form, like a child building a sandcastle on the beach. Gradually, she was finally able to blink and make out the graffiti sprayed on the concrete pier beneath a bridge.

It seemed the ocean currents had carried her a long way. This wasn’t the sea-crossing bridge anymore. It looked more like an overpass on the outskirts of Blackmoor City, right by the water.

Lying motionless on the rocky beach, it took Brianna a long time to realize she must have been there for at least a day after being washed ashore. She remembered it had been pouring rain in Blackmoor City on the night of her confrontation with Chaisi. Now, the rain had long since stopped, and the ground was dry.

’Is it the next night?’ Her phone was long gone; she couldn’t check the date.

Her wallet, however, was still there, tucked into an inner pocket.

’The Black Cube...’

’When I lost consciousness, the Black Cube must have reverted to its initial state, just like most Illusions do when they lose their operator.’

’Once it reverted, Chaisi must have taken it. If my phone hadn’t been washed away, I’d probably have a major news notification from the Nest by now.’

’Does this mean that without Westley, I’m nothing—’

’Don’t think about it.’

’Don’t even think about it.’

Brianna pushed herself up and touched the gunshot wound at her temple.

The snow-white shard that had been embedded in Green’s face was gone, leaving a small, dark hole in its place.

If she wanted to, she could stick a finger inside. It would go deeper and deeper, touching nothing. It was as if the tissue that once formed the face had simply vanished, leaving a deep, bottomless tunnel.

Brianna shuddered and pulled her index finger out.

’What do I do now?’

’Even if I managed to fool Chaisi once by putting makeup on Green’s face and passing myself off as a woman—how could I possibly hide a gunshot wound on my temple and a black hole in my face with cosmetics?’

’Will the flesh in the wound rot?’

’I can probably never see Morando again.’

’Even if it’s Green’s face with the hole, I can’t let Morando see me like this. There has to be a limit to how disgusting I can be. And that girl with Chaisi... I wonder if Morando knows her. She looked—’

"...Who is it?"

A faint voice interrupted Brianna’s blizzard of chaotic thoughts.

She sat there, stunned. For a few seconds, she wondered if she had finally gone mad.

’Then again, after everything I’ve been through, maybe going mad only now means I’m pretty strong-willed.’

’Because... how is this possible?’

"I saw... your finger... Who are you?"

’How could that faint female voice be coming from the hole in my own face?’

’Is it that thing... Han Liuyue?’

’No, the voice sounds different.’

"Wh-who are you?" Brianna asked, her mouth moving to form the words.

She could clearly feel her facial muscles and tongue shifting as they moved, rubbing against the edges of the black tunnel in her face. The pressure made her speech sound slightly slurred.

"Why are you... coming from inside my eye..."

The woman seemed lost in a daze. After a moment, she murmured, "I... My name is Ashley Page. I’m a police officer."